The Lady By His Side(93)

But their next stop was at a derelict barn, and once again, he was off his horse and waiting to hand her the gray’s reins the instant she halted the mare. “This won’t take long” was all he said before stalking into the barn.

Leaving her to wait outside.

She humphed. She glanced around, looking for a tree or bush to which to tie both sets of reins…only to realize there wasn’t anything suitable nearby.

Maybe that was why he’d left her holding the reins. She returned her gaze to the barn door, sagging on its hinges, and narrowed her eyes… Perhaps. But she had to wonder.

The barn proved uninteresting. His expression hard and unrevealing, Sebastian returned, reclaimed the gray’s reins, mounted up, and they continued quartering the fields, moving steadily westward.

They saw no other structures requiring searching before they reached the Deal-Dover road, once again not far from Ringwould, although this time to the north of the village.

Sebastian drew rein and looked toward the cluster of village roofs. “Let’s go back to the Five Bells and have an early luncheon. There’s unlikely to be anywhere else on our route where we might get food.”

“An excellent idea,” she returned and led the way. She’d discovered her appetite had grown; even the extra scrambled eggs she’d eaten that morning hadn’t entirely assuaged her hunger.

At the Five Bells, the day’s main dish proved to be mutton stew, hearty and filling and almost as tasty as the previous day’s pie. They spoke little while they ate; for her part, she was absorbed with thoughts of where barrels of gunpowder might be hidden, and what next they might do if their search today proved as futile as yesterday’s.

Suitably fortified to face the afternoon, they quit the inn, remounted, and rode northward, steadily traversing the fields of the estate bordering the road.

That tack revealed no structures of any kind and landed them at the northwestern corner of the estate, where a large coppice filled the triangle between the fields, the road, and the northern boundary fence. The coppice hadn’t been harvested for some time and was overdue for attention; the trees grew thick and dense.

Antonia drew rein facing the coppice. Sebastian rode closer, ranging between her and the trees. He appeared to be peering into the massed thickets.

She noticed a path leading into the coppice. “There’s a path there.” When he glanced at her, she pointed. “Should we get down and search?”

Sebastian rode to the opening of the path. Standing in his stirrups, he looked down it, then he shook his head, resat, and turned the gray toward her. “It’s just a clearing. Nothing there. If whoever’s behind this has a grain of sense, then assuming they want to use the gunpowder to blow something up, they won’t risk leaving it in the open, even under a tarpaulin. In this season, damp will get in, and that will be the end of their plans.”

“We could hope,” she replied and turned the chestnut’s head to the east.

They rode on, again taking a zigzag route across the fields as they covered the last section of the estate they hadn’t yet searched—the fields inside the northern boundary from the road to the shore.

The next feature they came upon was another large coppice, a roughly circular one surrounded by fields. Sebastian had been riding on Antonia’s left, but when they slowed before the coppice, he urged the gray forward and across, coming between her and the trees. This coppice had been recently harvested; perched on their horses, they could easily see through the thin young shoots. But with Sebastian between her and the coppice, Antonia had to lean sideways and crane her neck to see around him.

“Nothing there.” He nudged the gray on.

Her view finally clear, she cast a swift glance over the coppice, confirmed there was no structure of any kind hidden in its depths, then raised her reins and pressed the chestnut into motion again.

Still keeping station between her and the trees, Sebastian led the way on.

From beneath her lashes, she cast him a narrow-eyed sidelong glare. Did he even realize what he was doing? Where was the danger here? What did he imagine—that someone was hiding in the coppice waiting to take a shot at her?

She humphed and shifted her gaze forward. Were noblemen in the grip of this particular affliction really so illogical? So driven by instinct that common sense fell by the wayside?

She had a sneaking suspicion her mother would assure her that they were. That she—Antonia—should expect such behavior.

She felt like snorting.

She bit back an acerbic comment when they came to another coppice, this one on the other side of their route, and he behaved in the same shielding way, wheeling the gray around her to do so.