2. Chapter 2
Istep out of the shadows, a pillar of protection blocking the officers as they fly down the hill. “Good evening, gentlemen.”
They scramble to a stop with a spray of snow. “Beg pardon, madam. Stand aside, please!”
They sidestep, and again I block their progress. “I suggest you turn back.” I stare them down, daring them to lay a finger on a lady. “I’ve a talent for causing trouble.”
“Halt!” A yell echoes from across the hill. “You there!” Two officers up the embankment have been beset upon by the vagrants. A small riot is gathering.
I give a pointed look. “Pray, will you let your fellow officers suffer at their hands while you assail me?”
They exchange looks. “You’d best clear out, miss,” says one, then they sprint back under the arches toward the chaos on the other side.
The moment they’re gone, I lurch through the crumbling doorway, scaling the steps two at a time into the remains of the old church tower. Halfway up I collide with the man on the stair, and my back hits the wall. I step down and oh, how my heart pounds to see Papa’s coat up close again.
I should leave before the situation worsens, but that coat beckons me with a pulsing heat in my chest. I will not let it out of my sight. “Come along.” I touch the man’s arm with one gloved hand.
He springs back, as if I’ve come to march him to the guillotine. “Leave me be.”
“I’m not arresting you, you absurd creature. Merely attempting to rescue you.”
He hovers in the shadows of the stairwell, clutching a worn rucksack, eyes alight. He doesn’t wish to follow me. But the police will find him here eventually, or catch him if he runs alone. He’s trapped.
“Here,” I say, my patience thinning terribly. “Put this on.” I twirl off my red velvet cloak and toss it to him. He holds it out as if it might bite him. “Give me that.” I point at the frock coat as if it’s nothing to me. He stares, narrowing his already slitted eyes.
The noise below intensifies.
“Now!” I hiss.
He throws it to me and I shove my arms into the sleeves as I drag its new owner down the crumbling steps. He slips out the door in my red cape and moves, without harassment, up the bank and toward the walk. A moment later, I exit, head down.
A hand yanks me ‘round by the arm, tossing me into the snow. One glance at my frightened face, my pristine gown beneath the frock coat, and the officer lowers his truncheon and moves on with a terse warning.
I rise and scramble up the embankment opposite the most wretched brawl I’ve seen this side of London’s West End. Once I’ve distanced myself, I slow and close my eyes for a moment, inhaling deeply, hoping a trace of my father remains in that tattered old thing.
It does not.
I catch up to the man in my cloak just outside the huddled shops of Fore Street, among the shabby buildings all crammed together.
“There!” The shout echoes from a distance.
An officer is pointing at us. “He started it all.” Two officers give chase, and we duck into a narrow alley that reeks of Exeter’s seedy underbelly.
The streets are slick as we sprint up one and down another, finally flattening our backs against a rough mortar wall in a nearly hidden inlet.
It is ripe with putrid aromas. I brace myself, panting.
The rescued man glares at me, then his gaze flicks past me as if expecting someone else—someone worse—to come for him. He shrugs off my cloak and tosses it back as running boots echo on pavement nearby.
I wrap Papa’s coat around me more tightly. “This coat,” I say, rubbing the scratchy fabric of the arms. “Where did you get it?”
His frown deepens, as if any question is invasive. He holds a finger to his lips.
More boots clatter by.
“Have you heard of a man called Silas Snow?”
“What’s it to you?” he whispers.
“Is he here?”
“No one by that name under the bridge.”
“He must be—”
“No.” Another grimace, hard and final. His voice is low. “You don’t seem to understand. I cannot be arrested. Cannot.”
I stare at him, this gaunt man covered in layers of rags, pale face hidden behind a dark beard.
“They’re gone for the moment,” I say, braving a normal voice.
The man glares. He thinks it mindless chatter, my questions about the coat.
The truth tingles on the tip of my tongue.
Yet I look into that haggard face, the pure panic showing the whites of his slanted eyes, and for a moment I see another face.
Another terrified man needing protection that I hope someone is providing while I cannot.
And I make a rather generous offer instead—one I have no business making.
“How would you like a change of circumstances, sir?”
He grimaces, fisting and opening his hands. “Charity?”
“A welcome. Come to my home for the holiday, where you can warm your feet by the fire, eat your fill, dry your… these.” I gesture at his clothing. “What do you say?” I hold out my gloved hand.
His gaze snaps from my white glove to my face, staring long enough to send shivers up my back. “What’s your scheme?”
I drop my hand. “It would seem the poor aren’t the only ones judged by their appearance.”
“Take your benevolence to some other bridge.”
He turns away, but I touch his arm. “Wait.”
He stops.
“What are you running from?”
He flashes me a look as if I’ve gone mad.
“My home is a fair sight better than this place, I assure you. It is rather remote, I’ll admit, but—”
“How remote?” He faces me quite suddenly, eyes narrowing. Cords tense up and down his neck.
My pulse triples. “Not a soul enters Dunn House that is not expressly invited. I vow it.” I’m barely welcome there as it is—and if Uncle knew what I was about this moment, I’d be out on my ear.
I might be yet. Unless I’m clever about it, offering this man a home for the holidays might just cost me mine.
Yet I cannot bear to go without him. Without the coat.
He presses his shoulders back, keeping a wary eye on the end of the alley, then holds out his hand. “My coat,” he orders.
No. My coat.
I touch the patches, then force myself to slip off Papa’s old frock coat, fold it in half, and hand it back. Yes… yes, I need this man at Dunn House. Even if it costs me everything.
He tosses me my fine velvet cloak, turns to go, and my words tumble out. “Yes, it’s charity, perhaps, but oh please do come, only for dinner. Please.”
Shifting his muscles beneath the coat, he throws me one last look of disdain and slips out of the alley.
But then… I see them before he does—a crowd of police officers descends upon the bridge in the distance. I yank him back by a fistful of frock coat and peek out. They’re swarming the place, rounding people up, throwing them like sacks of flour into prison carts.
He lowers his head, shoving dark hair off his face and sucking in long breaths. Then he lifts his pale face to me. “It’s completely remote, this house?”
“You have my word.”
He studies me a moment more. A police whistle sounds far too close.
I huff. “Don’t be stubborn. It’ll be the end of you, you know.” I slip my hand gently in the crook of his arm and tug. “Come on, now.” Surprisingly, he yields.
Anchored to one another’s side, we move quickly through the streets, myself and this man with bowed head and stooped shoulders attempting to shrink into nothing.
I’m shocked and slightly alarmed that he moves with me so effortlessly, even though I invited him myself, desperately wished for him to accept.
As I realize the weight of my actions, my heart pounds an erratic what-have-you-done?
He’s deathly afraid of arrest, clearly dodging the police, and carrying more baggage than the threadbare rucksack over his shoulder.
And soon this tall stranger will be entering my home, sitting at my table.
He’ll have access to a wealth of baubles and trinkets, any of which might set him up nicely for a year at least.
Trust, Uncle always says, is a failure of one’s imagination. Though as we crunch through snow up the steep and winding road toward the train, my imagination conjures countless possibilities of how this might end terribly.
But the coat. I stop myself from laying my cheek against the sleeve, drinking in the feel of it… and remembering. I might have relented and let this stranger be, but my mind hitches on one fact—when I asked if he knew Silas Snow, he had not said no.
The sun is orange and low ahead, nearly swallowed by the horizon, and with a jolt I recall that I slipped my maid—which means she’ll be worried.
How long have I been missing? The journey from London has proven arduous, and this changeover in Exeter far too short.
How long was it meant to be—twenty minutes?
Half an hour? I’ve pushed the bounds of even that.
Gripping his arm, I weave through the crowded streets, up St. David’s Hill and past rows of terraced houses, then porters hauling trunks on their shoulders. A train whistle sounds in the distance and I urge him on.
This will never work. What becomes of me if the train has left already? I would be alone with this stranger, this man who for some reason is ducking from the police. Would my maid remain behind, or abandon me and go on to the seashore?
“Why the rush?” he asks, his voice low and steady again. “We’ve slipped the bobbies, haven’t we?”
“And now we must meet the train.” I tug my hand free and, abandoning him for a moment, sprint to the counter.
I can scarcely undo the strings of my reticule to fish out my sixpence, my hands shake so.
I purchase his ticket and return, but his expression has changed.
He does not look at me. I tug his arm but he remains fixed in place, frowning at the train that has pulled into the station with a hiss and squeal of brakes. “Where exactly is this dinner?”
“My uncle’s seaside estate.” I bite my lip. “In St. Ives.”
He pulls back. “You’re daft. I’ll not be going clear to St. Ives.”
“Of course you will. I’ve bought your ticket.” I flatten the stub against his chest.
Yet with that brief touch, the world slows, and the chaos softens. His heart beats a solid rhythm against my palm, and as I look up, my rush melts away under that penetrating, narrow-eyed gaze, layer by layer—no one has ever looked at me so directly before.
Something deep and powerful resides beneath his countenance.
“Please come.” My voice is soft now, my throat thick, as I grab hold of the coat’s lapels. “Please. It would mean ever so much to me.”
He runs a hand along his grizzled beard, gaze darting around, then does a double take—a trio of uniformed policemen cross the platform. They’re looking for someone.
He pivots, face cast down. “Let’s go.”
With that, I shuffle him onto the third class car on the Great Western Railway train bound for Penzance, glancing over my shoulder to make certain they haven’t followed. “It isn’t the finest accommodation, but…”
He offers a quick smile, as if he understands he’ll be far more comfortable in third class than among the uptight passengers of first. Or in the back of a police wagon. He throws his rucksack over his shoulder and climbs aboard, vanishing into the darkness.
I exhale, allowing myself a moment to breathe, then hurry toward my first-class car.
“Miss Rosalyn!” The voice is jarring. “Oh miss, you’re alive!” My maid Sally throws herself at me, near squeezing the life out of me. “That vagabond—has he—?”
“I’m perfectly well, Sally.”
The constable steps out from behind her. “We have a fair number of tramps about these parts, miss, with the alms house overrun. Best to stay clear of them. Was that man bothering you? I’ll see to it he’s taken in.”
He moves past, but I plant myself before him. “Then what, pray, will you do with him if the poorhouse is full?”
“They’re using the old gaol for now. I’ll make certain he ends the night in there. He’ll not be sharing your train.”
“Oh, but he will.” I cross my arms, barring his way. “I’ve bought him a ticket.”
“You’ve what?” Sally shrieks.
In Dunn House, there are two camps—Uncle Elias’ and mine. Concerning politics, society, the running of the household, we are diametrically opposed. Every servant, guest, and neighbor is in one camp or the other.
Sally, my maid, is firmly in his.
The whistle sounds and the conductor calls for final boarding. “I appreciate your concern, officer,” I say, brushing past him. “Truly, I do. Good day, sir.” With a less-than-gentle shove to my maid’s back, I hurry us through a puff of steam and into our car.
Sally turns in the aisle, mouth open, but I lift a finger to silence her. “Not a word, Sally. We may speak of anything you wish… except him.”
“Very well then, let’s talk of how your uncle will have your head—and then mine!” Her voice squeaks.
“Let me worry about Uncle Elias.” I’ll be doing precisely that for the remainder of the trip as it is.
Tucking my skirts beneath me, I sink back into my seat, pull out my notebook, and stare thoughtfully out at the swirling snow from which that man is now sheltered.
But for what purpose? And at what cost? My heart will not cease pounding.
My Dear Mr. Dickens,
I’d like you to know that your serials have inspired a recent act of charity—no, an act of boldness.
I’ve found a man who might pass for one of your wonderfully drawn characters—a man down on his luck, a man haunted by something—and brought him home for the holidays.
The trouble is, I’ve an uncle there who also resembles one of your characters—Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge.
Mr. Dickens, I’m afraid I’ve ruined Christmas.