Peregrine wheeled the gray stallion, a magnificent man on a magnificent horse. "Are you ready to brave the dangers of the London streets, Lady Sara?"
"Lead on, Your Highness," she said, saluting her companion with her riding whip.
As they trotted into the street side by side, Sara was pleased to learn that her riding skills had survived ten years of disuse. Effortless balance, the subtle control of reins and body, were still as natural as breathing. Still, it had been wise to start with dependable, placid Pansy, though she could not prevent a sigh of longing as she admired the gray stallion's silken elegance. "What have you named your horse?"
"Siva," the prince replied, slowing his mount to let a delivery cart cross in front of them.
"Shee-va?" she said experimentally, trying to get the vowels exactly as he had pronounced them. "What does that mean?"
"Siva is one of the gods of the Hindu pantheon," he said. "That aspect of the divine that rules destruction and regeneration, to be exact."
"Goodness! That is a lot of symbolism for a horse to carry," she said. As he laughed, she continued, "Though I suppose only humans worry about the weight of intangibles. Are you a Hindu? I had assumed you were Muslim."
"No, I'm neither Hindu nor Muslim. Kafiristan is an island of paganism surrounded by a sea of Islam. To a Muslin, a kafir is an unbeliever, which is where the name Kafiristan comes from."
"What do you mean by paganism?" she asked cautiously. "Or should I not ask?"
"Ancestor and nature worship," he explained. "Quite a lot of gods of all types. Wooden statues of the ancestors stand outside Kafir villages. Very colorful, not unlike the statues of war heroes that the British are so fond of putting in parks."
Sara laughed, and laughter was the theme of their ride across the river and through southern London. They had reached the rolling hills of Surrey, and subsided into amiable silence before Sara realized that she had done most of the talking, and the subject had been her life. Artful comments and questions from Peregrine had led her to talk about her childhood, her accident and slow recovery, even her relationship with Charles.
She gave her companion an exasperated glance. She had voiced thoughts that she had never before spoken aloud, but apart from the fact that she now knew that Kafirs were pagans, she knew no more about Peregrine than she had at the beginning of the ride. Now that she thought of it, she did not actually know if he subscribed to the religious beliefs of his people, for his attitude had been rather detached.
Sara sighed and rubbed her aching leg. Her companion was certainly a master of gaining information without giving anything away about himself. But while the idea that the prince knew much more about her than vice versa made Sara a little uncomfortable, there was no harm in it. Obviously he hadn't been raised in the English tradition of reserve and restraint, and he asked questions to satisfy his natural curiosity about a country and people that must seem very strange to him. Nobody had compelled her to answer, but the man was diabolically easy to talk to. Perhaps it was because she knew he did not see things as an Englishman did.
As they neared their goal, Peregrine's formidable curiosity turned to the country they rode through. His gaze probed and assessed everything they passed, and he spoke only to ask Sara an occasional question.
Finally she said, "You are studying Surrey the way Wellington must have watched the field of Waterloo. Do you expect wild tribesmen to attack us?"
He gave her a startled glance, then chuckled. "Not at all. It is just that I have never seen rural England. I sailed up the Thames at night and have been in London ever since."
He gestured at their surroundings. "I had not realized what I was missing. England is like a vast garden, where everything has been designed to please the eye."
She followed his gaze, and for a moment saw her country with fresh eyes, as he must see it. The lush grassy lane they followed was bounded by low, flower-strewn hedges. Beyond lay a quilting of neat fields whose crops colored them in shades from pale gold to vivid green. The square Norman tower of a parish church punctuated the horizon, and above floated the mysterious, hazy blue ridge of hills called the North Downs.
And it was not just the eye that was pleased, but all the senses, for a murmuring of insects and bird song soothed the ear, and scents of healthy growing things wafted through the air.
Sara caught her breath, feeling as if blinders had fallen from her eyes to reveal heart-stopping serenity and loveliness. "You're right, England is rather like a great garden. Did you know that Ross's estate, Chapelgate, is only about a half hour's ride from here? Because I know the area well, I was taking this beauty for granted." She smiled at her companion. "Thank you for making me see this for the wonder it is. But doesn't Surrey seem very tame compared with the mountains where you grew up?"