April Moon (18 page)

He smiled to himself, picturing some fair creature begging prettily for his mercy, which he, ever gallant, would gladly give. Wide-eyed, she’d lean from the carriage’s window, where the moonlight would find her face, and—

And what?
His imagination stopped abruptly, brought to a halt by a memory as brilliant as the moonlight itself, a memory so shockingly sharp it made him swear aloud.

Another April moon such as this one, ten years ago, his last night home at Atherwall Manor before his journey across the Continent began: he was eighteen again, and Sophie was sixteen, the age
she’d always remain for him. They’d met in their special secret place up the ladder and over the stables, where they knew they’d be alone except for the sleepy horses below.

But still the moonlight had followed, slicing in through the square single window to find the thick golden blond of her hair. Sophie’s hair had always reminded him of a new-mowed shock of hay, straight and shining and resisting her aunt’s efforts to make it curl for fashion’s sake, and she’d smelled like new hay in the sun, too, sweet and wild, with freckles like cinnamon scattered over the bridge of her nose.

She’d promised to be brave and not to cry, and she’d kept her word to the last. But the sadness in her eyes had been inescapable, as if she’d already realized how final their farewell would be, and when they made love one last time, it had seemed to him that every touch of hers, every kiss, had carried a bittersweet tenderness. She’d known then; she’d known. But he, great strapping fool that he’d been, had understood only when it was too late, when she’d sent back his letters unopened, unread, unwanted.

They had been friends, it seemed, since she’d been born, and he’d always expected her to be there with him until he died, and he’d never, ever dreamed instead that she’d end everything so completely the first time fate had separated them.

“Good evening, my lord,” said the butler as he opened the door, his expression swiftly changing to concern as Harry stepped into the light of the night-lantern in the hall. “My lord, are you unwell? Should I fetch—”

“Of course I’m well,” said Harry, striving to recover his earlier bravado. No one could undo the past, least of all the past he’d shared with Sophie Potts, and the sooner he could finally make himself accept that, the better. “Well enough, at any rate. Now come, Hargraves, and hurry. I’ve much to do this night, and precious little time in which to do it.”

“B
ETTER YOU SHOULD
spend the night here, miss,” said Mrs. Lowry, the innkeeper’s sturdy wife, her hands folded over her apron and her broad face wreathed with concern. “It’s not safe to begin such a journey after dark. It’s courting bad luck, miss, plain and simple.”

Deliberately Sophie set the stoneware teacup down on the table. Believing in luck, bad or good, was a luxury she’d never granted to herself. “I thank you for your concern,” she said, “but the moment the wheel on the carriage is mended, I must be on my way.”

But Mrs. Lowry pretended not to hear, instead openly appraising Sophie’s plain travelling dress and gauging her ability to pay. The inn was small and old, with only this single public room, and from the lingering haze of last night’s tobacco to the bare, battered tables, Sophie guessed that most of the Lowrys’ business came from local farmers coming to drink when their day was done, and not from weary travelers staying overnight.

“I won’t charge you much for the night, miss,” said the innkeeper’s wife finally, deciding Sophie was worth her trouble. “You being respectable and all, I could put you in with the widow. She’s small, and won’t take more than her share of the bedstead.”

What a sorry compliment, thought Sophie wryly, that she was now considered such a well-aged spinster at twenty-seven as to be safe company for poor widows! Yet what else would Mrs. Lowry make of her? She was dressed in somber, serviceable clothing, a gray wool gown with a dark blue wool spencer buttoned up close beneath her chin, and her hair was drawn back so tightly under her untrimmed bonnet’s sugar-scoop brim that not a strand of it showed. She looked like an old maid because circumstances had made her one, and she’d long ago abandoned any impractical, impossible dreams of a husband and children of her own.

Yet still she wasn’t so old that she’d forgotten when she’d been regarded as a beauty instead, when gentlemen in the street would turn to watch her when she passed them by, when one handsome young man in particular had called her the loveliest girl in the kingdom, and given her his heart to prove it….

“I am sorry, Mrs. Lowry, but I cannot linger,” Sophie said, her bittersweet smile more for her
memories than the woman before her. “I am expected to arrive as soon as is possible.”

Mrs. Lowry sniffed. “That’s if you arrive at all,” she said darkly. “There’s things that happen out upon the road that no young woman such as yourself should have to suffer.”

“Oh, I’m a practical creature, Mrs. Lowry,” answered Sophie confidently, “and I’m not easily frightened, particularly not by goblins and ghosts hiding in the shadows. I’m accustomed to making do for myself. I’ve come clear from Lincolnshire thus far without mishap, and I expect to reach Winchester the same way.”

But Mrs. Lowry only shook her head. “It’s not the ghosts I’m speaking of, miss. It’s the flesh-and-blood dangers. I cannot speak for Lincolnshire, but this close to London and Portsmouth, things are different. Times are unsettled on account of the French war. There’s all manner of thieving ruffians about on the roads, deserters from the army and those who’ve run from navy ships and the good Lord knows what else. And considering the sorry state of your carriage, miss, why, I’d—”

“
Thank
you, Mrs. Lowry,” said Sophie as firmly as she could, determined not to listen to any more. “I appreciate your interest in my welfare, but my plans remain unchanged.”

Of course her plans wouldn’t change, no matter what Mrs. Lowry urged. How could they? A gov
erness between positions had no say in such arrangements. In the best of circumstances, a governess was little more than an elevated housemaid, expected to obey her employers’ wishes without question. If Sir William, her new master, wanted her to begin her responsibilities as soon as possible, then Sophie would. He had even insisted on sending a hired carriage to fetch her from Iron Hill, her last place in Lincolnshire, to be sure she arrived safely.

Sophie had appreciated his concern, until she’d seen the carriage itself: an ancient, spavined specimen on rickety wheels, and driven by a large, gruff man whose name she still hadn’t caught. The worn springs and patched seat cushions that smelled like nesting cats had been a not-so-subtle indication of how Sir William already regarded his sons’ new governess, as were the second-rate horses that were acquired at each change along the road. When earlier today a spoke on the left lead wheel had cracked on a large rock, Sophie had been startled, but not surprised.

But she
would
cope, and once again make the best of the lot she’d been given. She would not be intimidated by Sir William or his rickety hired carriage, or frightened by the possibility of phantom thieves. She would adapt, and she would persevere, the way she always did. It was one of her greatest strengths, something to take pride in. Every one of
her references praised her for it: “No challenge is ever too great for dear Miss Potts.”

“Please yourself, then, miss,” said Mrs. Lowry, pointedly gathering up Sophie’s empty tea cup without refilling it another time. “Risk your life to oblige your master’s whims. Leastways you’ll have the moon for company, even if your common sense has fled.”

And how much more agreeable company that moon would make than an ill-tempered innkeeper’s wife, thought Sophie wearily as Mrs. Lowry stalked back toward the kitchen. Sophie would take the moon any day, hands down. With a sigh, she pushed the bench back from the table and stood, smoothing her skirts as best she could. After three days of travelling, her clothes were rumpled and wrinkled and filmed with a fine coating of road dust that no amount of brushing seemed able to budge.

But if she and the carriage were spared further accidents, she should reach her destination by tomorrow morning, and with that knowledge to fortify her, she retied the ribbons of her bonnet beneath her chin and resolutely headed for the door.

And gasped out loud.

The moon rising over the roof of the inn’s stable was more like a set piece on the stage, all candlelight and silver foil, than a real feature of the evening sky. As round and silvery bright as a new-minted Spanish dollar, this moon managed to make
the sky itself seem too small to contain it, clamoring for attention from everything grand or small that now basked in the glorious glow of its light.

Only one other time have I seen such a moon. Only one other time, another April night, and that so long ago it could have belonged to another life….

“There you be, miss.” The carriage’s driver tugged on the front of his broad-brimmed felt hat. “Will you be going now?”

Reluctantly Sophie looked away from the moon to the man before her. This was a sizable speech for the driver, but it still left questions unanswered.

“You were able to find an acceptable wheel-wright in this village, then?” she asked briskly. “Is the wheel mended to your satisfaction?”

“It’ll do,” said the man. “Well enough.”

“That is not convincing,” said Sophie. “I’ve no wish to have my neck broken in the middle of the night because of a poorly done repair.”

He shrugged, as if to agree that he wasn’t entirely convinced, either, but what else could be expected?

“Might I see the wheel for myself?” Dealing with uncommunicative boys was a specialty of hers—she was as good at coaxing them to speak as she was at teaching them to write in a fine, gentlemanly hand without blots—and though the driver was far older than any of her charges, she guessed
the same direct approach would apply. “Would you please show me the repair?”

“Aye, miss.” He led her to the gig in the courtyard, a drowsing horse already waiting in the traces. “There it be.”

She leaned over to inspect the wheel, though beyond the newness of the replaced spoke, she hadn’t much notion of what she was inspecting.

“We can stay ’til morning, miss,” said the driver. “On ’count of you not wantin’ to go.”

“But I do.” She rose, brushing her hands together. “If you are satisfied with the wheel, then we shall leave directly.”

The man scowled stubbornly. “It don’t be the wheel, miss.”

Sophie sighed, her impatience growing. “Then what exactly
is
it?”

“That moon,” he said, solemnly pointing up in the sky like some Old Testament prophet. “Strange mischief happens wit’ a moon like that one.”

Strange mischief: was that all it had been with her and Harry beneath that other long-ago moon?

“Moon like that be same as midsummer night,” he continued. “No matter that it be April. The fairy queens and such will be about, no mistake, ready t’ fright the horses.”

“Butter and beans,” declared Sophie soundly, folding her arms over her chest to reinforce the strongest oath she ever used. “My father was a
cleric in the Church of England, and he would have told you that the only place fairies and goblins and other heathen nonsense exist is in an empty head, especially a head made more empty by a full belly of gin below it. Now shall you drive me as you were hired to do, or must I climb up top and take the reins myself?”

Grumbling what was doubtless a great many oaths toward Sophie and her ancestry, the driver finally took his place on his seat and Sophie hers inside, and the gig rolled slowly from the inn’s yard and onto the open road. Once again Sophie settled herself as best she could against the flattened cushions, her sore muscles protesting at resuming the same uncomfortable position as they had these last days.

She drew the carriage robe over her legs against the evening chill, and tucked her hands beneath her arms for good measure. If she hadn’t been so busy arguing with the driver over the fairies and the moonlight, she would have asked at the inn for a jug of hot tea to bring with her, and perhaps a light supper to last her through this final leg of her journey.

Well, she’d be the one to pay now, not the driver, and it would serve her right if a random fairy or two did cross their path this night. She sighed, curling her feet up on the seat beneath the robe, and gazed out at the moon, still rising in the evening
sky. How much her life had changed since that long-ago April full moon, she thought drowsily, and how much she’d changed herself, while Harry—ah, Harry would never change, because he’d never had to.

She couldn’t remember a time when Harry hadn’t been there for her, whether they’d been hunting frogs in the rushes near the pond, or pretending to translate Latin fables while her father dozed in the next room, or climbing the apple trees for the sweetest fruit in the orchard at the manor. He had been her best friend and companion for so long that when they’d finally, awkwardly, blissfully kissed, the summer she’d turned sixteen, it had simply seemed like one more glorious adventure to be shared with Harry.

But her father, his health failing, had seen the peril in such adventure. Sorrowfully he blamed himself for his inattention, and for allowing Sophie to become so familiar with the family at the manor. He understood what Sophie herself was too young to comprehend: that when Harry’s father died, Harry would become the fifth earl of Atherwall, while Sophie would be no more than the penniless daughter of a country cleric, with no fortune or future, especially not with an earl. Sooner or later—more likely sooner—Harry would inevitably leave Sophie and any child she might conceive, and
take as his wife a more suitable girl of his own class.

The bitter, heartbreaking truth of that had hurt, hurt worse than anything Sophie had every imagined. Harry could never be so faithless—to love, to friendship, to her—and she’d tearfully refused to believe such a grim prediction. But she’d been practical even then, hadn’t she? Once her tears were dried, she’d done what was best for everyone. At last she’d listened to her father’s reasoning, and by the time Harry had left for his two years’ tour travelling the Continent, she’d come to see how inevitable their parting must be.

Her father had written to Harry on her behalf, and returned every one of Harry’s letters unopened and unread. Then to put her father’s worries about her future to rest, she’d accepted her first position as a governess. She didn’t doubt that she’d done what was right, even if it never, ever would be fair….

It was the jolt of the sudden stop that woke her, tossing her forward clear off the seat into an inglorious heap of petticoats. Still more asleep than awake, Sophie clumsily struggled upright on the carriage’s floor, shoving her hat back from where it had been knocked across her face. Not another broken wheel, she thought with dismay as she struggled to untangle her legs from her skirts. At this rate they’d never reach Winchester.

But then she heard the stranger’s voice, and froze.

“Keep your hands where I can see them,” he was ordering the driver. His voice sounded muffled, as if he were disguising it behind a scarf or mask. “No foolishness, or you’ll be the one to pay.”

Her heart pounding, Sophie kept low, not wanting to draw attention to herself. Through the window, she could see they were stopped beneath the dark shadows of trees, the branches a black tangle against the night sky. They’d been ambushed by some low sort of thief, trapped like a drowsy chicken by a fox, and her temper flared at the foolish indignity of it. Hadn’t enough happened on this miserable journey without
this?

“You bloody thievin’ coward,” snarled the driver. “You’ve stopped th’ wrong carriage, you have.”

“What, because you’re the brave fellow with the reins?” asked the other man, clearly bemused.

“Nay, because I’ve only th’ one passenger,” said the driver stubbornly, “and she don’t be what a bastard like you wants, not at all.”

The man chuckled, and Sophie’s anger simmered, hot with indignation. Though the thief’s voice seemed purposefully disguised, from his manner and words Sophie was sure he’d been raised a gentleman, accustomed to being obeyed. But what sort of gentleman would have become a highway
man, stopping carriages on the road at night? And what
gentleman
would enjoy distressing a woman travelling alone, laughing at her plight like this one was doing to her this very moment?