Page 1 of A Kiss to Stop a Wedding

‘W oah, there, Magpie.’

Matt Talacre brought his horse to a stop at the crossroads.

He had been travelling along the old Roman road for nearly twenty miles and knew he must be nearing his destination.

An old man in a smock was approaching from the north.

He was leading an ox cart and Matt eased the horse to the side of the road.

‘Good day to you,’ he called. ‘Can you tell me which is the way to Whilton?’

The old man looked up at him from beneath his battered hat, squinting slightly against the evening sun.

‘I’m thinking it should be that road, to the east.’ Matt nodded towards one of the tracks.

‘Aye, and you’d be thinking right,’ agreed the old man, not breaking step. ‘Follow that road fer nigh on two mile, past the windmill, and it’ll bring ye to Whilton.’

Matt touched his hat and, when the cart had lumbered passed him, he trotted off along the lane.

It ran fairly straight, between green fields and hedges white with May blossom.

Before long he spotted the round stone tower of the windmill, its sails turning lazily, and not long after he was riding into a small market town.

He made his way along the wide main street until he came upon the Whilton Arms, a large hostelry with a brightly coloured sign hanging over the door.

Matt turned and rode through the arch into a large stable yard, where he left Magpie with an ostler, and went into the taproom.

After the sunlight it was dark inside and, when his eyes had adjusted, he saw there were very few customers.

He ordered a tankard of ale from the landlord and asked, in his cheerful way, if he was far from Whilton Hall.

‘No, sir. ’Tis about two miles south of here, by road.’

‘And will I find Lord Whilton there?’

The man shrugged. ‘I believe not, although His Lordship ain’t in the habit of telling me his business.’

The landlord moved off and Matt sipped his ale. It was unfortunate, after coming all this way, if his quarry was not at home, but he would go to the house anyway and enquire.

* * *

A couple of hours later, after bespeaking a room for the night, Matt rode off to Whilton Hall. A circuitous, tree-lined drive led to a redbrick stable block, and beyond that a moated manor, complete with a stone bridge and imposing medieval gatehouse .

A stable hand appeared. Matt left the mare and a silver sixpence, for which the man volunteered the information that if he made his way across the bridge and went to the big oak door on the far side of the inner courtyard, he could ask the housekeeper to show him around the house.

It was not Whilton Hall that Matt wanted to see, but he did not enlighten the stable hand. He merely thanked the man and went off to the house, where a footman informed him that Lord Whilton was not at home.

‘My enquiries in London gave me to understand that he was coming here,’ said Matt. ‘Perhaps you could tell me when you are expecting him—in a day, a week?’

‘As to that, sir, I couldn’t say,’ the footman replied woodenly.

Matt extracted a visiting card from a small silver case and handed it to the man. ‘Then I will leave this for him. I wish to see Lord Whilton on a matter of business and I shall call again.’

‘As you wish, sir.’ With a stiff bow the servant stepped back and shut the door, leaving Matt to make his way back to the stables, where he collected his horse and returned to the village.

The Whilton Arms provided him with a very comfortable room and a very tolerable dinner, although Matt did not linger over his meal.

Glancing out of the window at the clear sky, he calculated that there was at least another two hours of daylight.

Time enough to reconnoitre the ground. Lord Whilton might not be at home, but he might just find what he was looking for.

* * *

Flora Warenne stood by the drawing room windows, looking out at the distant woods and hills.

She had spent the day shopping in Whilton with her Aunt Farnleigh, but now she was longing to be out of doors again.

Not in the garden, with its well-scythed lawn and elegant flower borders, but somewhere wilder, less ordered.

Somewhere more in tune with her current restless spirit.

‘I think I shall go for a walk,’ she announced.

‘Really, dear?’ Aunt Farnleigh looked up from her embroidery. ‘Surely it is too late.’

Flora glanced at the clock; it was not yet seven. Most of their friends would only now be sitting down to dinner, but her aunt and uncle maintained their custom of dining at five whenever they were not entertaining guests. It was something Flora attributed to their age.

Her late father had been the youngest of the family, Aunt Farnleigh the eldest, and it was often supposed by those who had not been introduced that Flora was under the care of grandparents, rather than her aunt and uncle.

It had not worried Flora when she was younger, but in recent years she had become aware that they were becoming more fixed in their ways. She smiled fondly at her aunt .

‘It is a fine evening and there are a good two hours of daylight yet. Plenty of time for a walk.’

‘Very well, my love,’ said Aunt Farnleigh. ‘As long as you take Betty or one of the other maids with you.’

‘I shall not go alone, Aunt,’ Flora promised her.

‘And be back before sunset,’ added her uncle, not looking up from his newspaper.

‘I shall make sure of it, sir.’

Flora dropped a light kiss on his head as she passed and ran off to collect her pelisse and bonnet.

* * *

Ten minutes later she was walking briskly down the drive.

When she reached the gates, she crossed the road and proceeded into Whilton wood.

She had every intention of being home again before dark, but as for not going out alone, she had brought Scamp, her uncle’s old spaniel, with her.

That was surely sufficient protection in these woods, where she had never seen anyone save the woodland creatures and occasionally one of the groundskeepers.

The wooded valley was her favourite walk and this her favourite time of year, with the bluebells in full bloom and even now, so late in the day, the wild garlic was adding its pungent scent to the air.

She had not gone far before she realised that the recent rains had saturated the ground, and when Scamp came bounding back with his liver and white flanks a uniform muddy brown, she realised it was too wet to continue walking down into the valley.

Calling the little dog to heel, she made her way upwards until she came to the narrow lane through the woods that led directly to Whilton Hall.

Since the grounds there were rather neglected, they would serve her purpose just as well.

At this time of the day, with the Viscount away, the gardens would be deserted.

Flora had no idea why she should be so restless. It had been coming upon her gradually all spring and, despite her work with numerous charities and helping Aunt Farnleigh with the running of Birchwood House, she felt she was drifting aimlessly into another summer.

At six-and-twenty, she had few close friends in Whilton.

The young ladies making their come-out were little more than schoolgirls, while most of those of her own age were married.

Their worlds, and conversation, revolved around home and children and, try as she might, Flora could not enter wholly into their concerns.

She bent and picked up a stick, throwing it as far as she could for Scamp to retrieve.

‘The fact is, I am bored !’ she announced to the air, watching the spaniel coming back towards her with his prize, ‘Oh, there are promises of great things, once I am married, but nothing is happening now .’

She needed an occupation, something to tax her. She had reached the edge of the woods and could see the gardens of Whilton Hall ahead of her. The roofs and upper floors of the house were visible beyond the overgrown hedges and everything was bathed in the warm evening sunlight.

‘Well, there is no reason why I shouldn’t imagine how I might reorganise the gardens,’ she said aloud, quickening her pace. ‘Scamp, come!’

Before her, on the bend in the track, was a hornbeam hedge with a gate into the formal gardens.

She stepped through the gate into the overgrown shrubbery, thinking, not for the first time, that Whilton Hall deserved better care.

The Viscount employed only one elderly gardener plus a few assistants who kept the paths free merely by hacking back the bushes, heedless of the way they grew higher in an attempt to reach the sunlight.

This resulted in the shrubbery walk being in almost constant shadow and not at all the place to linger.

Scamp, clearly not sharing her opinion, went off into the undergrowth to explore new scents while Flora walked on to the Italian garden.

This, too, showed some signs of neglect, but at least here the groundskeepers maintained the lawns and kept everything trimmed to a more manageable height, allowing sunlight to reach the flowerbeds.

Flora made her way around the paths, thinking of the improvements she would like to make.

The small pool around the fountain should be restocked with goldfish and the colonnade leading to the next part of the gardens would look far better if it was covered by climbing plants.

What should they be? she mused as she reached the end of the colonnade and stepped through the arched opening in the hedge. Honeysuckle, perhaps, or jasmine. Or—

‘Oh!’

Flora came to a halt, her pleasant daydreams shattered as she found herself face to face with a stranger.