Page 72 of The Cornish Bride

Chapter Thirty-Three

“Ithink I might come riding with you this morning,” Sam said, as he and Ysella sat at breakfast in the dining room on the day following the aftermath of the shipwreck.

Ysella, who had been eating a slice of toast, set it back on her plate and fixed him with a surprised stare. “You will?”

Sam nodded. “I was wondering if you’d like to dip your toes in a more manageable bit of the ocean? If we ride along to Branok Bay. The weather is set fine for the day, there’s very little wind blowing and the waves should be small enough not to present any danger to us.”

“Paddle? With my bare feet?”

“Yes. Barefooted. I thought if we were to take Jem with us on the pony he uses for the lawns, he could take care of our horses while we walk along the beach.”

A smile lit Ysella’s face that was reward enough for Sam. “I should love that.” She sprang out of her chair. “I shall go and put my riding habit on.”

Sam held up a hand. “Why don’t you wear your breeches?”

She froze, her head coming round slowly to stare him in the eye. “My breeches?”

“Yes. Your breeches. Can you imagine how awkward it would be to walk along in the sea with all the extra fabric that’s in a riding habit trailing behind you? And if it were to get wet, which it most likely would, think how uncomfortable that would be for you on your ride back.”

“Oh, Sam!” Before he could stop her, she bounced up to him and bending over, kissed him on the cheek. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.” As she retreated, she glanced back over her shoulder and he saw the light of mischief in her eyes. “Martha will be so cross!” Then she was gone.

Sam sat in his chair for a minute longer, all appetite for his breakfast flown out the window with Ysella’s chaste kiss still tingling on his cheek. At least he’d made her happy this morning. That was a start.

*

Astride Lochinvar andHercules, both of whom were skittish and lively as they hadn’t been out for a few days because of the storm, Sam and Ysella took the lane towards Branok Bay. Martha had confined Ysella’s glorious hair with a black ribbon, and no one who saw her could have mistaken her for a real boy, despite the breeches and gansey she’d donned. She seemed to have taken more than a passing fancy to the gansey, and it did suit her well. However, despite the puritanical dress, she looked what she was, a beautiful young woman dressed in the clothes of her brother.

Sam kept Hercules close enough to Lochinvar that his leg kept rubbing against Ysella’s knee, and as she made no effort to move away, he assumed she probably didn’t mind. Or liked it. He certainly did. The simple touch of knee against knee sent tendrils of electricity coursing through him, making riding an uncomfortable business. He chided himself for nurturing feelings of lust. He mustn’t think of her in that way, lest he frighten her. He must remember what she’d suffered with that cad.

Jem, delighted to be removed from his gardening duties yet again, jogged along behind them on the fat gray garden pony. As he was far younger than the two new outdoor servants Sam had employed, this necessitated him receiving all the worst and most boring jobs, so his elation at escaping their control and being treated with a trip to the beach was not surprising.

His long skinny legs dangled down on either side of the pony, which was very small and did not possess a saddle, but nothing could deter Jem from enjoying himself and, every so often, he broke into a tuneless whistling.

“Have you ever paddled in the sea?” Ysella asked Sam, pushing a tendril of hair out of her eyes. They were riding through the dunes now, halfway along the beach, a fresh wind off the sea picking up the dry sand and twirling it in the air in little dust devils.

He shook his head. “This’ll be the first time for me as well.”

Emerging from the dunes, they found the tide halfway in, or it could have been halfway out. Sam had no idea and Jem, when asked, was no help. Leaving Jem sitting on the pony near the path through the dunes, they took their horses for a canter along the beach before returning to Jem and dismounting.

“Now for a paddle,” Sam said with a grin at Ysella, handing Hercules’s reins to Jem and giving him his sternest glare. “Wait here and don’t let them wander. No going to sleep.”

He turned to Ysella. “Give Lochinvar to Jem and take off your shoes and stockings.”

*

Ysella rolled herstockings up and slipped them inside her boots, then, with a quick wave to Jem, who was already looking bored and fed up, she headed towards the high-water line. A thick matting of dried seaweed, bits of rope and old cork floats from fishing boats, mixed with shells and dead crabs blocked her way.

Sam bent over to pick something up from the mess of dark seaweed. “I believe this little thing is called a mermaid’s purse.”

He was holding out a piece that looked much the same color as the seaweed, but had four pointed corners to it and might have been some sort of container. Sam smiled. “Some kind of egg case no doubt. I only know because Jem showed me the one he has in his collection of things he’s picked up off the beach.”

Ysella picked up a long, flat, lozenge-shaped white object. “I wonder what this is. Do you think Jem will know?”

Sam shrugged. “It looks almost like some sea creature’s bone, although it’s a strange shape to be useful as a bone. We really need to get someone who knows about sea life to come down here with us. I’m not sure Jem is the right one to ask. He couldn’t tell me what the mermaid’s purse might be for—other than that he believes it to truly be what its name implies.” He chuckled.

Ysella beamed. “Who’s to say it isn’t what it purports to be? Don’t forget, Kit thought Morvoren might have been a mermaid and sometimes…” Here she giggled. “Sometimes I wonder if she might have been.” She handed him the piece of bone. “Can you put it in your pocket so we can ask Jem later? But I think Uncle Jago might be better. Perhaps if I walk down to Nanpean Cove, I can persuade him to give me a natural history lesson. I’m not so much in awe of him as I was. Not now. After the other night.”

“That would be nice. I’d like that. Tomorrow, maybe?”