At Jane’s side, John spoke quietly.
“Lord Wilmot and I will follow shortly. We’ll catch up to you and keep within sight of you as long as we may before we branch off towards Packington.”
He gave an almost imperceptible nod to the king, and went to stand beside his wife.
“Travel safely, sister. And Henry.”
Henry touched his hand to his hat in salute, and spurred his strawberry roan gelding into a walk, the dappled mare bearing Withy and her husband following.
“Have a care!” Jane’s mother called as Jane’s grey mare fell in behind the other horses. “Go with God!”
And the journey had begun.
THE SKY WAS PEARLY GREY, AND A LIGHT BLANKET OF MIST LAY OVER the fields that stretched away on either side of the road. The calls of sparrows and wrens echoed in the crisp morning air and a breeze stirred the drifts of brown and golden leaves. The horses’ hooves sounded dully on the muddy road, but Jane was grateful that no rain clouds threatened overhead, and it appeared they would have a fine day for their travels.
Henry spurred his horse to a faster walk, and Withy’s husband, John Petre, followed his lead. As the horses quickened their pace, Jane realised that she had never ridden pillion behind anyone but her father or one of her brothers. She was grasping the little padded handhold of the pillion, but to be really securely seated, she needed to hold on to the king in front of her. What to do? Surely she could not simply slip her arms around the royal person, uninvited? The king seemed to sense her quandary, and turned his head over his shoulder to speak low into Jane’s ear.
“Hold tight to me, Mistress Lane.”
The sudden pressure of his back against her shoulder, the warmth of his breath, and the low rumble of his voice sent a tremor through Jane.
“Yes, Your—yes, I will, thank you.”
She reached around shim with both arms and held fast. Her lower body was facing sideways, but of necessity her right breast was pressed against the king. Dear God, she had never been so close to a man before, she thought, and this sudden physical intimacy jolted her into a new awareness of her own body. Her heart was fluttering in her throat and she swallowed hard, wondering if the king was similarly taking note of the sensation of having her close against him.
The road was mercifully free of many travellers at this early hour, and they passed through Darlaston, Pleck, and Quinton without running into neighbours.
As the sun cleared the horizon, the misty light of dawn gave way to a glorious day. The sky arching overhead was a cloudless blue, and it seemed to Jane that the leaves of the trees, radiant in their autumn golds and reds, stood out more clearly than she had ever noticed before. On either side of the road, the stubble fields and red earth rolled away in gentle waves, broken by the lines of dark stone walls.
“The day could not have been finer had we ordered it,” Jane said to herself.
“Mistress?” The king tilted his head towards her inquiringly.
“Oh! I only remarked how splendid the day.”
“It is indeed. My heart soars with hope, I find.”
He glanced ahead to see if they were overheard, but the thud of the horses’ hooves on the clay of the road covered the sound of their voices. A conversation with the king. Jane’s heart soared, too, and she began to sing softly.
“The east is bright with morning light
And darkness it is fled,
And the merry horn wakes up the morn
To leave his idle bed.”
The king laughed with pleasure. “I’ve not heard that since I was a boy.” He joined in for the chorus, his deep baritone a counterpoint to Jane’s treble.
“The hunt is up, the hunt is up
And it is well nigh day,
And Harry the King is gone hunting
To bring his deer to bay.”
The cheerful mood was catching, and the others sang along as Jane and the king continued with the next verses.
“Behold the skies with golden dyes
Are glowing all around;
The grass is green and so are the treen
All laughing at the sound.”
The cool autumn breeze whispered by them, redolent of hay, livestock, and the deep earthy smell of the fields.
When they had been travelling for only an hour, Henry pointed to two figures off in the distance. John and Lord Wilmot, with hawks on their wrists and John’s hounds tumbling and barking around them as they rode through the open fields.
“Excellent,” the king murmured. “Two good men within sight, should we need them.”
THE PARTY HAD BEEN SOME FOUR HOURS TRAVELLING, AND JOHN and Lord Wilmot had only just disappeared from view, when Jane’s horse cast a shoe.
“What a nuisance,” Withy huffed. “Did not this mooncalf Jackson examine the shoes before we left?”
She glared at the king and he dropped his head to avoid her eyes.
“Bromsgrove lies not far ahead,” Henry said swiftly. “A smith can soon put us to rights, and we’ll not lose much time.”
He glanced at the king, and Jane knew they shared her apprehension about stopping and being seen, but there was no hope of riding as far as Long Marston without the horse being reshod.
As they rode into the little village, they came to an inn posted with the sign of a black cross, and the sound of a blacksmith’s hammer rang out from a small smithy behind it.
“We’ll take the ladies inside for some refreshment, Jackson,” Henry said, helping Jane dismount. He handed the king some coins. “Wet your whistle while you wait for the smith, and fetch me when he’s done.”
“Aye, sir,” the king said.
Withy and John Petre were already entering the inn, but Jane hesitated. Would the king know what to do? Had he even been in a smithy before? He gave her a smile and nodded infinitesimally as he led the grey mare towards the stable yard.
Jane turned to follow the others inside, but her eye was caught by a broadsheet nailed to a post before the inn, its heavy black letters proclaiming “A Reward of a Thousand Pounds Is Offered for the Capture of Charles Stuart”. Glancing around to see if she was observed, Jane edged closer and read with a sinking heart.
“For better discovery of him take notice of him to be a tall man above two yards high, his hair a deep brown, near to black, and has been, as we hear, cut off since the destruction of his army at Worcester, so that it is not very long. Expect him in disguise, and do not let any pass without a due and particular search, and look particularly to the by-creeks and places of embarkation in or belonging to your port.”
Jane moved quickly away from the signpost, desperately wondering what to do. Surely the smith, the grooms and ostlers, all the people of the inn and the town had seen the proclamation, and it must be the same in every village through which they would pass. How could they hope to arrive at Abbots Leigh without the king being discovered?
She had to warn the king, she decided. She walked around to the back of the inn, where the sounds of the blacksmith’s hammer had rung out. The privy was likely to be back there as well, she reasoned, and she could use that as her excuse for skulking in the stable yard should anyone wonder.