Maiden Lane [6] Duke of Midnight (19 page)

Or advertise their wares
, Maximus thought cynically as he slipped through the magnificent front gates just as the clock struck midnight. He wore his Ghost of St. Giles costume tonight, for though he had no doubt he could affect Lord Kilbourne’s release as the Duke of Wakefield, it would take time.

Time the madman evidently didn’t have.

Over his head, twin stone figures writhed on the arched gate, one representing Melancholia and the other Raving Madness. Before him was a vast, open courtyard, made monochrome in the moonlight. On holidays the courtyard and building within was flooded with sightseers—all of whom paid a tithe to see the amusements of deranged madmen and madwomen. Maximus had never been himself, but he’d sat listening distastefully often enough as some fashionable lady described the titillating horrors she’d seen with her bosom bows. Over one hundred poor souls were incarcerated here—which meant that if he were to find Kilbourne amongst them, he’d need a guide.

Maximus glided toward the massive front doors and found them, not surprisingly, locked. All the windows were barred to keep the patients safely inside, but there were several side doors for the delivery of food—and perhaps the inmates themselves. He selected one and tried the handle. It, too, was locked. So he tried the next obvious choice.

He knocked.

There was an interminable period of waiting before shuffling could be heard and the door swung open.

Inside, staring at him with wide eyes, was a guard.

Maximus immediately thrust his short sword against the guard’s throat. “Hush.”

The attendant’s mouth opened in an oval of surprise, but he didn’t make a sound. The man was dressed in breeches, waistcoat, and a very ragged coat, his head covered by a soft hat. He’d probably been asleep. No doubt Bedlam was not used to receiving visitors in the middle of the night.

“I wish to see Lord Kilbourne,” Maximus whispered. He was unlikely to ever meet this man again, but it never hurt to be cautious.

The attendant blinked. “ ’E’s in th’ Incurables ward.”

Maximus cocked his head. “Then take me to him.”

The man started to turn, but Maximus pressed the sword tip against his throat warningly. “And don’t go alerting any of your fellow guards, mind. You’ll be the first to fly this life should I find myself in a sword fight.”

The attendant swallowed with a small clicking sound and turned with exaggerated care to lead Maximus into Bedlam. He’d brought a lantern with him when he’d answered the door, and this gave a feeble light as they entered a long corridor.

To the left were tall, barred windows overlooking the courtyard. To the right, a row of doors led away into the darkness. A square window was cut into the upper part of each door and inset with crossed bars. Faint sounds came from the inhabitants of this place: rustling and sighs,
moans, and an odd, eerie humming. Somewhere a voice was raised in argument, but no other voice answered back. The air was thick with a miasma of smells: urine and cooked cabbage, lye and tallow, wet stone and feces. Something about the corridor and the place gave Maximus a sense of déjà vu, but he could not remember why.

They were almost halfway down the corridor when footsteps echoed behind them. “Sully? Is that you?”

The attendant—apparently, Sully—stopped and turned, his eyes widening in alarm. Maximus ducked his face into his shoulder so the nose of his mask couldn’t be seen in profile and peered behind.

A figure was at the other end of the corridor, but surely he couldn’t tell at this distance who they were.

Maximus poked Sully with his sword under cover of his cloak. “Remember what I told you.”

“J… just me, Ridley,” Sully stuttered.

“Oo’s that you got with you?” Ridley asked suspiciously.

“My brother, George, come to have a bit of tipple with me,” Sully said nervously. “He’ll be no bother.”

“Keep walking,” Maximus whispered.

Ridley started down the corridor.

“I… I’ll just show George to my rooms,” Sully called in a high voice, and then they were around the corner and running up a central flight of stairs.

“Will he follow us?” Maximus demanded.

“I don’t know.” Sully sent him a nervous glance. “ ’E’s a suspicious one is that Ridley.”

Maximus glanced back when they reached the upper floor, but he couldn’t make out if anyone was trailing them in the darkness. He turned back to Sully. “Show me Kilbourne.”

“This way.”

To the left was a door. Beside it stood a stool and a key hanging on a hook.

“Leech’s turn for the night guard,” Sully muttered as he took the key and fit it into the lock on the door. “ ’E’s probably drunk in ’is bed, though.”

As Sully held high his lantern to open the door, Maximus could see the sign that hung over the lintel:
Incurable
.

Beyond lay a long corridor like the one below, save that here the cells opened on both sides. The rooms had no doors to either shield the occupants or protect the visitor. The inmates within lay upon straw like stabled animals, and the stink of their manure was enough to make Maximus’s eyes water. Here was a white-haired, bearded venerable, his nearly colorless eyes staring sightlessly into the light as they passed. There, a young woman, pretty, save for the savage lunge she made at them when they crossed her doorway. A chain rattled and she fell back, exactly like a bitch choked by a collar. The youth in the next stall laughed, high and hysterical, scrabbling at his own face as he did so.

Sully crossed himself and hurried to the last stall. He stopped and held his lantern high, illuminating a massive male body lying in the straw.

Maximus frowned, stepping closer. “Is he alive?”

Sully shrugged. “Was when we brought dinner ’round to the others. ’Course ’e didn’t eat it seein’ as ’ow ’e’s been asleep.”

Not so much asleep as insensible
, Maximus thought grimly. He went to one knee beside the man in the filthy straw. Viscount Kilbourne looked nothing like his sister. Where she was slim he was huge—wide shoulders,
massive hands, legs that sprawled across the cell. Whether he was a handsome man or not was impossible to tell: his face was swollen and caked with dried blood, both eyes blackened, his bottom lip split and grown to the size and color of a small plum. This close Maximus could hear an odd, whistling wheeze as the big man’s chest struggled to draw air into his lungs.

Kilbourne appeared near death. Would he even survive the move out of this place? He also looked as if he’d received no doctoring at all—even the blackened blood on his face hadn’t been wiped away.

Maximus’s lips thinned grimly. “Do you have the key to his manacle?”

“It’ll be hanging by the door.” Sully made to turn, but Maximus grabbed him.

The guard quailed.

“You come back within the minute or I find you. Understand?”

Sully nodded frantically.

Maximus let him go.

Sully was back in less than a minute with an iron ring of keys. “Should be one o’ these—”

“What’re you doing in here?”

Maximus rose and whirled at the voice, both swords out.

Sully squeaked and froze, his hands clutching the keys before him like a shield.

The man who stood in the doorway to the cell paused with Maximus’s sword at his throat, his eyes wide. Maximus recognized the voice now as Ridley’s. He was a big man—nearly as big as the one sprawled at their feet—and he had the look of a bully.

“Sully, take off the manacles,” Maximus ordered, careful to keep his eyes on Ridley.

He heard the clank of the manacle falling to the floor.

“You”—Maximus gestured to Ridley with his sword—“pick up his feet.”

“What d’you want with ’im?” Ridley sounded sullen, but he bent to grab Kilbourne’s feet. “ ’E’s near enough dead as ’tis.”

“Give me the lantern and take his head,” Maximus said to Sully, ignoring Ridley.

The first attendant looked doubtful, but he surrendered the lantern readily enough. With a grunt and a bit of swearing, both men lifted Kilbourne’s limp form.

“Weighs a bloody ton, ’e does.” Ridley spat into the straw.

“Less talk,” Maximus said softly. “If another guard comes, I won’t be needing you, will I?”

That shut up the second attendant. They made their way back down the hallway and—with more difficulty—down the staircase. Maximus watched carefully that they didn’t drop Kilbourne, but otherwise didn’t help, preferring to keep his hands free in case more guards showed up.

“Would’ve finished the job if’n I knew you was coming for ’im anyway,” Ridley muttered as they finally made the ground floor.

Maximus slowly turned his head. “You did this?”

“Aye,” Ridley said with satisfaction. “Always were mouthin’ off, th’ whoreson. ’E ’ad it comin’ to ’im, ’e did.”

Maximus looked at Kilbourne, lying near death, his face unrecognizable, and thought:
No one deserved that.

“Surprised ’e lived through that first night,” Ridley
mused, apparently under the impression that they were now fast friends.

“Really?” Maximus asked in a flat tone. He looked at the rows of cells they passed, the long, wide corridor, perfect for viewing the inmates, and suddenly knew what this place reminded him of: the Tower Menagerie. The humans within this place were used for the entertainment of others, exactly like the exotic animals of the menagerie… excepting that the animals were better kept.

“We gave it to ’im good, we did,” Ridley said in a voice that made Maximus’s skin crawl. “An’ if ’e ’adn’t passed out so quick, we woulda give it to ’im better, if’n you know what I mean.”

“Oh, I think I do,” Maximus growled. They were at the end of the long ground floor corridor now. “Put him down by the door.”

Sully looked at him warily, while Ridley was puzzled. “ ’Ere? ’Ow’re you going to get ’im out the door?”

“Don’t worry your head about it,” Maximus said gently, and smashed him on the temple with the butt of his sword.

Ridley slumped to the floor.

Sully threw up his arms. “Please, sir!”

“Did you take part in this?”

“No!”

Sully might’ve been lying, but Maximus hadn’t the heart to hit him in any case. The gore on Kilbourne made him sick. He bent, took Kilbourne’s right arm, and hauled the big man over his shoulder with a grunt. The man was heavy, but not as heavy as his stature should make him. Maximus could feel the bones of Kilbourne’s wrist, stark and hard. No doubt he’d lost weight in this place.

The thought made Maximus’s mood darker. “Open the door for me.”

Sully ran to do his bidding.

Maximus stepped out, but paused to look over his shoulder at Sully. “Tell Ridley and all the other guards: I’ll be back. At night, when you’re sleeping, when you least expect it. And if I find any more inmates treated as Lord Kilbourne was, then I’ll not ask questions. I’ll simply deal justice with the point of my sword. Understand?”

“Aye, sir.” Sully looked absolutely terrified.

Maximus stepped into the night.

He trotted to the gates with his burden, and slipped through. Outside lay the gardens of Moorfields and, a little way down from the main gates, a waiting horse and cart.

“Go,” Maximus muttered as he heaved Kilbourne into the bed of the cart and climbed in after.

“Are we being followed?” Craven asked as he slapped the reins.

“No, not yet, at any rate.” Maximus panted, trying to catch his breath while watching for pursuers.

“A successful job then.”

Maximus grunted, glancing at the madman. He still breathed at least. What in hell was he going to do with a fugitive from Bedlam?

Maximus shook his head at the thought and replied to Craven, “Only if Kilbourne lives.”

A
RTEMIS WOKE TO
a soft tap at her door. She blinked and looked around the room, for a moment, confused, until she remembered that she was in her guest room at Pelham House.

The tapping came again.

She struggled out of the warm bedcovers and shrugged into a wrapper. A glance at the window showed that it was just dawn.

Artemis cracked the door open to find a maid, already dressed for the day. “Yes?”

“Beg pardon, Miss, but there’s a messenger for you at the back door. Says he’s to speak to you and no other.”

Apollo.
It must be. Trembling, Artemis found her slippers and followed the maid down the stairs and back toward the kitchens. Had Maximus found her brother? Did he still live?

The kitchens were already abustle with preparations for the day. Cooks and maids were rolling out pastry, footmen carrying silver, and a young girl carefully tended the hearth. A great table lay in the middle of the kitchens, the center of much of the food preparation, but at one end a lad sat, a cup of tea and a plate of freshly buttered bread before him. He stood as she neared, and Artemis saw that his clothes were still dusty from the road.

“Miss Greaves?”

“Yes?”

He fumbled in his coat pocket before drawing out a letter. “His Grace said I was to place this in your hands and no other’s.”

“Thank you.” Artemis took the letter, staring for a moment at the embossed seal.

“Here, Miss,” the lad said, holding out his butter knife. He had a fresh, country face, though he must’ve come from London. “To break the seal.”

She smiled her thanks—rather tremulously, she was afraid—and hastily broke the seal. The letter held only one sentence, but it meant the world:

He is alive at my house.

—M

Artemis exhaled a breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding.
Oh, thank God. Alive.

She must go to him at once.

About to leave the kitchen, the letter clutched in her fist, she remembered the messenger with a pang. She turned back to him. “I’m afraid I forgot to bring my purse down, but if you’ll wait here, I’m sure I have a shilling for you.”

“No need, Miss.” The lad grinned in a friendly way. “His Grace is a generous master. He said as how I wasn’t to accept coin from you.”

“Oh.” Artemis said. That Maximus had thought to spare her the embarrassment of having no money for the messenger made her heart warm. “Well, I thank you, then.”