The Last Gamble

by Mary Nichols

  ‘I did no such thing.’ He had got no further than the stable door in his quest for a riding horse, deciding he could not leave her, however much she infuriated him, however many loves she had waiting for her at the end of her journey. At the rate she attracted problems, other people’s as well as her own, she would never reach journey’s end.

  He was torn between his need to get home as soon as possible and wanting to stay and do what he could for her. It was an inclination so strong that to deny it was to deny his inbred sense of chivalry. But there was more to it than that; she held him like a magnet and he could not tear himself away. Yet, if he did not do so, where would it lead? To more heartache, more humiliation? He was gambling with his hard-won peace of mind.

  And now, for his pains, he was saddled with not one but two helpless females and his own homecoming was destined to be delayed still further. ‘If the foolish muckworm hasn’t the ginger to face up to what he has done, it is none of my doing.’

  ‘You are not to speak of Tom like that,’ Dorothy cried. ‘I love him. He is a good kind man…’

  ‘Then where is this good kind man?’

  ‘I do not know.’ She dabbed at her eyes with a lace handkerchief. ‘But it is all my f-fault. I am not usually such a w-watering pot but I could not h-help it and he was so angry with me…’

  ‘You do not seriously think he has abandoned you because you cried?’

  ‘Y-yes. N-no. Oh, I don’t know.’

  ‘Merciful heaven, save me from weeping women. It is bad enough having to watch over one helpless female…’

  ‘Captain, are you by any chance referring to me?’ Helen put in, wishing she had not so readily shown her pleasure at seeing him again. His reference to facing up to what you had done reminded her of her father; the Captain would undoubtedly condemn him out of hand. ‘I am not helpless and I do not need watching over. If you have assumed the mantle of my protector, then it was entirely unnecessary. And you are being cruel to Miss Carstairs who is too upset to defend herself.’

  ‘She doesn’t need to defend herself when she can get other people to do it for her.’

  ‘And why should I not speak up for her?’

  ‘Because you have enough to do looking after yourself. I never met such a one for getting into scrapes.’ The only way he could control the feelings which threatened to run away with him was to keep his sympathy well in check; any sign of weakness and he would be lost.

  ‘And you, sir, are so hard and unfeeling you cannot recognise true distress when it is right under your nose. I fancy you have been too long a soldier. We are not one of your men, to be bullied into submission. I do not know why you came back, if you have nothing helpful to offer. You could have been halfway to wherever you are going by now.’

  Oh, why had she said that? Now he would leave and this time he would not come back. Why did she say one thing when she meant another? She wanted him to stay. So why was she behaving so waspishly? It was no longer a game, it was a clash of minds and hearts, a fierce battle and her only defence was in attack and that made matters worse.

  ‘So I could. Is that what you wish?’

  She could not truthfully say yes and her pride would not allow her to say no. ‘You must please yourself.’

  They were so absorbed in their exchange, they had almost forgotten the cause of it, when Dorothy cried out. ‘There he is!’ and dashed from the room, along the corridor and out into the yard, where Tom had returned and was speaking to one of the ostlers.

  The watchers from the window saw her fling herself into his arms, saw him comforting her, talking gently to her, taking both her hands in his and kissing them one by one.

  ‘Oh, what it is to be in love,’ Duncan said wryly. ‘I think I would sooner have indigestion.’

  ‘Now, Captain, you know you do not mean that,’ Helen said, thankful that she could relinquish responsibility for Dorothy to Tom.

  ‘I am not in the habit of saying things I do not mean.’

  ‘Then you are cynical beyond belief.’

  ‘Perhaps I have reason to be.’ His dark eyes reflected a remembered pain, but she would not allow herself to feel sympathy.

  ‘If you have suffered at someone else’s hands, it is hardly civil of you to belittle other people’s feelings,’ she said, wishing she understood her own. ‘I, for one, am pleased for Miss Carstairs and wish her happy and if you cannot do the same, then you should not have come back. You should have left us to manage.’

  ‘I am not so easy to shake off, Miss Sadler,’ he said. ‘Nor such a scapegrace as to leave any young lady to her fate, however much she might deserve it.’ If he had said it with a smile instead of something approaching a scowl, she might have felt better.

  A few minutes later the young couple returned indoors hand in hand to where Duncan and Helen waited. ‘It’s all right,’ Dorothy said. ‘He hadn’t left me. He just wanted to go away and think about what to do.’

  ‘A trifle late in the day, don’t you think?’ Duncan murmured. ‘The thinking should have been done long ago.’

  Tom ignored the jibe. ‘We have decided to go on to Derby.’

  ‘I have an aunt there,’ Dorothy explained. ‘We will go to her and send word to Papa that we are there, then he will come and fetch me. Aunt Sophia will help us to persuade him to let us marry.’

  ‘Recruit the distaff side to your cause, how very clever,’ Duncan said, laughing.

  Tom coloured but made no comment.

  ‘Oh, I am so happy,’ Dorothy said. ‘I really shan’t mind riding in the coach knowing it is not for long. Papa is sure to bring the carriage.’

  ‘That is a splendid idea,’ Helen said. ‘Derby is not so very far away.’

  ‘In miles, perhaps not,’ Duncan said. ‘In time, it is another matter. The coach is not yet repaired and we shall be kicking our heels here for several hours more. We will be lucky to reach Leicester tonight, let alone Derby.’

  ‘Then I, for one, shall go for a walk,’ Helen said. ‘I need a little exercise.’

  ‘Alone, princess?’ queried Duncan, raising one well-shaped brow, making the scar on his forehead stand out.

  ‘Dorothy and Mr Thurborn will come too, won’t you?’ she appealed to the other girl.

  ‘Of course, but surely the Captain…?’

  ‘That goes without saying,’ Duncan said, with a lopsided grin. ‘I don’t think I dare let Miss Sadler out of my sight.’

  ‘I should think not, either,’ Dorothy said, taking Tom’s arm. ‘Come, Helen. Captain Blair.’

  Duncan chuckled and held out his arm to Helen. ‘Come, princess, let us play chaperone to young love.’

  There was nothing she could do but lay her fingers on his arm and accompany him from the inn and even that small physical contact was giving her shivers.

  ‘I believe there is a very pleasant park nearby,’ Tom said, as they walked. ‘I glimpsed it while I was out earlier.’

  ‘Wistow Hall,’ Duncan said. ‘During the Civil War, its owner, Sir Richard Halford, was host to Charles I before the Battle of Naseby. I believe it belongs to Sir Henry Halford now.’

  ‘Isn’t he one of the Royal physicians?’ Helen asked, and could have bitten off her tongue. She had made up her mind not to mention anything which could connect her with London Society, even if any well-read young lady could have known about it.

  ‘Yes. He treated the late King and I believe the present one. Wellington and Pitt too.’

  ‘Do you think he is at home?’ The last thing she wanted was to meet anyone who might have known her father.

  ‘It is doubtful.’ Detecting the slight concern in her voice he turned to look down at her, but all he could see was the brim of her black bonnet, a wisp of curl and a pert little nose. ‘Are you afraid of meeting him?’

  ‘No, why should I be?’ She laughed a little unsteadily. ‘But I should hate to be accused of trespass.’

  ‘Then we will avoid the gentleman’s residence.’ He pointed to a lane to the left, run
ning through a spinney. ‘This looks a pleasant little byway. Shall we take it and see where it leads?’

  It led, they discovered, to a tiny village with a quaint little church and a handsome manor house. Having admired both, they resumed their walk, turning south along the bank of a river.

  ‘How peaceful it all is,’ Helen said. ‘It is difficult to imagine it was the scene of a great battle.’

  ‘The battle was a little to the south,’ Duncan said. ‘But I can imagine the countryside would have been filled with troops, horses and pikemen, supply wagons and hospital carts being marshalled to their positions, trampling down the crops, taking over farmhouses and buildings.’

  ‘It must have been dreadful for those who lived in their path, whichever side they favoured,’ Helen said.

  ‘War is always terrible,’ he went on. ‘But civil war especially so, neighbour fighting neighbour, brother against brother, son opposing father. I am glad I did not live in those times.’

  ‘Would you have opposed your father?’

  ‘One opposes my father at one’s peril,’ he said, somewhat caustically.

  ‘Oh.’ He was evidently speaking from experience and she wondered just what he had done to displease his father. Had he formed an unsuitable attachment or refused to obey him in some other way? Had he been banished? Was that why he had been so long a soldier? She would have liked to ask him, but knew he would not welcome her questions any more than she wished for his.

  ‘I fought for King and country, Miss Sadler, not in a Civil War,’ he said. ‘Being a second son, it was expected of me.’

  ‘How hard it is always to do what is expected of one,’ she said softly.

  ‘Yes.’ He did not elaborate, leaving her feeling unsatisfied.

  ‘Oh, look!’ Dorothy cried, pointing. ‘The hunt is out.’

  They stood and watched as a band of noisy horseman hallooed after a pack of hounds in full pursuit of a fox, thoughtlessly flattening a carefully ploughed field and tearing down hedges as they jumped them. Helen, watching them, realised that the damage they were doing was minute compared to what an army would cause, but it was bad enough. ‘Tomorrow, some poor labourer will have to plough the field again and mend the hedges,’ she said.

  ‘He will not mind that,’ Duncan said. ‘It is work, after all, and he will be paid.’

  ‘I suppose so, but I abhor wanton destruction, either of crops or animals.’

  ‘Very commendable, but have you ever hunted, Miss Sadler?’

  She paused, casting her mind back to happier times, to visits to their country home near Peterborough, before everything had gone so badly wrong. She had hunted with Papa then. She was considered a good horsewoman and had enjoyed the exhilaration but had always been relieved when the fox escaped, but she could not tell him that. A schoolma’am, which is what he thought her to be, would certainly not have hunted. Unwilling to face the cross-examination if she told the truth, she took refuge, once again, in lying. ‘No.’

  ‘Then you can know nothing of the excitement of the chase.’

  ‘No, but I have eyes to see.’

  ‘What you see, is not what you feel. To feel something, you must experience it.’

  ‘Is that so?’ Had he ever experienced the confusion she was feeling now? She doubted it; he seemed so self-possessed, so iron-hard, and yet she detected a softness he tried hard to disguise.

  ‘Do you ride, Miss Sadler?’ he asked, changing the subject abruptly. ‘I imagine you must have taken a gentle hack in the park.’

  ‘That pastime is for ladies,’ she said, evasively. He was still playing their game of cat and mouse, still probing, and she knew he would counter any reply with more questions. To stave them off, she must divert him. ‘I prefer walking, there is time to see so much more. I used often to walk in Hyde Park.’

  ‘I wonder you found the time,’ he murmured. ‘Being a working girl.’

  ‘I thought Miss Sadler must be a lady’s maid,’ Dorothy put in. ‘But she tells me I was mistaken.’

  ‘Of course you were mistaken,’ Duncan retorted. ‘Can you not tell she is a princess in disguise?’

  ‘No!’ She looked from him to Helen, both of whom were unsmiling, and then laughed. ‘You are gammoning me.’

  ‘Of course he is,’ Helen said. ‘He has a very strange sense of humour.’

  ‘Then if you must earn a living, how do you do it?’ It was Dorothy’s turn to ask questions and these were not so easy to parry. She could hardly snub her.

  ‘I was a companion to an elderly lady, a widow to a wealthy nabob who had made his fortune in India.’ Worse and worse! Not content with being evasive, she was being inventive; until now she would never have believed it possible.

  ‘India?’ queried Duncan, his interest aroused. ‘Who was she? I have been in India, I might be acquainted with the lady.’

  Helen felt the colour flooding her face; being a liar needed more wits and guile than she possessed. ‘I do not think so, she was not much in Society,’ she said lamely.

  ‘What happened? Did you lose your position?’

  ‘No, she died.’ Oh, where was it all going to end? She was falling deeper and deeper into the mire.

  If that was the reason for the mourning, Duncan thought it a little excessive unless the old lady were related. ‘My condolences, Miss Sadler.’

  ‘It must be dreadful being a companion,’ Dorothy said before Helen could find a suitable reply. ‘I should hate it, being at the beck and call of an old lady’s every whim. “Fetch my wrap.” “Read to me.” “Make me a drink.” No time to yourself at all…’

  ‘But Miss Sadler has just said she did have time to walk in the park,’ Duncan said pointedly.

  ‘Carrying the old lady’s parasol, I’ll wager,’ Tom put in. ‘Going at a snail’s pace.’

  ‘She was very good to me,’ Helen said, deciding she may as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. ‘She allowed me two half-days off a week when I could please myself what I did.’

  ‘Goodness me, two half-days!’ Dorothy exclaimed. ‘How fortunate you were. I know someone who is companion to a friend of my mother’s, who has no free time at all. She is a poor little thing with no spirit at all.’

  ‘I should think that spirit is the last trait you would need for that occupation,’ Duncan said, smiling at Helen. Of all things, she was undoubtedly spirited. ‘Would you not agree, Miss Sadler?’

  ‘Not necessarily. If people behave like mice, then they cannot complain if they are treated like mice.’

  ‘But if your bed and board are dependent on doing as you are told…’

  ‘Captain, have you never heard of compromise?’

  ‘Naturally I have. One must tread the tightrope, is that not so, Miss Sadler?’

  The barb went home and she lapsed into silence. How much had he guessed? Did he know she was lying through her teeth and did not even know why? She supposed it must be her pride driving her. Unhappy and disappointed in her father, penniless, having to pretend to be inferior to Dorothy Carstairs, travelling alone to heaven knew where, she had been forced to call on her pride to sustain her. It was all she had left. Pride. And according to her old nanny, that came before a fall.

  How much further could she fall? Were there greater depths? She straightened her back and strode on, so that the others were obliged to quicken their pace, until they came within sight of the inn.

  ‘You have ample time to have a meal before you go,’ the innkeeper said, coming from the back regions as they entered the parlour. ‘The coach is not yet ready and my wife is the best cook in the county. You will fare better here than in Leicester. It will be late by the time you arrive and all that’s left will be scraps.’

  Duncan had a fair idea that the old man had told the wheelwright not to hurry over the repair and at any other time he would have roasted him for it and insisted on haste, but this afternoon had been more enjoyable than he had expected it to be and a good meal in the quiet surroundings of this out of the way inn would
round it off nicely. He was becoming philosophical about the constant delays; it was fate and it was never a sensible policy to kick against fate. He smiled. ‘What do you recommend?’

  ‘The partridge pie is very fine and so is the stew. Finest scotch beef went into that, Captain. There’s oysters too and a roast capon. Syllabub and apple pie to sweeten the taste buds and wine to wash it all down.’

  ‘All of it,’ Tom said heartily. ‘I am hungry as a hunter.’

  Having succeeded in persuading them to stay, the innkeeper set about proving his claim that the cooking was the best in the county, which he did to everyone’s satisfaction. It grew dark while they ate and their host lit the lamps, but they hardly noticed, being absorbed in cheerful conversation. Not until they had all declared they could not eat another thing, did he tell them the coach was ready in the yard with the horses, now nicely rested, back in the traces.

  Duncan insisted on paying the bill, then left them to oversee the stowing of their luggage and speak to the coachman who, with his broken arm still strapped to his chest, was busy inspecting every inch of the equipage.

  ‘How is the guard?’ Duncan asked him.

  ‘Staying here. The doctor said it would be unwise to move him tonight. I’ll call for him on the return journey.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘Middling fair.’

  ‘But not yet able to drive, I’ll wager. I’ll take us on to Leicester, if you like.’

  ‘I was hoping you might offer, Captain, but I’m not travelling inside again, not nohow. And you’d best wear my spare coat; it’ll be cold on the box.’ He dragged a heavy buff benjamin out from under the box and handed it to Duncan. ‘You may as well look like a coachman.’

  Ten minutes later, everyone was back in their seats and Tom, who had purloined the horn from the long basket attached to the side of the guard’s seat, blew a tantivy into the night and Duncan, muffled from neck to heels in the big coat, set the horses in motion.

  Helen half wished she were still on the box, but then decided it could not be so pleasant in the dark with nothing to see of the countryside and unknown obstacles lurking in the shadows. The glimmer of the lamps on each side of the coach illuminated little more than the backs of the wheelers. Driving an unknown team must be ten times more hazardous at night and she did not envy the Captain.