Madness

by Sorcha MacMurrough

  “Can you carry her?” Gabrielle asked, gesturing to Lucinda.

  He nodded. “If I have to, aye. I’ll hold her on my left side. Clarissa, you walk on her left. Gabrielle, you’re on my right with the basket in your left hand, pistols at the ready. Get her cloak on, and let’s go.”

  “Remember, we’re three tarts and you’re our pimp,” she said, undoing the bodice of her gown and yanking her chemise down to show several inches of ample cleavage.

  Clarissa's eyes widened, but she did the same.

  “I’ll do my best. But you have to promise me, if there’s any trouble you take Lucinda, and run like hell.”

  “I’m not leaving you. And how far do you think we’re going to get with her barely able to stand?”

  He sighed heavily. "All right, we're not going to argue. Let's go."

  They assembled just as he had said, waiting only for Clarissa to lock his door again from the outside. Hopefully by the time anyone raised a hue and cry and discovered it was not Simon in his cell, but the poor poisoned Spence, they would be long gone.

  "Done," Clarissa said breathlessly. "Let's go."

  She came onto the blond woman's left side, and Clarissa and Simon both gathered the weight of Lucinda between them. Then they were hurrying down the corridor in a flurry of skirts.

  "What?" Lucinda said, rousing from her torpor.

  "We're going for a walk," Gabrielle reassured her. "Just a little walk out in the fresh air."

  "Oh, lovely," Lucinda said, and began to put one foot in front of the other with enthusiasm.

  Gabrielle shot Simon an encouraging smile, and hurried on.

  They got down to the safety of the second landing when he asked, “Have you got any of that alcohol left?”

  She nodded and fished a small bottle of brandy out of the basket.

  He held his finger partly over the mouth of the bottle and sprinkled it all over their clothes. The smell was pungent, and he made them each take a swig and swirl it around in their mouths, but not swallow. They spit it down their fronts instead.

  “If they ask you anything, slur when you speak. My brother was always a superb actor. I learned more than a few tricks from him that saved my life during the war.”

  He sniffed them assessingly. “Good. Between that and a bit more of your magnificent breasts, we’ll be out of here in no time. Ready?”

  She nodded.

  They ventured down the hall to the landing, walking, not running, and finally they were on the central staircase, brushing past the inmates, nurses, orderlies and visitors, singing some lusty songs as they progressed.

  Gabrielle felt as if all eyes were upon them, but they were merely impersonal glances as they went about their business.

  Simon resisted the urge to drag Gabrielle along and kept their pace steady, his hand on the basket handle, ready to dip in with his right hand at a moment’s notice.

  Clarissa propped up Lucinda to take the weight off and hurry them along, and followed on slightly behind as they jounced down the stairs.

  “Come on, Lucy, we’re going home,” Gabrielle urged.

  At last they were on the ground floor and in viewing distance of the gate. They all stiffened their backs and moved forward. They got to the gate unchallenged.

  But just as they were about to pass through, they heard a second guard just coming on duty say, “Hold on, what are you—”

  Simon made his voice gruff, his accent Cockney. “I’m takin’ me girls back to the crib. One of yorn got my girls tipsy. This one's so drunk she’s no bloody use ta me lessen anyone wants to swive a corpse.”

  The man stared at Lucinda, but Gabrielle distracted him lest he recognise her by giving him her most bold glance and winning smile.

  The guard looked as though he were about to make an offer for her services when she clapped her hand to her mouth dramatically. “Aw, Gawd!” she exclaimed. “I’m gon’ ta spew—”

  The sick doxy act was enough to convince the guard to let the lewd brandy-soaked quartet pass. Pity about the girl with the huge jugs, but if she was one of Mistress Sin’s regulars, he’d see her again soon enough….

  “Walk, don’t run,” Simon urged quietly as they began to step out of the gate and into the street. He took about three steps forward and then grabbed his temples.

  The last rays of the sun darting into his face at an acute angle made his head swim. He threw one arm over his eyes as he felt himself falling. Gabrielle was forced to drop the basket, and had to heave upwards with all her might to stop him falling flat on his face.

  “Come on, love, we can do this. Lucinda, love, can you help me with our friend here?" she urged in a low voice.

  In a more audible tone, she shrieked, “Come on, ye drunken lout, shift yer arse!” for the benefit of a couple of passers-by.

  Clarissa grabbed the basket with the pistols up off the ground, and they pressed on to the corner of the street, the three women doing their best to keep the stricken Simon on his feet amid his seizure.

  They struggled on bravely, with Gabrielle whispering encouragement the whole way.

  "That's it, one foot in front of the other. That's right. And once we get around the corner into the Waterloo Road, Clarissa can cover herself up with her cloak and hail a cab. It's a busy road, one is bound to come along if you just hang on.. Then we'll cross over the Thames, and head to the clinic…."

  They heard a coach drawing up as the two women staggered under the combined weight of a dazed Lucinda and part of the much-weakened Simon.

  The coach pulled up just behind them. A huge man with dark hair strode to the gate without a second glance, but a tall, distinguished blond man exited a bit more slowly, and caught up with them.

  “May I be of assistance, sir, madame?” he asked, his stunningly handsome face not the least bit mocking.

  Gabrielle’s first instinct was to tell him to go away. He had to be a young buck merely laughing at the poor drunken tarts. But something in his blue eyes seemed sincerely concerned, and inspired confidence.

  She nodded. “If you don’t mind finding me a cab, I’d be grateful. Me mate’s ill and me pimp’s drunk. We be not going far, Tavistock Crescent,” she said, for she had heard from Angela that it really was Mistress Sin’s address.

  “No need for a cab," the young Adonis said, staring at Lucinda as though he had seen the Heavens open. "By all means take our coach. My friend and I are just going in to visit someone inside Bedlam. Keep it as long as you like. We can get a cab back when we’re ready.”

  He gave the order to the driver before she could say a word in reply.

  Gabrielle made a quick decision, and decided to accept. “Thank ye kindly, sir.”

  She dragged Simon to the door and rammed him head first into the relative darkness of the interior of the coach. The stranger gave her a hand up with him, then lifted Lucinda before she fell.

  “You really need to avoid the demon drink in this game,” the handsome young man said knowingly, giving Lucinda a long look and shaking his head.

  He almost looked as though he would stroke her flaxen hair back from her cheek, but withdrew abruptly and fixed his gaze upon Gabrielle now.

  “You drink in this game, you’ll never be out of it. And you’ll get careless and clapped or knocked up, or you’ll be killed. I know, believe me. I’ve seen it too many times in the molly houses. I expect in your place it must be terrible too."

  "Oh aye," she said, staring at him, while Clarissa too shot him a stunned look. Just went to show you never could tell…

  “If you care about your friend, take her to the Bethnal Green Clinic. Ask for Dr. Herriot. He’ll help her, help all of you if you ever want to get off the game.”

  “Th-th-thank you,” she stammered, wondering how on earth he knew Antony. Was he another Rakehell?

  But he said he knew all about molly houses, which catered for men seeking other men, a capital crime if they were ever caught.

  “Thank you. But we’re fine as we are,” she sa
id with a brash toss of her head.

  She had interpreted Clarissa’s worried expression correctly. They needed to go, now. This man knew too much alreadly.

  “Very well,” the handsome blond man said reluctantly. “But promise me you’ll remember what I said. Dr. Herriot, Bethnal Green. Straight up Blackfriars Road and Bridge, then east, if you chance your mind about going to Mistress Sin's. Good luck and God bless."

  The young man stared at them pensively as Clarissa and Gabrielle scrambled in and shut the door. Then Gabrielle banged the roof of the coach and told them to hurry for Tavistock Crescent.

  With a shake of his head and a deep sigh of regret for the virginal looking blonde, Sebastian followed his tall dark friend George into the asylum to enquire for the Earl of Oxnard’s insane wife.

  Chapter Twenty

  The rather debauched-looking quartet took the kind young man’s coach as far as Tavistock Crescent, where three of them went up to the door and pretended to knock.

  Gabrielle said to the driver as she offered him a gratuity, “Thank you. Who does this coach belong to?”

  He waved away the tip airily. “Mr. George Davenant.”

  She stared and frowned. No, surely not... Their helper had looked such a respectable man.

  It just showed how deceiving appearances could be. Davenant was said to be a theatre owner, pimp and criminal mastermind.

  Yet the man they had spoken with had looked a great deal less dangerous than she had imagined from all she had heard about him.

  And how did he know about the clinic? Antony must have treated some of his girls at some point, she concluded.

  She shrugged. She didn’t have time to worry about that now. He hadn’t recognised Clarissa or herself, for all he had said he knew of the clinic, so there was an end to the matter.

  They pretended to be waiting for an answer at the door until they were sure the coach was safely out of sight. As soon as the coach was gone, she gestured to the others to rejoin her at the curb. Clarissa held up Simon on the pavement still shielding his eyes while they secured another ride.

  Once they had piled into the second cab, they headed south once more, this time for the coaching inn at Wimbledon Common, where they took a single room for the three of them.

  Gabrielle laid her sister in a trundle bed and Simon on the main bed, where she began to tend to him with cold compresses.

  She was eager to get out of London as soon as possible, but they needed to inquire about timetables to the west, and certainly couldn't be seen in public.

  Clarissa made inquiries, but was told there wouldn't be room for a party of their size riding inside until ten the next morning.

  She relayed the bad news to Gabrielle, who bit her lip and felt annoyed at this unexpected obstacle never occuring to her.

  "I could ride up top—"

  Clarissa shook her head. "You'd perish in this weather. Besides, the fewer the witnesses, the better."

  Simon lifted the cool cloth off one eye to look at her. "She's right, you know."

  "Why not take a coach anywhere out of London, and double back?"

  Clarissa went back to see what she could find, but got varying degrees of the same story. No coach seats riding inside the carriage were available until at least midmorning the following day.

  "I tell you what, I'll take cab back to the clinic and my home to fetch more of my things, and enough money to hire a private conveyance for the trip down to Somerset."

  Gabrielle shook her head. "We couldn't ask you to—"

  "I'm offering."

  "But the expense—"

  “You might also need to hire someone to help you with Lucinda, unless of course Clarissa would be willing to come with us?’’ Simon suggested, his eyes still watering from the brightness now that he was free from his cell at last.

  Gabrielle shook her head. “Oh, no I couldn’t ask you to come all the way to—”

  “I’ll do it,” Clarissa said promptly. “I’ll tell Dr. Herriot I need a few days off, and find someone to look after the children. It will give you one less thing to worry about. Simon isn’t fully well yet, after all. And we don’t want anyone asking too many questions about Lucinda.”

  Gabrielle thought about it for a time, but in the end, she agreed to the new plan.

  Clarissa saw Lucinda settled comfortably, while Gabrielle watched over both of her charges with the pistols ever at the ready, and promised she would be back as soon as she could.

  She went off and Simon and Gabrielle nestled in the bed exhausted, and clung to each other tightly, with the door firmly bolted and both weapons on the nightstand.

  “Lord, that was so close. And that man Davenant was our guardian angel, helping us get away so quickly,” Simon said after he had kissed her thoroughly.

  “Fallen angel, more like,” Gabrielle said with a smile. “Who would ever have thought he would have anything to do with molly houses, a fine man like him. In fact, if I didn’t know better, I would say he was quite taken with Lucinda.”

  He shrugged one shoulder. “I'm sorry I couldn't see anything because I was covering my face against the sunlight. I'll take your word for it, though. So all I can say is, people will do all sorts of things for money, or principle. In any case, the carriage belonged to him, and he was very kind to lend it to us when he saw us in need."

  After a time, he said, "I thought you said he was a theatre owner and pimp?”

  “That’s right.”

  “He sounded young."

  She thought for a moment, then nodded. "Aye, not much older than Lucinda, I should think."

  "That sounds quite young to be so succcessful, so infamous. Perhaps he was only a brother or colleague.”

  She shrugged one shoulder. “That’s true. Well, whoever he was, he saved us all. I was so afraid you were having a seizure. I don't know how we would have managed without his intervention.”

  “Aye, I thought I was having one too. But it was just the sunlight.”

  “Are you in much pain now?” she asked softly, before planting a kiss on his cheek.

  “No, but I fear my eyes may be permanently weakened as a result of my incarceration.” He sighed.

  “Best not to overdo things for a time, then."

  "I'm not talking about overdoing things, my love, I'm talking about not being as blind as a bat."

  "If you need to do any reading, I can do it for you. Not that I need to with all the volumes you have in your head.”

  “Aye, which nearly killed me,” he said bitterly. “It’s my good memory which got me into this situation in the first place.”

  “So you’re saying that you have a codebook of sorts in your head?” she surmised.

  He nodded, gritting his teeth against the inevitable pain.

  “Yes, I can see the page, and only I and the person who sent the code will know. A one book, one page code.”

  Now it suddenly started to all make sense to her. “So the two of you have the same book, or books, and you tell the page number and use the letters to code and decode. So the only way they would believe the message came from a legitimate source was by knowing which book or books were acceptable.”

  He nodded. “Yes. In my case I never even had to carry the book.”

  Simon gasped then, but the pain wasn’t as severe as he thought it would be, and he stared at her in surprise.

  She smiled at him in sheer relief.. “It’s all starting to become clear sense now. You were able to run all of Wellington’s communications in the Peninsula and later on during the French campaign in that way. So they’ve kept you because the knowledge is so valuable, but they've just not used it yet.”

  “And someone sold me to be tortured because the price on my head was so high, and they got greedy.”

  “Once the French had you, they wanted the title of the book. When that didn’t work, they asked you to code things for them, false messages. So what did you say in the message?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t dare tell you,
and I don’t dare report it.”

  “Report it?”

  “To my old masters.”

  Her brows knit. “But if they were keeping an eye on you, they already know. You said to me once you were bait. So they wanted you to send the message. You have no reason to look so despairing.”

  “But the message—”

  “Yes, I heard it. ‘Free the eag—’”

  “Don’t say it. Can you not guess what it means?”