Sampson opened the front door and she saw a carriage waiting in the street. Sampson hustled her into it. Charles followed them. A few moments later the carriage rumbled over the cobblestones, carrying Abigail away from Bath.
Gifford had spent the afternoon riding with Anthony and Malcolm Anderson. In recent years it had been a rare occurrence for him to spend time with his uncle. Both men knew that their relationship would have to undergo changes if Gifford stayed in England, but neither of them were in a hurry to address the subject. Anderson planned to go to Oxfordshire the following day. Perhaps by the time they met again, Gifford would have made a few decisions about his future.
He walked into the drawing room, feeling a pleasant buzz of anticipation. Today Abigail was coming to live in the same house with him. It was true she had a room in Mrs Chesney's quarters, but Gifford was hoping she could be tempted to dine upstairs with them.
Mrs Chesney brought in a tea tray.
'Perhaps Miss Summers would like to join us?' Malcolm Anderson suggested to the landlady, sparing Gifford the trouble.
'She's not here, sir,' said Mrs Chesney apologetically.
'Not here?' Gifford swung round to look at her. 'I thought she moved in today.'
'She did, Captain.' Mrs Chesney set the tray down on a table. 'Nice and snug in my sitting room, she'll be. But she wanted to take one last look at the old house. See everything was set to rights before she handed over the keys.' Then Mrs Chesney frowned, glancing at the clock on the mantelpiece. 'She's been gone longer than I expected. Maybe...'
'I'll go and find her.' Gifford didn't like the thought of Abigail sitting alone in the empty house.
Just as he opened Mrs Chesney's front door he heard screeching from the house opposite.
'Ezra! Ezra!'
Gifford raced across the road and pounded on the door. Almost instantly it flew open, and a maid tumbled out into his arms.
'He's dying!' she sobbed. 'He's dying! He's dying! He's dying!'
'Where?'
'Here!' The hysterical girl grabbed his sleeve and hauled him into the house. 'Quick! Quick!'
Gifford followed her swiftly into the dining room. He immediately saw a man lying huddled on the floor between the dining table and several chairs. Gifford tossed the chairs aside and knelt beside the collapsed man.
He was unconscious, but when Gifford bent over him he discovered the fellow was breathing loudly. He also smelt wine. He shook the man, but it had no effect.
'Quiet!' he ordered the maid. 'Come here, girl!'
She gulped and shuddered, her eyes huge with fear.
'Come here,' Gifford repeated more gently. 'Come.' He held out his hand to her. 'If you're quiet, you can hear he's still breathing,' he told her.
'Ezra?' She sniffed and fell on her knees beside the unconscious man. She leant over him until her ear was almost against his mouth, her hand resting on his chest. 'Ezra? Ezra?" She shook him more roughly than Gifford had done. 'Why won't he wake up?' She lifted her panicky gaze to Gifford's face.
'He's drunk.' Gifford had taken time to look around the room. He'd noticed the wine bottle on the table. There was a half-empty glass on the table. And a broken glass lying beside the fallen man.
Anthony, Malcolm Anderson and Mrs Chesney crowded into the dining room, peering around each other's shoulders to see what was happening.
'Taking advantage!' Mrs Chesney said scathingly. 'What are you doing here, Polly Smith? You've no business—'
'He's not drunk!' the maid interrupted excitedly. 'One glass of wine—and he fell off the chair! He's poisoned. He's poisoned, sir!' She fixed her desperate gaze on Gifford.
'Where's Miss Summers?' he demanded.
'She's not here. Sir...£zra!'
'His pulse is strong,' Gifford said curtly. 'Feel. You see, his heart is beating strongly.'
'Oh, sir.' Tears poured down Polly's blotched cheeks and she clutched Ezra's wrist against her breasts. 'Are you sure he's not poisoned?'
Gifford picked up the largest piece of the broken wine glass and sniffed carefully at the wine dregs. He was impatient for information about Abigail, but he knew the panicky maid would answer his questions more coherently if she was reassured about her young man.
'I think he's drugged,' he said. 'He'll wake with a thick head, I dare say. Now—where is Miss Summers?'
'I don't know. I think she was here. Ezra and me, we was upstairs—but we wasn't noticing much—'
'What did you notice?' Gifford cut across her embarrassed excuses. He could guess what kind of an opportunity the apparently empty house had represented to the couple.
'We was about to come down, but we heard voices. So we went back to the attic,' Polly snuffled. 'Ezra saw a carriage through the window. When it was gone...later...we come down...'
'Which direction was the carriage facing?'
'I don't...I don't know,' Polly stammered. 'Ezra saw it. He didn't t-tell...'
'Mrs Chesney!' Gifford snapped over his shoulder. 'Question the neighbours. I want to know if anyone else saw the carriage. Which way it went. Anything else they noticed about it. Malcolm! Go with her. Did you recognise the voices?' He turned his attention back to Polly.
'N-no. Ezra was ahead of me. He just pushed me back up the stairs.' 'How long ago?'
'I d-don't know.' Polly scrubbed her cuff against her tear-stained cheek. Her anxious attention was divided between Gifford and the unconscious Ezra.
'What did you do when you came down?'
'I showed Ezra all the fine rooms. I wanted to show him the dining room. We saw the wine. No one...no one was here. Ezra said it was a pity to waste it. It weren't stealing, sir.'
'No. You won't be accused of stealing,' Gifford said curtly. 'Stay with your Ezra. If he becomes worse, call me. But I think he'll sleep it off.'
He stood up and walked into the hallway with Anthony.
'Johnson?' Anthony asked sharply.
'Who else? Dammit!' Gifford's hands curled into frustrated fists. 'Pullen said his estate was mortgaged to the hilt. He didn't tell me where it was.'
Gifford strode out of the house, Anthony at his side. Gifford headed straight for the landlady who was talking to someone from a nearby house. Gifford noted in passing that Mrs Chesney and Anderson were talking to different neighbours. He was grimly pleased with their initiative.
'Ma'am, do you know where Johnson's estate is?' he demanded, interrupting her conversation with a startled housemaid.
'No, sir. N-oo.' She thought about it a few moments. 'I'm sorry, sir.' She looked pale and anxious.
'Fetch Pullen,' Gifford barked at Anthony. 'And the lawyer. One of them will know.'
'Sarah here saw the carriage,' said Mrs Chesney.
Gifford questioned her. The housemaid had seen Abigail climb into the carriage, and she knew which direction it had travelled along the street, but she was vague about the time.
'It's him, sir!' Mrs Chesney wrung her hands together, staring up at Gifford in horror. 'Why's he taken her?' Frightened tears started in the landlady's eyes. 'Sir, what'11 we do?'
Gifford gazed straight ahead for a few seconds. A deadly stillness had possessed him from the moment he'd realised Abigail had indeed been taken by Charles Johnson. At his core he was filled with fear for Abigail—and a murderous rage directed at Johnson. But years of fierce discipline locked into place.
He focussed on Mrs Chesney. He'd met several of her male relatives that morning when the younger ones had moved Abigail's pianoforte. Her brother kept a shop only five minutes walk away.
'Go see your brother,' he said curtly. 'Tell him what's happened. Ask him to send his sons to check for sightings of the carriage on every route out of Bath. I want to know for sure which way it's heading.'
'Yes, sir.' She set off at a jog trot, despite the afternoon heat, obviously relieved that she had something constructive to do.
'London?' Malcolm appeared beside Gifford.
'Perhaps.' Gifford's lack of local information frustrated him.
So did his complete ignorance of Charles Johnson's character. To his knowledge he'd never even laid eyes on the man—let alone spoken to him. He couldn't predict with any degree of certainty what Johnson intended to do with Abigail.
'Ransom?' Malcolm suggested, as they walked back towards Mrs Chesney's house. 'You to pay for her safe return? Only a fool would think we'd let him get away with it. But a desperate man with massive debts...'
'Possibly.' Gifford frowned. 'But I've never met him. And Johnson spent so little time in Bath over the past week I doubt he's heard any gossip linking me to Abigail. Nothing to suggest I'd pay a large sum for her return.'
Malcolm's sombre expression briefly lightened. 'Giff, you could receive a demand to rescue a complete stranger and you'd leap into the breach! Anyone who knows anything about you—' He broke off as his nephew scowled. 'By the same token, anyone who knows about you would know you'll never let this go unpunished,' he continued quietly.
Gifford acknowledged Malcolm's words with a brief nod. 'Horses,' he said crisply. 'I want them here, ready saddled. Four at least.'
Gifford only knew for sure that he would take Anthony with him, but one of the local men might prove a useful guide.
Malcolm nodded acknowledgement and hurried back to the livery stable they'd already used once that day.
Gifford stood still for several seconds, assessing the decisions he'd made and the decisions he had yet to make. He tried not to think of Abigail in Johnson's power. She'd stepped into the carriage without assistance. Did that mean that Johnson hadn't drugged her as Ezra had been accidentally drugged? Or had it simply not taken effect yet?
Gifford ruthlessly put aside such speculations. His priority was to find and rescue Abigail. He'd once told her that the life of a ship's captain could be very boring. But it also required the kind of self-discipline which enabled him to stand still in the midst of feverish activity, waiting for absolutely the right moment to commit himself to a course of action.
'Put this on!' Charles threw a dress at Abigail.
She let it fall across her lap, then slide onto the floor in a flurry of white muslin. She stared at him impassively.
'Put it on, damn you!' he snarled.
Abigail folded her hands in her lap. She didn't want him to see how frightened she was.
He'd brought her to an inn not far from Bath. When the carriage had rattled over the cobblestones into the courtyard, she'd assumed he simply intended to change horses. Instead, he'd ordered her out of the coach.
She'd stepped down, her hopes rising that she might have a chance to escape. But Charles had forced his arm through hers and grabbed her hand. Then he'd bent her arm up, and clamped her elbow against his side, compelling her to walk where he chose. Sampson had been an attentive presence on her other side.
She'd briefly had time to notice that it wasn't a regular coaching inn before she'd been forced inside. Lounging male servants had openly leered at her in the courtyard. Inside she'd been assaulted by a miasma of unpleasant odours—some more familiar to her than others. She'd recognised the smell of stale wine and
beer. Lingering tobacco smoke. A nauseating taint of rotten eggs. Other smells she couldn't identify.
She sat on a grimy chair in a tawdry room and stared at Charles. Her fear had coalesced into an unrelenting, paralysing sense of dread. It lay like a stone beneath her ribs, threatening to suffocate her every time she tried to take a breath.
For an instant she almost wished she had drunk the drugged wine. At least she'd have had some relief from this soul-destroying terror.
Images of Raven flickered in and out of her thoughts. Her heart cried out to him. If he was here he would save her.
But he wasn't here.
He had no way of knowing where she was. Or what was happening to her.
A vivid picture of the way she'd first seen him suddenly filled her mind. It was so clear her dingy surroundings briefly faded away. He'd leapt from his bed to confront his nightmares. Naked. Armed only with a knife...
She locked on to the memory. She'd always known, even without asking, that his enemies had not always been phantoms. Once they'd had the flesh-and-blood power to wound him. And she knew he'd confronted them just as boldly when they were real.
She hugged the memory to her. Drew courage from it. If Raven could face his enemies with courage, then so could she.
'Put the dress on!' Charles's voice rose dangerously. He pointed a pistol at her. Abigail didn't know if it
was the same weapon Sampson had held, or whether it was a different one.
'Now?' she whispered.
'Yes, now.'
Another wave of fear surged over Abigail. She'd never undressed in front of a man. She'd never even undressed before a woman since her childhood. She'd never had a maid of her own.
'I'll do it for you.' Charles advanced on her, eagerness blazing in his eyes.
'No!' Abigail sprang to her feet. The sudden movement made her head spin. She blinked back dizziness, then started to unbutton her bodice with stiff, unresponsive fingers.
'Hurry up!' Charles watched her lasciviously.
Abigail's mourning dress was formed in two sections. She turned away from Charles and slowly pushed the bodice off her shoulders and down her arms. Then her movements suddenly became feverish as she realised the quicker she stripped out of her own clothes and put on the new dress the safer she'd feel.
'Take off your corset!'
'What?' Abigail twisted her head to stare at him over her hunched shoulder.
'Take off your corset. And turn round so that I can see.'
Abigail's body shrank with horror at his demand. She turned around and saw that, in his eagerness to look at her, he'd allowed his pistol hand to drop a few inches. It wasn't much, but perhaps she could take advantage of his distraction.
She let the muslin gown fall on to the floor and began to unfasten the front lacing of her corset. She listened to Charles's heavy breathing, disgust coiling through her shaking body, and from the corner of her eye watched the pistol drop a little lower.
'Good.' Charles stepped nearer. With the muzzle of his pistol he circled her nipple through the sheer fabric of her chemise.
Abigail's breath stopped. She was too numb with horror to protest, hypnotised by the dull grey metal which caressed her so obscenely.
Charles felt the weight of her other breast with his free hand.
The loathsome feel of his flesh against hers jolted Abigail out of her appalled trance.
She spun away from him. Stumbling over the clothes on the floor, she fell against the bed, grabbing the bedpost and whirling around it. She clutched it desperately as she stared, panting at Charles.
He laughed.
'If I'd known how much sport you'd offer, I'd have indulged myself years ago!' he exclaimed. 'Of course, that would have queered my chances with the old bitch. And now...' He sighed theatrically. 'Sometimes a man has to put business before pleasure.'
He picked up the white gown and threw it onto the bed.
'Put it on,' he ordered.
Chapter Seven
'I understand that it is something like a revival of Sir Francis Dashwood's Hellfire Club.'
Mr Tidewell's precise voice echoed in Gifford's memory as he brought his horse to a halt at a bend in the road, a hundred yards from the entrance to the Blue Buck Inn. He was accompanied by Anthony and Mrs Chesney's youngest nephew, Ned, a strapping nineteen-year-old.
The Blue Buck was located between Bath and Bristol, but it wasn't on the main thoroughfare. Ned had led them through a complicated route of local roads which would have defeated a stranger to the region. The inn was only a few miles from Bristol, but it stood in an isolated, desolate piece of countryside— although it was doing good business tonight. Gifford could hear a low drone of voices and the occasional burst of laughter coming from the courtyard.
He glanced behind him, checking they were alone on the road. Then he dismounted. His companions followed suit and they all
led their horses into the concealing shadows of a small stand of trees. It was not
much later than nine thirty, but dark clouds obscured the stars.
Gifford briefly recalled the last time he'd been forced to prowl after his enemy through dark and unfamiliar surroundings. He pushed the memory aside. Abigail was his only consideration tonight.
Answers to their enquiries along the route indicated Charles Johnson had indeed brought Abigail in this direction. But had he taken her to the Blue Buck?
Mr Tidewell and Admiral Pullen had both heard whispers about the debauched and even blasphemous activities that took place in the disreputable inn, but neither of them knew its exact location. Ned had never been inside the Blue Buck, but he ran regular errands into Bristol for his father. He knew where the inn was located. And he'd heard rumours about it on the streets of Bristol that hadn't reached the older generation in Bath.
'It used to be a common flash-house,' said Ned in a low voice. 'Landlord bought stolen goods—so I heard. Never caught, though. But everyone knew 'twas full of thieves and whores. Now it's a fancy gentlemen's club. Strange kind of gentlemen, to my mind. Rubbing shoulders with such vermin.'
'Yes,' said Gifford grimly. The things some gentlemen would do for entertainment had stopped surprising him years ago. 'Do you know its layout?'
'No, sir.'
'Very well. Stay with the horses,' Gifford commanded, and gestured to Anthony.
It was years since Gifford had pitted his wits against his father's gamekeeper, and Anthony's field craft had
always been better than his. He was happy to follow his cousin's lead as they circled silently through the shadowy fields that surrounded the inn.
'Only clear way in and out is through the courtyard,' said Anthony at last. 'We could take to the fields if we have to—but with Miss Summers along it's not a good option. Better to carry it off with a high hand. Judging by the specimens we've seen entering, you should fit in. A likely recruit for the Devil if ever I saw one.'
Gifford grinned wolfishly. 'And you're a damn Obeah man who can kill with a curse,' he retorted. 'Lot of connections to the trade in Bristol. They'll know how scared the planters are of slave superstitions.'
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