10. DASHING THROUGH THE DARK

THE FANCY DRESS BALL (10)

My mind was everywhere but where it should have been. Daylight had almost faded away completely, we were on the hard surface of the road that led through Swanspottle towards the town of Brumpton and seemed to be competing with the wind for speed. What on Earth had happened? I had been shot at and I could still feel my head throbbing even though it seemed not much damage had been done, the gardener, poor old Todd Anderson, was fighting for his life with a blade sticking in his back, and one of Sir Jeffrey’s twin daughters in her fancy dress nurse’s outfit had, apparently, been kidnapped and the outfit left in the gutter.

And, above everything else, I was sitting behind Jeffrey’s beautiful wife on her favourite horse, she was naked as the day she’d been born and I was having to hold on to her or fear falling off. It reminded me, for an instant, that too much of what you’ve dreamed of can be very bad indeed, and I’ve dreamed of holding this woman for long enough. I tried letting go our of a sense of decency and did manage to remain reasonably stable.

“We’ll be jumping in a minute, so hold on tight!” she shouted as she spurred the horse on to something I could neither see nor want to know anything about. We were going to jump? Two of us on a horse? And me a complete and utter cowardly novice? The whole idea filled me with terror and I was horribly aware that one thing I can do better than most men is fall.

Then I discovered what she meant by saying we’d be jumping because we reached the kiddies play area, a smallish park with little more than swings and a small games pitch, and suddenly the horse defied gravity, the sounds of its hooves were momentarily silenced and, well, I rather liked it.

“Hold on!” she shrieked, and I did. Her naked skin was cold to the touch, but I suppose it would be, hurtling along as we were through the late evening, but I held on firmly.

“Nice,” she said, and I hoped she was being ironic.

Once on the playing pitch in the park near where there were some goal posts she pulled the horse to a standstill and turned round to face me.

“I bet you enjoyed that?” she smiled, and I realised I was still holding on to her tightly, and admittedly reluctantly, I let go.

“That’s better,” she approved, “you were digging your nails in! I think we must be about there though, don’t you?”

“About where?” I asked, totally at a loss as to what we were doing where we were and what on Earth the lovely naked woman actually meant.

“Look over there,” she pointed.

I’d better explain the geography of the park. We’d vaulted a fence that surrounded it, and in order to gain access to it by road any vehicle would have to drive along two roads and round a roundabout. It was a long route and ever since the park had been planned parents of children who used it had complained because the footpath also went the long way round, and it was considered dangerous letting very young children navigate their own way with traffic not so far away, just to get to a couple of swings.

Anyway, I looked where she pointed.

An electric milk float was slowly edging its way along the park entrance and making in a direct line for the swings, which were at the opposite end of the park. It was incongruous, to say the least. After all, you don’t see so many milk floats these days and this one was loaded with empty crates that rattled over every bump.

“What on Earth?” I asked in a whisper. It seemed appropriate to be whispering because anything louder might well have drawn unwanted attention to us and I realised that it would be a darned sight better if we remained still where we were, or as still as a horse fresh from the gallop would allow.

“Watch!” she hissed.

Once it had pulled to a standstill two men leapt from the milk float, roughly handling a girl, Jessica, one half of Cynthia AKA Lady Godiva’s, twenty-something twins. We were sensibly well shaded by the hedges and trees that bordered the park where we stood with a perspiring Trigger, and even the white flesh of Cynthia would have been difficult to make out from where the milk float was.

“Would you be a gentleman and let me have your hauberk?” she whispered, and I realised that even in a warm evening she would be feeling cold. My imitation Roman Uniform included a loose fitting hauberk that I was wearing over my tunic, and I hastily removed it and handed it to her.

“Thanks,” she smiled at me, and added, “Modesty insists,” she added, covering her top half with imitation chain armour.

“Very fetching,” I murmured, “now what in the same of goodness is going on?”

“I heard them snatching Jessica,” she said quietly, “I was in the stable getting ready to dress in my bodysuit so that I’d look naked without being naked, and those two men must have grabbed Jessica, who happened to be coming along to help me, because I saw them running off towards Jeffery’s milk float. It’s a hobby of his, having eccentric old vehicles. You see, my body suit is a two woman affair if you want to dress in them quickly, which is why Jessica was coming. I made it myself out of yards of flesh-coloured elasticated cotton material and it’s probably a bit fragile.”

“Yes, but who are they?” I asked, “I’ve seen them lurking around for days now. Who are they and what do they want?”

She looked at me, surprised. “I thought you’d know,” she whispered, “they’re the men who were doing the music at the ball! Now look: I need to rescue Jessica. Can you wait here while I’ll do my rescuing act all over again?”

I didn’t have chance to reply because she was back on Trigger in what seemed to be no more than an instant, and then she was off.

The ground of the park was soft, but in the quiet of evening the sound of the horse galloping ever more swiftly across it was loud enough to be heard for miles.

Then I saw how she’d grabbed hold of me and pulled me onto the horse as she did the same thing to Jessica. She made it look easy and must have been something she’d had a fair amount of practise at. Then, and it’s off how you can remember odd things like this, I remembered that when she left school she’d gone to work at a circus. It was years ago but she must have learned it there.

But what she didn’t see and what I saw quite clearly was that rather than being a prisoner Jessica seemed to be in charge as she harangued one of the men in the sort of voice that suggested to me that she was in charge. I couldn’t hear what she said, but that didn’t matter. But what was more telling, and I hope Cynthia saw this, was the fact that she was still wearing her fancy dress costume. She was still dressed as a somewhat dated nurse.

Her body language told me even more, and I did hear her words as her mother grabbed hold of her and pulled her onto the saddle behind her.

“Get your hands off me, you stupid woman!” she screamed.

© Peter Rogerson 26.07.20