Page 133 of The Secret Love of a Gentleman
Rob had returned to her then.
Tomorrow, I want her to be Mrs Marlow.
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Rob smiled nervously as Harry jogged down the stairs. It was still dark outside. The servants must be awake, but if so, they were all below stairs.
Rob opened the door. He had asked a groom he trusted to ready his curricle.
At least because Harry was constantly misbehaving, if anyone did see them, they would think it less odd.
‘Are you ready to slay the dragon?’ Harry said with a smile.
‘I am indeed.’
Rob had hardly slept, his thoughts absorbed by Caro and their child. If he was shot, it would leave her in a terrible position. But he could not leave Kilbride’s threats unanswered.
Rob climbed up and took the straps from the groom, who climbed down and made room on the seat for Harry. There was no oil lamp on the curricle but the moon was bright enough to see by.
Rob flicked the straps and set off.
‘Your goal, brother,’ Harry said, ‘is to make yourself as small a target as you can do…’
‘I know. I shall stand as straight as I can, side on to his aim. But I have faith in myself. What he does not know is that I am the best shot in Manton’s shooting range.’
As they travelled out of London, the sky turned from a very dark blue to a lighter shade, as Harry spoke about a card game.
Rob reached the inn, and turned onto the meadows. Kilbride’s carriage was there, emblazoned with his coat of arms, shouting Rob’s folly to the world. If they were discovered, Kilbride would probably pay his way out of trouble.
Rob hoped, though, that Kilbride would be too proud or too ashamed to evade this challenge.
When Rob drew his horses to a halt, the sky had lightened to a sapphire blue.
Kilbride stood on the far side of his carriage with a groom. It looked as though he had been practising with his pistol, warming up the gun. Of course, he would not have warmed up both pistols, giving himself an advantage.
‘Here are two boys come for a game of pistols!’ Kilbride taunted.
Harry jumped down easily as Rob set the brake. He tied off the straps and climbed down less easily, but forcing his leg to look as normal in movement as he could manage.
All around them the birds broke into song in the trees at the edges of the meadow. It was a raucous sound, as hundreds of high-pitched trills became one.
The truth of the risk he was taking hit Rob as heavily as a bullet might, as Kilbride handled the pistol he had already selected. If Kilbride had tampered with his gun, or if he was simply a good shot, Rob may die in this field. Caro would not thank him, if she was left an unmarried mother. This was reckless.
But hispride– Rob smiled at the word – could not leaveKilbride free to make his threats. He needed to be taught a lesson, and if anyone was going to avenge Caro, he was determined it would be him.
The top of the sun peaked across the horizon and spread light across the sky from the east.
‘May I see the pistols?’ The man who had been challenged, according to the old custom, chose the weapons, but Rob had taken a set of duelling pistols from John’s library last night and they were stowed beneath his seat on the curricle in case Kilbride tried to play him false.
Rob picked the gun up from its bed of velvet. ‘Thank you,’ he said to the groom who held the box. Rob looked down the barrel, then opened the mechanism, looking for any sign that the metal had been filed to put the shot off. He handed it to Harry who checked it too.
‘May I see the other?’ He would not lose his life through lack of care.
Kilbride handed it over with a smirk. ‘You do not trust me?’
‘You beat a woman black and blue and had men attack me, so, no, I do not trust you.’
The pistol Kilbride had held was identical to the other, only warm. Rob gave it to Harry to look at too.
