Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
Much to his surprise, Jonathan found a place on the other side of fear that allowed him to push forward, even though he knew his and Charlie’s lives could be in horrible danger.
He was numb as he rose from the fallen tree and took Charlie’s hand to make their way back up to the house.
He had no idea what waited for them, out in the darkness of Fairford’s grounds, in the house, or for the rest of his life once they escaped this place.
And they would escape it. That was the one thing Jonathan was certain of. He and Charlie would leave Fairford house, no matter what it took, and he would make everything up to Charlie for the trouble he’d put the young man through.
But first, they needed to make it back to their room.
“I don’t see anyone,” Jonathan said, peering out from the edge of the trees and surveying the moon-kissed meadow around them. “They might have given up searching for us.”
“They don’t know where we are.”
Jonathan glanced over his shoulder at Charlie, uncertain whether his words meant whomever Dalhurst had searching for them would be looking elsewhere or whether they were a supposition that no one was truly looking for them at all.
He could not risk everything on the hope that Dalhurst was not as suspicious of him and Charlie as he had sounded earlier.
He couldn’t stay where he was either, though.
He squeezed Charlie’s hand tighter, waited until another bank of clouds covered the moon, then started out across the meadow toward the house at as fast a pace as he dared.
The grounds continued to be dark and silent as they crossed the meadow, then found their way to one of the paths that circled around to the back of the manor house. Jonathan was just beginning to let his guard down when he spotted a shadowy figure loitering near the side of the laundry.
“We cannot go this way,” Jonathan whispered, pulling Charlie back in the other direction, keeping to the shadows as much as they could.
Neither of them spoke as they walked around the house the other way, looking for a door that was unlocked and unguarded. The first door they tried was locked tight, and the front door was watched over by two men Jonathan hadn’t seen at all during the length of their stay.
It was a stroke of pure, blind luck that they found themselves on the side of the house where one of the disused morning parlors was located just as one of its windows was thrust open. At first, Jonathan reeled back, throwing out an arm to protect Charlie and push him back against the house’s wall.
A moment later, Jonathan let out a breath of surprise when the pale-faced maid lifted a leg over the windowsill and climbed through it.
The maid dropped to the ground in the grass and instantly spotted Jonathan and Charlie. She gasped as if she would scream, but stopped herself at the last second. As Jonathan pulled Charlie to approach her, she slowly rose on shaky legs and looked at them with terror in her eyes.
Jonathan was certain the young woman would scream and sound the alarm, but when Charlie stepped forward, she leaned toward him.
“They’re searching for you,” the young woman whispered.
Charlie nodded, letting go of Jonathan’s hands and closing the distance between them. “We know,” he said. His voice turned tearful as he continued with, “They took him.”
The young woman’s face crumpled. “I was too late.”
Charlie shook his head. “It was my fault.”
“No, it wasn’t.” The young woman grabbed his hands. “They’ve been planning to move him for weeks. I thought there was time.”
“Do you know where they’re taking him?” Charlie asked her.
She shook her head, tears glinting in her eyes. “I’m going for the constable,” she squeaked out, letting go of Charlie’s hands. “If he’ll believe me. He is my cousin, so he might.”
The lightness Jonathan felt for half a second at the maid’s mention of the police crashed down a moment later.
There was very little chance any country constable who owed their position to Lord Frome would believe any accusation a housemaid brought against him, even if he was her cousin. But it was the only hope they had.
“Do what must be done,” he told the woman, stepping forward and resting a hand on Charlie’s waist, more to anchor himself than anything else. “We will do what we can from here.”
The maid studied Jonathan warily for a moment, then nodded and dashed off into the dark.
Jonathan watched her go, praying that she made it to her destination, but deeply worried that the shadowy figures who now seemed to patrol Fairford House would catch her before she got far.
“We need to be inside,” Jonathan told Charlie quietly.
Charlie nodded slowly as he, too, watched the maid go, likely as fearful for her safety as Jonathan was.
There was nothing they could do to help her, but she had inadvertently helped them. The window she’d climbed out of was still open, and with a bit of effort, Jonathan was able to give Charlie a hand up and over the sill into the house, then to climb in after him.
The parlor was dark, but there was enough light spilling in from the hall that Jonathan noticed at once they had a problem.
Their trek through the ground of Fairford House had left both him and Charlie damp from dew and decorated with bits of grass and dirt.
Anyone who intercepted them as they tried to make it up to their rooms would know they’d been outside.
“This isn’t ideal,” Jonathan sighed, bending to brush his trousers off.
Charlie did the same, but neither of them got very far before the sound of footsteps and men talking echoed from the hall. Jonathan straightened and grabbed him, tugging Charlie to the wall just beside the doorway so they wouldn’t be seen if the men passed them.
“—jolly good time,” Copeland’s voice became distinct as the footsteps grew near. “And my membership is secure, I take it?”
“Yes, yes, of course,” Hammond’s voice answered him moments before the two men crossed by the doorway. “Provided you pay your dues.”
Copeland laughed. “Oh, yes, my dues. I think we both know what that means. But if you’re able to provide entertainment nearly as interesting as Frome has provided, then I would be—”
Their voices faded as they disappeared down the hall.
Jonathan let out a breath and sagged against the wall for a moment. He and Charlie had gone unnoticed, and they were not the immediate topic of conversation. He could hold onto hope a bit longer.
He reached for Charlie’s hand again, and once he felt the security of Charlie’s warm palm against his and their fingers entwined, he started out into the hallway.
Immediately, he stood straighter and walked as if he owned the house. It stood to reason that if they were seen before they made it upstairs, he could pretend that nothing at all was amiss.
That plan lasted until they came near the front hall and the main staircase, the most exposed part of their flight to their rooms. As soon as Frome stepped out from the opposite hallway, a worried frown creasing his brow, Jonathan remembered that his excuse for being absent was supposed to be illness.
“Moorgate?” Frome flinched slightly at the sight of him. His gaze shot straight to Jonathan’s and Charlie’s joined hands. “Wherever have you been, man? The entire house is fretting about your health.”
Jonathan glanced to Charlie, then hunched over slightly. “They should be worried,” he said with what he hoped was a nauseated smile. “Though perhaps they should be more worried about the turtle soup than about me.”
Frome glanced him up and down, his frown returning, more puzzled than anxious now. “None of the others were taken ill.”
Jonathan thought he’d gotten away with something until Frome stepped closer to him and said, “You’ve been outside.”
“Yes,” Jonathan said with a wobbly smile. Keep smiling. Always smile. “I, er, I did not make it as far as my rooms when I departed supper earlier.”
“Did you not?” Frome’s expression tightened as he closed the remaining gap between them with calculated slowness. “The servants did not note your presence in any of the gardens.”
Frome knew. There was no chance at all that he was merely a pawn in someone else’s game, someone who was using his estate for their own purposes. He knew that Jonathan had, at some point, become aware of everything as well.
Jonathan stalled facing that truth and finding a way out of it by doubling over, his free hand held to his belly. He groaned as if he might be sick.
Frome stepped back, whatever certainty he’d had moments before faltering. “Are you certain you’re quite well?” he asked.
“Not at all,” Jonathan moaned.
“I found him near the laundry,” Charlie whispered, his voice shaky. “In the weeds.”
Frome hummed and took another step back. “No wonder they couldn’t find you.”
A jolt like electricity slithered across Jonathan’s skin. Frome could have meant something else, but it seemed very much as if he knew Dalhurst’s men had gone searching for him.
“I apologize for my illness,” he said, making a show of being in pain as he straightened.
“I very much regret imposing upon you, but I request the use of one of your carriages to take me and Charlie and our things to the station with all due haste. We may still be able to take the last train to London tonight, where I might find some relief.”
Frome hummed again doubtfully. “You do not need to go jaunting off across the countryside on a train in your condition, young Moorgate. You need bedrest and careful monitoring.”
Jonathan wanted to curse. In fact, if he truly had been ill with a stomach complaint, Frome would be right.
“I’ve no wish to impose on you,” he said.
“It is not an imposition at all,” Frome said, regaining some of his earlier cheeriness. “Perhaps if you retire to your room, your young man here, Charlie, can come with me to the kitchens so that he might fetch you some sort of carminative.”
Charlie tensed by Jonathan’s side, inching closer to him.