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“No There’s nothing between us and the e in that direction” She swung her arm around

“Fool, bloody fool I should have realized The birds, that was it, when there were no birds, I should have—”

Because the conversation he was having appeared to be with hinored hiround in front of her with her hands, she was able to creep slowly forward Wolf hining anxiously at her back, clearly of the opinion that she was pushing her luck, but she ignored hi as close as possible to the stricken stranger She’d re accident once, when she and her fa in the Lake District A child had fallen from a boat, and one of the men stripped off his jacket and used it as a sort of rope, so that the child had sorasp

Francesca didn’t have a jacket, but she did have her woolen cloak It was old but it was ht that it would do very well

The stranger was stillto hi his head around, eyes narrowing, as if he was surprised to find her there “Can you move at all? If I were to twist my cloak into a rope and throw it toward you, could you use it to try to pull yourself free?”

He atching herto read her lips Perhaps he was delirious

“Sir?” she repeated desperately “Did you understand what I said?”

“Cherries,” he said, as if he’d come to so, and the nose…”

Crouching on the edge of the mire, her skirts muddy, her face frozen, and her hair da rain, Francesca wavered in her deter back for help” She spoke loudly and clearly “I don’t want to leave you here, but I think I ”

He blinked, and clarity returned to his face and focus to his eyes “No,” he said with hoarse desperation “Don’t go I proht spent trying to keepsed up by this infernal muddy soup”

Francesca hesitated

He could see the doubt “Please,” he repeated “If you go, I won’t be alive when you get back Don’t desert th She read it in his eyes as they stared at each other, and knew that thisdeep inside her as she acknowledged the responsibility, but it was one she illing to accept

“I will do reed “I won’t desert you”

“Thank you” He s about his smile…

Francesca busied herself by re it until it resehtly as she could around her hand, and then she tossed the other end toward him