Chapter 35 #3
The scene depicted the moment of Mrs. Ainsley’s capture.
Eddy was crouched behind a garden statue, her arm extended upward, her pistol pointed at a smiling moon.
Mrs. Ainsley, her hair standing on end like the writhing snakes of the mythical Medusa, was tumbling backwards, her own weapon also flying through the air …
Ye gods, where had Eddy learned such foul-mouthed curse words, wondered Charlotte, her brows rising as she read the string of epithets coming from the lady’s lips—
“Eddy is only being accurate!” explained Raven. “That’s exactly what the witch said when I tackled her from behind.”
Wrexford, who had been studying the art with great interest, finally looked up. “I’ve been wondering how the lady was apprehended. Kindly explain to me exactly what happened.” He eyed Eddy’s watercolor palette. “And without taking any artistic license with the facts.”
“Raven had only a few moments to come up with a plan,” piped up Eddy. “It was exceedingly clever of him to think of it so quickly.”
“We heard noises coming from inside the large coal chute that angled down into the building’s basement.
The only logical explanation was that one or more of the varlets were intent on fleeing,” said Raven.
“Don’t worry—I wasn’t going to do anything rash.
If there were two of them, we were simply going to lie low and then follow them.
But if there was only one varlet with a single weapon, I had an idea for how to foil the escape. ”
“He sent me to hide behind one of the garden statues, figuring the varlet would head for the back alleyway rather than the street,” offered Eddy. “The hoot of an owl was the signal to go ahead and put the plan into action.”
“I saw it was a lone lady with just one pistol. It was dark, and she appeared jumpy as she looked around, so I gave the hoot,” continued Raven.
“Bang! I aimed straight up at the sky and fired a shot,” explained Eddy.
Raven once again quickly took up the narrative. “As I had hoped, the sound startled the lady into whirling around and, on instinct, firing in return. As her back was to me, I then charged and tackled her around the knees. We both went flying, and as we rolled across the grass, she—”
“She said a lot of really bad words,” interjected Eddy.
“Her claws were far worse.” Raven winced and rubbed at his scratched cheek. “I’d rather tussle with one of the Tower lions. They wouldn’t be nearly as nasty.”
“The plan was well thought out,” conceded Wrexford.
“And we didn’t fire our weapons at any living target,” pointed out Eddy.
“Another mark in your favor,” said the earl. “Still—”
“We withdrew as soon as Griffin appeared,” offered Raven.
“I think what Wrex means is, you showed quick thinking and resourcefulness in making a split-second decision …” Charlotte drew in a harried breath. “But your jumping so fearlessly into the fray scares us half to death.”
“Raven says doing the right thing often means bucking up your courage and making difficult decisions,” said Eddy.
How to answer?
“You’re absolutely right,” replied Charlotte. “Just as long as you understand that the hard decisions also include weighing the consequences of an action, and backing away when reason dictates that the better part of valor is to do nothing.”
“I—I think I understand,” responded Eddy.
“What will happen to the lady?” asked Raven. “I heard her tell Griffin that she was the wife of a high-ranking bank official. Was that a lie?”
“Alas, no.” It was Wrexford who answered. “She betrayed her family and friends to follow a path of evil. In fact, it turns out she was the mastermind of all the murder and mayhem that has entangled our family in such a dangerous investigation.”
“She was responsible for Mr. Campbell’s death?” asked Hawk.
Wrexford nodded. “Aye, lad.”
“I—I hope she will have to answer for her heinous crimes.”
Charlotte responded without hesitation. “Like all of us, Mrs. Ainsley will have to face judgment from a higher power for the moral choices she made in life.”
Though the Weasels all knew more about the grim realities of Life than most children, she decided that the lady’s self-inflicted death was a dark detail that they didn’t need to know just now.
“Qui totum vult totum perdit,” she added in a solemn voice. “He—or she—who wants everything loses everything.”
A weighty silence hung over the room as each of them pondered the Latin aphorism … and then, after a long moment, it was broken by Eddy.
“How do you spell that?” she whispered to Raven. “It would make an excellent title for my drawing.”
“Indeed it would,” said Charlotte, smiling to chase away the lingering shadows of evil. “You have a remarkable talent for capturing the vagaries of Life in your drawings.”
“Oiy,” added Raven.
Eddy’s cheeks turned pink at the praise. “I-Is that a good thing? I imagine that one of the many onerous rules of Polite Society strictly forbid a young lady to poke fun at her elders.”
Her three fellow Weasels looked at each other and began to chortle.
“Surely you know by now that in this family, the rules of Polite Society are not considered to be etched in stone,” said Raven. “The one thing that matters most is never to shy away from the Truth or the quest for Justice.”