by Lucy Gillen
‘Oh no, I’ll take Rusty ! ‘
Her response was unthinking and it was not until John walked back to her and she saw his curiously furrowed brows, that she realised what she had said. He came and stood by the chestnut’s stall, resting one hand
on the dividing screen and looking at her in silence for a moment before he spoke.
‘Anything you say,’ he told her, but made no other move. ‘He’s quiet enough at least.’
‘Yes.’
He still made no move, but stood watching her, and she felt there was a certain tautness in his manner. ‘I get the feeling I’ve missed out somewhere,’ he remarked. ‘Or maybe it’s none of my business.’
It would have been so much easier if she had explained in the first place, Melodie thought; as it was he was bound to suspect her motive for keeping quiet about her ride with Neil. To cover her discomfiture she turned and took the saddle herself and started to put it on the gelding’s broad back, but she had barely started when John took over, his usually sunny face showing the first hint of anger she had ever seen there, then he looked at her and his eyes were narrowed.
‘I guess it’s none of my damned business at that ! he declared forcefully.
It was difficult to explain, and she wished it wasn’t, for there was no reason why she should find it so hard to tell him that she had been for a ride with Neil. Except that she thought of the ride simply as a prelude to what had followed, and that was what made her reticent.
‘There’s really no mystery,’ she said, taking the rein from him and soothing the gelding’s soft nose while she talked. ‘I came up here about a week ago because I suddenly decided I’d like to ride, and—Neil was here, so we went together.’
It sounded so simple and so uneventful, outlined like that, and that was how it should have been. Only the advent of a storm and that fiercely passionate reaction
of Neil’s to her near ducking in the river had turned it into anything other than a perfectly ordinary ride, but it was the unexpected that made it so hard for her to forget the incident.
John’s brown eyes scanned her face for a moment, then he reached out and took the hand that stroked Rusty’s nose, drawing it into his hold for a moment while he spoke. ‘You don’t expect me to say I don’t mind, do you, Melodie?’ he asked, his voice quiet but not quite steady. ‘I do mind, and I mind more that you felt you had to keep quiet about going with him, but as I said, it’s none of my damned business ! ‘
‘John ‘ She looked at him with wide uncertain eyes, finding his reaction difficult to cope with. ‘I didn’t keep quiet about it—not intentionally. I mean, I’d have told you if the opportunity had arisen, but there didn’t seem any point in suddenly announcing the fact that I’d been riding with Neil.’
‘Not even back there at the cottage—when I spoke about how long it had been since you rode last?’
The suggestion that he was accusing her of something was not easy to accept, but she knew that was what he was doing, and she did her best not to resent it. ‘It didn’t seem that important,’ she insisted, and he pursed his lips.
‘Seems to me it was a whole lot more important than it should be from the way you’re reacting.’
‘John, it’s not—’
‘O.K., O.K.!’
He gave her one long look before turning his back to her and walking back along the stable to saddle his own mount, and she watched him with vaguely uneasy eyes while she stroked the gelding’s soft nose absently. It hadn’t been important, she was sure Neil would agree
with that, but it crossed her mind to wonder just how much more resentful John would have been if he had known the full story.
‘Shall we go?’
His sudden question brought her swiftly out of her reverie, and she nodded hasty agreement, leading Rusty out into the yard. Just as Neil had done, he left his own mount to come and help her into the saddle, but before he did so he stood with one hand on at animal’s neck, very close to her and looking down at her steadily with serious brown eyes.
‘I guess I’ll have to watch my step,’ he told her ruefully. ‘I could quite easily fall in love with you, Melodie Came, and I have a feeling I’d be wasting my time.’
‘John
He put a finger over her lips to silence her, then bent to help her up into the saddle. ‘Let’s go,’ he said, ‘before I start saying something I’ll be sorry for.’
She watched him swing himself on to the broad brown back of his horse, and tried not to compare his style with Neil’s, shaking her head firmly to dismiss the comparison. They were two very different men, both in character and appearance, although both had the same kind of rugged attraction. The difference was that John was open and extrovert, while Neil McDowell presented an enigma that she found an increasing need to understand.
Out on the moors again, Melodie felt the same sense of being overwhelmed by her surroundings as always, and she wondered if it would ever be possible to grow tired of such an environment. Riding with John she realised that he was less a part of the countryside than Neil was, but that was only to be expected. Canada
was his country and he probably had the same affinity with that vast continent that Neil did with this ruggedly grand country.
They had ridden so far at a steady walk, but John as well as his mount began to grow restless eventually at the slowness of their pace, and he turned to Melodie with the familiar grin and a hint of challenge in his eyes that she found hard to resist.
‘How about seeing what these critters are made of?’ he asked. `Do you feel up to taking a gallop?’
Melodie had no great enthusiasm for the idea, but neither was she completely averse to it, and it was certain that Rusty would be less soundly outclassed by John’s mount than he had been by the flying black stallion. ‘Why not?’ she said, and he studied her for a moment with a sudden concern.
‘Don’t say so if you’d rather go on at a steady pace,’ he told her. ‘I’d hate anything to happen, Melodie. If you got hurt I’d never forgive myself.’
‘I won’t get hurt.’ She stroked the gelding’s rough coat without looking at John as she spoke. ‘I’m quite capable of taking care of myself, John.’
He leaned across and put his hand over hers for a moment, his expression serious. ‘I hope so, honey—I’d hate it if you got hurt just to prove something.’
‘I won’t.’
‘O.K.’ He gave her one last look, then put his heels to his horse’s flanks and set him off at a gallop, heading for a huge boulder that soared skywards from the turf and heather, some half a mile away. ‘Let’s go!’
To Melodie it seemed the ground was more uneven than she remembered it from that wild gallop through the storm a week ago, but the gelding never once faltered, and-she began to thrill to the speed of their
gallop as her long black hair fluttered out behind her and the wind whipped a bright colour into her cheeks..
John was in the lead by about four yards as they raced the last few yards to the boulder and she had little hope of catching him, although her mount seemed quite willing to try, until a sudden high-pitched whinny of fear startled him into swerving from his course. It took all her skill and strength to pull him up and she saw what happened only from the corner of her eye when the horse ahead stumbled suddenly and fell, rolling over before it lay on its side, its belly heaving with recent exertion, while its rider rolled clear.
‘John ‘
She turned the gelding hastily and slipped from the saddle almost before he stopped moving, kneeling on the turf beside John. He was already raising his head when she knelt down, with a hand to his brow and looking as much annoyed as hurt. He hauled himself, up on to an elbow and pulled a face at her.
‘Of all the lousy luck ! ‘ he declared, and for some reason she could not explain, Melodie felt a sudden surge of anger.
‘It’s worse luck for your horse!’ she told him, and got up from his side to go and look at his horse.
She soothed the glossy br
own coat with a gentle hand and wished she knew enough to recognise an injury when she saw one, for the animal had made no attempt yet to get to its feet again, so she felt sure it must be more seriously hurt than its rider. Then she heard two new sounds at almost the same instant, and felt her heart thud suddenly-hard in her breast.
John swore softly to himself, and the thud of horses’ hooves reached her quite clearly via dip springy turf she knelt on. In the circumstances it had to be Neil, and
the stallion that enabled him to cover the distance between them so rapidly that she had barely time to muse on his timely arrival before he was there beside her.
Nor did it come as any surprise that he gave his immediate attention to the animal rather than its rider, or that he said nothing until he had assured himself that the horse was not too badly hurt. He knelt beside her, almost sweeping her aside, and ran his big gentle hands over the animal’s legs and the glossy flanks with a surety of touch that suggested he knew exactly what he was doing.
His voice murmured quietly all the time he was carrying out his inspection, soothing and reassuring the animal. Melodie got to her feet after a second or two, but still stood beside him, fascinated by his gentleness and unaware that John was watching with a frown.
Only when he was apparently satisfied did Neil get to his feet and looked across to where John sat with his knees hunched before getting stiffly to his feet. He could not be too badly hurt, Melodie felt sure, for he had rolled clear and the heather made a soft fall, but he evidently meant to make the most of his moment.
‘Are you hurt, John?’
The belated inquiry from Neil brought a grimace, and John was running his hands through his hair, a frown suggesting that Neil McDowell was the last person he wanted to see at the moment. ‘I thought you’d never ask!’ he retorted acidly. He came across to them, rubbing a hand over his back and grimacing as he walked. ‘I’m O.K., just bruised a bit—how’s Tarquin?’
Neil gave his attention to the fallen horse once more before he answered, holding the rein lightly in one hand and coaxing the animal to its feet with soft words
and a soothing hand until it stood up. ‘He’s not much more than winded, as near as I can tell at the moment,’ he said, ‘but I’ll need to look at him more thoroughly in the stable.’ He bent once more and ran his hand over the vulnerable fetlocks, then nodded as if satisfied. ‘At least he has nothing broken.’
‘Well, thank God for that at least!’ John’s voice was heavy with sarcasm, and Melodie looked at him in some surprise. ‘I don’t have anything broken either, but I feel like I’ve been thrown out of a window!’
‘John, you’re not hurt are you?’ She felt vaguely guilty suddenly, for both she and Neil, she realised, had given more attention to the well-being of John’s mount than to him. ‘You didn’t say
‘You didn’t ask!’ John interrupted ruefully, and she realised that was true.
She had gone to him, prepared to sympathise, but his statement that his fall was lousy luck had incensed her for some reason she could still not quite explain, and she had left him almost at once to go and look at Tarquin. Neil, she thought, was probably more angry than he appeared at first sight. It showed in the darkness of his grey eyes and the tight look about his mouth.
‘You’re both a lot luckier than you’ve any right to be!’ he said.
John’s usually friendly face was flushed, and he was much less troubled about letting his anger show. He glared at Neil in a way Melodie would not have believed him capable of only days ago. ‘I get the impression that I’m taking the can back for this fall,’ he said, his voice harsh. ‘Dammit, how was I to know the fool horse would tread in a hole?’
Neil still would not allow himself the luxury of losing his temper, Melodie realised as she watched that
stern and uncompromising face from the shadow of her lashes, but his eyes had a steely greyness that brought an involuntary shiver to her. So far he had said nothing to her directly, and she hastened to speak up before a more serious situation developed between the two of them.
‘We—we thought we’d give them their heads for a change,’ she ventured, and Neil turned and looked at her at last.
‘We?’ He asked the single word question so quietly that it was doubtful if John even heard it, and Melodie
flushed.
‘I—agreed,’ she told him. ‘It’s the same thing.’
He seemed unprepared to argue the point, but after a brief steady survey of her flushed face he walked across and picked up the rein of his own mount again while both she and John watched him uneasily. It wasn’t in John’s interests to quarrel with him, no matter how much he felt inclined to and she thought, with sudden insight. that John was not the kind of man to do anything that would jeopardise his own comfort or convenience.
‘Well, what happens now?’ he asked, and Neil shook his head. His hand was on the stallion’s saddle and he prepared to remount, but he still had possession of Tarquin’s rein, and that worried John. He watched him with a curious mixture of suspicion and dislike, but said nothing more.
Safe mounted once more, Neil looked down at the two of them for a moment before he replied. ‘Give me your hand, Melodie ! ‘
‘Hey now, wait a minute!’
John found his voice again, but by then Melodie had obeyed the instruction more by instinct than conscious
reaction, and Neil’s strong fingers were closed around her wrist. ‘Now come away up ! ‘
The grey eyes looked down at her steadily, challengingly, she might almost have said, and she did as he said, letting him use their clasped hands to help her on to the stallion’s broad back pillion-fashion—behind him. She slid her arms around him and felt the hard rapid beat of her heart as she pressed against the warm vigour of his body.
He gave her one brief glance over his shoulder, then looked down at John still standing, helplessly angry, on the ground. ‘Take Rusty, John,’ Neil told him, and countered any protest on John’s part by posing a question. ‘I think Black is better able to carry two than poor old Rusty, do you not agree?’ he asked with deceptive mildness. ‘And Tarquin had best be walked until I’ve had the chance to take a better look at him.’
‘If you say so ! ‘
John complied with very bad grace, and he pulled the patient gelding round quite roughly until he caught Neil’s eye on him, then he frowned and swung himself up into the saddle, a picture of angry resentment. Neil handed him the rein of his erstwhile mount and he took it without a word.
‘I need both hands for this fellow,’ Neil explained, ‘especially with a lady aboard.’
They made a curious little procession as they rode back across the moor, with Neil slightly in front on Black Knight, as was to be expected, and John obliged to slow his pace to a walk because of the riderless horse’s hurt. It was as they neared the house and the cobbled yard that Melodie ventured to speak to Neil about the incident.
Her voice was as low as she could make it and still
be sure he heard what she said, for she did not want John to hear and resent her appealing on his behalf. ‘Please don’t blame John for what happened.’ She put her face close to his, stretching to reach over his shoulder and conscious as she did so of the hard muscles that kept the stallion under control.
Neil half turned his head, his cheek brushing hers and showing her a brief glimpse of his mouth, just touched by a hint of a smile, as if her appeal amused him. ‘I don’t blame John,’ he told her. ‘Whatever gave you the idea I did?’
It was not the answer she expected, and for a moment she was at a loss. ‘I—I don’t know,’ she confessed. ‘Except that you seemed angry.’
Once more he half turned his head. ‘I’m always angry when one of my horses is hurt,’ he informed her, as if she should have known his reason without being told. ‘I care for my animals, Melodie.’
‘More than you do for people!’
The retort was impulsive, and unforgivable, she realised when she felt the
hard body she clung to stiffen in her arms, but his self-control was remarkable. His body was no less taut, but it was quite at variance with the cool and matter-of-fact voice, and she was once more forced to ponder on the complicated character of the man.
‘I find them a lot more reliable than most people.’ He turned the stallion into the stable yard and his hooves dattered on over the cobbles in a way that aroused memories of the last time they had come back from a ride, so that Melodic half expected to see Jessie McKay in the doorway as she had been then. He reached round for her hand to help her down before he dismounted himself, and for a moment she met the steady, unwavering look of the grey eyes head on and at no more than a few inches distance. ‘You find that cynical?’ he asked, and Melodie did not reply at once.
She slid down on to the cobbles and glanced at John just appearing on the far side of the yard. She recalled the story John had told her only that morning, confirming her early suspicions that Neil McDowell had been the victim of an unhappy love affair, and she shook her head.
‘No,’ she denied. ‘I don’t find it cynical.’
She felt very small suddenly now that he stood beside her, looking down in that steady and infinitely disturbing way he had. He was close enough for the fine lines at the corners of his grey eyes to be clearly seen, and she could sense the vigorous tautness of his body, like a tensed spring. Raising her eyes, she looked at him as steadily as she was able, trying to convey to him that she understood his reasons for being the way he was, and the act of meeting his eyes brought a tingling awareness to every nerve in her.
‘I—I understand,’ she said. ‘I understand your reasons perfectly.’
Clearly he found her pronouncement puzzling, for he was frowning. He would quite probably have questioned her meaning, but by then John had joined them and he looked no less resentful and disgruntled—a definite discouragement to further conversation.
‘I will ask you to explain that at some other time,’ Neil murmured, and Melodie wished she had not glanced over her shoulder the way she did, as if she feared John might have heard what he said.