Kate Moore Read Online Free Page B

open. The stable was lit as if they were expected, and a horse in one of the stalls nickered at their entrance.
    The thief turned to Margaret. “Whatever you think of me, Miss Somerley, you must agree that Phantom deserves my attentions for his efforts tonight. I must rely on you to remain where you are for a few minutes. Your adventure is nearly at an end. Can you be patient a while longer?”
    Margaret shook her head. She did not trust herself to speak.
    “I thought not,” he said. In an instant he stripped the linen from his neck and bound her hands. He set her up on a partition between the stalls and, his hands still on her waist, looked directly into her eyes. “You will wait for me.”
    She looked away, but soon turned back to watch him. She could not help but admire the quickness and sureness of his motions, the care and skill of his attentions to the horse. He talked to the horse, praising and teasing, and she felt the calming influence of his voice. The thought occurred to her that she had not watched a man so closely before. When he spoke, assuring her that his tasks were nearly complete, she shifted her weight upon her narrow perch and looked down at her bound hands. The movement brought the papers in his jacket up against her ribs. Really she was behaving witlessly. She ought not to have been staring, ought not to have been admiring the appearance and strength of a thief. If she could not escape, perhaps she could at least hide the earl’s papers.
    But the thief turned from his horse and reached to lift Margaret down. He pulled her after him, though her strides could hardly match his long, quick ones. At the cottage he called, “Humphrey, where are you, man?”
    They entered a low-ceilinged parlor, the striking feature of which was stacks and stacks of books, like staircases about to topple, so many that Margaret and the thief had to pick their way with care. Before the fire, like an island in the chaos, was a conspicuously empty wing chair, with a table anchored to one side.
    “Humphrey,” her companion called again, but received no answer. He led her through the maze of stacks to a door in the far wall of the parlor, and Margaret sent a pile crashing to the floor, taking two others with it so that in one corner there was now a heap of books.
    “Don’t worry,” her captor assured her, “Humphrey will not notice for weeks.” A hall at the rear of the cottage led them to a room, black except for the patch of moonlight admitted by a window. The thief found a tinderbox in the dark and lit two candles, revealing a spare order in startling contrast to the main parlor. He led her to the bed, bade her be seated, and released her hands.
    “It seems your adventure continues,” he said as he removed a watch from his waistcoat pocket and glanced at it. Margaret studied him further, this thief named Drew. She had kept herself from saying his name, for she meant not to be on terms of any familiarity with such a man. She was beginning to recognize the cold alteration in his voice and features whenever he spoke of the meeting toward which he was hurrying.
    “There are a few changes I must make; let us hope Humphrey returns,” he concluded in the same brusque tone. He closed the door of the small room and began to unbutton his waistcoat before her startled eyes.
    “My girl,” he warned, a sudden smile lighting his eyes, “if your sensibilities are at all delicate, you would do well to take a book from that shelf and peruse it earnestly for the next few minutes.” Margaret turned to a shelf above the bed and snatched the volume on the end. To her dismay it proved to be a work in Latin, but she held the slim volume before her burning face and worked at the lines.
    “Do you have a taste for Horace, Miss Somerley?” he asked a few minutes later. She made the mistake then of dropping the book to her lap and looking at him as he tucked the tails of a fresh shirt into his inexpressibles.
    “Perhaps I ought to wait