LITMIR.BIZ

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      ‘From Lazen Castle, my Lady?’

      She nodded. ‘Indeed, my Lord.’

      ‘My dear lady! Good Lord!’ He seemed quite flummoxed suddenly, as if St George, having rescued the maiden, discovered that he was too shy to talk with her. He blushed. He looked at the crumpled figure on the turf. ‘He must have been mad!’ he blurted out.

      She tried to stand, stumbling because she needed to keep her hands within the cloaks, and Lord Culloden came forward to take her elbow as though she was made of porcelain. She smiled her thanks. ‘Do you have any water, my Lord?’

      ‘Water?’ He said it as if she had asked for the moon. ‘Ah! Water! No. I have rum, my Lady?’

      ‘Can I beg you for a sip?’

      He walked to his horse and Campion felt another shudder of revulsion as she saw the bent neck and still body of her attacker.

      ‘My Lady?’ Lord Culloden nervously offered her a flask. She could not take her hands from within the cloaks; he seemed to understand and held the flask to her mouth.

      She almost choked. She used the first mouthful to swill the sickness from her tongue, spat, and then she drank some of the crude spirit, and she saw her rescuer’s smiling, anxious face and she felt a great rush of warmth and gratitude.

      He led her to the phaeton so she could lean against the wrecked, tipped carriage. He smiled. ‘How do we get you home? Can you ride?’

      She nodded.

      ‘And what were you doing alone on the blasted heath?’ He was patting her bays’ necks. ‘I thought fair maidens stayed away from such places. Too many dragons!’

      ‘Apparently,’ she said. ‘It has always been safe.’

      ‘That’s what King Harold said about Hastings.’ He grinned. The sun was bright on the gold wires and lace of his uniform. ‘Now, my Lady, you will ride my horse and I’ll take yours.’ One of the bays was shivering, the whites of its eyes showing. Lord Culloden ran his gauntletted hand down the horse’s back. ‘You’re recovered enough, my Lady?’

      She nodded. ‘Indeed, my Lord, thanks to you.’

      ‘Thank the rum, Lady Campion.’ He smiled. ‘Is it far to Lazen?’

      ‘No, my Lord.’ He was, she thought, despite his gaudy uniform, a plain, honest looking man. She could imagine him in a saddle for a day’s hunting, a squire with a voice that could carry for two wet fields against the wind. He was obviously awed by this meeting with the daughter of one of England’s great families. His eyes, slightly hooded, added a dash of humorous languor to his face, hinting that he might possess a wry wit. He was not, at first sight, a man of startling handsomeness, yet at this moment he was, to Campion, more handsome than St George and all the angels. She made herself stand upright. ‘If we could go to Lazen, my Lord, I would be most obliged.’

      ‘To Lazen we shall go. I would dream of going nowhere else.’ He was leading his own horse towards her. She was shaking still. She could see the dark ruin that had been her attacker’s throat and she closed her eyes on the sight.

      ‘Lady Campion?’ Lord Culloden’s voice was gentle.

      ‘My Lord?’ She opened her eyes, forcing herself to be calm.

      He was blushing, making his blond moustache seem even lighter against his red skin. ‘If you clutch the cloaks so tight then I fear I will have to lift you onto the saddle, can you bear that?’ He smiled.

      She nodded.

      He lifted her easily to set her sidesaddle on his horse, then used the wrecked phaeton as a mounting block to settle himself on one of the bays. He gathered its long driving rein into his hands, took the reins of the other, and smiled at her. ‘To Lazen, my Lady. The dragon’s corpse we will leave behind!’

      She was suddenly freezing, shivering despite the two cloaks, but the relief of it all was overwhelming. She even felt lightheaded now, laughing as Lord Culloden talked to her and they descended the steep hill towards the town. He was still nervous of her. He looked at her often for reassurance that some small witticism was well received, and he touched his moustache in an habitual gesture whenever she smiled at him. He became shyer as the excitement of the rescue faded, embarrassed almost to be in her presence. She remembered some story of his family, of his father gambling away much of the property. She guessed that Lord Culloden was not accustomed to glories such as Lazen.

      They rode through the town and earned inquisitive looks from the people who watched them pass and then, as they came to the gatehouses, Lord Culloden reined in. He shook his head in amazement. Before him, like a hill of stone and glass, was the grandeur of Lazen. Seen thus for the first time it was easy to imagine why some people called Lazen ‘The Little Kingdom’.

      ‘It’s magnificent! Magnificent! I’d heard so, of course but…’ His voice tailed away.

      She smiled. He could have said nothing better calculated to please her, such was her love of this place. ‘My father will want to thank you, my Lord.’

      He blushed modestly. ‘I could not impose, my Lady.’

      She dismissed his modesty, urged him onwards, and together they rode into Lazen.

       5

      It was the first time in three years that the fifth Earl of Lazen had left the Castle.

      First he was carried downstairs by three footmen, then carefully placed on the cushioned seat of Lazen’s most comfortable travelling coach. He hated leaving his rooms. He hated outsiders to see his weakness.

      He was sober this day. His face was pale and drawn, the face, Campion thought, of an old man. She was not going with him, but as she watched the blankets being tucked about his thin body she thought how the raw, winter light made him look a score of years older than fifty. His manservant, Caleb Wright, climbed into the coach and the door was shut.

      The Earl nodded to Wright, who rapped on the coach roof, and then the Earl grimaced as the coach jolted forward. Even small movements gave him pain, yet he had insisted on going out this day.

      There was not, after all, far to go.

      The coach went down the driveway, through the huge gates with their stone carved escutcheons that showed the bloodied lance of Lazen on either post, past the gatehouses that curved forward in elegant wings, and then slewed right on the cobbles of the market place to take the Shaftesbury road.

      Lord Culloden rode beside the coach. His face looked grim and wintry, suitable for this occasion.

      Simon Burroughs, Lazen’s chief coachman, had brought extra horses and, when they reached the field at the bottom of Two Gallows Hill, they were harnessed to the six already pulling the coach so that the great vehicle could be hauled to the summit of the hill.

      Waiting at the hilltop, as the coach heaved and jolted upwards, was a common cart. It stood close to the pitch-painted gallows that leaned eastwards towards the town.

      A small group of men stood about the cart. They were cold. The Castle lay like a great stone monument in the valley beneath them. The smoke from its scores of chimneys drifted flatly over the winter-hard land.

      The coach, creaking and swaying, reached the gentler slope at the hill’s top. The men standing about the cart pulled off their hats as the door was swung open. They could see the white face of the sick Earl staring from his seat. He raised a hand in acknowledgement of their muttered greetings.

      The door had been opened so he could see what was about to happen.

      Lord Culloden dismounted. ‘You’re ready, my Lord?’

      ‘I am.’ There was a grim pleasure in the Earl’s voice.

      The turf about the gallows

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