Chapter Nineteen
T he crowd in the taproom had grown rowdy. High spirits reigned. At the table beside them, a man laughed uproariously as he waved a hunk of sausage at the end of his knife. The rest of the sausage was clearly visible, half chewed in his wide-open mouth. Grimacing, Niall turned away to the man he’d convinced to sit and talk with them.
“You won’t understand. No one does.” Joshua Dalton’s voice was ragged, his spirits obviously low. “The other instructors, even the director at the school when I teach, they think I am just a brokenhearted fool. I am, of course, but it’s so much more than that.” The teacher looked up. “Katherine is not herself. I don’t know how else to explain it. It’s as if someone else lives inside her.”
“You are not a fool,” Niall reassured him. “And you are not far off the mark, either.”
He explained about Katherine’s twin taking her place.
Dalton sat straighter, his breath coming faster as he listened. “I knew it,” he said in a whisper. “I knew I was not losing my wits.”
“You are not,” Niall agreed.
The teacher frowned. “But she knew things. Things I had only discussed with Katherine.”
“It appears she has been watching her sister for some time.”
“Did Katherine keep a journal?” asked Gyda.
Dalton nodded. “She did. Her dream book, she called it. She filled it with little drawings, with stories, with her wishes and plans.” His face fell. “The sister read it.”
“The sister imitated her in Kingston Upon Thames. Perhaps she was testing the masquerade.”
“I never liked her going there alone, but I could not accompany her. Not until we married.” His expression was unfocused, as if he were casting back, recalling their interactions. “I was right. I knew she could not speak to me so. Katherine and I had so many plans for our future. Plans we dreamed up together. I knew she could never disparage our hopes and ideas in such a cruel fashion.” He put both hands on the table, as if he meant to push off and run. “But where is she? Where is my Katherine? What has this sister done with her?”
Niall was forced to tell him the truth.
Dalton crumbled in on himself. “No,” he whispered.
Gyda spoke from the shadows. “She is a criminal, the woman you have been following here in Chiswick. She is a murderer. A traitor to the Crown.”
The man was still caught in the shock of Niall’s news. “She’s dead?” he asked quietly. “You are sure?”
“I am very sorry,” Niall told him.
Dalton was clearly in the grip of very real grief. A shudder went through him. He swallowed several times, but fought back tears. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply. But when they opened, his expression had hardened. “A traitor, you said?”
Gyda nodded.
“Yes. I knew it. I knew something wasn’t right. I just did not want to believe my Katherine could be involved in something like that.”
“Something like what?” asked Niall sharply.
“I don’t know. That other bitch is up to something nefarious.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Niall saw Gyda stiffen, her attention caught on something else.
He kept his focus on Dalton. “Tell us what you have seen.”
The other man covered his face with his hands. “I’m not sure. She has been spending time with a gunsmith. I’ve seen them in his shop. They were going over plans, diagrams. Gibson is his name. He owns land, a farm out on the road toward Ealing, although he doesn’t stay there. He keeps rooms above his shop. But he’s been going out there with her. I followed them, more than once. Something is going on out there.”
“What? What do you think is going on?” asked Niall.
“I don’t know. There are other men staying there. Some of them are foreign, I think. They very obviously do not want anyone getting close to the place. Someone is always on watch. I have been chased off several times.”
“Niall.” Warning rang in Gyda’s tone. She sprang out of her seat and surged past him.
He looked up to see a large man stalking toward their table. Planting herself in his path, Gyda snarled up at him. “Where is she?”
“Out of my way,” the behemoth growled.
Was that a Russian accent?
“That’s one of them,” Dalton said. He stood. “He’s one of the men from the farm.”
“Tell me where to find Petra Scot,” Gyda hissed at the man. She barely came up to his shoulder, but she faced him without a qualm. “Tell me now and we’ll allow you to leave. You won’t have to go down with her.”
Niall stood, but the man growled at Gyda again and roughly pushed her aside, shoving her into the next table. Shouts of protest arose, but the brute ignored them. Without preamble, he stepped forward and swung a meaty fist at Dalton.
The teacher, caught by surprise, stumbled back and fell into his chair.
Stepping around him, the assailant pulled out a blade. Wordless, his expression fierce, he aimed a slicing swing at Niall’s throat.
Startled by the swift escalation, Niall dodged, but it was a close call. Crouching, he pulled his own knife from his boot and came up, thrusting for the assailant’s kidney.
The man jumped aside, more agile than Niall had expected, given his size. He struck the table where they’d been seated, gripping it with both hands for stability as he knocked into the back of the chair Dalton had landed in.
The teacher looked back, grabbed his tankard, and slammed it into the brute’s knife hand, loosening his grip on the blade.
The big man roared. Knocking the tankard aside, he spun, grabbed Dalton by the scruff of the neck, and lifted him into the air like a kitten. Kicking the chair away, he slammed Dalton’s face down onto the table.
The other patrons were becoming aware of the situation. Some slipped out of the taproom. The tavern keeper came out from behind the bar holding a cudgel. She stood back several paces, and a few others spread out on either side of her. The men at the next table were hooting and cheering and pawing at Gyda.
The brute had left his back exposed. But even as Niall lunged, the man lifted Dalton again and flung him at Niall.
With a gasp, Niall twisted to avoid skewering Dalton. The teacher hit him hard, and they both went down in a tangle of limbs. Trying to suck in a breath while pushing Dalton away, Niall glared up as the assailant stepped toward them. He had regained his blade. Menace written in his face, he raised it high.
Metal flashed over his shoulder. The behemoth stopped, his arms suddenly flung wide. He gave a shout and turned as Gyda skipped backward—and Niall saw the neighboring table’s sausage knife buried high in his back.
Shockingly, it didn’t stop him. Niall scrambled to his feet as the brute went after Gyda. The man swung a long arm and clipped her, his knife leaving a thin slice of crimson across her arm.
The men from the other table were finally scrambling out of the way. Gyda tripped over one of them and stumbled to one knee.
The brute reached for her, but he suddenly stopped, frozen in place.
Niall, finally back on his feet, stumbled over to see Gyda’s own blade, etched in Nordic runes, pressing into the fabric between the man’s legs.
“Give over the knife or I will cut off your prick,” she snarled. “Then I will buy a round of ale for the room and we will all watch and laugh while you bleed to death.”
Niall snatched the blade from the man’s hand. The behemoth did not move or resist. “Damn you to hell, cyka ,” he growled at Gyda.
Definitely Russian. And judging by Gyda’s expression, she understood the insult.
Some of the men circled around them were shouting encouragement at Gyda, while others moaned in sympathy for the brute.
They were at a stalemate. Niall didn’t know how—
Thunk.
Dalton struck the man on the head with the pewter ale pitcher. Hard. The assailant’s eyes rolled back, and he slumped to the floor.
Gyda glared at the teacher.
“What?” Dalton asked. “You can emasculate him later. We might need him for information.”
Niall pointed at the tavern keeper. “Rope,” he ordered her. “Now.”
He turned to Dalton. “Roll him over. Tie his hands and feet behind him, and call the constables.” Reaching down, he helped Gyda to her feet. “Are you all right?”
She peered at the cut on her arm. “Yes. It’s just a scratch. The bleeding is already slowing.”
“Good. Now, tell me one thing.”
“Yes,” she answered. “I would have done it.”
“I know. That’s not what I meant.” He looked around the taproom, his unease growing. “Where the hell is Kara?”
*
Petra moved quickly down Chiswick’s high street. Kara hurried in her wake, trying not to make a noise, and trying to stick to the darkness and avoid the bright circles left by the street lights. She was grateful she had worn her altered skirts. It was cold, and she might have been warmer in thicker petticoats, but there was more comfort for her in knowing she had potentially useful weapons and gadgets tucked away in her pockets, linings, and hidden compartments.
Petra ducked into the livery. Sticking to the shadows outside, Kara moved closer until she could hear the woman berating the grooms.
“Did I not leave instructions for the horses to be left in their traces? Get them out of those stalls. At once! This very minute!” The volume of Petra’s voice was rising. “Dullards! Idiots!”
“Beggin’ your pardon, ma’am, but you did say as you was to be quick, and that was this morning.” One of the livery men was brave enough to stand up to the woman’s ranting. “One of our lads took a delivery at the station, and he saw you boarding the train for London. We knew you’d be some time then. The beasts were—”
“The beasts are mine and I will do with them as I please! If I tell you to leave them standing for a fortnight, then you do so! Get them back in their rigging and get that cart—” She stopped and let out a screech of fury. “You don’t even have the hay loaded yet?”
“Nearly done, ma’am! Nearly done!”
“Where the hell is my driver?”
“He’s just gone for a pint across the way. No one had any idea when you—”
“Fetch him!” she ordered the man. “I want to leave before ten minutes are up. Do you understand me?”
Cart? Had Petra said cart instead of carriage? Kara crept close enough to peer around and into the livery courtyard.
It was a cart the grooms were swarming around, a long, narrow farm cart with a grid of slatted boards inserted to extend the sides higher and contain a load of hay. Petra was stomping about, still ranting, and making the horses dance as they were led out of their stalls.
Kara ducked back into the shadows. A farm cart? What was the woman up to? And how was Kara going to follow her to find out?
She shrank back as a man came running from the pub across the street. As Petra turned her rage on him, Kara risked another glance. The cart had been turned so that the last of the hay could be added. Kara saw that a grid of boards had been added to the back, too. Attached at the bottom, it tilted back, the top secured with chains to allow it to fan out. It left an open, triangular space at the back of the wagon. Staring at it, Kara knew it was her only chance of discovering Petra’s hideaway.
She waited. The men hurried to get the cart ready—and Petra gone, no doubt.
When they had finished, and Petra and her driver had mounted the narrow plank that served as a seat, Kara watched, poised and ready.
The cart rattled out of the courtyard at a clip. It turned right onto the high street. Kara followed it out onto the street, not wanting to be glimpsed crossing the light that shone from the livery. Hurrying, she moved to the back of the vehicle, keeping pace with it. It was a complicated maneuver. Keeping her feet moving, she braced her hands on the side of the cart and on the slatted grid, and managed to hoist herself into the inverted triangle of open space.
Unfortunately, the cart shifted with her added weight.
“What was that?” Petra’s sharp question drifted back.
“Something in the road, most like,” the driver answered.
“Get this crate moving,” Petra returned. “We have to get it unloaded and filled again with the supplies for London.”
“Vehicles are meant to take it slow on the high street,” the driver replied.
“I don’t care! We are leaving tonight. There is work to be done. We have to move!”
Kara pulled herself further into the space and hung on as the driver whipped the horses into a faster trot. At least the hay was warm at her back, and she had the shawl she’d taken from the tavern.
She settled in as they left the main street and the road grew bumpy. As the lights of the village were left behind, she hoped she was up to the task ahead of her.