Miss Antiqua's Adventure (9 page)

“How was I to know ’twasn’t some dead body alyin’ across the road?” Lucy said in her own defense.

“Oh, do try to be sensible,” Antiqua returned in exasperation.

“Very well, Miss, I shall be!” So saying, Lucy stalked to the side of the road and sat upon the embankment, disregarding the wet mixture of grass and dirt staining her cloak. “’Tis sensible to rest, for I’m fair worn out and my feet hurt.”

All argument against this scheme died unspoken, for Antiqua suddenly acknowledged she also was incredibly weary. She sank down beside Lucy and for a time the two remained still, as if gathering in every possible ounce of energy.

Lucy broke the silence with an abrupt announcement. “’Tisn’t right. ’Tisn’t seemly!”

Antiqua jumped, then gaped at her maid in astonishment.

“’Tis unseemly for us to be trampin’ along the road like common rustics! Why, if some nasty, murderin’ thief doesn’t make an end to us, ’tis certain this damp will work its way into a chill.” Lucy shook a chastising finger at her mistress. “You mark my words, Miss Antiqua, we’ll catch our deaths from this. What your Da would have said to these goings on, I don’t care to think.”

“Father would have had, as he did with regard to everything I ever did, precisely nothing to say. What did not affect him did not matter to him in the least,” she responded without rancor. “Come now, Lucy, we cannot be sitting upon the roadside or we shall never get to London.”

“I don’t think as how we’ll ever get there anyway,” Lucy mumbled, reluctantly rising. “All for a fool’s errand!”

The drizzle faded gradually as the black skies greyed. The faint light enabled them to pass by all the ruts, rocks and other impediments which they had heretofore only discovered through contact. The sun glistened in its first appearance upon the moist earth when they first heard the rumble of a vehicle behind them. With an exchange of fright between them, they twirled around to behold a flat cart drawn by a single nag advancing along the road. As it inched near, they saw a gnome of a man, all grizzled hair and beard beneath a wide, floppy hat, perched upon the wooden seat. He halted his horse as the cart drew abreast of them.

Approaching the cart, Antiqua strove for a winning smile. “Good morning, sir. How fortunate that you have come along. Our coach met with an accident and my maid and I were forced to walk. We’d be most grateful if you could take us up.”

The stunted man continued to stare disconcertingly at her. His gaze moved from Antiqua to Lucy, then slowly back again.

“I should be happy to pay you, sir, for as far as you could take us,” Antiqua said with determination. She wondered with despair if he were mute, for he continued wordlessly peering at them from beneath his hat.

Lucy brushed past Antiqua to rap him sharply on the arm. “Here, you! My lady demands an answer and you’d best have a civil tongue in your head if you know what’s best! Now, our coach had an accident, as my lady told you, and we got lost walking through the night. Tell us, if you can, you old simpleton, what road this is and how far we are from the nearest village!”

“Beggin’ your pardon, m’lady, but I was that bemazed at the sight o’ you standin’ aside the road, I knew not what to say. This here’s the road ’twixt Morcastle and Dover, m’lady, and Dover be the only town we’re like to meet.” He laughed gruffly at his own wit, then added, “’Tis Dover I’m agoin’ to.”

Antiqua accepted her elevation in status without demurral, simply thankful that the man was not, as she had begun to fear, witless. “You will take us up, won’t you?” she asked prettily. “We had hoped we were traveling north, but I daresay we can get a coach from Dover.”

“To be sure, m’lady. We’ll get there in no time.”

No time was approximately four hours, for it seemed that the farmer’s nag had but one speed and this was slower than Antiqua had thought possible for any four-legged beast. A mile an hour seemed to be the topmost speed to be had, so she sat, squeezed between the farmer and Lucy, striving to restrain her impatience.

Her main hope was that Vincent would wake late and upon discovering her gone, begin his search upon the wrong road. For she never doubted he would come after her. Aside from the papers, still nestled safe and dry within the soggy muff, Antiqua knew Vincent to be a man who would not easily take having his plans thwarted. She longed for a whip to encourage the horse into something more than the plodding gait from which it never varied. Eventually the cart rolled through signs of habitation which gradually bloomed into the town of Dover.

They parted from the farmer, Angus Pyle by name, on genial terms. Mr. Pyle refused to take payment for the ride, saying it had been a rare honor to escort her ladyship to town. He let them down before an inn which he assured them was the stopping point for the London stage and left them with a smile.

They entered the White Horse Inn to an accompaniment of stares. With a great deal of inner quaking, but with her head held high, Antiqua inquired if this was indeed where she could await the stagecoach bound for London.

A short, heavyset woman bustled past the gawking customers to glare at Antiqua from beneath bushy brows. Dark hair on her upper lip bristled above her frowning mouth as she barked, “You’ve just missed the coach, though there’ll be another one along ’round noon.” Short, pudgy hands rested on her extended hips as she looked the pair up and down, across and back. “If you wish to wait for the coach, don’t do so here! We don’t have the likes o’you in the White Horse!”

“But I wish to partake of some breakfast,” Antiqua began.

“Not in here you won’t! This is a quality inn!”

Antiqua gasped and her velvet-brown eyes flared up with golden sparks of indignation, but Lucy tugged on her arm and she let herself be led outside, sputtering and muttering all the way.

“Of all the infamous, arrant, disobliging--! I’ve a mind to go back in and give that woman a lesson in manners! How can she expect any custom if that is how she treats people?”

“That’s all very well, Miss Antiqua,” Lucy said, “but I can’t say as how I blame her. Just look at us!”

They were indeed a sight. Though their clothing had nearly dried, what was not bemuddied was rumpled or crushed. Tangled tresses fell haphazardly from beneath their bonnets, both of which were ruined beyond repair. The bandbox was battered and liberally splattered with mud. Antiqua had to admit they did not even look respectable, much less like quality.

In the end, they found a seedy coffee shop in the quayside where they were served bread which was stale with butter about to turn rancid and coffee that was curiously greasy. Both ate greedily, feeling in some measure revived. They ignored the round of lurid stares from the coarse, rugged men dotted throughout the shop, but hastened to leave as soon as they could.

Turning in the direction of the White Horse, Lucy suddenly stopped to stare agog, a look of puzzlement sweeping her face.

“What is the matter, Lucy? Why do you stare so? You haven’t seen Vincent?” Antiqua’s voice rose sharply as a surge of apprehension moved through her.

Lucy shook her head. “No, Miss. But I—I did think I saw—well, ’tis no matter, for I’m sure I couldn’t have done! Now you’ve got me seeing hobgoblins in the daylight, Miss Antiqua, and what will come next, I’m sure I’ve no wish to find out!”

Grumbling more of the same along the way, the maid only fell silent when they at length drew up at the White Horse Inn. A large black coach with a number of gentlemen perched precariously atop lumbered to a halt just as they arrived. Antiqua stepped up to the coachman as that burly gentleman leapt down from his box.

“Is this the north-bound coach?” she asked.

“Where’s your ticket?” he asked in reply.

“I haven’t got a ticket, but I’m ready to purchase my place,” she assured him.

His harsh face looked cross and impatient, but whatever he meant to say was arrested by the entreaty in her huge brown eyes. After a brief pause, he said gruffly, “Very well. How far do you wish to go?”

“As far as this will take my maid and me,” she returned, handing him fully half of the money she had left.

He scowled at the coins, pocketed them and jerked his thumb toward the coach. “Get in. We’ll be off soon.” He then disappeared into the inn for the bumper of heavy wet he had been thinking of this past hour and more.

The inside of the stage was occupied by thee others: a gaunt, lanky, scowling man, sitting with his arms crossed and his eyes closed; an expressionless sparse woman, shabbily dressed, beside him; and across from them, a man with multiple chins resting in layers upon his white collar and folds of fat forming a mound of a stomach upon which he laid his hands. He smiled as she entered, so Antiqua sat beside him while Lucy took up the place beside the colorless woman.

Fully a quarter of an hour passed before the coachman appeared from inside the White Horse, wiping his thick lips upon his sleeve. It was only after they had rolled forth that Antiqua let out a sigh of relief. She could not shake her conviction that Vincent was already on his way to capture her, and each passing minute standing in Dover had been torturous in the extreme.

The journey was uncomfortably warm, for though the spring air remained chill, the sun now beat directly down upon the coach and the thin man had closed the window not ten seconds after Antiqua raised it. With a mutinous gleam in her eye, she reached to re-open it, but the flash of fright over the features of the woman opposite stopped her. She left the window closed and suffered.

There was no conversation. An occasional belch pierced the air from the fat man, but that was the extent of comment within the coach. Antiqua occupied herself with reassuring pats upon the lump in her muff and devising plans to dispose of her information in London.

She was in the midst of visualizing her grandfather’s surprise and gratitude as she grandly handed over the salvation of England when the stage jerked into immobility. She looked out the window with interest which turned to shock as the door was yanked open and the coachman ordered her out.

“But so soon?” she queried in disbelief.

“You can’t expect to get to London on two crowns now can you?” countered the coachman with a leering laugh.

The satisfied sneering of the odious thin man told Antiqua he was enjoying her discomfiture to the utmost. With as much dignity as they could muster, she and Lucy climbed down from the coach.

“Where are we?” Antiqua icily inquired.

“Pleasance,” flung the coachman down as he resumed his seat in the box. With a thump and a rattle, the coach was gone, leaving them standing in a pretty little village that looked more sleepy than awake at mid-day.

“Well, now what’s to do, Miss Antiqua?” Lucy threw her hands into the air in a gesture more hopeless than helpless. “If this hasn’t been a hare-brained misadventure from start to finish, I’m sure I don’t know what to call it!”

“You need not call it anything,” Antiqua snapped. “If you are so displeased, you may stay here and wait for Jack Vincent to turn up.
I’m
going on. With a little luck, I may chance upon another farmer as obliging as Mr. Pyle.”

With that, Antiqua set off down the dusty road, following in the wake of the post-coach. Heaving a heavy sigh, Lucy collected the battered bandbox and shadowed her charge’s footsteps.

The road—being the direct route between Dover and Canterbury—was much trafficked, but they did not meet with the fortune of another so accommodating as Angus Pyle. This was little to be wondered at, for in addition to the mud and dust staining their apparel and smudging their faces, the hems of their thin gowns were now ragged from the wear of their long trek, while the fur trimming on Antiqua’s pelisse had detached itself to drag in the dirt as she walked. She finally discarded the crushed hat, leaving her unruly hair to cascade in wild disorder.

The sun began its descent and still the hungry and thirsty pair tramped wearily on, meeting the sound of each oncoming vehicle with both hope and fear; watching each pass by with both disappointment and relief.

“I wonder if we are upon too public a road?” Antiqua asked, wistfully watching a sporty curricle-in-four race by. “For you can depend upon it, Lucy, Vincent will be searching for us.”

“Never tell me you wish to go off on one of these country tracks!” her maid exclaimed in fresh horror.

“No,” Antiqua sighed, coming to a halt. “What I wish now is to repair my shoe.” She sat upon the grass on the bank and, oblivious to Lucy’s protestations of impropriety, untied her kid slipper from her foot. The shoe was hopelessly rent upon the bottom. “Oh, the devil!” she cried, casting the useless shoe into the grass.

“Miss Antiqua!”

“Forgive me, Lucy, but—”

A sharp crack ripped through the air. As the sound echoed to silence, Antiqua leaped up, grabbed Lucy’s hand and began to run across the open field. Yet another shot shattered the peaceful afternoon. This time, Antiqua screamed and fell to the ground.

Lucy stood as if struck to stone, eyes widening as she took in the pain etching itself into Antiqua’s suddenly pale features. Then she, too, shrieked and, flinging down the bandbox, knelt and cried loudly, “Oh, Miss Antiqua, Miss Antiqua! What’s been done?”

It was some time before the hysterical maid could be convinced that all that had been done was the catching of Miss Antiqua’s foot in a rabbit-hole. That this had taken so long was due, perhaps, to the very real grimace of pain imprinted on Antiqua’s face. But eventually Lucy was brought to the understanding that nothing more was wrong with her mistress than a twisted ankle.

Her ankle was quickly swollen well beyond its normal size. Having at last calmed Lucy sufficiently, Antiqua tried to stand, but the instant she tested the weight of her right foot, the piercing pain buckled her leg and she sagged against Lucy’s ready arm. All question of continuing to walk, even so little a distance as that remaining to Canterbury, was clearly over.

Lucy helped her back down to the grass. “’Tis no use, Miss. That ankle’ll be of no use to you for a day or two to come.”

“A day or two!” Antiqua repeated with dismay. “But we cannot sit in this field for two days!”