A Regency Virgin's Undoing. Christine Merrill

did the liquor he’d drunk seem to affect him. There was strength and surety in his gait, as though a change in circumstances did not bother him a bit. He navigated easily back to her through the crowded room without spilling a drop of his drink, then slid easily on to the chair on the other side of the small table they shared.

      She looked at him apprehensively and wet her lips. And then she stared down into the plate that had been placed before her, as though she had not used his absence to make a detailed examination of his person. She really had no reason to be so curious. While she might tell herself that it was a natural wariness on her part, and an attempt to guard herself against possible dishonour, she was the one who had come on this journey alone and then sought the protection of this stranger, based on necessity and assumptions of good character.

      She took the first bite of dinner though she had no appetite for it, and found it plain fare, but good. She vowed that she would finish it all, hungry or no, for who knew when she might eat again? As long as he showed no signs of troubling her as the other man had, she would allow Mr Hendricks to pay as well. If he complained, she would inform him that she had not requested to be fed and that it was sinful to waste the food.

      But the man across the table from her was not eating, simply staring back at her, waiting. ‘Well?’ he said at last, arms folded in front of him. He was looking rather like a schoolmaster again, ready to administer punishment once a confession was gained. ‘Do not think you can sit with me, well out of earshot of our companion, and give nothing in return.’

      She swallowed. ‘Thank you for coming to my aid, when we were in the coach.’

      ‘You left me little choice in the matter,’ he said with reproof, shifting his leg as though his ankle still pained him from the kick. ‘But even without your request for help, I could not very well sit silent and let the man accost you for the whole of the journey. It was an unpleasant enough ride.’ He glanced around him at the rain streaking the window of the inn. ‘And not likely to become more pleasant in the immediate future.’

      That was good, for it sounded almost as though he would have helped her without her asking. That made him better than the other man in the carriage who would surely have pressed any advantage he had gained over her from her lie. ‘I am sorry that circumstances forced me to trouble you, Mr …’ And now she would see if he had given the correct name before.

      ‘Hendricks,’ he supplied. ‘Just as I said in the coach. And you guessed my given name correctly. While I do not overly object to the loan of mine, I suspect you have a surname of your own.’ He stared at her, waiting.

      Should she tell him the truth? If the whole point of this journey was to avoid embarrassment to the family, it did no good to go trumpeting the story to near strangers.

      ‘Come now,’ he said, adjusting the fold of his arms. ‘Surely you can be more open with me. We are kin, after all.’ He leaned forwards on the table, so that their heads were close together and he could whisper the next words. ‘Or how else do we explain our proximity?’

      The obvious reason, she supposed. On this route, anyone seeing a couple in a tête-à-tête would think them eloping for Scotland, just as Priscilla had done. She took a breath, wondering if she should she tell him of her father’s title, and then decided against it. ‘I am Lady Drusilla Rudney.’ Then, hoping there would be a way to gloss over the rest of it, she fluttered her eyelashes at him and attempted a smile. ‘But to my friends, I am Silly.’

      And then, she waited for one of the obvious responses.

       I expect you are.

       Did they give you cause to be?

      Apparently, Mr Hendricks had no sense of humour. ‘An unfortunate family nickname, I assume.’ And one he would not be using, judging by the pained look in his eye. ‘And given to you by the Duke of Benbridge, who is your uncle. No … your father.’

      He’d read her as easily as the sermon book in her pocket. She must learn to be quicker or he’d have all the facts out of her, before long. ‘Actually, it was my sister who gave me the name. A difficulty in pronunciation, when we were children …’ Her explanation trailed off. It surprised her, for rarely did conversation with a stranger leave her at a loss for words.

      ‘Well then, Lady Drusilla, what brings you to be travelling alone? You can afford a maid, or some sort of companion. And to travel in the family carriage, instead of stuck in the mail coach with the likes of me.’

      ‘It is a matter of some delicacy and I do not wish to share the details.’

      ‘If you are going to Gretna, then you are clearly eloping, travelling alone so that your father does not discover you. Little else is needed to tell the tale, other than to ascertain the name of the man involved.’

      ‘I beg your pardon,’ she said sharply, insulted that he would think her so foolish. ‘I am not eloping. And how dare you think such a thing.’

      ‘Then, what are you doing?’ he shot back, just as quickly. The alcohol had not dulled his wits a bit, and the speed of his questioning left her with her mouth hanging open, ready to announce the truth to a room full of strangers.

      She took a breath to regain her calm. ‘I wish to go to Gretna and stop an elopement,’ she whispered urgently. ‘And I do not want anyone to know. Once my end has been achieved, there must be no hint of gossip. Not a breath of scandal. No evidence that the trip was ever made.’

      Mr Hendricks paused as though considering her story. Then he said, ‘You realise, of course, that the trip may be futile.’

      ‘And why would you think that?’ Other than that it was probably true. But it was better to appear obtuse in the face of probable defeat, than to be talked into giving up.

      He tried again in a much gentler tone. ‘Should the couple involved be determined, they will not listen to you. And if they had much of a start on you, they are miles ahead already.’

      ‘Quite possibly,’ she agreed.

      ‘The honour of the girl in question is most assuredly breached.’

      ‘That does not matter in the least.’ After a day and a night with her lover, allowing the wedding to occur would be the logical solution. But if Priss disgraced herself by marrying Gervaise, she disgraced the family as well. And Dru would get the blame for it, for it had been her job to chaperon the girl and prevent such foolishness. Father would announce that, no matter how unlikely it might be that his awkward daughter Silly could find a man to haul her to Gretna, he was unwilling to risk a second embarrassment. There would be no Season, no suitors and no inevitable proposal. She would spend the rest of her life in penance for Priss’s mistake, on the unfashionable edge of society, with the wallflowers and the spinsters.

      Was it so very selfish if, just this once, she ignored what was right for Priscilla and looked to her own future? ‘I will not let him marry her.’ If she had to, she would grab Priss from the very blacksmith’s stone and push Gervaise under a dray horse. But there would be no wedding. Dru narrowed her eyes and glared at Mr Hendricks.

      He glared back at her, his patience for her wearing thin. ‘By travelling alone and in secret, you have compromised your reputation, and are just as likely to end in the soup as the couple you seek to stop.’

      ‘With the need for speed and secrecy, there was little else I could do.’ The Benbridge carriage was already tearing up the road between London and the Scottish border, and Priss had left her barely enough to buy a ticket on the mail coach, much less rent a post-chaise. But the scandal of it would work to her advantage in one way: in comparison with Priss’s elopement, a solo journey by her ape-leading older sister would hardly raise an eyebrow.

      Mr Hendricks saw her dark expression and amended, ‘Perhaps you will be fortunate. The rain that traps us might trap them as well.’

      This was hardly good news. Until now, she had been imagining her sister and Gervaise travelling night and day in a mad rush to reach their destination. But if they were held up in an inn somewhere, the chance for recognition