by The Charmer
Rose was able to follow the band of thugs easily enough, for they obviously saw no reason to fear being trailed. After all, they’d captured the men. No reason to worry about repercussions from a house of women.
The ruffians had tossed their prizes into a waiting cart and had set off at an unhurried pace. Rose followed them at a distance, keeping well to the shadows of the early-morning streets, using her shawl for cover. There wasn’t much chance of them spying her through the mist of rain, anyway.
Still, the last thing she wanted was to call attention to herself while wearing a borrowed prostitute’s gown. Fear for herself felt almost wrong, however, especially when she saw the cart pulling into a heavy iron gate placed in a high, intimidating wall.
The sign above the gate, picked out in black iron against a gray sky, said: WADSWORTH & SON, MUNITIONS.
Oh, no.
As the gates creaked to a close, meeting in a heavy crash of metal, Rose turned and ran. Help was only a few miles away.
Finally, the edifice of the Liar’s Club loomed gray and lightless in the dim rain-swept morning. Rose pelted past the front door without truly recognizing the fact that Stubbs was not on duty there. Collis’s position was growing more dangerous by the moment.
To the right of the main door was the short stair from the street down to the service entrance. There were eight steps. Her feet touched only two.
She pushed through the door so fast it impacted the wall behind her. The storerooms were dark and unheated, but then, they always were. Rose took the steps up to the kitchen at a run to burst hurriedly into the kitchen.
Into pitch-darkness. The kitchen was always occupied. Even when Kurt was out or on a mission, Liars were forever scrounging in the larder. Rose had never seen it fully dark, and never, never was it cold. The great stove seemed to burn eternally. “Kurt?” There was no answer.
She groped her way to where the stove was and felt in the darkness for the small wooden box kept there. The new friction matches were much prized and the Liars were urged to keep them for use only on missions, but Kurt lived a law of his own. He always kept a good supply on hand, and some of the Liars were known to barter theirs for an extra serving of Kurt’s superb pastries.
Rose spared not a moment for her usual wonder as she swiftly lit a twist of paper she pulled from where it waited for the giant stove. The weak yellow light flickered to show a room abandoned in the middle of cooking. Vegetables lay wilted on the table. An opened sack of potatoes had emptied itself across the floor. Kurt’s favorite cooking knife lay stained and bloodied next to a graying slab of beef.
It didn’t look as though there had been any sort of attack. It more seemed as if Kurt had simply dropped everything to walk out of the club—for days. And if Kurt was gone—
Icy fear lanced through her. She fumbled for a nearby candle and lit it quickly. With one hand shielding the flame from the draft, she ran back into the common room of the true club.
Deserted, as were the map room and the code room and his lordship’s secret office, which she wasn’t even supposed to know about.
They were all gone and had been so for at least a full day, perhaps longer. What disaster could have pulled them all from the club? What level of emergency? Only invasion by the French themselves came to mind, or some sort of royal crisis—
“Oh, God. George.”
Of course they’d depart in a panic! George must have seemed to disappear in a puff of smoke! Hadn’t they received word yet from Lord Liverpool? “Oh, Collis, we’ve done it now.”
She made for the tunnel to the Lillian Raines School, cringing at the necessity of going underground again. There was no one in the school, either. Everyone must be hunting the city like mad. Rose pressed her fingers to her temples. “Hunting the nation, no doubt. Oh, God, what am I going to do?”
Her own shivering chill finally registered. Quickly she rummaged for a set of her training kit, an old pair of boy’s knee breeches and shirt. She found a pair of boots that would protect her better than Mrs. Blythe’s satin slippers and grabbed a waistcoat and short jacket from another student’s room. She shoved her hair under a borrowed cap and ran back to the main club.
Her first duty was to leave a message for the spymaster that the Prince and Collis had been taken by Louis Wadsworth. Her next duty was to go back to them. But alone? She’d be no more help than she had been before. To go back alone would only ensure that all three of them would be killed.
Rose banged on the door of Etheridge House until her fist throbbed, but it still took several minutes before someone opened the door. Denny stood blocking her way in, gazing at her sourly.
“Oh, it’s you.”
Rose didn’t have time to play. “Denny, let me in. I need to see his lordship!”
Denny sneered. “Gone. Him and Sir Simon and even the Sergeant. All gone, leavin’ me to answer the door like a bloody underfootman. I hope you’re happy about what you done. They’re all in a right tizzy about you kidnapping the Prince Regent.”
“Denny, stop it. Tell me where they are. It’s urgent!”
Denny folded his arms. “Tell you what. Give me your message and I’ll see he gets it.”
Message. Rose went still as she remembered. “Collis sent the message to you about where we were, didn’t he? Why didn’t you give it to Liverpool?”
That surprised him completely, she was sure of it. “Why would I? It didn’t say nothin’ about Liverpool. Just that you and him and Prinny was to be found at that brothel house.”
Rose narrowed her eyes. “It didn’t say anything like that. Collis would never be that explicit.”
Denny gave her a superior smile. “I been around Liars since you was cleaning chamber pots, Miss Lacey. I knew right off that when Master Collis said he was with his uncle George, he was with Prinny. Master Collis ain’t got an uncle George.”
There was something else here. Rose knew it. Collis had sent that message yesterday evening. The spymaster and Liverpool should have arrived within a few hours at the most. “Collis sent you a message to take to Lord Liverpool. What happened to it?”
Denny looked genuinely confused. “I don’t know. Cor, I could have done it, too. They know me around Westminster, they do!” Disappointment twisted his features. “You probably lost it.”
“I never saw it, you idiot. Collis gave both messages to that boy he paid.” The child might have dropped one. He wouldn’t likely admit it when he reached his destination, would he? Of course, he probably couldn’t read. The sort of children who ran the streets didn’t come with educations.
Damn it, time was running out! “So his lordship has gone to Mrs. Blythe’s?”
“Been and gone. They’re all out in the city now, trying to track you lot. How’d you do it anyway?” Denny asked curiously. “How’d you go and disappear that way?”
She couldn’t ask him to come with her. Rose wouldn’t trust Denny with a dirty tea towel. “Spy secrets, of course. Listen, if you see his lordship, tell him I left a very important message for him at the club.”
“I ain’t your servant!”
Rose had had enough. She stepped forward and shoved the blighter once in the chest. “Denny, Kurt taught me everything he knows. Do you truly want to plague me off?”
Denny’s eyes widened and he pulled back in alarm. “Right then. Tell him I will.” Then he shut the door on her, leaving her standing outside.
On her own. Again.
Rose left Etheridge House and headed back toward the factory. Where to find help? She could fight her way back through the city to Sir Simon’s house—but they’d have joined the hunt along with every able-bodied servant they had.
There was no time left to risk it. She must find help closer at hand. She closed her eyes and fought back her weariness long enough to think.
One name came to her. Someone Collis believed in completely. “I’ve known Ethan Damont since school. I’m sure he is to be trusted.”
Ethan Damont, gambler and likely ne’e
r-dowell—her only hope. Dear God, would he be any better than Denny? Scowling through her dread, Rose ran from the fine square that held Etheridge House to run toward the only help she could think of. The rain had stopped. She could see the clouds lightening—moving west, driven by a fresh wind from the sea.
Ethan Damont, the “Diamond.” Only dire panic would spur her to go to such lengths. That and the knowledge that Collis would do the same or more for her.
“Collis,” she muttered to him across the miles, “I hope you’re a better judge of friends than you are of valets.”
Ethan Damont poured himself another brandy…almost. Only an unfortunate trickle flowed into his snifter to swirl sadly round the bottom. He threw back his head to call, “Jeeves, bring more brandy!”
The shout brought no response, of course. There was no such Jeeves. No valet, no butler, not even a charwoman. Such people would insist on being paid a fair wage or any wage at all, neither of which the Damont household could supply at the moment.
And no more brandy, either, unless he’d somehow overlooked a dusty bottle in a corner of the cellar. Unlikely, since he’d scrounged everything that was left to eat, drink, or sell. Lady Luck had spurned him a few too many times lately. His fortunes at the tables had been dismal.
Fickle bitch.
Ethan glanced upward. “I didn’t mean that. So sorry. You’re a beauty, a vision, a veritable goddess. I could go on for hours, if only you would knock on my door once more.”
Knock, knock. There was no knocker on the door (good brass castings were worth nearly a week of grub, after all) so only the insubstantial tap of knuckles echoed through his empty rooms.
“Company,” Ethan muttered to no one. He didn’t feel much like answering. Likely it was only a creditor come to claim the last of Ethan’s possessions. And he didn’t much feel like giving up his shoes. Good thing he’d drunk all the brandy after all. He tossed back the last dribble, just in case. While his head was still tipped back, he smiled wistfully up at his neglectful lady.
“My princess, if only that was you at my door. Why don’t you come calling anymore, darling? What did I do to offend you?”
Truth be told, he knew why. He’d lost the passion. One day he’d woken up without feeling the thrill of the chase, the hunger for the game. Cards were just pasteboard and ink. Green felt suddenly seemed bilious rather than filled with emerald promise.
The knock came again, along with a high querying voice. A female voice, calling him by name. Ethan blinked in surprise. “Is it you, my love?” Well then, he had best answer after all. He could think of no women to whom he owed anything, unless it was some old lover seeking either renewal or vengeance. Either way, it was a change from the bare walls and empty decanter.
He stood, wavered a moment, then shuffled to the front hall. It was a fine hall, guarded by an even finer door. He wondered idly if it was worth anything. The latch was beyond him for a moment, but he mastered it at last. Bloody good brandy. Too bad it was gone.
Ethan opened the door and flinched from the bright light of day. “Morning already?”
Something shoved him backward as it pushed by him. “It is afternoon, Mr. Damont. Well past tea. You missed the rain entirely.”
“Oh…tea.” Abruptly, fierce longing seized Ethan. Tea and cakes, fresh from baking. “I like the ones with the little seeds.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake. You’re drunk.”
“Not willingly,” Ethan protested, still blinking to clear the jangling glare from his vision. “Couldn’t let the bastards get the brandy, you know.”
“No, I don’t know and I don’t care.” The door closed, shutting out the day with a crisp bang. Ethan sighed in gratitude. After a moment the after-glare receded and he found himself confronted with a very angry person in mismatched clothing. Angry or scared. Possibly both.
A woman—he was nearly positive she was female—in need of help, if he was not mistaken. He’d been a gentleman once, of sorts. Ethan reached deep to find if any shred of chivalry remained. Oh, there it was.
“Please, come in,” he said gallantly.
“I am in.” She folded her arms and glared at him.
She was pretty, if you liked them dark and pale. And thin. And rather scary.
Ethan found himself standing straighter, pulling himself together as if in answer to some unspoken challenge. He swallowed and hoped his breath wasn’t too brandied.
“How may I be of service, dear lady?”
She tugged her cap free of her hair, letting it fall halfway down her back. “I’m not a lady.”
Chapter Twenty-two
There was something about the cliché of being manacled in a dungeon beneath a castle that really annoyed Collis. Of course, it wasn’t really a dungeon. More of a storage cellar, with a number of crates piled high along one wall, stacked so high they required brackets and chains to keep them from tumbling down.
Nor was it truly a castle, merely an overdecorated arms factory not far from the East India docks.
But the manacles were real enough, cast of cold iron and uncomfortably tight on his right wrist and his left as well, theoretically. He was hanging at arm’s length from one of the brackets jutting from this wall. The Prince hung from another such bracket about six feet away, looking rather like a bloodied side of beef in a tattered and stained nightshirt. The Prince wasn’t moving.
Collis peered at him again, trying desperately to note any sign of life through his own battered and swollen eyes. If he looked anything like George did, two black eyes were the least of his worries. George had been beaten beyond recognition. His face was bruised and bloodied, and Collis had been watching blood drip slowly from George’s hair for the last hour. Head wounds could kill, or render the victim mentally damaged forever. Collis was very worried.
And Rose was not here. He knew he ought to be more worried about his monarch than his partner, but it was all he could do to contain the breathtaking fear he felt inside at thoughts of Rose’s fate. The men who had taken them had been foul brutes, low hired scum who might have taken Rose for themselves as a sort of fringe benefit.
Ironic that he hoped mightily that she was being held prisoner by Louis Wadsworth instead, as he was. The fact that she was being held elsewhere might even mean that she was being treated better than they, perhaps even like a guest—
It was a fruitless fantasy, but he couldn’t bear to think otherwise or he wouldn’t be able to think at all.
While he waited for George to wake—perhaps yet another fantasy—he tested his manacles with all his strength, stopping only when he saw the blood begin to drip down his left arm from his own abraded wrist. It was difficult to care about injuring that piece of dead wood, but slicing a vein and bleeding to death would do none of them any good.
A chain clanked, not one of his. Turning his head, he saw George rolling his head and blinking his eyes. “Sir!” he didn’t dare address him properly, for it was still possible that their captor knew not who he held. “Sir, are you well?”
George cleared his throat and tested his swollen, broken lips with the tip of his tongue. “That ith a thtupid quethtion. Of courthe I’m not well.” He shook his head and blinked rapidly. “I lotht a bloody tooth!”
Overcome with relief, Collis laughed aloud. George looked at him sourly. “Not amuthing. At my age, every tooth counth!”
“No, sir, it isn’t amusing. But it is very good to hear that they didn’t knock your brains from your skull, sir.”
“Humph. Bloody well feelth like it.” His speech was becoming clearer by the moment. And more recognizable.
“Sir, it might be wise if you try not to sound like yourself. I don’t think Wadsworth—” He had to be careful. There was no way to know if they were being overheard.
“You don’t think he knowth that you hired me to help you steal his planth?”
Collis snorted. “Exactly.” Good old George, sharp as ever. Thank every god ever named. He’d even altered his voice, turning his refine
d fruity tones into something nasal and high.
“Where’s our—ah—other friend?”
Collis ground his jaw. “I don’t know.”
“Are you sure that friend was taken?”
Collis closed his eyes, the image of an overwhelmed Rose going down fighting burned onto his inner vision forever. “Yes.”
“Ah.” The Prince fell silent. There was no need to say more. They both knew the fate that could befall a woman in unfriendly hands.
It seemed Collis had not been too far off to think them overheard, for shortly they heard the sound of a key in the lock of the great double doors. Someone had been waiting for them to awake, it seemed.
The doors slid sideways along rails to stand alongside the walls. Collis flinched against the sudden brightness, the light shooting through his pounding head like a lance. He blinked rapidly, trying to clear his vision as if seeing what was coming would help him fend it off.
It might have been late afternoon, for the sunlight slanting along the hallway outside had that peculiar golden tint that indicated sunset neared. Through the shimmering bars of floating dust motes stepped a figure all in black—Louis Wadsworth, clad like a highwayman in head-to-toe ebony silk.
“Oh, dear. Did I look that ridiculous?” George whispered.
Very nearly, Collis wanted to say, but the man was a prince, after all. “Shh, sir.”
Louis strutted toward them, his hand at his hip as if he fancied himself toting a sword as well. Collis would have rolled his eyes if they hadn’t been nearly swollen shut. Then he remembered his missing Rose and became serious indeed.
The factory was well guarded, but Rose thought not impenetrable. She could just see over the wall from her stance atop Damont’s shoulders. The main building was somewhat unnecessarily decorated in a rather medieval fashion, giving the entire establishment a castlelike appearance. This was reinforced by the many smaller brick structures that scattered at its feet like a small, grim village. The wall surrounded it all, enclosing a cobbled yard in the center.