The huntsman's strange vocalizing among his baying, searching pack suddenly changed tenor and her head snapped up, all thoughts of anything but the fox banished with the familiar surge of excitement that curled her toes in her boots.
The huntsman's horn blew, a long two-note resonance in the frosty air. The hounds in full cry tore across the covert, and then came the bellow from one of the huntservants that sent the blood coursing through Gabrielle's veins.
"Gone away!" Someone had seen the fox break from the covert.
The huntsman blew the note for any who'd failed to grasp the message and the entire field surged forward, breaking out of the trees, hooves pounding the frozen ground, breath steaming in the frosty air.
A long slope of meadowland lay ahead, and Gabrielle abruptly pulled her mount aside as the riders plunged past her.
"Nathaniel!" she yelled as she saw him pulling ahead of the main body. "This way!"
She was unaware that she'd used his name in her urgent need to attract his attention. She was aware now only that he was as eager and intrepid a huntsman as she was and she would share with him her own private knowledge garnered from hunting this land in childhood.
Heveered toward her without conscious reflection of his own, and she charged ahead of him, giving him a lead to the far corner of the meadow.
Heregistered the massive bramble-studded thicket hedge in a kind of daze as Gabrielle's horse gathered itself for the jump.
It was impossible, he thought. A suicide jump. And then his own mount was collecting himself, adjusting his stride, and he was sailing through the air. Only when they landed on the other side did Nathaniel absorb the wide ice-covered ditch they'd also had to clear at the base of the hedge behind them.
Of all the wild, reckless madwomen! But he had no time for further thought. She was racing ahead of him across a flat field toward a mercifully lower hedge at the bottom, and the excitement of the chase was in his blood, the frantic baying of the hounds sounding ever closer, the squall of the huntsman's horn filling his ears.
They sailed over the hedge and he saw they were way ahead of the field, right up behind the huntsman and his hounds, and the fox was a smudge of reddish-brown streaking toward a spinney to the right of them.
Neck and neck, they pounded behind the hounds and into the spinney, the rest of the field some hundred yards behind them. The pack of hounds abruptly lost direction and began rushing around in confused circles, yipping frantically.
Gabrielle drew rein just in time to stop herself from overtaking the hounds and committing the cardinal sin of destroying any scents in the process.
"He's gone to ground," she gasped. "I don't know whether to be glad or sorry. Wasn't that a wonderful run?"
Her hat was slightly askew, dark red ringlets escaping from its confines. The translucent pallor of her complexion had taken on a rosy glow and the dark eyes were alight. Nathaniel's head spun again.
"You're mad," he declared. "Of all the crazy, reckless pieces of riding! There had to be an easier way over that hedge."
Gabrielle looked at him as if he d taken on some strange, alien shape. "Of course there was. But we wanted to be ahead of the field."
"That's no excuse."
She continued to stare at him in incomprehension. "What are you saying?"
"That it was a piece of the most foolhardy risk-taking I've ever witnessed," he said flatly.
"Well, why did you follow me if you were scared?"
"I was not scared. It was all right for me to take the fence; my mount is bigger and more powerful than yours."
"Oh, wait a minute," she said softly. "This is nothing to do with horses, is it, Lord Praed? This is to do with what men can do and women can't… or do I mean shouldn't?”
"You can mean what you wish," he said. "But you've demonstrated yet again that you lack the qualities to join the service. I told you last night that reckless endangerment of oneself and others is unacceptable."
"Nonsense," Gabrielle said stoutly. "There was nothing reckless about that. Mymount is one of Simon's hunters. He's well upto the weight of a grown man, let alone mine, and very powerful. Besides, I've jumped that fence hundreds of times. Georgie's family estates march with the Vanbrughs' and I hunted this land almost every winter until a few years ago."
"You don't stop to contemplate consequences, madame," he declared. "Such habits make for a dangerous and untrustworthy partner."
Impatiently he glared around at the frustrated pack of hounds, the cursing huntsman, and the milling riders as they straggled into the spinney. "This is going nowhere. Why don't they move on and draw another covert?"
"They'll move to Hogart's Wood in a minute," Gabrielle said thoughtfully. There was no point defending herself verbally against such a wealth of misguided prejudice. They'd end up in a shouting match that would achieve nothing. A different, more challenging approach was needed.
"If you'll excuse me, Lord Praed, I think I'll make my way to the wood now. There's a shortcut. You won't wish to take it, of course, since it involves another rather sizable hurdle. But I'm sure you won't miss anything if you follow the body of the field."
She turned her horse and cantered off down the ride leading out of the spinney. Hooves sounded behind her with satisfying immediacy, and she smiled to herself, leaning low over the horse's neck as they emerged onto a stretch of gorse-strewn common land. She nudged his flanks and the animal broke into an easy gallop. She hadn't exaggerated when she'd said he was well up to a weight considerably more than her own. It gave her the advantage of speed in this race she was running with Nathaniel Praed.
They raced across the common, up a relatively steep hill, and then down the other side. The obstacle she intended to jump was a ten-foot stone wall at the bottom of the hill bounding the orchard of a sizable farmhouse. Hogart's Wood lay on the far side of the orchard and the hounds would have to be taken around the wall. An intrepid rider could thus ensure he was on the spot when the hounds drew the wood.
Nathaniel didn't know why he was following her. Except that she'd needled him again with that derisive challenge. Except that he couldn't seem to keep his distance. Except that he seemed in her company to follow impulse in as headstrong a fashion as the Comtesse de Beaucaire.
He saw the wall ahead-mellow golden stone in the crisp sunlight, dwarfing the horse and rider pounding toward it. He wanted to yell at her not to be a fool, but the black was already gathering himself for the effort and he knew he couldn't risk putting the animal off his stride by startling him. A hesitation would be enough to throw him off balance, and if his hooves so much as clipped the top of the wall at that height and terrifying speed, he would go down, hurling his rider to the ground like a cannonball from the breach of a gun.
He closed his eyes involuntarily and when he opened them again the wall was almost upon him and it was too late to bring his own hunter to a halt even if he'd wanted to. The animal, like all horses, simply followed his leader in blind trust.
For a dizzying moment they were in the air and then landed with a jolt on solid ground amid the apple trees of Farmer Gregson's orchard.
Gabrielle's horse stood panting, reins hanging loose from his neck. On the ground beside him lay the still figure of his rider, her hat flung several feet from her body, her black habit spread over the damp, dark green grass beneath the trees.
Chapter 3
Nathaniel flung himself from his horse and ran to the inert figure.
"Gabrielle! Dear God!" He dropped to his knees beside her, tearing at the snowy cravat to bare her throat, his fingers feeling for her pulse. It was strong but fast beneath his fingertip. He sighed with relief and then frowned. The black lashes formed half-moons on the pale skin, her lips were slightly parted, her chest rising and falling with each regular breath.