The Spirit Is Willing (The Lady Hardcastle Mysteries Book 2)

by T E Kinsey

  ‘Hmm,’ said Lady Hardcastle again. ‘Flo? How do you feel about the idea of going in alone? I don’t think we should both be there and I think you’re more useful in close-quarter scuffles if things cut up rough.’

  ‘Sounds fine to me, my lady,’ I said. ‘You’ll cover from a discreet distance?’

  ‘That was what I had in mind, yes. I take it you came out in a police motorcar, Inspector?’

  ‘I did, my lady,’ he said.

  ‘Good. You take Flo and I’ll follow in the Rover. I just need to change into something more practical and we can be off. Be a good girl and help me, would you, pet?’

  ‘Of course, my lady,’ I said, and followed her upstairs.

  The journey into the city with Inspector Sunderland made Lady Hardcastle’s driving look like a nervous maiden aunt taking a Sunday School class on an outing to the seaside. The police motorcar was more powerful than our own and he drove with an urgent aggression that had me clutching at the dashboard and door handle for support.

  ‘Are we in a rush?’ I asked, innocently, as we overtook a coal-man’s cart on a bend and nearly collided with a motorcar coming in the opposite direction.

  ‘Not especially,’ he said, swerving violently to avoid a bicycle. ‘Why?’

  ‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘Just as long as Lady Hardcastle can keep up.’

  ‘She’s holding her own,’ he said, looking in his rearview mirror. ‘She’s quite the driver.’

  ‘Hmm,’ I said, and decided not to pursue the matter further.

  We had discussed our general plan for the meeting before we left. Inspector Sunderland was already dressed in a much shabbier suit than usual and I had agreed that I should be much less conspicuous if I, too, were to dress down a little for the occasion. The Inspector revealed that he assumed the role of a petty criminal and all-round scoundrel known in the pubs to the south of the city as “Eddie” so I decided that I should be Eddie’s latest romantic conquest, Sally.

  ‘Why Sally?’ he had asked.

  ‘Because,’ I said in my best home town accent, ‘“Sally from the Valleys” sounds funny, isn’t it. I likes the sound of it, I does.’

  ‘Very well,’ he said with a chuckle. ‘Sally from the Valleys it is. What tempted you over the border? I thought you Welsh girls never left home.’

  ‘Better job opportunities,’ I said, and adjusted the bodice of my dress.

  He had laughed again, a genuinely joyful laugh that quite undercut the tension of the moment.

  To better maintain our cover, we had parked the motorcar a few streets away from the agreed meeting place and had completed our journey on foot, arm-in-arm and staggering a little. Just another tipsy couple on a night out.

  The smoke-filled pub was in a back street south of the river, not too far from the docks. We attracted little obvious attention as we walked in, but I noticed several pairs of suspicious eyes discreetly turning our way as the inspector looked around for his nark.

  He eventually spotted him at a table in the corner, playing dominoes with an old man. He saw us as we approached and said, ‘Go on now, Bernie, sling your hook, I’ve got a bit of business to attend to.’

  The old man stroked his prodigious grey beard but made no effort to leave.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said the nark, ‘I won’t look at your hand. Eddie here will look after your dominoes for you, won’t you, Eddie?’

  ‘Ar,’ said the inspector with a nod.

  ‘Can’t say fairer than that, can you?’ said the nark, and the old man reluctantly withdrew, taking his glass of rum with him.

  ‘Take a seat, Eddie,’ said the nark. ‘And your lady friend, too. I don’t think as I’ve had the pleasure.’

  ‘This is Sally,’ said the inspector. ‘Sally, this is Jesse Weaver.’

  ‘But my friends calls me Weasel.’ He said, holding out his hand.

  ‘Charmed, I’m sure,’ I said.

  With his pointed features and his shifty manner, it wasn’t difficult to see where the nickname had come from.

  ‘What are you drinking?’ said the inspector.

  ‘Pint of cider for me, Ed,’ said Weasel.

  ‘I’ll have a brandy, love,’ I said.

  ‘Brandy, eh?’ said Weasel with a leer. ‘Classy bit you’ve got there, Eddie boy.’

  The inspector said nothing and went to the bar.

  Weasel leaned across the table. ‘I thought I made it clear that you was both to come,’ he said in a low, angry voice. ‘Where’s ’er ladyship?’

  ‘She couldn’t make it,’ I said, equally aggressively. ‘She’s out for the evening.’

  He tutted and sat back in his chair.

  We said nothing further to each other until the inspector returned with our drinks.

  ‘Getting to know each other?’ he said with a frown as he set down the glasses.

  ‘Getting along famously, we are, aren’t we my lover?’ said Weasel.

  I raised an eyebrow.

  The inspector sat and put a few shillings on the table, as though it were his change from the bar. He toyed with the coins as he spoke.

  ‘What have you got for me, Weasel?’ he asked, calmly.

  ‘You in a rush?’ said the nark.

  ‘People keep asking me that,’ said the inspector. ‘I suppose I must be. I don’t like kidnappings. What do you know?’

  Weasel sat for a second, composing his reply. ‘I don’t know nothin’ about the kidnappin’,’ he said. ‘Not directly, at any rate. But I hears things, you know?’

  ‘What sort of things, Weasel,’ said the inspector, toying more obviously with the coins.

  Weasel’s eyes were drawn irresistibly to the money on the table and he seemed to make up his mind. ‘You gots to promise me word will never get out about who told you,’ he said.

  ‘My word,’ said the inspector. ‘What have you heard?’

  ‘Talk is as how there’s been a foreign bloke hiring muscle.’

  ‘Is that it?’ said the inspector, sweeping up the coins and moving to put them back in his pocket.

  ‘Foreign bloke. Blond hair. Nasty lookin’, they says. I’ve heard he’s put the wind up a few lads, and they’s not easily frightened, mind.’

  The inspector and I exchanged a look.

  ‘You knows him?’ said Weasel.

  ‘We might,’ said the inspector. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘I don’t know, I swears. All I knows is he’s been recruiting toughs and he’s holed up somewhere in the city.’

  ‘How do you know that?’ I asked.

  ‘Stands to reason, don’t it,’ he said. ‘He’s rounding up out of work dockers and factory men. They gots homes and families to get back to, annum. Must be nearby.’

  ‘“Annum”?’ I said, before I could stop myself.

  The inspector chuckled. ‘“Haven’t them”,’ he said. ‘“Have they not” in common parlance.’

  ‘Ohhhh,’ I said, feeling rather foolish. ‘Sorry.’

  Weasel just looked baffled. ‘’S what I said, innit?’

  ‘You did, Weasel,’ said the inspector. ‘You did. What else do you know?’

  ‘’Bout this? Nothin’. That’s all I knows.’

  ‘It’s not much for four bob, Weasel. How about we call it two and I’ll give you the other two when you come up with the blond chap’s hideout?’

  The inspector stood, and I followed.

  ‘Going so soon?’ said Weasel, a slight note of nervousness in his voice.

  ‘What’s the matter, Weasel,’ said the inspector. ‘Will they not be ready for us yet?’

  ‘I don’t know what you means,’ said Weasel, indignantly.

  ‘Of course not,’ said the inspector. ‘You and your dominoes partner can have our drinks. Goodnight.’

  We walked swiftly to the door and out into the fresh night air.

  As we walked down the street and back in the direction of the parked motorcar, I heard footsteps behind us, at least two pairs. I tapped the inspector’s arm and he no
dded. I began to turn to face the men who were clearly following us, but before I could properly ready myself, they pounced.

  I saw the flash of a blade in the streetlight as one of the men plunged it into the inspector’s back. I felt the tip of another knife in my own back as a large, gloved hand covered my nose and mouth with a damp rag.

  I struggled for breath and then realised my mistake as I began to feel woozy. Chloroform.

  The last thing I heard as I lost consciousness was another pair of running footsteps.

  ‘Got ’em?’ said Weasel, out of breath from his clearly unaccustomed haste. ‘Where’s my money?’

  ‘You were told to get both of the women,’ said a cold, vaguely familiar, German voice. ‘You failed me, Mr Weasel. You get nothing.’

  I heard the thud as a boot kicked the body on the floor in frustration, then nothing more.

  The effects of the drug were short-lived, but by the time I came to I was already bound and hooded, and lying on what felt like sacking in the back of a delivery lorry of some sort. After a jolting, jostling, but mercifully short journey, the lorry stopped and I was manhandled out of the back by two pairs of strong hands. They carried me into a building which somehow gave the echoey impression of being deserted, up two flights of stairs and then dropped me none too carefully onto bare, dusty floorboards. One of them pulled the bag from my head, slightly catching my hair and making me wonder for the first time what had happened to my hat. I winced slightly which earned me a gruff laugh from one of my abductors and a kick in the ribs from the other. I swore colourfully and they both laughed again. They both left the room and I heard the key turn in the lock as they closed the door.

  The room was almost pitch dark with just a chink of light from the street lamp outside shining dimly through the gap in the window shutter. I wriggled a little, trying to get a little more comfortable and to give myself a better view of the room.

  ‘Just lie still for a moment, dear,’ said a woman’s voice. ‘When we can be certain that Tweedledum and Tweedledee are back in their lair with their beer and cheese, we’ll see about getting you untied.’

  Startled to find that I was not alone, I tried to turn towards the sound of her voice.

  ‘Really, dear, you’ll just ruin your dress,’ she said. ‘We’ll sort you out in a jiffy, really we shall.’

  ‘Who on earth are you?’ I asked, still wriggling slightly but reluctantly coming to the conclusion that she was right – I really was achieving very little.

  ‘I’m so sorry, dear, how frightfully remiss of me. I’m Georgie Bickle, how do you do?’

  ‘How do you do?’ I said, automatically. ‘I’m…’ I wriggled a little more before finally giving up, ‘…Florence Armstrong. Are you all right? Have they treated you well? Everyone has been so very worried about you.’

  ‘Florence Armstrong… Armstrong…’ she said, ignoring my concern. ‘Of the Northumberland Armstrongs?’

  I laughed. ‘No, my lady, the Aberdare Armstrongs. I’m Lady Hardcastle’s maid.’

  ‘Are you? Are you indeed. Why do I know that name?’

  ‘Perhaps you read about her in the newspaper?’ I suggested. ‘She helped the police with a few murder enquiries last year.’

  ‘My goodness, so she did,’ said Lady Bickle. ‘And then she went and got herself shot. I do remember now. Well I never. And what are you doing here?’

  ‘Wriggling for the most part, my lady,’ I said.

  ‘My dear, I’m so sorry. We were going to get you out of all that nasty rope, weren’t we.’

  I heard, and felt, footsteps on the floorboards and then the rustle of skirts as she knelt down and started to investigate the cords around my wrists and ankles.

  ‘Soon have you out,’ she said gamely. ‘Whatever one might say for our captors, it certainly wouldn’t be that they’re master knotsmiths.’

  True to her word, she released me within a few moments and I was able to sit up and lean against the wall.

  ‘But really, dear,’ she said as I rubbed life back into my wrists, ‘what are you doing here?’

  ‘Looking for you, my lady,’ I said.

  It was her turn to laugh. ‘For me?’ she said. ‘Well, you do seem to have done rather an excellent job. Here I am.’

  ‘A cracking job,’ I said, looking around the bare room as my eyes became accustomed to the gloom. ‘But if I’m honest, not quite what any of us had in mind.’

  She laughed again.

  ‘Who’s “we”?’ she said.

  ‘Well, there’s me, my mistress, an inspector from the Bristol police… and that’s about it. Oh.’

  ‘What is it, dear?’

  ‘The inspector. I fear he might be dead.’

  She made no reply.

  ‘He was stabbed in the scuffle when they took me.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘how frightfully dispiriting. I had expected teams of searchers, packs of hounds, my husband bearing a sabre and leading a group of men from the village, each of them armed with a pitchfork and sworn to avenge my loss. Instead, I get – no offence, dear – a trussed-up lady’s maid and news of a poor man stabbed and left in the gutter. Ben really is a useless article.’

  ‘The newspapers said he was distraught,’ I said, consolingly.

  ‘Distraught, but hopeless, dear. Quite hopeless. Couldn’t arrange a booze-up in a brewery, that man; I’ve no idea at all how he manages to run the tram company. Ah well, can’t be helped. We’ll have to sort things out for ourselves.’

  ‘I must say,’ I said, ‘You do seem remarkably chipper for a woman who has been kidnapped at gunpoint and held in a dingy room for a couple of days.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve stayed in worse places,’ she said.

  ‘And were you taken there at gunpoint?’ I asked.

  ‘Well…’ she said, slowly. ‘There was this one time…’

  I laughed. ‘Have you any idea where we are?’ I said.

  ‘Somewhere in the middle of town,’ she replied, ‘to judge from the sounds from outside. But exactly where, I couldn’t say.’

  ‘That’s encouraging,’ I said. ‘If they meant to do away with us, it would be easier to do it out in the middle of nowhere. Have you tried to get out?’

  ‘One solid door, locked,’ she said. ‘Windows shuttered and locked, too. I tried shouting for help but it earned me this…’ she leaned forwards and showed me a split and bloodied lip, ‘…so I’ve been wary of trying it again.’

  ‘Probably wise,’ I said. ‘Have you been left alone otherwise?’

  ‘They bring me bread and water, they empty the gazunder…’ she indicated a bucket in the corner of the room, ‘…but, yes, otherwise they leave me to my own devices. It’s not like I’m going anywhere.’

  ‘We’ll see about that,’ I said, and stood up.

  The room looked to have been a bedroom in its day. There was a dilapidated fireplace on one wall with the locked door on another opposite the shuttered windows. The fourth wall was featureless apart from the peeling floral wallpaper which also covered the others. It was difficult to make out in the gloom, but I decided it was cream with tiny pink flowers. I ignored the door but instead directed my attention to the window.

  ‘They’re padlocked shut,’ said Lady Bickle. ‘I’ve had a damn good try at them, but they won’t budge. I thought I’d have more luck with the door, but it turns out that I don’t know how to pick locks. Would you credit it? A woman of my age.’

  ‘I can pick locks,’ I said distractedly as I examined the shutters. ‘But this one’s too small and I don’t think picking the one on the door would help us much. We don’t know what’s on the other side apart from stairs and large men with guns. We can negotiate stairs and I’d have no trouble with the large men, but their guns bother me a little. A frightened man with a gun isn’t the most predictable of beasts and someone is liable to get shot. I’d rather it wasn’t one of us.’

  ‘Crikey,’ she said. ‘You’re a bit of a one, aren’t you. Not sure I’d like to mee
t you in a dark alley.’

  ‘I’m a pussycat, really,’ I said as I located the screws holding the hasp in place. ‘Now, the thing about padlock hasps is that they’re designed so that you can’t get to the screws once they’re locked.’ I fiddled a little more. ‘And that’s all well and good until someone locks them with a scrawny little padlock like this one.’ I indicated the lock. ‘You see, now there’s a little play in it and we can get behind the hasp to the screws.’

  ‘And what good does that do us?’ she said, glumly. ‘Surely you haven’t got a screwdriver concealed upon your person. And even if you have, how would you unscrew a screw that you can only just see?’

  ‘Aha,’ I said, unbuttoning the top of my dress. ‘But that’s where you’d be wrong. Well, you’d be right, actually, but you’d have forgotten something. Have you ever dismantled a corset?’

  ‘Can’t say I have, no,’ she said, beginning to sound a little intrigued.

  I fiddled with the seam at the bottom of my own corset, worrying the thread loose and eventually opening a tiny hole. With a magician’s flourish, I slid one of the spring-steel bones free.

  ‘This,’ I said triumphantly, brandishing the sliver of steel, ‘is what’s inside. Strong, flexible implements of torture that would make Torquemada blanch, but which are always handy in a crisis.’

  ‘I say, brava!’ she said. ‘What a handy person you are to have around. Do you think it will work?’

  ‘We’ll soon see,’ I said, and set about trying to remove the lock.

  It took bloomin’ ages. Unscrewing the hasp of a lock with the bone from a corset had seemed like a terribly clever thing to do – and if I do say so myself, there really was a touch of genius in it – but it took so very, very long. The sun was coming up by the time I had finally yanked the hasp from the shutters and tentatively pulled them open.

  Lady Bickle had dozed off while I worked. She had protested that she wanted to help, but I had suggested that napping would be more practical – she would need all her strength for what was to come. She awoke as the light streamed into the room and sat looking blearily up at me. She was younger than I had anticipated – late-20s, I judged – and quite a bit prettier than one might expect the wife of a tram company owner to be.