Chapter Seven #2
But then, at a snarled, “Get him,” from the Weasel, the gang of drunks fell onto Mr. Campion all at once. Fists flew and there were grunts of pain.
Alarmed, Lyssa called out to the other guests, “Please, someone, help him.”
No one moved. Instead, they started making wagers on the winner—and the odds were not on Mr. Campion.
Lyssa could stand by no longer. Turning from the window, she reached for the ironstone pitcher and flew out the door, heading toward the steps.
Ian thought he was holding his own very well. He understood bully boys. They weren’t that hard to beat once you got the first punch in.
One lad was down and out or faking it; it really didn’t matter.
Another joined him in short order. Still a third was backing away.
Ian’s final trick was to pick up the lightest of the remaining three and toss him like a caber into his fellows, which included their ill-tempered leader.
The three of them tumbled down, and before Ian could pick up the little one to do it again, one man held up his hand, a sign that he’d had enough.
Ian stepped back. “I think you’d all best leave now.”
“We’re going, and too sober for our own good,” the Weasel admitted. He turned to help pick one of his friends up off the ground. The others stumbled off toward the road to the jeers and calls of the inn’s guests, who had witnessed their humiliation.
Ian turned to the innkeeper and his son. They’d both climbed out of the horse trough and were shivering wet in the night air. “Come, let us get you both a toddy and return to our beds.”
“Thank ye, sir. They are a rowdy bunch and I tell ye I am glad to see them get a bit of their own back. Ye’ve been in the ring, haven’t ye?”
“A bit,” Ian answered. He was tired. He needed sleep. Unfortunately, the innkeeper was in even worse shape. The poor man lost his balance and fell against Ian, who held his elbow to steady him.
At the same time, a blur of flaming red hair rushed out the door. Both Ian and the innkeeper turned in surprise.
“Leave him alone!” Miss Harrell announced and before Ian realized her intent, she smashed a pottery pitcher over the innkeeper’s head.
The man straightened in surprise, then his eyeballs rolled up and he fell backward, hitting the ground with a thump.
“My father!” the lad shouted, dropping to his side.
“His father?” Miss Harrell repeated.
“His father,” Ian confirmed.
Two hours later, after doing everything in their power to repair the damage, Lyssa and Mr. Campion were unceremoniously thrown out into the night.
Mr. Campion was not happy.
They walked down the moonlit road in silence, his long legs eating up the ground so fast that Lyssa had to skip every fourth step to keep up. She knew he had good reason to be angry…He was tired…and every once in a while he’d flex his fingers, clenching and unclenching them as if they hurt.
Finally, she could take the silence no longer. “I have the tin of salve. Perhaps it would help your hand?”
He didn’t answer.
“How was I to know the fight was over?” she argued. “I was running to your aid, which is more than anyone else back there was doing.”
He shifted his knapsack from one shoulder to the other, not looking at her.
“Don’t you believe the innkeeper may have overreacted?” she said. “After all, I didn’t intend to hurt him.”
Mr. Campion stopped so abruptly, she ran into him. In the darkness it was like running into a iron wall. She took a step back. His eyes glittered in the night.
“You cracked the man’s pate open,” he said, the Irish in his voice stronger than normal, a sign of how tired he was.
“It took a good half hour for him to stop seeing double, and I’ve spent what little coin I had paying to have him stitched up.
I know you don’t have a concept of money, Miss Harrell, but I do, and being without means we live by our wits, which lately seems to be in short supply. ”
“I thought I was helping you.”
“You weren’t.” He took another step forward, then stopped as he thought of another crime to lay at her door. “Furthermore, I told you to stay in the room. Do you remember?”
She pulled her plaid tighter around her. “Yes…”
“The next time I tell you to do something—do it.”
She nodded, stung by the sharpness in his voice. And she felt like the outsider. Again. In fact, she didn’t know when she’d ever felt so alone. “Yes, Irishman, you’ve made yourself very clear.”
Tension lashed out between them. She had stepped over the line. Yet she would not call her proud words back.
His strong hands took each of her arms. He leaned down until his face was at her eye level.
“You are a job, Miss Harrell, nothing more and nothing less,” he stated as if he’d been repeating the phrase over and over in his mind.
“I am going to take you safely to London and collect my money. And then, I’m going to pack up my sisters and their children and escape this infernal land for someplace where we won’t be having our heritage thrown in our face whenever someone wants to insult us.
Where we can be who we are and what we choose to be.
So be thankful I need the money your father is paying me.
Otherwise, I’d turn on my heel and leave you right here. ”
“You wouldn’t,” she whispered, fearful that he would.
They stood so close they were practically nose to nose. He pressed his lips together, his jaw hardening, and for a moment she could see he struggled with himself before admitting, “Damn me for being a fool, I wouldn’t.”
His hands released her and he turned away. Running an exasperated hand through his hair, he said, “Damn, I wish I had my hat…If there truly is a patron saint of lost causes, I’d best light a candle to him.”
“We aren’t in dire straits, are we?” The idea hadn’t even occurred to her. Frankly, with him at her side, she’d not worried about the details.
At that moment a fat drop of rain landed on Lyssa’s shoulder, followed by another, and another. The moon was still out, but quick-moving clouds were taking its place.
Mr. Campion swore under his breath and didn’t even bother to comment. Hooking his arm in hers, he said, “We’d better run for shelter.” The truth of his words was proven as the rain started coming down harder.
They dashed off the road to what little protection the forest could offer. Within minutes, lightning also made an appearance. Lyssa pulled her plaid up over her head.
Coming out into a clearing, Mr. Campion had started to turn them back toward the woods again, when lightning lit the scene and he gave a shout. “Over there. A run-in shelter. Come on.”
They made it to the shelter just before the skies opened and the rain fell like sheets. For a moment, they sat in the dark, thankful for dry ground and catching their breaths. From what Lyssa could tell, their safe haven was only a few feet deep and perhaps six feet wide.
Mr. Campion moved first. He took off his jacket. “Here, get out of your wet shawl or else you’ll chill.”
She dropped her plaid, setting it to the side, and crossed her arms. “Where do you think we are?”
“In a shepherd’s shelter,” he answered, leaning against the back wall, one leg stretched out, the other knee bent.
Lyssa’s shoes were soaked—again. She took them off and placed them next to the shawl. Her toes were cold, so she drew her legs up and tucked them under the hem of her skirt.
“Do you think it will rain long?” she dared to ask.
“I don’t know.” After a beat, he said, “Lie down and try to get some sleep. We have a long day on the morrow.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll keep watch.”
“You must sleep, too.”
With dogged stubbornness he said, “I earn my money keeping watch.”
Lyssa sensed she’d best not press the issue. She stretched out on her side, resting her head on her arms, careful not to touch him.
However, sleep didn’t come. She didn’t like the tension between them. She wanted to make amends.
Mr. Campion rubbed his face and yawned. She could hear the scratch of his whiskers. He settled himself more comfortably against the back wall.
At last she dared to say, “I’ve always enjoyed the sound of rain. If I listen closely, I believe I can hear someone whispering as when it falls through the branches.”
Lyssa didn’t expect him to answer her, so she was doubly surprised when he said, “The whispers you hear are the fairies complaining they’ve had their sleep disturbed.”
She laughed, delighted with the image. She relaxed, cradling her head in her arms, but her mind was even more awake now.
The air smelled of rain and wet earth. She waited, debating with herself whether or not she should say anything…
and in the end, as always, curiosity won out.
“You said you have the keeping of your sisters and their children. Where are their husbands?”
“Dead.”
He was not one to mince words, but the way he said this one sent a chill through her.
Lyssa sat up, brushing her hair back from her face. “I’m sorry.”
He didn’t answer but she could see the silhouette of his profile as he stared straight out into the steady rain. His arm rested on his bent knee and she noticed he rubbed his thumb against his index finger, a sign he wasn’t completely as stoic as he seemed.
Before she questioned the wisdom of it, she reached out and touched his shoulder. Nothing more, nothing less. A quick, simple touch.
Slowly, he turned to face her, his features masked by the night. “I told them to stay where I’d left them, but they came after me. They worried about me and couldn’t stay behind.”
Exactly what she had done.
“Where were you?”