“I have no idea,” Mrs. Summers stated, sounding more surprised than alarmed. “Our driver should have continued straight for several more blocks. What ever is our man thinking taking such a shortcut through such a squalid section of town?”
Mr. Wang raised his walking stick in preparation of pounding on the roof. “Shall I speak with him?”
“And have him stop in this area? Heavens no. We’ll take it up with him when we arrive.” Mrs. Summers turned again to the window and wrinkled her long nose. “You are not allowed here either, Sophie.”
Sophie didn’t think she’d have any problem obeying that command. The neighborhood reminded her of some of the poorer sections of Peking. Too many dilapidated buildings likely crammed with too many hungry people. She felt helpless in places like these, and a little ashamed. She watched as they passed a small chapel she might have described as having seen better days, if she’d thought there was any chance at all that the church had, in fact, ever seen a good day. She rather doubted it, and settled for describing it as “glum” instead. Perhaps she could take some of the money set aside for her purchases and make a donation.
The loud report of snapping wood followed by the unpleasant sensation of the carriage tilting precariously to one side immediately erased Sophie’s altruistic thoughts. She watched in horror as an unlit iron lantern slid dangerously close to the edge of the shelf over Mrs. Summers’s head.
The last thing Sophie remembered was bounding off the seat with her arms stretched outward in a grasping motion.
The next thing she heard was a man’s voice telling her to open her eyes. Low, soft, and just a little bit gravelly, it washed over her like a soothing lullaby.
Maybe she’d sleep a little while longer.
The soothing voice was promptly replaced by an annoying one. Mrs. Summers was demanding she wake up immediately. And she was doing it in that tone. That horrible, insistent, I-am-quite-out-of-patience-with-you tone every child despises.
And Sophie was going back to sleep. Absolutely.
A hand prodded the side of her head.
“Ouch!”
Sophie’s eyes flew open, and she was immediately rewarded for the effort with Mr. Wang’s soft chuckle, a painful eyeful of light, and the realization that what ever mattress she was currently lying on was astoundingly hard. Groaning, she squeezed her eyelids shut again.
“She’ll be fine,” Mr. Wang announced.
Mrs. Summers clucked her tongue (a noise Sophie found excruciating in her current state) and said, “Two square inches of unpadded space in the whole carriage and your head finds it, of course.”
The carriage. London! She tried squinting against the sun, which was peeking through the clouds now, when a large figure crouched in front of her and blocked out the light.
“Better?”
“Hmm, thank you.” It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust, and when they did she was forced to blink several times in disbelief.
Here was the man with the soothing voice, and good heavens but he was handsome. Without a doubt, the most attractive Englishman she had ever seen. To be fair, she really hadn’t seen very many Englishmen in her travels, but she had certainly run across enough to know that this one was not typical. Groggily, she wondered if perhaps she had hit her head harder than she realized and when her eyes regained their focus she would find he had enormous teeth and several chins.
If that were the case, she hoped she wouldn’t recover too quickly. He was quite pleasant to look at for the moment, with the chiseled features one rarely found outside of Greek sculpture, deep-set eyes that looked to be possibly green, full lips, and a strong jaw. His aristocratic nose certainly could have been lopped off some poor unsuspecting statue.
Michelangelo’s David, that’s what he reminded her of.
Only taller. Much taller. And with better hair. She watched as one coffee-colored lock fell across his brow. Lovely. She could just stare at him all day.
“Miss? Miss….”
“Hmm…Everton.”
“You can let go of the lantern now, Miss Everton.”
Ignoring the pain to her head, she craned her neck up slightly to look at herself. She was lying flat on her back in the middle of the road and held the lantern in a death grip on her stomach. If it had been a bunch of lilies, she might have been mistaken for a corpse.
“I caught it,” she said stupidly before laying her head back down.
“So you did,” replied Mr. Wang. She turned her gaze to find him standing next to Mrs. Summers. “You were quicker than that tiger, I’d say.”
“Let go now, Miss Everton,” said the stranger.
“Sorry?”
“The lantern. Let go of the lantern now.”
She tried, she really did, but her fingers were cramped in place. “I can’t seem to…”
Large warm hands covered her own and gently pried her stiff fingers from the lantern. She flexed them experimentally and felt the first painful tingling of returning feeling.
“What ever…?”
“We lost a wheel,” Mrs. Summers explained.