Lady of the Butterflies (21 page)

He clearly did not possess one jealous bone in his body. Unless it was just that he did not love me enough to be jealous.

“You are very tolerant of him. I wonder that you are such good friends.”

“I swear I have no idea what goes on in the lad’s head half the time,” Edmund said. “Except that everything is a competition to him. He can’t help himself. And since he has no brother to compete against, I am his natural opponent.”

“You don’t mind?” But I saw that, on the contrary, Edmund enjoyed the challenge. “You were right when you said he is not an easy person. He seems rather”—I searched for a word—“erratic.”

“He is inclined to brood. Has a great deal to brood upon.” The dance formation parted us, so for a moment Edmund could say no more. As soon as we were marching side by side again, he quietly explained. “He never speaks of it, or at least not to me, would far rather suffer in silence. But I do know, from what I have gleaned from those who knew him as a child, that he has endured the most dreadful hardship, deprivation and unhappiness in his young life.”

I felt a pain somewhere beneath my ribs. “Has he?”

We parted, came together again. The music switched to the longways country dance.

“He was born into exile, spent his entire childhood as a fugitive, shifting from place to place, in constant and severe want of both friends and funds. As I understand it, he came close to perishing for lack of bread and clothing. His brother did not survive the ordeal. Nor his mother. She was of Irish descent, had relations who were massacred by Cromwell’s New Model Army at Drogheda and others who were amongst the Royalists who were deported to Barbados. The death of one son proved too much for her. Richard was left in a state of abject destitution with his embittered father, who treated him rather harshly, from what I can gather.”

I turned my eyes back to the side of the hall to where Richard had been standing. I needed to look upon him in the light of this new knowledge I had of him. But he was gone. I scanned the room, suddenly desperate to seek him out amidst the blur of silk and smiling candlelit faces. And then he was there again, by my side, as the music faded. It started up again with the gavotte and Richard cupped his hand beneath my elbow, his eyes locked on mine. “Please, Edmund,” he said in a low voice. “You have had your turn. Do not keep her all to yourself.”

“Time enough together when we are wed, I suppose,” Edmund said, graciously stepping aside.

We danced the whole of the gavotte in silence. Then the music slowed into a piece that required partners to kiss twice on the turn and I felt such a longing and need in Richard’s brief kiss on my cheek, in the way that he held me, it made tears start to my eyes.

“What’s the matter?” he asked anxiously. “Why are you crying?”

“I’m not crying.” I blinked, and a single tear spilled down my cheek and rolled to the corner of my mouth.

“It is my fault for . . .”

“No.” I shook my head. “No.”

There were two little vertical furrows between his brows, just above his nose. They gave him an expression that was softly pained, and I had the most powerful urge to put my fingers to them and smooth them away.

When he stepped up to kiss me again, he turned his head slightly and instead of kissing my cheek he aimed for the tear, his lips brushing gently against the corner of mine, kissing it away. It was a surprising and tender thing to do, and yet he managed to imbue it with a delicate eroticism.

As the lines of dancers parted I stared at him over the divide.

I held out my hands to him as the other dancers held out their hands for their partners. Richard took hold of my fingers with the lightest touch, a tingling, magnetic touch, and I was drawn back to him as the needle of a compass is drawn to its true north.

But I had no compass to guide me through this strange and alien territory I had stumbled blindly into, a dangerous and dark place where I could seemingly care for two different men at the same time. I did not know which way to turn, whom to run to and whom to run from. I was utterly lost.

AS SOON AS the ball was over, Richard made his farewells to the Earl, as was polite, but did not seem able to get away fast enough. Outside in the crisp moonlit night, he thrust his boot into the groom’s cupped hands and threw himself up into the saddle, spurring the flanks of his horse as if he were riding into battle.

Edmund and I caught up with him on the open Tickenham Road.

“A race, Edmund?” Richard suggested with fevered enthusiasm. “Across the moors?”

I turned to Edmund and to my amazement saw that rather than dismiss it for the extraordinarily foolhardy idea it so obviously was, he nodded almost as eagerly.

I looked quickly from one of them to the other, then back again. “Are you quite mad, the pair of you?”

The horses seemed to sense their riders’ excitement and were already tossing their heads, prancing and snorting and champing at their bits, as the coaches clattered past.

“It is folly,” I argued. “It is past midnight. The moor is covered in marsh and bog. You’ll not even see the river.”

“We’ll jump the damned river,” Richard said.

“And break your necks.”

“The moonlight is bright enough to see by,” Edmund placated me. “And we’ll stop before the mill. Agreed, Richard?”

He gave an agitated nod, but the dangerous glint of recklessness in his eyes made me lean over and grab the rein of Edmund’s horse. “Edmund please, I beg you, use your sense. I know these moors, every inch of them, and would not do what you are about to do. I know how dangerous they can be. Don’t do this.”

He glanced across at Richard. “I don’t have much choice,” he said grimly. “I’ve not seen him quite like this before, but when this sort of mood is on him he needs some release. Believe me, a midnight gallop is far safer than a clash of swords, or much else he might try.” He leaned across, grabbed my hand and delivered a firm, swift kiss to it. I could see that what he had said was just an excuse. He was itching for the thrill of the race every bit as much as his friend was.

Richard was the first to dig his spurs into his horse’s flanks. With a whoop and a clatter of hooves they were both off.

This is my doing, I thought despairingly. If anything happens to either of them, I will be to blame. Except that I did not know quite what I had done wrong or what I could have done differently that might have prevented it.

I watched the two riders streak away across the moonlit moor, expecting at any moment to see a foreleg buckle, snap like wicker, for horse and rider to go down. But it did not happen. Their cloaks billowed out behind them like black sails as they splashed headlong through an area of marsh, the spray flashing in the moonlight as silvery bright as their swords. I could not bear just to trot along on my own far behind them, so I urged my own little mare into an easy gallop that soon had me splattered with clods of mud and droplets of icy water. I felt my hair tear free from its pins and whip away behind my back. I yelped with the thrill of it, understanding exactly why Richard had suggested this wild, starlit chase. Not recklessness at all but high spirits and a zest for life, and there was nothing wrong with that, nothing wrong with it at all.

Edmund had been out in front at first by a head, but now it seemed that Richard had edged closer and taken the lead. Both riders had leaned lower over their horses’ straining necks, but Edmund looked to be gaining ground again. They were careering toward the mill house now and just beyond that was the Yeo. Neither horse showed any sign of slowing. Richard was ahead and I knew with a sickening certainty that he, at least, was going to try to jump the river. I knew also that it was too wide to jump and that he would fail to clear the bank. If Edmund tried to follow him, they might both be dead or fatally wounded or drowned, in a matter of minutes.

“Stop!” I called at the top of my voice, galloping full pelt at them now. “Edmund! Richard! For the love of God, stop.”

Edmund reined in at the moment that Richard’s stallion sat back on its hocks and launched itself over the river. For a moment both horse and rider seemed suspended over the water, then both crashed down just short of the far bank. With an almighty splash, the horse landed awkwardly with its hind legs in the river and its forelegs floundering and thrashing halfway out. Propelled by momentum, Richard was thrown headfirst over the horse’s neck onto the bank, one of his legs for a moment tangled messily in the stirrup.

As I galloped on toward them Edmund had already abandoned his mount and was wading chest deep through the fast-flowing river. Richard could swim, Edmund could not, but I thanked God that he was tall and strong, that the sluice would be down and there had been no heavy rainfall to speed the flow of the millrace.

Richard, I could see, was lying very still on his back on the ground. As the horse flailed to try to gain a footing, he was seriously in danger of being crushed or trampled to death. If he was not dead already.

Edmund had reached the far bank now and, at no small risk to himself from the thrashing hooves, was grappling with the stallion’s reins to try to haul it to its feet and lead it safely away.

One glance at the surging river and I knew I would stand no chance in it. I hauled on the reins, spun my horse around, blinded for a moment as the wind whipped hair across my face, then tossed my head to shake it free. I galloped along the bank to the bridge that crossed by Church Lane. It seemed to take forever to reach it. I made a promise to myself that night that if Richard survived, I would damn well make him teach me how to swim.

Edmund had tethered Richard’s horse to a tree and was now crouched beside his friend, speaking to him, urgently trying to elicit a response. “Richard! Can you hear me?”

He gave no sign that he could. His eyes were closed. Against the black of his hair and lashes his skin seemed bloodless, white as chalk in the moonlight.

“Move back, Edmund,” I ordered, surprised at how authoritative I sounded when inside I was sick with dread. Edmund did move, immediately, seemingly relieved to have someone take charge, someone who appeared to know what to do: not that I did at all, but I did at least have the common sense to crouch down by Richard and lay my ear against his chest. I felt it rise and fall, heard his heart beating, fast and uneven, but strong. I had never heard such a welcome sound. “He’s alive, at any rate.”

I wanted to shake him, make him wake up, clasp him to me. Idiot man, what had he thought he was doing?

“There’s no blood,” Edmund said. “I can’t see any blood.”

“It doesn’t mean he’s not bleeding somewhere inside.” I quickly unfastened my cloak and laid it over his prostrate body. “Stay with him,” I said to Edmund, getting to my feet. “I’ll fetch Ned, and the cart.”

Just then Richard groaned and opened his eyes. Groggily, he looked at Edmund and then to me.

“Thank God.” I knelt back down beside him and took hold of his hand in both of mine. “Richard, do you have any pain?” I asked him gently.

He looked at me pathetically, gave a small shake of his head.

“Can you move your legs, do you think?” I looked down the length of them and saw his boots twitch.

He was wet from the waist down, shivering now, and there was a cold wind that I felt keenly through the thin silk of my dress. All I wanted to do was to gather him into my arms and wrap him up warm and hold him. “I’m going to fetch the cart. I’ll be back soon,” I explained to him softly, but as I moved away he clutched at my arm with surprising strength and almost pulled me down on top of him. “Don’t leave me,” he said. “Let Edmund go.” An afterthought: “He’ll be faster.”

I looked over at Edmund, who nodded at the logic of that and quickly went to mount my horse.

“Take Richard’s,” I said.

He shook his head. “Too skittish. Yours will carry me. It’s not far.”

He rode off at a gallop, and then there was just the profound and soothing peace of the moonlit moor. An owl hooted, hunting low over the reed beds, and the slight breeze rushing through the reeds was like a deep sigh.

Richard’s eyes were open and he was looking up at me, his lips slightly parted.

“Are you still cold?” I asked him.

He nodded.

I moved closer to him, positioned myself with my legs out in front of me. “Here.” I gently lifted his head and cradled it in my lap, tucking my cloak around him more snugly. “Is that better?”

“Much.”

I held him tighter and my hair fell down around us both like a pale shroud. “You’re still trembling,” I said anxiously. “It is the shock.”

He lifted his hand and stroked a tendril of hair back off my face. “I do not think it is that.”

“Do you always take such risks, Richard?”

He did not reply, but looked at me almost as if he did not understand the question.

“You do remember what happened?” I asked fearfully.

“I am forever doing and saying things I later live to regret. I cannot seem to help it. But I could never regret this. Even if I had broken both my legs, it would have been entirely worth it.”

I sucked in a breath. “You don’t mean . . . ?”