A Dangerous Liaison With Detective Lewis (19 page)

Silence. “I believe so.”

“Ah, let me guess.” Rafe detailed their immediate surroundings. “Thick cables and an odd variety of wheels and pulleys. I wager we are positioned somewhere under the contraption.”

“Directly under the lift.”

He licked a split lip and sucked in a deep breath. His chest strained against the bristle of hemp rope. “Hence the remark, ‘all the better to flatten us.’”

“I have come to understand they are quite excellent at threats.”

Along with a hammering headache, his senses returned. A tug came from behind his back. “What are we to do, Rafe?”

He made a brief assessment of their bindings. His hands were tied behind his back and his feet bound separately. Another heavier rope strapped the two of them
together. They appeared to be cocooned in hemp. “I’m relieved you didn’t ask if I had a plan.”

Fanny huffed. “Well, do you?”

He pictured the knotted brow and the pout on her lips and quickly shuttered all trepidation aside. For her safety. For their lives.

“First off, we need to get out of these ropes.” Rafe hunkered down and extended his legs. He found he could swing them side to side. Now, if they were both tied in similar fashion . . .

“What are we sitting on?”

“An old skip loader, turned upside down.”

“Stroke of luck. Possibly.” Rafe was thinking out loud. “Well then, we’re going to move together—like good soldiers. Be prepared to take a tumble onto the ground if this works.” He sat up straight and pressed his feet to the floor. “Brace yourself against me, place your feet on the ground, and raise your bum off the loader.”

Quite miraculously, they both rose off the metal container until Fanny’s feet slipped out from under her. She plopped back down, taking him with her. They both landed with a hollow thud. Rafe exhaled. “You all right?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, of course I am.” There was an exasperated breath before she leaned against him. “Let’s try again, only this time don’t push quite so hard.”

With backs pressed together and feet planted squarely on the ground, they pushed upward in sync. “On the count I am going to do a kind of toe-to-heel step to my right. Simultaneously, you will wriggle your feet to the
left, and we are going to shuffle along, until we reach the edge of this metal bin, and then . . .”

The rope binding them together snagged on one the cart’s wheels. A struggle to break free ensued, tipping the loader and themselves onto the ground with a crash.

“Here now, what goes on below?” The gruff query echoed down the long shaft.

Rafe froze. “Who’s that?

Fanny wriggled herself upright. “Rats.”

The voice from on high queried again. “A rat in a copper mine? Never heard of such a thing.”

“Sorry. I forgot they’re all aboveground here.”

Rafe snorted. Fanny always had been a stouthearted lass.

Her voice returned to a whisper. “Can you feel my fingers, Rafe?”

Good God. A lovely tickle along his wrists. “Yes. Yes I can.” Their fall to the ground had twisted them so that their bound hands were in close proximity to one another. “Fan, if you could manage to find the tail of the knot, that would be a start.”

Rafe inched his hands closer. Pressing hard, he strained against the bindings even as they cut into his wrists. “Can you reach it now?”

Tentative fingers made several blind attempts to get a grip on the rope. “Wait, yes, I believe I’ve got it.”

Dear God. Rafe closed his eyes. Prayer was something he admittedly invoked only on rare and deserving occasions. However, twice now in so many days, he had asked for the Almighty’s assistance in saving Fanny Greyville-Nugent.
Her fingers tugged at his knot and her elbow pressed against him in a jerky fashion.

To ease the tension in the rope, he pressed his wrists together to allow the smallest bit of slack in the prickly hemp. He felt a long pull, and the rope eased. “I think—” Rafe pulled hard, twisting his hands. “That’s got it.” He wrested a hand loose and was able to push off the bindings. Easing his arms to his sides, he wriggled his hands up through the coils of rope binding them together.

“Patience, Fan, I’m almost free.” Rafe loosed the bindings around his ankles, untied her wrists, and pulled her upright. “We need to find a way to get him down here.” He chafed a bit of circulation back into her wrists, then untied her feet. “I’m going to need you to cry out, like you did before. Louder this time, and quite desperate.”

Fanny nodded and stood up to yell. “Wait a moment.” He pulled her off to one side of the mine shaft—away from the path of the lift. “Just in case their desire to kill us is greater than their curiosity.”

“Ready?” Fanny didn’t wait for an answer. She inhaled a deep breath and let loose an ear-piercing shriek.

“I say, what be the trouble down there?”

Fanny turned to Rafe and raised a brow. He held an index finger to his lips. As seconds of eternity passed, they waited in silence.

“Hello down there? Miss?”

Rafe pulled her close. “How many guards, do you think?”

She stood on her tiptoes to whisper in his ear. “I believe some of them went off, not sure how many were left behind.”

Another voice, different this time, came from above. “Don’t make us come down there, lass. Ye will no’ like it much if we do.”

His hand remained at the small of her back. “Do you still have the gun?”

She raised a brow. “You mean the one digging a hole into my leg?” She turned away and drew up her skirt. Fanny’s momentary lapse into modesty caused a grin. Pivoting back, she passed the weapon to Rafe.

He released the cylindrical chamber and counted bullets. Overhead, the gasp of steam signaled the lift engine was engaged. The pulley system began to lower the metal cage. Her large round eyes shifted up from the revolver. “How many?”

“Two.” Rafe winked. “No pressure.” He motioned her back into the shadows and bade her stay, while he crouched behind a queue of empty skip loaders and cocked the pistol.

As the iron cage descended, he made out a pair of legs, and then another pair. And another. Drat. Three men were in the metal cage and they were almost upon them. Belching a hiss of steam, the heavy platform groaned to a stop four feet above the shaft floor. Good. They assumed he and Fanny were still tied up below. The gate retracted, and one of the guards dropped to the ground. The man drew a weapon and ducked under the lift.

Rafe stepped out of hiding and slipped under the platform. He used the butt of his revolver to strike the back of the man’s head and caught hold of deadweight.
The body slumped soundlessly over the upturned skip loader. Rafe pocketed the man’s pistol and took cover behind the unconscious guard.

A second man landed on the ground with a heavy thud. This one, a burly stout bloke, turned and fired a shot into his own man. Rafe returned fire and brought the guard down. With a hiss and a clunk, the lift began to rise overhead. Rafe leaped onto the skip loader and into the air. He caught hold of the edge of the platform and pulled himself up. The guard at the controls stepped away and kicked Rafe’s shoulder, sending him back off the lift. Rafe barely held on to the ledge as a booted foot stomped. Bruised fingers slipped off the platform and left him dangling by one hand. He looked down. Pain knifed through his upper arm even as crushed fingers numbed. Soon the lift would be high enough that the fall alone would either kill him or break both his legs.

Rafe swung a leg up, meeting his attacker face-to-face. The guard moved to crush the bones of his other hand. The crack of a pistol shot zinged overhead, but he was almost certain it came from below. Rafe stared as a dark hole appeared under the man’s eye above him and blood dripped from an open mouth. He fell forward, then plunged head over heels off the platform. The body landed facedown on the floor below. A frightened, wild-eyed Fanny stepped into a shaft of light, holding a pistol with two hands. The gun still pointed at the lift.

“Brilliant work, Fan, but lower the gun, darling, if you would?”

“Don’t you dare fall, Detective Lewis.”

He clenched his teeth, ignored throbbing fingers, and raised himself onto the lift. A lantern sputtered from the cage ceiling. With no one at the controls, the lift continued to rise. Willing himself to stand up, he stared at the tubes and levers that made up the control.

He shouted into the darkness, “Which way do I push the lever?”

Fanny’s strained voice carried up to him. “The engine must be in neutral before you can change directions. Find a midpoint.”

Aching fingers gripped the brass handle and pulled the lever back to an upright position. Neutral, he hoped. The cage jolted to a stop. He poked his head out of the steel chamber and found her ashen face below.

“Groaning men are starting to flail about.” She stood in a shaft of light, shading her eyes. “Rafe, please come down.”

He rubbed his bruised hand and returned life to several swollen fingers. “Should I push the lever past neutral in the opposite direction?”

Her head bobbed a yes. “Try it.”

Rafe pressed the lever down and a burst of steam came from above. The iron cage rattled, groaned, and gasped, then started down again. Near the bottom, Rafe brought the lever back to neutral and the lift stopped. Rafe leaned out the open metalwork gate. “Hop aboard, Miss Greyville-Nugent.”

Rafe lifted her into the cage and shoved the gate closed. He wound his arms tightly around her and pushed the lever. “Look.” He nodded upward. From
a tiny square of light, high above, a rose-colored sky poured soft rays down on them. “Nearly dusk outside.” They had been down in this hellish pit for most of the day. Fanny clung to him as the groaning, creaking platform slowly climbed up the shaft. “Now what, Rafe?”

He stroked the small of her back and spoke softly. “We charge ahead, Lieutenant Cutthroat. Onward to Glasgow.”

Chapter Sixteen

T
he grind and squeal of metal pulleys and the shudder of the lift bore a strange semblance to her own fatigue. She was weary of being chased around Scotland’s industrial corridor by this bizarre band of malefactors. And this cat-and-mouse game—this seemingly endless struggle—had grown well beyond tiresome. The foppish malefactors had murdered her father and two others. Now they skulked after her. But why? Even though her body ached, her mind retraced what little they knew of these devious, malicious men.

It wasn’t as if she was going to become an inventor. She was more of an engineer, if truth be told, with a keen interest in mechanical devices. She had even helped her father out on a design or two. Child’s play, really—hardly genius. Besides, how would these criminals know anything of her hopes and dreams?

She nuzzled close to Rafe. She couldn’t help it, the man brought out the wanton hussy in her. Worst of all,
she suspected that he knew it. His jacket smelled of copper dust and gunpowder, reminding her she’d just held a pistol in her hand. Good God. She pushed away. “I believe I killed a man.”

“It was either him or me.” His grin was oddly reassuring. “Glad you chose to save me.” The cage rose aboveground and a rush of air swept through the open ironwork. They clung to each other and gulped deep breaths. Fanny exhaled a sigh.

“The fresh air should help revive us.” Rafe spoke in low tones as he opened the retractable gate and peered around the gravel yard.

Some distance away, a man sat in a wagon, his back to them. His snores suggested their lookout might have had a wee too much drink. Rafe reached for Fanny’s hand and stepped out of the lift. They circumvented massive wheels and pulleys and exited the shaft house.

A steep incline covered in loose shale girded the mine entrance. They kept to the deeper shadows and made their way around a curve of foothill. Once they were shielded by a slope of knoll, they headed toward the setting sun. West, Glasgow way.

“Look here.” Rafe pointed to a boarded-up shed. A couple of two-wheeled contraptions were parked against the building.

Fanny’s eyes sparked with recognition. “Velocipedes!” Bicycles were often used to move about large mining operations.

“A couple of old Rovers.” Rafe rolled out one of the wobbly-wheeled bicycles and dusted off the seat.

“A bit drossy, don’t you think?” Fanny squinted at the rusty Rover.

“Maybe a bit worse for wear.” He held the metal frame upright and motioned her on. “Shall we have a go?”

Fanny gathered up her skirts and settled onto the seat. She tucked a bit of skirt under her bottom and away from the wheel spokes. “Ready?” She nodded and Rafe shoved her off.

On her first turn, the handlebars of the teetering two-wheeler proved loose and unworthy. Rafe frowned. “How’s the steerage?”

Fanny leaned forward and pedaled faster. “Improves some with speed.” At least the pedals worked fair enough. Fanny steered the bicycle in ever-widening, wobbly circles until she got a good bit of steam up. Passing Rafe, she made a turn down the country road and waved. “See you in Glasgow.”

Rafe jumped on the other bicycle and chased after. He rode close behind, keeping a lookout, as they quickly put a good bit of distance between themselves and the mining operation. Fanny silently gave thanks for long summer days. The luminous silver twilight would linger for some time to come. At least she would be able to see the road ahead.