Chapter Seven #3
Gabe glanced at the ceiling. “What the devil are those women doing? How long does it take to pack a bag?”
Ethan shrugged. “They’re women.” He picked a book up and sniffed it.
“Leather. Beautiful embossing.” His fingers traced the decoration before setting the book carefully on the shelf.
He looked through a few of them, then noticed Gabe watching and closed them with a snap.
“No pictures.” He quickly shoved all the books back on the shelves, then went in search of a broom.
Gabe was righting the upside-down books when the two ladies came downstairs.
“About tim—er, all set?” He hurried forward. Miss Tibthorpe was carrying a faded carpet bag, and an umbrella and Callie was carrying a large, covered box.
Gabriel relieved her of it. “Good God,” he exclaimed. “What’s in this? It weighs a ton.”
“Tibby’s things,” she said in a voice that indicated she thought the question impertinent.
Gabe grinned. A few minutes in her governess’s company and his avenging angel was turning back into a snippy little duchess. Gabe didn’t mind. He liked her either way. He noticed the pistols and placed them carefully in his pocket.
“I’ve packed enough for a few days,” Miss Tibthorpe said, “but I’m worried about my dear little Kitty-cat. I can’t find him anywhere.” She went to the back door and called, “Kitty-kitty-kitty!” No cat came forward.
“You get along to the Grange, we’ll find your cat,” Gabe told her. “We’ll finish tidying up here—”
“Oh, but I can do that later.” Miss Tibthorpe glanced doubtfully from him to Ethan, who’d been pushing the mop around the floor a bit, leaving smeary marks. He looked like a big ox in the feminine little cottage.
“Madam, we made the mess, we will clean it up—or rather, I will. Ethan will escort you two ladies back to the Grange and I will bring these villains before the local magistrate.”
“No, you mustn’t!” Callie gasped. “I don’t want them reported.”
Gabe frowned. He didn’t like it. “The crime should be reported. Any other action is to invite anarchy.”
“If you report that foreigners broke into Tibby’s house and held her prisoner, there will be a huge fuss. Count Anton must be staying somewhere nearby. The local constable is bound to speak to him, Count Anton will find out who reported it and where you live—he will know where I am.”
He stared into her eyes. He read in them fear and determination.
“Very well. It goes against all of my instincts, but I won’t report it,” he said, comforting himself with the reflection that no red-blooded man could resist the appeal in those green eyes.
“Now come along, let’s get moving. I’ll finish up here and follow shortly. ”
“What about my cat? Kitty-cat doesn’t like men,” Miss Tibthorpe said, looking as though she and Kitty-cat shared the same views. “He will be even more mistrustful now, since that horrid beast kicked him!”
“I’ll find the blas—I’ll find the cat.” Gabe told her, trying to mask his impatience. He looked out the front and checked to make sure the coast was clear. “Cats like me, don’t worry. But I can do everything much better once I know you are both safe.”
“And out of the way,” Callie said in a voice only Gabe could hear.
“Exactly.” He gave her the sort of smile one gave to a clever pupil.
She glowered at him.
“You can glower at me even better from the curricle,” he said. “It’s higher up.” Slipping his free arm around her waist he propelled her toward the door.
“I can walk perfectly well by myself,” she muttered.
“Yes, but will you? That’s the question.” Gabe compelled her onward. “Ethan, escort Miss Tibthorpe, if you please,” he ordered over his shoulder. “Now move!”
“There is no need to shove,” his duchess said snippily.
“There is every need. Think of it not as shoving, but an affectionate nudge.” He marched her out of the cottage, dumped the box in the back, and lifted her bodily into the curricle.
Ethan did the same with the governess, then climbed up, squashing in beside the governess.
Gabe handed him the pistols. “You know what to do.”
“So do we,” said Callie with pursed lips.
“Hah! I’ve heard that before,” Gabe said and slapped the grays on the rump.
He watched until the curricle was out of sight. Nobody followed. Gabe started to breathe normally again. He’d fought four men this afternoon and was still standing, but she’d delivered him a blow that had knocked him endways.
The way she’d come back and burst in the door, pistols waving. To help him. Him. Risking herself to save a man who was more than capable of looking after himself. He’d survived eight years of warfare.
Crazy female. She had no idea of how it was supposed to be between men and women. He was the one who protected her, not the other way around.
Gabe checked the men at the back door. They were still unconscious. He was tempted to hand the cowardly swine over to the authorities, but he’d given her his word he wouldn’t. The first time in his life he’d been swayed from doing what he considered to be the right thing.
He checked the cottage. There was damage to the doors and windows. He’d send a man down tomorrow to effect any repairs needed. He straightened a couple of rugs and some pictures.
He couldn’t get it out of his head; no woman, ever, had tried to protect him.
He had no idea how to handle it.
She had known him a day—less than a day.
He heard a sound behind him and whirled. Nothing. Then he glimpsed a movement under the kitchen dresser. He crouched down and saw a big, old, ugly, battle-scarred ginger tomcat peering warily back at him from one good eye.
“You can’t possibly be her dear little Kitty-cat,” Gabe told it. “You ought to be called Cyclops, or Ulysses.”
The cat glared at him in silence. A bitten-off, sorry-looking excuse for a tail twitched angrily. But the cat, though angry, was very much at home.
“Come on then, Kitty-cat, you old reprobate.” Gabe reached under the dresser to take the cat and the cat lashed out.
Gabe swore and sucked his well-scratched hand.
He wrapped a handkerchief around his hand and, uttering soothing noises, he tried again.
The handkerchief got shredded and Gabe acquired some more scratches.
“Look, you ugly old devil, I’m not going to hurt you, I’m just bringing that poor deluded woman her sweet little Kitty-cat. ”
“Where’s ze princess?” a voice from above him said, and Gabe’s head exploded with pain.
“Princess? What princess?” he said, groggily. A boot kicked him hard in the groin and Gabe doubled up, groaning and cursing his own stupidity. At least three of them stood over him. He’d been half under the dresser, caught unawares like any wet-behind-the-ears novice.
The leader, in shiny black riding boots with silver spurs, snarled, “Don’t waste my time, peasant! I want ze princess and her son!”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about. Don’t know any princess.” Gabe tried to push free, but the heel of another boot stamped down on his hand. The pain was excruciating.
“Tell us where she is. She and ze prince.”
“Never seen any princes or princesses,” he ground out. “Saw the king once, afore he went mad.” He tried to look up at the speaker and found a boot planted on his head. He was pinned down and helpless.
The boot pushed down. “The princess and the boy are all we want.”
Gabe was a soldier and a realist. There was only one thing he could do. So he swore at the man, insulting him in the worst ways he could think of. Years in the army had given him an excellent vocabulary.
It had the desired effect; they stopped questioning him and started beating him up, instead.
The last thing Gabe saw was the cat streaking between a forest of black boots and out of the door…
“Capt’n, can you hear me, Capt’n?” Cold water splashed onto Gabe’s face. He tried to move and groaned. Every inch of his body ached. He managed to crack open one eye and saw Ethan, anxiously looking down at him.
“Are you hurt bad, Capt’n?”
Gabe shook his head and winced. His head felt like it was about to split. “No, just battered. Are they gone?”
“Aye. Can you move?”
“Of course.” Gabe moved and swore again. He examined the inside of his mouth with his tongue, checking to see he still had all his teeth. He did.
“Drink this.” Ethan put a flask of brandy to his lips. Gabe swallowed, then waved him back, coughing, as the fiery liquid burned its way down.
“What the devil—?” he gasped.
Ethan grinned. “A little drop of Irish mountain dew, sir—what we call poteen. Good for what ails ye.”
“If it doesn’t kill you first!” Gabe spluttered.
Ethan gave him a few seconds to recover, then helped Gabe to stand. “I have the curricle outside. When you didn’t turn up, I got worried. Left the ladies at the Grange and came back. So, what happened?”
Gabe pulled a wry face. “The blackguards got the jump on me.”
Ethan’s jaw dropped. “You, Capt’n?”
“Me,” Gabe admitted ruefully. “Own stupid fault. Worse than the greenest new recruit. They caught me half under that dresser, chasing that blasted cat.”
He staggered to the front door and looked at the cinder path, at the end of which waited his curricle. “Any more of that blasted Irish firewater?”