Chapter Four #2
Joseph held his hands up in surrender. “I won’t be much of a baker with only one hand to knead my bread. I’m afraid the task of getting her in the wagon is up to you, but you must hurry. I am due at my next stop.”
Jo nodded. “All right, girl,” she said, patting the back of the wagon. “You’ll have to jump.”
The dog looked at her with pathetic eyes.
“None of that,” Jo admonished, looking the frail beast hard in the eye.
“If you can draw breath, you can fight.” She cupped her under the chin.
“You can do this, love” she said fervently.
Then, smiling at the intent animal, Jo climbed into the wagon and sat down, then patted the seat next to hers.
“Come on, girl,” she encouraged. “Keep fighting!”
The dog eyed the spot.
“I believe in you, girl,” Jo urged. Then suddenly, she leapt off her hind legs, landing in the wagon. Jo would have sworn she glimpsed pride in the dog’s eyes, but the look was fleeting, replaced with desperation as she collapsed on her side, panting from the painful effort.
“I knew you could do it, girl,” Jo crooned, gently snuggling her new friend. Panting and whimpering, the dog licked at a sore on her hind leg, then rested her head in Jo’s lap.
“She belongs to you now, heart and soul,” Joseph declared. “See the way she’s looking at you? True love, that’s for certain.”
Jo smiled. “I love you, too, and I’ll make you well,” she promised softly, meeting adoring yellow eyes.
“Here.” She pulled a pigeon pie she had bought at market from her satchel.
The dog sniffed at it but did not take it.
Jo set it on the wagon in front of the poor animal.
“You need it more than I do. We need not stand on formalities. Go ahead.” Finally, the dog took the pie between its paws and in two bites, finished it off.
Jo laughed. “There’s more where that came from. Stick with me and you’ll be better in no time at all.”
“What will you call her?” Joseph asked after giving the reins a gentle snap. As the wagon rolled forward, Jo considered his question. She gently stroked her newfound companion’s patchy fur. “What shall I call you, girl?” she murmured.
Yellow eyes held hers. “Oh, you lovely beast.” Jo wrapped her arms around the dog’s neck.
“We shall be the best of friends.” With a soft gasp she pulled away.
“Ruby! I shall call you Ruby.” For a moment, sorrow, heavy and threatening, seeped into Jo’s heart.
Her beloved maid Ruby, like everyone and everything she had ever loved, had been lost to her.
“No,” Jo whispered, chiding herself. Pushing her shoulders back, she shook her head, chasing away the memories. “It does no one any good to dwell on the past.” She gave her new Ruby a hard look. “And I don’t want you lamenting what brought you low either. You’re safe now, and that’s what matters.”
Jo smiled and scratched her companion behind the ear, earning a sigh from the weary animal, who laid her head on Jo’s lap and fell asleep.
Now, robust and healthy, Ruby was enormous with thick, tawny fur—tufted with darker streaks—and big, pointed ears. And she loved Jo with her whole heart but...despised absolutely everyone else.
To say that Ruby was protective of Jo would be an understatement, which did mean Jo had to keep her on a short leash or else she might bite anyone who even tried to speak to her.
Ruby’s loyalty meant the world to Jo, who traversed the streets of Durham with her cloak drawn and her head down, always vigilant and watchful for those who hunted for Clan Fergusson’s missing ladies.
A memory flashed in Jo’s mind, of the first night she and her mother had crossed the border into England.
Using a small gem Lady Clara had pried loose from her wedding band as payment, they had taken a room at an inn.
Most of that night, Jo had spent in tears, crying for her father and the comforts of home while fleas bit at her skin and the raucous din of drunken men rose up from the common room below them.
Lying beside her, her mother stroked her back. “Your name is Jo now,” she insisted in an accent that had fooled the innkeeper into believing they were English. “We are English peasants, weavers by trade.”
Jo gulped. “But we’ve no loom,” she cried.
“We will,” her mother said firmly. “We will sell—” Her mother’s words were interrupted by a deep cough that racked her shoulders.
“Oh Mama, ye’re not well.”
Lady Clara shook her head while she continued to cough. At length, she cleared her throat. “I am fine. As I was saying, we will sell the remaining gems from my ring and our fine clothes to purchase a loom and find a room to rent.”
“In this place?” Jo asked as her shoulders shot up around her ears, frightened of the wild noises below.
“No. We are still too close to the border for my comfort. We could be recognized. We shall venture farther south.”
“Nay,” Jo cried. “I want to go home. I want to return to Da. Don’t ye?”
“There is no point wishing for what cannot be. Right now, we have no choice but to accept our fate and do what we must to survive. And make no mistake, daughter, you are fighting for your life. From now on, you keep your head down and trust no one.”
Jo swallowed hard. “I will try,” she answered in her best English accent. But despite her attempt to be brave, her tears renewed, streaming down her cheeks.
“Cry all you want tonight,” Lady Clara soothed, her voice softening for a moment. “But come the morrow, you must dry your eyes for good. You can’t see who’s coming with tears flooding your eyes.”
“Who is after us, Mama?”
“Anyone...Everyone!”
Jo buried her face in the crook of her arms and sobbed.
By the next day, however, Jo had done as her mother bade her.
She stopped crying and had not shed another tear since—not when they arrived in Durham and found their small, shabby room to rent; not when she had to start weaving from sun up until sun down, day after day, to earn enough coin just to survive one day to the next; not even when her mother grew so ill that she insisted Jo bring her to the Durham Abbey to live out her last days in God’s house.
Jo had become hard.
Jo had become vigilant.
Why anyone and everyone would wish to hunt down a modest lady from a humble lowland clan was beyond Jo’s ability to comprehend, nor did her mother ever fully explain the matter, even when pressed.
And so, Jo simply had to accept her fate. She was Lady Josselyn no longer. Now, she was a simple English peasant, fighting everyday to survive.
Reflecting on her mother made Jo pick up her pace.
“Come, Ruby. We must hurry!”
Today, of all days, Jo was even more grateful for the wide berth people gave her fierce friend—she had fabric to weave, rent to pay, and payment for her mother’s care was due.
As they approached the baker’s table, the scents of flaky piecrust and fresh baked bread reached her nose, making her stomach rumble again and Ruby whine with excitement.
“Good day, Jo,” the baker’s assistant said in greeting as they approached his stand.
“Good day to you, Joseph.”
Joseph beamed at her. “Will today be the day you tell me what Jo is short for?”
“Not Joseph,” she replied with a cheeky grin.
“I believe we had already established that.”
“I’ll never tell,” she teased. “So you may as well stop asking.”
“Where’s the fun in that?” Joseph asked with a wink before shifting his gaze to Ruby.
“Well, if I can’t win you over, mayhap Ruby will warm up to me today.
” Meat pie in hand, Joseph circled around to the front of the stall and started toward the hungry animal.
“What do you say, girl,” he crooned softly.
Slowly squatting, Joseph started to reach out his hand to Ruby, but Jo stopped him.
“No meat pies today,” she blurted, trying to ignore its succulent scent. “Two rolls will suffice.”
Joseph cocked a brow at her. “Do you honestly believe a roll is going to satiate a wolf’s hunger?” He held out the pie to Jo. “It’s still warm.”