Lady Jane (5 page)

5

The novelty of
actually riding in a carriage cancelled out the terrible discomfort during the first half of Jane’s journey; after that the discomfort made itself more compellingly apparent

Mrs. Hawks had seen to it that they were in the inn yard thirty minutes before the scheduled departure of the London Mail for Maidstone. But Jane hadn’t minded. The stir and bustle of the busy yard, with coaches arriving and departing, passengers milling about, hostlers unhitching teams and leading up fresh ones, provided her with more entertainment than she’d ever experienced. She ran a feminine but inexperienced eye over the various travelling costumes exhibited by the lady passengers, and picked out two that she would like to have had. Her own shabby black pelisse was now covered with a handsome Paisley shawl presented to her by Lady Stanier. Jane had demurred, thinking it much too grand to accept, but Mrs. Hawks told her not to be such a wet goose.

“Mistress would not have give it had she not meant you to have it, and Lord knows she’s well-supplied with shawls, so you’d not be depriving her in any way. Now you just wrap that about your shoulders and be grateful and think no more about it.”

Jane did so, and
was
very grateful for its warmth when she stood waiting in the early morning chill, shivering as much with excitement as with cold, and feeling excessively grand in so fine a garment She was blissfully unaware of the glances cast in her direction, glances of curiosity and speculation on the part of the women, admiration from the men. The women, estimating the cost of the fine Paisley shawl to the last halfpence, wondering where she could have come by it, dressed as she was in a shabby black pelisse and a bonnet that had seen better days, and being such a young girl—and then there were those bruises on the face. The men saw only the sparkling brown eyes, the full red mouth half-open with excitement and curved up in a delicious smile, and the slim figure.

When the Maidstone carriage was announced, Mrs. Hawks elbowed everyone aside in order to put Jane first into the carriage. A stout lady who felt it her privilege to be the first to ascend snorted indignantly, but Mrs. Hawks ignored her completely. She seated Jane by a window and saw that she had all her possessions before standing aside to allow the other passengers to enter. But she didn’t leave. She stood beside the window admonishing Jane on how to conduct herself on the journey until the coachman came from the inn and prepared to mount the box. There were already six passengers inside and four on the top, and one of these being a young boy of about fifteen years, Mrs. Hawks began immediately instructing the coachman that he was not to allow himself to be persuaded to give the reins over to this boy under any circumstances.

“The young lady inside has not been well, and I’ll not have any harum-scarum young scamp with more hair nor wit thinking he can drive fine as five pence and scaring the daylights out o’ my girl, you hear me?”

Mrs. Hawks was well aware of the latest fad among young men of taking over the strings of the coach, after greasing the palm of the coachman, and driving full out to the accompaniment of terrified screams from the passengers. Since these young men had usually had very little experience in driving these heavy coaches there had been many an accident, and she was determined that it should not happen while Jane was aboard. Mrs. Hawks’ heart had been wrung by her first sight of the battered young girl, and every motherly instinct had been roused, so that in spite of the shortness of their acquaintance, she now felt quite possessive about Jane, and treated her in the same way she treated her own daughter. Jane, responding to the first love she had received since the death of her mother, felt the tears begin to rise in her throat as the actual moment of separation came, in spite of the thrill of being in a coach.

When Mrs. Hawks turned back to her after admonishing the coachman, Jane leaned forward through the door and threw her arms about the thick neck and kissed Mrs. Hawks’s cheek fervently. Mrs. Hawks held her close for a moment, then pushed her firmly back into her seat.

“There now,” she said, dashing a rough, red hand across her eyes, “you’ll have me bawling in a minute. You be a good girl and
mind what’s
told you and you’ll be fine. And if you’ve the time, mayhap you could send me a word or two on how you make out.”

“All right—stand back there, missus,” warned the hostler, putting up the step and slamming the carriage door shut. He waved up to the coachman, who flicked his whip expertly over the backs of the horses and the carriage began to move forward. Jane strained forward to wave to the retreating figure of Mrs. Hawks as long as she was in sight. For some moments she was so busy fighting back the tears she was unaware of anything else, but then the glamour of her situation overcame the sadness and she sat back and stared with fascination out the window. She was so grateful for Mrs. Hawks seeing to it that she had this seat and was determined not to give it up under any circumstances. Mrs. Hawks had warned her that the carriage would stop every ten miles or so to bait or to change the horses, at which time the passengers could climb down to stretch their legs and take refreshment, and Jane must make sure not to lose her seat. Jane had decided she wouldn’t need anything to eat or drink before the coach arrived in Maidstone, and if she felt near perishing for want of something, she still would not get down when they stopped and take a chance that someone would beat her back to it and then refuse to give it up. She wanted to see everything there was to see, to experience the whole trip to its fullest. Food she would, she hoped, have every day for the rest of her life, but who knew when her next carriage ride might come along?

She watched eagerly now as the carriage made its way south out of London, revealing sections of the city she’d never seen before, and then finally, to more sparsely settled areas before reaching the open countryside. She was so rapt by all she was seeing out the window she paid no attention to the passengers, until she gradually became aware of a pressure against her leg. Glancing down she saw a thick male thigh, so tightly encased in nankeen pantaloons as to seem in danger of bursting the cloth, pressed firmly against her own.

She pulled her legs as far away as they would go and turned a look of open inquiry at the man next to her. His red face flushed even rosier, and he coughed, looked away, and withdrew his leg, glancing around the carriage covertly to see if this had been observed.

He met the cold, beady glare of the stout lady sitting opposite, who stared him down before transferring her gaze to Jane. Jane met her glance squarely, staring back until the woman sniffed and turned her head away.

Jane glanced at the other passengers now, but found them less interesting than the scenery.

There were four gentlemen, the gimlet-eyed lady, and herself. The perspiring young man with the stout and wandering thigh was the youngest of the men, the others being middle-aged to elderly, and none showed any tendency to friendliness to any of the others. It seemed strange to Jane for six people to be in such uncomfortable, even embarrassingly intimate, contact and yet remain so aloof. The seats were really only meant to hold two people, so there was little the three people squeezed into each one could do to avoid their fellow passengers. Aside from this, the state of some parts of the road caused an almost constant bouncing and jouncing.

When the first halt came, Jane, though she remained in her seat, managed to refresh herself just from the relief of the pressure of another body jolting against her own and from the cessation of all movement They were in a small country town and the sweet early spring air flowed into the open door of the carriage, and she became aware of the unusual quiet around her. She sat in a trance for a moment listening to birds twittering and singing from the hedge.

Everywhere she looked there were trees, all wearing the earliest spring leaves like pale green lace waving in the light breeze and the pale lemony sunlight. The world seemed new-minted as of this very morning; a fresh beginning, to match her own new beginning. I’m startin’ over, she thought, and the world is startin’ with me, and now everythin’ will be different. I shall be happy in the country, I know I shall, and safe! No relative of Lady Stanier could be bad or allow anyone bad to be in her household, so everyone will be kind as they were at Lady Stanier’s, and I shall work very hard and be a great help to the lady and her poor, sick little boy.

While she was thinking these virtuous thoughts the passengers began to enter the carriage again and after a short wait, the coachman emerged from the taproom of the inn and with a great boisterous laugh, clapped the innkeeper on the shoulder and climbed back up to his perch and they were off again.

At the noon stop the stout young man climbed over her legs to step out last and then turned back.

“Forgive me, Miss—er—” he doffed his hat and waited expectantly, but Jane remained silent, “—well, I was only going to say that you really should step down and have a bit of luncheon and stretch your legs.”

She stared at him suspiciously. After the incident of earlier in the journey she had no trust in him anyway, and now it seemed he was trying to lure her out of her window seat No doubt he had been coveting it all along. Well, he’d find she was not such a pea goose to fall for such blandishment

“I’ve no wish for anythin’,” she replied coldly and looked away.

The young man was so taken aback by this rudeness that he stood for a full minute gaping at her before pulling himself together and turning away into the inn.

Jane was not aware of the rudeness. She was protecting herself. After all, the man had dared to be lewd with her in a public conveyance, something she was sure he’d never have tried if she’d been Quality. Since he didn’t pay her wages and had not earned her courtesy by any of his own, she felt no qualms about treating him as an enemy.

In fact, she was beginning to feel that most men were her enemies. Oh, of course there were exceptions, like Mr. Crews, but for the most part her experience with men had been all of one kind: leering looks, grabbing hands, and outright attack. Jane had till now been proud of her precociously blossoming body, and romantic enough to hope that love would come her way someday, and with it the opportunity to explore the sensuality she felt in herself.

But now she felt differently. She envied Lilly, the fat lump of a girl who was a kitchen maid at the Montmorency’s, and Rosey at the Stanier’s who was so painfully thin and chinless. They would never have to suffer the humiliation that had been Jane’s this past week. Of course, neither of them would have dared to try on the mistress’s robe in the first place, but if they had, you could be sure m’lady’s randy young brother wouldn’t have bothered himself to tear it off them! So they would never have found themselves in the streets because of a well-formed figure, and prey to the likes of Leach. Well, she hoped she’d learned her lesson once for all. Any man she had to do with in the future would need to prove himself innocent of lust before he should be her friend.

She looked up from these stormy thoughts to find the young man standing at the steps holding a steaming cup of coffee and a small meat pie in a napkin.

“I took the liberty—er—I thought as you wouldn’t—well, I brought something out to you as you wouldn’t come in. You must have something, you know.”

She looked into the earnest pale blue eyes and seemed to see there an apology, and her own warm heart relented. She smiled warmly and took the food from his hands.

“Very kind of you, I’m sure, sir. That looks tasty, I must say.”

He mopped his round, perspiring face and grinned as he watched her bite eagerly into the pie.

“Tell me Miss—er—”

“Coombes.”

“Miss Coombes—why will you not get out of the carriage?”

“Mrs. Hawks said as how it would be best to stay put, else I might lose my window seat.”

This simple explanation caused him to smile. “I’ll admit it has happened, but no one would be so ungallant as to take the seat a pretty girl expressed her preference for, I assure you.”

“Oh,” was all she said. She finished her pie and drank her coffee and handed the cup back to him with another ‘thank you.’

She would like to have said more to him in a friendlier tone after his kindness and compliment, but was tongue-tied with confusion. She wondered if she’d ever understand folks. Here was this man behavin’ so slylike with her, as he’d never have done if she’d been a lady, then next moment goin’ out of his way to do her a kindness and speakin’ all polite.

Then young master at the Montmorency’s who’d almost surprised her into acquiescence, then grabbed her so bold when she’d tried to escape, and ended by trying to give her a gold coin in a shame-faced sort of way. She thought again of his look when she’d thrown the coin back into his face.

Well, not exactly in his face, she thought with a stifled giggle. But immediately she felt ashamed of herself. Her mam had told her that such a blow as she’d dealt young master was the most painful one a man could have, and Jane had never deliberately hurt anyone before. And certain sure, though he’d deserved it, he was not to be blamed entirely. She could not forget her own voluptuous acceptance of his embrace for the first moments, as though she were hypnotized. He’d been so gentle, and oh! such a pretty lad he was it was little wonder she’d forgotten herself for the moment. She shivered slightly as he remembered the soft kisses on her throat, the hands so-so reverently cupping her breasts—

Pooh! I’m naught but a clunch to sit here moonin’ over a handsome phizz—when he’s no more nor a scarce breeched calfling with not enough gumption to stand up and take his medicine as I had to do, she thought self-righteously. I’ll think no more of him.