Time stopped. She was his prisoner, fighting her own desire to kiss him back rather than struggling against his embrace, and when he finally raised his head she was strangely disappointed. She remained in his arms, unable to move and staring up at him. Her eyes had grown more accustomed to the darkness and she could make out his features a little better beneath the shadow of his hat. The smiling mouth and lean cheeks, the strong lines of his jaw that ran down to the cleft of his chin, the hawkish nose and most of all those dark, dark eyes, gleaming at her through the slits of his mask.
‘Mmm,' he murmured, soft as a sigh. ‘Heavenly.'
Charity had forgotten her surroundings, the icy wind that was even now scattering tiny flakes of snow over them, the fact that he was a stranger. She had even forgotten that he was a highwayman, until he raised his head and barked out an order to the coachman and guard.
‘Keep yer hands on yer heads, me fine friends.'
His rough warning brought her back to reality. She pushed him away-no, he did not move, it was she who stepped back, hiding the trembling of her hands by vigorously shaking out her skirts. A glance behind her showed the coach still standing on the road, the driver and guard still sitting motionless on the box and the white faces of the passengers visible at the coach windows. It could only have been a minute that had passed, maybe two, yet Charity felt as if something momentous had occurred. She gave herself a mental shake. Good heavens, it was only a kiss, and she had been kissed before, but never had it had such an effect.
It was the excitement, she told herself sternly. Fear set your nerves on edge and made you feel the experience all the more keenly.
The highwayman was holding out his hand to her.
‘Having exacted my price from you, madam, you are now free to go on your way.'
Silently she took his hand and let him help her back into the carriage. He closed the door and she saw the glint of amusement in his eyes as he touched the barrel of the pistol to his hat brim in a mock salute. He stepped back and glanced up at the box.
‘Now, me lads, I'll thank you to sit where you are a while longer.'
He whistled and the black horse trotted up to him. Charity noted the athletic way he leaped up into the saddle and galloped away, leaving everyone in a shocked, immobile silence.
As the hoofbeats faded, the spell was broken. The farmer began to rage about the impudence of such rascals while his wife fell back in her seat, fanning herself vigorously and declaring she could feel a seizure coming on. Betty muttered up a prayer of thanks and the guard clambered down to retrieve his shotgun and to ask if the passengers were all right.
‘All right? Of course we are not all right!' shouted the farmer. ‘What're you about, to let one rascally knave with a popgun cause us all such terror? Look! Look at my wife. Right terrified, she is. 'Tis a disgrace, I tell 'ee. One man on the road and all you can do is drop your gun!'
‘Aye, I dropped it right enough,' replied the guard, affronted. ‘He were threatenin' to shoot me head off.'
‘So you let 'im get away with daylight robbery!'
‘As I recall, he didn't take anything o' yours,' the guard retorted.
‘He stole the mail,' countered the farmer's wife.
‘And he assaulted my mistress,' added Betty.
‘Which is why I came to enquire if she was hurt.' The guard turned his attention to Charity. ‘Well, ma'am? Have you suffered any injury?'
Charity was reliving the memory of being imprisoned in those strong arms and her lips still burned from the highwayman's kiss, but she would never admit that to a soul.
‘N-no, I am a little shaken, but I am not hurt.'
‘The rascal stole your brooch, Miss-'
‘Hush, Betty. It was a mere trinket.' She turned to the guard. ‘Please, it is not important. Let us get on.'
The guard seemed satisfied with that. He nodded.
‘Then we'll be on our way. We're stopping at Beringham to change horses, so we will report the incident then.'
He closed the door and the carriage rocked as he climbed back onto the box beside the driver.
‘Aye, and I'll be reporting this to the mail company,' muttered the farmer as they set off again. ‘Never seen the like, a guard and driver made to look no-how by a lone horseman-why, between the three of us we could have taken him!'
‘That's just what my mistress sug-'
Charity dug her maid in the ribs. She summoned up a bright smile.
‘Well, I for one am glad we came off so lightly. I pray we will have no more excitement before we reach our destination.'
* * *
Her prayers were answered, and the short journey into Beringham was uneventful. The passengers were invited to go into the inn while the constable was summoned.
After the chilly carriage, the sight of the inn's blazing fire was very cheering, and when the landlord had supplied them all with a cup of hot coffee, even the farmer's mood improved. The local constable turned out to be a stolid individual called Rigg who painstakingly wrote everything down, explaining that the magistrate would want to have all the details reported to him. Once the guard and driver had given their version of events, he turned to the passengers. Charity glanced at the clock. They should have been at Allingford by now, but the delay could not be helped, so she stifled her impatience and gave her attention to the matter in hand.
‘He got down off his horse and ordered you all out o' the coach, you say?' The constable looked at his notes. ‘So you had a chance to get a good look at the fellow, eh?'
The farmer shook his head. ‘Nay, 'twere too dark to see out by then.'
‘That's true,' affirmed Betty. ‘And he soon ordered us all back inside, except Mrs Weston.'
‘Weston?' The constable looked up, all attention. ‘Mrs Weston, you say? Are you-?'
‘I am an actress.' She smiled to atone for interrupting him. ‘Mrs Weston is my stage name.'
The farmer's wife sniffed, her earlier smiles replaced now with a more haughty stare.
‘Ah, I see.' The constable looked even more interested in that. ‘You'll be on your way to Allingford, then.' He added, with something like a sigh, ‘We have no theatre in Beringham.'
‘Nor any other entertainment,' grumbled the farmer. ‘Even the inns ain't what they was.'
‘But she was closest to the villain,' put in the farmer's wife, ignoring her husband. ‘In his arms, she was, and he was makin' free with her-'
‘I beg your pardon, but it was no such thing,' declared Betty, bristling in defence of her mistress. ‘He ravished her, quite against her will.'
Charity blushed and shook her head at the bemused constable.
‘He stole a cheap brooch, that is all.'
‘And he kissed her, too!' cried the farmer's wife in outraged accents.
‘Very understandable, ma'am, if you don't mind my saying so,' returned the officer of the law, then coloured to the tips of his ears.
‘It means she saw him better than the rest of us,' said the farmer. ‘Right tall fellow, he was.'
‘Ma'am?' The constable turned his eyes towards Charity, who shrugged.
‘I would not have said he was that tall. About medium height, I think.'
‘Bigger, surely,' argued the farmer's wife. ‘He towered over you!'
Charity remembered it only too well, but she shook her head now.
‘I was cowering a little.'
It was a lie. She had felt no fear in her encounter with the highwayman. There had been anger, yes, and excitement, but she had never felt afraid of him. The farmer's wife was continuing.
‘A big man, all in black and astride a great black 'oss. And he had right broad shoulders.'
Charity remembered him coming close, the feeling that he was enveloping her in his shadow.
‘His coat was very large,' she said. ‘It had several capes on the shoulders, which gave the impression of width.'
‘Did you see his face, or his hair-did he wear a wig, perhaps?'
‘He never removed his hat. And he wore a mask, so I could not see his countenance.'
That much was true. She could not even say with any certainty what colour his eyes had been, only that they were very dark and had bored into her, as if he could see into her very soul.
‘His horse, though-that should be easy to find.' The coachman tapped out his pipe upon the hearth and set about refilling it. ‘It was a stallion, a great dark beast, pure black from mane to hoof.'
‘And he weren't from around these parts,' added the guard. ‘Irish, I do reckon.'