Anne Perry - A Christmas Promise

“Right you are, sir!” the cabby answered, and increased speed again.

Gracie looked out of the window again. There seemed to be traffic all around them, carriages, other cabs, a dray with huge horses with braided manes and lots of brass, a hearse, carts and wagons of all sorts. They were barely moving.

“We gotta go faster!” she said urgently, grasping Balthasar’s arm. “We won’t get there in time like this!”

“I agree. But don’t panic. They are stuck just as we are. Come, we shall walk the rest of the way. It is not far now.” He pushed the door open and climbed out, passing coins up to the startled driver. Then, grasping Gracie by the arm again, he set off, head forward, pushing his way through the crowds.

Gracie wanted to ask him if he was certain he knew where he was going, but the noise was a babble like a field full of geese, and he wouldn’t have heard her. It was hard enough just to keep hold of him and not get torn away by the people bumping and jostling their way, arms full of bags and boxes. One fat man had a dead goose slung over his shoulder. Another man had his hat on askew and a crate of bottles in his arms. There was a hurdy-gurdy playing somewhere, and she could hear the snatches of music every now and then.

She lost count of how far they went. She felt banged and trodden on with every other step, but if they could just find Minnie Maude in time, the rest was of no importance at all.

Here in the crowd it was not so cold. There was no space for the wind to get up the energy to slice through your clothes, and the shawl Mr. Balthasar had given her was much better than her own. Her boots were sodden, but perhaps it was as well that her feet were numb, so she couldn’t feel it every time a stranger stepped on them.

She did not know how long it was before they were gasping in a side alley, as if washed up by a turbulent stream into an eddy by the bank.

“I believe we have not far to go now,” Balthasar said with forced optimism.

She followed him along the dark alley, their footsteps suddenly louder as the crowd fell behind them. Ahead the cobbles looked humpbacked and uneven, the little light there was catching the ice, making it glisten. The doorways on either side were hollow, the dim shadows of sleeping people seeming more like rubbish than human forms. In a hideous moment, Gracie felt as if the sleepers were waiting for someone to collect them—someone who never came.

Ahead there was a sound of horses shifting weight, hooves on stone, a sharp blowing out of breath. It was impossible to see anything clearly. Lights were as much a deception as a help, a shaft of yellow ending abruptly, a halo of light in the gathering mist, a beam that stabbed the dark and went nowhere.

“Tread softly,” Balthasar whispered. “And don’t speak again. We are here, and both Stan and the toff will be here soon, if they are not already. Please God, we are soon enough.”

Gracie nodded, although she knew he could not see her. Together they crept forward. He was still holding on to her so hard she could not have stayed behind even if she had wanted to.

Foot by foot they crept across the open space, through the wide gates and into the stable yard. Still they could see only tiny pools of light, the edge of a door, a bale of hay with pieces sticking out of it raggedly, the black outline of a cab and the curve of one wheel. There was a brazier alight. Gracie could smell the burning and feel the warmth of it more than see it. A shadow moved near it, a man easing his position, turning nervously, craning to catch every sound. She had no idea if it was Stan or not.

Balthasar kept hard against the wall, half-hidden by a hanging harness, its irregular shape masking his and Gracie’s beside him. The tightening grasp of his hand warned her to keep still.

Seconds ticked by. How long were they going to wait? Somewhere ten or twelve yards away a horse kicked against the wooden partition of its stall with a sudden, hollow sound, magnified by the silence and the cold.

Stan let out a cry of alarm and jerked around so violently that for a moment his face was lit by the coals of the brazier, his cheeks red, his eyes wide with fear.

Nothing else moved.

Gracie drew in her breath, and Balthasar’s fingers tightened on her arm.

From the shadows at the entrance a figure materialized, long and lean, its face as gaunt as a skull, a top hat at a crazy angle over one side of the brow. Deep furrows ran from the nose around the wide mouth, and the eyes seemed white-rimmed in the eerie light as the brazier suddenly burned up in the draft.

Stan was rigid, like a stone figure. From the look on his face, the man in the doorway might have had death’s scythe in his hands. But it was nothing so symbolic that stirred beside the figure’s thin legs and the skirts of the man’s black frock coat. It was Minnie Maude, her face ash-pale, her hair straggling in wet rats’ tails onto her shoulders. He had hold of her by a rope around her neck.

Gracie felt the cold inside her grow and her own body tighten, as if she must do something, but she had no idea what. She felt Balthasar’s grip on her arm so hard it brought tears prickling into her eyes. She pulled away, to warn him, and he loosened it immediately.

“You did not deliver my box,” the toff said quietly, but his perfect diction and rasping voice filled the silence, echoing in the emptiness of the stable. Somewhere up in the loft there would be hay, straw, probably rats. “Give it to me now, and I will give you the girl. A simple exchange.”

“I left it fer yer,” Stan retorted with a naked fear one could almost smell. “In’t up ter me ter ’old yer ’and while yer sneak out an’ pick it up. In fact, yer’d prob’ly cut me throat fer seein’ yer if I did.”

“I would have preferred that we not meet,” the toff agreed with a ghastly smile. His teeth were beautiful, but his mouth twisted with unnameable pains. “But you have made that impossible.” He gave a quick tweak to the rope around Minnie Maude’s neck. “I have something that belongs to you. I will trade it for what you have that belongs to me. Then we will part, and forget each other. I imagine the men who supply you, and pay you whatever pittance it is, are not happy with you.”

Stan’s breath wheezed in his throat, as though the whole cage of his chest were too tight for him. “I in’t got it!”

“Yes, you have! Those who supply it want their money, and I want what is in my box. You want the child.” He made it a statement, but there was an edge of panic in his voice now, and his eyes were wild, darting from Stan to the shadows where the light from the lanterns flickered.

Gracie was motionless, afraid that even her blinking might somehow catch his attention.

“Yer’ve always ’idden,” Stan argued. “Now I’ve seen yer, wot’s ter say yer won’t kill me, like yer killed Alf?”

The toff drew in a quick breath. “So you do have it. Good. This is a beginning. You are quite right. I will kill to get what I need. With regret, certainly, but without hesitation.” He pulled Minnie Maude a little closer to him, using the rope around her neck. She looked very thin, very fragile. One hard yank could break the slender bones. The end of her life would be instantaneous.

Balthasar must have had the same conviction. He let go of Gracie’s arm and stepped forward out of the shadows.

“Do not lie to the man, Stanley.” He spoke quietly, as if he were merely giving advice. If he was afraid, there was nothing of it in his voice, or in the easy grace with which he stood. “Alf gave it to Rose, perhaps as a gift. He had no idea what was inside it, simply that it was pretty. When you realized where it was, you took it from her, as he”—he gestured toward the toff, “knew you would. He followed you and beat that information out of Rose. He will not pay the suppliers until he has his goods, as you well know, which is why you are afraid of them. They will surely hold you accountable, possibly they already have. I imagine it is your blood on your stable floor, which is why you are terrified now.”