Beyond the Fortuneteller's Tent

by Kristy Tate

  “Walk through the field? With the cows?” Petra smiled because he looked so much like Kyle when he’d been told he had to drive his Uncle Billy’s Oldsmobile to school because his Volvo needed an oil change.

  She pulled her lips down, attempting to look serious. “Well, they won’t hurt us, will they?”

  “They’re filthy.”

  “But slow, right?” She didn’t know anything about cows, but the ones on the cheese commercials always seemed good-natured.

  The pink dominated Fritz’s face. Sweat ran down his forehead and he pulled at his collar. He’s hiding something, Petra thought. But why?

  Chapter Fourteen

  A bull is different from cows:

  A bull is much more muscular, has larger hooves, a very strong neck, and a big, bony head.

  A bull is taller and weighs a lot more.

  A bull becomes fertile at about seven months of age.

  A bull is nothing like the California happy cows in the TV commercials.

  —Petra’s notes

  Fritz answered by pulling down a basket from the driver’s perch. The warm smell of fresh baked bread escaped from beneath the check cloth covering the basket and wafted her way.

  Mary, you sly match-making dog, Petra thought.

  “Sir, if you and my lady wish to retire in the shade of the tree,” Fritz said, his words stiff, as if rehearsed. “I will fix the axle and return herewith.” He pulled a quilt from his perch and tucked it over his arm.

  Herewith? The blanket suggested a stay overnight. Petra glanced at the cloudless sky, grateful for the sun and warm breeze. “My lord, we can walk,” she insisted.

  “No!” Fritz said at the same time Garret bellowed, “We will not!”

  Petra rolled her eyes, annoyed, but then her annoyance turned to distrust. “Wait. If I stay here, with you, doesn’t that…I mean, couldn’t that…” she searched her memory. In Laurel’s Regency romance novels, there were complicated rules of etiquette and if any were breached a marriage always seemed to be the punishment. Alcoves, terraces, and bed chambers were off limits, of course, but what about a tree in the middle of nowhere? Garret, as the son of an Earl, would be expected to uphold certain standards, but what were those standards? “If we stay too long together, alone, wouldn’t that be bad for my reputation?”

  Fritz blinked rapidly, his lips forming words he didn’t say. Petra watched him through lowered eyelids. What was it with these people? Fritz, Mary, why were they so anxious for her to hook up with Garret?

  “I will walk.” Petra announced, scrambling out of the carriage. Her skirts caught on the door jamb, pulling her dress up around her thighs. She yanked them free.

  Garret stared at her legs with an open mouth. “Alone?”

  “Yes, alone.” Petra swept a disgusted gaze over him as she righted her skirts and headed for the split-rail fence.

  “My lady, I beg of you,” Fritz began. “I’ll return shortly, you have my oath, but if you’re in the field, I won’t be able to find you.”

  “We could have been halfway home by now,” Petra said over her shoulder. She pulled up her skirts to climb over the fence. Behind her, she heard gasps.

  A hand on her arm stopped her mid climb. “My lady,” Garret said. “Please, I know another way. We will be home within an hour.”

  The panicked expression on Fritz’s face had eased, the pink had left his cheeks and returned to his neck.

  “We’ll have to go through the woods,” Garret said in a tone that sounded like, we’ll have to go through hell.

  They walked silently up the hill beneath sun dappled trees. Garret matched his long stride to Petra’s shorter one and she was glad for his quiet, if hostile company. Although she’d ridden to church in the carriage, supposedly on this same road, nothing looked familiar. They could have been transported to Italy for all she knew. “You do know where we are, right?”

  “We aren’t far from the village,” Garret told her.

  From a distance, the church bells began to toll long and low and Petra wondered why. It felt bizarre to be walking through the countryside with a strange man in a foreign place while church bells rang an ominous rhythm.

  They rounded a corner and came face to face with a monster. Not literally a monster, maybe, but definitely monster-like compared to any creature Petra had ever seen up close and for real. Her mind said bull, but her gut said wooly mammoth. His horns glistened in the midday sun. Leaves of grass poked out of his mouth and twitched as he chewed. Standing three feet away in the middle of the road he seemed larger than any of his family members, distant brown menaces in a field.

  Garret took a step backward and put a protective arm in front of Petra. “Let’s hope he has already eaten his supper,” he said softly.

  The creature snorted, as if to say that he preferred humans to grass.

  ***

  Emory squinted through the dust motes that filled the tiny wooden structure’s air and counted the powder kegs. Sunlight peeked through broken, gaping slats. Spiders spun in the corners and hay, like a golden mountain, covered nine kegs. The gun powder was easily enough ammunition to blow a wing off Hampton court, destroy the translations, the translators and a few members of the king’s court as well.

  “My life for tinder and flame,” Anne said.

  Emory glanced at her. Her fever-bright eyes told him that she was only partly jesting. “Come,” he said, putting a hand on her shoulder to draw her away. “We are halfway home. It is almost done.”

  Anne refused to budge. “But it tempts me so. We should set it now. Imagine the flames.”

  Emory, who had his own fearful memories of fire and flame, took her hand and pulled her down a cart path. “If we act too soon, they will have time to recover. The distribution is key. Until then, we cannot risk disclosure, nor can we endanger you.”

  “I have no fear of them,” Anne said, shuffling and kicking up small dust devils.

  “You should,” Emory told her. “I fear for you.”

  “Because I am a gentle woman? Because you believe I should keep my concerns to home and hearth? But who is to say that the word of God isn’t a womanly concern?”

  “Chambers and his lot are dangerous, Anne. As you well know, this is not a game.”

  “Why have you no fear for yourself? Or for Rohan?” Anne asked. “Rohan is not in his youth; he should be safely tucked into a monastery tending herbs and perfecting Latin.”

  Hearing voices, Emory stopped and placed his hand on Anne’s back.

  Anne also heard the raised voices and whispered, “Tis the Sabbath. Have they no care?”

  Emory slid his gaze toward her, smiling at her hypocrisy and indignation. “Hush, perhaps it is our zealots,” he murmured. Then he recognized the voices. Slowing, he crested a small hill and saw Petra, Falstaff carrying what appeared to be a picnic basket, and a bull standing in the middle of the road.

  Petra waved a large stick in front of the bull’s nose, but the animal didn’t seem even mildly threatened. Further down the road was the carriage, lilting to one side with a wheel lying alongside of it.

  Watching Falstaff and Petra battling the bull, Emory fought a wave of unreasonable irritation. “It would appear your would-be suitor is seeking another’s favor.”

  “He is not my suitor,” Anne said through gritted teeth. She dropped her hand and turned away.

  “Not for lack of effort,” Emory said. His heart thumped, suddenly off rhythm, when Falstaff pulled Petra against his back.

  “I’m glad he’s turned his attentions elsewhere,” Anne said, lifting her chin and sounding small and young.

  Then Emory realized that he was responsible for the roaming bull. “Did you close the gate?” he whispered to Anne.

  She leaned toward him. “A manly chore, much too difficult for a gentlewoman such as myself.”

  Emory’s lips twitched. “We must help them.”

  Anne shielded her eyes from the sun. “They are as helpless as children.” She said it cas
ually, fondly even, but Emory heard a steely note in her voice.

  Emory knew he had to take Anne home. He had only brought her because she had refused to tell him the information, Rohan’s information, unless he’d let her join him. He should have left her in the churchyard and found Rohan himself, but Rohan had been speaking with Petra and he would rather compromise Anne than face Petra.

  A bad decision and here he faced another decision. Turn away from Petra, Falstaff and the bull? Before he drew Anne away and bypassed the trio, he heard distant horse hooves. It might be anyone, he thought, but the chill down his spine warned him it was Chambers or his men.

  It seemed Petra was not to be avoided.

  Chapter Fifteen

  King James authorized the Church of England’s translation of the Bible in 1604. He appointed 47 clergymen who completed their task in 1611. Many factions of the church disapproved of the availability of the Bible to the common man.

  —Petra’s notes

  “He sounds unfriendly,” Garret said.

  The bull snorted, pawed the ground and made guttural noises in the back of his throat, but another noise caught Petra’s attention. She looked around Garret’s back to watch Emory and Anne at the fence.

  “And what is friendlier than a Sunday afternoon picnic?” Emory said, stepping onto the road, before helping Anne over the sty. “May we join you?”

  “Emory, can you not see they are already dealing with one uninvited guest?” Anne smiled but her eyes were calculating. She shook out her skirts; the hem was dirty and smudged.

  In a world where it seemed very few of the opposite sex were on a first name basis, why did Anne get to call him Emory? Why did they get to wander through pastures together when she and Garret had to watch their toes for fear of being punished by marriage?

  She looked to see if Garret shared her thoughts, but his attention was firmly focused on the bull. Petra’s gaze flew from Emory to Anne and back to the bull, who, snorting and pawing, refused to be ignored.

  Emory undid his belt buckle and fashioned a lasso. Petra’s heartbeat accelerated as Emory looped his belt over the monster’s horns. The bull fought, but Emory, avoiding horns, teeth and hooves pulled the creature behind the fence. Anne locked the gate and Emory vaulted to safety.

  The entire episode had taken less than a minute. With his nose to the ground and grass sticking from his mouth, the bull seemed happy enough.

  Petra wondered how long she and Garret had faced off with the bull. Maybe it’d only been minutes, but it had seemed like forever. How long would they have stayed there, trying to out-stare the bull if Emory hadn’t shown up? She felt a smidgeon of reluctant gratitude.

  “Well done, sir,” Garret said. He glanced at the basket and quilt, as if he’d forgotten their existence. Gathering his resolve, he turned to Anne and said, “Let us retire to the shade of the oak and share some wine.” It was a statement, but Garret made it sounded like a question.

  Anne clapped her hands and said, “Splendid idea.” All smiles and giddiness, Anne rang false.

  “Splendid,” Petra muttered. She stood apart, watching Garret spread the blanket over the spotty grass and buttercups. Anne settled on the quilt and drew her skirts over her tiny shoes. Garret drew bread, cloth wrapped cheese, apples and a pair of tin goblets from the basket and set them in front of Anne with a shy smile and a flourish.

  “It appears a luncheon made for two,” Anne said, cocking her head and smiling at him.

  “Tis plenty for all,” Garret said, a flush staining his cheeks, “especially for you.”

  Petra scowled, watching Garret fawn over Anne. Why had Emory and Anne both turned on their charm? What were they doing on this deserted road? Didn’t Garret even wonder? What did he see in her? Why was he so into her? And was that hay on the hem of Anne’s skirt? Beyond the hill stood some sort of a barn, had Emory and Anne been in the barn? Where were the etiquette police when they were needed?

  Not that she wanted to force Anne and Emory into marriage.

  “Are you not joining us, Miss Petra?” Anne said, sweetly.

  Emory, who’d been looking over her shoulder turned to smile at Petra’s left ear. He didn’t meet her gaze. She turned to see what he’d been watching. In the far distance, two men on horseback approached the barn. If they came closer, they would have to square off with the bull. She faced Emory and wondered if his sudden save the bull act had anything to do with the men on horses. Were Emory and Anne hiding from them?

  A flicker in the back of Petra’s mind told her that something more than hunger had brought Emory and Anne to their bull rescue.

  “Please, Miss Petra,” Garret said, motioning toward the quilt. “As gentlemen, we must remain standing until you sit.”

  “Or, should we defy convention, we risk of getting cricks in our necks conversing,” Emory picked up the wine bottle and studied its markings.

  “You must sit down, dear,” Anne cooed. “The heat and the excitement of encountering the bull must have frightened you and you wouldn’t want to cause yourself further harm.”

  Petra opened her mouth and then shut it quickly. She wanted to cause serious harm. The two men smiled at her. At that moment, she hated them all, but not knowing what else to do or where to go, she sat.

  Garret sliced the apples with a knife that looked capable of taking down the bull. He laid cloth napkins before Petra and Anne and then placed thin apple slices on the cloth.

  “Miss Petra, you employ the most interesting turns of phrases,” Anne said, picking up an apple slice. “They are charmingly original to my ear.”

  “Yes,” Emory agreed, accepting a slice of cheese from Garret. “Just last night I heard her say shuck you and I’ve been baffled ever since.”

  “Oh, I think you know what that means,” Petra said, frowning at the apple slices. One had a brown spot, like a worm hole.

  Garret looked at their faces. “I was not aware that the two of you had met before.”

  “Briefly,” Petra said.

  Emory flinched beneath Garret’s gaze.

  “Then perchance you can settle the mystery of Lady Baron’s sudden arrival,” Garret said.

  “I am afraid not,” Emory said. “Lady Baron is as much a mystery to me as to you.”

  “But if as you say, you met last night -- ” Garret pressed.

  “Tell us about your village,” Anne said, smiling, but definitely interrupting. “Maybe something you say will ring true.”

  Ring true? As if she was lying? Of course she was lying. She couldn’t very well tell the truth, no one would believe her. This was one of those instances where honesty was the worst policy.

  “Yes, tell us more of your village, my lady,” Emory said.

  Petra took a deep breath. “Well, in Royal Oaks, if a gentlemen is nice one day, he’d also be nice the next.”

  Garret looked at Emory and Anne. “Nicety surely knows no geography,” he said.

  “You’re kindness doesn’t,” Petra said, smiling into his eyes.

  Garrett poured the wine into a goblet and set it in front of Petra.

  She shook her head. “I don’t drink, especially if there’s a possibility of a sleeping potion.”

  Anne had the grace to blush.

  “Suspicion, a malady, I’m afraid,” Emory murmured, taking the goblet in front of her. “May I?”

  Petra looked over his shoulder and watched horsemen at the shed. She was sure Emory was playing some sort of game and she didn’t know the rules, was perhaps, even incapable of learning how to play. She didn’t understand any of them. She felt like Alice at the Mad Hatter’s tea party.

  She stood, determined to not stay another minute. She didn’t need funky mushrooms or drugged cakes to help her get away.

  The men, surprised, slowly, reluctantly, climbed to their feet.

  She nodded stiffly. “Goodbye.” She knew she was ruining their party, but she didn’t care. Anything seemed better than this. Emory made her feel like he was a cat and she was mo
use.

  Anne and Garret made her feel in the way.

  ***

  Emory felt sick as he watched Petra leave. He’d caused her pain. Guilt settled across his shoulders. He tried to shake it off, tried to engage in Anne’s and Falstaff’s conversation, but he kept watching Petra, small and sad, walk away.

  Anne laughed, and he supposed it shouldn’t surprise him, but it did. He stared at his friend. The anger, where had it gone? What had Falstaff said to make her forget her vengeance for her brother’s death?

  Falstaff leaned forward. To Emory’s amazement, Anne also leaned in. They were practically nose to nose. She looked…mesmerized. Laughter in her eyes, pink staining her cheeks, Emory couldn’t watch. It was too intimate.

  “Excuse me,” Emory said, quickly standing and brushing off his breeches. He cleared his throat and started again. “I’ll walk Miss Baron to the manor.”

  Falstaff and Anne had their eyes locked on each other.

  “Would you like us to accompany you?” Falstaff asked without breaking eye contact with Anne. He spoke like at school, saying something he knew that he should, but didn’t mean.

  Emory wondered what Falstaff would do if he said yes. Emory considered accepting Falstaff’s offer, just to see what would happen. But Garret and Anne, caught in their trance, captivated by one another, were unpleasant company. “Thank you, no. I’ll be off.”

  Anne didn’t look up when he left.

  Emory sped to catch up to Petra. He’d never known a lady who walked so fast. With her skirts clutched in her hands, she was near as brisk as many a man. Although, she looked nothing like a man. With her chin up she looked like an avenging angel.

  Once he caught up with her, he wished he’d taken more time, because now, a few strides away, he didn’t know what to say.

  “If I’ve given cause for grief, I apologize,” Emory addressed Petra’s back.

  She started to turn toward him, but then caught herself and poked her chin an inch higher, revealing her soft white throat. He waited for her to speak, but she didn’t.