“We’ll talk about it later, Charles,” Mr. Singh said, breath heaving. “If you could stop me bleeding to death in the meanwhile . . .”
Mr. Thornfield’s cry of dismay was the only signal I had that Mr. Singh was about to topple like a felled tree; I was dragged a bit by his bulk, but Mr. Thornfield caught him round the waist and together we made it into the parlour. Mr. Singh landed on the settee and lay back, all his limbs quivering.
“Jane, whatever are you doing here?” the love of my life demanded. “Who dared to lay a finger on—”
Mr. Thornfield tore off the makeshift bandage of my cloak and saw what had been done.
“No.” He closed his eyes and shook his head as if the sight could be erased. “For Christ’s sake, no. Sardar—”
“No!” I cried, lurching towards the window.
Mr. Singh managed to raise his torso, and the three of us watched as Mrs. Garima Kaur, saddled on Nalin, galloped past the bay window with Sahjara seated between her knees and exited the estate through the gate where my forgotten horse was still tethered with its trap.
THIRTY-TWO
“I could dare it for the sake of any friend who deserved my adherence; as you, I am sure do.”
What in hell is the meaning of all this?” Mr. Thornfield shouted as he tore off his coat and rolled his sleeves up, dropping to his knees. “Where is Garima off to with Sahjara?”
“Go,” Mr. Singh gasped, eyes on me. “Please bring her back. It is unfair to ask it, I know, but—”
I was already running; the last sight which met my eyes before I flew out the parlour door was that of Mr. Thornfield viciously cursing at the spectacle of an arm without a hand attached before tearing off his gloves.
There was no time to think about what that meant as my feet and lungs propelled me towards the stables, my ears burning in the cold. Homelike smells of leather and manure assaulted me as I charged into the refuge of my childhood, my exhalations hanging in the atmosphere like malevolent ghosts.
The Sikh grooms stared at me in astonishment. There might have been some trouble over procuring a mount; but as it happened, Sahjara’s new mare was still saddled, having just returned, so I swung myself up onto Harbax, tearing out of the stable as if Satan were at my heels. For the first five minutes of my pursuit, I despaired of catching up to them before we reached the village, for Nalin was the fastest steed in Mr. Thornfield’s stables, and young Harbax the most unpractised.
Gift of God. Sahjara named you that, and Mr. Singh supposed it important, though Mr. Thornfield joked about the meaning. Please, please prove to be a gift of God.
I caught sight of them—a silhouette, really, just an outline in the gathering crystalline fog. Recalling with a thrill of hope that Nalin was the least tractable of her species I had ever encountered, I urged the more docile Harbax onward, feeling the mare surge as she sensed my distress.
Garima Kaur heard her pursuer and craned her head to glance behind, her emaciated form looking dangerously fragile atop such a powerful beast. Nothing of Sahjara could be seen save her rhythmically swinging feet; but reader, I loved her then, for she was the victim of blighted hopes and blind circumstance, as so many are, as I am, and Garima Kaur did not have a knife any longer, and I would return Sahjara to the people who quietly, carefully cherished her if it cost me my own right hand—or worse.
Abruptly enough that I feared snapped necks would result, Garima Kaur reined Nalin, and the mare emitted a wild, wary sound; she turned the horse with difficulty, and then it was that I saw Sahjara’s lovely face—uncomprehending and panicked.
“Miss Stone!” she gasped. “Where is Charles? Mrs. Kaur says we are to escape to London, that there are Company soldiers making for Highgate House.”
“Mrs. Kaur,” I cried through the mist, “there is no one more sympathetic to your situation than I. I beg you, however—”
“You will ruin more lives, but you will not ruin mine entirely,” Garima Kaur snarled. Nalin’s nostrils flared, her hooves agitatedly stamping the ground.
“I seek to ruin no one, I swear to you upon any holy book you like.” Harbax, conversely, was an island once halted, perfectly quiet. “Only let me take Sahjara home.”
“Sahjara is mine!” she cried with the cracking voice of a breaking woman.
At times disaster visits us when we least expect it; and at others, we see the fraying rope and know that the hour of peril is nigh. I did not know what form disaster would take, but I knew then that Garima Kaur would not be returning to Highgate House, knew it with every fibre of my being.
I should have loved to stop the inevitable, but there was nothing whatsoever I could do.