Saving Sarah

by Gail Ranstrom

  There was one advantage of having only brothers, Sarah thought as she lifted the sash of her bedroom window. They provided an endless supply of outgrown lad’s clothing and never suspected their little sister of any form of deviousness. To them, she was simply a sweet but inconsequential inhabitant of the same house. Only Reginald, her oldest brother and guardian, considered her as more.

  Since her father’s death last year, Reginald had been plotting how he might marry her off to advantage. She knew he had affection for her, but he rarely thought of her as having preferences.

  Reginald had begun, very gently, to urge her to be more flirtatious. More receptive to interest. Less particular in her choice. Sooner or later, he would have to know why she could not marry. But not yet.

  She sat on the windowsill and swung her trousered legs out, scooted along the tile slope to the eaves, then edged along to a trellis by the kitchen door. Wedging her boot toe into one opening of the latticework after another, she gained the stone path that led around the house to the street. She entered the lane and hurried toward the Thames, blessing the fog that hid her from close scrutiny.

  Sarah was not a fool. She knew, too well, the vulnerabilities of being born female and that when she was dressed as a woman, she drew attention—dangerous attention. But when she secretly dressed as a lad and prowled the lanes and alleys to conduct investigations, she lost all her fears, all her inhibitions. No one noticed a lad. On the streets she was without note, free of the rules, restrictions and vulnerabilities of being female.

  Blackfriars was her destination, and a tavern within sight of Saint Paul’s Cathedral. The Wednesday League’s chief investigator, Mr. Renquist, would be waiting at his usual table. She had sent him a note last week, detailing all the pertinent facts. By now he would have set his investigation in motion and would already have something to report. Mr. Renquist was extremely efficient.

  Feeling especially bold tonight, she tagged a ride from a passing coach by catching hold of the luggage straps and swinging herself up to sit on the empty rear rack. Her weight was so slight that the driver did not feel the sag of coach springs that would betray an unpaid customer.

  Just past St. Paul’s, she alighted and darted down White Lion Hill toward the river and the King’s Head Tavern. She ducked her head, pulled her soft cap down about her ears and walked through the door, heading directly to a table in the dimly lit back of the large public room.

  Francis Renquist, a short, powerfully built man about Reginald’s age, gave her a discreet wave and nodded to a chair opposite him at the table. Had there been trouble, he’d have waved her off and she would have disappeared into the street again. Tonight, however, all was well.

  She slid into the chair and wrapped her hand around a waiting pint of ale. Lord, she thought, I must be some mistake of birth. Truly, I was meant for the low life.

  As if to contradict her thought, Mr. Renquist bobbed his head deferentially. “Evening, Lady Sarah.”

  “Good evening, Mr. Renquist. What have you got for me?”

  “Not much. I set Sticky Joe and Dicken on it,” he said, referring to two of the young street lads he employed on occasion. They lived in the lanes and alleys of the walled city and could appear and disappear at will. “They are looking into boarding schools and workhouses. Mayhap the little ones have been put in orphanages. Dicken should have something soon.”

  Sarah sighed. “Very soon, I should hope. There is no time to waste.”

  She had memorized the list, and now she felt as if she knew the Whitlock children. Araminta, the eldest at ten years of age. Theodore, second born and six years old last week. And Benjamin, the baby at age five. Their welfare was her chief concern now. She had to find them quickly. Their lives, and their mother’s life, depended upon it.

  Mr. Renquist recognized her impatience. “I’ll have Dicken meet you at the steps of St. Paul’s tomorrow at midnight. He’s sure to have news by then.”

  She nodded. “Thank you. I fear patience has never been one of my virtues,” she admitted, still keeping her voice low. “But with so much hanging in the balance, ’tis difficult to say ‘anon, anon.’”

  “We are not saying ‘anon,’ Lady Sarah. We are strategizing. We are planning and putting affairs in order.”

  “Are we, indeed?” She smiled at his attempt at encouragement. “Whose affairs?”

  Renquist grinned. “Within the month, a certain ship is leaving for Java. The first mate is anticipating the delivery of a ‘Mr. White,’ a deserter from the Royal Navy, as a deckhand. The ship will not make port until Capetown. If we’ve got the children beforehand, we’ll lock him up in the hull. If not…we’ll snatch him off the street and force their locations from him by any means necessary. Meantime, I’ve hired a forger to draft the Last Will of Harold Whitlock. Seems he’s going to leave everything to his wife and stepchildren.”

  Sarah laughed outright, finally believing they could succeed in saving the children and securing their future.

  She realized her mistake when Mr. Renquist’s smile faded and he muttered “Bloody hell” under his breath.

  “Well, Renquist. What’s this? Feminine laughter? I thought you were a married man.”

  Sarah froze, not daring to turn and look at the owner of that deep, amused voice. His speech was not that of the working class, but that of the ton. And what in God’s name would a member of the ton be doing in this part of town after midnight?

  “Yes, er, well…” Mr. Renquist hedged.

  “Where are my manners?” the intruder said. He moved around the table to face Sarah. “Ethan Travis, at your service, Mistress…?”

  Mr. Renquist looked at her helplessly.

  “Sadie,” she supplied as she lifted her face to meet the stranger’s eyes. “Sadie Hunt.”

  “Miss Sadie Hunt,” he repeated in softer tones and added a lopsided smile and a courteous bow.

  Sarah’s insides liquefied. Mr. Ethan Travis was tall, dark and decidedly handsome. His hazel eyes held a little more green than brown, and his hair was a dark polished brown that was an inch or two longer than fashionable. In all, he was unforgettable.

  That came as a relief, since she realized he could not possibly be a member of the ton. She would have noted him had he ever been in the same room—even a crowded room. In fact, she wondered how he could have been in the same city without her knowing it.

  “I’d say well done, Renquist, were you not newly wed,” Mr. Travis said, a hint of cynicism in his voice. “What would your wife say, I wonder?”

  Sarah was amazed to see Francis Renquist color the shade of an apple. How unusual. She supposed she must rescue him again. “I perceive your comment as a warning to me, sir, and I thank you for it, but it is entirely unnecessary.”

  “You know he is married?” The man arched an eyebrow, a smile curving his sensual mouth.

  “Know it, and know his wife, sir. I believe you have misunderstood our meeting. We are conducting business.”

  The man’s head tilted back in a deep laugh. “Business? I never would have guessed it. Past midnight. Darkened corner of a pub. A woman alone. Ah! I begin to see.”

  Now Sarah felt her face flood with heat. Ethan Travis thought she was a prostitute!

  Mr. Renquist found his voice at last. “Here now, Travis. La—Miss Hunt has hired me to…to find her missing brooch.” His hesitation gave lie to his words.

  She held one hand out in a gesture of interdiction. “Do not explain, Mr. Renquist. This is none of his business. Who is he, anyway, to question us?”

  “No one of consequence, Miss Hunt,” Ethan Travis answered for her companion. “I was merely passing when I heard you laugh. That is not a sound common to this place. Please accept my apology for interfering in your…affairs.” He offered a curt bow before turning and walking away.

  Anxiety burned in her. Or was it excitement? “Have we been found out, Mr. Renquist? Will he tell?”

  “Mr. Travis will not talk. He is discreet to a fault. And that
is the only good thing I can say about him.”

  “Oh?” She turned to watch the man exit. “Do you think he might be of use to us?”

  “Good God! You cannot be serious. What would we want with the ‘Demon of Alsatia’? There is a high price to be paid for dealing with men like Travis.”

  Alsatia! That most disreputable of neighborhoods where thieves and murderers used to find sanctuary! Though cleaned up somewhat since its heyday, the area still suffered an unsavory reputation. She did not know many people who would willingly go there after dark. Mr. Travis must be a very brave, or very dangerous, man.

  “High price? Cost is not a consideration, Mr. Renquist. The Wednesday League has adequate resources.”

  “Your soul?”

  Sarah shivered. “My soul, Mr. Renquist, has already been forfeit.”

  Mr. Renquist glanced away, always sensitive to her past. “Remember, Lady Sarah. Tomorrow at midnight. The west steps of St. Paul’s.”

  Ethan Travis closed the door of the King’s Head Tavern behind him and moved silently into the mist with a rueful smile. What had possessed him to involve himself in Francis Renquist’s personal business? That was not like him at all. What other men did was of no interest to him.

  Ah, Sadie Hunt’s laughter! That must have been it. He hadn’t heard that sound in years. Oh, he’d heard laughter—polite, patronizing, or purchased—but not the sweet, unaffected rippling of true amusement.

  The little strumpet was the most unlikely “light skirt” he’d seen since coming to Blackfriars. No exposed décolletage, no brash face paint and no hollow, empty eyes. Who could have suspected a waiflike figure dressed in trousers could be so erotic? Who could have thought curling tendrils of chestnut hair escaping a boy’s cap and deep violet eyes would awaken long-dormant feelings? Certainly not he.

  Was she new to the fallen sisterhood? Would it be too late to save Sadie from the soul-stealing profession? Did she even want to be saved? Ethan gave a self-deprecating smile. He was scarcely the man for such a task. The blind leading the blind? Not likely. What he could and would do, however, is remember her name. Perhaps, some night when he was drunk enough, lost, dissipated and desperate enough, he’d track her down, pay his money and see if she could still laugh like she meant it. And if he was still capable of passion.

  Chapter Two

  Sarah arrived at St. Paul’s for her appointment with Dicken and Sticky Joe well before midnight the following night, climbed the steps and crouched in the shadows of a column. The dense fog pooled near the ground and swirled around her. She could hear the voices of vendors and prostitutes calling their wares to passing gentlemen followed by the occasional burst of laughter and a drunken reply. Near dawn the noises would change to vendors coming early to stock their carts and shops with the vegetables, flowers, fish and meat arriving by barge from the outlying countryside.

  She took a deep breath and lifted her face to the cold darkness, loving the anonymity of night. She suspected she should be afraid of the night, or at least afraid to be alone, but she had conquered those demons, and now the night held no fear for her but sleep, and the relentless nightmares that came with it.

  She looked forward to the meeting with twelve-year-old Dicken. She enjoyed their camaraderie. Dicken reminded her of her brothers before they entered society—funny, bright, enthusiastic, adventurous and optimistic. And he treated her like a social equal. Mr. Renquist had introduced her as Sadie Hunt, the middle daughter of a working-class family who liked to help people in need. He had taken her under his larcenous wing.

  A steady drizzle began and the temperature dropped by several degrees. Dressed in her brothers’ castoffs, Sarah wished she had worn a heavier coat. She was soaked to the skin by the time she saw Dicken coming up the steps toward her.

  “’Ere then,” the twelve-year-old said, squinting through the dark and the rain. “That you, Sadie?”

  “Yes, Dicken,” she said, stepping out of the shadows. She ruffled his sandy hair fondly, even though he was nearly as tall as she. “What have you got for me?”

  “Nothin’.” he said. “Me an’ Sticky Joe have been askin’ all day, and I can only tell you where they’re not.”

  “And where are they not?”

  “They’re not in any private schools or boardin’ ’ouses.”

  “That’s more than we knew before, Dicken. You’ve earned your pay. You’ll keep looking?”

  “Aye. Me an’ Joe’ll find ’em.” Dicken grinned, exposing a row of even white teeth with a gap between the front two. A sprinkling of freckles across his nose made him appear deceptively innocent. “We’ll look in orphanages, work ’ouses, poor ’ouses, an’ ’ospitals. Ask neighbors if they’ve seen any new faces, or if any of the tradesmen ’ave new apprentices.”

  “You are so resourceful,” Sarah praised. “You will be as clever as Mr. Renquist one day.”

  “Am now,” he replied, puffing his chest out proudly. “I’m ’eaded over to Saint Bart’s Orphanage to meet Sticky Joe. We’re gonna see if they got any new inmates. Wanna come?”

  She had five hours before daylight, four before she had to be back in her bed. She did not even hesitate. “Lead on, Dicken.”

  Saint Bartholomew’s Hospital was just around the corner from St. Paul’s. The orphanage was down a side street, its coal-darkened stone walls holding out a cruel world. Crueler than the orphanage itself? Sarah wondered.

  A single oak tree stood in the courtyard and tall iron gates were ajar. Dicken turned to her and winked. He slipped through and pulled her after him.

  Sticky Joe stood by the kitchen door, signaling them with a wave of his hand. He was a year older and taller than Dicken, all arms and legs, the sort that her father would have called “a gangling youth.” His grin when he saw Sarah revealed slightly crooked teeth. He laid one finger across his lips, signaling her to silence.

  “Well met, Sadie,” he whispered. “I’ve been chatting up the maid, Bridey O’Malley. She says as ’ow there’s three new arrivals. One of ’em meets your description of the oldest girl. Araminta, is it?”

  Sarah said a quick prayer as she took a miniature from the pocket of her vest. She handed it to Sticky Joe and ducked to let the light from the doorway spill upon it.

  “Aye,” Sticky Joe bobbed his head. “Shall I show it to ’er to be sure?”

  “Yes, please,” Sarah said. She turned toward the street at the sound of a hired coach drawing up outside the iron gates. Before she could react, Dicken seized her by the coat sleeve and pulled her through the door into the kitchen.

  “Blimey! If we’re caught, Bridey will have a beating.”

  She did not resist when Sticky Joe and Dicken pushed her to the back stairwell. The three of them huddled together as they saw the kitchen door thrown open and a stout man step across the threshold. Sticky Joe laid a finger across his lips and began inching up the stairway on his errand, leaving her and Dicken to hide in the stairwell.

  “Mrs. Carmichael!” the visitor shouted, standing in the center of the kitchen. He dropped his tall hat, gloves and walking stick upon the long wooden table before going to the banked fire in the hearth to warm his hands.

  Sarah frowned. The man was of medium height, heavy, had a receding hairline, and was dressed in the height of fashion, though disheveled. His eyes were glazed and a damp sheen on his forehead hinted at more than rain.

  A middle-aged woman in nightclothes and a lace-edged nightcap rushed into the room, wrapping a rough woolen blanket about herself. “Oh, sir! ’Tis you! I feared something happened to you. You said you’d be back in a week, and I haven’t seen you in more than a fortnight.”

  “I shall come when I please, Mrs. Carmichael. I gave you enough coin to feed all three brats for a month. I know you’ve got rid of the boys, but is the girl still here? Have you found a place for her?”

  “She is here, sir.” The woman smoothed her blanket in a vain attempt at preening. “I have been keeping a close eye on her, just as you instructe
d. She even sleeps in my room and cannot draw a breath without my knowing it. But I have not found a position for her.”

  “’Twould never do to have the chit seen. Wouldn’t put it past Gladys to hire runners to find her.”

  Sarah clutched at her heart. The man was Mr. Harold Whitlock! Araminta was being kept here, at St. Bart’s. She glanced at Dicken and he smiled and nodded.

  “I would not care if you indentured her, just keep track of her. I need to produce her if I have to. That may be the only way to keep Gladys in line—giving her the occasional glimpse of her brats.”

  Indenture her? His own stepdaughter? Sarah could scarcely believe her ears. What sort of monster could be so cruel to an innocent child?

  “Do you want to see her, sir? Shall I wake her? She has been disconsolate, weeping herself to sleep at night.”

  The visitor waved one hand dismissively. “I have other calls to make this night. Have her gone by tomorrow. I cannot say what has changed, but my clever wife has grown silent on the matter. Too clever by half. I think she must have something up her sleeve. That will never do. She will learn that I am the master here. Araminta must disappear before she can find her.”

  “Yes, sir. Tomorrow.” Mrs. Carmichael gave a flustered glance over her shoulder as if wondering if she could, indeed, be rid of the girl that quickly.

  “The box, now, that’s a separate matter,” Mr. Whitlock continued. “Bring it to me, if you please.”

  Mrs. Carmichael was gone scarcely more than a minute before she returned carrying a small padlocked metal box. She placed it on the table.

  Mr. Whitlock took a key from his vest pocket and opened the lock. With his back to her, Sarah could not tell if he was putting something in or taking something out. The box was relocked, and he gave it back to the woman. “Keep that safe, mind you, and keep your mouth shut. I’ll be back for it soon.”