Boot steps on the tile outside his study signalled the return of Hobson. “No sign of anyone outside now. Whoever it was left as quietly as he came.”
“Damn. You were both so sure there was a watchman.”
“Probably just some drunkard having a piss or something. I think the miss suffers an overactive imagination but I was sure I felt someone watching,” Hobson said gruffly.
“If there isn’t a spy then no one knows she is missing yet.”
“It’s only a matter of time before the alarm is raised. The maids have to go to her rooms to feed the fire eventually. And there was someone out there at some stage.”
They’d collected and collated knowledge about the inner workings of Sir Anthony’s home for a month and now the information would help them. “Germaine might not seem to care for his sister a great deal, but he would already be on the doorstep if it was his spy. He doesn’t enjoy appearing the fool.” James shook his head. “We’ll work this to our favour. I don’t want to wait until someone tells Sir Anthony we have his sister. I don’t even care if the useless blackguard never knows where she is. As long as we reach the captain and have her to trade, the outcome will be favourable.” James sat behind his desk and took out four pieces of parchment. On each of them he wrote the same words of ransom for Captain Germaine to read. He was to prepare his “items of value” to swap them for his daughter.
“These will need to be delivered to the docks. Pay for their passage north and give instructions that they are only to be handed on to Scottish fishermen, the rougher the better.”
“Then what?” Hobson asked.
James stood, flicked open his watch and met the gaze of his oldest and most trusted friend. “It is two o’clock now; if we can be on the road within the next few hours we’ll have a good head start. If Anthony does discover her missing before then, he can give chase. He’ll say she has retired, ill, I imagine. That way she can choose to return to the Marriage Mart if indeed this story of preferring the sea is the hogwash it smells like.”
“So we are for Gretna?” Hobson asked.
“Forget Gretna for the moment. We’ll head in that direction but once we cross the border we’ll let Daniella navigate.”
“And if she is leading us into a trap?”
“If we see it in time, we make for Gretna and wait it out in a public place full of both English and Scottish witnesses. If her father took Amelia and Mother to draw me out, if this is some kind of revenge attempt, he will either wait for us or meet us halfway.”
“Why don’t you just compromise and marry her? Then her father will have to give the women back. He won’t hurt his little girl’s husband or his kin.”
“Firstly, she is a pirate and a hoyden, not the wife of a marquess. Secondly, you assume Captain Germaine has a moral compass where I think he would be just as happy to see his daughter widowed to inherit my money. I would play into his hands and get myself killed and all he would have to do is drive the knife in.”
Hobson’s eyes opened wide for a moment and then he guffawed loudly. Once his laughter died down, he grew serious. “How do you think he worked out that it was you who stabbed him that day? He weren’t exactly asking questions.”
“That stupidity was my own fault. I identified myself in the hopes he would find his conscience and let us live without a fight.”
“By all reports, he does enjoy a fight. What makes you think you’ll be the victor in this one?”
“How many battles have I lost?”
“None.”
“If the man had brains at all, he would never have invited me into a fray.”
“You can’t win them all, James.”
He smiled then, a cold tightening of his lips. “Oh yes I can.”
*
Daniella was far less than prepared when the door to her prison opened and once again Lasterton filled the doorway. Clean-shaven and dressed more like a king than a servant, he peered down his nose at her. “You have ten minutes to refresh yourself and then we leave.”
No please or thank you? “You can’t expect me to cross the country in this gown.” She had liked it because it was daring and made her feel beautiful and desirable but here, with him, she was just cold and half-dressed.
“There is another gown waiting for you.”
“Whose?” she asked, as she narrowed her eyes at him.
“My sister is a different shape from you but it will have to do.”
“I do hope she doesn’t object to you lending her clothing to a stranger.”
He shrugged but his shoulders were tense and a fleeting wariness flickered in his eyes for a moment before he answered. “She and my mother are travelling the continent. I dare say she’ll purchase a hundred more and discard all the others as unfashionable upon her return.”
Daniella bit her tongue against a sharp reply about English women having far more allowance than good sense but she couldn’t afford to fight with him. It was already going to be difficult sitting across from him in a carriage for near on two weeks. If they set off on bad terms it would be that much harder. “Very well, if you’re sure she won’t mind.”
By the end of fifteen minutes, Daniella swore and cursed fashionable ladies as though they were
