Belinda Read Online Free PDF

water.
    The stagecoach driver came in with his guard, a pair of tough but honest looking men. The driver announced that the horses were changed and they’d be off in about half an hour, as soon as he and his partner had eaten.
    While the deplorable coach station owner busied himself with the stagecoach crew, the group introduced themselves. The thin man was called Timothy and his fatter friend was Oliver, whilst the brunette went by the name of Marie and her blonde companion was called Jane. They were not married and they were, as Belinda had already heard, from Boston and were as wealthy as they were witty. They had become bored with polite Boston society and were on a slumming it adventure holiday, looking for whatever laughs might come their way.
    â€˜I guess you could say we’re game for any old bit of excitement,’ said Timothy to Belinda, looking down his nose at her with a wicked aristocratic smile, which she found rather electrifying.
    â€˜But pray, Belinda,’ said Marie a little haughtily, ‘if it’s not too impertinent, what’s an English girl doing out here in the wilderness without a penny or a horse? You are English, are you not?’
    â€˜Yes, I’m from Liverpool, actually,’ said Belinda, taking a sip of her gin and water.
    And she told them of how she had come out in search of a new life, without mentioning her old life, and how Bill had been slain within minutes of their meeting. She also told them about Lord Raven and how she had watched the slave Rosie being beaten, albeit more or less voluntarily. Again, she omitted her role in that ritual.
    Blonde Jane, speaking for the first time, was most intrigued by the events at Lord Raven’s plantation, and went over and over the details with Belinda. She clearly found the situation quite thrilling and her little pink tongue darted in and out, licking her lips below her eagerly shining eyes.
    Chubby Oliver, with beer dribbling down his shiny badly shaven chin, wanted to know where she thought she was heading, since she seemed to be directing herself deeper into the wilderness. They were astonished enough to exchange sudden smirks when she said California, though none of them knew of a place called The Angels, in English or in Spanish.
    After some debate, Timothy advised her through heavy eyelids that her best, indeed her only, hope was to head for St Joseph on the banks of the Missouri, which was the jumping off point for most of the wagon trains. She’d be sure to find a train or a family to let her work her passage, a phrase that made Marie and Jane suppress snorts of amusement.
    â€˜Oliver,’ drawled Jane elegantly with a lopsided smirk, ‘doesn’t our stage pass by that new cattle railroad to St Joseph?’
    â€˜Why yes, it surely does, Jane,’ the fat man replied through greasy lips. ‘Passes within a couple of miles in fact, some time tomorrow morning.’
    â€˜Well there we are!’ cried Marie, clapping her hands. ‘We need entertainment and she needs a lift!’
    â€˜Ah ha!’ said Timothy brightly. ‘Yes! Belinda, you didn’t seem too condemnatory of old Lord Raven’s carry on last night. Perhaps if you joined in some rather modern games with us in the coach we’d be inclined to pay your passage to within walking distance of a train that’ll take you to all them wagons in about two days. How about it?’
    Belinda allowed a grin to slowly spread across her face as she looked at his handsome features. She also felt Jane’s thigh press harder against her own.
    â€˜Yes, please,’ she whispered demurely, looking forward to a stagecoach ride in the right direction and many sessions of cards and I-Spy and the like. If the fun flagged she would entertain them with a selection of songs, both traditional and modern.
    Oliver startled everyone by giving a whoop of joy at her response, and throwing himself backwards against his chair as he did