The Reluctant Reformer (6 page)

Once she was finished, she had exited the dining room to find Annie awaiting her. It was then she had realized that the woman would not be leaving her until she retired. It had been an unexpected crimp in her plan.

But Maggie had refused to give up easily. Pushing her irritation at this turn of events aside, she'd engaged the girl in conversation, trying to deduce the direction and whereabouts of the nearest village or neighboring estates, but Annie, while polite, had not been of much assistance.

“Oh, aye,” the girl had assured her. “We have neighbors. Everyone has neighbors.” But when asked how far away they might be, the girl had taken on a cagey look and shrugged. “I couldn't really say, m'lady. Not being nobility, I've never had much cause to visit them.” She
had been of equal use when it came to the direction and distance to the nearest village.

Given up on questioning the girl, Maggie had pretended to read a book, occasionally remembering to turn the pages as she pondered how to slip away. She had wasted the entire day that way and found herself subjected to another formal meal presided over by a bevy of servants that night, at last retreating to her room to consider and reject several other possibilities on how to escape.

In the end, it wasn't her own cleverness at all that had allowed her to flee. It was circumstance. Today had dawned gray and gloomy. Maggie had donned the rose-colored gown that had been silently set out overnight, followed Annie unhappily to the dining room to break her fast, then had opted for the library to glare blankly at another book and fret. Then, just before the noon meal, it had begun to rain—one of those slow yet steady, halfhearted drizzles that tended to last forever and cause a lassitude in everyone. Annie had yawned, and then Maggie had had her idea. She'd waited until after the noon meal, then had returned to the library, feigning a yawn or two to complement the real ones that were slipping from the maid. Then, as the girl had begun to nod in her seat, Maggie had closed her book with a snap that had startled the maid back to wakefulness.

“What a horrid and gloomy day,” she had commented wearily, then added a yawn for good measure. “I think I should like a nap.”

Much to her relief, rather than looking suspicious, the maid had appeared relieved at the announcement. Annie had escorted Maggie to her room without question,
nodding when asked to wake her in time for dinner. After waiting what she considered a suitable amount of time for the servant to vacate the hall, Maggie had tiptoed over, grasped the doorknob, and slowly eased the door open enough to peer out. What she saw made her freeze at once. Annie had collected a chair from somewhere, positioned it to the side of her door, and settled in, looking as if nothing short of the Second Coming would move her.

Which verified her belief that the girl was a guard, Maggie supposed vexedly as she eased the door cautiously closed again and slowly turned the knob back before releasing it. Moving despondently away from the door, she had them peered about the room, stymied for a way to get rid of the girl. Something short of murder would be best.

Maggie considered sending the maid to fetch a beverage, or something to read or eat. But those options would have seen the girl return to find her missing, and Maggie wanted more time to get away before her absence was discovered. In her frustration, she started mumbling some not very nice words learned from her brother, before her gaze at last landed on the doors to the balcony.

Filled with hope, Maggie promptly hurried across the room and shoved outside. The balcony was on the second floor, of course, which was a problem in itself, but not one that was insurmountable. Maggie had been a rather adoring younger sister and had trailed her brother everywhere until he'd gone away to school. She had run with him, played games more fitting for boys, and had even climbed trees to keep up with Gerald. Which, she realized now, would come in quite handy.
There was a lovely tree growing right off this balcony, one large, sturdy-looking branch even reaching accommodatingly over the railing. This will
be a breeze
, she'd thought with amusement.

Of course, she hadn't considered the fact that it had been many years since she'd climbed trees with Gerald. Nor had she considered the problem of her great, hampering skirts, or the rain that made everything slippery. She had barely managed to get out onto the branch and start her descent before she'd lost her footing and tumbled the rest of the way. She'd landed with an “oomph” in the bushes below. They softened her landing somewhat, but not completely. The fall had been enough to knock the air from her lungs, and she had lain there in the drizzle for several moments, aware of nothing but her body's desperate need for oxygen.

Once she'd regained her breath, Maggie had eased to her feet and peered about, unsure whether to be relieved or unhappy that no one was around to note her bravery or her near calamity. Pushing such foolishness aside, she had moved quickly to the cover of the surrounding woods and slipped into them.

Making her way through the woods along the laneway had seemed the safest bet. She hadn't wished to take the lane itself and risk being spotted, but she also had wanted to avoid finding herself lost in the woods—keeping the lane in sight seemed the only option. Maggie had thought that as long as she kept the lane in sight, she would manage well enough.

“Ha!” she muttered now. Her plan had started out well enough, but then she had come across a river. There was a bridge over it on the lane that she had not realized they'd traversed. Worse, the bridge was still in
plain view of the house, and her fear of being spotted had forced her to make her way deeper into the woods. Moving along the river in search of a place to cross, a shallow spot perhaps, she had not been concerned with getting wet. The constant drizzling rain and her fall into the damp bushes had already soaked her, so she had wandered along, moving farther and farther away from the lane, positive that soon she would find a safe spot to cross. Just a little farther. Just around this bend. Just around that curve.

A fallen oak had appeared across her path, reaching just to the river's edge, but not crossing it. She had been forced to make her way around, fighting with branches and brambles and moving deeper into the forest. Then she had pushed through a screen of underbrush…to find herself tumbling down an incline the foliage had hidden!

At the bottom, Maggie found herself not only wet, but mud-covered. She wasn't the sort to give up, though.
Stubborn
and
prideful
had been a couple of unattractive descriptions used for her in the past, and she admitted the designations were still true today. Determined to climb back up and continue on her way, she had found that the incline was impossible to scale. It was steep and slippery with mud from the rain, and her several attempts had only ended in lost footings and several behind-bruising falls. At last, she'd turned her determination to searching for an easier spot to climb. She had traveled an increasing distance from the river and the fallen tree, deeper into wilds, in search of that spot, following the curved and wending incline.

Maggie wasn't sure how far she'd journeyed before she discovered a place where the roots of a tree offered
enough purchase to pull up out of the small ravine in which she found herself. She had barely reached the top when the snapping of a branch had alerted her to the presence of a nearby animal. Normally the stalwart, non-nervous type, Maggie had not been too alarmed at first, but slowly she became aware of the creepy silence of the rest of the woods. The hair prickled at the back of her neck as she stood listening to the sounds of something making its way through the underbrush from the way she had come. Finding her heart lodging itself in her throat, Maggie felt her body grow numb with fear. As she realized the sounds were drawing nearer, she broke, turning on her heel and making a mad dash in the other direction—running willy-nilly until her fear had eased enough to realize the mistake she'd made. The stupidity of running blindly in the wrong direction had been a hard enough admission, but the fact that she no longer knew the
right
direction was even more dismaying.

Maggie was now lost, completely and thoroughly. She was also soaking wet, muddy, cold, and miserable. Such were the results of her grand plan of escape.

Heaving out an irritated breath she peered at the surrounding woods, searching for something that might show her back the way she had come. Unfortunately, nothing looked familiar. She had not thought to note landmarks in her mad dash.

Her gaze rose to the trees surrounding her, and she briefly considered climbing one. Perhaps at its leafy summit she might glimpse the towers of Ramsey manor and, in that way, get her bearings. But the accident escaping her balcony was enough to change her mind; she
was in no shape to climb trees anymore, was more likely to break her neck than anything.

She took a moment to wallow in self-pity, then forced herself to straighten her shoulders, stand, and get on with her escape. She had no intention of just sitting still until death by starvation or exposure overtook her. She wasn't the sort for such foolishness. Besides, wasn't she perfectly capable of taking care of herself? Else she would have sold off her brother's home and moved to the country, as any other woman would have done in her circumstances. Instead, she had taken up her brother's job and set about trying to support his home and servants. She could overcome any difficulty. She would simply head north until she came across something. But…which way was north?

Maggie pondered briefly, fairly sure she had heard that moss grew on the north side of trees…or was it the south? West?
Oh, dear
. Sighing, she decided she needed another manner of determining directions. Didn't the sun rise in the east and set in the west? Or was it the other way around? Oh, this was
damnably
irritating. She really should have paid more attention to such things.

At last, she simply decided that she would move toward the sun; in that way she could at least avoid walking in circles. The plan might have been a good one, if the combination of tree branches and gray clouds overhead had not obscured any possibility of finding the bloody sun.

It was beginning to appear that she was well and truly lost. Of course, it was all Lord Ramsey's fault.
The ass
. Had he not decided to stick his nose in her business and kidnap her…well, she wouldn't be
here!

Satisfied that she had laid the blame firmly where it belonged, she wasted a moment attempting to shake some of the mud off her skirts, then straightened her shoulders and marched onward. If she simply kept moving, she would come across something. Eventually.

Much to Maggie's amazement, she hadn't been walking very long when the sound of rushing water caught her ear. Pausing, she listened to see which direction it came from, then moved toward it. Relief poured through her as she found herself stepping out onto the bank of the river. She had found it! Even better, she had come upon the waterway at a spot where it twisted and narrowed, one edge jutting out farther than normal and flat rocks making something of a path across. Some of her optimism returning, Maggie started over the stones, moving cautiously from rock to rock, until at last she leaped to the opposite side.

Buoyed by her success, she paused to debate her next move. Should she follow the river back to the land, back to where the Ramsey estate was in sight, then continue from there? Or should she simply move steadily away from the river and hope she came across the main road that led to Ramsey's drive?

The cautious side of her suggested that returning along the river was the smartest move, but that seemed to entail the loss of a great deal of time, and it was already beginning to grow darker. She had already wasted a good stretch.

The daring side of Maggie, that which had encouraged her to take such risks as donning the persona of G. W. Clark and visiting brothels or other unsavory spots in search of stories, was urging her to simply continue forward, away from the river.

She would likely come to the main road just as swiftly, but ages away from the Ramsey drive.

Maggie, as usual, found herself trusting the less cautious part of her personality. She pushed determinedly onward. It was only a few moments later that she found herself stumbling out of the trees. She came out on the side of a laneway, this one wider and—judging by its rutted state—better traveled than the Ramsey drive. Maggie fought free of the bushes, pleasure and relief just starting to wash over her when a carriage trundled past.

Her first instinct was to flee for cover, lest it be Lord Ramsey. Maggie followed that instinct and whirled about to dart back into the underbrush. She knew, even as she did so, that the action came too late; she caught a glimpse of a man's face through the carriage window as she spun away. Maggie didn't recognize the man. She
was
sure it wasn't Lord Ramsey. She was also sure that she had been spotted. Still, her survival instinct sent her crashing into the woods to hide herself behind a handy tree.

Pausing with her back against the old oak's rough bark, she pressed a hand to her racing heart and tried to listen over the sound of her own heavy breathing. Her alarm increased as she heard the man call out, the carriage slow to a stop, and then the telltale sound of the coach door opening and closing.

Damn! The man was coming to investigate. Maggie's mind was suddenly crowded with possibilities. He could simply be a traveler on the road, curious about a woman dashing wildly about the woods. But then, he could also be Lord Ramsey's cohort in crime. Or, perhaps he was simply getting out to stretch his legs.

Maggie snorted aloud at the last possibility and glanced wildly around, seeking escape. She had not managed to escape her prison only to be caught now! She considered her options. Running was one, but she had already experienced the difficulties of racing about the muddy woods with tree branches and bushes snagging at her skirts. That was out. Which left hiding. Dropping to her knees, she scuttled into a bush next to the tree.