Page 86 of A Castaway in Cornwall
“What are you doing?” he hissed.
“Going with you. I know where you can hide, and you’ll need me to help you.”
She led the way up the track, past the abandoned drive.
“The ice cellar?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Too risky. My uncle and Eseld know about it. They might guess I would hide you there and tell the militia.”
They stayed in the shadows as much as possible, following a line of scrubby tamarisk bushes to the nearest dune. Thewind gusted, stirring sand into their eyes as they went. Finally, the narrow track led them to St. Enodoc, the partially buried church.
Laura retrieved the rope from the sexton’s shed. Then they continued through the lych-gate into the churchyard. She scurried up the grassy mound and onto the roof, and Alexander followed.
“Are you sure about this?” he asked.
“Have you a better idea?”
“Just keep running?”
“Then how would I get word to you about a ship captain willing to take you across the Channel?”
“Good point. Very well. I’ll go down, but if they find me here it will be like shooting fish in a barrel.”
“The officers are not local men. Let’s hope they don’t know about the hatch in the roof. It’s the only way in.”
As she had seen done every year since arriving in Cornwall, she secured a noose of rope around a Cornish cross on the mound and pried opened the hatch.
Tossing down the other end of the rope, she said, “God be with you.”
“And with you,ma chère.” He pressed another firm kiss to her mouth, then lowered himself, sliding down the rope into the chancel, his feet hitting the paving stones between the altar and rood screen.
“If anyone comes searching, hide behind something,” she called down, then added, “I wish I had thought to bring you something to eat.”
“I’ll manage. I have been eating well lately.”
“I will bring you something as soon as I can. As soon as it’s safe.”
“Thank you, Miss Callaway.”
She pulled up the rope, shut and secured the hatch, and hurried off the roof. If they caught her up there, it would surely give away his hiding place.
Instead of returning the rope to the shed, she hid it in the shadows between a nearby tomb chest and the church wall. She didn’t want to give his pursuers the means to enter the church themselves if by chance one of them knew of the hatch. Hopefully the militia officers had not recruited the local parish constable to aid in their search.
Hearing footsteps coming fast, she darted through the lych-gate and crept along the hawthorn hedge. She prayed she could get far enough away that, if they found her, they would not automatically guess she had been at the church. She rounded the sexton’s shed, planning to stop and catch her breath, only to gasp in surprise. Two people stood there in the shadows, clutched in a fond embrace. By the dim twilight, she recognized Eseld and Perry.
He stepped back sheepishly, clearing his throat, but Eseld seemed too transfixed to do more than smile softly up at him. The young doctor had told Uncle Matthew he would see Eseld home safely. He must have decided a leisurely moonlit walk would be more romantic than a brief carriage ride.
Perry opened his mouth to speak, but Laura shook her head and put a finger to her lips in warning.
Footsteps passed nearby and entered the churchyard.
“Let’s search the church,” a familiar masculine voice called.
The militia officers she’d met in Padstow, Laura guessed. Was François still with them? Her heart beat hard, and her palms perspired. She drew in shallow breaths, straining to hear, and caught the sounds of scraping footfalls and a muttered oath.
“Cursed sand is covering the door.”
And it would be difficult for them to see inside, Laura reassuredherself, assuming Alex hadn’t done something foolish like find a flint and light a candle.
