The Moonless Night by Joan Smith Page B

satisfy him by telling him. He tethered his stallion to a fencepost and walked quickly all around the building, trying doors with an eager air, but failing to gain entrance.
    “I must see what is going on in there,” he exclaimed in excitement
    “There is a window, but it is very high up,” she pointed out. It was a good eight feet from the ground, and impossible for Sanford to see through.
    “If I lifted you up on my shoulders you could get a peek in,” he suggested, looking at her hopefully.
    The image this suggestion conjured up was so bizarre she could hardly hold her lips steady—herself clambering up on this haughty man’s impeccable shoulders. “I would prefer not to,” she answered primly, and remained where she was, on her mare’s back.
    He exhaled a breath of air angrily giving her a corresponding look.
    “There is an old door lying on the ground. I believe they have put on a new door. My, there must be something very interesting going on in there, for someone to have taken such a precaution. I wonder if you could lean the door against the barn and climb up,” she suggested.
    He immediately went to the door and hauled it up, examining the decaying wood uncertainly. “If you held it secure at the bottom I could use it as a ramp,” he said.
    As this promised some amusement, she agreed. “I would be happy to,” she told him, hopping down from her mount.
    It made an extremely wobbly unsafe ramp. Sanford’s foot went right through the wood on the third step up, taking a gouge out of his beautiful Hessians and also jarring his knee. “My valet will have my hide,” he said, but was not hurt, and continued balancing his way up with a good deal of agility.
    Marie was uncertain in her mind afterwards whether she might have prevented the accident. Just as Lord Sanford approached the point some good five feet from the ground and was leaning precariously forward to get his fingers on the windowsill, the door gave a lurch. She tried to grab it, but with his weight, it was difficult. Or maybe she didn’t try so very hard—that was what caused her to wonder later, for really she was overcome with a strong desire to see him tumble ignominiously in the dust. In any case, door and lord both went crashing to the ground, where a very ungentlemanly oath left his lordship’s lips. He cast a look of utter loathing on Miss Boltwood, who said in a show of dismay, “How clumsy!” as he struggled out from under the door, where his leg was pinned. His first step caused a wince of pain and another oath.
    “I’ve sprained my godda—my ankle,” he said. “What a time for it! If you had let me lift you up as I wanted to, this wouldn’t have happened.”
    “It wouldn’t have happened to you! It would be me you dropped, instead of the door.”
    “Not a decent sawbones for miles around, I suppose. What the hell am I to do?”
    She expressed not a single word of commiseration, but suggested blandly that she would bring his horse to him, and if he could control his temper till they got back to the Hall, her aunt was very good with a splint or fomentation, whatever was required.
    His long jaw looked two inches longer at this suggestion.
    “Where is the closest doctor? I don’t want an amateur quacking me.”
    “Plymouth,” she answered. “You have to ride past the Hall, in any case. I expect you will want to stop and change over into a carriage.”
    She led his stallion to him, and said in an innocent voice, “And you still didn’t get to see what is in that barn. But you must not worry that it is a gang planning to hide Bonaparte out there. I have just remembered—David said the other night that it is used for cockfighting nowadays. That would account for the new door and lock, and the traffic. It has several chairs and tables and so on, that must be kept safe. I wish I had thought of it sooner.”
    “I’m sure you do,” he said, glaring at her, and suppressing all show of pain, as it seemed to give the young