by Jamie Carie
“You’ll find the rest of the rooms refurbished as well,” the soft voice spoke from the doorway. Whirling, she turned to see her uncle.
“It was about time, too. The place was looking shabby under your father’s care, I must say.”
There was a sneer in his voice that made the hair rise on the back of her neck.
“Please, my dear, come into my library. We have much to discuss.”
Motioning for Kendra to precede him, she started to speak and then acquiesced, walking down the long hall, the back of her neck crawling with fear.
She walked into the dim library and sat in the chair Andrew motioned toward. He came around the desk that used to be her father’s and sat across from her.
“When my butler told me you were here, I must say I was very, very angry. You have always done your best to make my well-laid plans go awry. But after considering it, I’m glad you’re here. I should have done the job myself in the first place and saved myself the hassles of those bumbling colonial relatives of yours.” He shrugged, his lips curving into a ghastly smile. “You know what they say, if you want a job done right . . . do it yourself,” his arm waved in the air as his voice trailed off into a chuckle.
Kendra pressed her back into the chair shaking her head back and forth. Panic rose to her throat making her want to gag.
“I can see understanding is slow to dawn so I will have to explain. Such the pity.” But he looked delighted to explain. Dear God, help. He looks stark-raving mad!
“You see, I’ve been a cheated man. I was the firstborn twin, not your father. But that unfortunate midwife tied a ribbon to his foot and they all insisted he was first.” His eyes took on a glazed appearance and he looked to be in a trance as he continued, “She was my first kill. Strangulation. Fought rather hard but I was strong for my age.”
“Age?” The question slipped out.
“Ah. Fourteen. Mother knew I deserved the title, but father loved Edward, so I became the second son.” Andrew walked over and grasped Kendra around the neck. Standing over her he looked down into her wild eyes. “I couldn’t just let him have it, you know. I vowed long ago that it would all be mine, including that paltry dowry your grandmother set up for you.”
Kendra gasped for air. He let go and shoved her against the back of the chair. His movements were slow, casual, as he walked to the liquor decanter, pouring a long draught. After swallowing the contents, he smacked his lips together and continued. Kendra tried not to moan aloud with fear. “They all thought me such a spoiled dandy. No head for business. Couldn’t handle my money.” He laughed, a low and menacing sound that sent prickles of panic over Kendra’s skin. “Fools—the lot of them. Especially Edward. All along I was making my fortune, more money than your father had ever dreamed of having.”
Kendra shook her head and gasped out, ”But you lost everything to that company . . .”
“The Brougham Company?” Andrew threw back his head and laughed again, this time loud and boisterous. Then he abruptly stopped and stared at Kendra—waiting, waiting, like a snake about to strike, he waited for her to see it.
“The Brougham Company. It wasn’t bankrupt like you told my father. The ships that failed . . . they didn’t fail, did they? It was all lies. Is that how you gained all this wealth?”
“I see that full understanding is beyond your reach, my dear. And it is such a brilliant plan. I wouldn’t want you to miss a single nuance of it.” His eyes lit up with glee. “Come now, you must see the irony soon. It’s so delightful. The ships in my company are divided into two fleets. Half are legitimate merchant ships and the other half”—he grinned, his eyes feverish—“are pirate ships. You have even met with one of them! I hire my men from Newgate to work for me. Ex-prisoners, they’re cheap labor and have the black hearts that I need. It’s brilliant, really.” His chest filled out with pride. “I send out two ships on each excursion. The pirate ship steals the cargo from other vessels then meets up with the merchant ship, where the stolen goods are then transported to the legitimate ship. My merchant ship forges papers documenting the sales history of the cargo and then sails to ports to carry out honest trade. You see, pirates have long had the problem of being able to sell what they steal. To appear more legitimate and sell my merchandise, I use the appearance of the Brougham Company as a front and the legal merchants don’t know they’re buying stolen goods. Genius, isn’t it?”
Kendra was too stunned to answer. After a moment she spoke out in horror, “So you tricked my father into giving you everything he owned and left us practically penniless. But why?”
“But that’s not all! I tricked him into giving me his wealth, but I still needed the title, and as you know, there was only one way to get that.” Andrew raised his brows in expectation.
“You killed my father,” Kendra whispered in horror. “You murdered your own brother for the title.”
“Kill number two, I’m afraid. It was rightfully mine.” Andrew’s face reddened. “It was mine!”
“But if you were going to kill him, why bother stripping us of everything? It would all be yours after . . . after he died.”
Andrew stepped closer, got in her face. “I wanted him to suffer as I had suffered. I wanted him to feel what it was like to lose everything.”
“But he still had me, didn’t he? We weren’t as miserable as you had planned because all that really mattered was that we had each other.”
Andrew turned his head away, white lines of anger on either side of his clenched mouth. “Yes, well, we can’t have everything we want, can we? Looking back, I should have had you in the carriage accident. That would have destroyed him.” He swung away from her, agitated.
Kendra could barely manage to get the words past the terror in her constricted throat. “No, it wouldn’t have. My father looked to God for his strength. You couldn’t take that away from him.”
Andrew shot her a dark look. “Perhaps. And what shall I do with you now?” He tapped his bottom lip with one finger. “Since those bumbling colonials couldn’t finish you off, I will have to do it myself. It’s too bad though, no one would have missed you in America. You’ve no doubt made your presence known across the countryside. I’ll have to think of some accident for you. A fire, perhaps?” He mused with brows raised and a cruel twist to his lips. “Burning flesh, melting off your bones.” He shuddered as if appalled by the thought.
Kendra could barely hear him above the roar of her heartbeat as he came nearer. The room grew dark around her. She fought for consciousness. She lost.
Kendra woke to utter darkness and a damp, musty smell. Struggling to rise off the dirt floor, she stood up, one arm curled protectively around her stomach. Andrew killed my father. The memory of what she had discovered hammered against her mind and caused her stomach to twist with nausea. She had known Andrew to be selfish and lazy, but never in her wildest dreams had she thought him capable of something so horrid. The man had murdered her father, his own brother, and was planning to kill her if she didn’t find a way out of here. Panic rose in a bubble in her throat. She had to escape!
“Hello! Anybody here?”
Thrusting out her hands, she edged forward, afraid of what she might step on, until she felt a wall. Where had he put her? She turned in one direction and felt along the wall, easing herself around the room. A piece of furniture banged onto her thigh, making her cry out. It was a table. Feeling along the top, she found a lantern and a tinderbox. Thank God, Andrew hadn’t left her without light. With trembling fingers she struck the tinder to the flint several times until she had a wavering flame. Careful not to extinguish it, she lifted the glass globe on the lantern and lit the wick. Turning around with the lantern held high, she studied her surroundings. The old abandoned cellar. There were sagging, half-rotted wooden shelves against one wall which held some dust-coated jars. The rest of the room was bare except for the crude table she was standing beside. Terror rose back up inside her throat. Would Andrew bring her food? Water? Or did he plan to leav
e her down here to die? She took a breath of the damp, cool air and walked to the shelves. If she got desperate enough she would open a jar and see if there was anything edible inside. She swallowed a wave of nausea. Please God, don’t let it come to that. Help me find a way out.
Looking up over her head, she could just make out the outline of the door. It was a good fifteen feet above her head. She noticed that the wooden steps had been removed and wondered how she had gotten down to the floor. Andrew had probably just dropped her into the hole. The walls were bumpy dirt, but not anything she could climb. If only she had some kind of tool, she could dig out steps in the wall, but there was nothing. She could only hope that if she waited, there would be a moment when she could escape. She had to believe that. She just needed a chance.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Dorian lifted his spyglass to one eye and peered toward the eastern horizon. Never had a journey seemed to drag by as this one had. Never had time seemed to stand so still. Two, maybe three more days, and they would reach the London harbor. Glancing up at the dark clouds hovering near, he clamped his teeth together, suppressing a snarl. The weather had been clear up to now; cold, but clear. If this storm held off it would mean the difference between three days or as much as five. He didn’t want to wait that long. He didn’t want to wait another five minutes to get his wife back. But, of course, he had no choice. With balled fists, he turned away from the endless waves and scanned the deck for John. It had been a good thing John was along. His friend had kept him from killing members of his crew with his demand for speed more than once on this voyage; he’d kept him sane.
Dorian found John on the foredeck and walked over.
“You think we’ll outpace the storm?” John asked the same question on his mind.
“It’ll be close. I want to check those gaffs and that mainsail that was giving us trouble one more time, then I’ll meet you in my cabin for some dinner.”
“You know we’ve checked everything three times already today.” John raised a brow at him, a look of concern in his brown eyes.
Dorian ran his hand through his hair, turned his head away, and sighed. “I know. It’s just that I need something to do. This waiting is killing me.”
John gave him a pat on the shoulder. “You are driving yourself crazy with this.”
Dorian took a deep breath and let it slowly out. “I’m going to need a miracle to win her back.”
“Good thing we know the Author of those.”
The squeaking of hinges brought Kendra out of her sleepy haze where she had been curled up on the table, well away from the dirt floor where she imagined spiders and rats might live. Bolting upright, she saw daylight above her and a cloth bundle being lowered by a rope.
“Andrew?” she shouted. “Please, Andrew, let me out of here. I won’t tell anyone what you have done. I’ll go back to America and disappear.”
A snorting laugh was her response. “You’ll not get anything from him, Lady Kendra.” It was the butler. “I’m surprised he is not letting you starve to death.”
Kendra scrambled off the table and ran to the swinging bundle. She hurried to untie it and grasped it to her while the rope was pulled back up and the door slammed shut.
Taking the food to the table, Kendra unwrapped it to find half a loaf of bread, a small piece of cheese, some salt pork, and a canteen of water. Opening the canteen first, she took a long swallow. She wanted to gobble down the food as fast as possible, but she made herself eat slowly. Still hungry when the last crumb was gone, Kendra went over to the dirty jars. Taking the hem of her dress, she attempted to clean them enough to see what was inside. It looked to be fruit preserves, maybe sweet potatoes in another. After several attempts to pry open one of the jars, Kendra fell back against the table in frustration. The lid wouldn’t budge. As she looked at the jar, an idea came to her. She could break it open and use the broken glass to dig grooves into the wall. If she dug them out in such a way that there were handholds, she might be able to climb up to the door. Taking up the largest jar, Kendra walked to the table. The corner was sharp. Raising the jar above her head, Kendra crashed it down on the corner of the table. The table wobbled and moved along the wall. She dropped the broken jar as it fell to the floor. Bending down, she picked up the largest piece of glass and put it on the table. It was sharp and would cut her hand if she used it like a knife. What she needed was some sort of handle. Lifting the hem of her dress, she reached for her petticoat and ripped off the flounced edge. There. That would do. Wrapping it around the end of the glass, she set to work.
Sitting on the floor, she began to make her first groove at knee level. The walls were hard-packed earth, making the process slower than she’d hoped. Within an hour, droplets of sweat dripped from her brow, but she kept going. Now and then she would take a short break and take a small drink of precious water, but only when she had to. Her hands ached and cramped, causing her to stop to massage or stretch them, and then she would start again. After four steps were made, Kendra crawled back up onto the table. The room flooded with darkness as she extinguished the lantern, but she was too tired to feel afraid. Closing her eyes, she was instantly asleep.
She woke with a start, terror gripping her. Her mind began to clear of the nightmare she had dreamed. Andrew . . . coming at her with his hands outstretched . . . as if to strangle her. He laughed in an evil roar while she cried out for her baby’s life.
It was just a dream.
Just a dream.
Rubbing her hands up and down her arms, she tried to shake it off. Tears threatened to overwhelm her but she shook her head against them. There was no time to cry. She had to escape. She looked down at her hands, dirt-encrusted fingernails, swollen and aching. They looked like they had been beaten. Massaging them to work out the stiffness, Kendra picked up the glass and climbed up to the second groove, hanging onto the third groove with her free hand, she reached as high as she could and began to dig. Only three more grooves and she would be able to reach the door. The thought that the door might be locked kept trying to creep out of her subconscious and into conscious thought, but Kendra wouldn’t let herself dwell on it. There was no reason for them to lock it, as they would think she could never reach it.
A creaking warned her that the door was being opened, so she jumped down to sit on the ground, the broken glass hidden under her skirts. The butler peered down into the hole. “I see you made it through the night,” he yelled down, scowling. “I would have thought the rats had done you in by now.”
Kendra hadn’t seen any rats but she wasn’t about to tell him that. The old man would probably find some to join her. Peering through the bright light, Kendra saw a similar bundle being lowered. Her stomach growled in anticipation. “Please, can you tell me what day it is? How long have I been here?”
“Time won’t mean much to you before long. Lord Townsend is busy working out the details of your demise. But if you say pretty please, I might tell you.”
Anger welled up inside Kendra, but the desire to know the day was greater. “Please,” she muttered between gritted teeth.
The old man cackled with glee. “You’ve been in that hole for three days, and it’s Tuesday, about noon. I’m to bring you food once a day around noon.” With that, he slammed the door closed and darkness engulfed the room once again. Three days! She’d been here three days, and if what he said was true, it didn’t sound like Andrew would keep her here much longer. Grabbing up the bundle, Kendra ate the bread and the tiny piece of meat as fast as she could and took a small drink of water from the canteen. The last canteen had not lasted very long, and Kendra had to fight the urge to drink her fill of the new one. Wiping her dirty hands on her skirt, Kendra once again climbed up to the step she was working on and began again. If she worked hard, she might be able to escape by tomorrow night.
As soon as the Angelina docked, Dorian set his plans into action. He and John would go to the Arundel estate while the rest of the crew stocked up on supplies and waited for the
ir return on board the ship. He sent John to buy the best horses he could find and get directions. If they rode fast and had decent horses, they might make it by tomorrow night.
Kendra looked up from the dirt floor at the eight grooves in the wall. She was ready to make her escape. She guessed that the butler had brought her food twelve hours ago. That would make it right around midnight, if her calculations were correct. She waited a little longer in case she was wrong. It must be dark when she made her escape and the later the hour the better. Her only chance was if no one was guarding the door, and if the door was not locked from the outside. She had gently pressed on it after she had carved out the last step and it seemed to give, but she remembered the squeaky hinges and didn’t want to press her luck in broad daylight. Any number of people could be milling about the area and hear her.
What she would do once she gained freedom, she wasn’t sure. She was hoping that she would be able to find one of the old servants she knew to help her. If not, she would just have to take a horse and get away as fast as possible. London. Back to London. It was the only place where she might find help in exposing all Andrew had done. What she really needed was proof. Documents that told of the schemes, the fake company, cargo records, letters, something. The obvious place to look would be Andrew’s desk in the library. The likelihood that Kendra could get into the house and down to his room unnoticed was slim, but if she couldn’t find anyone to help her, she would have to take that chance.
