Chapter 15
The Warehouse on the River
At twenty past ten, the box left Penelope's house by the service door.
Alistair watched it from the shadow of a shut-up stable across the street. Two servants carried it to a light coach with no arms on the door. The weight cost them enough effort to confirm it, though the waxed cloth hid the shape.
Graeme was nearer, dressed in the dark clothes of a quay porter. When the coach started, he waited for it to turn the corner and followed on foot.
Dugald came up beside Alistair.
"The dark ribbon is in the window."
The signal confirmed that Diana had found the new hour. It did not make the operation safe. Penelope had already changed the transfer once without telling Malcolm and could do it again.
"How many came out of the house?" Alistair asked.
"The coachman and two men. None of them is Malcolm."
"He may be waiting at the warehouse."
Dugald looked at the empty street.
"Or somewhere else."
Alistair closed his coat over the binding that protected the stitching.
Eight days had given his movements steadiness back; freedom would take longer.
When he turned, the skin still pulled under the léine.
Iain would have kept him at the shelter.
Diana would have made better arguments and arrived at the same result.
Neither of them was there.
"Come on."
They went by streets parallel to the river, keeping their distance from the coach. The air carried silt, wet timber, and coal. In the lower lanes, dark water threw back the few lanterns fixed to the walls.
One of Dugald's men was waiting near the ropewalk. He put two fingers to his cap when he saw them.
"The box went in by the back door. Graeme's still on the north side. Four men outside."
"More than before," Dugald said.
"Any movement on the quay?"
"A small boat tied at the mooring. No crew."
Alistair watched the warehouse. The stone building took up almost the whole length of the block. The door facing the river stayed shut. Two lanterns lit the main entrance, where Boyd's men pretended to talk without taking their eyes off the street.
The passage between the warehouse and the ropewalk ran narrow and wet, with no light in it. Alistair went in first, with Dugald and two more MacLeods behind him. The rough wall scraped his shoulder. At the end, a low door opened onto the back of the building.
Graeme appeared beside a stack of crates.
"The box is inside," he murmured. "The coach has gone. Two men stayed."
"Did you see Malcolm?"
"No."
"Boyd?"
"Nor him."
The absence of the two men with the most to lose should have stopped the operation. Alistair looked at the door, then at the high window above it. A light moved inside.
The map might be a few steps away.
"We take the key and go in."
A guard came into the yard, looking for shelter from the wind against the wall. Graeme reached him before he caught the movement. One hand covered his mouth; the other twisted his arm back. Dugald took the key out of the man's pocket and handed him to the two MacLeods.
"No blood," Alistair said.
They tied the guard and left him behind the crates.
The key turned without resistance.
The inside of the warehouse was broken up by rows of shelving and stacked bales. The smell of wet wool mixed with tar off the quay. A lamp burned on a table near the back.
No one came to meet them.
Alistair raised a hand. The group split.
Graeme checked the rows on the north side. Dugald moved along the wall. Alistair took the central aisle, listening for the smallest sound. The wooden floor gave under their boots in different places, and there was no hidden breathing, no metal coming out of a scabbard.
They found the first guard behind the table, senseless, with an empty bottle beside him. The second was asleep on a bench with his head down against his chest.
Graeme put two fingers to the man's neck.
"Laudanum or strong drink."
"Put here to be found," Dugald said.
The box sat in the middle of an empty space. The waxed cloth had been taken off. Pale wood, a new lock, carriage marks on the sides.
Alistair knelt in front of it.
The wound pressed against the binding. He ignored it.
Dugald handed him a short iron bar. The lock gave on the second try.
Inside was cloth.
Layers of blue wool, gray silk, and undyed linen filled the box almost to the rim. Graeme pulled out the first lengths and threw them on the floor. Under them he found a sacking bundle tied with cord.
Too heavy for parchment.
Alistair cut the knot.
An iron weight, the kind used on cargo scales, dropped against the bottom of the box.
The sound went through the warehouse.
Graeme went still.
"She brought us here."
Alistair looked at the wool spread on the floor. Cloth from Penelope's house. A package built to look valuable. Guards put to sleep, an easy door, Malcolm absent.
The whole operation had been left there for them.
"The object was to keep us away from the house," Dugald said.
Alistair was already on his feet.
The quick movement pulled the stitching and spread heat under the binding.
"Graeme, with me. Dugald, pull the men off their positions and close the withdrawal to the north."
Steps ran in the yard.
One of the MacLeods came in without waiting for the signal.
"Message from the cooperage."
He handed Graeme a narrow strip of linen. Two lines of stitching crossed the cloth. The third had been cut through the middle and knotted dark.
The agreed signal for capture.
Alistair took the cloth.
"Who brought it?"
"A boy of the washerwoman's. He said the red-haired girl pushed him out the kitchen door and told him to run."
"Is Eliza free?"
"She was when she sent him."
Graeme took the tied guard by the collar.
"How many men went to the house?"
The man shut his mouth.
Graeme put him against the wall.
"Answer."
"I don't know."
The pressure increased.
"Malcolm had a note," the guard said. "He sent for a coach and six men. That's all I heard."
Alistair let the cloth go. The strip of linen fell across the blue wool.
Six men. A coach.
Diana.
"We're going now."
The door facing the river opened before they reached the passage. Two men came in with pistols up. Dugald put the first one down against a bale. Graeme struck the second one's wrist before the shot. The report burst inside the warehouse and tore splinters out of a beam.
Alistair took the pistol and hit the man with the butt.
He did not wait for him to fall.
Outside, a church bell struck eleven.
They ran up the lane. The effort reached Alistair's side with every stride, hot and wet under the léine. Graeme caught it when he slowed.
"The wound?"
"Keep going."
"If you go down, I'm not coming back for you."
"Liar."
Graeme did not spend breath answering.
The first street was clear. In the second, a cart set crosswise blocked the way. An axle had been taken off and flour sacks filled the space between the wheels and the walls. Two men were arguing with a driver under a lantern.
"Prepared," Graeme said.
Alistair turned off into a passage between houses.
At the far end they met a night patrol coming on in formation. The officer raised a hand.
"The street is closed."
"Why?" Graeme asked.
"Theft on the quay."
The news could not have reached that street yet. Penelope or Malcolm had arranged the block as well.
Alistair turned away before the officer decided to examine their clothes. They went down a narrow stair to the tanners' street, where the smell of dressed hides and lime burned in the throat.
Another block waited at the far end: empty barrels, two riderless horses, and men pretending to mend a wheel.
"She knows the routes," Graeme said.
"She knows the routes we used before."
Alistair pointed to a low wall on the left. They climbed into the yard of a brewery, went between the vats, and came out by a gate onto the upper street.
Penelope's house was three blocks away.
A third-floor window stood open. The dark ribbon still hung from the catch, useless now. No light moved behind it.
The front door stayed shut. There was a man on the step and another at the corner.
Graeme caught Alistair before he crossed the street.
"By the side."
They went around by a narrow passage. The service door stood open. A maid was crying against the wall with Ellis holding her up. Eliza came into the yard with no cloak and her hair loose over one shoulder.
Graeme reached her first.
"Where's Diana?"
Eliza looked at Alistair.
There was no color in her face.
"Malcolm came in at the back while Penelope kept Diana in the drawing room. Two men held Ellis. I was in the linen room when I heard it."
"Penelope?" Alistair asked.
"She left before that, in a small coach. She took the leather bag and a box I didn't see."
The map.
Penelope had used Malcolm to draw the MacLeods off and left with what she wanted.
"Diana," Graeme said again.
Eliza closed her fingers on her own skirt.
"She fought. I heard something break. By the time I got to the corridor, Malcolm already had her."
Alistair looked at the open gate.
"How long ago?"
"Minutes."
The sound of wheels came from the street.
He ran.
His side burned. The binding gave somewhere, and his legs kept going. He reached the corner as a dark carriage picked up speed in the north street.
"Horses!" Graeme shouted behind him.
Alistair went on up the middle of the street.
The carriage passed under a lantern. For a second the window curtain came away.
Diana was inside.
A man had her shoulder and was pulling her back from the glass. Her face turned toward the street and found his.
Her bound hand struck the window.
The carriage turned the corner and was gone.