Maggie MacKeever (34 page)

“Cuddling.” Miss Lennox’s tone was hollow. “I do not think we will have much opportunity in Newgate for such things.”

In this manner did they set about their self-appointed mission of mercy, and the day steadily progressed. Over cobbled streets the carriage rattled, past inns and derelict houses and decrepit old watchmen leaning on their poles. Miss Lennox was roused sufficiently from her depression to gaze with interest upon peddlers and pedestrians, scarlet-coated porters and hawkers with bandboxes on poles. She saw small chimney sweeps laden with their brushes, slaveys in mobcaps who called insults from upper-story windows, cits in high hats and neat broadcloth; and, unbeknownst to her, beggars and mudlarks, footpads and thieves. She also saw ramshackle tenements and dark alleyways, and a hospital for the insane, and the College of Surgeons, which stood unnervingly near to the Old Bailey, where the bodies of executed felons were taken for dissection.

Still, it was spring, and Miss Lennox was in love, and had spent many of the past hours in the company of her affianced husband. Granted, their purpose might be grim, but their spirits were not. It was as Jynx was restoring her energy with a potato roasted in its jacket that Shannon had purchased for her at a street stall, and watching with interest an enterprising youth with a dung cart, and discussing with Lord Roxbury their approaching nuptials, that disaster struck.

It was not immediately recognizable as such. Shannon glanced out the carriage window, cautiously, because they traveled through a part of London where well-dressed gentlemen dared not venture even in daylight, and in comparison with the inhabitants of these narrow, filthy streets Shannon, even in laborer’s attire, was extremely well-dressed. “Look, Jynx!” he exclaimed. “There’s Percy’s carriage.”

Jynx, too, peered at Lord Peverell’s eye-catching rig, which was painted the brightest of blues and liberally touched with gold. “Who but Percy,” she said scathingly, “would go about this business in something so easily recognized?”

Shannon, engaged in argument with the coachman, did not reply. The carriage rumbled to a halt, despite its owner’s strongly expressed conviction that to do so was to risk both life and limb; and its passengers once more alit. “There seems to be some altercation underway in that alley,” Jynx offered with great reluctance. “I suppose that we had better see what it is.”

With no greater enthusiasm, Shannon agreed. Fervently, he wished that Sir Malcolm had provided him with a pistol. Cautiously, they approached the narrow alleyway’s entrance.

The coachman’s ill temper had progressed apace with the waning day. In his opinion—shared unknowingly with a certain shopkeeper—these two were crazy as a pair of loons. Additionally, they were also very likely to soon be dead as doornails, and he did not care to become involved with a pair of soon-to-be-corpses discovered in a St. Giles alleyway. Callously, despite the large fare owed him, he abandoned them to their fate.

Lord Peverell and Cristin were indeed in the narrow stinking alleyway, and with them was a rotund little gentleman. This worthy proved better equipped with foresight than Lord Roxbury; in his chubby little hand was a wicked-looking gun. “What the deuce!” ejaculated the viscount, under the impression that Percy was in the process of being robbed.

“Glad to see you!” uttered Lord Peverell, whose handsome brow was beaded with sweat. “In a very nasty predicament!’

“Aye, so you are, cully!” remarked the rotund little man, as he turned on the newcomers a bright eye. “Caught with the goods, no less, and by no other than William Brown.” He flourished an identity card in the general direction of Lord Roxbury. “For so I am, and the best of them all when it comes to running desperate criminals to ground.”

“Desperate criminals?” echoed Miss Lennox, since the viscount appeared to once more have been stricken by paralysis of the tongue. “Come now, my man!”

Mr. Brown took no offense from this stark incredulity. “Don’t look it, do they?” he inquired jovially. “There it is, all the same! This dandy gent is no less than Innis Ashley, and he’ll be examined by the magistrates and committed for trial in less than a pig’s whisper. Theft, you see, ma’am.”

This complication was too mind-boggling even to contemplate. Jynx dared not imagine the to-do if Lord Peverell was brought to trial for Innis Ashley’s crimes. “You are a Bow Street Runner, then?”

“I am.” Mr. Brown’s smile was beautiful to see; it lit up his plump little face like a morning sun. “Here in discharge of the law.”

Cristin, who had been softly weeping all this time, emerged from behind her handkerchief. “Oh, Jynx! Tell him it isn’t true.”

“Now, now, missy, none of that!” The Runner frowned. “This miscreant has been taken for a criminal offense and you yourself have been caught compounding a felony, for which there is a government reward of forty pounds. If not for that, I might let you go, being as you’re such a pretty little thing, but a man has to live somehow.”

“Very well!” Cristin saw that she’d have precious little help from Lord Roxbury or Miss Lennox, both of whom were gazing with expressions of unconquerable horror upon the scene. “If he is Innis Ashley, then who am I?”

“I’m sure I can’t say, miss.” Mr. Brown did not seem to particularly care. “But it don’t signify. You’ll see the paved courtyard of the Old Bailey soon enough, whoever you may be!”

That dire prediction brought Jynx to her friend’s rescue. “There is a grave misunderstanding here, sir,” said she. “That gentleman is
not
Innis Ashley.”

“Oho!” The Runner’s bright eyes fixed with an unnerving intensity on Jynx’s dirty face. “So you know this pretty pair, do you?”

“Yes,” responded Miss Lennox, a great deal more courageously than she felt. “I also know Innis Ashley, and this gentleman is not he.”

Mr. Brown looked contemplative, so much so that Lord Roxbury was compelled to interfere. “It is true,” he said with marked reluctance. “I——”

“Now
we have it!” Mr. Brown’s pistol trained itself on the viscount’s smock-covered midriff.
“You’re
Innis Ashley! The same Innis Ashley who sent this silly widgeon to Tattersall’s with a forged authority from a certain lord to collect his winnings, and then later sent those winnings round to the moneylenders to hold them off awhile. That was a very foolish business, sirrah!”

Foolish indeed, thought Miss Lennox, even for an Ashley.
“Did
he?” she breathed, while Percy sputtered and Cristin sobbed. Lord Roxbury, on the other hand, stood positively motionless, his gaze fixed on the Runner’s gun.

“He did,” said Mr. Brown, with that chilling amiability. “Damned if this isn’t a good day’s work, for I’ve captured a whole bevy of villains who’ll be the better of a good hang! ‘Tis plain as a pikestaff that all of you are in this together—ample ground for suspicion, forsooth!” He adopted an expression that put Jynx forcibly in mind of a sad-faced basset hound. “More than ample ground,
if
I choose to use it.”

The nimble-witted Miss Lennox was quick to seize upon this thinly veiled hint.
“Choose,
Mr. Brown?”

The Runner had not been slow to note that this batch of criminals was not among the more clever of the thieving brotherhood. Therefore he awarded the perspicacious Miss Lennox an approving nod. “Exactly so, miss. I figure I could stash this case—refrain from giving evidence, that is—and let you all escape me for a sum of—oh, two hundred pounds.”

Cristin emerged once more from behind her handkerchief.
“That,”
she said sternly, “sounds very much like bribery!”

“So it does,” Mr. Brown replied with unabated good cheer. “Like I said, missy, a man has to live. Or I can clap the darbies on the lot of you, and take you away.”

Lord Roxbury roused from his stunned stupor to discover that four pairs of eyes were fixed on him hopefully. He looked bewildered. “Money,” prompted Miss Lennox. “This nice man will let us all go if you give him two hundred pounds.”

Shannon would have liked very much to do so, but he had anticipated no great financial crisis that morning when he’d so blithely left his house, and his purse had been sorely depleted by the outlays made from it during the course of the day. He further realized that the purchases made with those outlays were hidden beneath the seat of the hackney coach that had so hastily left them stranded. “I don’t suppose,” he said, with little hope, “that you’d accept my note for that sum.”

The Runner snorted. “I’m a fair man, I am, but
that’s
trying it on much too rare and thick! Accept a note-of-hand from Innis Ashley!” He sighed. “Well, there it is, and I tried my best, but it seems I’ll have to run you in. But first you must be searched.”

“Searched!” cried Cristin, outraged. Lord Roxbury said nothing at all, and Jynx backed away a pace, while Percy looked anxiously heavenward, as if he anticipated that some means of rescue would be presented by that unlikely source.

“Aye,” said Mr. Brown. “In cases of felony, your miscreant is always searched when first apprehended—stilettos and pocket pistols and that sort of thing! But we must do this by the book!” He drew himself up smartly. “Innis Ashley, I take you in charge and notify you that you will be taken into the safe-keeping of—”

He never finished the statement. Lord Roxbury had become belatedly aware that the valiant, if eminently corruptible, Mr. Brown was outnumbered one to four. Lord Roxbury was also a notable proponent of the noble art of self-defense, and with one well-aimed blow to the jaw knocked Mr. Brown unconscious. “Zounds!” said Percy. Cristin peered out from behind her handkerchief and uttered a little squeal.

Oblivious to the congratulations that were offered him on all sides, Shannon knelt and bound the Runner’s hands and feet with strips torn from Miss Lennox’s petticoats. Then he placed Mr. Brown’s pistol near him on the ground, and shepherded his companions toward Percy’s carriage.

“What now?” inquired Miss Lennox, as they set out at a smart pace. “I must confess, Shannon, that I feel I have never before properly appreciated you.”

“Thank you, poppet!” Lord Roxbury, oddly exhilarated by his adventure, would have greatly liked to further explore this topic, but Cristin was weeping all over him. Cristin, it was at length learned, was distressed beyond measure to think of poor Mr. Brown left tied up in a St. Giles alleyway.

“Well, I like that!” uttered Percy from the driver’s seat, where he was in a most harrowing and inexpert manner wielding the reins. “After he threatened to do for all of us! I don’t mind telling you that I was shaking like a blancmanger the whole time.”

So, currently, were the rest of them, and Shannon took over the reins. “Mr. Brown will free himself readily enough,” he remarked, before Cristin could raise a further outcry. “But hopefully not before all four of us have removed ourselves from town.”

“Oh?” Percy looked curious. “Are we going somewhere?”

“Yes.” Lord Roxbury’s tone was very firm. “You and Cristin are going to Gretna Green, once you rid yourselves of this damnably conspicuous carriage. Hire yourselves a coach, and proceed by stages, and for God’s sake don’t use your own names!”

For a couple so set on marriage, Lord Peverell and Cristin voiced considerable protest. Cristin’s, being far more emotional, had to be dealt with first. “Percy’s family,” she sobbed, “will be broken-hearted at the disgrace!”

Miss Lennox felt obliged to intervene, lest Lord Roxbury lose his temper, and that he should lose his temper appeared imminent. “Percy’s family would be a great deal more brokenhearted,” she remarked, “if you did
not
elope! I think even Lady Peverell would consider Gretna Green preferable to Newgate. If you stay in London, you are bound to be identified as passers of stolen merchandise, what with Cristin being Innis’s niece, and Percy having practically shouted his name to the world via this coach.” She glanced at Shannon. “For that matter, so will we!”

“Exactly,” said Shannon. “Which is precisely why——”

Percy cleared his throat. “Don’t mean to throw a spanner in the works,” he muttered apologetically, “but I haven’t a feather to fly with. Don’t see how a man can elope when his pockets are to let.” Lord Roxbury sighed and remarked in exacerbated tones that he would finance the expedition from his own strongbox.

“No,” interrupted Cristin, with surprising firmness, “you will not. Percy is already too greatly indebted. I am not wealthy, but I have more than enough money to pay for our journey and to tide us over until we can straighten out Percy’s accounts.”

This statement caused her companions to stare, even Shannon, to the extreme hazard of an unwary pedestrian.
“You
have money?” echoed Jynx.

“Of course I do, and I do not see why everyone must be gawking at me! Mama left me some money, which my father did not know about, and I’ve been hoarding the rest for years. Some of it has been invested, and though I have made no great killing, the returns have not been inconsiderable.” Cristin looked irritable. “I know you are thinking that it is queer for an Ashley to be so thrifty, but mama told me a long time ago that I must allow myself to be guided by my father’s mistakes.”

“Good God!” uttered Lord Roxbury, and returned his attention to Percy’s horses and the narrow streets.

“But, Cristin!” Jynx said faintly. “You could have paid off the Runner, and Percy’s gambling debts!”

“The
first
lesson I learned from my father,” Cristin said severely, “was
not
to foolishly throw money away!” Miss Lennox might have been dumbfounded by this extreme example of Ashley logic, but Lord Peverell was not. He expressed himself delighted that his darling Cristin should possess so rational a point of view. Cristin was in turn delighted to be so well understood, and fell into his arms. Jynx regarded them with an expression that came perilously close to loathing, then gathered up her skirts and joined Lord Roxbury on the driver’s seat.

Chapter Twenty-eight

While Miss Lennox and Lord Roxbury were engaged in circumventing the law, Lady Bliss was barricaded in her book room, listening to the sounds of the house being torn down around her, and waiting without a great deal of hope for her knight in shining armor to come to her rescue. Since the brandy decanter was fortuitously barricaded in the book room with her, her vigil saw her grow increasingly tipsy. And then the noises of desecration and strife ceased abruptly, and an ominous silence settled upon Blissington House.