In the Brief Eternal Silence (65 page)

“Neither do I,” Bertie said. “But the smell
seems to be stronger.”

There was a snapping sound from nearer the
far wall, and as they both looked in that direction, a hot ash
floated with whimsy to the floor. Then there was another snap, and
another ash, and even as they watched this, they noted with sudden
horror that the roof appeared to be burning.

“Good God! The bloody place is on fire!” Lord
Tempton rose from his seat. But even in his urgency, he had the
presence of mind to slide his cards into a deck and pocket
them.

“I'll get the children, you wake Mrs.
Crockner!” Miss Murdock exclaimed, rising also. She clutched the
one child in her arms and hurried to the other in front of the
stove.

“Most improper for me to wake her,” Bertie
advised, and Miss Murdock turned to exclaim that this was certainly
not a time to worry about decorum, when she saw that his merry eyes
were twinkling even as he moved to the back room.

And she almost laughed, for it was apparent
to her that Bertie thoroughly enjoyed whatever scrape he was
dragged into. But although they should have plenty of time to leave
the shanty without fear for their lives, she was much too nervous
to find anything thrilling about their predicament. She took the
seven year old by the hand and Bertie returned with a frightened
Mrs. Crockner. He nodded to Lizzie and said, “Out the door then,”
and taking Mrs. Crockner's arm, and Lizzie behind him with the two
children, he pulled the door open.

There was a sudden sharp thud and a
splintering of wood. A report of gunfire came to their ears, and it
was very close, and with amazement, they looked at the door, saw
the bullet hole drilled through it, and of one accord, they all
fell back into the small house, and Bertie slammed the door. “Get
down on the floor! Mrs. Crockner, is there another way out?” he
asked.

But she only shook her head. “No, m'lord! An'
we're trapped in here 'n' all with me two young babies!”

Lizzie met Bertie's eyes and she saw that the
merriment had left them. The three year old began to cry and the
older one said, “Ma, it's burnin', ma! Why canst we go out?”

Miss Murdock soothed him as best she could.
“We'll go out, we just have to wait a minute,” and she looked with
helplessness to Bertie but he was already crawling along the floor
to a window with his pistol drawn. He rose high enough to peer from
it, but as he drew back the canvas to better see, there was another
splintering of wood and a loud crack, and he ducked back down with
a curse.

“We shall have to try to break through the
back wall,” he explained, but at the rate that the flames were fast
consuming the wood the place was made of, Miss Murdock could well
understand the sudden doubt in his voice.

St. James learned from Steven that he knew of
no better route to his home than the one he had taken Lord Tempton
and Miss Murdock along in the wee hours of that morning. They were
in his curricle, St. James driving and Steven up behind where Tyler
normally would stand, and Tyler rode astride upon his mount. They
were near the pool's neighborhood (as Steven's father had naturally
been returning to that area the night of his attempt on milord's
life, and hence, the undertaker Tyler had found as handiest was not
all that far) with the imposing new London Bridge to be seen over
the rooftops ahead of them. St. James scanned his memory of the
street Lucy had led him to the night before and asked Steven,
“There are the houses to one side of the street and warehouses to
the other, are there not?”

To which Steven nodded affirmative and added
an “Aye,” with the realization that St. James from his position in
front of him could not see his answer. “T'is between two warehouses
that we'll come out into our street. But 'twill be some hundred
feet or so from me own doorstep.”

“You will have to let me know, Steven, when
we are drawing close to this mew, for I did not come in this way
last night and am unfamiliar with it.”

“Last night?” Steven asked.

“Yes, of course.” St. James gave him an
impatient look from his gold eyes. “You do not think that I allowed
your mother to go home without any protection, do you?”

And if Steven had any lingering doubt that he
were somehow betraying his father by renewing his friendship with
St. James, his lordship's words of concern for his mother erased
them.

“Coo, then you'd best slow now, m'lord. For
we'll be but t'length of t'warehouse from t'end of that mew when we
next turn up here.”

St. James slowed the curricle, and Tyler, who
had been forced to follow behind because of the narrowness of the
side street, did likewise. When they arrived close to the mew that
ran at a counterpoint to it, St. James stopped the curricle, said
to Steven, “Jump down, lad, and peep about and see if there is any
one about, and if there is a door to the warehouse upon this side.
Large enough for a curricle to fit through, mind you.”

Steven did as he was asked, feeling a great
deal trusted, and St. James was a little surprised when after just
a brief second of glancing down the mew from the corner, the lad
drew his head back as though seeing something to alarm him. St.
James waited for no further explanation, as Steven seemed bent upon
looking again with even more caution, but jumped down from the
curricle with a significant look to Tyler, who was trapped behind
the curricle and could do nothing but wait at any rate. Then he
joined Steven at the corner, and ducking down so that he was
pressed against the boy's legs, moved his own head to where he
could get a take on the situation.

He had expected a few children to mayhaps be
playing in the mew, as it was afternoon by now, and although cold,
it was clear. That in itself would have been a challenge, for they
would undoubtedly be moved to some kind of excitement when seeing a
curricle driven down an alley that did not see such sights on just
any given day. But although such a situation would have been less
than perfect, he felt that he still would have enough time to
gather Miss Murdock from the house and be off again with her before
any one of significance had a chance to investigate what was
happening.

As it was, there were no children, to his
relief. But there was a man at the far end, where the mew ended and
Steven's street cut across the mouth of it, and even as St. James
spied him, the man was turned and looking back along the mew, and
in his hand he held a gun, which was half raised as he scanned the
mew as though he may have heard the wheels of the curricle and the
accompanying beat of hooves with it, and was even now waiting to
see what may become of these sounds.

His scanning was but brief as he seemed to
become distracted by something along Steven's street, for he gave a
final glance about and then turned again to peep around the corner
of the warehouse, much the way St. James and Steven were doing now.
Without further hesitation, St. James whispered to Steven, “Hold
the horses where they are, lad, and I will be back momentarily,”
and he slipped one pistol from his waist band and slid around the
corner.

Then, with his eyes not leaving the man ahead
of him, he advanced toward him, pistol held at the ready. The man
shoved his head further around the corner, and St. James was but
ten yards from him and bearing down fast when something more like
instinct than actual sound must have made the man aware of his
presence.

He pulled his head back and swung toward St.
James. His gun hand stopped in mid jerk as he recognized the
significance of St. James' aimed pistol and he realized he was well
and truly covered and any effort on his part to bring his own
weapon to bear and fire would be folly.

“Very good,” St. James panted as he covered
the last few yards and stood but a few feet from him. “You may hand
it here butt first like a good lad, now, mind you, and no funny
business or I will plug you without even knowing what no good you
are so obviously up to.”

The man was not a lad, but older than St.
James by a good ten years, but he swallowed this condescension
without comment and replaced the hammer that was cocked, took the
barrel with his other hand and handed it over. He was large and
burly, and St. James was not stupid enough to think that although
the man was apparently now unarmed that he would be no threat. He
kept his distance from the reach of those powerful arms.

Tyler arrived out of breath beside him, as he
must have climbed over the back of the curricle at seeing his
employer slipping off around the corner. Now he came forward,
staying clear of the line of fire that St. James had drawn between
pistol and man. “We'll need a rope, Tyler,” St. James said as Tyler
pulled back the man's coat and found another weapon still tucked
out of sight, which he himself pocketed into his own waistband to
join the gun already there.

“T'boy's got one about his pants,” Tyler
reminded him, and St. James grinned at the thought of Steven doing
without his belt and his pants perhaps falling. Tyler glanced down
the mew, must have seen Steven regarding all of this activity from
the corner as before, for he motioned with his hand for him to
come.

Steven, with good common sense, led the team
and the curricle, and as Tyler had tied his mount to the back of
it, this horse followed also.

“T'ain't you gonna ask me anythin'?” the man
held at gunpoint complained. “T'is no law 'gainst lookin' down a
street!”

But no one answered. Tyler strode forward and
procured the rope from Steven. St. James said, “You may have a seat
there on the ground and put your hands out before you, together.
Just pretend you are praying,” he mocked. The man paled, perceiving
that although his captor seemed uncommonly polite that he was in
fact furious.

He sat as requested. Tyler looped the rope
about his wrists, tightened it, knotted it and then pulled on the
remaining length of it until the man's hands were at his ankles,
which he kicked into the proper position and trussed his hands to
his feet in short order. Now the man was breathing hard, and
despite the cold he was sweating. St. James took out one of his
endless supply of hankies, said to Tyler, “I am afraid I
inadvertently lied to Miss Murdock, for I led her to believe that
they were for nothing but hysterical females.”

“Yer t'duke!” the man exclaimed.

“Indeed I am,” St. James told him, “and I
fear that your recognition of that lady's name has just told me
more than an hour's worth of grilling you.” And he twisted the
fine, delicate handkerchief and gagged the man without mercy.
“Check beneath his coat in the back, Tyler, for he has the look to
me of a three pistol man,” and Tyler did so and was rewarded with
yet another weapon secured in the man's pants at the small of his
back. He handed it to the duke.

“Now,” St. James said, stepping around the
now impotent man and with a pistol in either hand. “We shall see
what's t'do.” He hugged the wall of the warehouse and peered around
this corner, letting his eyes move first to the house that he knew
to be Lucy Crockner's and with seeing nothing unusual there allowed
his perusal to spread out until he had encompassed all that was in
his sight. But there was nothing for apparent alarm.

“Well?” Tyler asked from behind him.

“Nothing,” St. James returned with
certainty.

“Mayhaps you put a stop to whate'er he had
planned, m'lord,” Steven offered.

“Mayhaps,” St. James replied as he studied
the street in front of him, “but I think we shall pause here for
another moment and see if any thing comes about. Tyler, can you get
that door open to the warehouse? It's not large enough for the
curricle, but we can at least get our reluctant companion out of
sight,” and then on the heels of his words, “Damn it!”

“Movement?” Tyler asked.

“God, yes,” St. James replied and he rose
from where he had been half crouching. One pistol that had been
pointed down came up in his hand, but he did not fire. “The
goddamned house is aflame!”

The smoke that had been curling from the
chimney had now been joined by a more ominous, thick, grey wafting
coming not from the chimney but from the roof. Even as he spoke,
St. James saw the sudden appearance of licking flame.

His brief hope that no one was in residence
was squelched as the door to the shanty burst opened and he saw
Bertie and Mrs. Crockner and Lizzie behind and God help him, two
children. The man on the ground behind him could not have torched
the house, there hadn't been time. He must have been waiting as
another set it aflame. Without further thought, St. James aimed and
fired and plowed a bullet into the door but a few inches from
Bertie's face and saw with satisfaction that they all fell back
into the house with great panic and slammed the door.

An angry voice called from the other side of
the warehouse from him, “Too damned soon, ya bloody idjit! I'd had
a clean shot if you'd just waited but another second!”

“What the hell are you doing!” Tyler asked,
his mildness gone and his own weapons drawn. St. James whirled, was
amazed to see Steven had drawn a pistol also, and he recognized it
as his own even in the distraction.

“Here, lad, I'll take that,” he told the boy
and Steven looked disappointed as he handed it over, but brightened
when St. James handed him a replacement in the form of the one he
had just fired. “Load it!” Then he hastened to explain to Tyler.
“They'll burn them out, and shoot Miss Murdock when she walks from
the door. I've managed to give them fair warning not to come out,
but we have got to do something now, or they'll only die
inside!”

“They wouldna have shot the children!” Tyler
protested. “You coulda let her take her chances and at least seen
that the rest of them lived!”

“I haven't time to argue about this now,
goddamn it! We get them all out, or they all die, but I'll not see
her sacrificed, do you understand me?” St. James roared. “Now boost
me up onto this roof, for I estimate we have less than two minutes
before the house caves in and they're all done for.”