Chapter 15 #2
He came back out a few minutes later with a man of middling years and a shiny bald spot on the back of his head, which Mantheria saw when the man bowed deeply to her.
The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a silver button.
“A lad bought his breakfast with this silver button not half an hour ago. I insisted that he had overpaid, but Noman said that he had no other means to pay and that he was not a beggar. If you would like, I can give it back to you.”
The man held out his hand close enough for Mantheria to see the familiar design of the button—it was Andrew’s. Not that the name Noman wasn’t also a pretty large clue to her son’s identity. “You may keep it if you tell me the direction that he went.”
Placing the button back into his apron pocket, the man wiped his hands on the cloth and then pointed down the road. “Just down the main road, but I did warn Noman to stay to the right; for it comes to a fork and thereabouts is the headquarters of One-Eyed Tim, the old highwayman.”
Mantheria sucked in a breath. Andrew could well and truly be in peril. “Thank you, sir. Come on, Sunny.”
She led her horse back to the center of the muddy road, and despite the villagers going about their daily business, she urged her horse to a gallop. They were so close to finding Andrew, and she needed to make sure that he was safe. Her heartbeat was thundering in her ears.
The pike road came to a fork. She pulled her horse to a halt.
She pointed, and her voice only shook a little.
“Sunny, could you possibly take the left road, just in case? If you find Andrew, you can cut across the fields. And I’ll search for him on the right road.
We are so close, and I do not wish to miss him again. ”
Mantheria half expected Sunny to refuse to leave her side or to insist that she needed to be cosseted and protected.
Instead, he pointed to her bandbox. “Take out your gun and keep it within arm’s reach.
I’ll follow the left road for two miles if I don’t see Andrew.
Then I’ll cut back across the fields to Bristol Road.
If I don’t see you, I’ll wait for you in Chewton Mendip.
Or you and Andrew can wait for me there. ”
A small laugh escaped the back of her throat. “The name of the village is truly Chewton Mendip?”
Sunny flashed her a smile that lightened her heavy heart. “I guess there are men that like to chew there and to dip.” His face quickly sobered. “Be safe, my dearest friend.”
She watched Sunny ride the other direction for only a moment or two before she took out her loaded pistol from her bandbox and placed it in the stirrup. Breathing in deeply, Mantheria urged her mount to a gentle canter. Her pulse quickened. Her son had to be close.
“Andrew! Andrew!” she called at the top of her voice, over and over again as she rode.
After nearly a mile, there was a faint, high sound that was not from herself or her horse.
She yanked on the reins and stopped to listen.
She heard nothing. Turning her horse in a circle, she saw two marks on the side of the road that might have been from feet being dragged through the mud.
They were in the direction of a copse of trees.
She focused on the trees and saw a glimpse of a dark shadow to the south of them.
It might be a stone building, but it was too far from the road and blocked by the trees for Mantheria to be certain.
Taking a calming breath, she urged her horse off the road and toward the shadow.
She could not see any further dragging marks, but after ten yards, she was certain that it was some sort of structure: home, inn, or stable.
From her distance, it appeared to be abandoned.
But Mantheria felt certain that the noise she heard had been her son’s voice.
She transferred the reins to one hand and carefully cocked the pistol, placing it in her other hand.
Her heartbeat was as loud as the clop of her horse’s hooves.
A branch brushed her arm, and she nearly discharged the gun.
Hands shaking and heart thumping, Mantheria rode around the back of the stone building to the front, where there was a weathered door and one window.
It appeared to be dark inside the structure and silent.
Perhaps the sound that she’d heard was only a figment of her imagination.
Mantheria was about to turn and leave when she heard a scuffle and a harsh whisper.
Someone was being held inside this building and needed help.
Carefully, she slid off her horse, and her legs jolted as her boots hit the ground.
She kept her pistol in her hand as she tied the bridle to the closest tree.
If she were to discharge her weapon, it might spook the horse to run back home to Tunley.
Checking the hammer on her pistol to make sure that it was cocked and ready, Mantheria slowly crept toward the stone building. A frisson of fear ran down her spine, and her stomach churned nauseously. How she wished that Sunny or one of her sisters or brothers could be here with her!
She kicked open the half-broken door and charged into the dim space with her pistol first. “Stand and deliver!” It was the shout of a highwayman in a trashy novel, but it was the first thing that came into her head.
“Drop the gun, milady, or I’ll slit the lad’s throat.”
Blinking to focus her eyes in the dark, Mantheria could see the hollowed walls of the ruin and an older man with a scraggly, long brown and gray beard holding a knife to the throat of her son.
The metal appeared rusted, and the edge was broken but sharp enough to do damage.
The vagrant man tightened his grip on Andrew’s mouth and pressed the knife against his skin.
Her son’s eyes were wide with fear. His face was dirty, and his hands had been tied behind his back.
Mantheria walked closer, her pistol still raised. “How do I know that you won’t slit both of our throats if I put down this gun?”
The captor smiled, and he was missing his front teeth.
His movements were jerky, and Mantheria could smell the stench from his body and his clothes from several feet away.
This man was desperate and possibly not in his right mind.
“You don’t, but if you want Noman back alive and well, you’ll do what I say, milady. ”
A small wave of relief rushed through her as she realized that the man did not know that he was holding a duke.
For the first time that day, Mantheria was grateful for her blowsy hair and mud-spattered gown.
She might have the voice of a lady, but she certainly didn’t look like a duchess. “What do you want?”
“Your purse.”
Mantheria’s reticule was hanging from her wrist. There were only a few coins left in it.
She almost handed it to the man, but instead, she remembered that her mother always said that if she was ever accosted, she was to throw the valuable item as far away from her as possible and run in the opposite direction.
Inhaling a swift breath, she unlatched the reticule from her wrist and threw it out of the building. “Take it and leave us.”
Rather than letting go of Andrew, the thief dragged him out of the broken door and out of the ruins, always careful to keep her son between himself and her.
Mantheria followed, seeing black spots in her vision.
Still, she held out her pistol, cocked and ready to shoot.
She was tempted to pull the trigger, but if her shot was off at all, she might hit Andrew.
Or if she missed entirely, she would be without a weapon, and this man still had a knife.
“Pick it up, boy,” the man hissed in Andrew’s ear.
Mantheria’s entire body trembled as she watched her son stoop down to pick up the reticule.
This was her chance. The thief’s torso was an open target.
She pulled the trigger, and the kickback of the pistol caused her to stumble backward a few steps and drop the weapon.
The sound and the smell of gunpowder caused her to close her eyes for only a moment.
The man had also stumbled, but he was somehow still on his feet.
She ran to her son, who was shaking all over, and untied the ropes around his hands.
She could see the red impressions on his wrists.
“You’ll pay for that, milady,” the thief spat.
Mantheria saw that her bullet had barely grazed his side, and it was bleeding slightly onto his filthy shirt. It hadn’t been a killing shot, and the rusty and horrifying knife was still in his hand. “Run to my horse and ride home, Andrew.”
Tears were running down his dirty face, making streaks. He grabbed her arm. “But Mama, I can’t leave you!”
Shrugging out of his hold, she stepped between the thief and her son. “I said to run and ride, Andrew!”
She didn’t have to look over her shoulder to hear the sound of his footsteps running away from her or the whinny of her horse. Mantheria’s eyes never left the frightening face of her assailant.
“There’s nowhere he can ride that I won’t find him after I slit your throat, my pretty lady.”
Mantheria glanced around on the ground for a weapon to protect herself with. She picked up a small rock and threw it at the man.
It hit his right shoulder, and he swore violently as he continued toward her.
Stepping backward, she desperately searched for a stick of some kind to pick up.
But there were only twigs and small rocks.
The man was getting closer. She could smell his stink and the scent of his blood.
Her eyes looked for Andrew. He was on the back of her horse and riding toward Bristol Road.
To give him more time to get away, she ran in the opposite direction through the field.
Her hand clenched her side as her run became a jog.
She looked backward to see that the man was still following her and getting closer.
The angle of his knife looked even more menacing.
But she was a Stringham, and Stringhams didn’t give up without a fight.
With the last of her strength, she made a sprint for the edge of a stone fence and climbed it.
She kept moving forward as quickly as she could.
Breathing hard, she saw a rider in the distance.
She cupped her hands around her mouth and yelled, “Help!”
The horseman altered his direction to come toward her, but the thief would get to her first if she didn’t keep going.
Half sobbing, half breathing, Mantheria jogged and walked and stumbled toward her would-be rescuer.
For a moment, she thought that she could make it.
But then her braid was pulled from behind, and she fell hard onto her backside.
The thief jumped on top of her, caging her body with his legs and arms, his sour breath against her face.
It was even worse than his scent. “Perhaps I’ll have a bit of fun with you first. Your face is rather pretty. Perhaps I’ll carve it up like a ham.”
A surge of fear and adrenaline ran through her veins. She pushed at his shoulders, but his body didn’t budge. He laughed in her face and brought the knife against her cheek. “Every time you fight me, I’ll give you another cut. No gentleman rider is going to stop for a lightskirt like you.”
Mantheria remembered the gun wound that she’d given him on the side of his torso.
She made her right hand into a fist and punched the bleeding area as hard as she could.
The thief jerked back, and she rolled away from underneath him.
Getting to her knees, she scrambled to get to her feet when she felt the man tug on the bottom of her skirt.
She fell face-first into the mud and tried to kick at him with her boots.
The thief got to his feet, his jagged knife in one hand and a handful of her skirt in the other. He leered at her, and Mantheria was frozen by fear. He brought his knife down toward her face, and she closed her eyes.