The Road to Gretna (8 page)

They stepped out of the inn under the lime tree, from which came the drowsy humming of bees, and turned down the hill. Ahead towered the great spire of St. Wulfram’s.

“What interesting features has the church?” Angus enquired without enthusiasm.

“The architectural beauties are many, but perhaps the most unusual sight is the sixteenth-century library of chained books.”

“In medieval times the bibles in churches were chained, were they not?” Penny put in.

“Yes, they were very valuable as they had to be copied by hand. I know two or three noble bibliophiles who might be tempted by St. Wulfram’s collection even today, for all the books are at least two hundred years old. We’ll not have time to study them this evening, alas. He indicated a narrow back street. “Let us stroll as far as the market-place.”

“How old is the Angel Inn?” she asked as they reached the imposing building. “It looks ancient.”

“The gatehouse is from the fifteenth century, but the hostelry was founded much earlier. There is a room known as the King’s Chamber where King John held court in 1213, and in 1480 or thereabouts Richard III signed the Duke of Buckingham’s death warrant.”

“You see,” Penny said, turning to Angus. “I told you he knows everything of interest.”

Angus responded with a sceptical grunt. He brightened, however, on learning that another nearby inn, the George, had been Sir Isaac Newton’s home; and the sixteenth-century stone water conduit inspired him to deliver a lecture on sanitation and public health. Penny listened conscientiously. As a doctor’s wife she ought to be conversant with the subject. It was a pity that she found the doings of long-dead kings so much more engrossing.

When they returned in the dusk to the Beehive, two small boys were standing underneath the lime tree gazing up into its branches.

“Betcha a taw it does,” said one as they passed.

Glancing up, Penny reached out to tug Jason’s sleeve. “My lord,” she said demurely, “pray look up into the tree.”

There was Lily, batting playfully at an angry bee.

“I don’t believe it,” moaned his lordship. “This is the second ...third...fourth time today.”

“Fourth?” queried Penny.

“Have you forgot the garden pond at Huntingdon? I have not, but then you were not present when I had to buy a towel from the innkeeper to wrap the little horror in. I swear this time it can take care of itself.”

“Miss White will be sorely dis—” Angus was interrupted by a yowl that would have done credit to a full-grown tom-cat. Lily hurtled down from the tree and clawed her way up his trousers. An incomprehensible Scottish oath escaped him.

“Tolja so,” said the small boy to his companion. “You owe me a taw.”

Penny smothered her laughter and went to Angus’s aid as he seized the kitten by the scruff of the neck and tried to disengage her claws from his best coat. “I collect Lily has been stung,” she observed. “If I were you, my lord, I should purchase a basket with a lid, for her own safety—and everyone else’s.”

“A splendid idea, ma’am,” he said with an excellent imitation of sober politeness belied by his twitching lips. “Pray allow me to assist. I have perforce developed something of a knack for handling wild beasts.”

Between them they rescued Angus from Lily and vice versa. Angus’s concern for Henrietta’s distress had vanished, but Penny managed to soothe his ruffled feelings as they went into the inn. The kitten, in Jason’s firm grip, made unhappy little mewing sounds.

“Oh Lord,” he said as they moved from the passage into the brightly lit parlour, “her foot has swelled up as big as an orange. Quick, doctor, do something about it before Henrietta comes down and sees it or we shall have a hysterical female on our hands!”

“More like the size of a greengage,” said Penny, taking the kitten from him and examining her paw. Lily was all sweet docility now. “The little demon must have climbed out of the chamber window into the tree."

“I canna bring doun the swelling,” Angus grumbled, producing his spectacles and a pair of tweezers from his coat pocket. “But if I tak’ oot the sting, mebbe it willna grow worse. A slice of raw onion will tak’ awa’ the pain.”

“Raw onion!” said his lordship faintly. “Raw onion,” he repeated to the waiter who came in just then to see if they were ready to dine, it being a quarter past the hour. “A slice of raw onion, and send my coachman to me.

“At once, my lord,” said the waiter, not turning a hair.

A few minutes later Henrietta came in, a slender sprite in pink crape with huge satin roses around the hem of her skirt. Jason was just sending Mullins out to buy a covered basket and Penny, weeping involuntarily, held Lily while Angus applied a poultice of mashed onion to her paw.

“Oh!” Pausing in the doorway, Henrietta raised her hand to her mouth, her blue eyes filling with tears. “Is she...dead?”

“Now why would I be buying a basket for her if she were dead?” enquired his lordship tartly.

“To bury her in?”

“Don’t be a widgeon,” advised Penny. “She was stung by a bee but Angus has treated her and she is perfectly comfortable now.”

“Oh, doctor!” Henrietta pattered across the room to them. “How kind you are, and how very clever.”

Fascinated, Penny watched Angus blush right up to the tips of his ears.

CHAPTER SEVEN

“For pity’s sake, Angus, Uncle Vaughn is probably after us by now. We must leave early.”

“Airly, to be sure, but there’s nae need to gang wi’ the dawn. I dinna fear your uncle.”

“But I do.” Penny suddenly became aware of the expression of sympathy on Lord Kilmore’s face. Embarrassed, she concentrated on cutting up her juicy pear.

“We are all tired after a long day,” Jason pointed out. “I, for one, mean to retire very soon after dinner, so rising early will be no hardship.”

Henrietta looked at him in alarm. “But Jason...”

“We shall leave whenever you are ready, my dear,” he assured her hastily, patting her hand, “but I shall order breakfast for you, Miss Bryant, at whatever hour you decide upon."

“Please, Angus,” she beseeched. “Breakfast at six,” he conceded. With Mrs. Ratchett to be fed that meant they wouldn’t be on the road before seven, but it was better than she had expected. Sighing, she nodded. She really must try to remember that Angus often gave in to an appeal, whereas arguing simply set his back up.

“My dear Miss Bryant, you are half-asleep already,” said Jason, and she realized she was sitting with her fruit knife poised, unmoving. He took it from her. “Allow me to finish slicing that for you.”

Quickly and neatly he prepared the pear. She thanked him with a weary smile and ate the sweet fruit while he cut up another for Henrietta. Crotchety as a tired child, she took one nibble and decided she’d rather have some damsons, so Jason stoned a few of the small purple plums for her.

Penny had to admire his patience when Henrietta declared that the damsons were sour and their skins too tough and she wanted a pear after all, but not that one because it was already turning brown.

When the second pear was pushed away half-eaten, Penny stood up. "Bedtime," she said firmly, as if Henrietta were indeed the child her behaviour suggested. “You are burned to the socket, and I shall never make it up the stairs if I delay any longer.”

Taking the cue, Jason rose and ruthlessly pulled out Henrietta’s chair. “Sweet dreams, my dear,” he said, kissing her hand.

Before she could protest, Penny swept her out of the room and up the stairs to their chamber. Cora appeared at once, doubtless warned by one of the inn servants and eager for her own bed. She had already laid out her mistress’s lace-bedecked nightgown and a blue velvet wrapper.

“I cou’n’t find your night rail, Miss Bryant,” she said apologetically, starting to undo Henrietta’s buttons.

“There was no room in my bag so I didn’t bring one. I shall sleep in my chemise.” Penny struggled with her own buttons. Her fingers seemed to be all thumbs.

“Sleep in your chemise!” said Henrietta, shocked. “You cannot do that. You must borrow my spare nightgown.”

“I’d split the seams, my dear. I shall be quite comfortable, I promise you, and I did bring extra chemises to change into.”

However irritating she could be, Henrietta’s generosity was undeniable, Penny thought as a chambermaid came in wielding a warming pan. A few minutes later she slipped between the warmed sheets, and she fell asleep while Henrietta, her hair in curling papers, was trying to decide what to wear in the morning.

She woke to see Cora’s candle-lit face above her. The rest of the room was in darkness.

“Time to get up, miss,” the abigail whispered, sniffing.

“There was no need for you to rise so early,” Penny whispered back.

“It’s not that early, not like what you wanted. The chambermaid said as they don’t have stages stopping here and most people don’t get up that early, she’s not used to it and she overslept.”

“Drat! What time is it?”

“Past six, miss. I don’t know, ‘xactly. The girl came to wake Mrs. Ratchett, and I didn’t want her to wake Miss Henrietta by mistake so I brung your hot water. I’ll help you dress, miss, then go back to bed.” She made an extraordinary noise that Penny took for a swallowed sneeze.

“Are you ill, Cora?” she asked, shivering as she sat up and swung her feet out from under the covers.

“I must of caught cold, miss, when I got wet fishing that dratted cat out of the pond. I’ll be awright.”

“I’ll ask Dr. Knox to leave some medicine for you if he has anything suitable. Go back to bed now, and get your rest. I can manage.”

“Bless you, miss.” She set down the candle and departed through the connecting door, snuffling into a handkerchief.

In the quiet, Penny heard dripping water. She went to the window and pulled aside the heavy curtain. Grey daylight revealed falling rain, a steady drizzle which looked to be set in for the day. Dismayed, she hurried to wash and dress. The rain was bound to slow them still further, and even the prospect of spending a wet day trapped with Mrs. Ratchett in a rickety chariot did not abate her sense of urgency.

When Penny reached the parlour it was in darkness. She was drawing back the curtains when Angus came in.

“‘Tis a pity the chambermaid overslept,” he said, “but I gave our breakfast orders last night so as not to waste time.”

“That was well thought of. I hope the cook has kept everything hot, as we are so late. This wretched weather!”

He came over to the window. "No more than a mist, my dear.”

“Ah, I’ve heard of a Scotch mist, that soaks an Englishman to the skin.”

He looked affronted, but before she could explain that she was teasing, a sleepy waiter appeared.

“What’ll yer ‘ave?” he asked grumpily, spreading a dingy cloth on the bare table.

“I ordered our breakfast yestreen,” said Angus.

“Last night were my night off.” He shrugged. “I’ll see what the cook says. She just come down.”

“Just cam’ down! We ha’...”

“Please find out,” Penny interrupted. When the man slouched out, she said to Angus, “I daresay the chambermaid woke the cook after she came to us. It’s no good shouting at the waiter. Besides, he’s the sort who just goes the slower if you chide him.”

Several minutes passed before he returned. “She got yer order but she just put on water to boil for yer porridge and by what she says it takes a good ‘alf an hour to cook.” He seemed to take a malevolent pleasure in reporting the delay, for he wore a sour smile as he lit a pair of candles and set three places at one end of the long table.

“We shall be here for ever!” Penny slumped onto the settle by the still-empty fireplace. A fire would have been welcome this dank morning.

“I am accustomed to break my fast with porridge,” said Angus stiffly, “but I could have something else instead.”

“No, you have your porridge, Angus. It hardly matters, as Mrs. Ratchett is not yet down and it’s impossible to hurry her once she has started eating.”

Restless, she jumped up from the seat and went back to the window. Rivulets ran between the rain-washed cobbles of the inn yard. Lord Kilmore’s maroon carriage stood dripping nearby, oddly forlorn with no horses between the shafts.

At least, she thought, cheering up a little, the delay might allow her to see him again. She had been too sleepy last night to say a proper farewell and to thank him for...she wasn't sure quite for what, but she felt a warm glow of gratitude towards him. Simply for raising her spirits, perhaps.

Her spirits were at a low ebb again by the time Mrs. Ratchett put in an appearance. Preceded by a wave of violet scent, she trudged heavily into the parlour and sat down at the table, red-faced and wheezing as if she had walked a mile, not just down the stairs.

“It’s me stays,” she explained. “Takes a while to get ‘em on and takes another while to get used to breeving in ‘em again. Where’s breakfast, then?”

The waiter came in balancing a laden tray. Its contents proved to be entirely for Mrs. Ratchett, who quickly recovered.

“I’ll go ahead afore it gets cold,” she said, picking up her knife and fork, “if that’s all right with you, miss.

“Please do,” Penny urged her.

The porridge and Penny’s meal arrived after another wait. Penny was touched to see that Angus had recalled precisely what she ate for breakfast the day before and had ordered the same again, with the addition of a dish of buttered eggs.

“Lest you should be hungrier today than yesterday, my dear,” he said, salting his porridge and pouring on milk. “I suppose you will not try a little porridge?”

“Thank you, no, but I shall eat the eggs. I am hungry this morning.” Not to mention the fact that she had learned the futility of hurrying through a meal in her present company.

Angus took a spoonful of porridge, grimaced, swallowed, and set down his spoon. “‘Tis fu’ o’ lumps,” he growled, “and burnt to boot.”

Feeling slightly hysterical, Penny pushed her dish of eggs towards him. He ate another spoonful of porridge, set the bowl aside, and dourly applied himself to the eggs. Penny rang the bell and, when the sulky waiter came, ordered more eggs, more muffins, and more bacon.