Jane Steele(117)

“Miss Stone!” she gasped. “Where is Charles? Mrs. Kaur says we are to escape to London, that there are Company soldiers making for Highgate House.”

“Mrs. Kaur,” I cried through the mist, “there is no one more sympathetic to your situation than I. I beg you, however—”

“You will ruin more lives, but you will not ruin mine entirely,” Garima Kaur snarled. Nalin’s nostrils flared, her hooves agitatedly stamping the ground.

“I seek to ruin no one, I swear to you upon any holy book you like.” Harbax, conversely, was an island once halted, perfectly quiet. “Only let me take Sahjara home.”

“Sahjara is mine!” she cried with the cracking voice of a breaking woman.

At times disaster visits us when we least expect it; and at others, we see the fraying rope and know that the hour of peril is nigh. I did not know what form disaster would take, but I knew then that Garima Kaur would not be returning to Highgate House, knew it with every fibre of my being.

I should have loved to stop the inevitable, but there was nothing whatsoever I could do.

Nalin reared—triumphant, angry, frightened. One never quite knows what a horse is thinking, but I like to imagine that horses are able to sense what people are thinking.

My frantic cry as Garima Kaur was tossed like a flour sack from the fractious horse was not so loud as the hammering of my heart when I saw Sahjara begin to slide after her kidnapper. Dismounting to catch her was impossible, and riding to meet her would cause Nalin to career off until she found the horizon.

Helpless, I flung out an arm.

Falling, Sahjara did the same.

Except she did not mirror me, not quite; she hooked her arms round Nalin’s neck, swung a leg over, and tumbled almost gracefully, a pendulum swinging within a clock. When she dangled from the mare’s neck, dropping to the ground a few seconds later, I could have wept for relief; she had Nalin by the reins immediately, thanks only to instinct. Then she viewed the tragically contorted body of Garima Kaur and began to cry.

How long I held her there in the road after dismounting Harbax, I cannot say; how long Garima Kaur took to die I can, however, for she was stone still by the time I had reached Sahjara. Not wanting to leave any erstwhile friend of Sardar’s crushed and discarded, I instructed Sahjara to mind both horses and not look at me as I hid the sickeningly light shell of a body under a holly tree.

When I emerged again, I was a wreck and Sahjara similarly blasted. We embraced for a long while, each supporting the other, until I realised that I was freezing to death.

“We must get back to the house,” I grated. “Ride Harbax, and I’ll take Nalin?”

“Miss Stone,” she sobbed. “We can’t leave Mrs. Kaur so. What if—”

“There are no more what ifs for her, darling,” I said, hoping Mr. Thornfield’s favourite endearment might calm her. “She is sleeping peacefully, and no one can hurt her ever again. Ride back with me—the gentlemen are worried sick over you.”

“Because of the Company men?” she asked, touching the knife in her hair.

“Yes,” I lied. “We’re going home now, as fast as ever we can.”

“Miss Stone?” She raised her tearstained face. “You won’t tell Charles that I learnt to hang from the neck of a horse—”

“Oh, Sahjara,” I gasped, pulling her back to me. “I’ll never tell. You’re alive, and you’ve a secret—well and good. Live as long as you can, and have as few secrets as possible. Mr. Thornfield wouldn’t last a day without you—remember that, for all our sakes.”

? ? ?

When we arrived back at Highgate House, my first task after guiding Sahjara to her bedroom was to take Sam Quillfeather’s neglected horse and trap to the stables. The grooms were absent, probably speculating as to what the deuce had happened to Sardar Singh; so I rubbed the beast down and afterwards stood, silently weeping, with my brow against its ribs.

I simply did not wish to face learning that anything disastrous had befallen Charles Thornfield—for he would equally be lost without Sardar Singh, and I had begun to suspect that I might be similarly affected by his absence.

After cursing myself for a weakling, I hurried to the main house, tapping upon doors and tumbling through them as if I had a right to be there. They had made me feel as if I had a right to be there, after all—they had made me feel as if I had a home.

At last I found Charles Thornfield in the kitchen, speaking urgently to Jas Kaur as he washed his bare hands; they were already clean, but his crusted shirtsleeves told a gruesome story, and his white hair was liberally speckled with blood.

“How is he?” I questioned. “Did he tell you . . . did he—”

“Jane!” Mr. Thornfield dived for a cloth, drying his fingers; seeing them naked again was peculiar, as if I ought to turn away and grant him privacy. “Say that you found Sahjara, I beg of you. If she—”

“I’m here,” came a small voice, and I saw that the commotion had brought Sahjara out of hiding; she stood in the hall just outside the kitchen, eyes puffy and strained.

I am not proud of many of my actions; most were committed for selfish reasons, and bringing Sahjara back ought to be numbered among these, for I could not bear the thought of losing her. However, the look on Mr. Thornfield’s face as he crossed the flagstones in a frantic leap and swept her up into his arms, cradling the shivering child’s face against his shoulder without any barrier between them, I thought might be cause for celebration.