CHAPTER 25 #2
Perception, she reminded herself, rarely aligned with reality. In her experience, no one was either all bad or all good.
All of us are all simply human.
“Mrs. Sloane?” Shadows tangled with the strands of black hair curling, making his face as shapeless as his rag market hat. “No protest? No demand to charge in where angels fear to tread?”
Charlotte wished she could see his expression. There was an undertone to his question that she couldn’t quite identify. “I know you think me ruled by impulse rather than logic—”
“Intuition, not impulse,” he corrected. “Which I’ve learned to respect. If you have an objection, I am willing to listen.”
“And I, sir, have learned to respect the way you use reason to attack a problem. Even with all the information we’ve gathered, there are many unknown variables within Lowell’s hideaway.
It would be foolhardy of me to demand to accompany you.
Worrying about me making a misstep would be a dangerous distraction. ”
“A wise decision,” said Henning. “But then, I expected no less of you.”
She glanced up at the sky. The purples and pinks of dusk were darkening. Lowell’s ultimatum was fast approaching. “Shouldn’t we be going?”
Wrexford took Henning and Sheffield aside. A quick exchange, too low for her to hear, and then his two friends slipped away into the gloom. “We will follow shortly,” he said. “By a different route, to err on the side of caution.”
She nodded. A fluttering rose in her chest, a steel within velvet sensation of butterflies beating their wings against her ribs. The curse of a febrile imagination, she thought. In her mind’s eye, they all were colored in garish shades of gold.
Wrexford was calmly contemplating some faraway spot on the wall.
Charlotte sought to draw strength from his unruffled attitude.
For him, life was like science. It had a certain ruthless logic to it.
One could control only so many variables of an experiment; then one simply had to step back and let the physics of the universe take its course.
Detachment disengaged from emotion.
It was a trait she seemed to be lacking.
Head bowed, Raven shuffled his feet. She moved closer to him and set a hand on his shoulder, sensing any further show of emotion might embarrass him. He flinched at first, but then allowed his scrawny body to slump against hers. The warmth of him was comforting.
Time seemed mired in molasses. The minutes slid by with a viscous slowness. The fluttering was now a drumming against her tautly drawn nerves.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
At long last, the earl turned. “Let’s be off.”
They moved in single file, three wraiths threading their way through the shifting shadows.
Charlotte led the way, with Wrexford guarding the rear.
He moved lightly, his steps sure and silent over the uneven ground.
She could feel the thrum of a stalking predator’s flexing muscle in the night air.
Repressing a shiver, she quickened her pace.
They were still several streets away from their destination when the earl drew them deep into a gap between two buildings. He pitched his voice low, the terse whisper nearly swallowed by the creak of a rusty sign swinging in the breeze.
“I’m counting on you to keep your position, no matter what you might see or hear.”
“I understand, sir,” answered Charlotte. She felt she owed him that.
“What if there’s an explosion?” demanded Raven. They hadn’t told the boy about Lowell’s chemical compound, but she wasn’t surprised that he had caught wind of it.
Crouching down, Wrexford leaned in nose to nose with him. “You don’t move.”
Charlotte didn’t hear a response. She wondered if the earl remembered just how defiantly stubborn boys could be.
Wrexford seemed, however, to have taken that into consideration. He held out his hand, the upturned palm a flicker of pale silver in the mizzling moonlight. “Give me your pledge of honor that you’ll do as I say.”
Raven hesitated, then slowly sealed the promise with a touch of his own hand.
“Excellent. I should have disliked hanging you by your toes from that butcher’s sign overhead. But I would have done so.”
Charlotte didn’t doubt it.
Raven grinned. “I wudda found a way te wriggle free.”
“I think not, Weasel. But we shall leave testing each other’s mettle for another time.
” He rose, and Charlotte felt the brush of his clothing against hers as he edged toward the opening.
“I’ll leave you two here, Mrs. Sloane, and will count on you using your good sense to take your appointed place. ”
He was gone before she had a chance to wish him good luck.
Perhaps that was for the best.
“Come,” she murmured to Raven. “Let us hurry.”
* * *
The knife blade found the brass catch. A slight jiggle released it, allowing the window casing to ease open.
Wrexford held himself still, listening for any sounds from inside before pulling himself up to the ledge and slipping inside.
The long room was still cluttered with art supplies.
Perhaps Canaday and his coconspirators had harbored illusions of reviving their swindles.
The trouble was, men of artistic genius were far rarer than those who counted greed and an utter lack of morality as their primary talents.
Like had found like, he thought, as he quickly searched the space for any sign of Hawk. Lowell’s evil had proved even more powerful than that of The Ancients. His clever manipulations had destroyed their schemes.
As I shall destroy his.
The central corridor was unlit. Feeling his way along the rough, plastered wall, Wrexford cursed the fact that Sheffield had convinced him to trade his supple, well-fitting boots for the Petticoat Lane pair.
The loose leather and frayed stitching around the thick sole was making it hard to move quietly.
He slowed a half step, hoping the deference to disguise wouldn’t turn out to be a grave miscalculation.
There were two other rooms abutting the art storage area.
A quick look in each showed them to be empty.
The large space across the corridor was also devoid of furnishings, save for a few old writing desks and a three-legged chair sitting forlornly in the dusting of light allowed in by the barred windows.
Wrexford had expected no less. The basement and cellars were Lowell’s lair, and when vermin were being hunted, they always went to ground.
He drew the door closed and headed for the stairwell leading down to the bowels of the building.
As he approached the double doors, he paused to slip his knife back into his boot and readjust the weight of the pistol in his pocket.
His coat, a plain-cut garment thankfully unembellished by the shoulder capes and fancy lapels favored by a gentleman, buttoned up snugly to the throat, hiding the white of his linen.
The hat he dropped as an unnecessary encumbrance.
Drawing a measured breath, he pressed an ear to one of the portals and listened for sounds of activity behind the age-dark oak.
Nothing, save for an oppressive silence.
Was the boy still alive? A pawn was often played for just one move, then carelessly sacrificed in order to move the game along. Wrexford forced himself to forget such thoughts. Distractions were dangerous.
The latch yielded to the pressure of his palm, allowing him to slip into the stairwell.
An odor of acid, sour and slightly metallic, hung heavy in the damp air.
He could feel that the stairs were made of stone.
How many there were was impossible to make out.
The darkness was as viscous as India ink.
Placing a guiding hand on the rock and mortar wall, he started downward, step by tentative step.
He counted twelve treads before coming to a small landing. There the stairs reversed direction and continued to descend.
A thin line of light was visible below. The fumes were growing stronger. Raven had said the laboratory was at the base of the stairs, and as Wrexford came closer, the faint glow from under the door showed a fancy lock fabricated from steel and brass, just as the boy had described.
Pulling his pistol from his pocket, he noiselessly drew back the hammer and continued on to within a pace of the door.
There were rustling sounds from the other side, punctuated by the muted click of glassware. But no voices.
Which meant it was damnably impossible to know whether Hawk was being held prisoner there or in some other part of the basement.
Reluctantly turning away, Wrexford began to retrace his steps, exploring along the wall for another access into the basement.
Just before reaching the landing he found a small horizontal door, barely wide enough and tall enough for a man to shimmy through.
The hinges swung smoothly in response to a testing tug.
A hint of light danced deep within the narrow crawlspace.
After a tiny hesitation, he once again pocketed the pistol and slipped inside.
Inching along over splintered floorboards that clawed at his clothing, the earl gingerly traversed a short, tight passageway that opened up to a catwalk of exposed wooden beams. A sconce holding a single candle hung on the wall below him, casting just enough fluttery light for him to make out the bare bones of his surroundings.
From his vantage point, he saw it was a long drop down to the floor, where scattered stacks of large crates indicated that this, too, was another storage area, one where heavy goods were kept.
Just ahead, a heavy iron pulley was bolted to one of the beams, a heavy rope and hook still dangling down into the murky shadows.
Wrexford slithered out onto the narrow rough-cut timber, intent on reaching the rope, when suddenly a loud clang echoed off the walls of the cavernous space.
He froze as a second door was thrown open and a beam of skittery light cut through the gloom.
Footsteps sounded and a figure appeared.
The slim silhouette, the well-tailored clothes, the artfully tousled curls—Lowell was instantly identifiable as he crossed to a tall column of crates near the far wall.
The earl held his breath, willing the man not to look upward.
After setting his lantern down, Lowell turned the wick up. A flame hissed to life, throwing a circle of weak illumination over the planked floor. His movements were not quite as casually elegant as his attire. They betrayed a taut nervousness as he clumsily adjusted the angle of the light.
The beam wavered, and then picked out a chair. Hawk was tied to it, the high slatted back and coiling of rope making him look pitifully small.
Wrexford felt a surge of outrage.
The boy’s face was purpled with bruises and one eye was nearly swollen shut.
“It’s almost dark. You had better pray that Mrs. Sloane turns the Earl of Wrexford over to the authorities. Else you are going to die.”
Hawk stared at him in defiant silence.
The earl mouthed a silent curse. He couldn’t reach for his weapon without risking that Lowell would spot him.
“Actually, you’re going to die whatever she does.”
Hawk had the temerity to laugh. “Ye daft bastard—ye think she ain’t smart enough te know that? She won’t squibble on His Nibs. He’ll come find ye, and I won’t be the only one wiv the Devil’s pitchfork poking up my arse.”
His face mottling with fury, Lowell cocked a fist and hit the boy with a hard punch that landed flush on the jaw.
Hawk’s head snapped back and blood spurted from his lip. It took a moment for him to shake off the shock, and then . . .
Wrexford watched as Hawk inhaled deeply through his nose and then spit out a broken tooth with an audible whoosh. The tiny missile shot through the air with pinpoint accuracy and hit his tormentor smack in the eye.
Bloody hell—the little imp possessed more backbone than most men.
Lowell cried out in pain and slapped out another blow. “I swear, I shall beat you until you scream for mercy.”
“Hit as hard as ye like. Ye ain’t never gonna make me cry.”
Lowell gave a nasty laugh. “You worthless little piece of gutter scum. Much as I’d enjoy killing you now, I’d rather wait and make that she-bitch watch me cut your throat while she begs for your life. Oh, you’ll cry then—in fact, you’ll squeal like a stuck pig for I’ll take care to do it slowly.”
Hawk blinked as the man taunted him with a series of high-pitched snorting sounds.
“Enjoy your last night alive, brat,” finished Lowell, finally tiring of tormenting the boy. Taking up the lantern, he turned on his heel and stalked off.
Wrexford waited until the door clanged shut, then quickly wriggled his way to the rope and pulley.