The Wild One (2 page)

He had just the briefest glimpse of her face
— scared, pale, beautiful — before one of the highwaymen shot out
the lanterns of the coach and darkness fell over the entire scene.
Someone screamed. Another shot rang out, silencing the frightened
cry abruptly.

His face grim, the young gentleman knotted
his horse's reins and removed his gloves, pulling each one
carefully off by the fingertips. With a watchful eye on the
highwaymen, he slipped his feet from the irons and vaulted lightly
down from the thoroughbred's tall back, his glossy top boots of
Spanish leather landing in chalk mud up to his ankles. The horse
never moved. He doffed his fine new surtout and laid it over the
saddle along with his tricorn and gloves. He tucked the lace at his
wrist safely inside his sleeve to protect it from any soot or
sparks his pistol might emit. Then he crept through the knee-high
weeds and nettles that grew thick at the side of the road, priming
and loading the pistol as he moved stealthily toward the stricken
coach. He would have time to squeeze off only one shot before they
were upon him, and that one shot had to count.

~~~~

"Everybo'y out.
Now!
"

Holding Charlotte tightly against her,
Juliet managed to remain calm as the robber snared her wrist and
jerked her violently from the vehicle. She landed awkwardly in the
sticky white mud and would have gone down if not for the huge,
bearlike hand that yanked her to her feet. Perhaps, she thought
numbly, it was the very fact that it
was
bearlike that she
was able to keep her head — and her wits — about her, for Juliet
had been born and raised in the woods of Maine, and she was no
stranger to bears, Indians, and a host of other threats that made
these English highwaymen look benign by comparison.

But they were certainly not benign. The
slain driver lay face-down in the mud. The bodies of one of the
guards and a passenger were sprawled in the weeds nearby. A shudder
went through her. She was glad of the darkness. Glad that the poor
little children still inside the coach were spared the horrors that
daylight would have revealed.

Cuddling Charlotte, she stood beside the
other passengers as the robbers yanked people down from the roof
and lined them up in front of the coach. A woman was sobbing. A
girl clung pitifully to the old man, perhaps her grandfather. One
fellow, finely dressed and obviously a gentleman, angrily protested
the treatment of the women and without a word, one of the
highwayman stuck his pistol into his belly and shot him dead. As he
fell, the wretched group gasped in dismay and horror. Then the last
passengers were dragged from the coach, the two children clinging
to their mother's skirts and crying piteously.

They all huddled together in the rainy
darkness, too terrified to speak as, one by one, they were relieved
of their money, their jewels, their watches, and their pride.

And then the bandits came to Juliet.

"Gimme yer money, girl, all of it. Now!"

Juliet complied. Without a sound, she handed
over her reticule.

"The necklace, too."

Her hand went to her throat. Hesitated. The
robber cuffed it away in impatience, ripping the thin gold chain
from her neck and dropping the miniature of Charlotte's dead father
into his leather bag.

"Any jewels?"

She was still staring at the bag. "No."

"Any rings?"

"No."

But he grabbed her hand, held it up, and saw
it: a promise made but broken by death. It was Charles's signet
ring — her engagement ring — the last thing her beloved fiancé had
given her before he had died in the fighting at Concord.

"Filthy lyin' bitch, give it to me!"

Juliet stood her ground. She looked him
straight in the eye and firmly, quietly, repeated the single
word.

"No."

Without warning he backhanded her across the
cheek, and she fell to her knees in the mud, cutting her palm on a
stone as she tried to prevent injury to the baby. Her hair tumbled
down around her face. Charlotte began screaming. And Juliet looked
up, only to see the black hole of a pistol's mouth two inches away,
the robber behind it snarling with rage.

Her life passed before her eyes.

And at that moment a shot rang out from
somewhere off to her right, a dark rose exploded on the
highwayman's chest, and with a look of surprise, he pitched
forward, dead.

~~~~

Only one shot, but by God, I made it
count.

The other two highwaymen jerked around at
the bark of Gareth's pistol. Their faces mirrored disbelief as they
took in his fine shirt and lace at throat and sleeve, his silk
waistcoat, expensive boots, expensive breeches, expensive
everything. They saw him as a plum ripe for the picking, and Gareth
knew it. He went for his sword.

"Get on your horses and go, and neither of
you shall be hurt."

For a moment, neither the highwaymen nor the
passengers moved. Then, slowly, one of the highwayman began to
smile. The other, to sneer.

"Now!"
Gareth commanded, still moving
forward and trying to bluff them with his display of cool
authority.

And then all hell broke loose.

Tongues of flame cracked from the
highwaymen's pistols and Gareth heard the low whine of a ball
passing at close range. Passengers screamed and dived for cover.
The coach horses reared, whinnying in fear. Gareth, his sword
raised, charged through the tangle of nettle that grew dense at the
side of the road, trying to get to the robbers before they could
reload and fire. His foot hit a patch of mud and he went down, his
cheek slamming into the stinging nettles. One of the highwayman
came racing toward him, spewing a torrent of foul language and
intent only on finishing him off. Gareth lay gasping, then flung
himself hard to the left as the bandit's pistol coughed another
spear of flame. Where his shoulder had been, a plume of mud shot
several inches into the air.

The brigand was still coming, roaring at the
top of his lungs, already bringing up a second pistol.

Gamely, Gareth tried to get to his feet and
reach his sword. He slipped in the wet weeds, his cheek on fire as
though he'd been stung by a hundred bees. He was outnumbered, his
pistol spent, his sword just out of reach. But he wasn't done for.
Not yet. Not by any stretch of the imagination. He lunged for his
sword, rolled onto his back, and sitting up, flung the weapon at
the oncoming highwayman with all his strength.

The blade caught the robber just beneath the
jaw and nearly took his head off. He went over backward, clawing at
his throat, his dying breath a terrible, rasping gurgle.

And then Gareth saw one of the two children
running toward him, obviously thinking he was the only safety left
in this world gone mad.

"Billy!"
the mother was screaming.
"Billy, no,
get back!
"

The last highwayman spun around. Wild-eyed
and desperate, he saw the fleeing child, saw that his two friends
were dead, and, as though to avenge a night gone wrong, brought his
pistol up, training it on the little boy's back.

"Billeeeeeeee!"

Gareth lunged to his feet, threw himself at
the child, and tumbled him to the ground, shielding him with his
body. The pistol exploded at close range, deafening him, a
white-hot lance of fire ripping through his ribs as he rolled over
and over through grass and weeds and nettles, the child still in
his arms.

He came to rest upon his back, the wet weeds
beneath him, blood gushing hotly from his side. He lay still,
blinking up at the trees, the rain falling gently upon his
throbbing cheek.

His fading mind echoed his earlier words.
Well done, good fellow! Well done....

The child sprang up and ran, sobbing, back
to his mother.

And for Lord Gareth de Montforte, all went
dark.

Chapter 2

"Help him!" Juliet cried. She thrust
Charlotte into the other mother's arms, picked up her skirts and
ran headlong through the weeds toward the fallen gentleman. "Dear
God, he saved us all!"

Still in shock, the other passengers stood
milling around like sheep; but Juliet's words penetrated their
daze, and before he could flee into the woods, the last highwayman
was subdued and others were charging through the weeds after
Juliet.

"Is he all right?"

"Bless him, he saved that little boy, that
dear, sweet little boy —"

Juliet reached him first. He lay on his
back, half-concealed by a canopy of dripping nettles — broken,
broken, bleeding, still. She plunged to her knees beside him and
grabbed his hand — so lifeless, so smooth — and shoved her finger
beneath the lace that draped it, trying to locate a pulse.

More people came rushing up behind her.

"Is he dead?"

"Sure looks like it to me, poor fellow
—"

Juliet looked up at them over her shoulder.
"He's not dead, but I fear he will be if we don't get help, and
soon!"

Ignoring the commotion behind her, she
squeezed his fingers, willing him to hold onto life as more people
came running to his assistance. She saw the blood soaking through
his fine clothes, the paleness of his cheek beneath the crescent of
dark lashes that lay against it. Wet stinging nettles were crushed
beneath the other. Tenderly, Juliet reached down, flinching as
those same fiery weeds stung her own tender skin, and lifted his
head so that his face was clear of them.

His cheek was already puckered and angry.
Juliet looked up at the circle of faces above. "Someone, please
give me a coat, a cape, anything!"

His breath smelled of spirits. His head was
a heavy, lolling weight in her hands, his damp hair coming loose
from its queue to spill in soft, tumbling waves over her fingers.
Someone thrust a jacket beneath him, and she gently eased his head
back down to it as more people came hurrying toward them.

"Let's get him out of these nettles and into
the coach," Juliet said, instinctively taking charge. "You, take
his feet. You there, help me take his shoulders. Hurry, let's
go!"

Their fallen savior was a tall man, lean and
honed with muscle, a dead weight as they struggled to lift him.
They rushed him across the road to the coach, where two people were
already spreading a blanket on the grass for him while another
hastily began clearing the vehicle's interior of broken glass. The
other mother stood nearby, pale and silent, trying to quiet
Charlotte wile her own children, seeing the injured man, hid their
faces in her skirts.

Juliet shut her mind to her baby's distress.
"Right here. Easy with him. He's been hurt, badly."

People pressed close, eager to help. This
gallant gentleman had saved their lives, and everyone seemed to
want to touch him. Hands reached out to support him beneath his
arms, his body, his legs, though so many were not needed and only
got in the way. Gently, they lowered him to the blanket while the
coach was made ready for him. Kneeling beside him on the wet grass,
the other passengers crowding around and above her, Juliet quickly
loosened the flawlessly knotted, elegant spill of lace at his
throat. Then she began unbuttoning his waistcoat, her fingertips
going wet and slippery with blood as they neared the wound in his
side.

You can't die,
she willed him,
working furiously now and calling for some light.
Not after what
you've done for us!

Charlotte, still in the stranger's arms,
began to wail, only adding to Juliet's sense of urgency.

Someone found a candle and flint. Suddenly,
feeble light danced over worried faces and threw Juliet's shadow
across the injured man. As she gingerly undid the last button, his
head began to move weakly on the blanket. He groaned in pain, his
skin as white as chalk, his eyelashes fluttering.

"The child ..." he said, thickly.

"The child's fine. Be still. Relax. You're
going to be all right." Out of the corner of her eye, Juliet could
see movement, shadowy and silent, as the dead were placed side by
side and covered with a blanket.
Please God, don't let this poor
gentleman be joining them.
She slid her fingers beneath his
waistcoat, peeling it away from his blood-soaked shirt and feeling
a wave of nausea at the sight that met her eyes. In the dim glow of
the candle, blood was everywhere.

"Oh, dear God, I'm going to faint," murmured
one of the woman passengers, who was quickly escorted away from the
grim scene before she could.

And all the while Charlotte's piercing wails
rang in Juliet's head.

She shut her mind to her bawling daughter.
She shut it to the last highwayman, his hands tied to a nearby tree
and cursing them in language horrible enough to make her toes curl.
She shut it to the people breathing down her neck, to her own
queasiness, to her fear that this man was dying and there was
nothing that she or anyone could do for him.

"I need a knife," she said, anxiously
looking up at the faces above. "Does anyone have one?"

A small blade was produced, and Juliet
deftly slit the injured man's shirt all the way to his breeches.
The fabric was soaked with blood. Gently, she eased it open where
the ball had gone in. In the feeble light, it was impossible to
tell how badly he was hurt, but there was an awful lot of
blood.

"We need to get help, immediately," she
said, hacking a strip of cotton from her petticoats and packing it
into his side in an attempt to stop the bleeding. "I don't want to
move him for fear of making his injury worse. Does anyone know
where we are, how close the nearest village or town might be?"

"I think we're almost into Ravenscombe."

"Is there a doctor there?"

"Don't know. If not, might be one back in
Lambourn, I should think...."

Juliet shook her head. "We can't go charging
all over England with him while we're looking for a doctor. It
would be better if one of you rides for help and brings one back."
Glances were exchanged. "
Now
!"