“It is either this or we get soaked. Which would you prefer?”
“Can we not leave them open just a little, to allow some light in? I doubt we would get very wet.”
“Well, your mother would, sitting by the window,” he replied, nodding at Lady Elizabeth, “and Ellen on the other side.”
“Oh, I don’t think it would be so very much,” said Ellen at once. “I’d really rather have the air and the view.”
“Very well. But do not come complaining to me when you both take a chill and can’t go to court. Illness is an expensive business, you know.”
Lady Elizabeth perked up at once. “Illness is expensive? I am sorry to have given you such great expense; it was most inconsiderate of me to fall so ill, so often.”
“Now, that is not what I meant at all,” Sir Richard hastily corrected. “I meant to impress upon the girls the needlessness of expense in their case, if they brought illness upon themselves.”
“Brought illness upon themselves? Needlessness of expense? I can hardly believe my ears; I had no idea that you begrudged the care of our health.”
“You know full well that is not what I meant, and being trapped inside a coach in the rain is not a good place to pick a quarrel.”
But Lady Elizabeth seemed determined to do just that. “We would not be trapped in this coach if you had not rushed us away from Rycroft so soon.”
“I did so to honour my agreement with your own brother.”
“Would he truly have minded, had it been a few days later?”
“Enough,” Sir Richard urged, “enough of this now. We have left, we are here, cease your quarrelling, woman.”
Thomasin shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Her parents rarely argued. However, in the last year, since the revelations that had come out in the wake of Cecilia’s failed marriage, the harsh words had been more frequent. She looked at her mother, who had turned her face away. It was hard for her to forget what she had learned: that Lady Elizabeth had shared the king’s bed in her youth. Once, Thomasin had feared that King Henry might even have been her own father, but her likeness to Sir Richard had made her put that idea from her mind. Yet it was a difficult fact to bear, and she was in no doubt that it had redefined her family.
Suddenly, the carriage began to rumble and bounce then plunged downwards on one side. Thomasin was thrown forward in her seat, against her mother’s knees. A loud crack sounded from outside; they lurched to the left and came to a halt.
“God in Heaven!” cried Sir Richard. “What now?”
The door sprung open, flapping on its hinges at a strange angle. The coachman stood outside in the rain.
“My Lord, Ladies, are you hurt? My apologies. A wheel has come off the axel; the pin has snapped.”
“Can it be fixed?”
“Not at the moment, not here. It will take a farrier. I’m afraid you cannot remain within, my Lord.”
“We must leave the carriage?” Lady Elizabeth clasped the side to steady herself.
“I am afraid so, my Lady.”
“How hard is the rain?”
“Still light, but persistent.”
“Well, there is nothing for it. It will not be safe to remain inside,” said Sir Richard, climbing out carefully, as the steps were at an angle.
He turned and offered his hand to Ellen, then to Thomasin. Climbing out, she felt the instability of the carriage, balanced on its three remaining wheels. The fourth had come clean off and lay in the road. They had come to a stop in a narrow lane between tall trees. There was no verge beside them, with the land sloping down on one side and up on the other.
“We are in the middle of nowhere!” declared Ellen.
“Do you have any idea of where we are?” Sir Richard asked the coachman.
“We have crossed into Kent,” the man said, “and passed the village of Markbeech a way back. But I saw no signs of a forge there.”
“And ahead?”
