This simple request seemed to leave Hopkins at a stand. Then he said huffily, “Do you think I’d cheat you, sir? Ye’d see me damned first! I do be ’appy to take fifty now and fifty ’pon delivery. You just go on along to your tea, and this ’ere ’oss will be baited at the stable of your choosin’ afore dark.”
“Mr. Hopkins,” the Seigneur said patiently. “I’ve no interest in that. You and I, and I daresay every other local man here, are quite aware that this horse will not leave the vicinity of the other animal without creating an excessively unpleasant scene. If I want the one, I’ll have to take the other. I’m willing, You’ll won’t get a penny on the pound from the knacker.”
“Give over, Hopkins,” someone said. “The man’s got ’is eyes wide open.”
“I do, you know,” the Seigneur said kindly. “There’s no hope of passing your flummery off on me.”
“Well,” Hopkins sputtered. “By the Lord Harry!”
“I’ll give you twelve for the two,” the Seigneur said, “just because you’re an honest man.”
Hopkins looked sullen, but he nodded. After a quick darting glare in the direction of the bystander who’d spoken up, he stuck out his hand. The Seigneur barely touched it for an instant and paid in Rye banknotes from his own purse.
“I’ll send you word where to take them,” he said, and offered his arm to Leigh again.
“Awake upon every suit,” she said tartly as they strolled away. “Quite the horse trader. If the pair truly won’t be separated, what use is the one you bought?”
“I know horses,” he said briefly. He was watching another two men arguing over a leggy chestnut with a white blaze. It appeared that the gentleman holding the horse’s lead wished to return his purchase to the coper, vehemently complaining that it refused to cross any body of water under any kind of duress whatsoever—not to mention the flighty beast had backed his new curricle into a tree in an attempt to avoid the ferry. The coper was equally vehement in denying any intention of taking the animal back. As the level of their voices rose, the chestnut horse danced uneasily, its ears pricked and its head lifted.
The Seigneur looked down at her. “Do you fancy him for yourself?”
“Not at all. I fear there are a few streams between here and the north.”
“I can take care of that.”
She glanced at him, hardly knowing whether to believe in such simple confidence or not.
He was watching the horse. “I like his lines. He’ll carry you north, and no mistake. That poor coxcomb who bought him’s in a desperate lather. I can get him for a whistle,” he said.
Still she hesitated. The owner of the chestnut was shouting at the dealer. It was quite apparent that the seller had no intention of taking the animal back at any price. “Perhaps I’ll ride the stage,” she said warily.
He looked down at her. “You don’t believe me,” he said.
“I think you’re monstrous full of yourself.”
He lifted one eyebrow lazily. “Would you like to place a wager on it, madame?”
Chapter Fourteen
Leigh stood beside an oval paddock, shivering a little inside the Seigneur’s old buff coat, back in her breeches at his personal request. She felt more conspicuous than before when no one had guessed she was female. But if she got numerous interested glances from the small crowd of horse copers and farm boys who ranged around the paddock ready to watch the show, it was worth the freedom of wearing boots.
No one would touch her or make a rude remark, that she knew by now. The eccentric Mr. Maitland, with his sword and his odd starts, seemed to have a certain reputation in the neighborhood of Rye: a smuggler’s town, where audacity—and money under the table—spoke far more loudly than the law.
In the cold air, the sound of hooves beat a low, excited thud, interspersed with the shrill call of the black that the Seigneur had purchased that morning. It cantered recklessly back and forth in the oval paddock, neighing frantically in the direction of a distant pasture, where the Seigneur’s rogue and the blaze-faced chestnut tore along the fence line with their tails in the air.
The Seigneur stood in the center of the little paddock with a long driving whip. He was in his shirt sleeves in spite of the chill: his velvet coat and embroidered vest reposed safely in the arms of a wide-eyed dairymaid sitting on a stump. The horse completely ignored him, flinging clods of earth as it arched its neck and dashed at a high-stepping trot from one end of the enclosure to the other in its desperation to rejoin the other horses. It skidded to a halt at the fence, hurled itself around, and galloped the other way.
“Look at this,” the Seigneur said quietly. He addressed himself to Leigh, disregarding the horse as wholly as it disregarded him. “Do you think this animal’s paying any attention to what I want?”
The horse chose that moment to pound past within a foot of him, snorting and blowing frost in the frigid air.
“No,” Leigh said. “I can’t say that I do.”
“Watch, then. I’m going to teach you something that’s not luck, Sunshine.”
She leaned on the fence. Nemo bumped his nose at her waist, and she rubbed his head. He sat down next to her and leaned on her leg.
“The first thing I want this chap to know,” he said, “is that he’s not alone in here.” He lifted the whip, which had a long, stiff shank doubled by the length of its lash, and gave it a sharp crack. The horse flinched at the sound, glanced at him, and continued to canter around the paddock.
He cracked the whip again. This time, when the horse came barreling around the pen, the Seigneur took a few steps sideways, as if to walk into its path. The animal skidded to a wild-eyed stop, turned tail, and went the other direction around the ring. After one revolution, the Seigneur stepped forward, cracked the whip, and changed the gray’s direction again. The horse circled the paddock, then threw its weight on its haunches, as if to stop and call out to the others, but the Seigneur moved behind it, brandishing the whip and making a chirruping noise, driving on the horse without ever touching the animal or even coming close.
“Now does he know I’m here?” he asked.
Leigh watched the horse’s high head carriage and plunging gallop. The sound of its blowing was loud in the quiet air. “Barely,” she said.
“Right. Watch him looking off over the fence all the time while he goes. He’s not thinking about me: he’s thinking about having a champagne punch and a rubber of whist over there with the other fellows.” He stepped again to the side and turned the horse with a cluck and snap of the whip. “I don’t want the fence holding him in—I want his attention keeping him here. How am I going to get that?”
She frowned a little. “Are you going to whip him?”
“My sweet love—that’s a stupid guess. Is he going to stay here if I hurt him?”
She pursed her lips.
“Not if I hurt him, no,” he said. “But if something else hurts—if his lungs hurt, and his muscles ache—and I’m the agreeable fellow who lets him rest… then we open a negotiation, hmm? We begin to communicate.”
He flourished the whip and took a step, forcing the horse to turn. She could see the relaxed concentration in his face, the way he never took his eyes off the horse as he spoke, the familiar way he handled the whip. Every motion he made was smooth and deliberate.
“For now, I just want to control one thing—the direction he’s going,” he said. “These are the lessons for the present: he can run like the devil, the faster the better… but he has to run the way I want him to go, he has to turn when I ask, and he can’t stop unless I let him.”
He pushed the horse on every time it showed any slight inclination to slow on its own, popping the whip and forcing the animal to turn around and run in the opposite direction whenever its attention strayed over the fence, which was frequently. Over and over, he repeated the sequence, until the horse began to breathe in heavy gusts.
Its shrill calls for the other horses had stopped: the black had no time for that now. I
t gradually became too distracted by the whip and where the man in the paddock might step next. Within a quarter hour, the Seigneur had only to hold up the whip and point it toward where the horse was headed to make the black slide to a stop, whirl around, and run the other way.
“Watch the way he turns when he changes direction,” the Seigneur said. “See—it’s always outward, away from me, toward the fence. He’d still rather not be in here with me. I want him to start to turn inward, with his head toward me. I want him to learn that it’s more pleasant to pay attention to me than to keep running around like a fool.”
The next time he stepped in the horse’s course, he kept his shoulders relaxed and the whip lowered. The black skidded back on its heels and turned tail, swinging its head outward again. The Seigneur’s whip came up and drove him on with that insistent pop.
“No luck that time. I’ll ask him again,” the Seigneur said. “I’m giving him a chance—do you see what I’m doing?” He lowered the whip and stepped toward the horse’s path. “I’m quiet; I’m not clucking, I’m not using the whip. I’m offering him a pause.”
This time the animal hesitated for an instant, flinging its head in his direction before it scrambled around with its rump toward him once more.
“There,” he said. “He’s thinking about it. He’s got his brain working now.”
He dropped the tip of the whip again as he moved, and amazingly, the sweating horse did swing its forefeet inward and its rump to the fence, giving the Seigneur and the whip a good swift look before it trotted off the other way.
There was a faint murmur of appreciation from the audience.
The Seigneur drove the horse around the ring a few times with the whip, then relaxed his arm. The black turned instantly inward—and this time it stopped, staring at the Seigneur, its flanks heaving.
“Clever fellow,” he said caressingly. He took two steps to one side. The animal’s head swung, its large dark eyes riveted to him. The Seigneur walked the other way, with the same result. He kept walking, and the horse’s head followed him, turning so far that it had to shift its hindquarters in a circle around its forefeet as the Seigneur walked, until the animal was facing exactly the opposite direction from where it had been before.
“Now is he paying attention to me?”
Leigh couldn’t suppress a smile. “Yes.”
A distant whinny brought the horse’s head up and around. Instantly, before the animal could respond to the call, the Seigneur cracked the whip and sent the horse back into a canter around the ring. After a number, of revolutions and turns, he gave it another chance to stop. The horse halted facing him, blowing hard, and took a few steps in his direction.
Another faint call came from the distance. The panting black lifted its head as if to answer, heard the Seigneur’s chirrup, and abruptly dropped its nose, staring at him. It seemed to be weighing its options, daring another glance toward the far pasture. The Seigneur clucked again and lifted the whip a fraction. The black jerked its head slightly at the warning, and then the taut muscles in its neck relaxed. It ambled over to the Seigneur, the picture of total surrender, and stood with its head lowered next to him.
He scratched its ears, murmuring softly.
A ragged round of applause made the horse lift its head for an instant, but then it dropped its poll again and pushed gently at the Seigneur’s arm. When he walked toward the fence, the black followed him like a huge puppy, ignoring the repeated whinnying from the far pasture.
Leigh felt a strange tug in her chest at the sight. What an extraordinary man he was.
The horse took an introduction to Nemo with complete aplomb, giving the wolf no more attention than a barnyard cat. After that, it seemed only reasonable that the Seigneur could quite easily introduce a saddle and bridle, and mount while the black stood quietly. Before noon, he’d ridden it in the paddock, and then outside, heading away from the excited calls of the other horses until he was completely out of sight.
When he’d returned and dismounted, he took a deep swig of water from a long-handled cup that someone offered. There were plenty of volunteers to take the horse and tend to it; everyone was waiting, hoping he’d tackle the rogue next.
“The Mermaid packed us a basket,” he said to Leigh. “You’d best eat.” Then he turned to the horse coper Mr. Hopkins. “Go ahead. Bring the devil over here—any way you can manage it.”
While Leigh and the Seigneur ate a silent lunch beneath a tree, half the crowd of locals tramped down the road to watch the new show. The rogue was moved into the paddock by creating a human chain to block the lane and chasing both horses out of the pasture, down the little road, and into the paddock. Then someone caught the more docile chestnut and led it back out to wait with the young black.
The rogue danced along the edge of the paddock for a few minutes, sending spectators back off the fence, then dropped its head to graze. Its ears flicked back and forth furiously as it tore up the grass in quick, ripping grabs.
The Seigneur stood and held out his hand to Leigh. She allowed him to help her to her feet, feeling his fingers warm and strong beneath her elbow as he led her a little distance from the spectators ranged along the fence. She waited while he frowned intently at the gray rogue. It was a magnificent horse in spite of the bloody scars on its face; as pale as moonlight on ice, with a flowing, tangled mane and a tail that dusted the ground. When it flung up its head at some disturbance, the great brown eyes showed white and its neck arched, so that it looked like some fierce, noble mount in a painting of a soldier king.
“Just remember,” the Seigneur murmured, “he’s frightened of you.”
She turned her head. “Of me!”
“Aye. You saw what I did. You can do the same with this one.”
“Are you mad?” she exclaimed.
“Not at all. I showed you how.” His lips curled a little. “It’s not luck, after all.”
“For God’s sake. I won’t go in there with that animal.” He gave her a slight frown, as if he was surprised to find he didn’t quite approve of her. “He’s frightened,” he repeated.
“He savaged a man.”
“What would you do if somebody held you down and beat you across the face?”
She drew in a breath and gave a shaky laugh. “I know I’ve insulted you.” She looked at him. “You want me trampled to death in return?”
“You’re afraid!” he said, in a voice of soft astonishment. “The girl who plans to murder the Reverend Mr. Chilton.”
She was stung into turning away from him. “It’s not the same thing.”
“How do you know?” he asked. “When it comes to the breach, do you think you’ll have it in you if you don’t have it now?”
She whirled back. “It’s not the same!” she hissed. “I hate him!”
“It takes more than hate to kill a clever man, Sunshine.” His hard words cut the clear air. “It takes brains. I’m trying to teach you something you can use. That horse is a weapon, if you have the nerve to master it.”
Her jaw worked. She turned her head, staring at the untamed beast trotting boldly around the paddock. “I thought you meant the chestnut for me,” she said at last.
He moved his hand impatiently. “The chestnut will do for a cover hack. But this fellow here—God, look at him! Show him some courage and confidence and he’ll take you straight into hell if you ask it.”
Just then, the horse bunched its muscles with awesome power, kicked out and squealed and took off along the length of the paddock, its tail flying. Leigh felt that painful, trembly sensation rise in her chest again at the rapt look on the Seigneur’s face. She bit her lip.
He wanted this horse.
And he was forcing it on her. He looked down, his mouth set, his green eyes intent and challenging.
She felt suddenly helpless, that shaky weakness inside trapping words and arguments in her throat. Her cursed lower lip kept threatening to tremble. He lifted her hand and laid the long-handled whip across it, closin
g her fingers around the braided leather stock.
“I’ll help you,” he said. “I’ll tell you what to do.”
She looked at the ground, trying savagely to suppress the telltale quiver of her mouth. “I really don’t care if the damned horse kills me,” she muttered. She rested the butt of the whip on the springy turf, and then lifted her face to the magnificent devil that pounded down the paddock. She tossed her head. “I don’t give ha’pence what happens.”
S.T. watched her climb the gate and walk out into the center of the pen. He hardly knew why he’d insisted on this. He could work the horse faster and better; he itched to do it, to help the belligerent, brutalized animal learn that a man was something it could trust.
But she thought he was a sham. She thought it was all luck. Too easy to just go out there and tame this rogue for himself—he wanted her to experience it right down to her toes. He wanted her to fail. And then he could show her.
He wasn’t afraid for her safety. The “rogue” wasn’t past reclaim. It wasn’t heart-deep vicious—just a smart, hot-blooded stallion that had been badly mishandled and discovered every trick to thwart anyone who’d tried to master it. Gelding the animal had been a crime and an abominable waste, but these phlegmatic British never could seem to deal with stallions. They had to cut every animal in sight and harness it to a carriage.
At least Hopkins or some other fool hadn’t docked its tail. Likely couldn’t throw the beast down long enough.
There was no threat now in the horse’s pricked ears and rhythmic snort as it stared at Leigh. It felt itself free—or free enough, for the moment—and warily curious. There was still dark, dried blood smeared on its face and flecked across its chest. It looked as if it hadn’t been groomed in weeks; mud spatters and grass stains marred the pale coat, but for all that, it was still the loveliest brute he’d seen since he’d lost Charon. It had stood out in the fair like a grubby Galahad amid the rabble.