A large hand came to rest over her mouth. Miles sat up, then took his hand away.
“Nay, no wife. Women do not like me.”
“Really?” she asked, looking at him and finding that very hard to believe. “Good grief, is everyone blind here in backwoods England?” She clapped her own hand over her mouth when she realized what she’d said. “I meant—”
He was grinning. “I know what you meant, Abigail. And I thank you for the compliment. But even though I am a knight with land of my own, women don’t care overmuch for my past accomplishments.”
“And just what would those be?” Great. Out of all the places she could have resurfaced, she’d resurfaced in the moat of someone with questionable past accomplishments.
But at least he had accomplishments. And what was this business about being a knight? Maybe that was why he carried a sword. Abby looked at him thoughtfully. It couldn’t hurt to reserve judgment until she found out more about him. She realized that she was already stacking him up against her Ideal Man list, but she could hardly help herself. After all, he had given her the only bed in his house. He was easily the most appealing man she had seen in years. He liked her hair. He had a great accent. He wasn’t much of a housekeeper, but that could be fixed. The first thing to do was move the barn-like accoutrements outside—
“—burn me at the stake—”
“Huh?” she exclaimed, turning back in. “Run that one by me again.”
He looked at her with a frown. “Haven’t you been listening?”
“No. I’ve been cataloging your good points. I don’t think this is one of them.”
He shook his head with a slow smile. “I was telling you that I’d just recently escaped being burned at the stake. For heresy.”
“For what?”
“Heresy—which was a lie, of course. I had simply made the grave error of expressing my views on the Crusades,” Miles said. “I was traveling through France this past fall, having just returned from the Holy Land, where I saw and heard tell of ruthless slaughter. To be sure, I could find nothing to recommend the whole Crusading affair. One night I sought shelter at an inn. I slipped well into my cups, but came back to myself a goodly while after I’d already disparaged my table companion, a man I soon learned was a former Crusader and a powerful French count.”
“And what did he do to you? Threaten a lawsuit?” Trouble with the law, Abby noted. That could definitely be a mark in the negative column.
Miles smiled. “The law had nothing to do with it, my lady. He sent for his bishop, threw together an impromptu inquisition—of souls without any authority, I might add—and convicted me of both heresy and witchcraft.”
“Witchcraft?” Abby eased herself back on the bed. There was no doubt about that being a red flag.
He snorted. “Aye, if you can stomach that. The count’s witnesses—paid for handsomely, of course—claimed they had seen me conversing with my familiar.”
“And that would be?”
“A fluffy black cat.”
Abby laughed. “Oh, right. That would have been a pretty one-sided conversation, what with you sneezing your head off.”
Miles smiled. “I laughed as well, at first. I sobered abruptly when I saw the wood piled high around the stake and one of the count’s men standing there with a lit torch.”
“Good grief,” she said, “they really weren’t going to do it, were they? What kind of backwater town were you in, anyway? Hadn’t they ever heard of Amnesty International? Human rights activists would have been all over this.”
“I daresay the count’s men had heard of many things, yet they fully intended to do the man’s bidding. They secured me to the post, but not without a goodly struggle on my part.”
Abby was speechless. What was the world coming to? She made a mental note to avoid rural France as a travel destination.
“The count had taken the torch himself and was giving me a last fanatical spewing forth of religious prattle when a miracle occurred.”
Abby found she was clutching the edge of the bed with both hands. “What?” she breathed. “A downpour?”
Miles laughed. “‘Twould have been fitting, to be sure. Nay, ’twas my grandsire, whom I had been traveling to meet. His men overcame the count’s, he set me free and I fled like a kicked whelp, not even bothering to offer him a kiss of peace. Needless to say, my journeying in France was thereafter very short-lived.”
“Did you tell the police about that guy? What a nutcase!”
“Police?” he echoed, stumbling over the word. “What is that?”
Abby frowned. “You know, the authorities.”
“Ah,” Miles said, nodding, “you mean Louis. Nay, I did not think it wise to chance a visit to court. My grandsire sent word a fortnight after I arrived home telling me that he’d seen the matter settled.” Miles said pleasantly. “The sly old fox has something of a reputation. I daresay he applied the sword liberally, as well as informing the king of what went on.”
“Sword?” Well, Miles seemed to have one handy. Maybe his entire family had a thing about metal. “And what do you mean he informed the king?” she asked. “What king?”
“Louis. Louis IX, King of France.”
“But France doesn’t have a king,” she pointed out.
“Aye, it does.”
“No, it doesn’t. It has a president.”
“Nay, it has a king. Louis IX. A good king, as far as they go.”
Abby scrambled to her feet, careful to keep them on blanket-covered floor. As an afterthought, she made a grab for her tights to keep them from falling to her knees.
“France does not have a king,” she insisted.
Miles jumped to his feet just as quickly.
“How can you not know of King Louis?” he asked.
“What is he, some fringe guy trying to overthrow the government?”
“He’s the bloody king of that whole realm!” Miles exclaimed. He looked at her as if she’d lost her mind. “Next you will tell me that you know nothing of Henry.”
“Henry who?”
“Henry III, King of England!”
“No, no, no,” she said, shaking her head. “Henry isn’t king. There’s little prince Harry, but he’s just the spare heir. Elizabeth is queen.”
“Elizabeth? Who is Elizabeth?”
He was starting to sound as exasperated as she felt.
“All right,” she said, taking a deep breath. “Let’s start from the beginning. And can we go sit by the fire? I’m cold.”
“Gladly,” Miles said. He shoved his feet into boots, then clomped over to the pile of logs in the middle of the room and built up the fire.
Abby tiptoed gingerly into the kitchen and put on her Keds. They weren’t as dry as they could have been, but it beat the heck out of wearing more of Miles’s floor on the bottoms of her tights than she was already. She squished her way over to the fire to face her scowling host.
Miles folded his arms across his chest. “Let us see if we cannot untangle this snarl inside your head.”
“My head?” she said. “I’m not the one who’s confused.”
“Aye, but you are!”
“I am not! France does not have a king, and neither does England. England has a queen and her name is Elizabeth!”
“It has a king and his name is Henry!”
Abby smirked. “I’d say let’s turn on the TV and see what the local newscaster says, but I’ll bet you don’t have a TV either, do you?”
“Nay, I do not,” he said, stiffly. “Nor would I have one.”
“Ha,” she said. “You don’t even know what a TV is.”
He scowled fiercely. “Aye, I do.”
“Do not.”
“How would you know what I do and do not know?”
“You don’t have any electricity, bucko. It’s a dead giveaway.”
He growled at her. “You are a most infuriating woman.”
“Really?” she said, surprised. She smiled suddenly. “How nice. I’
ve always wanted to be infuriating. It looks like the Garrett blood is really coming out. My grandmother would be so proud.”
“I think I’d like to wring it all from you, for ’tis most—ha ... ha ... hachoo! ”
Abby barely stepped aside in time to avoid the product of his violent sneeze. She grabbed his arm.
“Hush,” she whispered, frantically. “Sir Sweetums has to be nearby.”
Miles panted through his mouth. “Sir Sweetubs? What kind of a nabe is that for a bloody cat?”
“It’s a term of endearment. Like this: sweetie pie, honey bunch, snookums.” She tickled him under the chin for effect. “See?”
Miles scowled. “I see noth—ha . . . ha—”
Abby put her finger under his nose to plug it. “Don’t even think about it, toots. We’ve got a kitty to find. Don’t make any sudden moves.”
She kept her finger under his nose as they turned slowly in a circle.
“See anything?” she whispered.
“Nay.”
“Keep looking.”
They turned another circle and Miles froze suddenly. “There,” he said, softly.
Sir Sweetums was sitting next to the hall door.
“Perhaps he will cobe if you call to hib,” Miles said, breathing through his mouth. He was obviously fighting his sneeze.
“Here, kitty, kitty,” Abby said. She beckoned. “Come here, Sir Sweetums. Miles won’t hurt you. He likes cats.”
Miles muffled a sneeze in his sleeve.
“All right, his nose doesn’t, but the rest of him does.”
Abby took a step forward. Sir Sweetums got to his feet, gave her a meow she couldn’t quite interpret, turned on his heel and, with his tail held high, walked through the door.
Through the closed door.
Miles staggered. He threw his arms around her and clutched her.
“Merciful St. Michael,” he breathed. “I did not see what I just saw.”
Abby would have felt the same way, but she had inside information. It was hard to swallow, but she had the feeling Sir Maximillian Sweetums was a ghost. She held onto her shaking host and wondered just how to break the news to him.
“Things of this nature do not happen,” Miles said, his voice hushed. “’Tis a modern age. I do not believe what I have just seen.”
Abby looked up at him. “Honey, I think you’re living in the past. Everyone else has indoor plumbing.”
“How much more modern an age can it be?” he asked, returning her look, his eyes wide. “I don’t care overmuch for his politics, but King Henry is a most forward-thinking monarch.”
She rolled her eyes. “Oh, brother. Not that again.”
“Aye, that again,” he said, some of the color returning to his face. He released his deathgrip on her and stepped back a pace. “Saints, woman, where have you been?”
“Out to lunch,” she returned, “obviously.”
“Henry rules England,” he insisted.
“No, he doesn’t.”
“By the very saints of heaven, you are a stubborn maid! Have you forgotten the bloody year? Who else would sit the throne in 1238?”
Abby blinked. “Huh?”
Miles clapped his free hand to his head. “That swim addled your wits, Abigail.”
“What did you say before?” she managed. “What year?”
“1238. The Year of Our Lord 1238!”
Abby kept breathing. She knew that because she had to remind herself to do it. In, out, in, out. Twelve-thirty-eight, twelve-thirty-eight. She breathed in and out to that rhythm.
It couldn’t be true. She looked around her at the stone room. There weren’t any fireplaces; just Miles’s bonfire in the middle of the room. No electricity, no central heat, no carpet. The walls were bare, leaving their stone selves fully open to perusal. No twentieth-century construction job there.
She looked down. There was stone beneath her feet, what she could feel of it beneath the layer of scum and hay. She looked around again. There were a pair of crude wooden tables near the walls, and chairs that looked rustically crafted. But that was the extent of the furniture. She took a deep breath. Well, the place certainly smelled like 1238.
She looked up at Miles. He stood in homespun clothing exactly like hers, wearing a very medieval frown. He didn’t have the benefit of modern grooming aids, if his finger-combed hair and non-ironed tunic were any clue. He’d definitely been packing a sword the night before. He’d said he was a knight. Could that be true too?
Abby looked toward the door. Maybe if she stepped outside into the fresh air, she might have a different perspective on things.
She wanted to saunter across the great hall casually, but she had the feeling it had come out as more of a frantic get-me-the-hell-back-to-my-century kind of run.
She struggled with the heavy wooden beam that obviously served as a dead bolt in 1238. Heavy hands came to rest on her shoulders.
“Abigail—”
“Let me out!” she shrieked.
“Abigail—” he said, starting to sound a bit concerned.
Abby wasn’t just a bit concerned. She was on the verge of having hysterics—and she was starting not to care just exactly what Garretts did and did not do.
“Please!” she begged.
Miles heaved the beam aside and opened the door, in spite of her attempts to help. She ran outside.
It was raining. She slogged straight into three inches of muck.
“Yuck!” she exclaimed.
She would have run anywhere just to be running, but she couldn’t seem to get her feet unstuck from the goo.
“Abigail.”
Before she could tell Miles just what had her so frantic, she found herself turned around bodily and gathered against a very firm, very warm body. Without giving his good or bad points any more thought, she threw her arms around him and clung.
“Oh, man,” she said, feeling herself beginning to wheeze again. It was a nasty habit she’d gotten into lately. She was certain wheezing was something no respectable Garrett ever found herself doing. “Oh, man, oh, man,” she wheezed again.
“By the saints, you’re trembling,” Miles said, sounding surprised. He stroked her back with his large hand. “There’s nothing to fear, Abigail.”
“It’s 1238!” she exclaimed against his very rough, very un-department-store-like shirt.
“See?” Miles said, obviously trying to sound soothing. “You’ve remembered the year. ‘Tis a most encouraging sign. I’m certain ’twas simply a bit of chill that seeped into your head and addled your wits for a time. Reason is most definitely returning to you.”
Abby felt her tights beginning to slip and she made a grab for them before they migrated any further south. She tilted her head back and looked at Miles.
“It really is 1238, isn’t it?” she whispered. “And you really are Miles of Spendingthorn—”
“Speningethorpe—”
“Whatever, and you really are a knight, aren’t you?”
“For what it is worth, aye, I am.”
Well, stranger things had happened. Like Sir Sweetums walking through a thick, wooden plank of a door.
Then there was her trip down into Murphy’s Pond the night before to consider. That had taken an awfully long time, hadn’t it?
But seven hundred years?
She rested her nose against Miles’s chest and contemplated. Garretts didn’t faint. Garretts didn’t run away from difficulties. Garretts didn’t lose their marbles.
Funny, she’d never heard anything about Garretts not time-traveling.
She looked up at Miles. “You don’t believe in witches, do you?”
He smiled faintly. “Having come within scorching distance of a healthy bonfire myself, I would have to say nay, I do not believe in witches.”
“Then I think you should sit down.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re going to fall down when I tell you what I have to tell you. It’ll hurt less if you’re closer to the groun
d.”
Miles looked at her archly. “The de Piagets of Artane do not faint.”
Abby reached up and patted him on his beautiful cheek. “There’s a first time for everything, toots.”
“Toots? Why do you persist in calling me that?”
Abby took his hand and pulled him back inside the hall. He’d just have to trust her on this one.
And she definitely hoped he’d meant what he’d said about the witch thing, or she was certain her revelations would land her in the fire.
Chapter Four
MILES FROWNED TO himself as he allowed Abigail to pull him back inside his hall. Something had obviously troubled her deeply, if her frantic flight from his fire was any indication. But what? She had looked at him as if she were seeing a ghost.
He realized abruptly that he was allowing himself to be led and he dug in his heels. Abigail stopped and looked at him with that same, almost frantic look. Miles held his ground.
“Whatever you have to tell me, you may most certainly tell me while we are standing. Indeed, I insist upon it.”
He looked down at her as he said it, and wondered if she shouldn’t be the one sitting down. She was very pale. Saints, had she suffered some sort of injury that had damaged her mind so that she barely remembered the date?
He lifted his hands and cupped her face, rubbing his thumbs gently across her cheeks. Her skin was so soft and fair. Perhaps she was a nobleman’s daughter who had become lost and wandered into his moat. Never mind how she was dressed. It was possible her sire employed seamstresses with very odd ideas on fashion. He should have questioned her sooner about her family, but he’d been too bemused by her actions the night before, then too unsettled by the appearance and disappearance of her cat today to think too deeply.
She caught his right hand and looked at it. “You have more calluses on this hand than the other.”
“Of course,” he said.
“Why?”
“’Tis my swordarm, Abigail.” He put his callused hand to her brow. She wasn’t feverish. Indeed, she was chilled. “Perhaps we should repair to the fire,” he said, pulling her in that direction, “then you should tell me of yourself. Forgive me for not having asked sooner. Your sire will no doubt be grieved over your loss. I will take you to him as soon as may be—”