In for a Penny (29 page)

“I
mean
,” Sir Jasper said with savage mockery, “that you are destroying everything I’ve worked for.”

Penelope wanted to say something rational and soothing, something that would make Sir Jasper see—but the words died in her throat. There was no making Sir Jasper see anything. He was mad, and he hated her, and she was alone with him save for a girl who hated her too. “Sir Jasper.” She hated the thready sound of her own voice. “Please, there’s no need—”

“There is
every
need! Since Bedlow married you things have gone from bad to worse.”

“Sir Jasper—”

But it was as if the sound of her voice was anathema to him. His face contorting, he raised the pistol. “You’ve done all the talking you’re going to do.”

Penelope stared down the gleaming barrel of the gun and, to her complete surprise, instinctively covered her stomach.

Unexpectedly, Agnes Cusher stepped forward. “Sir Jasper, surely you needn’t—”

“Oh, yes,” Sir Jasper said with sudden calm. “I’d forgotten about you. Don’t think I’m going to let a Jacobin’s wife like you ruin everything.” The gun swung away from Penelope, and there was a report, unnaturally loud in Penelope’s ears. Agnes cried out and toppled to the ground.

Penelope only had a moment to decide what to do. If she stayed where she was, Sir Jasper would use his second shot on her. She looked at Nev’s grandfather’s ruin, rising over the top of the Greygloss trees. She turned toward it, gathered up her skirts, and ran directly into the forest.

“Stay here,” the man told Amy. “I’m going to see if I can find someone to take care of you.”

She hurt all over and there was a pounding in her ears. “I don’t need someone to take care of me. Lady Bedlow does.”

“Lady Bedlow has a husband to take care of her!” The man left the room. Amy tried to think if there was anything else she could do, anyone else she could turn to.

She would try to send a message to Greygloss. Perhaps she could give it to a servant. There must be paper—there must—she tried to stand, the blood rushed to her head, and she fainted for the second time that day.

The crowd was obviously shaken. Mrs. Bailey had pushed her way to the front. “Are you all right, my lord?”

“I am fine,” Nev said curtly. “Mrs. Spratt, are you injured?”

Helen looked subdued. “No. I didn’t mean to spook the animal.”

“No. You only meant to make me think you would shoot me in the face if I stood in your way. This has gone far enough. Go home, all of you, before you do something you will really be hanged for.”

“She could be hanged just for firing at you, my lord,” Aaron said with a spark of his old defiance. “What have we got to lose now?”

Nev raised his eyebrows. “I don’t plan to tell anyone about this. Least of all Sir Jasper, when he comes to read the Riot Act. Go home. Bring in the harvest. The money from the
corn will pay for lawyers for your men. I swear I will do everything I can to help them.”

“And if you can’t save them?”

“Then I can’t. They broke the law. They knew the risks. I’m sorry. But if I can’t help them, then you certainly cannot.”

“And that is supposed to comfort us,” Aaron said with quiet bitterness. “That there is nothing we can do. That we are not real men, that we’re helpless to protect our families. The law is wrong. They were
hungry
.”

Nev’s heart clenched. “I know.” Then he had an idea. A compromise.
It doesn’t have to be all or nothing
, Penelope had said. “I know it has been hard for you at Loweston. For all of you. My wife and I are trying to make things better. Perhaps you would like to select one or two among yourselves to be…delegates. To come speak to us and our steward once a week. To tell us what you need.”

Murmurs began in the crowd. Nev thought they sounded considering. And Helen Spratt looked completely nonplussed—as well she might, since if a similar arrangement existed anywhere in England, Nev had certainly never heard of it. “You—you’d do that?”

Nev wondered if he would regret this. But it seemed fair. “We can’t promise to follow all your suggestions. Money will be tight, especially in the coming year. But we’ll listen and do our best.”

“Will you get rid of Tom Kedge?” someone shouted from the crowd.

The tension eased out of Nev so abruptly he found himself laughing, a little shakily. Louisa’s elopement had one good consequence after all. “That I can promise you!”

That simply, it was over. He could feel it. There would be negotiations and perhaps a few more protestations of good faith to be made, but there would be no blood. Weak with relief, he was already planning the conversation he would
have with Penelope upon his return, when rapid hoofbeats came clearly from the direction of the house.

The crowd froze, staring in the direction of the sound. Nev hoped to God it wasn’t Sir Jasper. But when the horse came into view, and he recognized Thirkell in his most reckless hell-for-leather gallop, the shock of fear that went through him was worse than had an entire band of yeomen been riding down on his people. He could think of no reason for Thirkell to have left both their families that was not of the direst.

The horse drew closer. Nev ran to meet him.

Thirkell dismounted, gasping for breath. “Lady Bedlow—your wife—she’s run off somewhere. I can’t find her.”

Nev stared, unable to take it in. Penelope was missing; she was somewhere on these unfamiliar grounds, laced with traps to catch poachers. Where could she have gone?
Why
would she have gone?

Then there was a gunshot, somewhere to the east and close. Nev took off running, not waiting to see who followed him.

He crested a hill, and his blood froze; the crumpled figure of a woman lay on the path skirting the Greygloss woods. He could not quite be ashamed of his relief when he recognized Agnes Cusher’s faded gown and blonde hair. Someone raced past him, and he realized that he
was
followed—by the entire crowd. Thirkell caught up with him, panting.

“Aggie!” cried the man who had passed him. “Aggie!” He fell to his knees and turned her gently over, revealing a blood-soaked bodice that, thank God, still rose and fell. “She’s breathing,” Aaron said in relief as Nev reached them.

Agnes’s eyes drifted open. “He shot me…Bastard looked right at me and shot me.”

“Who?” Nev asked, crouching on her other side. “Who would do such a thing?”

“Sir Jasper. He made me bring her here. Don’t blame Josie, please—”

Nev knew he ought to speak gently to a woman in pain, but he found himself saying fiercely, “Who? Bring who here?”

“Lady Bedlow. She ran into the forest. He ran after her. Know it sounds crazy.”

Nev remembered that vicious gleam in Sir Jasper’s eyes when he looked at Penelope. It did not sound crazy at all. “Which way?”

“Toward Loweston.” Her hand fluttered. “Sorry—”

Nev didn’t wait to hear it. He stood. “I’m going after her.”

He tried to think how he would even begin to search for Penelope in Sir Jasper’s woods, filled with traps for poachers that only Sir Jasper knew—then his thoughts caught up with themselves.
Traps for poachers
. There were men here to whom Greygloss land was not as unfamiliar as it was to Nev. In his mind the most reckless compromise he had ever made sprang into life. He turned to the crowd. “Sir Jasper has my wife somewhere on these grounds. Some of you know Greygloss better than I do. Please, come with me and help me save her!”

“Why should we risk our necks for your wife?” someone shouted, and although he was shushed by several voices, the crowd still waited for Nev’s answer.

Nev fought down his rage and his terror, fought down the urge to shout at them that Penelope was worth a hundred of them and he would
make
them help. That could not serve Penelope now. He didn’t think about what he was about to promise them. “Because if you do I will
personally
see those men freed from jail. Your families for mine. Do we have a bargain?”

“What about Aggie?” Aaron asked.

“Take her home. I’ll pay for the doctor. Who’s coming with me?”

Aaron reached for Agnes, but she flinched away. “Go with his lordship.”

“Aggie, you’re hurt, I can’t leave you!”

A tear leaked out of the corner of her eye. “All my fault. If I’d married you, Josie would never have had to take to poaching—”

“Aggie, please,” Aaron said, almost begging, “let me take you to a doctor!”

Nev’s mind was filled with a hundred terrifying images of Penelope afraid, of Penelope in pain. The one thing he did not allow himself to think was that it might already be too late. “I don’t have time for this. I’m going.”

Aaron didn’t look up. “You won’t get far without help.”

“Someone else will take me to a doctor,” Agnes told him. “You have to save Lady Bedlow.”

Aaron bowed his head. Then he picked Agnes up as gently as if she were a porcelain vase neither of them could ever afford and carried her to one of the other men. “Take care of her.” Then he turned to the mob and roared, “Let’s get this bastard! Who’s with me?”

The mob roared back.

Nev’s vision blurred. “Wonderful. Thirkell, go to the Loweston side and start a search there in case she got through.”

“Of course,” Thirkell said, dependable as always.

“Thirkell—” Nev put a hand on his arm. “If I don’t come back—tell Percy to take good care of Loweston. And wish him and Louisa joy for me.”

Thirkell didn’t protest or try to make a comforting speech. He just nodded and got back on his still-winded horse, spurring her on toward the Grange.

Nev turned and saw that Aaron was organizing a contingent of men, most of them armed. “Give me a gun,” he said.

“No,” Aaron said, and continued on.

“I wasn’t asking.”

Aaron looked at him and laughed. “These aren’t nice, reliable weapons like yours, my lord. These guns belong to these men, and they know just how far to the left they fire and how hard they jump. You’d have trouble hitting the broad side of a barn. Have you got a knife?”

Nev reached into his pocket. His fist closed around his pocketknife. “Yes. Let’s go.”

Penelope was lost, and close behind her she could hear Sir Jasper crashing through the woods. She was winded, and weak from having barely eaten in two days. Any second now Sir Jasper would emerge from a stand of trees and find her a pathetically easy target, and she had no idea which direction led toward Loweston and safety.

Perhaps running wasn’t the answer. She slipped behind a tree and prayed Sir Jasper would pass her by.

His footsteps came nearer and nearer. She held her breath and pressed herself against the tree until she could feel the knots digging into her back through her stays. She could hear him going past. Now if she could just inch her way round to the other side of the tree so he wouldn’t see her if he glanced behind him…

He was nearly past when a slight breeze set her skirts billowing. She snatched them back; Sir Jasper had stopped moving. She held herself poised for flight—

An arm snaked round the tree and grabbed hold of her, and she screamed so loudly she would have been embarrassed if she weren’t occupied in trying to get free. Thrashing wildly, she hurled herself backward so that his hand smashed into the rough bark of the tree. His grasp loosened, and she threw herself into headlong flight. He was close behind her—she could hear him. Afraid to look back, she put on a last
burst of speed, and something came into abrupt focus ahead of her.

She skidded to a halt, her stomach an inch from a tripwire. She backed up a step, turned, and saw another to her right. The two wires came together at a tree a foot away, and at their junction a gun was mounted on a swivel. She turned. Sir Jasper stood about five feet away, watching her.

“If you come near me—” She coughed; her throat had gone dry. Swallowing, she tried again. “If you come near me, I’m sure I can contrive to get us both shot.”

“I’m afraid I shall have to risk it,” Sir Jasper said with the wry smile she had once, briefly, thought charming. “I seem to have used up my ammunition.”

“That wasn’t very well-planned.”

His mouth twisted irritably. “Perhaps not. But I shall enjoy strangling you.”

He advanced on her. Penelope was preparing to dodge when she heard a noise to her left. She cut her eyes that way, and the absurdly loud pounding of her heart seemed to double in volume.

It was Nev, edging toward them, about thirty feet away.

Any second now Sir Jasper would hear him too, and the element of surprise would be lost.

Without conscious thought, Penelope began to cry. It was surprisingly easy. Years of crying silently with her face pressed into her pillow seemed to melt away; she sobbed and heaved and made horrible gasping noises. “Please! Sir Jasper, please, I’ll do anything!”

Amazingly, he stopped. “Oh, for God’s sake.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t help it!” It took all her willpower not to look toward Nev. She couldn’t hear his footfalls over the noise of her own tears.

“You’ve got snot dripping down your chin,” Sir Jasper said. “You’re a disgusting little thing, aren’t you?”

Even at that moment, it stung. She must look horrendous.

He took a step closer and repeated, louder, “
Aren’t
you?”

“Yes!” She wiped at her nose with her sleeve. “Yes, I am. I know I am, but please—”

“Please what?” Sir Jasper was enjoying himself now. “Please don’t snuff out your pathetic, vulgar little life? You ought to be thanking me for putting you out of your misery. If Bedlow’s tired of you already, just think how he’s going to feel when you’re six months gone and fat as a sow.”

Through her sobs, Penelope heard a twig crack. Sir Jasper blinked, and Penelope screeched like a fishwife, “Nev isn’t tired of me!” A triumphant smile spread across Sir Jasper’s face, and Penelope hated him, just hated him. She wiped her nose on her sleeve and glared.

“Oh, isn’t he?” he said. “You’re crazy about him, aren’t you?”

The sobs froze in Penelope’s throat. She stared at Sir Jasper, at Sir Jasper’s horrible smile, and could not think, could not speak, could not make a sound. Sir Jasper’s eyes flickered again, as if he were going to look away, and Penelope heard herself say loudly, her voice choked with tears and nearly unrecognizable, “Yes! Yes! I’m crazy about him! Are you happy now?”

“And how do you suppose he feels about you?” Sir Jasper asked.

Nev rolled under the tripwire and came up in a crouch, his knife out. “He feels pretty much the same.” He lunged at Sir Jasper.

Within a very few moments, Penelope had more sympathy with Gothic heroines than she ever had before. There simply did not appear to be anything she could do to help Nev, or even anything she could do that wouldn’t actively hinder him. So she stood like a particularly useless stone and watched as he and Sir Jasper lunged and feinted and were
very, very careful not to step too far to the left or right, because the tripwires were close.

The one good thing was that Nev knew what he was doing. He was swift and focused, and Penelope saw quickly that he had the advantage over Sir Jasper in skill, speed, and condition. The problem was the enclosed space, and that his only weapon was a short pocketknife. Sir Jasper was soon bruised and bleeding from a dozen small cuts, but it was clear that Nev did not dare close with him for fear of toppling them all into a wire. He tried to drive Sir Jasper back, away from the deadly corner and Penelope, but Sir Jasper was no fool and refused to give ground.

But, Penelope realized, Nev did not seem desperate. He fought steadily and calmly, as if he did not have to win.

Then she thought she heard another rustle in the trees, and Nev tensed, ever so slightly.