Page 67 of Against the Wind

Chapter 23

Martin and John’s trip back to Pentridge took less time than expected, owing to the horse the good captain loaned them. Martin sent John to tend the animal and arrange for its return, and to get some breakfast. Martin’s only thought was to find Kit.

Knocking the dried mud from his boots on a stone outside, he hurried into the White Horse Inn and up the stairs to their rooms, anxious to finally share with her all that had happened. He had told her he would be late but had not expected to be gone all night. By now she’d be worried.

Their rooms were empty. All his instincts were on alert as he gazed around the sitting room and saw no signs of his wife’s having been there that morning, no breakfast tray, newspaper, or teacup where she often left them. Striding to the bedchamber, he saw the bed still turned down for the night, not mussed from sleep as he would have expected. Dread crept up his spine like icy fingers. Something was terribly wrong.

Could she have left him? She’d been angry with him for refusing to tell her why they were here or what he’d been doing at the rebels’ meetings. It was for her own protection he hadn’t told her. If she knew he was working for the Crown, Kit would have been in the middle of it. She might even have tried to help. He wasn’t taking that chance with his kitten. She had finally given herself to him and told him she loved him.

For that reason, despite the state of the room, he knew she would not leave. Certainly not without talking to him or leaving a note. Not without taking her clothes.

There was no note, so he made a quick search of the bedchamber’s armoire and her trunk. His fear grew, a brooding omnipresence, as he realized not a thing was missing. Not her brush and comb, not even her reticule. Then he saw the sketchbook.

He picked it up and flipped to the last page she had drawn upon. It was his face as seen through the eyes of love, different from the first one of him she had drawn. No, she would not leave him, he felt certain. This image was proof. But had she followed him to Hunt’s barn? He had not seen her there.

He set the sketchbook down. She had been gone since at least last night and had not left on her own, of that he was now quite certain. Hastily descending the stairs, he spotted Nanny Weightman staring out the front window of the inn. Glancing through the glass, he saw nothing of note that she could be watching.

At the sound of his boots on the floor, the older woman turned to face him with an anxious look. “Oh, Mr. Donet. It is terrible, terrible! My sons have been arrested. Have ye heard? Were ye there? Did ye see what happened?”

He joined her in the entry. “I am afraid the rebellion was doomed from the start, Mrs. Weightman. The hussars have arrested many of the men and are searching for the others.”

She sank into a chair. “It was to have been so grand, a new government where the common people had something to say….”

Her words trailed off and she stared into space. Martin was tempted to express his opinion about a mother who would push her sons into joining an uprising against the Crown, but he could see she was hurting so he refrained. Likely her sons would go to prison, or worse. Based on what he knew of Sidmouth’s plans for quashing the stirrings of rebellion, he held little hope they would remain free.

“I am truly sorry your sons and you were involved,” he said. It was the only comfort he could give the woman. The weight of Kit’s disappearance was heavy on his heart as he asked, “Have you seen my wife, Mrs. Weightman? She is not in our rooms, and it does not appear she slept there last night.”

“What?” Nanny Weightman stared at him then shook her head as if coming out of a dream. “Oh. A gentleman called on her yesterday. He told me he was to bring her to ye.” She eyed Martin, a puzzled expression on her face.

“What gentleman, Mrs. Weightman? What was his name?”

“Didn’t give a name. But I could see he was a gentleman by his clothes. There was a man with him, a hired man I’m thinking, and they had a carriage. At least I saw a carriage waiting. I returned to the kitchen before they left.”

Speaking slowly, as if to a child, Martin commanded, “Describe the man for me. The gentleman.”

“He was tall, though not as tall as ye. He had dark brown hair and eyes, and he was well groomed and clean-shaven. His face was most stern, now that I recall, even when he smiled.”

That described half of London. “Was the man from these parts?”

“No, I don’t think so. I’ve never seen him afore. His speech was very proper. Such men as that are rare in this part of Derbyshire.”

“Think carefully, Mrs. Weightman. Was there anything unusual about him, a mark of any kind?”

“Why, yes. There was a scar on his left temple.”

A stern-faced gentleman with a scar on his left temple? Suddenly Martin knew who it was. But how could that be? How could Rutledge have found Kit this far from London? There were only two explanations that made any sense. Either he’d followed them, which Martin doubted. His instincts would have told him if that had been the case. More likely, Rutledge was somehow involved in Sidmouth’s plot in the Midlands and happened to see Kit. Either Sidmouth or Castlereagh might have asked Rutledge to do the dirty work of assuring there would be armed men to shatter the rebellion urged on by Oliver. Martin had always believed someone else in the peerage was involved.

Rutledge has Kit. Tightness seized his chest as he considered the possibility of what the evil earl might already have done to his beautiful bride.

John was just sitting down to breakfast when Martin found him. “John, Kit is missing and I believe her brother-in-law Rutledge has taken her.”

John dropped his bread and nearly choked on his egg. “The same Rutledge yer lady was running from in London?”

“Yes. The same. While you saddle the horses, I’ll check the other inns in Pentridge. Perhaps I’ll get lucky and he’ll have been staying in one of them. Otherwise, we’ll have to go to South Wingfield. The magistrates there will know if a peer has been involved in this business.”

It didn’t take Martin long to end up at the Dog Inn. As he entered, he recognized the obviously distraught woman who approached. He’d seen her before. He was loath to press her for information, but there was no choice. “Madam—?”

“Mrs. Onion, sir,” she said anxiously.