snow. Godfrey rushed to Wally’s side as he groaned and tried to push upright.
Gripping Wally’s arm, Godfrey helped the heavier man to his knees, then hauled him to his feet.
Wally staggered and ineffectually wiped snow from his chin. “Sorry, guv. Didn’t see the hole under the snow.”
“Are you all right?” Godfrey glanced at Wally’s feet.
Wally took a step, and his ankle buckled. “Bugger—I’ve wrenched it.”
Godfrey quashed his rising alarm. “Here.” He looped one arm in one of Wally’s and reached for the leader’s bridle with his free hand. “Come on. Use me as a crutch.” We have to keep moving. He bit the words back; neither he nor Wally needed reminding.
Getting the horses walking again took a degree of persuasion, and even then, the beasts would only consent to plod along. Not that it mattered; with Wally’s gait hitching with every step, it was all he and Godfrey could do to keep up.
About them, the storm showed no sign of abating. Godfrey tried not to dwell on the stories he’d heard of storms in these parts that raged for days.
Heads down, he and Wally struggled along beside the horses, each step a battle against the thickening snow, the howling wind, and the ever-deepening cold. Picking out the lane ahead grew even more difficult as the hedges disappeared beneath drifts of disorientating white.
With frigid air sawing in and out of his lungs and Wally an increasingly heavy burden dragging on his arm, Godfrey had reached the point of wondering if they would ever reach safety—rather detachedly imagining news reports of a marquess’s brother being found frozen to death beside a lane in North Yorkshire—when an odd shape standing on the bank on the other side of the road caught his eye. He halted and muscled Wally around so that the groom was leaning against the nearer horse. “Wait there.”
Ducking against the wind, Godfrey rounded the horses and staggered and scrambled up the short bank to what looked to be some sort of sign. Using his greatcoat sleeve, already crusted with frozen snow, he brushed clear the face of the board mounted between two uprights—enough to read “Hinckley Hall.”
They’d made it. Or at least, Godfrey amended, as he squinted up what he took to be the drive and saw no sign of any house, they’d reached the mouth of the drive.
He clambered and slid down, his boots sinking into snow nearly a foot deep. He trudged across and a few yards along what he thought must be the drive, confirming there was a solid surface beneath the snow.
The certainty gave him the energy to hurry back to Wally and the horses.
He found Wally almost unconscious, slumped against the leader’s side.
“Come on! Almost there.” Although Godfrey was taller than his henchman by several inches, Wally had always been significantly heavier. It took considerable effort for Godfrey to haul Wally up and around and get him and the horses moving again. They managed the turn into the drive in a shuffle, then Godfrey leaned forward and urged both horses and Wally on.
They’d gone only a few yards when the curtain of falling snow behind them parted, and a horseman as limned in snow and ice as they loomed out of the white.
Greatcoated and booted as was Godfrey, the man saw them, drew rein, and swung down from the saddle. Leading his horse, he hurried to Godfrey and Wally and, without being asked, lent Wally his shoulder, easing the drag on Godfrey. “Terrible storm,” the man offered in greeting.
Godfrey managed a nod, then peeled apart his frozen lips to say, “We’re making for Hinckley Hall.” He tipped his head toward where he thought the drive went. “I saw the sign by the road, and I’m hoping we’re on the right track.”
“You are.” The man joined Godfrey in steering Wally and the horses and curricle up the drive. “I’m heading for the Hall myself.”
The man’s horse was trotting along eagerly. The man nodded at the beast. “He knows where he’s going and that it’ll be warm and dry there.”
Thankfully, Godfrey’s pair appeared to take their cue from the newcomer and lifted their feet with greater enthusiasm.
Their expanded company forged on.
More or less following the lead of the man’s mount, they rounded a bend. Godfrey raised his head and squinted through the if-anything-thickening wind-whipped snow. Through the bare branches of intervening trees, he saw a light glimmering a hundred or so yards ahead.
“That’s it.” The man nodded toward the light. “All we have to do is make