Drop of the Dice Read Online Free Page A

your dear Damaris… and, what is more important, Damaris wants you.’
    So the visit was over. I did want to see Damaris, of course, but I was loath to leave Harriet, Gregory and Benjie. I loved Eyot Abbas too, and I was sadly thinking that there would be no more trips to the island which I could see from my bedroom window. I was torn between Enderby and Eyot Abbas. Once again I was conscious of that surfeit of affection.
    Harriet said: ‘Gregory, Benjie and I will take you back. We’ll take the coach. It will give us a little more time together.’
    The thought of a journey in Gregory’s coach delighted me. It was such a splendid vehicle. It had four wheels and a door on each side. Our baggage was carried in saddle-bags on horses as there was no room for it in the coach. Two grooms would accompany us—one to drive the horses and the other to ride behind, while they changed places every now and then to share the driving.
    It was a leisurely journey and very enjoyable, with stops at the inns on the way. It stirred vague memories in me. I had ridden in this coach before. That was when I was very young. It was the first time I had seen Hessenfield. He had played at being a highwayman and stopped the coach. As I sat looking out of the window while we jogged along, pictures flashed in and out of my mind. Hessenfield in a mask, stopping the coach, ordering us to get out, kissing my mother and then kissing me. I had not been afraid. I had sensed that my mother was not either. I gave the highwayman the tail of my sugar mouse. Then he rode off and it was not until he carried me away from Eyot Abbas and out to the ship that I saw him again.
    I felt drowsy in the coach. Harriet and Gregory were dozing too. Next to Gregory sat Benjie and every now and then he would catch my eye and smile. He looked very sad because I was going. I thought then: If you were Hessenfield, you would not let me go. He carried me away to a big ship…
    I compared everyone with Hessenfield. He had been taller in stature than anyone else. He had towered above them in every way. I was sure that if he had lived he would have put King James on the throne.
    We were travelling slowly because the roads were dangerous. There had been heavy rain recently and every now and then we would splash through the puddles of water. I thought it was amusing to see the water splashing out and I laughed.
    ‘Not so pleasant for poor old Merry,’ said Benjie. Merry was driving at that moment. He had a lugubrious face, rather like a bloodhound. I thought it funny that he had a name like Merry and laughed whenever I heard it. ‘One of nature’s little jokes,’ said Harriet.
    Suddenly there was a jolt. The coach stopped. Gregory opened his eyes with a start and Harriet said: ‘What’s happened?’
    The two men got out. I looked out of the window and saw them staring down at the wheels. Gregory put his head inside the coach. ‘We’re stuck in a gully at the side of the road,’ he said. ‘It’ll take a little time to get us out.’
    ‘I hope not too long,’ replied Harriet. ‘In an hour or so it will be dark.’
    ‘We’ll get to work on it,’ Gregory told her. He was so proud of his coach and hated anything to go wrong with it. ‘It’s this weather,’ he went on. ‘The roads are in a dreadful state.’
    Harriet looked at me and shrugged her shoulders. ‘We must settle down to wait,’ she said. ‘Not too long, I hope. Are you looking forward to a nice warm inn parlour? What would you like to eat? Hot soup first? The sucking pig? The partridge pie?’
    Harriet always made you feel you were doing what she was talking about. I could taste the sweet syllabub and the heart-shaped marchpane.
    She said: ‘You rode in this coach long ago, remember, Clarissa?’
    I nodded.
    ‘There was a highwayman,’ she went on.
    ‘It was Hessenfield. He was playing a joke. He wasn’t a highwayman really.’
    I felt the tears in my eyes because he was gone for ever and I should