The Fortune Hunter Page 0,8

down, but her numb fingers were unable to perform the simple task. She blew on them, she tucked them into her relatively dry and warm armpits. It was no good, and her own shivering was getting worse by the minute. She could feel an impulse growing in her to burst into tears of misery. She had to get help.

She hated the thought of stepping out into the deluge, but across the muddy quagmire of a yard the warm golden light of a lamp glimmered in a window. She could see the shelves of a kitchen and could imagine the fire there, the warmth and aroma of the ovens. A haven.

Pointlessly, she dragged the soaked sacks further forward onto her face, then made a dash for it.

After three steps her feet went from under her. She slammed forward into the mud and slid for a yard or so. Stunned, she lay there winded. The mud was glutinously foul between her fingers. The rain beat down on her back. She could laugh or cry. She chose to laugh.

A fine beginning to her career as a fortune hunter. No one would want her at this moment.

It was tempting to just lie where she was, but Amy heaved herself up, her soaked muddy clothing like a millstone around her neck, and plodded carefully to the farmhouse door. It at least had a little porch covering it, and the rain stopped beating down on her head. She knocked. Nothing. She wiped her sodden hair back off her face with filthy fingers, picked up a stone, and beat on the door with that.

It swung open. Amy looked up to see a handsome, tawny-haired young man in shirtsleeves staring at her in astonishment.

Harry Crisp had been congratulating himself on staying indoors on such a day. His friends, Chart Ashby and Terance Cornwallis, had ridden out early to ride with the Belvoir, unwilling to miss a day's hunting this close to the end of the season no matter how unpromising the weather. Served them right. They'd be drowned rats by the time they found shelter.

He doubtless would have been with them, however, if he hadn't felt the need for a bit of time to think.

At Easter he'd taken his usual trip to Hey Park, his family home. Chart disliked his parents and went home as little as possible, but Harry was fond of his. They were a good sort. They gave him an adequate allowance, and despite the fact that he was an only child, they didn't fuss over him, or try to interfere with his fun. His father was deeply suspicious of London and clearly feared Harry would one day be ruined there, but even so he made no cavil at Harry's annual jaunts there with Chart. Yes, a very good sort.

Moreover, Lord Thoresby was still under sixty and Harry had reckoned, when he'd thought about the matter at all, that he had many years before he need think of settling down.

Now he knew that his father was not well.

Lord Thoresbys untypical petulance about it had been alarmingly convincing. "Load of nonsense," he'd grumbled. "Just because I've been dizzy now and then."

"Perhaps I should come and help you here, sir."

"Rubbish! And miss the last of the hunting? None of that. I have people here to do what's needed."

"There's only a week or two left," Harry said. "Hardly worth going back for." His father looked as well as normal but he couldn't persuade himself this was all a mare's nest.

"Won't hear of it," said his father firmly. "In fact," he added a great deal less firmly, "I... er... I was thinking it's about time you spent more time in London."

Harry stared at his father in astonishment. "I can't think why."

Lord Thoresby rambled on about gaining a bit of bronze, learning to know a flat from a sharp, and a great many other unconvincing reasons. Harry took the puzzle to his mother.

"Oh dear," said Lady Thoresby. She was a small, plump, pretty woman who had given her son his tawny curls and amiable temperament. "I hoped he wouldn't... you mustn't mind him, Harry dear. He's a little out of curl these days. Don't like to feel he can't do just as he wishes."

"But why would he want me to go to Town?" Harry demanded. "I could understand if he wanted me home, and I'm more than willing."

"Marriage," said his mother apologetically. She looked at her horrified son and chuckled. "It is a state slightly better than hell on earth,