Mr. Dalrymple Revealed by Lydia M Sheridan Page B

tremble caused the
pearl-handled pistol in her hand to waver. Every nerve and muscle was poised
for the attack.
    The heavy old coach creaked and ground up the final lap of the
hill, swinging ponderously around the last curve several hundred yards from
their hiding place.
    Quickly, Kate clapped her heels to Diana’s flanks. Giving a
hoarse shout, she fired into the night sky and horse and rider sprang from the
bushes, galloping flat out toward the oncoming coach.
    The crack of the shot was deafening in the silent night. The
coachman fought to keep control of the rearing team. In a fine flurry of
dancing plumes and swirling cape, Kate pulled up short barely a yard in front
of the plunging horses.
    Diana reared, snorting and tossing her head, and the terrified
coachman gave up the battle. His eyes rolled back in his head as he slid
quietly to the ground in a dead faint. One of the leaders got a leg over a
trace and the team came to an uneasy halt.
    With a practiced flourish, Kate pulled out the second pistol
from her saddle holster and shoved the spent pistol in its place.
    "Stand and deliver, poltroon, lest ye welter in your own
blood this night!” Kate roared in her best highwayman voice.
    “My dear--ah--felon,” lisped a refined tone. "Surely
this drama is all too--er--dramatic.”
    And out of the coach stepped a very long leg, shod in the most
elegant of Hessian boots and tightest of breeches, followed languidly by as
overpowering a dandy as Kate had ever had the misfortune to encounter. Since
this afternoon, anyway. She rolled her eyes in disgust as she recognized the
impudent coxcomb from the Coffee Shoppe.
    From the top of his brilliantly oiled locks to shirt points so
high they threatened his cheeks with impalement, to the wondrous arrangement of
his cravat, studded with a gaudy stickpin, to the greatcoat fluttery with
capes, his raiment screamed affiliation with the veriest Pinks of the ton.
    Kate’s lip curled with contempt even as she leveled the barrel
of the pistol between his eyes. She’d have no trouble at all with this--this
mincing macaroni merchant.
    "Quite unnecessary, too,” he went on, gazing
disinterestedly through a jewel-encrusted quizzing glass at the form of the
coachman sprawled inelegantly on the road. "The--um--poltroon went out
faster than a candle in a lightskirt’s bedroom.”
    "Stubble it,” Kate ordered gruffly, gesturing with the
pistol, but the exquisite seemed not to notice. He was anxiously inspecting
the high gloss of his boots, visible even in the dark, for any speck of dirt,
or, horrid thought! a scratch.
    A movement on the coach drew Kate’s attention and her pistol.
The guard, looking no more than a boy in the moonlight, peeked prudently over
the roof of the coach. Before he had time to point the heavy blunderbuss he
carried, he was staring down the muzzle of Kate’s gun.
    “Unhand your weapon or your master sleeps with the angels this
night!”
    The guard blinked. “Wha--?”
    The gentleman sighed, gesturing with a fine lawn handkerchief.
    “Dear me. I believe, my boy, this Knight of the Road desires
you to put down your weapon. At the risk of displaying a vulgar selfishness,
perhaps you might do as he asks.”
    The boy laid down his old-fashioned gun and awaited further
instructions.
    "See to the horses,” Kate barked. Obediently, the
lad scrambled toward Diana. "Not mine, you idiot!"
    The gentleman yawned delicately into soft, white fingers.
    “What an excellent suggestion,” he approved. "Although
perhaps you are being overgenerous categorizing these gluepots as horses.” He
watched with sleepy eyes, so bored he seemed barely able to stay awake, as the
guard managed to untangle and calm the trembling animals. "Still, we are
all God’s creatures.”
    “One more word out of you, my fine buck, and I shoot just for
the joy of it.”
    "Such violence in the world today. It grieves me.” He
stifled another yawn and picked a speck of lint off his sleeve.
    Thoroughly