Folly's Reward (10 page)

Meanwhile she heard Hal’s jacket hit the chair, and his boots thump to the floor. She sat on the edge of the bed and unlaced her traveling boots, then debated whether she should remove her stockings. It was beyond all bounds of propriety to be here, sharing a room with a man, even if Bobby was a perfect chaperon, but somehow to have naked feet and legs made it all the worse.

Yet she never slept in her stockings.

So finally she unrolled them, rinsed them at the washstand, and set them neatly to dry above the dresser beside her clothes.

She heard Hal pull off his shirt and toss it after his jacket. In the darkness it glimmered a little, like a ghost. Keeping her back to the dark, masculine shape, now stripping off his trousers, Prudence slipped her capacious nightdress over her head and within its reassuring shelter wriggled out of her shift.

Hal was already between the sheets.

Prudence stood in the dark room and looked at the bed. The most uncomfortable feelings spread through her blood. She had nothing to protect her from ruin but her night rail, and her innocent faith in the dampening presence of a five-year-old boy.

When she awoke, Hal had gone. The steady breath next to her was only Bobby’s. Prudence scrambled out of the bed and into her clothes before Hal could return. She was, thanks to her foolish inability to protect her own purse, entirely in the hands of the mysterious stranger from the beach. It seemed a lifetime ago that she had found him there, washed up like driftwood.

He came back to the room with pork pies for breakfast, and news that the man with the eye-patch had scoured every coaching inn and was watching the main road south to London. It was still barely light.

“Our friend has been liberal with bribes and encouragement to the ostlers. We should not be able to take horses from any inn in town and not have him after us within the hour,” he finished.

“But you have a plan,” Bobby said. “And we shall be safe.”

Prudence had informed the child that they were hiding from someone who was after them. She had not told him why, or that it was serious. For Bobby, the journey was still just a grand game.

“Come,” Hal said. “And you’ll see. I have found a man with a boat.”

They did not take the regular passenger ferry across the Mersey to Birkenhead. Instead, a disreputable-looking fellow in a flat cap rowed them in his little boat up the wide pool of the estuary and into the mouth of the River Weaver. He put them ashore near a cluster of warehouses and docks on the south side of Runcorn.

“Here you are, then, sir,” he said.

Hal counted out some coins. The man pocketed the money, turned his boat, and disappeared into the early morning mist.

“Who on earth was that?”

“Very probably a smuggler,” Hal replied. “And his fees have already dangerously depleted my purse. So from here, angel, I shall work our passage. Would you prefer to travel with coal, salt, limestone, or clay?”

Half an hour later Hal had secured work and a sleeping nook for them both on a narrow boat that was about to set out down the Grand Trunk Canal for the potteries of Stoke-on-Trent. The name of the boat was painted in bright colors at her bow:
The White Lady
. The boatman, whose name—Sam Masters—marched across the panels of the tiny cabin amid a revel of blue and red flowers, was willing to take on an extra hand in trade for board and passage, but he wasn’t too sure about the woman and boy.

“She’s not the mother of that lad,” Sam Masters said suspiciously. “She’s not old enough.”

“Oh, the boy’s mine, from a previous liaison,” Hal replied. “But the lady is my wife.”

The man looked them both up and down.

“I’m a widower with just the one son to help me, and I can use the help, since my usual lad is laid up, but I’m not a fool, sir. We’re godly folk. I’ll not take your strumpet along.”

“Good heavens, the lady and I are married. Here’s the paper to prove it.”

Hal pulled out the marriage lines that they had been given in Gretna Green.

“Then you’re newly-weds?” The boatman’s face creased into smiles. “Canal folk often travel with their wives, sir, and I don’t blame you for wanting to bring your bride along. The little lad can sleep with my Davie, and I’ll find a private spot for you and the lassie, shall I?”

* * *

“My lord.”

The footman bowed over the silver tray that he held out to the marquess. It was the ingratiating manner of the very best London servant, which irritated Lord Belham enough to make him frown darkly at the man and send him scurrying from the room.

Belham glanced once at the cover and tore open the seal. The letter was from Carlisle. The small Lord Dunraven and his governess were being followed successfully.

But who the devil was the young man traveling with Miss Drake?

He was very completely described: black hair, blue eyes, handsome, the high-handed style of a gentleman. Yet the letter contained an extremely unlikely tale to account for the fellow’s presence. According to the neighbors at the Manse, he had been found washed up on the beach.

He was also remarkably proficient with a pistol.

Would that prove awkward or convenient?

The marquess tossed the letter into the fire. Devil take the dowager countess! Lady Dunraven had turned into a mad old witch. He closed his eyes for a moment. By God, she had cost him dearly enough. How tempting was the thought of revenge!

Alas, it was all too late.

There was only one comfort left. The child was traveling south. Thus every day brought him farther away from his thrawn grandmother and closer to his new guardian.

* * *

It would be truly delightful to be floating slowly south through the green spring countryside of England, the round rumps of the tow horses steadily leading the way, if Prudence did not have to pretend that she was married to Hal.

They had indeed been given a private spot.

“Here you are then,” Sam announced. “You can sleep here.”

Their bed was tucked into a space between some bales of cloth at the front of the narrow boat. Part of the cargo cover formed a frail roof to protect them from the elements.

“Thank you, sir,” Hal said, and laughed. “We shall be nestled in cotton like chicks in the nest.”

“Aye, right enough! And, like I said, your little lad can share with my Davie in the cabin.”

Sam’s son, Davie, was about nine years old, yellow-headed and shy, but he grinned at Bobby and promised the little boy a warm welcome. The two children would stay safe in the cabin together.

When they tied up for the night, Prudence tucked Bobby into the older boy’s bed. Her pulse distinctly unsteady, she stayed with him until he fell asleep. The trap had closed. As soon as Davie and Sam came in, she must leave Bobby in the care of these strangers and sleep with Hal.

Yet when she clambered alone to the front of the boat, Hal had disappeared.

She stared up at the stars for a moment, then slipped out of her dress and crawled into the makeshift bed. There was nowhere else. Without leaving the protection of the covers, she wriggled out of her corset and into her nightgown.

Night settled over the canal. Her heart beat hard for a while, but nothing disturbed her. She heard only the quiet lap of water and the gentle hoot of some faraway owl.

She turned over and buried her head in the pillow.

A slight rustle, a draught of cold air.

Prudence jerked awake, then lay rigid. Her pulse pounded as if her heart might burst.

Hal slid in beside her. The bed chilled. But with silent courtesy he turned his back, not touching her.

Almost instantly, his breathing became steady and deep.

She raised a little on one elbow. A small shaft of moonlight caressed the planes of his face. The soft light turned his hair to ink.

He was already asleep, abandoned to dreams, his lips slightly parted.

Very carefully, she touched his hair. It was damp.

Had he been swimming in the canal, in the cold and dark, until exhausted?

Prudence turned away and waited in vain for slumber.

When she awoke in the morning, he was gone.

* * *

A day and a half out of Runcorn, she sat comfortably on a cushion at the back of
The White Lady
, mending one of Bobby’s muslin suits. Sunshine flooded her perch. For the moment, Bobby was playing safely next to her on the tiny deck, building and destroying innumerable castles made from small pieces of clay.

Prudence glanced at Bobby and felt the rush of love and protection that she always did. How could a child be so absorbed in the moment? Bobby seemed to have neither regret about the past, nor fear for the future.

She gazed ahead at the calm water, stretching away between green woods. Davie led the first of the tow horses, which were harnessed in tandem. Sam was teaching Hal the correct feel of the tiller.

The scene felt so safe, beneficent, as if the canal were part of a world where wicked lords could not possibly exist.

She looked around as Hal leaped up.

“Well, Bobby,” he said gaily. “Would you like to learn to ride on the tow horses with Davie? Mr. Masters says you may.”

The child squealed with glee. “Yes! Oh, yes, please!”

“No,” Prudence said. “No. He might fall.”

As if she hadn’t spoken, Hal swung Bobby from the boat. The child crowed with pleasure and raced off after the horses.

Prudence scrambled after him. “No!”

“He must be allowed some freedom,” Hal said, seizing her hand. “Horses are his birthright.”

“No, please!” She wrenched her hand free, but Hal caught it again.

“There’s no danger,” he said. “Please don’t keep him swaddled like a baby. Would you infect him with a fear of shadows? He’s a peer of the realm. One day he must take his place in that world. Meanwhile, he must be allowed to grow up as a gentleman.”

She felt frantic, even though he might be right. “And you know that in your bones,” she said, “because that’s how you grew up?”

“Perhaps. I don’t know.” Something bleak shadowed his eyes for a moment. “But I do know that Bobby must be allowed to run and play and ride, like any other boy. He’ll be in no danger with the tow horses, I promise.”

Sam walked up to them. “Now, then,” he said. “What’s to do?”

“My wife worries for my boy,” Hal said.

“When you have a lad of your own, Mistress Silkiman,” Sam said kindly, “then you may have your say, I should think. But the lad is your husband’s, and his father knows best.”

Prudence bit back her tumult of emotion. There was nothing she could say, so she smiled and nodded.

The boat master turned back to the narrow boat, leaving her alone with Hal.

“You may be correct about this,” she said. “But how dare you take advantage of our masquerade in such an outrageous fashion? Bobby’s safety is my responsibility.”

“I don’t dispute that, but I care for him, too. These horses may be giants, but they’re gentler than kittens, and Davie has a fine understanding with them. Bobby will come to no harm.”

Prudence watched, her heart in her mouth, as Hal tossed the boy onto the second horse’s back. He walked alongside for half an hour, keeping the child safe on his high perch. Bobby laughed and clutched both hands in the harness. When Hal said it was enough, the child ran back to the boat, his face alight.

“I rode the horse,” he shouted. “I rode him all by myself.”

Prudence did not get the chance to talk to Hal privately again that day. She anyway didn’t know whether she wished to soothe her ruffled feelings, or berate him again.

Yet when night finally settled over the canal, she knew that he was swimming out there in the dark, stroke after long stroke, until bone-shattering fatigue forced him from the water.

She lay awake for a long time, listening, but she fell asleep before he came to bed, and woke in the morning after he had already left.

* * *

The next day was overcast and cooler. The day after that, a steady downpour forced Prudence to stay in the cabin, teaching Bobby his letters and numbers.

Yet, whatever the weather, Hal moved like a prince as he worked with Sam at the constant daily tasks: the ongoing repair and cleaning of the boat; the care of the tow horses; the strenuous help to the lockkeepers working the machinery that opened and closed the locks on the canal.

When the sun returned at last, he left his shirt hanging carelessly open at the neck, with the sleeves rolled to the elbow. It revealed far too much firm, masculine flesh for comfort. Jamie’s roughly delivered bruises had already faded from Hal’s skin. Prudence was mortified that she had noticed.

But how could she think of much else, except Hal? She was every minute presented with his physical beauty. He climbed, laughing, about the boat, or leapt carelessly onto the bank, with the ease of an athlete. She had never been so close before to a man going freely about a man’s work—or at least, not a young man with muscles like silk, like Hal’s. Just to see him move was captivating.

The family friends of her childhood and her rough-and-tumble brothers seemed clumsy and homespun in comparison. His hair, now far too long, ran back in a dark mane from his fine-boned face. He seemed always merry, always relaxed.

Whenever they had a moment alone together, he teased her unmercifully. Yet every evening he allowed Prudence to maintain her modesty when she was obliged to crawl into their tiny bed. And every night, he swam until fatigue streamed like water over his face.

But how was she to cope with this intimacy with him, day after day, night after night?

* * *

“Your wife is a shy lass, isn’t she?” Sam asked, jerking his head back over his shoulder to indicate Prudence.

Hal glanced up. He was strapping down a loose cord near the front of the narrow boat. Sam had left the tiller for a moment and come climbing up over the cargo to talk to him.

“Is she?”

Prudence was sitting sewing, her pale head bare to the sunlight. She bent gracefully over the mending and laughed at something Bobby said. A knot of fine hair framed her nape. Loose tendrils tickled at the strip of naked flesh above her collar.