Keeping the Castle - By Patrice Kindl Page 0,25

a brilliant hue, but no one could deny that it was striking.

The hat was likewise a triumph. Once stripped of its gold cording and metal badge of rank, and then swaddled with a filmy black scarf, it became a very fashionable ladies’ hat indeed. The feathers had been nibbled by moths, but a quick trim restored them. The only problem with the hat was that it was a bit large. I stuffed it with rags until it sat steady.

My attire for the outing now settled, I turned my attention to my second concern: my horse. She was an elderly mare who had to be coaxed up the smallest hill and suffered from severe vertigo on a rise of only a few feet. I dared not ride her near the cliffs. Once in recent months I had tried it; at first sight of the abyss she froze, her eyes grew large as saucers and in her terror she nearly plunged us both to our deaths. It would not do, not for her sake and not for mine.

The only way I could think of to obscure the fact that we could not afford a good ladies’ riding horse for Mama and me was to pretend that my mare had been purchased for me as being extremely gentle. Actually she had only been extremely cheap, though she was a dear, good creature, named Pegeen. I was able to afford her maintenance largely due to the kindness of Sir Quentin, who regularly directed his farrier to attend to her, and incidentally sent along several bales of feed.

“Can’t bear to see a horse badly shod,” was his explanation.

I loved to ride—it was my passion—but I would have to behave like a nervous little miss too frightened to be mounted on anything more spirited than a child’s hobby-horse.

This was injurious to my pride, but I decided that it was for the best, at least for the moment. I could—could I not?—appear to gradually become more adventurous on horseback, so that by the wedding I would be so much at ease that His Lordship could give me a strong-willed Arabian stallion for the groom’s gift to the bride. I closed my eyes and imagined myself galloping at a breakneck speed o’er hill and dale with the Baron at my side. However, if he was like most men, he would reserve the fiery stallion for himself and present me with a docile, younger version of Pegeen. Ah well, that was for the future.

I therefore decided that we would ride inland towards a group of megaliths arranged in a rough circle, known locally as “the Screaming Stones” because of the noise the wind made rushing between them. As standing stones went, they were not large or notable, but they were undeniably old, and might, by their extreme antiquity, provide a subject for reflection and conversation on the part of the more sensible members of the party and a certain amount of superstitious nonsense on the part of whichever of my stepsisters gained the right to accompany us.

Only one would be able to do so. My stepsisters had their own horse, shared between them. They would not on any account lend the animal so that Mama and I could ride together, or for any general purposes of the household, and would only allow it to be hitched to our chaise when they wished to be conveyed somewhere, such as on the night of the ball. Neither enjoyed riding much—the horse was for show and spent the vast majority of its life idle, eating its head off and growing stout—and so there was no reason to bear the expense of two when one was rarely used.

Once it occurred to Charity that she and Prudence would therefore not both be able to join the party, she proposed that we use the chaise.

“Then, you know, we could all go. It would be shocking to leave poor Mama Winthrop home,” she said. As the younger of the two Winthrop daughters, she would be the one obliged to give way to her elder sister.

I shook my head. I, too, thought it would be a shame to leave my mother at home. But taking the chaise was not to be thought of. “The roads are far too bad. You know quite well that the last few miles of the way are nothing more than a track fit only for walking or riding. Of course, if you wished to take the chaise, leave it at Allingham, and