Page 4 of Escape of the Highwayman (Escape #3)

This was much more in line with his lordship’s usual behaviour, but it did not soothe Chloe’s unease.

She stared at him. “It’s Mr. Black, isn’t it? You know him.”

“Know of him,” Papa corrected, gazing out of the window in a deliberately vague kind of a way.

“ What do you know of him?”

“Oh, just heard his name. Done very well for himself. Seems a civil sort of a fellow, considering. No smell of the shop—or the bank!—about him.”

“But you can’t mean him for Beatrice,” Chloe said appalled. “She is already disgusted by his mere presence at Ellscombe! And besides, I’m fairly sure Mrs. Dunwoody means him for Laura.”

“Can’t blame her for trying,” Papa said. “And of course I wouldn’t waste Beatrice on him.”

Chloe’s jaw dropped. “ Me? ”

“Well, he’s not up to snuff, is he? He’ll put up with your eccentricities because he doesn’t know any better. He’ll get an aristocrat’s daughter to wife, and the family’s fortunes will be saved. Perfect.”

Not for me it isn’t! But she was incapable of saying the words. In fury and hurt, she merely sat there in dazed silence. She would be sold to a banker who wanted to thrash children for being kind because she was too eccentric to attract anyone of her own class.

And then it struck her that Beatrice had been putting up with this kind of thing, this market , for years.

***

M OLLY THE CAT WAS STILL pacing and purring on the shelf above the stable stalls. Chloe climbed up to see to her and she pressed against her chest, vibrating, before she stropped off again.

“Shouldn’t she be having her kittens by now?” she asked Joe the groom below.

“They’re all different,” Joe said laconically.

“She’s made another nest.”

“Best leave her to it then, miss.”

When they were children, they had called each other by name. There had been no sense of rank, except for who was oldest or biggest or came up with the best games.

“You will tell me if they start being born without me?” she said, climbing down the ladder. “Or if she’s distressed?”

“I will.” Joe grinned at her. “She’ll be fine, miss.”

Chloe left the stables and went back to the house, where she tracked her sisters down to their “bower.” Next to the schoolroom, the bower had been their private place since they were small.

Although still clean and ornamented these days with a few more adult touches, such as a cherished piece of porcelain and an embroidered tablecloth or two, it was in dire need of redecoration.

In fact, apart from the very public rooms, the whole house wanted refurbishment. Presumably Mr. Black was expected to pay for that, too.

“Don’t you hate it, Bea?” Chloe said, throwing herself into the smallest of the chairs, since it was the only one unoccupied.

“Hate what?”

“The marriage mart.”

Beatrice shrugged, concentrating on her needlework. “It is necessary. Suitable matches must be made.”

“But you’re beautiful, you’re charming, and you do everything right. You haven’t found anyone suitable in three years.”

Pink seeped into Beatrice’s cheeks. “Thank you for pointing that out. The emphasis is on suitable.”

“And who decides that?”

Beatrice sighed. “Papa, as you very well know. And the would-be husband or his family.”

“We have no say.”

“We do have some,” Beatrice said calmly, continuing to stitch. “What has you riled now?”

“Papa wants me to marry Mr. Black although he is clearly at Ellscombe to offer for Laura.”

“Really?” Celia dropped her needlework into her lap with some relief. “How exciting. Do you mean the family fortunes will be saved and we can all have Seasons?”

“Apart from me.”

“Well, you never really wanted one, did you?” Beatrice said reasonably. “What is this Black banker like?”

Chloe waved one impatient hand. “Oh, pleasant enough, distinguished enough. He would not disgrace us at family parties. But he wanted to thrash the children who freed my birds!”

“Lots of people want to thrash children and care little or nothing for birds and animals. After all, we eat them every day and consider ourselves lucky.”

“Not the point.” Chloe sprang up again, pacing to the window and back.

“Then what is the point? That Laura won’t speak to you? That your freedom is about to be curtailed?”

“Yes!”

There was a hint of pity in Beatrice’s face. “You grew up knowing how it would be. You just ignore what you don’t like.”

“I suppose I do,” Chloe said dully. “And I have to do this, don’t I? You’ve been doing it for three years.”

“Without getting caught,” Celia noted slyly.

Chloe’s eyes widened.

Beatrice met her gaze. “There are ways. It’s just a balance to be struck between what is good for the family and what is bearable for us. And it must be said, the world knows we are poor.”

Is that it? Is that my life? Making the best of Mr. Black before I even have one adventure? Before I see one other country that is not my own?”

Celia nudged her. “There is always the wedding journey.”

In war time? Unlikely .

In fact, thinking of lost adventure had brought the highwayman’s face back into her mind.

***

T HE CAT GAVE BIRTH to a litter of six kittens just before dinner. They looked like little insects with their eyes tight closed, but their mother licked them and fed them, and Joe said they would all likely survive.

For Chloe, it was a reminder that life went on regardless. One just had to make the best of the hand one was dealt.

She tried, but the daydreams that had always sustained her could not drown out the dinner table chatter about tomorrow evening’s dreaded party. A knot of panic had formed in her stomach and reminding herself of her duty did not help.

It was the same when she went to bed. She read until her eyelids started to close of their own volition and then turned out the lamp and lay down.

But sleep eluded her. Her thoughts were too full of Mr. Black and her family and the Bow Street runner.

She even wondered if the highwayman were caught yet or was even now holding up yet another coach on the king’s highway.

Everything was too jumbled and unsettled in her mind, and not in an exciting way that meant she could actually look forward to something.

She thought about the poor trapped birds at the market, released into freedom. And Molly the kitchen cat with her babies. She should have gone to the stables before bed to be sure they were all thriving. She had been too wrapped up in her own foolish dread.

What will be, will be , she told herself.

Mr. Black might not like her, or might already be committed to Laura, in which case, she hoped Laura liked him.

But there was nothing she could do about any of that.

She could help Molly, perhaps, if she and her kittens were in difficulty.

On that thought, she lit the lamp again and rose from the bed.

Sticking her bare feet into her boots, she wrapped herself in her dressing gown and an old shawl and crept downstairs as she often had before.

Sometimes she had met Jack Dunwoody and some of the village children like Joe and gone to scrump apples or fish in the river or just enjoy life in the different world that was nighttime. Sometimes, she had sat with a sick dog or horse, or helped deliver a foal.

She let herself out of the house, swapping her lamp for a lantern, once she had lit one from the other and doused the lamp. Then she made her way to the stables and opened the door.

Used to her, the horses didn’t move, though one gave a snort of welcome.

Most of them were out in the paddock in the fine weather.

She left them for later petting, going immediately to the ladder and climbing up one-handed until she set the lantern on the shelf and followed.

By its light she could make out Molly, curled around her kittens, eyes wide open and staring at her.

Chloe knelt in front of the little hay bed. The cat made a strange sound deep in her throat, like a growl, and yet she was not threatening Chloe. She was warning her.

Prickles ran down her neck and spine. With her heart in her mouth, she turned her head and saw the masked man in the gloom, pointing a pistol straight at her.

Even in that first, terrified glimpse, she knew it was the highwayman.