Susanna Kearsley - The Winter Sea

‘Then I’m afraid I’ll disappoint you, for I found the duke to be most charming, though we did not speak at length.’

‘What did you speak about?’

‘He asked me my relation to you.’

‘Did he?’ asked the countess in that tone of guarded interest that Sophia was beginning to associate with any conversation that involved the Duke of Hamilton. ‘What else?’

‘We spoke of Darien. He said it was a blessing I had not gone with my parents.’

‘And it was.’

‘And that was all. The interview took but a quarter of an hour, perhaps. No longer.’

‘And you thought him charming.’

‘Yes, my lady.’

‘Well,’ the countess said, ‘I can forgive you that.’ She gave no further explanation of that statement, nor did she reveal her own opinion of the man, although Sophia reasonably guessed that, in the judgment of the countess, she had been herself deceived.

But nothing else was said about it.

Two more weeks passed, and the days began to lengthen, and the restlessness that held those in the castle in its grasp grew ever stronger.

‘I would ride today,’ the countess said, one morning after breakfast. ‘Will you come with me, Sophia?’

In surprise, Sophia said, ‘Of course.’

‘We need not trouble Mr Hall, I think. He is yet occupied.’ The countess smiled, and added, ‘I believe I have a riding habit that would well become you.’

The countess’s chamber was larger by half than Sophia’s and looked to the sea, too, although it was not as impressive a view, as one wall of the castle intruded upon it. The bed, richly carved, had silk hangings of blue, and the chairs in the room all had backs of the same blue silk, artfully reflected in the gilt-edged looking glass that caught the daylight from the narrow windows. Blue was clearly a favorite color of the countess, because the velvet riding habit that she spread upon the clothes-press in the antechamber was blue as well, a lovely deep blue like a clear loch in autumn.

‘My hair was the same shade as yours once,’ the countess said, ‘and I did always believe that this habit looked well on me. My husband brought it back from France. He chose it, so he said, to match the color of my eyes.’

‘I could not wear a thing so precious to you.’

‘Nonsense, child. I had rather that you would make use of it than it should lie in a corner, unworn. Besides,’ she added, ‘even were I not in mourning, there is no known magic that could make this fit my waist. Come, take it, wear it, that I might have a companion on my ride.’

The groom who brought the horses round to them was Rory, the same young man whom Sophia had seen rocking on his chair and watching Kirsty in the kitchen that first morning, when she’d lost her way. She’d seen him several times since then, but always he had passed her with a down-turned glance, and only nodded briefly to her greeting. ‘He’s nae one for talk,’ was Kirsty’s explanation, when Sophia asked if she had somehow given him offence. ‘He told me once there were so many folk lived in his house when he was just a bairn, that now he likes a bit of peace.’

Sophia said good morning to him anyway, and Rory nodded, silent, as he helped her to the saddle. He had given her the same horse she had ridden north from Edinburgh, a quiet mare with one white stocking and a way of twitching back her ears to catch the slightest sound or word.

The mare seemed faintly agitated and impatient, as though she, too, felt the changing of the season and the warming of the wind, and wanted only to be off. Sophia had to take a firm hold on the reins, once they were on the road, to keep her to a walk. When the mare danced lightly sideways in a step that nearly knocked them into the countess and her mount, Sophia said, as an apology, ‘My horse has a mind to go faster.’

The countess smiled. ‘Mine also.’ Looking at Sophia, she said, ‘Shall we let them have their way?’

It was so glorious a feeling, that free run along the road, with the wind at her back and the sun on her face and the sense of adventure before her, that Sophia half wished it could go on forever, but at length the countess reined her horse and turned it back again, and with regret, Sophia did the same.

Her horse, though, did not wish to slow the pace, and before Sophia could guess the mare’s mind, she had bolted. There was no response to the reins, though Sophia pulled strongly, and all she could do was to hold on as best she could, watching with fear as the mare left the road, running overland straight for the sea. For the cliffs.

When it seemed she must let go the reins and the stirrups and throw herself down from the saddle to save her own life, the mare suddenly wheeled and changed course, running not at the sea but alongside it. The great walls of Slains, soaring out of the shoreline, grew nearer with each pounding volley of steps.

She must stop, thought Sophia, or else the mare might go the wrong way around those walls, into the precipice. Pulling the taut reins with all of her strength, she called out to the mare, and the brown ears twitched round, and the mare unexpectedly came to a sliding halt, flinging Sophia clear out of the saddle.

She had a vague awareness of the sky being in the wrong position before the ground came up with bruising force, and stole her breath.

A sea bird floated overhead, its eye turned, curious, toward her. She was gazing upwards at it, with a roaring in her ears, when a man’s voice asked her, ‘Are you hurt?’

She wasn’t sure. She tried her limbs and found them working, so she answered, ‘No.’

Strong hands came under her, and helped her sit. She turned to better view the man, and found he was no stranger. ‘Captain Gordon,’ she said, wondering if she perhaps had suffered greater damage to her senses than she’d realized.

But he seemed real enough, and his smile seemed pleased she’d remembered his name. ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘I’ve the devil’s own habit of turning up anywhere, and it’s a good thing for you that I did.’

Running hoofbeats interrupted them as, breathlessly, the countess caught them up. ‘Sophia—’ she began. Then, ‘Thomas! How in God’s name do you come here?’

‘By His grace, my lady,’ said the captain, kneeling still beside Sophia. ‘Sent, it would appear, to keep your young charge here from being sorely injured, though I must confess I’ve done no more than set her upright.’ With a grin, he asked, ‘Do you indulge in racing now, your Ladyship? I should point out that, at your time of life, it is not wise.’

Her look of worry cleared. She said, ‘Impertinence,’ and smiled, and asked Sophia, ‘Are you truly unharmed?’

Sophia answered that she was, and stood to prove it. She was shaky on her feet, though, and glad of Captain Gordon’s firm hand holding to her elbow.

He looked to the mare, quiet now, standing several feet off. ‘She does not appear such a dangerous mount. Will you try her again, if I stand at her head?’

He did not say as much, but Sophia well knew he was urging her back on the horse for a reason. She’d only had such a great fall once before, as a child, and she yet could remember her father, in helping her back on the pony that had thrown her, saying, ‘Never waste a moment getting back into the saddle, else your confidence be lost.’

So she went bravely to the standing mare and let Captain Gordon help her up into her seat, and saw his eyes warm with approval. ‘There,’ he said, and took hold of the bridle. ‘If you will permit me, we shall set a slower pace, on our return.’

The countess rode beside them on her own well-mannered gelding. ‘Truthfully, Thomas,’ she asked him, ‘how came you to Slains? We have had no account of your coming.’