Earl's Well That Ends Well

by Jane Ashford

  She fell in a heap, hitting the floor with a loud thump.

  They waited, poised and tense. There was no reaction from below.

  “Espero que la hayas matado!” said a voice from inside the room.

  “Tranquila!” replied Teresa. At Macklin’s inquiring look, she added, “Sonia hopes I have killed her.” Did she care if she had? She supposed she didn’t wish to kill any person, but this woman had surely deserved a knock on the head.

  “Unlock the others while I bind her,” said the earl. He took the ring of keys from the woman’s inert hand and gave them to Teresa, then took out his pocketknife and began rapidly cutting the coverlet from the narrow bed into strips.

  Teresa went from door to door, freeing the girls. The opera dancers greeted her with soft cries of gladness. The two strangers were wary at first and then grateful. Teresa would have felt triumphant, had not all of the girls showed signs of violent usage.

  She asked the names of the two girls she did not know—Jill and Poppy—and then introduced all the girls to each other. “We must work together as we go.” Teresa stepped back into the bedchamber, where the earl now had the hostess securely bound. She uncurled the woman’s fingers, took the money Macklin had just given her, and distributed it equally among the former captives, knowing this would be a comfort and reassurance. A babble of thanks rose. “We must stay very quiet,” she reminded them.

  Lord Macklin emerged. “I will go and call for my curricle,” he said.

  “Won’t they ask about her?” Teresa gestured at the bedchamber where the woman lay.

  He assumed a haughty expression. “What has she to do with me? I am profoundly uninterested in their opinions.”

  “You do that manner all too well,” said Teresa. She rather wished he did not.

  “I have heard it often enough in my life,” he replied.

  “We will not all fit in your curricle.”

  “We couldn’t think of a way around that problem,” the earl reminded her. “I could not drive a coach myself.”

  He hadn’t wanted to bring his coachman here, Teresa knew. He was careful about those who were dependent on him. It was one of the things she most admired about him.

  “I will see what vehicles they have in their stables,” he added. “Can you drive?”

  “Well enough,” answered Teresa. She had only twice handled the ribbons of a carriage, but she would do what she had to do.

  “Then we will steal one,” he replied.

  “Yer a right one,” said Poppy. She showed bruises on her face and down her arms that hurt Teresa’s heart, but her blue eyes gleamed with defiance. “I know horses,” she added. “I’ll help ye.”

  A moan came from the bedchamber. Lord Macklin went to stand over their captive. The rest of them crowded into the doorway. He pulled down the strip of cloth he’d tied over her mouth. “How many people work in this house?” he asked when she blinked back to consciousness.

  She glared at him, Teresa, and the huddle of girls. “Ye’ll rue the day…” she began.

  “I shall rue nothing,” Lord Macklin interrupted. “This house will soon be receiving a visit from the local magistrate and his men, which I doubt you will enjoy. It might go easier if you answer my questions. How many people work in this house?”

  She writhed in her bonds, but they were secure.

  “Let me hit her,” said Poppy. “I’ll make her tell ye.”

  “Moi aussi,” said Jeanne. All the girls but Odile crowded forward as if they would be happy to join in. Fists were raised.

  “Three,” said the woman. “Two maids and a cook. They stays in the kitchen unless I call for them.”

  “Las criadas son muy grandes y crueles,” said Sonia.

  “The maids are large and cruel,” Teresa translated. The girls nodded.

  “They get their licks in whenever they can,” said Jill, pointing to red finger marks at her wrist.

  “What about the gate guards?” the earl asked the proprietress.

  “There’s two of them,” she responded sullenly. “One on and one off. They live in the stable with Joe.”

  “So they do not come into the house?”

  “Not unless I need ’em for sommat and call ’em in special. Can’t trust ’em with the girls.”

  “Who manages the dogs?”

  “Them dogs’ll tear you apart,” she snarled. “And I’ll laugh to see it.”

  “Who is in charge of them?” the earl repeated. When the woman didn’t speak at once, Poppy rushed forward and pinched her upper arm.

  “Oww!”

  “You don’t like how it feels?” Poppy asked. “Fancy that!” There was an angry murmur from the former captives.

  “Joe feeds them,” said the woman quickly.

  “Joe would be the groom?”

  He received an affirmative grunt in reply. “Ye’ll never get away from here,” she added.

  Lord Macklin replaced the gag. He rechecked the bindings before leaving her on the narrow bed. Teresa locked her in. “We should secure the doors that were locked as well,” he said. “In case anyone does come to check.”

  Teresa did so.

  “You will all wait here,” he began then.

  But this drew a chorus of protest that made Teresa’s heart leap with apprehension. “Quiet,” she hissed.

  They obeyed, but none of the girls would agree to stay in the house. Freed from their prisons, they wanted to run. Nothing else would do.

  “We are trying to get away,” Teresa told them softly.

  “You didn’t have no plan how to get out?” asked Poppy.

  “If you don’t like it, then you can stay behind, puta!” said Sonia.

  “We will bring everyone,” said Teresa, glad Poppy knew no Spanish. “It was difficult to make a plan when we knew nothing of this place.”

  “A moment,” said the earl. He disappeared into one of the rear bedchambers down the hall. After a short time, he came back. “All right, the stables are within the inner fence,” he said. “Away from the dogs. A fortunate thing for us. We will all go out there together. The garden is overgrown. There is a row of yews we can use as concealment.”

  “This ‘concealment’ is what, please?” asked Jeanne.

  “Something to hide us from the house,” replied Teresa. She turned to the earl. “We should find one guard, possibly sleeping, and the groom Joe in the stable.”

  “Yes.”

  “Unless that creature lied to us.”

  “She named all the people I’ve seen,” said Poppy. “I watch…watched out the window.”

  Lord Macklin nodded. “Let us go. Carefully and quietly.”

  Leading them down the first flight of stairs, Arthur winced at the noise they made. No one was talking. All were trying to be quiet. But eight people simply could not move silently.

  The corridor on the next floor remained empty. Arthur pointed at the door of the chamber they had been given originally, and Señora Alvarez nodded. They had agreed that she would leave it locked to throw off pursuit.

  He didn’t bother to look for a back stair. It would likely end near the kitchen, which they had to avoid. He would have to find another way to the rear of the house.

  They edged down the stairway to the entry hall, also empty, and into a reception room on the right. This opened into a second large chamber behind and then another, smaller parlor, which had two windows looking out to the back.

  There was a low fire burning here and signs of occupancy. Possibly it was the proprietress’s sitting room. Arthur crossed to the rear and tried one of the windows. It opened without difficulty. The ground was not far off. He mimed climbing out and extended a hand. One of the opera dancers took it, and he helped her over the sill. He gestured for her to crouch down beside a shrub border, and she did so. Another followed her out, and another
.

  All was going smoothly until the girl called Poppy darted over and pushed aside the fire screen. Moving with startling speed, she raked the coals of the fire out onto the carpet, then threw a pile of papers from the writing desk over them. As flames licked up, she added the contents of the woodbin. She kicked glowing embers under the draperies of the other window. Fringe at the bottom caught fire, and more flames licked up toward the old, dry wood paneling. “That’ll keep ’em busy,” Poppy murmured with vindictive pleasure.

  It was all over before Arthur could protest, so he didn’t bother. He handed Señora Alvarez over the sill, signaled for Poppy to follow, and slipped out himself, closing the window behind them. Perhaps the fire would be an effective diversion, and not a pointer to their escape.

  The señora, whose courage and resourcefulness seemed boundless, had spotted the row of yews that marched toward the wrought-iron fence at the back. She pointed to it, and he nodded. Crouching low, the group ran into its shadow.

  The gardens were as oddly untenanted as the house. Certainly they looked as if no gardener had tended them for years. They moved quickly down the row of yews, keeping close to the drooping branches. Arthur didn’t think they could be visible from the lower regions of the house, and indeed there was no outcry.

  When the trees ended, they were not far from the stables. But a graveled yard stretched between them and the building. Arthur could see his curricle drawn up at the far side. Anyone walking across to it would be exposed. There was no choice from here.

  He managed to convince his charges to wait in the shelter of the last yew tree. They were less anxious now that they were outside. Then he strode across the yard, the crunch of his boots on the gravel seeming very loud.

  There was a back gate in the wrought-iron fence, he noted. Was it best to use that and not drive around to the front? It might be locked, however, and he didn’t know where the lane that ran away from it led. It would have to be the front. He stopped beside his curricle. “Hello,” he called.

  After a moment, the groom who had taken charge of his vehicle appeared in the stable doorway.

  “Joe, isn’t it? Bring my team. I am leaving.”

  The young man looked startled. Presumably he wasn’t accustomed to seeing visitors back here. But he touched the brim of his flat cap and said, “Yessir.”

  Arthur followed him into the stable, surprising him again. His horses were in loose boxes. Joe went to lead them out.

  There was a narrow wooden stair in the back corner that surely led to rooms above. The off-duty guard would be there, Arthur concluded. He hoped the man was deeply asleep.

  There were four horses in the stable other than his own. Two were clearly for riding, and two were carthorses to pull the rustic wagon that sat near the wide door. As the only choice, the wagon would have to do.

  Arthur walked with Joe as he led the team out to the curricle and began to harness them. The groom looked anxious. Arthur decided to push a little. “Quite an establishment Lord Simon has here,” he said.

  Joe’s sidelong look and twitching shrug suggested that he wasn’t comfortable with the comment.

  “Do you like working here?” Arthur asked him. He put a tinge of contempt in his tone.

  The younger man did not look at him. “I just takes care of the horses. That’s all.”

  “But you know what goes on inside?”

  The groom finished fastening the traces. “That’s nothing to do with me!”

  He was so vehement that Arthur decided to take a chance. “Girls are beaten and misused in that house.”

  Horror flitted over Joe’s face. He hunched and hurried his work on the bridles and straps.

  “And since you work here, you are partly to blame for that.”

  “No, I ain’t!”

  “Perhaps you have even heard their cries,” Arthur added. “And never lifted a finger.”

  Joe’s hands dropped from the harness. He glanced fearfully up at a small window in the upper part of the stable.

  Arthur noted it. That must be the guard’s quarters. The frame was empty.

  “I hate it here,” Joe murmured to the earth at his feet. “But Harkon’ll beat me within an inch of my life if I open my trap. And they said if I leave they’ll hunt me down and make sure I can’t squawk. I think they’d kill me. Harkon said as how he knifed a fella once.”

  “If you help me, I will see that they cannot harm you.”

  Joe finally looked up. He examined Arthur as if evaluating his power to keep his promise. “Help you how?” he asked finally.

  “I am taking the girls away from here. All of them.”

  “Not in one curricle, you ain’t. Even hanging off the sides. And the dogs wouldn’t stand for that anyhow.”

  “Precisely. You will drive them in that cart I saw within.”

  The young groom looked terrified. “Harkon won’t let us do that.”

  “I will ensure that he does.”

  “Begging your pardon, sir, but I don’t see how. Once he sees the girls…”

  “We will cover them with hay.”

  He took a little more convincing. But Joe really did want to leave the place, and Arthur was persuasive. At last the groom agreed.

  When he’d finished harnessing Arthur’s team, they went back into the stables and quickly and quietly hooked up the cart horses and half filled the farm wagon with loose hay. All the while, the passage of time beat in Arthur’s veins.

  “Follow my curricle over to those yews,” he said to Joe when they were ready. “Stop just at the end.” At the groom’s nod, he climbed into his vehicle and drove it to the spot where he’d left the others huddled by the trees.

  The wagon came up behind him. “Señora Alvarez will ride with me,” said Arthur quietly to the group of women. “As when we arrived. The rest of you slip into the cart as fast as you can and cover yourselves with hay. Joe will drive it out.”

  There were uneasy murmurs and doubtful looks, but no arguments. All of them could see that this was the only choice. Arthur held out his hand, and Señora Alvarez climbed up beside him. Poppy was the first to slip into the cart and burrow into the hay.

  Most of the girls were in when a hulking man came striding out of the stables. Their luck had run out. The guard had awoken and spotted them. Arthur shoved the reins into the señora’s hands and leapt down to meet him. “What the hell do you think…” began the man.

  Arthur surged forward and hit him with a left to the jaw, followed by a crashing right to the man’s midsection. The guard doubled over and went down, breathless but still conscious. “Joe!” called Arthur.

  The groom jumped down from the wagon. “That was a right old mill there,” he said.

  “Rope. Now.” Arthur stood over his groggy opponent as Joe ran for the stable and returned with a length of rope. They bound the man where he lay, dragged him into a tangle of yews, and returned to the vehicles.

  “Mr. Rigby would be impressed,” said Señora Alvarez.

  “I took him by surprise. Gentleman Jackson would say it was not fair play.”

  This drew a snort from her. Arthur noticed that the señora had gotten out her pistol and was holding it down by her side. He did not object.

  As he drove around toward the front of the house, Arthur saw smoke seeping from the back parlor windows. It seemed that Poppy’s fire had taken hold.

  On the other side of the building, Joe got down to open the gate in the iron fence. The dogs showed up immediately, but they seemed mollified by the groom’s presence and merely paced the two vehicles as they had when Arthur arrived. No one came out of the house to question them.

  They proceeded down the drive. The gate in the outer wall appeared around a curve. It was, of course, closed. “Ho, the gate,” called Arthur.

  There was a brief delay, and then it opened a bit. The guard who ha
d let them in came through from outside, closing the panel behind him.

  “Open the gate, man,” commanded Arthur in his best sneering voice.

  The guard stared. “What’s Joe doing there?”

  “I have no idea. Nor do I care in the least.” It was a challenge to sound bored when you were vibrating with tension.

  “He ain’t allowed out without one of us goes with him.”

  “And what does this have to do with me?”

  For a moment, as the guard puzzled over the question, Arthur thought they might get through. But then the man frowned. “There’s somethin’ havey-cavey about this.” He started around the curricle toward the cart.

  Señora Alvarez raised her pistol and shot the man through the calf.

  “Ahh!” The guard fell to the ground, gripping the wound and yelling. The dogs went wild, slavering and barking. The señora turned her gun on them but didn’t fire.

  Joe, showing more speed and courage than Arthur had expected, jumped to the ground. The dogs surrounded him in a leaping mass, but they didn’t bite. “Down, Rex, Faron,” the groom cried. “It’s all right.” He pushed the gate open and leapt back to his seat on the wagon. Arthur had already set his curricle moving.

  “You’ll be sorry for this, Joe Crendel,” said the guard as they passed. “We’ll come for you.”

  “On the contrary,” said Arthur over his shoulder. “The law will be here shortly, coming for you.”

  “So you better leg it,” said Joe.

  “Or hobble it,” said Señora Alvarez, showing not the slightest remorse, though her voice shook.

  A laugh burst from Arthur as he made the turn onto the lane outside the walls.

  Joe closed the gate behind them to contain the dogs. Arthur would have left it open for the convenience of the magistrate he meant to summon as soon as possible. But he didn’t want to chance canine pursuit.

  They headed for the main road. Arthur slowed near the copse beyond the wall, and Tom and his group rode out to join them. “These are friends,” Arthur called back to allay Joe’s concern. Though he didn’t really expect anyone to ride after them, he was glad of the escort.