Chapter Five
CHAPTER FIVE
BALLEY GOT OUT of his carriage, sneering across the clearing in the woods at Nothshire. Nothshire was wearing his mask—no reason in proclaiming his identity in case this all went badly, after all. He kept a far distance from the other man.
The sky was growing lighter, but the sun had not deigned to make an appearance yet. Dawn, however, was not far off.
“Who do you think you are?” said Balley. “How dare you kidnap my wife? And where is she, anyway?”
“All in good time,” said Nothshire in his put-on Cockney accent. Belatedly, he remembered they were supposed to be French now. Well, time for that next time, he supposed.
“Yes,” echoed Dunrose, also masked, his Cockney accent frankly better than Nothshire’s. “All in good time!”
Nothshire glared at him. Don’t fuck this up, he thought at the other man. He turned back to Balley. “We shall release the location of your wife after we are assured that you have brought what we asked for.”
“No,” said Balley. “That’s not what was stated in the letter, and that’s not what I agreed to.”
“If you want her back—”
“I have only your word you even have her,” said Balley. “She left in a carriage and neither the carriage nor my driver nor her maid have reappeared, so for all I know, she’s halfway north by now, and you’ve concocted this scheme just to take money from me. Produce my wife, or I go back home.”
Nothshire considered this. Stall, that was the goal here. He turned to Dunrose. “All right, then, go and get her.”
Dunrose gave him a confused look.
Nothshire gestured meaningfully with his head. He stepped closer, meaning to speak in a low enough voice that Balley wouldn’t hear.
“None of that!” said Balley. “You two say everything out loud where I can hear it. I’m coming closer, in fact.”
Nothshire sighed heavily.
Dunrose shrugged. He mouthed an apology.
Nothshire shook his head. It wasn’t Dunrose’s fault. It would have worked nicely, of course, if Dunrose could have understood to pretend to go and fetch the viscountess and then they could have waited, because surely, at any moment, Rutchester and Arthford would arrive. But that wasn’t going to work, so he must come up with another strategy.
“Why wouldn’t your driver come back after he lost your wife?” called Nothshire.
“I have no notion,” said Balley, stalking towards them across the clearing as the sky lightened behind him.
“You know he said to me that you would murder him if you found out that I’d kidnapped her,” said Nothshire. “Is that the way of it, then?”
Balley stopped walking. He folded his arms over his chest. “One can’t rightly murder a servant, can one? Servants are put on earth for the purpose of serving their betters. If they fail in that service, it’s the right of their masters to correct them.”
“Yes, certainly,” said Nothshire. “So that they can behave in the proper way in the future.”
“Just so,” said Balley.
“Which is impossible to do if one is dead,” said Nothshire. “Have you killed other servants?”
Balley glared at him.
“Your wife had a bruise on her face,” said Nothshire.
“It’s a husband’s right to correct his wife,” said Balley.
“Yes, and what did she do wrong?” said Nothshire, raising his eyebrows.
Balley gave him a withering look. “What is this about? You kidnapped her, or so you say, anyway, so what do you care about whether she was bruised or not?”
“Don’t remember?” said Nothshire. “You hit her a lot, I suppose? How’s it working? Is all that correction making you hit her less? Because it seems to me, if that’s the purpose of punishment, it should. Or else, I suppose, you’re not doing the punishing correctly.”
Balley’s nostrils flared. “This is none of your concern, you blackguard thief. You dare to lecture me on the ins and outs of morality? You?”
“Maybe you’re not hitting her because she did anything wrong but simply because you like the way it makes you feel. Maybe it makes you feel powerful.”
“How does it make you feel when you make men cower in their carriages and empty their purses?” countered Balley.
All right, all right. That was hitting a bit below the belt.
“Admit it,” said Nothshire. “Admit that you ‘correct’ her more often than necessary. Admit that you ‘correct’ all of them for no good reason. Admit you’re a tyrant and your driver is terrified of you.”
“I shall admit no such thing,” said Balley. Now, he was approaching again.
Well, if you would, I think I could shoot you myself, Nothshire thought. It a was a weakness, these rules he made for himself. The rules took on a life of their own, and he was helpless to fight against them. If he could be certain that Balley was a wretch, through and through, it would be one thing. But this, now, without the admission of guilt, without any real evidence, only conjecture…
Damnation.
Balley kept coming closer.
Nothshire tried to convince himself to get his gun. It was loaded. He’d come prepared. He’d only get one shot, but Balley was coming right for him, so it’d be easy enough. Pull out the gun, take aim, done.
Do it, he urged himself.
Balley came closer.
Closer.
Nothshire did not do it.
Now Balley was practically on top of them. He stopped, looking from Nothshire to Dunrose. “Oh, God. It’s you. The both of you. I should have realized. Why, are we all absolute dunces in London society not to have seen it? The two of you, you’re both so… broken. If anyone would lose his mind and start robbing people, of course it would be—”
He broke off to the sound of approaching hoofbeats. He furrowed his brow and turned.
Rutchester and Arthford, neither masked nor attempting to hide their identity, galloped into the clearing.
“Oh, all four of you,” muttered Balley. “Of course.”
Rutchester climbed off his horse. He ran a hand through his long dark hair, which he grew out in defiance of all fashionable conventions of the time. He smiled at Balley. It wasn’t a nice smile.
Balley cleared his throat. “Rutchester. You, um, you and I have no quarrel, you know.”
Rutchester yanked a sword out of the scabbard that hung from his waist. The sound was a ringing noise that seemed to scream its way across the pre-dawn light of the early morning.
Balley turned to Nothshire. “This is ridiculous. Take the stupid money, all right? I don’t even care where she is. I imagine you’ll send her back to me at some point.”
Nothshire lifted his chin and shrugged at him. “This was the best way, I’m afraid, Balley.”
Rutchester advanced, swinging the blade ahead of him, his smile going nearly demented. “You can run if you want, Balley. I like chasing.”
Balley reached down, but he didn’t have a sword, just a knife. He pulled that out, brandished it, holding his ground. “I’m not a coward,” he snapped.
“Everyone’s a coward in the end,” said Rutchester. And then he sprang on Balley.
NOTHSHIRE WIPED BLOOD spatters off his face with his handkerchief. He surveyed the red smears on it, folded it, and then went back at it, because he could still feel the hot wetness on his forehead and cheeks. It had gotten all over his mask, as well, which was ruined now. That was all right, though. He had other masks.
Rutchester had blood in his hair, blood on his hand, blood all over his shirt. He had dressed hastily and wasn’t wearing a cravat or waistcoat. His shirt was pasted to his chest with blood.
“They won’t be able to identify him when they find the body,” said Arthford, surveying what was left of Balley.
“Who’s dealing with the driver?” said Rutchester, turning to look over his shoulder at Balley’s carriage.
“Oh, hell and damnation, the driver,” muttered Nothshire, stepping around the mess of gore that had once been Balley to go off in the direction of the carriage. The driver was not sitting on the bench on the carriage anymore. The reins were lying askew and the horses were standing at attention, too well trained to have bolted, even during this.
“He fled,” said Dunrose helpfully.
“Yes, obviously he did,” said Nothshire, sighing. Just what he wanted for the rest of this hellish morning, hunting through the woods looking for someone else besides the damned viscountess.
Rutchester fell into step with Nothshire. “You want me to do him too?”
“No,” said Nothshire. “No, we don’t need to kill everyone, Rutchester.”
Rutchester wiped a hand over his mouth, smearing redness everywhere. “Well, if you want to scare him, I can help with that, at least.”
Nothshire picked up the pace.
As he cleared the carriage, he realized the driver was there, pasted against the other side of it, trembling. He looked young, maybe fifteen or sixteen. Not the usual driver, then, for that one had gone with Balley’s wife. This must be some stable hand, a boy who could drive the carriage until the usual driver returned.
The driver flung up both of his hands, covering his face. He was crying.
Damnation.
“That was easy enough,” said Rutchester, stalking toward the boy.
Nothshire’s arm shot out and seized Rutchester by the back of the jacket. He yanked the other man back.
Rutchester raised gore stained eyebrows. “What?”
“Boy,” said Nothshire. “What’s your name?”
“Oh, don’t do that,” said Rutchester. “You don’t get their names. It even bothers me more when I know their names.”
Nothshire ignored Rutchester, advancing on the boy. “You aren’t Balley’s usual driver.”
“No, sir,” said the boy in a very high-pitched voice. “No, I never drive the carriage. Usually, with Roger out of town—he took the mistress, you see, after dinner hour—it’d be George, but he lives in his own house on the other side of town with his wife, and George would’ve had to be fetched by someone, and the master said it’d be me, since I sleep in the house, you see, and it wasn’t that far of a distance. I was afeared of it. I ain’t used to driving the carriage, not at all, but you don’t cross the master if you know what’s good for you, you see, so I did as he said and I…” The boy sniffled. “Likely talking too much, ain’t I? Always getting that. Mrs. Greer, she’s the housekeeper, she says I talk a lot when I happen to be in trouble and I know it to be true. I’ll shut my mouth, then, will I?”
Nothshire sighed. He considered the situation, glancing back at Rutchester and then at the boy and then at the carriage. “Can you drive it back? Alone?”
“I, er, I don’t know,” said the boy. Then, standing up straight, “I mean, yes, sir, if you let me go, yes, sir, of course I can.”
“Your master was set upon by bandits,” said Nothshire. “You witnessed that sure enough, did you not?”
“You’re a b-bandit, sir?”
Nothshire nodded. “I am.” He nodded at Rutchester. “But this one, he’s something else, you see that? He’s not a man, he’s a living demon.”
“Oh, yes, sir,” said the boy, his voice cracking, more tears spilling out of his cheeks. “Oh, I do see that.”
“He can find you,” said Nothshire. “I’m not saying that you know any of us here by name. You’re a stable boy. You may not pay attention to the comings and goings of anyone in town, so we may be strangers to you—”
“Oh, you are, sir,” said the boy. “I never seen any of you before in all my life. It ain’t been light enough to make much out, anyway.”
“That may be true,” said Nothshire. “For your sake, I hope it is. If you ever say anything otherwise, or indicate that you had any notion of our identities, any notion at all, this one will find you and he will do to you what he did to your master. You believe that?”
The boy’s face crumpled.
“Good, then,” said Nothshire. “Take the carriage and go.”
“Wait,” said Rutchester.
“Hmm?” said Nothshire.
“The ransom is in the carriage,” said Rutchester.
“Oh, yes, obviously,” said Nothshire. “Let me take that, then.” He pushed past the boy to open the carriage door. Two trunks were sitting inside, and he heaved one out and then the other, while Rutchester stood there and made garish faces at the crying stable hand. “Stand there and do nothing to help me, of course,” he muttered at Rutchester.
“ Nothing to help you?” said Rutchester. “I was just roused from my bed to do violence for you, wasn’t I?”
Nothshire smiled at him grimly.
“You wouldn’t last long without me,” said Rutchester with a careless shrug. “Do you think Simon has his pipe on him? I could do with a smoke.” He smiled widely, and it was horrifying.
“Not our names, for God’s sake,” said Nothshire to Rutchester. He turned to the boy. “Off with you, then, if you know what’s good for you.”
The boy scrambled back up to take the reins. He rode off like he was being chased by the devil himself.