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up the reins. ‘What makes you think it was this Hedley Swayne behind your abduction?’
    Helen frowned. In reality, now that she considered the matter more closely, there was no firm evidence to connect Hedley with the kidnap attempt.
    Observing her pensive face, Martin’s brows rose. ‘No real reason—just a feeling?’
    At the superior tone rippling beneath the raspy surface of his deep voice, Helen drew herself up. ‘If you knew how Hedley’s been behaving recently, you wouldn’t doubt it.’
    Martin grinned at her prickly rejoinder and infused a degree of sympathy into his, ‘How has he been behaving?’
    ‘He’s forever at me to marry him—heaven only knows why.’
    Pressing his lips together to suppress the spontaneousretort that had leapt to his tongue, Martin waited until his voice was steady before asking, ‘Not the obvious?’
    Absorbed in cogitations on the vagaries of Hedley Swayne, Helen shook her head. ‘Definitely not the obvious.’ Suddenly recalling to whom she was speaking, she blushed. Praying that the poor light would conceal the fact, she hurried on. ‘Hedley’s not the marrying kind, if you know what I mean.’
    Martin’s lips twitched but he made no comment.
    Helen considered the iniquitous Mr Swayne, a slight frown puckering her delicate brows. ‘Unfortunately, I’ve no idea why he wants to marry me. No idea at all.’
    They proceeded in silence, Martin intent on the bad road, Helen lost in thought. The land about was open pastures, separated by occasional hedgerows, with not even a farmhouse to be seen. A stray thought took hold in Martin’s mind. ‘Did you say you were at a ball when they grabbed you? Have you been missing since last night?’
    Helen nodded. ‘But I went in my own carriage—not many of my friends have returned to town yet.’
    ‘So your coachman would have raised the alarm?’
    Slowly, Helen shook her head. ‘Not immediately. I might have gone home in some acquaintance’s carriage and my message to John got lost in the fuss. That’s happened before. My people wouldn’t have been certain I was truly missing until this morning.’ Her brows knit, she considered the possibilities. ‘I wonder what they’ll do?’
    For his own reasons, Martin also wondered. The possibility of being mistaken for a kidnapper, and the consequent explanations, was not the sort of imbroglio he wished to be landed in just at present—not when he had barely set foot in England and had yet to establish his bona fides. ‘You’ll certainly cause a stir when you reappear.’
    ‘Mm.’ Helen’s mind had drifted from the shadowy possibilities of happenings in London, drawn to more immediate concerns by the presence beside her. Her rescuer had yet to ask her name, nor had he volunteered his. But her adventurous mood had her firmly in its grip; their state of being mutually incognito seemed perfectly appropriate. She felt comfortably secure; appellations, she was sure, were unnecessary.
    Absorbed in the increasingly difficult task of managing his team over the severely rutted track, Martin racked his brains for some acceptable avenue to learn his companion’s name. Their situation was an odd one—not having been formally introduced, he did not expect her to volunteer the information. He balked at simply asking, not wanting her to feel impelled to reveal it out of gratitude for her rescue. Yet, without it, could he be sure of finding her in London? He ought, of course, to introduce himself, but, until he was more certain of her, was reluctant to do so.
    Another drop of rain and a low mutter from the west jerked his mind back to practicalities. Skittish, the horsestossed their heads. He settled them, carefully edging them about a sharp corner. The dark shape of a barn loomed on the left, set back in a field and screened on the west by a stand of chesnuts. The mutter turned into a growl; lightning split the sky.
    With a grimace, Martin checked the horses for the turn into the rough cart