A shaggy Connemara pony pulling a well-laden farm cart plodded around the corner and was pulled up at the hitching post not far from where she stood. The scrawny ostler shed seen earlier jumped down from the seat and walked stiff-legged to hitch the animal to the post. That done, he straightened and looked her over with glum disapproval.

"You got business hereabouts, lad?"

"As much as you."

"That so? Well, I got to go back and get another horse. If aught on this cart is disturbed while I'm gone, I'll know where to look."

Caitlyn's reply was crude, and the gesture that accompanied it was cruder. The ostler spat in her direction, glared, and stumped off toward the stable behind the pub. Caitlyn eyed the pony and cart with some interest. Making off with them wouldn't have occurred to her if the ostler hadn't put the idea in her head. But since he had, she calculated that the pony itself would be worth a good bit of change, to say nothing of the cart and its contents. Perhaps she could just put aside the idea of taking the Sassenach up on his offer and prig the pony and cart instead. She could live on the proceeds for a goodly while, and handsomely too. If she didn't swing for it…

The Sassenach walked out of the Brazen Head. His linen was as snowy as it had been the day before. Despite the just-hatched gloom of the morning, the white shirt and frilly jabot seemed to glow. This morning the rolled collar of his frock coat was black, and his breeches were black too. He'd changed the red-heeled shoes for knee- length black boots meant for riding, and he'd evidently left off the face powder, for his skin was no longer softly white; but he was still as foreign to her kind as a Hottentot. A sneer curled Caitlyn's mouth as she looked at him. Despite the physical strength she knew he possessed, and the kindness that had prompted him to feed her and offer her a job and a home, he was still bloody English. A bloody English popinjay.