When they reached Tunbridge Wells, the horses were watered and rested for a few minutes. Then once again they set south on the main pike. The adventure had lost its initial thrill for Myriah, and her mind was now busy with the problems facing her. There was Sir Roland, who surely would be upset. She had done him an injustice leaving as she had, allowing him to believe she had acquiesced to her father’s outrageous plan. But then, she had not missed his expression, which told her he had not been completely fooled. But Papa—there was no telling what he might do, though she was fairly certain he would post down to her grandfather’s in the morning … and then there would be a scene.
The road meandered past rich green farms and through meadowlands boasting of spring wildflowers, whose scent was carried on the growing breeze. The aroma infiltrated her senses, and for a moment she just breathed it in and sighed. Feeling rejuvenated, Myriah said, “Just look about at all this glory.”
“Loo
k at what, m’lady?” asked her astonished groom as he came up alongside her. “What can ye see in the darkness? ’Tis half-daft to try!”
“Oh, Tabby, don’t vex me so! I can see … with my mind’s eye, and I do so love Kent!”
“Aye!” Tabson agreed, relenting, for it had been his home as well, and he too was heartily sick of town life.
They maintained a steady pace for the next half hour without speaking. In her haste Myriah had neglected to put on a riding hat, and her fiery ringlets had tumbled down upon her shoulders. The breeze was stronger now and whipped the long, thick locks across her cheeks. With an exasperated sigh she reined in, pulled off a glove, and pinned back the wayward tresses.
Tabson looked up at the sky and mumbled a complaint that made Myriah raise her eyes heavenward. “Oh dear …”
Clouds had gathered and obscured the moon’s glow, and a low mist had set in and seemed to be getting thicker. They had been on the road for nearly three hours, and Myriah knew their horses would soon need a proper rest.
“We are nearly there, are we not, Tabby?” She pulled a face and added, “This mist is dreadful. I can barely see ten feet in front of me.”
“Humph,” agreed her companion.
For the next thirty minutes they continued, the silence punctuated now and then by an unladylike exclamation when Myriah found herself off road and in the thicket. At last a fingerpost loomed up at the crossroad, and she rode up to the narrow white wood.
“Dymchurch three miles—oh, no, Tab,” Myriah exclaimed. “We must have taken the wrong turnoff—we are heading in the wrong direction.”
“Humph. Thought the air a bit too salty. Nothing for it, m’lady. We’ll have to take the coast road. It cuts through the marshlands farther down, and we can follow the river a bit to Northiam.”
“Oh, Tabby, I am so tired. We’ve been traveling for hours—how much longer do you think it’s going to take?”
He scratched his head. “One … maybe two hours if this mist holds up.”
“One or two hours! Why, it must be past two in the morning. Good lord.”
“Best be moving on, m’lady. Dymchurch be no place for lingering at night.”
“Why?” asked Myriah, surprised.
“Because it ain’t!”
She was too weary to press him further and this time allowed him to lead the way.
As suddenly as it had appeared, the mist vanished, and only the dewy grass and moist bushes retained evidence of its earlier visitation. Low, flat, and marshy lands were dark and eerily foreboding in the blackness.
The road was lined by narrow dikes, glistening rills, and shadows that teased Myriah’s imagination. She spurred her horse forward, passing her groom. A chill and strange sensation seized and swept through her. All at once, the eerie feeling made her pull her horse up short, sure that she had heard something …
Tabby halted his horse directly behind her and leaned forward in his saddle. “What be that?”
“Hush,” commanded his mistress, listening intently.
Again the sound came to her ears, and this time she could identify it. A horse—it was the snort of a lone horse. She squinted through the darkness, zeroing in on a clump of evergreens and shaggy bushes. There—she saw it! The animal had shaken its head, and she caught the movement, following the line down the horse’s nose to a dark clump at its hooves.
“Oh no, Tab!” Myriah uttered worriedly, her heart racing.
She couldn’t really see, and yet instinct—a certain ‘feeling’—told her someone lay injured beside the horse. Without another word she closed the distance to the object of her interest, slid off Silkie, and went down on her knees beside a young man.
His face was half-hidden by his arm, and his fair hair was free of the hat that had fallen beside his limp form. She pulled the heavy material of his riding coat away from his chest as she eased him onto his back. Tabby had by this time jumped off his old roan and was leaning over both her and the unconscious stranger. “He is hurt,” she told him.
“I see that, m’lady—must have had a bad fall.”