Anne Perry - The Sins of the Wolf

Monk reacted only just in time. The blade grazed his arm and he went backwards, knocking Hester off balance and lurching against the iron railing of the spiral stairs. He only just avoided going over them as they caught him in the small of his back and his foot slipped and went from under him, leaving him sprawled at Hester’s feet.

Alastair still stood mesmerized.

Oonagh waited only an instant, then realized he was going to be useless. For a terrible moment she stared at Hector, then she ran at him, bending to catch him in the solar plexus and knock him over the railing to fall the twenty feet to the floor below.

He understood from her eyes, but he moved too slowly. She caught him in the chest, to the left, not quite under the heart. He fell sideways against the railing and backed into Hester, sending her flying. She caught Quinlan just as he reached Monk to strike again. There was a shriek, a flailing of limbs, a moment’s blind panic, and then a sickening thud from the floor below.

Then total silence closed in, except for Alastair’s weeping.

Hester peered over the edge.

Quinlan lay on the floor below them, his blond hair like a silver halo. There was no blood, but his right arm, in which he had held the knife, was bent underneath him, and no one needed to be told he would not move again.

At last Alastair seemed to regain some semblance of control. He looked around for another weapon, his eyes glistening with almost manic hatred.

Oonagh could see there was no more room for words, no excuses anymore. She plunged past the choking Hector and still-sprawling Monk, ignoring Hester, and clattered down the iron stairs, making towards the back of the vast building until she disappeared between the bales of paper.

Alastair stared wildly around him, then after only a split second’s hesitation, followed after her.

Monk scrambled to his feet and bent over Hector.

“Are you all right? Did she injure you?”

“No…” Hector coughed and gasped to regain his breath. “No…” He looked at Monk with wild eyes. “She didn’t. How did I beget that? And Mary… Mary was…”

But Monk had no time for such speculation. He checked to see that Hester was unhurt, that it was no more than a few bruises and a possible abrasion. Then he set off down the stairs after Oonagh and Alastair.

Hester followed after him, tucking her skirts up in an undignified but very effective manner, and Hector lumbered close behind at a surprisingly good speed.

Out in the street Oonagh and Alastair were at least fifty yards ahead and increasing the distance between them. Monk was sprinting with an excellent turn of speed.

They reached the thoroughfare, and Alastair, waving his arms and shouting, leaped directly in the path of an oncoming carriage. The horse shied and the driver, foolishly standing to ward off what he imagined was an attack, overbalanced and crashed to the ground, still grasping the reins. Alastair leaped into the box, turning only for a second to haul Oonagh up with him, and then shouted wildly to urge the horses into flight again.

Monk swore with breathless venom and skidded to a halt at the crossroads, looking to the left and right for any kind of a vehicle.

Hester caught up with him, and then Hector.

“God damn them!” Monk choked with rage. “God damn her above all!”

“Where can they go?” Hector coughed, gasping to regain his breath. “The police will catch them…”

“We’ve got to get back and find the police.” Monk’s voice was rising in an anguish of rage. “And by the time we’ve explained Quinlan’s death, and persuaded them we didn’t do it… and shown them the room with the forgery equipment, Oonagh and Alastair will have got to the docks, and could even have set sail across towards Holland.”

“Can’t we get them back?” Hester demanded, even as she said it realizing how hard that would be; with the whole of Europe beyond, and perhaps friends to help them, they might succeed in disappearing.

“Brewery!” Hector said suddenly, jerking his arm to point across the road.

Monk fixed him with a glare that should have withered him to dry bones.

“Horses!” Hector began to shamble across the street.

“We can’t chase that in a dray!” Monk bellowed after him, but he began to follow him all the same.

But Hector emerged only a few moments later with not a brewer’s dray but a very handsome single-horse gig, and pulled up only long enough for Monk to heave Hester up and then follow after her at a clumsy swing, almost landing on top of her.

“Whose gig have you stolen?” he yelled, not that he cared in the slightest.

“Brewmaster, I expect,” Hector yelled back, and then bent his attention to controlling the startled horse and urging it at an unnerving speed along the road after the vanished carriage.

Monk crouched forward, clinging to the side, white-faced. Hester sat back, trying to wedge herself into the seat, while the gig lurched and bucketed all over the road, going faster and faster. Hector was oblivious of everything except his son and daughter ahead.

Hester knew why Monk was so ashen. She imagined the chaos of memories which must be knotting his body and bringing the sweat to his skin, even if his mind only half recalled a haze of sensation, that other carriage careering through the night to end in a heap of splintered wood and spinning wheels, the driver killed and himself lying injured and senseless beneath it, all his life to that moment blotted out and lost forever.

But there was nothing she could do except cling on for dear life. She could not let him know she understood.

Another crossroads loomed ahead and the carriage was already out of sight. It could have gone any of three ways. Presumably straight ahead?

But the gig horse was at a gallop now, and Hector reined it in, almost throwing the beast to the ground, and then urged it to the right, the gig riding on two wheels. Monk was hurled against Hester and the two of them all but fell out. Only Monk’s weight, bringing Hester to the floor, saved them.

Monk swore luridly and furiously as the gig righted itself and plunged along Great Junction Street, and then almost immediately turned again towards the sea, sending them pell-mell to the other side.

“What the hell are you doing, you damned lunatic?” Monk made a lunge to grab at Hector, and missed.

Hector was oblivious of him. The carriage was ahead of them again. They could see Alastair’s fair hair flying and Oonagh close to him, almost as if he were holding her with his other arm.

The street vee’red again, and they were beside the narrow, deep river leading to the sea. There were barges moored in it, and fishing smacks. A man leaped out of the way, shouting abuse. A child let out a wail and fled.

A fishwife screamed a string of curses and threw her empty basket at the carriage. One horse reared up and overbalanced onto the other, and in almost dreamlike motion they skewed crazily over to the harbor wall and the sheer drop to the water. The carriage swung around and the shafts snapped. The carriage balanced for a split second, then toppled over into the river, taking Oonagh and Alastair with it. The horses were left shivering on the edge, eyes rolling, squealing with terror, held by the chains and harness.

Hector reined in, throwing his considerable weight backwards to check his own horse, and slamming on the brake with his other hand.

Monk leaped onto the ground and ran to the edge.

Hester scrambled behind him, ripping her skirt where it caught, and almost spraining her ankle on the rough cobbles.

The carriage was already sinking, exquisitely slowly, sucked and held fast in centuries-deep mud beneath the surge of incoming tide. Oonagh and Alastair were both in the water, clear of all tackle and harness, struggling to stay afloat.