Excerpt of Mostly A Lady by Lisa Manuel

"Madam, are you hurt?" A gaze the color of the Yorkshire hills at dawn, not green nor gray but a shade in between, darted toward the carriage's awkward stance against the rowan. "By St. George, what happened here?"

"The horses...they were going too fast, and the rain and the road, all muddy and pitted, and then the bend and the driver fell and..." She stopped, her head drooping and her teeth clamping her lip. She was babbling, yes, but more. She blinked and tried to stop the tears, quell the rising grief and guilt. And the numbing fear that she'd never manage this plan of hers, that she'd been addled even to have thought of it.

As if she, and not Elizabeth, had survived the crash but only just, she began shaking so violently the man's hands and arms shook too, until his grip on her shoulders tightened and he straddled the wall to stand before her.

"It'll be all right now, madam. My name is Dylan Fergusson. I will bring you to safety. You'll soon be warm and dry and taken care of." His voice, husky, nearly a baritone, penetrated the wind and rolled over her like soft, sturdy flannel, making her believe, for a precious instant, that everything could and would be all right. As if the gift of that voice weren't enough, he enfolded her to his chest, wrapping his cloak tightly around her, securing her in the shelter of his arms.

The tears became a torrent. Gentleman that he was, he went on holding her, patting her back and putting his solid presence at her disposal. Which of course only made the tears flow more furiously. It was the first time since Nathan died that anyone had shown her any kindness at all.

"Forgive me," she mumbled after some minutes into the second tier of his cloak's collar. He wore an open suit coat but no waistcoat beneath, only a fine linen shirt that smelled of an autumn meadow.

She was loath to pull her face away, to relinquish her first haven since she'd lost the farm. Somehow she found the strength to lift her chin, straighten her shoulders, step back. "Forgive me," she repeated louder, more firmly this time.

"Not at all." He spoke with a soft brogue, a lovely lilt that softened a voice otherwise gruff and gravelly. His face, too, possessed an almost blunt, rugged quality smoothed by the fine arch of his eyebrows beneath fire-shot brown hair that wanted trimming. "You've been through a terrible ordeal," he said. "How long have you been stranded?"

"Two days."

"By God, and in the rain."

"Most of the time, yes. I stayed inside the coach, except when I tried to salvage the luggage."

He glanced over her head, not hard to do for one so tall. "Where is your driver? Your horses?"

"The linchpin and whiffletree broke, and the horses galloped away. We were headed south. They're probably halfway to London by now." She ducked her head, not wishing to answer his first question, hoping he'd let it pass.

He did not. Removing a glove, he placed his hand beneath her chin and raised it, and all Eliza could think as she met his concerned gaze was that there was a callous on the tip of his thumb, and how rough and reassuring it felt against her skin. How masculine in an honest, unpretentious sort of way.

"What happened to your driver?" he asked, his voice as gentle as a misty rain.

She shivered and turned her face to where the incline leveled and the rocks were not as dense. She'd rolled first the driver and then Elizabeth onto the blanket that first day and dragged them both there. Side by side she'd laid them, covered them with the only cloak she'd found and Nathan's old coat, and weighted it all down with stones. Thus she had kept the buzzards away.

Mr. Fergusson followed the direction of her gaze, then looked back at her, one eyebrow upraised in a question that didn't need asking. She nodded. His gaze returned to the makeshift mound.

"Are there two deceased?"

Again she nodded. "The other was...my paid companion." She'd planned this story the first night but stumbled over the voicing of it nonetheless. Lies had never come easy to her. This one sat like a stone inside her chest.

"How on earth did you survive unscathed?"

She felt a lick of panic. How to explain her utter lack of injury? She opened her mouth hoping something believable would come out, but he spoke again first.

"That you're standing here now is nothing short of a miracle, sure enough." His thick brows drew low. "Do you know of their families?"

The question startled her. Of course she didn't know a thing about the driver's background, and precious little about Elizabeth's. Mr. Fergusson eyed her, waiting and expectant.

"An aunt." She paused and thought back to the scant clues in Anselmo Mendoza's letter. "In York. They'd been recently hired, you see, and..." She cut short the fabrication, not at all feigning the sudden dizziness that made her teeter in the unfamiliar high heeled boots she wore.

"Easy, lass." Mr. Fergusson's arm went round her waist and she once more found herself pressed to his warm, solid length. "I fear you may have been injured more than you realize. I won't rest easy till we get you to a physician."

For a wondrous moment she let him hold her steady. He didn't feel as she'd thought a gentleman would, not soft and purposeless but powerful, substantial, resolute. She felt a world of determination in the crook of his arm, tempting her nearly beyond endurance to remain against him forever, protected, cared for, no longer alone.

She eased away. "I haven't eaten much these last two days. I didn't know how long I'd be here and thought I'd best conserve."

"Pardon me for saying so, lass," he said with the beginnings of a smile that caused an odd flipping sensation in her stomach, "but I'd say you don't eat much most of the time. You're a mere slip of a thing."

Indeed. The corset she'd somehow wrangled her way into had delivered the same taunting message. She'd had to tighten and retighten the laces, yet even so whenever she moved the wretched thing twisted and gaped and poked where it shouldn't while her breasts kept disappearing inside. Where Elizabeth had been slender and graceful, Eliza was unfashionably gaunt.

Still, it took her aback that he'd mentioned it. And when, exactly, had he proceeded from madam to lass? Had he sensed something amiss, some slovenly bent in her posture or tone of voice that proclaimed her less than a lady? Would a lady have leaned so readily against a complete stranger? Flames rose in her cheeks.

"That was rude of me," he said, lowering his chin to search her face. Her first instinct was to turn away, hide her face in her hands. But the contrition in his misty hazel eyes held her trapped. His lips curved ruefully. "I'm very sorry."

In the next instant he shrugged out of his cloak, tossed it around her shoulders and tucked it tight beneath her chin. She all but disappeared inside its abundant folds while the hem thudded to the soggy ground with fabric to spare. It felt, oh, like heaven, the velvet lining impossibly soft, incomparably warm with the lingering heat of his body.

She slipped her arms free. "No, Mr. Fergusson, it's quite chilly and your suit coat will never suffice. You'll catch your death and I...I have a shawl in the coach."

He was already shaking his head. "You keep it, lass. This isn't considered at all cold where I come. But you, now, you're as shaky as a newborn lamb."

He stepped closer, again tucking his chin low as he regarded her in that familiar, intimate way of his. Eliza thought a lady might find his manner intrusive; might step away while issuing a firm warning to mind his distance. She didn't.

"Have you nothing warmer than this summer frock? You'll catch your death."

She shook her head, basking in his concern. There might have been warmer dresses in the piles she'd gathered, but she had never dressed the part of a lady before. The corset had been difficult enough. This dress had few buttons and no lacings, a welcome respite for her cold and aching fingers.

She had, of course, searched for a black gown, for Elizabeth should appear in mourning. She'd found none among the scattered luggage. At first this puzzled her, until she determined it to be another clue to Elizabeth's immediate past. Her husband must have passed away so recently she'd only had time to have one mourning dress made - the one she wore.

"There's a village a few miles back." The young man's bare hand closed around her shoulder through the bulk of his cloak. "We'll stop there and hire someone who looks trustworthy to come and collect your luggage. Is there anything of value you wish to take now?"

"Only my purse and-" She'd started to add Nathan's rifle, but how could she possibly explain her attachment to the filthy, rusted old weapon? She shook her head, shivering again. "Just my purse. It's in the coach."

He nodded. Surely he recognized her awkward hesitations and sudden flushes for the signs of a liar. Or was he too much of a gentleman to read them accurately?

"Let's get it and be off. We'll need to search out the nearest undertaker as well. Your servants need a proper burial. What did you say their names were?"

She hadn't said. She'd thought up identities that first night, too, but when she opened her mouth now something entirely different, unexpected, appalling, came rushing out. "Nathan and Eliza Kent."

She very nearly clapped her hands over her mouth. And yet those names made perfect sense. In order for Elizabeth to live, Eliza of course must die. And as for Nathan...she might as well have followed him into the grave six months ago.

"A married couple?"

"Yes," she said, nodding and looking away. "Recently."

"Poor souls." They started down the incline toward the coach, his hand firm at the small of her back in steady counterbalance to the uneven ground. "I'll see to it suitable markers are made for their graves."

She came to a sudden halt and nearly sent them both tripping over his trailing cloak hem. "You'd do that, sir? You didn't even know them."

"I may not have, but I daresay Nathan and Eliza Kent deserve as good as anyone else. And I see no reason to burden their aunt with the cost of it. When you write to her, assure her that her relations were well-tended."

"Thank you, Mr. Fergusson," she whispered.

He didn't reply; he merely took her hand to help her across the rocks.

Ah, his kindness made her throat throb with the desire to tell him the truth, made her wretched and ashamed. But then again, his generosity was offered because he believed her to be a gentlewoman. Had he known her for a common farmwife turned laundry maid turned almost-whore, he'd surely exact a lewd price for conveying her to the nearest village. Then he would go on his gentleman's way while she returned to the Raven's Perch to decide whether to whore or starve.

At the coach she wrapped the cords of Elizabeth's reticule - the velvet one that matched the lovely carriage dress - around her wrist. She'd fretted over that frock, wondering what to do. What would people say about a paid companion wearing such expensive clothes?

She'd considered exchanging the gown for something less sumptuous, more appropriate for a genteel servant. But stripping those beautiful velvets from Elizabeth's cold body seemed an insufferable insult, an indignity the gentlewoman would never have forgiven.

Eliza so hoped she might have Elizabeth's forgiveness, not only for what she'd done thus far, but for...everything.

Mr. Fergusson found a small satchel among the baggage and handed it to her. "You might wish to fill this with necessities. I believe my horse can manage that much."

She packed a change of under things, stockings, an extra pair of gloves. She reached for a silver and gilt hair brush, then quickly shoved it inside when she realized the hair caught in its bristles didn't match her own sandy brown in the least. She stole a peek over her shoulder. Again, Mr. Fergusson made no acknowledgement of her odd behavior.

She selected a final item: a tortoiseshell trinket box that had been locked until she had tried one of the keys in Elizabeth's reticule. Inside she'd discovered money, a great deal, so much she hadn't bothered to count. Perhaps more importantly she'd found further clues into Elizabeth Mendoza's life: a copy of the bill of sale for Folkstone Manor and records of annuity and stock accounts that Eliza despaired of deciphering. It didn't matter; she'd let Raphael Mendoza de Leon handle such financial matters.

She slipped the cache inside the portmanteau. After taking a moment to twist her hair and pin it up, she secured a satin-lined bonnet on her head. Then together she and Mr. Fergusson made their way back up to the road. He secured the bag and swung up into the saddle. Leaning low, he extended his forearm. Eliza took hold of his triceps with both hands, astonished all over again at how muscular he was, how thoroughly solid. With as much ease as if she were a child, he swung her up behind him.

He twisted around to face her. "Perhaps it's time you told me your name. You do have one, don't you?"

In spite of everything her life had been up until that moment, she found a smile for this man. "I do. It's Elizabeth Mendoza de Leone." And then her smile shriveled, consumed by her lying tongue.

This, too, went unnoticed. He grinned. "That's like music."

As he clucked his horse to motion, Eliza pressed her cheek to his back and squeezed one last tear into his woolen coat.