He would concede that she had a great deal to be angry about. But really, there were limits to what one might reasonably expect. Had she had to punish him by risking her life in the curricle? He had had a nightmare ride home, expecting to come upon her mangled remains around every bend of the road and over every rise. And was it not taking anger a little too far to lock herself in her room for almost twenty-four hours?
On the first occasion when he had gone along to reason with her from the other side of the door, she had refused to come out, but her voice had certainly not done so. His ears had soon been ringing with insults and hair-raising threats. She was so ingenious, in fact, he had decided, that perhaps it was as well that a man could die only once. On the second occasion her voice had done the same as the rest of her person: it had refused to come out. He had been left holding a well-reasoned argument with a silent and unsympathetic wooden door.
And he refused utterly to avail himself of the key to the door, which Russell had suggested in the wake of a discreet cough. Fair is fair, Nicholas decided. While she was at Barton Abbey she was, he supposed, his guest, and one did not force oneself on one’s guests. Let her wait until she was off Barton property, though. Then Mrs. Katherine Mannering would find her privacy and her sullen tantrums less well-respected.
She had allowed both Thelma and Audrey into her room after a lengthy interrogation had had both girls swearing on their honor that a certain monstrous Nicholas Seyton was not lurking beyond the keyhole ready to invade her room as soon as she turned the key. She had needed to let someone in. She had not a stitch of a personal belonging in her room with her, having left her trunk in Moreton’s carriage and her reticule in the inn parlor. She had made arrangements to leave for London the following morning, traveling with Thelma and her father and brother.
Kate was feeling foolish. It had been the obvious thing to do, in her embarrassment on her return, to rush to her room and lock the door. And it had seemed a good idea to show Nicholas that she was still angry and still had not forgiven him, by refusing to come out of her room. She had even enjoyed abusing him through the locked door. There had been no danger that the sight of him would weaken her resolve.
But she had really put herself into a nasty predicament. How was she to get out of the room without looking and feeling remarkably silly? And so she had been stuck there for two whole nights and an interminable day in between. It did not help to hear from Thelma all the disclosures that had been made during her absence and all the happiness that seemed to fill the house except for the small area of her room.
So Nicholas was happy, was he? He had good reason to be. He had suddenly acquired a respectable name, a title, fortune and property, a mother and a half-brother. And he was to leave later that very day to meet his mother in London. Who would not be happy under such circumstances? He had probably forgotten completely about her. He had not been to her room to try to coax her out since early the previous afternoon.
Kate was feeling satisfyingly sorry for herself as she sat on the edge of her bed, her packed belongings around her once again, waiting for Audrey to indicate to her that the carriage was ready at the door. She did not particularly welcome the thought of having to share a carriage with Lord Barton, but really she was thankful that she had a way of leaving the Abbey and returning to the sanity of her Aunt Priscilla’s house in London without any further delay.
The next few minutes would bring the worst ordeal, she decided when Audrey had knocked on the door and Kate had finally opened it wide to allow two footmen to carry her luggage downstairs. He would undoubtedly be waiting in the hall to see the travelers on their way. Well, she would just not let his presence bother her. She would keep her features quite composed and she would neither look at him nor speak to him. She would walk past into the carriage. If she were lucky, Lord Stoughton or a footman perhaps would be there to hand her in. She took a resolute breath and stepped out of the sanctuary of her room.
He was there, as she had anticipated. She did not have to look up to see him. She could feel him. Good heavens, why had she not realized long since that Sir Harry Tate was Nicholas Seyton? She had always had a sixth-sense type of awareness of both men. He was shaking hands with Lord Stoughton, and his brother stood beside him. The latter turned toward her as she stepped across the hall.
“Ah, madame,” he said, “how pleased I am to meet you again and to thank you for leading me to discovering my brother.” He took her hand and raised it to his lips.
Kate smiled at him deliberately as punishment to Nicholas, who had also turned in her direction. “I am glad for your sake, sir,” she said, “that your fears proved to be groundless.”
“Katherine . . . ” Nicholas began.
Kate let her eyes sweep over and past him, gathered her pelisse about her as if to avoid brushing against him, and swept through the open door to the waiting carriage. Lord Stoughton handed her in. It was perhaps a good thing that she missed Nicholas’ grin and the wink he directed his brother’s way before he made a dash for the staircase and raced up the stairs in most undignified manner, three at a time.
Kate stared stonily out of the carriage window for the remaining five minutes before it began to move and for the journey down the driveway and out onto the main road. What a dreadful thing pride is, her stubborn mind was telling her. Here she was, sitting in a carriage which was every moment taking her farther and farther away from him, plunging her deeper and deeper into misery, and all for pride. All so that he should not have the satisfaction of thinking himself forgiven.
Well, she thought determinedly, there was no point now in regretting anything she had done in the last few weeks. Better to put it all behind her and turn her mind to the future. No experience in life, no matter how painful, she recalled her father saying, is ever wasted if one learns from it. She had learned from this experience, right enough. She had learned that she must set herself to being a quiet, meek-and-mild governess. A nice quiet life without any emotional upheavals. Heavenly bliss! That would be her life from this moment on. She had learned to know herself at last.
“How lovely it is to have both you and Adam in the carriage with us,” Thelma was saying to her father. “For once I feel completely safe. Even with Sidney a few days ago I felt somewhat apprehensive, did I not, Kate? I suppose that once one has been held up once by a highwayman, one is bound to be nervous ever after. Though as Aunt Alice pointed out just yesterday, most people never get held up even once. It is safe to assume that if one has been held up, the same thing cannot possibly happen again.”
“I don’t think that particular highwayman is likely to show himself in these parts again,” the earl assured her a moment before the carriage lurched and began to pull to an abrupt halt.
Thelma shrieked.
“What the devil?” Adam Seyton said, pulling down the window and poking his head outside to see what had caused the commotion. “By Jove, Thelma, it’s that same highwayman. Of all the nerve! It is broad daylight.”
Thelma shrieked again and tried to burrow her way inside her father’s coat.
The door of the carriage opened from the outside to reveal emptiness. “You may all stay inside and take your ease,” a deep voice with the trace of a French accent said. “The wench who was saucy to me last time may jump down. The one in the gray garments.”
“You may go to hell with my blessing, sir,” Kate said very distinctly, sitting coolly in her corner of the carriage, her back straight and her hands folded in her lap.
Horse and rider appeared in the doorway suddenly, and the masked blond figure of the highwayman leaned inside, grabbed Kate by the waist before she had a chance to recover from her surprise, and swung her out and up before him on the saddle.
“Put me down this instant!” she hissed.
“Oh, I say,” Adam Seyton protested. “This will not do at all, you know, fellow. Mrs. Mannering is on her way to London and has no fortune on her person. I have twenty guineas. Take those and release her immediately.”
“Mrs. Mannering is a fortune,” the highwayman said before spurring his horse forward out of sight of the occupants of the carriage.
“Continue on your way, coachman,” he called to that individual, who strangely enough had put up no fight or protest at being stopped so rudely on the open highway. Perhaps equally strangely, Clive Seyton had made no attempt to dissuade the highwayman from kidnapping his daughter’s companion.
“Put me down this instant,” Kate demanded, trembling with rage, “or I shall shriek and start clawing at your face so that you will be sorry you ever set eyes on me.”
“If you do those two things, Katherine,” Nicholas said, “I doubt if I will be sorry. I shall be dead and so will you. On horseback is not the place for an out-and-out fight. Wait until we reach the cottage and then you may go at me to your heart’s content.”
