Unable to kiss her good-bye, since that really would arouse the rebels' suspicions, as well as other inconvenient organs, Geoff did the only thing he could. Under cover of the henhouse, he reached for her hand and squeezed. "I'm going to go drag Miss Gwen out of the house. The minute you see her, light the fuse."
Letty knew what she wanted to say. But since she couldn't, she went with the next best substitute, inadequate though it was.
"Be careful," she whispered, but the words were lost in a sudden burst of noise. Like an ill wish, Miss Gwen appeared, bursting forth from the back door with enough force to shake the door on its hinges. She seemed, for a moment, to hang in midair like an avenging Fury, her gray hair bristling and her parasol raised like a general's baton.
At the end of the alley, the rebels stood amazed, frozen from sheer shock.
Letty couldn't blame them.
Twisting the handle of her parasol, Miss Gwen drew out a thin sword from the shaft. In her left hand, she braced the open purple parasol like a shield. The silk fringe bobbed merrily in the fading sunlight.
"Fire away!" cried Miss Gwen. Thrusting her sword point high in the air, she charged the astounded band of rebels.
Letty didn't need to be asked twice. Dropping to her knees behind the henhouse, she struck the flint with hands that were surprisingly steady. The metal fit familiarly into her hand, an oddly domestic counterpoint to the scent of sulfur stinging her nose and the chicken dung muddying her pantaloons. Under Letty's efforts, the tinder caught, and lit. Her heart somewhere around her cravat, Letty thrust the powdercoated fuse into the small spark and waited for it to catch flame.
Nothing happened.
The fuse wasn't taking. The flame smoldered sullenly at the very tip before winking damply out.
Fighting her rising anxiety, Letty struck the flint again, willing the metal to spark. Just on the other side of the weathered wooden structure, Miss Gwen's shrill yips of triumph and tart asides mingled with masculine oaths and grunts. They seemed to be holding their own, but how long could two hold out against six?
If there was something wrong with the fuse Merciful heavens, she didn't even know what a functioning fuse was supposed to look like, much less what one was supposed to do if one wouldn't work. Those little black flecks she assumed they were supposed to be there, but who knew? And the ground was damp, a damp that might have worked into the twine, inhibiting the action of the flame.
Letty worked the flint with a burst of energy born of desperation, tipping the end of the fuse to catch the flame. If the fuse wouldn't take this time, she would just have to find something else. A long spar of wood torn from the chicken coop, perhaps, and thrust through one of the larger knotholes in the wall. It might work. If the fuse didn't light, it would have to work.
The tip of the fuse caught and smoked, smoldering uncertainly against the backdrop of the muddy earth. As though through a screen, Letty could hear the pounding of booted feet against packed dirt, shouted threats and imprecations, the harsh exhalations of hard-pressed lungs, all drawing steadily nearer. It couldn't have been more than seconds, but it felt like an eternity. Cupping her hands around the red tip, she blew gently on the flame, willing it into life.
"Please," Letty breathed. "Please "
Whether it was the plea or pure chemistry, the little tongue of flame gathered momentum, greedily gobbling its way down the fuse, like the fiery salamander of medieval myth.
Letty stumbled backward to her feet, watching as the flame licked toward the wall. She wanted to squeal, to cheer, to fling her hat in the air. They had done it! The fuse was lit! Giddy with triumph, Letty spun on one heelbut her cry of triumph turned to a muffled yell as someone ignominiously grabbed her about the waist from behind and hauled her painfully up into the air.
* * *
"CHARGE!" CRIED MISS GWEN, thrusting her sword parasol in the air.
Geoff caught her up halfway down the alley. "We just have to hold them long enough for the fuse to burn down to the wall," he tossed at her in a quick undertone. "No heroics."
Miss Gwen looked distinctly put out.
Putting her ire to good use, she flashed out with the point of her sword in a movement that owed more to vigor than science. Staring transfixed at the fringed purple parasol she held as a shield, her target barely had time to wrench out of her way, winning a long rent in his sleeve rather than the killing thrust Miss Gwen had intended.
"Sirrah!" snapped Miss Gwen. "Kindly stand still!"
For a moment, her opponent looked like he meant to obey. Belatedly recalling his circumstances, he scrambled for his knife, just as Geoff brought two clasped hands down on the back of his neck, sending him sprawling.
Shoving her parasol in the face of one rebel while fending off another, Miss Gwen still found the time to cast a glower in Geoff's general direction. "That one was meant to be mine," she complained.
"There are more than enough to go around," rejoined Geoff, ducking beneath a poorly planned punch.
Unmoved by that sensible sentiment, Miss Gwen expressed herself volubly as to the general uselessness of the male gender.
"Sharp-tongued old besom," grumbled one of the rebels. "Couldn't get a husband?"
Miss Gwen pinked him in the knee.
Leaving Miss Gwen to settle accounts with her admirer, Geoff repelled one assailant with a stiff elbow to the throat while driving his fist into the stomach of a second. The man doubled over satisfactorily, unreeling a stream of colloquial curses that mingled oddly with another noise, a cry that sounded more alto than baritone, and made Geoff's chest tighten in a way that had nothing to do with the knife blade that had just scraped stingingly across his ribs.
Dispatching the wielder of the knifemomentarily, at leastwith a leg hooked beneath his knees, he heard Letty, quite definitely Letty, demanding that someone put her down, right now.
The man Geoff had tripped stumbled to his feet and staggered forward again.
"That was Letty," Geoff said shortly, finishing the man off with a blow to the head with the butt of his pistol. Four men lay groaning on the turf in various positions of pain, leaving only two to be dispatched. "Can you hold them?"
Miss Gwen ran one of the remaining two through the shoulder with her sword parasol. A grim expression of satisfaction showed on her face as he collapsed groaning at her feet.
"What are you waiting for?" she demanded, as she advanced on her final opponent.
Geoff didn't need any further urging. Sprinting down the length of the house, he called back over his shoulder, "I'm in your debt."
"Your first child, Pinchingdale!" Miss Gwen cackled.
As Geoff skidded toward Patrick Street, he could hear Miss Gwen behind him, knocking open the roof of the henhouse and urging its feathered contents onward. "Peck, my pretties! Peck! That's the way!"
It was enough to make one feel sorry for the rebels.
Geoff skidded to a stop, scanning left, then right, just in time to see Letty tumbling backward over the side of a wagon several yards away. She disappeared among a spurt of straw as the driver slapped the reins, urging his horse forward. The wagon started with a lurch that sent Letty's head, briefly visible above the slats that boxed in the sides, straight back down again.
She wasn't hurt.
Relief was rapidly replaced by rage as Geoff recognized the driver. He hadn't bothered to wear a hat, and the sun shone right down on his infamous sideburns.
Jasper had Letty.
One minute Letty was admiring her handiwork; the next she was dangling a foot off the ground.
Two large hands grasped her under the arms, yanking upward. Letty howled with indignation and pain. That grip under her arms hurt, with a throbbing pain that did not get any better when her assailant gave another concerted pull, raising her another half inch and threatening to dislocate her arms from their sockets. Letty batted ineffectually behind her, but she had failed to take into account quite how difficult it was to hit someone who had one by the armpits. Her fingers barely brushed the fabric of his sleeves.
"Let go!" Kicking out behind her, Letty's flailing foot hit wood instead of flesh, with a force that sent pain reverberating all down her leg.
Her captor took advantage of her distraction to haul her up another half foot, her backside scraping against a decidedly splintery surface. Letty's jacket snagged on a rough edge, and her captor gave an irritated grunt.
It wasn't much, but that tone of irritation was unmistakable. Letty made a concerted effort to look behind her that resulted only in a wrenching pain in her right arm.
"Captain Pinchingdale?" she exclaimed.
"Would you be still?" Jasper demanded in aggrieved tones, as though it were perfectly unremarkable for him to be grabbing her from behind and attempting to haul her into a vehicle that seemed to be completely composed of sharp fragments of wood, all aimed at Letty's backside. "You're making this much harder."
"I'm making this harder?" retorted Letty incredulously. "No one asked you to grab me! Put me down at once."
"I'll put you down"Jasper gave another mighty heave, bringing Letty's back into uncomfortable contact with the edge of the wagon"once you're inside."
"You might have just asked me," Letty gritted out.
Jasper snorted. It was, Letty had to admit, a fairly accurate representation of the likelihood of her having agreed to go anywhere with him. With a final heave, Letty's back scraped painfully across the edge of the wagon and she toppled over sideways, into a scratchy substance that scraped her cheek and got up her nose. The hay smelled heavily of horse and other substances that Letty, even with her country upbringing, would really rather not have encountered quite so intimately.
Why was it that people suddenly seemed to feel an ineluctable desire to pick her up and toss her into their vehicles? Some women attracted sonnets; others collected small animals. Letty got tossed into carriages. It was a trend that had to stop.
Blowing hay out of her mouth, Letty heard the slap of reins as Jasper urged the horse into motion.
"I hadn't realized you had taken up agricultural pursuits," commented Letty, struggling to her knees as the ill-sprung wagon rocked back and forth. She had never realized before quite how slippery hay could be. Every time she managed to get a bit of purchase, the cart swayed, and her hand slipped out from under her.
Jasper's nostrils flared, in an expression uncommonly similar to that of the animal he was driving. The horse clearly didn't care for Jasper any more than Jasper cared for him. "I couldn't afford anything better. Thanks to our munificent Geoffrey."
Letty clawed her way up onto the bench, wincing at the ache beneath her arms. "If this is another attempt to get me to murder my husband, the answer remains no."
"Do you really think I'm that foolish?"
"Given the circumstances?" Letty didn't have to think about it. "Yes. Now that we've gotten that cleared up, I would be much obliged if you would put me back down. Right now."
"As much as it pains me to disoblige a lady, I'm afraid that won't be possible." Jasper didn't look the least bit pained. "You see, I have plans for you."
Letty had plans for herself, too. She doubted they coincided.
"Well, that's just too bad." Letty reached for the reins. "Some plans aren't meant to be."
Jasper forestalled her by the simple act of pulling a pistol from his waistband and jamming it into the region of her waist. It was much larger than the pistol Geoff had given her, sixteen inches at the least from stock to muzzle. Jasper handled it with a one-handed ease that bespoke long familiarity with the weapon.
"Sit," he commanded.
Letty sat.
"Is it loaded?" she asked hopefully.
Jasper sent her a look loaded with enough derision to stagger the Dowager Duchess of Dovedale. "What do you think?"
"I think you ought to put it down. You might hurt yourself."
"Your concern touches me deeply."
The thought of touching Jasper in any way revolted her. It did not, however, seem politic to say so while he had a gun jammed up against her spleen.
"I'm flattered that you were so determined to have our drive together, but you can let me down now." Letty favored him with a sparkling social smile that was only slightly marred by the smudges on her cheeks and the hay in her hair. "This has been simply charming, but I should be getting back before I'm missed."
"Has anyone ever told you that it's unwise to mock a man with a gun?"
"The situation has never arisen," said Letty honestly. "I would prefer to keep it that way."
It probably wasn't the wisest course to taunt a man with a gun shoved into her ribs, but Letty didn't believe Jasper would actually pull the trigger. At least, not deliberately. Jasper was a boaster and a bully, not a cold-blooded killer.
She hoped.
No, she wasn't going to let herself go down that road. If Jasper had the mettle for murder, he would have just killed Geoff outright, rather than trying to bamboozle her into doing it. Letty didn't doubt that Jasper was greedy enough and conscienceless enough to attempt to arrange the death of anyone who came between him and his tailor, but he just didn't have the backbone to do it himself, a fact for which Letty was profoundly grateful.
Letty scrounged for other explanations. The only one she could come up with was ransom money. The thought cheered Letty immensely. If he was planning to hold her for ransom, she would be far more use to Jasper alive than dead. No one paid full price for a corpse.
Perhaps if she started him talking, Jasper's grip on the weapon would relax. Once the gun was knocked out of his reach well, she would deal with that bit when she got to it.
"What do you intend to do with me?"
"I thought you would never ask. Get along." Jasper impatiently slapped at the horse, which was ambling along at its own peaceful pace. With a quick look at Letty, he added, "Not you."
"Of course not." Letty folded her hands demurely in her lap and tried not to look as though she were seeking the first opportunity to whack him in the arm, steal his gun, and leap out of the wagon.