resting on the hilt of his sword he hauled her back to the others.
‘Keep still, you little savage. It will do you no good. Lower your weapons,’ he said to his comrades. ‘’Tis naught but a youth.’
The sound of his voice sent a thrill down Henrietta’s spine, and she trembled for some unknown reason. Glancing at the men, the one called Jack brandishing a dagger, told Henrietta that they wanted blood. Suffering the painful grip, she began to fear for her life. When she had come to live on the edge of the heath, one of the old grooms, who loved to tell stories, had told her a host of gruesome tales about the fearsome things that had happened to people who had been on the heath after dark. She would never have believed that such things could happen to her. But one cannot be confronted by four dangerous men and not fear for one’s life.
Little by little, she was learning the hard way that most cruel of all lessons—that if she were to survive, she would have to use all her wits to do so. But she guessed she was not going to be good at deception. It did not come naturally to her. She had no experience of it and had never had reason to resort to dishonesty.
Though she held her chin high and glared in a show of grand defiance, she knew she was defenceless. But when she glanced at her captor, big, black and fierce and for all the world like some fearsome being from Hades itself, a strange, murderously tranquil smile on his face, she blanched and, when he released his hold on her arm, she spun around, seeking any escape route. Unable to see a way past the men who had formed a ring around her, there was nowhere to flee. Her heart pounded. The man called Jack reached out to try to grab her, and Henrietta reacted in self-defence, reaching for the knife in her belt, the blade flashing wickedly in the moonlight. Jack fell back with a garbled curse.
‘Why, you young pup, I’ll gut you for that.’
‘Try it if you want my blade in your own,’ she replied with admirable self-possession, pitching her voice low, while inside she was trembling with terror, knowing she would never have the courage to use the weapon.
Simon looked her over. It was clear the lad could take care of himself, but he was insane if he thought he could take on the lot of them. He held out his hand. ‘That’s a nasty blade you have there, lad. Hand it over.’
Henrietta’s eyes were wide, filled with fright. She swept the surrounding men with a nervous glance. ‘And get myself killed?’
‘You’re already in trouble and you can see you can’t escape. Don’t make this any worse for yourself than it already is.’
She wetted her lips with a nervous flick of her tongue and again eyed the men. ‘But they—’
‘I’m the one you’d better worry about,’ he warned in a low voice. ‘Give me the knife,’ he coolly ordered. ‘And do that very slowly, for I am not at all amused.’
Henrietta grimaced at the man’s unintentional pun, but she did not relinquish her weapon.
He waited immovably, the men looking on in palpable tension as the fierce youth dared refuse Simon’s order.
Simon flicked his fingers impatiently, beckoning her to hand the knife over—he stretched out his waiting palm, watching her intently. ‘Hand it over,’ he said in a hard tone. ‘You’ve got no choice.’
Henrietta agonised over the decision, the war of emotions transparent on her face, but after a long moment, she slowly yielded, handing it over.
Simon clasped the weapon and thrust it into his belt. ‘There. That wasn’t so difficult, was it? Take my advice, my fine bandit, and study your craft more. You are a most inferior footpad.’
Henrietta found herself meeting dark eyes set in a face of leanly fleshed cheekbones. There was a cleft in his strong chin, his nose was thin and well formed, slightly aquiline, and beneath it were generous, but at the moment unsmiling, lips. There was an air of the professional soldier about him, a quality that displayed itself in his crisp manner and rather austere mien. The handsome features bore the look of good breeding and those eyes, glinting with a sardonic expression and blue, she thought, seemed capable of piercing to her innermost secrets, causing a chill of fear to go through her.
‘For pity’s sake! Do not kill me,’ she pleaded, having no idea of the kind of men she was dealing with.
An evil laugh was the answer. ‘No witness—that’s the first rule in this business.’
‘Who—who are you?’ Henrietta demanded, feeling most uneasy.
Simon raised his eyebrows at her question. ‘Who am I? I might ask the same question of you—and with considerably more justification.’ He looked the youth over disapprovingly, taking in every detail of his clothes. His eyes quickened as he studied him with the keen glance of a man accustomed to noting the minutest detail around him. The lad was no country boy, though he might dress like one. His voice gave him away. Simon was secretly intrigued. ‘Explain what you’re doing here, lad. Why the devil are you wandering about the countryside by yourself?’
‘That’s my business.’
Simon’s eyes gleamed coldly in the darkness. ‘Not any more.’ The hard line of his mouth tightened and the crease at the corner grew deeper. ‘The person who sent you cannot have done so merely for the pleasure of visiting the heath after dark.’
‘Why should you think anyone sent me?’
He stared at her intently. ‘If you are indeed here on a mission, the most likely supposition is that you’re an agent. But whose? Did you follow us here?’
‘No, I swear I didn’t. I—I saw the light and I was curious.’
‘Perhaps you are on a mission, which argues a high devotion to duty, and I must congratulate whomever employs you on their ability to inspire it.’
Henrietta stared at him, beginning to realise what he was implying and that he was accusing her of spying on them. ‘No one employs me. I work for no one.’
‘And we are to believe that?’ Jack grumbled. ‘What are you running away from, lad? Maybe the law, eh? Likely you’re a thief, I shouldn’t wonder.’
To hear herself accused of theft was more than Henrietta could bear. ‘I am no thief,’ she retorted fiercely with a fine and cultured accent, ‘and I forbid you to insult me!’
‘Forbid? Listen to me, laddie, you’re in no position to forbid anything. I’d watch that tongue of yours if I were you. There’s nothing to stop me taking you by the scruff and tossing you in the river.’
Henrietta was too angry to be frightened. ‘If you wish to throw me in the river, feel free to do so. You will be doing me a service. I regret that I was mistaken in you. I took you for a spy. It seems, however, that you are a murderer!’
‘Hell and damnation!’ Jack, seething with fury, was about to throw himself at the insolent young pup, but Simon cast himself bodily between them and thrust him back.
‘Let it be, Jack. Can’t you see he’s only a lad? He’s scarce out of breeches.’ He turned to Henrietta and gradually his stern visage softened as he stared at the worried figure. When a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth, he quelled it as quickly as it came. ‘I’m sorry, lad. My friends are a long way from home. I fear their manners need as much improvement as their judgement. How old are you?’
‘Old
