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their positions just behind her to ride with the men. |
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"Where have you been?" Geoffrey asked, sounding as if someone had him by the throat. |
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Joanna blinked. "What do you mean, where have I been? Most lately I have been to Mersea, but you know that. I wrote" |
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"Where have you been since you sent to me to tell me you had been summoned by the king?" Geoffrey asked, sounding, if possible, even worse. |
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"Are you mad?" Joanna rejoined calmly. "I have been at Roselynde and then on the road here. Where else" |
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"Ten days? I make it ten days since you wrote to me. Do you expect me to believe it took you ten days to come some seventy miles?" |
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"Well, of course I expect you to believe it. Indeed, it was not at all easy to accomplish. If the weather had not helped me by turning wet, I should have had to feign illness, and I do not like to do that because it is too easy for the pretense to be discovered." |
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That silenced Geoffrey for a moment. He took a deep breath. "Are you telling me you deliberately spent ten days on the road in February? For what purpose?" |
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Joanna was not quite certain what had sent Geoffrey into such a fit of ill temper, but since she had nothing to hide and was absolutely sure Geoffrey would approve heartily of what she had done once he understood it, she could not forbear to have her fun. She lowered her eyes demurely. |
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"Oh, no, I have not been on the road for ten days," she replied, deliberately adding obscurity to confusion. |
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"I agreed it was ten days since I wrote you, my lord." |
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Experience of Joanna's sense of humor should have taught Geoffrey better, but he was so completely taken up with the rage that comes with relief that knowledge lost its power. "Where have you been then?" he bellowed in a voice that made Joanna's mare shy across the road. |
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"I do not understand you, my lord," Joanna replied meekly, bringing her mount back into position. "I have |
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