by Cindy Anstey
“Bits and pieces have been coming back to me for some time now,” she fibbed, dropping her gaze to the sawdust on the floor. “Elizabeth … How could you do that to Elizabeth?”
“Ah yes. Well my dear, we’ll have to put that down to Kyle’s temper again. I never—” Mr. Renfrew left his sentence hanging and quickly turned his head toward his accomplice. “Did you hear that?” The slow but stealthy sound of footfalls echoed in the larger warehouse.
“They are here.”
“Then they are early.” The gentleman pulled out a small pistol from his pocket and cocked it. He pointed it at Rebecca and Caroline. “Go check,” he ordered his partner.
“For whom are we waiting?” Caroline asked when Saunders closed the door behind him.
Mr. Renfrew smiled. “We are waiting for some business associates. I came by the other day to make the final arrangements. You see, as much as you may think otherwise, I really do not stomach murder well. I had never intended to do either of the Misses Hanton harm but had devised a rather ironic, truly fitting end to this scenario.”
He raised an eyebrow at Rebecca’s confused expression. “You didn’t think that had your father complied, I would have returned you to him? No, no, that would not do! I would have been arrested before I had stepped into my carriage, let alone onto a clipper.”
Just then the door opened, admitting two roughly dressed men. One had a short craggy beard and the other had a potbelly and a fleshy jaw. They were unkempt and smelled of fish and alcohol.
Saunders followed them in and closed the door.
“You are early,” Renfrew complained.
“Right you are there, gov’ner.” The jowly man reached into his pocket, his loud voice echoing from the rafters. “Let’s get this business over, then. Something is going on out there. People milling about when it’s usually as quiet as a rat’s fart.” He pulled a small jingling bag from his pocket. “Where is they then?”
Mr. Renfrew sidestepped even though Rebecca and Caroline were already in full view. “Right here.”
“What, them?” The man seemed astounded. “They’s too old.”
“What are you talking about, man?” Renfrew’s voice was sharp, his body tense. It was the first hint of temper that Renfrew had displayed thus far.
“They’s too old. Can’t sell them. These would be nothing but trouble.” He glared at Rebecca, who glared back. “See what I mean?” His jowls bounced as he nodded his head.
Mr. Renfrew’s face hardened. “Do you want them or not?”
The man eyed Rebecca for a few moments. “Nah. Not even if they was free.”
The moneybag jingled again as it was returned to his pocket.
Mr. Renfrew shook his head in disbelief and Saunders’ smile grew.
“How does it feel to be rejected, Misses Hanton? And by the scum of the earth. You could hardly get any lower.” Saunders’ voice was smug and superior.
The slave traders pivoted. “Who’s callin’ who scum, you Bond Street fripple!” The jowly man spit at Saunders’ feet and reached beneath his soiled coat. He drew out a large knife and used it to point at Saunders’ dagger, still swaying from side to side. “What you got there?” he taunted. “A toothpick?”
With a quick, deft movement, Saunders slashed at the man, catching him across the mouth. The trader grabbed at his wound, making a ghastly gurgling sound as blood poured through his fingers and rained onto the floor. He tossed his knife at his companion just as a loud bang rent the air; the blade fell uselessly to the floor. Renfrew had fired his pistol into the wall above their heads.
“Enough,” he growled.
The traders turned, anger in their eyes, ready to take him on … but they hesitated.
“Enough,” Renfrew said again in a whisper. A dangerous, deadly threat.
The uninjured trader lifted his chin, gripped his companion by the front of his coat and dragged him from the room without a word.
* * *
FROM A CRACK between the crates in the darkened corner farthest from the light, Rebecca and Caroline watched Renfrew turn back to the center of the room and realize that they had disappeared behind the dubious protection of the maze of boxes. The man laughed, and Rebecca closed her eyes for a moment and swallowed.
“Come, ladies, the room has but one door,” Renfrew scoffed. “Let us not play games.”
Rebecca looked above her to the crates piled high. She pushed gently on the closest, but it didn’t budge. She motioned to Caroline. Sign language and intuition aided their wordless conversation, leaving Rebecca to question Renfrew while Caroline climbed.
“What are you going to do with us now, Mr. Renfrew? Do you have an alternate plan?” She spoke loud enough to create an echo; it marginally disguised her location—marginally.
“Always my dear, but it is not one that I wanted to implement.”
“You can’t kill us; you would have no leverage with my father. You will never persuade him to take up your cause that way.”
“My dear, how totally selfish of you. Do you think your sister has no value in your father’s eyes? Now please, come out so we can talk face-to-face like civilized people.”
Caroline had climbed halfway to the top of the crates. Rebecca looked up and met Caroline’s wide eyes. She put her hand over her mouth to prevent any sound from escaping and nodded to Rebecca.
Rebecca’s stomach roiled. “Elizabeth isn’t dead?”
“No, no, my dear. I will admit she is not doing very well, but she is alive.”
Rebecca slipped between two boxes and then stilled. Had she heard correctly? Had he just said that Elizabeth was alive? Could she believe him? She looked up. Caroline’s smile was so wide it spread beyond the confines of her hand. In fact, she was having a hard time holding on, she was shaking so badly.
Dragging in a gulp of air, Rebecca started to tremble as well and fought to remain standing. One thought, one statement played over and over in her mind: Elizabeth is alive! But where was she?
* * *
“IT’S ALIVE!” Walter shouted, jumping back as if he’d been burned. Slowly, ignoring the groans behind him, he crept back to the iron-grated door. He peered into the darkness. Jack joined him, wagging his tail. There was no mistake: Something was moving in the small cell beyond, and it seemed to be responsible for the thumping.
“Henry, Smythe, there is something in here.”
Walter turned his head enough to use his peripheral vision.
Smythe still sat where he had fallen. The man was panting. In pain or from the exertion of his struggle with Brill, Walter couldn’t tell. He watched as Smythe yanked off his neckcloth and tied it around his leg.
“Then find out what it is!” the man barked as he planted both hands hard against the weeping wound.
Walter nodded slightly, took a deep breath, and pulled back the bolt. The door slid quietly and easily toward him. Jack leapt ahead to the far wall where a bundle of rags lay.
As Walter crept closer, he was confronted with many odors, all of them foul. The most prominent among them was that of putrescence. As he neared the pile, he realized that it was a person, curled up and covered and very sick.
He slowly drew back the thin covering. The pale face of a girl emerged; her eyes were only half open, but her lips were weakly smiling. As he pulled the covers back farther they revealed a swath of filthy bandages wrapped around her throat; the stench was overwhelming. In her hand was a small tin cup. Even now she was banging it against the floor as if afraid that Walter would disappear were she to stop.
He gently opened her fingers and eased the cup from her. “It’s all right. You can stop now,” he whispered.
Her nod was barely perceptible.
Walter pushed Jack away, drew back the miserable rag of a covering and as gently and heedfully as he could, reached beneath her knees and around her back. She was light—hardly any weight at all. He squinted as they emerged, the dull torchlight bright in comparison to the hole that had housed her.
Smythe was in the process of tying a wad of cloth torn from his shirt onto his leg when he looked up. On seeing the bundle in Walter’s arms he tried to jump to his feet, but his leg wouldn’t hold him and he sat back down. “Elizabeth?” he cried. “Lud, is it Elizabeth?”
Walter frowned, confused by the question and the emotion on Smythe’s face. He stepped toward Smythe and turned just enough for the girl to see the man who had addressed them.
“Matt!” she shouted. It was hoarse and painful, but she flailed her arm as if trying to reach Smythe.
Walter lowered her to the floor beside the wounded man.
“Oh Lord, Funny Face, what have they done?” Smythe lifted his hand as if to touch the bandages at her throat but stopped and put his arm around her instead.
The two huddled together. In the hushed atmosphere of the room, their emotions were all too evident.
Finally Smythe wiped his face on his sleeve and looked up at Walter. “Thank you, Mr. Ellerby, for your help. I apologize for the subterfuge. I was unsure of your place in these matters.” He held up his one free hand and although it was his left, Walter was not insulted. “This is Elizabeth Hanton, my sister. My name is Matthew Hanton.”
Walter stared, mouth agape, trying to make sense of her name. The villains seemed to have an affinity to girls called Elizabeth. The room was silent for some moments as the boys absorbed the news, and it was just as well, for a voice called from above. “Mr. Ellerby, Mr. Thompson, answer me!” Mr. Strickland must have been calling for some time. “Are you down there? Be this a prank?”
“No!” the three young men shouted, and there could be no doubt that it was heard. Footsteps echoed through the halls, bouncing down to them.
Walter looked over to the Hantons, disturbed to see Elizabeth flailing her arm again. Her brother leaned closer and she whispered something to him.
Matthew Hanton looked to Walter, his expression troubled. “Rebecca, where is Rebecca? Is she all right?”
“Rebecca?”
“Yes, Rebecca. Straight brown hair, oval face, looks somewhat like me. Our sister Rebecca. Is she all right?”
Walter paused, thought, and then nodded with great vigor. “So, Beth’s name is Rebecca. And you are her family. Well, that is most excellent.” He waved his hand at them and smiled. “She is fine. Rebecca is fine,” he said loftily, rolling the name around in his mouth as if getting used to the sound. “Safe and sound with my brother and sister in London. They are likely sipping tea in the drawing room as we speak.”
* * *
REBECCA, lost among the crates in the cavernous warehouse backroom, sobbed silent, joyful tears. The scene in her mind was of her first visit to this monstrous room. Elizabeth’s injury kept playing over in her mind. How had her sister survived such a wound? Where was she now?
“Oh, my dear, I am most sorry. I did not realize that you believed her to be dead. I would have told you straightaway. She is at Risely. No wonder you were so out of sorts.” Renfrew continued to maintain the ridiculous attitude of benevolence in the face of his atrocities.
Rebecca almost found the affectation more revolting than the cold menace of Saunders. “And when would you have done that? At Daisy’s funeral?”
In the brief lull of their voices, Rebecca heard a creak to her right. She looked up to see Caroline still moving higher. She took a deep calming breath and wiped the tears from her eyes. Through the crack she could still see Renfrew, holding the reloaded pistol, but of Saunders she could see nothing. She moved her head this way and that, straining.
“Yes, indeed. I see your point.” Renfrew laughed and sounded genuinely amused. “Well, let me clear it up for you now. Saunders would likely have killed your sister had I not seen it coming. So, in fact, you have something to thank me for.”
Now that Rebecca was listening for it, she heard another creak. This time it was slightly closer and she understood Renfrew’s chattiness; he was trying to hide Saunders’ stealth. She would have to move again. Hiking up her skirts, Rebecca tucked the hem into her bodice. She grabbed the crate ahead of her, ignoring the sharp slivers of wood and asked one last question, in the hopes that the echoes and Renfrew’s babble would cover the sounds she would inevitably make climbing to the other side. “And why would I thank you?”
“If I hadn’t grabbed his arm and pulled it back, instead of cutting her neck he would have slit her throat. But the blood, oh my dear, it was no wonder you were misled. What a mess that was! We had to put the cloth meant for her mouth, around her throat. I have to admit, though, that the trip to Welford Mills would not have been so calm were your sister not unconscious. A little spitfire that one. Yes, with you trussed and her senseless, the trip was not all that unpleasant.
“We were mere moments away from Risely when the accident occurred. We were so close. Really, a most inconvenient happenstance. We can only lay the blame at the feet of your younger brother, Miss Ellerby. He is too wild and needs reining in. Your mother has left him to his own devices for far too long.”
Renfrew was taunting Caroline to speak, but Rebecca knew she was not easily provoked.
“There were so many times that Kyle wanted to introduce his flashy dagger to Walter. But I am a man of integrity; I would not let him throw away the true purpose of our scheme. I hope you appreciate that.”
Climbing over the top crate and down the other side, Rebecca dropped her skirts back to the ground and silently inched through the narrow opening between the boxes and the wall.
“You must have known this to be futile.”
Startled, Rebecca half turned toward the voice, but Saunders grabbed her from behind. He wrapped his left arm around her and raised his right hand to her throat. In it he held the hummingbird dagger.
“Go ahead,” she taunted, surprising herself.
Saunders laughed, his mouth beside her ear, his breath warm and repulsive. “Not yet,” he whispered. “Not yet.” Instead, he walked her forward into the light. Something bumped against her boot as he pulled her to a stop; it made a soft metallic scrape as it shifted.
“Ah, there you are at last,” Renfrew sighed. “The conversation was becoming tedious.” He turned to the middle of the room and looked up into the dark. “You can come out now, Miss Ellerby. We have Misses Hanton.”
Rebecca prayed that Caroline stayed hidden; it was their only strength, their only weapon … Or was it? With a quiet gasp, Rebecca rolled her foot sideways. She found the object she had nudged and once again heard the soft scrape of metal. Straining to see, Rebecca lowered her chin, ignoring the sharp prick on her neck and slow dribble of blood.
She couldn’t see the entire object—just the hilt. The hilt of the trader’s knife.
“Miss Ellerby, I tire of this game!” Renfrew’s tone and stance showed that it was true. The real Gilbert Renfrew was emerging. He turned his head toward Rebecca, eyeing her predicament with relish. “Well, my dear, it seems we must do this the hard way.”
* * *
“WHERE HAVE THEY GONE?” James’ voice had risen in volume with each repetition of the question; he was fairly shouting by the time they reached the Vauxhall Garden gates. Brant was unhelpfully silent. “Renfrew said he would wait for us here and yet here he is not!” James huffed and glared at any and everyone around them. His glower cleared the promenade, making it even more apparent that the ladies were nowhere to be seen.
Renfrew had lied. “He lied!” James shouted to no one in particular.
“About many things,” Brant said quietly, cutting through James’ panicked rage. “The peelers were not looking for us; he is not waiting where he said he would be, and I don’t believe he persuaded Mrs. Thompson to forgo the Blakeney Assembly because it would be a crush.”
“Absolutely not!” James said. He shook his head and swallowed several times in succession. His heart pounded; he was desperate to find Caroline and Rebecca. He could not lose her—would not lose them! Where were they?
“Sir!” a voice accosted them from the oth
er side of the gate.
“Sam.” James jumped over the turnstile, brushed past the protesting ticket man, and stepped out onto the street. Brant was right behind him. “Sam, have you seen Miss Ellerby?”
The coachman looked over his shoulder toward Colyhurst Road. “Yes, m’lord. She an’ Misses Hanton was squeezed in a hackney with an older gent. They was rushin’ off somethin’ terrible. The driver was flicking ’is whip before they even gots to the road.”
“Did you recognize the gentleman with them?” James felt sick. Disaster had befallen. Rebecca and Caroline were gone—kidnapped!
Sam shook his head vehemently. “No, sir, but I heard him yell to the driver. ‘To St. Katherine’s docks.’”
“Oh, Lord,” Brant said, “if they are taken onboard a ship we’ll never find them. They could sail anywhere.”
“Get the carriage free, Sam.” James turned to the eavesdropping ticket seller. “When the peelers get here, tell them where we have gone.” He didn’t wait for a reply but turned back. “Go, Sam. We are right behind you!”
* * *
REBECCA HEARD A low rumble in her ear and realized that Saunders was chuckling. She shivered with revulsion and his laugh became colder. He tightened his hold on her waist and pulled the knife away from her throat to show her the red tip—her blood dribbling down the blade of the hummingbird dagger. It was terrifying—the stuff of nightmares.
Rebecca dropped. Straight down, she let her legs do what they had wanted to do for sometime, collapse. She felt the dagger swing just over her head and threw her shoulder into Saunders’ legs, knocking him off balance.
Suddenly, boxes and crates tumbled from their perches—helter-skelter, raining down on them. Rebecca rolled aside, grabbing the trader’s knife as she did. From the corner of her eye, she watched Caroline jump down on Renfrew, knocking him and his pistol to the ground. Caroline landed hard on her knees beside the villain and pummeled the man about his head.
