Gingerbread Bride

Chapter Five: Part 2

Mary was pleased to reach the end of the first day's travel. She climbed down at the posting inn, stretching the kinks out of her back and knees, as Polly clambered down to join her.

The inn allocated them a pair of rooms on the second floor, near the back, and they were climbing the stairs when they passed someone coming down. He was looking at the gloves he was putting on, rather than where he was going, and Mary had to step smartly to the right to avoid a collision.

He looked up impatiently, saying, "Watch where you are going, Ma—Cousin Mary? Good God, it is. What are you doing in this godforsaken place?"

Lord Bosville. Of all the people Mary imagined meeting, he was the last she'd expect to find this far from London. "Cousin," she replied, giving him a frosty nod. They had parted on unfriendly terms, after he had tried to kiss her and she had, as her father had taught her, punched him in a vulnerable part of his anatomy.

Bosville rearranged his face into a friendly smile that did not reach his eyes. "I do apologize for my language, Cousin Mary. I was startled. How nice to see you. Mother will be delighted to hear you are well. She has been so worried."

What nonsense. Mary suppressed a snort. Worried to have lost Mary's money, perhaps.

"If you will excuse me, Cousin, my maid and I are tired."

But Viscount Bosville turned and accompanied them up the stairs, insisting he would see them safely to their rooms. "And after you are refreshed, dear cousin, you will, of course, allow me the privilege of providing a small dinner? In a private parlor, so you need not hesitate for a moment."

"Thank you, Cousin, but we are very tired..."

Viscount Bosville kept arguing all the way to their rooms, and stood in the doorway, still insisting, until Mary agreed, just to be rid of him.

"Excellent, Cousin. I will do myself the honor of escorting you myself. Shall we say eight o'clock?"

Mary closed the door on him, and wondered how she could gracefully extricate herself from his fulsome and insincere compliments over dinner. Perhaps a sudden and unexpected dose of the plague?

****

Bosville kept to his side of the table. Mind you, that could be because Mary took Polly down to dinner with her, and showed the viscount the little pistol that Mary always carried for protection.

Even if he wasn't a danger, he was a bore. He couldn't seem to grasp she didn't find him, his friends, and his activities as engrossing as he did. And he seemed to have convinced himself her refusal of his advances was modesty, not repulsion. He said, several times, he realized he had rushed her. He apologized for his haste, but assured her it was her fault for being so beautiful.

Mary, who had heard him describe her to a friend as his homely cousin, was not fooled. Replying in monosyllables, changing the subject, looking all around the room instead of at him; all the little strategies she could try and still stay just this side of good manners, he ignored. He was delighted to carry the full burden of the conversation, ignored any topic she raised, and did not look at her often enough to notice her distraction. As soon as she could, she escaped to bed.

****

Mary and Polly left the inn before the sun was fully up, to avoid his escort. Mary felt silly. Surely she was overreacting. What could he do, after all? This wasn't medieval times.

Even so, as the post chaise left the inn, and turned onto the Oxford Road, she relaxed. She needn't think about Bosville again.

"Would you care for a game of cards, Polly?"

The morning passed quickly, and in the afternoon, both women fell asleep after finishing the picnic lunch packed by the inn.

Mary woke when the post boy shouted, and all of a sudden, the carriage leapt as it sped up. With difficulty, she pulled herself to the front window. The increased velocity set the carriage lurching and swaying worse than a ship in a storm. The windows were too dirty for easy viewing, but she could see no sign of the post boy, and on either side, the hedges rushed by. The horses must have bolted!

Could she get to the front luggage rack from the side door? If she didn't try, would she and Polly survive?

Balancing herself as best she could, she used her free hand to pull her skirt up from the back to tuck it into her sash, leaving her legs free. She wound one end of a long shawl around her wrist, and gave the other end to Polly.

"Polly, hold tight," she said. Polly, veteran oldest sister of a tribe of boys, wedged herself into the corner of the seat.

When Mary opened the door, it whipped back out of her hands. She caught both sides of the doorway, and then, grasping every handhold she could find, she pulled herself forward up onto the luggage rack. The horses were uncontrolled, galloping heedless and headlong with the post boy nowhere to be seen.

She sent up a quick prayer of thanks that this part of the country had long straight roads, sunk between hedges. In any other carriage, she might have had a chance of grabbing the reins, but this was a post chaise, controlled by the post boy who rode one of the horses. Back here on the carriage itself, there were no reins to grab.

The carriage bounded over a large rut or rock, and she was airborne for a moment, holding the front rail of the luggage rack with a white-knuckled grip. With a thump that jarred every bone in her body and expelled what little breath she had left, she crashed back onto her trunks. She would be safer inside the carriage.

As she edged her way cautiously back to the door, a flash of movement behind the hedge to her left caught her eye. A rider? The hedge thickened again, and she couldn't be sure. Another bounding lurch prompted her to move again, and she swung herself back inside to rejoin Polly—though not without a few extra bruises.

"The post boy is gone, and the horses are bolting," Mary told Polly. "Stay in your corner and hold on tight. And pray that they run themselves out before we reach a bend in the road."

Following her own advice meant she couldn't see whether the glimpse she'd caught was a rider. Someone riding to their aid would be wonderful, but unlikely. Might as well wish for Rick to save her once again.

Polly, to her credit, didn't panic, just held on grimly, her face white and her lips moving—whether in prayer or cursing, Mary couldn't tell. Mary was praying. This was no time to annoy God!

Were the horses slowing? Yes. They were no longer in a full-out panicked gallop. Quite quickly, the gallop became a canter, and the canter a walk. The horses would be tired, of course. Mary didn't know how long she and Polly had slept, but they must be close to the next posting inn.

She carefully made her way back to the door. Perhaps now that they had slowed, she might be able to do something to stop them?

But there was no need. At the head of the offside horse, shouldering into it with his own horse and pulling the pair to a slower walk and then a stop, was a rider—a rider she recognized.

Rick Redepenning had rescued her again.