Chapter 51
The Consequences of Failure
… and all that remained was to marshal themselves …
Jane Austen, Persuasion
Rosalind froze where she stood. From the corner of her eye, she saw Adam raise his hands.
“One move toward her,” grated Spence from behind Rosalind, “and I’ll shoot you both dead, so help me I will.”
Now, Rosalind raised her own hands, although more awkwardly, because she was still cradling the unlit lamp.
Adam turned, and Rosalind turned with him.
Spence stood between them and the stable door. He still had his knife, but it was sheathed at his belt. In his hands, he held a shotgun, and it was pointed straight at Adam.
“What is the matter with you two?” demanded Elizabeth, storming forward to stand beside Spence. “I told you! All you had to do was wait quietly. God in heaven!” She shook her head. “I’m sorry, Nathanial. I thought they’d be rational. What should we do now?”
“What we said,” answered Spence. “Separate them. Let them understand that the other will be safe only as long as they behave themselves.” He set the gun’s stock against his shoulder. “You take her. I’ll take care of Mr. Harkness, here.”
For one wild minute, Rosalind wanted to beg. Please, please, don’t hurt him. We’ll do anything you say, just don’t hurt him. …
But Adam was not begging, nor trembling. Adam was not even blinking. He had gone absolutely still, his attention entirely fixed on Spence, and the gun. Rosalind shoved all her fear behind her. She would not cower. Not here, not now. Whatever came next, she would not do that.
Elizabeth moved to the wall and pulled down a leather strap from among the harnesses, bridles, and other equine accoutrement hanging there. Rosalind could not tell which bit of tack it was, and this left her feeling absurdly frustrated.
Elizabeth moved to stand in front of Rosalind and seemed to take her full measure for the first time.
“What’s under there?” She set the lantern down and dug underneath Rosalind’s cloak and found the lamp she’d held in the crook of her elbow.
She held it up. “Oh, excellent. I was afraid I might have to lead you around in the dark, and I know you do not like that.” She set the lamp down beside the lantern. “Now, give me your wrists.”
The presence of Spence and his shotgun made any thought of resistance impossible, so Rosalind did as she was told. Elizabeth wrapped the strap twice around Rosalind’s wrists and cinched it tight.
“There.” Elizabeth stepped back, as if admiring her handiwork. “I’ll put her in the stillroom,” she said to Spence.
“Good idea,” he grunted.
Elizabeth lit the lamp, lifted it up, and took hold of the long end of Rosalind’s strap in her free hand. “Come along, Miss Thorne.”
Rosalind looked toward Adam. He met her gaze, although his face remained as still as the rest of him. But Rosalind read all the feeling in his eyes. And knew he saw hers.
They would find each other again. No matter what.
Spence kept the gun pointed at Adam while Elizabeth led Rosalind back out into the pouring rain.
Raindrops hissed against the lamp’s glass housing and the flame guttered as the drops touched the wick.
They crossed the cobbled yard, splashing straight through the many puddles, until they came to a low building
“Hold that.” Elizabeth thrust the lamp into Rosalind’s hands and moved to unbar a door.
For a wild moment, Rosalind thought about running into the dark.
But which way would she go, and what would happen to Adam?
Even if she dared to risk flight, she would surely be caught, and with her hands bound like this, she could hardly fight off Elizabeth, let alone Spence and his shotgun.
Rosalind ground her teeth together in frustration.
Elizabeth had the door open. She took the lamp from Rosalind’s hands and ushered them both inside.
The flickering lamplight showed Rosalind the blocky remains of an ancient brick stove, some dusty shelves, and a single cracked bottle that had been left behind as a last testament to the cordials and syrups that had once been brewed here.
The stillroom had one window, high up over the stove. It was more of a vent, really, with a wooden screen over it instead of glass.
“Sit there.” Elizabeth gestured to the corner. There was no furniture. Rosalind sat on the floor, an awkward business with her hands tied as they were. “Put your legs out straight.”
Once more, Rosalind did as she was told. What choice did she have?
Elizabeth shoved Rosalind’s skirts aside and produced another leather strap. This she wrapped around Rosalind’s ankles.
“What is it you still hope to accomplish, Elizabeth?” Rosalind asked her as she worked. “You cannot possibly manage your substitution scheme now.”
“Poor Pride,” Elizabeth murmured. “Do you know, the only reason we even still have her is that no one would buy her from us? But no.” She sighed and sat back on her heels. “You’re right. We cannot enter that race, not that we’d ever planned to.”
“Then what—”
“I rather think it’s none of your business.
” Elizabeth stood and dusted off her hands.
“But, if you must know, Spence has informed Mrs. Lynn’s confederates that if they don’t want to be implicated in my father’s murder, and maybe the admiral’s as well, they’ll hand over the money she stole from us. ”
“She stole from you?” said Rosalind.
“She robbed us,” Elizabeth spat. “At least, she was planning to. She meant to slip away ahead of our agreed upon time, with all the money. What a pretty pair of fools we must have looked to her!”
“And that’s why you’ve turned on her?”
“She deserves it,” Elizabeth sneered. “And much more. She is the reason my father is dead and that we are any of us in this mess. Including you and your man out there.” She jerked her chin toward the door.
“You know that it was Mr. Spence who killed Admiral Walsingham,” said Rosalind softly.
Elizabeth bit her lip. She was sorry, but once again, she was not surprised.
“That was my fault,” she said. “I should never have told Nathanial about the admiral bursting in on us as he did. But I was afraid. Walsingham said he’d been to the stables.
He’d guessed the plan, or I thought he had.
If he told people …” she didn’t finish that. “Nathanial never wanted to kill him.”
“And your father?”
“Nathanial had nothing to do with his death.” Her answer was quick, her voice certain. Rosalind found she was inclined to believe it.
“Was it you, then?” Rosalind asked.
“I have nothing more to say to you.”
“All I ask is that you tell me why you are still here. If you were planning to escape, why not just go—”
“We need the money,” said Elizabeth bluntly.
“Canada is a long way from here, and starting a new life does not come cheap. You and Mr. Harkness cannot be allowed to interfere while we’re waiting for Mrs. Lynn’s people to bring us what we are owed.
When we have the money in hand, we will leave and you will be released, as I promised. ”
“I do not think her confederates will agree to pay you.”
Elizabeth lifted her chin. “Her confederates are a set of cowardly moneylenders. They will do as they are told.”
“Her confederates,” said Rosalind, “are her brother and her daughter.”
“What?” cried Elizabeth.
Rosalind arched her brows in mock surprise. “You did not know? Mr. Wallace, who dealt with the moneylenders at the card parties, is Mrs. Lynn’s brother. And her daughter was working in London to bring yet more gamblers.”
“Of course,” said Elizabeth. “She told me all about it.”
But she was lying. Here, at last, Rosalind saw she had a chance.
If Elizabeth could be convinced matters were not under as much control as she thought—if she understood there was more to this than she knew—her confidence might be shaken, she might be ready to change her mind about the risks she and Spence were running.
“Mr. Wallace has already left Bath,” said Rosalind. “I expect he has gone to fetch the daughter, and to fly with her. Neither he nor Mrs. Lynn would allow the young woman to be entangled in an affair that has become a hanging offense.”
“Then Mrs. Lynn will hang in her daughter’s place,” said Elizabeth coldly. “This Wallace must know that.”
Rosalind met Elizabeth’s gaze. “I expect she has accepted this.”
Elizabeth snorted. “You give her far too much credit.”
“Do I?” asked Rosalind. “Will you bet your future on that? Your life? Think, Elizabeth. How much have you and your sisters done for each other, and your father, even after he had driven you all to ruin? A parent will do as much for a child.”
Elizabeth looked toward the door. Her mouth moved, shaping silent words. Rosalind held her breath.
Elizabeth took up the lamp and walked out the door without looking back.
Having gotten a look at the attic room, and what had happened to the door, Spence decided to take Adam down to the root cellar.
He made Adam carry the lantern, so he could follow behind with the gun pointed right at Adam’s back.
The lantern’s unsteady light showed the cellar’s rough, earthen walls and hard-packed floors.
There were some wooden shelves littered with sacks and boxes, along with some coils of cord of the sort that would be useful for hanging washing and binding sacks.
Some rakes and shovels leaned in the corner.
“Stop there,” Spence ordered him, and Adam stopped.
“Don’t you move.”
Adam didn’t move. He thought about it. He could swing the lantern, blind Spence for a moment, make him drop the gun. …
But it was already too late. Spence had braced the gun against his hip, and grabbed up one of the coiled lengths of cord.
“Lie down, on your back, keep that lantern up.”
Again, Adam did as he was told. He laid flat on his back and held his arms straight up, the lantern balanced on his cupped palms. It was a smart decision, he thought idly. It would be very hard for him to launch any kind of attack from this angle.
Spence leaned the gun against the wall, and laid the knife on the floor, where he could get to it well before Adam.
He wrapped the cord tight around Adam’s wrists, making the light judder.
“You can still get yourself out of this, Spence.”
“Too late for that.” Spence yanked his knot tight and then sliced the cord off with his knife.
“Because you killed Admiral Walsingham?” asked Adam.
Spence didn’t answer, which was answer enough.
“We never wanted any of this,” he said through gritted teeth as he set about trussing up Adam’s legs with the rest of the cord.
“We wanted to get married. That’s all.” He drew the knot so tight Adam winced, and the lantern in his hands wobbled again.
“We didn’t even plan to stay and embarrass her family.
We planned to go to Canada, buy a bit of land, raise a new line of horses there. All we needed was the money.”
Adam said nothing, just let the man talk. He kept his attention on the gun against the wall, and on the shelves, and all the tools arrayed around them.
“At first we thought we could get some money out of her father,” Spence was saying.
“Elizabeth was sure she could talk him around, or maybe fake an engagement with some indebted titled fool so he’d have to offer up a dowery of some kind.
The fool would take a share and disappear before the wedding, and we’d run away with the rest.
“But then we found out there was no money. None.” He sheathed the knife, and stood, lifting the lantern off Adam’s palms. “That blind fool who called himself her father was living on his credit, and whatever could be scraped together on the quarter day. We couldn’t even rob him,” he spat again.
“So, we decided that we’d have to try something else. ”
“Was that why she killed him?” Adam asked.
“She didn’t kill him.”
“Who did?”
“I wish to God I knew.” Spence took up his gun. “I’d beat their fool head in with my bare fists.”