How the Hangman Lost His Heart by K. M. Grant

the racecourse and saw Alice as a tragic heroine. “Fly, fly to your uncle Frank, Alice my lovely!” she sang out, as if at the theater, and waved her hands, then, feeling this was not enough for such an occasion, she took off her wig and waved that too. “Fly to your uncle Frank!” Purple dust liberally sprinkled the heads and shoulders of those below.
    Alice could see her grandmother clearly, but only caught the last echo of her words. Despite the heat of the chase, they made her go cold all over. Uncle Frank’s head! She had left it behind! She glanced over her shoulder. The laundryman had caught his horse and the major was now mounted on another. Hew had charge of the washing basket.
    Alice turned. “Dan!” she shouted into the wind, “Dan, we’ve forgotten Uncle Frank!” But Dan could do nothing except twist his hands deeper into his horse’s mane. He had never ridden before and was quite out of control, and anyway there was no going back. EvenAlice must know that. They would have to leave Uncle Frank where he was. Alice punched herself with fury. How could she have been so thick? Without Uncle Frank’s head, the point of all this was totally lost.
    However, even she had to accept that it would not help Uncle Frank if she and Dan were taken too. Glancing around, she saw with some relief that the spectators, clearly wanting the funfair spectacle to last as long as possible, had closed ranks behind her, keeping the major and the pursuing troopers momentarily at bay. Taking full advantage, Alice pushed her horse as close as she could to Dan’s, seized its flapping rein, and steered both animals helter-skelter up to the main road. Here, all the assorted traffic of a London morning was building up: coaches, wagons, donkeys, children walking in pairs to school. Alice and Dan plunged through the lot, but though people shouted, most were too intent on their own business to pay much attention to a stockingless girl and an ashen-faced man, even if they were going at a pace more commonly seen at Newmarket. People were always fleeing from something or other. Best not to get involved.
    Alice kept charge of both horses as well as she could, trying neither to lose Dan nor to knock anybody over. “Passage, passage!” she cried. “Please let us through!”
    The crowd grumbled but obliged, and by the time the major managed to get away from GrosvenorSquare, she and Dan were heading northward through emptier streets and lanes until they eventually found themselves in the fields beyond Marylebone. The horses’ blood was up and, as the country spread wide in front of them, Hew’s black took the bit between his teeth. The feel of the girl’s bare legs was strange to him, as was her gossamer touch on the bit in his mouth. In the end, Alice had to let go of Dan’s horse, although she could still hear Dan’s groans as his bottom was battered against the army saddle.
    Alice steered right away from the main road and into the fields, plunging in and out of woods until, certain that they had outrun their pursuers, she hauled on the reins, aimed the horse into a thicket, and finally managed to bring him to a halt. She leaped off at once and in a second Dan was beside her. He did not leap off, but simply let go and fell to the ground in a style that left his horse distinctly unimpressed.
    Alice slumped down next to him, tears streaming down her face. “Uncle Frank,” was all she could say. “How could I have left him behind, Dan Skinslicer? How could I? He’ll be back on Temple Bar before we know it and I’ll have to start all over again.”
    It was a while before Dan could answer, but when he did, he was quite emphatic. “You most certainly will not, missy,” he stated, grimacing as he sat up, forthe whole of him was in agony. “Are you mad? We’re going nowhere near Temple Bar.”
    â€œBut we can’t leave Uncle Frank