Scott hesitated. “My uncle would never agree.”
Mater arched an eyebrow, an expression all the Jonquils knew how to make. “I hadn’t intended to ask him.”
“There are perks to being a dowager countess,” Harold said, biting back a grin. Mater was fearsome when she needed to be.
“First things first.” Mater looked from one of them to the other. “How do we get her out of her room without requiring the staff to be involved? There’s no point ruining their lives while we’re saving hers.”
Scott nodded, his expression distant, as if thinking. “If we break the door down, he’ll notice and they’ll be blamed. Taking a more delicate approach would require more time, adding to the possibility that we’d be discovered. His valet is not the only minion Uncle has amongst the staff. Others are reporting her movements to him, but I do not know who the informers are.”
A delicate situation indeed.
Mater shook her head. “We must somehow protect the innocent servants from those willing to double-cross them while hiding our efforts from those waiting to tattle despite not knowing who they are and all while slipping Sarah out of the house unnoticed.”
Scott’s expression grew ever wearier. “And we know we will be caught if she so much as steps into the corridor of the house. The few times she has tried, she was found out quickly.”
“So we take her out the window,” Harold said.
They both turned shocked looks on him.
“I’ve been to Sarah’s sitting room. The window there overlooks a small grassy area enclosed by a wall. It appeared fairly secluded.”
“It is.” Scott’s tone was hesitantly curious.
“This gap under Sarah’s door, is it large enough that you could slip a rope to her?”
Mater’s mouth dropped open in an O.
“You want her to climb out?” Scott shook his head. “She’s never done anything like that.”
Harold set his shoulders. “But I have.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Harold led his brothers around the side of Sarvol House. They’d needed the remainder of the day to plan their strategy and procure enough dark-colored clothing for all seven of them. Jason was not present, of course, but Crispin had volunteered his efforts.
“I cannot believe we are doing this,” Layton said, a laugh beneath his quiet words. “We are grown gentlemen.”
“Are you daft?” Philip shot them all a grin, barely visible in the dimness of dusk. “This is my favorite day ever.”
They reached their predetermined spot around a corner of the house, inside the isolated, grassy courtyard beneath Sarah’s window.
Harold faced Philip, who had always been the leader in these efforts. “We’d best get to it.”
Philip gave a quick nod and motioned the others closer. “Brothers, there’s a prisoner in this house in need of our special skills. It will not be easy. There will be danger. Charlie will likely fall off the roof.”
Their youngest brother shook his head. He probably even rolled his eyes, but it was too dark to tell.
“Crispin, Charlie, you’ve spied your lookout posts?”
They both nodded.
“Bird whistles,” Philip reminded them. They needed to know if someone unexpected came too near but couldn’t risk calling attention by shouting. Though he was very nearly giddy at the opportunity to enact a bit of mischief, Philip was also taking this very seriously. Harold could not have been more grateful. “Stanley is waiting with the horses. Layton, Corbin, and I know our part. Harold most certainly knows his.”
Nods. Were they not about to undertake something clandestine and a little dangerous, they probably would have teased him mercilessly.
“Do not fail Miss Sarvol.” Philip set a fisted hand to his heart, the gesture they had long ago decided on when undertaking this type of mission. “We are the Jonquil Freers of Prisoners.”
In unison, they joined him in finishing the well-known motto, fists pressed to their hearts, voices quiet out of necessity. “No one is abandoned. No one is forgotten.”
Crispin and Charlie moved stealthily in the direction of their posts. Harold allowed himself only a moment to notice how much better Charlie was walking. He was nearly healed.
Corbin slipped the looped rope from his shoulder and handed it to Harold. “Be certain you”—He took a breath. Sentences seldom emerged whole from their quietest brother—“you don’t start until—Let me check the fit one more time.”
Philip had wisely suggested Corbin be the one entrusted with devising some kind of harness Harold would wear while climbing up. He’d never climbed this wall before, and the brief evaluation he’d been able to do earlier hadn’t been promising. He wasn’t about to climb it without something to catch him if he slipped. Corbin’s vast experience with horses had taught him to tie knots expertly.
He and Harold had pored over Father’s copy of A Voyage to St. Kilda, reading again and again M. Martin’s brief description of the fowler’s climb he’d witnessed and the harness-like contraption the climbers had used. They also found in another book about the history of the Far East wood-carving prints of the mountain crossings the people in those distant lands had undertaken by way of ropes and rope harnesses for more than a thousand years. Stanley had supplied what he had seen during battle when soldiers had scaled the fortified walls of cities using ropes.
Philip had jokingly suggested they ought to reference the holy book since the climb would be undertaken by a vicar. Harold had, admittedly smugly, pointed out that the spies who had entered Jericho in the book of Joshua had done so by climbing the wall assisted by rope. He’d meant the remark to give his brother back a bit of the teasing he so often tossed in Harold’s direction, but it had proven a moment of revelation for himself. Climbing was not the purview of a vicar, but it was referenced in the Bible and not in terms of disapproval. He’d not ever thought of that.
“Thank you for helping with this,” Harold said.
“No one is abandoned,” Corbin said.
“No one is forgotten.”
Corbin stepped back but didn’t leave. He, Layton, and, though likely no one realized it, Harold were the strongest of the brothers. Corbin and Layton, along with Philip, would be holding the other end of the rope, keeping Harold—and Sarah, when it was her turn—from falling.
Though his eldest brothers often tormented him, Harold could not mistake the concern he saw in Philip’s and Layton’s eyes.
“Are you equal to this?” Layton asked. “This is not a short climb.”
“It’s less daunting than the ascent to the nursery when we were children, and I made that many times. Without Corbin’s magic harness, I’ll add.”
Philip slapped a hand on his shoulder. “We did make good use of our monkey, didn’t we?”
Layton fought a smile but lost the battle. “How long has it been since we called you that?”
“Years.”
“Why did we stop? It’s perfect.” Did Philip truly not remember?
“You decided ‘Holy Harry’ was more to your liking.”
Layton watched him closely. “But I suspect it was not more to yours.”
“‘Monkey’ was devised to praise something about me. ‘Holy Harry’ was only ever meant to mock.”
“Well then.” Philip gave him a light push toward the wall. “Make your upward journey, Monkey. And we’ll do our best not to let go of the rope.”
“I would really prefer if you didn’t, just so we’re clear.”
Philip nodded. “We won’t let go, Harold. None of us would.”
There was something more in the declaration than a promise to safeguard his upcoming climb.
Harold grabbed a small pebble and lobbed it upward. It hit the window with a tap. He watched. Waited. Had she heard? Scott said he would tell her to listen and to be ready to esc
ape.
Her window opened.
“Are you ready for this, Harold?” Philip asked.
“I’ve been climbing all my life.” Sarah appeared in the now-open window. The bit of Harold’s heart that had ached for her the past weeks, the past years, warmed and softened at the mere sight of her. “For the first time, I think I know why.”
She gave a quick, silent wave, then disappeared inside again. A moment later, one end of a long rope dropped down to them. Shortly after, the other side followed. Her window had a middle bar dividing the two halves. The rope looped around that thick iron bar.
Harold pulled off his jacket, undid the cuffs of his shirtsleeves, and put on his climbing slippers. He needed every bit of help he could get. He grabbed the harness Corbin had fashioned for him and slipped his legs through the two large loops. He tied another section at his waist. Two other loops hooked over his shoulders.
Philip and Layton retrieved one end of the long rope, while Corbin snatched up the other. Corbin worked with a confident swiftness that was deeply reassuring. After a moment, he had his end of the long rope tied to the ropes looped around Harold’s body.
“This will hold?” Harold pressed.
“If I had any doubt, I would never let you go up.”
After everything his brothers had put him through over the years, receiving repeated assurances tonight that he mattered to them was a new experience. Did they have any idea how much he needed to hear that?
“Be careful,” Philip said.
“You be careful lowering her back down. If you drop her, I’ll kill you. All three of you.”
“Up with you, Monkey,” Layton said. “The longer we wait, the more likely it is we’ll be caught. None of us wants to risk the consequences that would fall on the servants or Scott.”
They knew without a doubt Mr. Sarvol could not actually prevent them from simply walking into the house, up to Sarah’s room, and back out with her. The man was frail, and there were a lot of Jonquils. But Mr. Sarvol would likely dismiss the butler for letting them in, the housekeeper for not preventing their departure, and any maids anywhere near Sarah’s room. Scott might even be punished under the assumption that he had been involved.
This was for the best, no matter that it was a little risky and a little ridiculous compared to the far easier approach. But none of them wished to see the servants’ rendered destitute by the evening’s efforts.
Harold tugged at the knot in his rope, testing the tightness. He approached the wall, wishing he’d had a chance to practice rather than making his first attempt in the dark.
Corbin lit and positioned the lanterns they’d brought, each equipped with mirrors that directed the light with great intensity. That light now illuminated the wall.
With care, Harold planned out the first five moves of his climb. He’d have to judge the rest as he got higher. Corbin had set the lanterns to light a good amount of the wall, but some of it was quite dark. Thank the heavens for the harness and rope.
He found hand and foot holds and pulled himself onto the wall. One hand and foot at a time, he made his ascent. His hands slipped a bit now and then, though he managed to stay on the wall. He reached a darkened section.
Where next? He couldn’t see as well as he would have liked.
He curled his right toe and dug it into a small but well-positioned crevice where a bit of mortar had weathered away over the years. He reached up for a stone he ought to be able to get his hand around.
His fingers slipped. Then his left foot.
Harold’s heart flew to this throat. The harness yanked hard against him, not letting him drop more than a couple of inches.
He pushed out pent-up breath. His brothers had caught him. They wouldn’t let him fall, just as they’d vowed. He didn’t have to cling as hard and desperately as he had.
His confidence renewed, he set himself upward once more. He didn’t take unnecessary risks, but he wasn’t as paralyzingly cautious as he had been. One hand movement, one foot movement at a time, he climbed upward toward Sarah’s window, all the while feeling the unfailing tension in the rope and the reassurance that his brothers would not abandon him.
At last, his hand reached the edge of the outside windowsill. He set his other hand there as well. He pulled himself through the open window and sat on the sill, his legs dangling inside the room. His breaths came tight and belabored, but he’d done it. He’d reached her.
There she stood, within reach, watching him, pale and visibly shaken. He slid off the sill and the rest of the way inside the room. Before he could take a single step toward her, she closed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around him.
He didn’t hesitate but held her close. A mixture of relief and awareness filled him. He’d held her a few times when they were younger, fleeting embraces during their leisurely afternoons together. His arms had longed for her ever since.
“Sarah,” he whispered.
“I knew you would come. Even before Scott’s note explaining this plan, I knew you would come for me.”
He lightly kissed the top of her head. “You have more faith in me now than you did a few months ago.”
“That was before I knew you could climb walls.”
His chest shook with a silent laugh. “The climbing won’t win me any vicaring competitions, but it can be very useful.”
“I was so afraid you would fall.” Horror filled her words.
“My brothers wouldn’t have let me.”
She pulled back, smiling up at him. “Are they also dressed as thieves?”
“We have decided to take up a life of crime,” he said. “I thought I’d best begin dressing the part.”
She stepped from his arms but didn’t go far. “Is that the conclusion you came to during your travels? That thievery is your true calling?” She spoke very seriously. Too seriously. Sarah always had been quick with a jest or a light comment yet so very good at posing it with brilliant subtlety.
“Indeed.” He began pulling off the rope harness. “Of course, I did spend the entirety of my weeks away posing as a highwayman. That may have influenced my decision.” He stepped out of the leg loops and hung the contraption over his shoulder.
Sarah’s momentary amusement faded. “You took a tremendous risk, Harold.”
They stood near enough each other for him to clearly see the uncertainty in her eyes. He took her hand. “We are the Jonquil Freers of Prisoners, a merry band of miscreants with a long and storied history of breaking unfortunate souls free of their imprisonments. Of course, most of the captives we freed were each other, but we were always entirely innocent and undeserving of our punishments. Freeing our brothers was an act of justice.”
The smallest bit of lightness returned to her face. His heart warmed to see it.
“I had forgotten how funny you can be,” she said. “I always liked that about you.”
He had all but forgotten that about himself as well. Though he would have enjoyed spending a moment basking in the compliment, they hadn’t the luxury.
“Did Scott explain the odd . . . clothing adjustments you needed to make?”
She blushed a little and nodded. Harold knew it was a somewhat indelicate thing, requesting a lady wear a pair of men’s trousers under her dress, but using the harness in a dress without trousers underneath would have been humiliating for all of them, especially her.
“And he told you we’d be lowering you down?”
She took an audible breath. “I will confess, I’m not entirely happy about that bit.”
He set his hands gently on her upper arms and looked into her eyes. “If you absolutely can’t do this, we will try to think of something else.”
She shook her head. “I am ready to get out of this room and this house, but I will not risk the servants being punished for my escape. If this is the best way to manage that, then
I will do it. I will be part of my own rescue, Harold. Don’t think I won’t be.”
“I never thought it for a moment,” he said. “I know your determination well enough.”
A clunk sounded nearby, pulling their attention back toward the window. A small pebble skidded along the floor.
“I suspect my brothers are growing impatient.” He slipped away from Sarah and moved to the window. He called down, keeping his voice low. “She needs to get the harness on.”
“We could see you embracing,” Philip called back. “I’ve been retching repeatedly.”
“Hold yourself together, man,” Harold called back. “If you grow ill, we’ll leave you behind.”
“I’m still in charge,” Philip answered.
“I’m with Harold on this point,” Layton said.
Corbin, true to form, kept out of the bantering.
Harold looked out over the darkened landscape. Charlie and Crispin were out there, keeping an eye on things. That set his mind at ease. “Any bird whistles?”
“None.” Layton was usually more sensible in these situations than Philip. Yet Harold would not have felt at all confident in the plan without his eldest brother.
“She’ll be ready to climb down in just a moment.” Harold looked more closely at his dimly lit brothers. “Does Philip have my jacket on his head?”
“It’s cold out here,” Philip tossed back.
Harold sometimes forgot how entertaining Philip really was. “If Wilson could see you now, he would likely tender his resignation.”
“Or finally begin trusting my fashion sense,” Philip countered.
“If you two chatterboxes are finished,” Layton said, “we’ve a lady to help escape and detection to avoid. You’re not helping either cause.”
“Yes, Mama,” Philip answered.
Harold turned away from the window.
Sarah studied the rope harness. “This is safe?”
“It caught me on the climb up. I trust it.”
“Is there a different way?” she asked.
“None that wouldn’t have dire consequences for the staff.”
The Heart of a Vicar Page 21
