“I am utterly lost,” Damaris confessed as Alec looked up and down the road. “Have you any idea where we are?”
“The sun hasn’t reached the middle of the sky yet, so that way must be east. Unless I am mistaken, Little Fornton is that direction.” He pointed vaguely to his right. “I think this road might run parallel to the one by the inn. I’d say, let’s go this way.”
After a few minutes of walking, they heard the distinct sound of someone whistling merrily. Hastily, they crossed to the other side of the road and took shelter behind a stand of flowering bushes. Soon a cart come trundling into sight, drawn by a pair of oxen, and a sturdy country lad walked beside them, directing the pair. Damaris relaxed and looked at Alec.
“What shall we do?”
“I suspect that, for a few shillings, that lad would be happy to let us ride on top of his turnips. The cart appears only halffilled.”
“But if those men should happen down the road…”
“Yes, we would be quite exposed.” He hesitated, looking down at her. “I’d take my chances in a fight with them…”
“I am sure you would,” Damaris murmured.
He slanted a quelling glance at her and continued, “However, I cannot in good conscience expose you to further danger.”
“The danger is because of me,” Damaris reminded him. “I am the one who has exposed you to it. And if I remember correctly, I managed to hold my own in that fight.”
The corners of his eyes crinkled. “So you did. You have your hatpin at the ready?”
Damaris reached up to touch the side of her bonnet, into which she had slid the long pin for safekeeping. Alec chuckled.
“Very well, then. I say we ask the young man for a ride. We’ll not get very far on foot.”
As Alec had predicted, the youngster, though startled to see two people emerging at the side of the road, was happy enough to earn a bit of money to let them ride on the cart. Alec handed her up with all the elegance of a gentleman assisting a lady into the finest carriage, and they settled down in one corner.
“It’s a good deal too bad I lost my hat,” Alec commented, sliding a sideways glance at Damaris, who let out an unladylike snort of laughter. “You may laugh,” he told her sternly, “but my smock is simply not the same without it.”
“No doubt. Still, I think it was a disguise well lost. You were not—how shall I say this?—entirely believable in the role.”
“I thought I made an excellent farmer,” Alec retorted loftily.
Damaris rolled her eyes. “Oh, indeed. I am sure that no one noticed the set of your chin or the way you look just so…” She tilted her head up and cast a supercilious look down her nose.
Alec’s brows vaulted up and he lifted his chin in much the same gesture Damaris had just employed. “I beg your pardon.”
Damaris burst into laughter, and Alec’s eyes glinted with humor.
“It has been a refreshing journey, really,” he went on in the same vein. “An invigorating tramp through the woods, a relaxing ride down a country lane…”
“Don’t forget the jaunt through town on a stranger’s horse this morning.”
“True.”
“And we have met so many interesting people.”
“Indeed,” Alec agreed, adding judiciously, “It makes me appreciate how dull my life was before I met you.” Alec picked up her hand and laced his fingers through hers.
Damaris looked down at his long, aristocratic fingers tangled with hers and said in a suddenly sober voice, “I am very grateful to you, you know.”
He made a quick gesture of denial. “No, really… I assure you…”
“No, do not think you can slip out of receiving my thanks.” Damaris clasped his hand firmly and placed her other hand on his as well, holding it to her chest and looking at him earnestly.
“Dear lady, I would not dream of taking my hand from where it rests.”
Damaris grimaced. “And I will not allow you to quip your way out of my gratitude, either. I hate to think what would have happened if you had not ridden after me. Even though I had refused your help, you came to my aid. I have not always… thought the best of noblemen, shall we say? But you have truly been a gentleman. I—” She faced him squarely, her blue eyes looking deep into his. “However much I may tease you, I admire you.”
She felt his skin flare with heat beneath her fingers, and his eyes were almost silver in the sunlight. “Damaris.” His voice was husky. “Your teasing is a source of infinite pleasure to me.” He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. His breath was warm on her skin, sending feathery ripples through her.
“Now, here,” he went on, reaching out to untie the ribbons of her simple bonnet and remove it. He pulled her to him, settling her into the crook of his arm, her head on his shoulder. “’Twill be a long way to town, I am sure. You get some rest. I will keep watch for marauders.”
Smiling, Damaris nestled against him, and, lulled by the steady beat of his heart beneath her ear, she dozed off. It was a long time later that she came awake, roused by the peal of church bells. She sat up and glanced around. They were rolling into another town.
“Welcome to Dartford, wife,” Alec said cheerfully.
“Dartford?” Damaris repeated, anxiety rising in her. “We are back on the road to Dover?”
“We will cross it,” Alec agreed. “So we must keep an eye out for our friends. But young Ned tells me that public stages stop here at the White Bull, where he will so kindly let us off, and I intend to find one going in an entirely different direction.”
As they rattled through the streets of the town, Alec pulled his jacket from the sack and put it on, and wrapped his neckcloth around his neck, securing it with the ruby tie pin. “No doubt I look a thorough sloven in these clothes, but I fear the farmer’s smock would only make me more recognizable to those men, now that they saw us in Little Fornton.”
Damaris looked at him critically. Mrs. Putnam had done her best to clean his clothes, but it was clear that they had seen better days, being rather rumpled and stained, with a tear on one sleeve that Mrs. Putnam had carefully darned. “Perhaps you look a mite… purse-pinched.”
“Delightful. So I shall only appear in the basket—better, I suppose, than appearing to be foxed.”
“Of course your ruby pin is at odds with the look.”
“No doubt everyone will assume it’s paste.” He flashed a quick grin at her.
The cart boy let them out in front of the inn’s courtyard, and they found that they were in luck, for a stagecoach sat in the courtyard, its team being changed out by the ostlers. A few questions to one of the ostlers won them the information that it would be departing as soon as the driver and guard had finished their meals.
“But it is going to Gravesend,” Damaris whispered as they walked into the inn. “Not London.”
Alec kept his watchful gaze on everything around them as he answered, “Yes. However, it is leaving immediately, which at the moment I find more appealing than any destination. Besides, I have something in mind.”
A comprehensive look around the public room apparently convinced Alec that the place held no dangers for them, and he turned to Damaris. “Sit here and keep your eyes open. I shall purchase our seats on the stage.” He paused, looking vaguely uncomfortable. “Ah, it seems that—I fear that I am about to run out of coins.” He raised his hand to his tie pin, looking thoughtful. “There is scarcely time to find a place to sell this.”
“Don’t be silly. There is no need. I have money in my reticule.” Damaris pulled out a few paper notes and thrust them into his hand.
Looking somewhat reluctant, he took the bills and walked away. Damaris slipped into the nearest chair. A large woman in a purple bonnet was sitting at the table next to her, watching her with interest. She nodded cheerfully at Damaris and said in a confidential tone, “My man was allus the same way—money ran through his fingers. I had to keep it for him.”
“Oh. Yes, well. He has, um, experienced some losses.”
“I knew it.” The woman nodded again. “Are you taking the stage, then? I’m visiting my sister Meg. Expecting again, so I’m to take care of them. My Hal, he said she didn’t need me, but he don’t know Meg like I do. Fourth little one.”
“Oh. My.” Damaris was somewhat overcome by the woman’s spate of words and unsure how she was supposed to respond.
Apparently no response was necessary, as the woman swept on, “I’m Ethel Sanders, by the by.”
She looked expectantly at Damaris, and Damaris fumbled for an answer, “Oh, um, Mrs. Powell.”
“Pleased to meet you.” The woman moved on. “Was it gambling?”
“Excuse me?” Damaris stared at her blankly.
“That made him fall on hard times.” Mrs. Sanders jerked her head in the general direction of Alec. “Was it gambling? It’s allus what gets them, isn’t it—the gentlemen, I mean. And he looks like a gentleman. You can allus tell a gentleman by his hands, I say.”
She rattled on, and since Damaris realized that the woman needed little response to continue, she soon gave up trying to follow the jumps and starts of her new companion’s conversation, making do with a smile or a nod or a “Really?” every now and then.
“My dear.” Alec reappeared at her side, and Damaris realized, with a guilty start, that she had not been paying attention to the people around them.
“Oh. Yes.” Damaris sprang to her feet. “Is it time to go?”
“You’ve time yet,” Mrs. Sanders assured her. “They haven’t even blown the horn. Not used to traveling the stage, are you?” She turned to Alec. “Good thing you came to your senses.”
“I beg your pardon?” Alec’s brows rose slightly, and his voice was tinged with frost.
“You’ve a fine wife; it’s not worth throwing it all away in gambling dens.”
“My good woman—” Alec began, ending with a small grunt of pain as Damaris brought her foot down on his. He turned to her, frowning. “What—”
“Mrs. Sanders was just saying that she could tell you were, you know, experiencing financial difficulties. That is why we have to take the stage.”
His eyes widened slightly, but he said only, “Yes. I see. Well. Um.”
“No need to be embarrassed,” Mrs. Sanders said grandly. “Some are good with their coins and some aren’t. Just let the missus take care of it, and you stay away from the cards, and you’ll be back on your legs in no time, I’ll warrant.”
A horn sounded loudly in the courtyard, and Mrs. Sanders stood up. As they followed her out of the inn to the coach, Alec leaned down and murmured, “Did you have to tell her I had gambled away my money? Couldn’t I have been a poor but honest clergyman?”
Damaris giggled. “I didn’t tell her anything. I cannot help it if you have that dissipated look about you. Oh, and you are Mr. Powell.”
“Mr. Pow—oh, very well. I shall simply keep my mouth shut.”
“In that regard, I can assure you that you will have no choice.”
The coach was nearly full, and Damaris had to swallow a smile at seeing the Earl of Rawdon squeezed into a seat between a sour-faced old man and their new friend Mrs. Sanders, who proceeded to regale Alec with her story of going to help her poor younger sister, though her delicacy of mind prompted her to leave out so many details of her sister’s condition and to use so many euphemisms that it was difficult to understand precisely what she was talking about. But the confused expression in Alec’s eyes was soon replaced by a glazed one that lasted the rest of the way to their destination.
The trip seemed unending, and though Damaris’s nerves were stretched, fearing that at any moment their pursuers were going to stop the carriage and find them inside, the ride was also profoundly boring and uncomfortable. The seat was hard, she could not even talk to Alec, and the swaying of the big, clumsy coach made her slightly ill.
It had turned dark by the time they reached Gravesend. Damaris was glad to climb down; though they had stopped once to change horses and she had been able to get down and stretch her cramped muscles, she was once again quite stiff. She emerged rather cautiously from the carriage, glancing about as she took Alec’s hand.
The courtyard was lit only by the ostler’s lantern, leaving the corners darkly shadowed. She told herself that it was most unlikely that the men who had chased her would be here. How could they have known she would come here? Anyone would logically assume she was headed for Maidstone
or Dover. Still, she could not help but feel a little tingle of dread up her spine.
She had been afraid that they would not be able to get away from their newfound friend Mrs. Sanders, but luckily the woman turned her attention to getting her bags, which had been stored in the rope “basket” on the back of the carriage, and Alec and Damaris were able to slip out of the inn yard unnoticed.
There was still money in Damaris’s reticule, though it was dwindling, and Alec used it to get them a place at an inn that looked more respectable than some of the others they had passed. Weary as she was, Damaris followed Rawdon up the stairs, scarcely taking notice of their surroundings. It wasn’t until he had closed the door behind them and Damaris had dropped down onto the settee by the fireplace that she took a comprehensive look around and realized, with a sudden sizzle of nerves, that once again they were sharing a bedroom.