Page 6
Lord Constantine insists I accompany him to his familial estate. If I do not, he’ll terminate my employment. I shall not give him the satisfaction and can only hope the contents of my stomach stay put. You know I don’t travel well. I’m quite beside myself, anticipating the journey and possible humiliating consequences of an extended coach trip.
I can hardly carry a bucket or a chamber pot aboard and hover over it the entire journey. Pray for me. I shall need it!
Purity told me in her last letter that she saw Trinity Ablethorne at a house party. I wasn’t aware Trinity had returned to England. I wish I had her constitution for traveling. I should very much like to see her.
~Miss Faith Roth, in a letter to her girlhood friend, Chasity Noble
3 September 1818
Five miles from Dovetonwick Court
On a wretchedly bumpy stretch of road
A few minutes past three in the afternoon
Pressed into the coach’s corner, Faith clamped her jaw and squeezed her eyes shut tighter. A miserable moan clawed up her throat, but she swallowed it.
I shall not vomit. I shall not vomit.
Amid the pounding between her ears, the bile burning her throat, and her waffy stomach, she was utterly and wholly miserable.
Three days of torment had culminated in this final leg of their journey on what had to be the worst track she’d ever had the misfortune of traveling. Even Lord Constantine Kellinggrave’s well-sprung coach and thickly upholstered sage-green velvet seat couldn’t prevent Faith’s teeth from jarring and her bum from bouncing.
Embly, also suffering from motion sickness, had opted to ride atop with the coachmen.
That reprieve was not an option for Faith, or she’d have seized it.
Still, she had the gratification of once again thwarting Lord Constantine’s obvious attempt to get her to resign.
A morose Harvey Camberg-Trainer sat opposite her beside a surprisingly solicitous Lord Constantine. Mr. Camberg-Trainer’s lady love had another beau, and Mr. Camberg-Trainer had bemoaned fate and providence most of the journey from London.
His lordship had given up on his dictation efforts after the first hour when Faith finally confessed reading or writing while in a moving conveyance would likely cause her to cast up her crumpets on his glossy boots.
Not that she’d eaten crumpets or anything else for that matter. She hadn’t dared much more than a thin soup and a few bites of bread the night before they departed and not much more than dry bread since.
Why did some people have no adverse effect to the jarring and bouncing, yet she was overcome with malaise? Probably the same reason why some people suffered greatly from sea sickness and the churning and pitching of the ocean didn’t affect others at all.
Gilly occupied the seat beside her, his shaggy head in her lap. The dog had attempted to offer what doggy comfort he could between lengthy naps. He whimpered in his sleep, his legs twitching as he dashed after something in his dream.
She idly patted his back to soothe him while keeping the palm of her other hand firmly pressed to her roiling belly.
A wheel dropped into a pothole, and a stifled oath escaped his lordship.
Mr. Camberg-Trainer grunted as he scooted further back onto the seat.
“I say, Con. The roads in Essex leave something to be desired.”
“Indeed,” came his lordship’s droll response. “More so each time I visit.”
Another sharp dip resulted in a hissing breath escaping between Faith’s teeth.
God save me.
How much more of this can I endure?
“We’re almost there, Miss Roth,” Lord Constantine advised, almost kindly.
So he’d reassured her the past ten miles.
