Rupert bolted inside and I followed, then stopped.
Two men lay on the floor of the warehouse, one at the back where it looked like he might have attempted to leave, the other only a few feet away from where I stood.
Munro stood up from over the nearest body and wiped the blade of his knife. He looked at me, then called out to Brodie in a low voice.
He came from the back of the warehouse where I had glimpsed that other body.
“The hound seems to think that she’s here somewhere,” he said, taking my arm and turning me back toward the entrance and away from that body.
I forced myself past the sick feeling at what I had just seen inside the warehouse. It wasn’t as if I was not aware what both were capable of, and I had seen dead bodies before. Still, it was the possibility that we might not find Lily alive.
“Is one of them Carney?”
“He’s not here,” was all he said.
That meant that he was still out there, somewhere, as well as Lily. And with that warning shout I’d heard, he would know that we were here.
Munro quickly joined us, his tall frame discernible in the fading light. He inclined his head toward the second warehouse, then moved in that direction.
Brodie hesitated, his hand on my arm. I knew what he would have said. I moved past him to follow Munro.
The second warehouse was nearer the water, with a landing at the edge of the river. Munro moved along the near side. Brodie stepped past me and followed him.
There had been no sign of Lily at the first warehouse. Was she inside this one?
And with it again came the thought that she might be injured. What would happen when Brodie and Munro entered the warehouse? Another scene like the first, only worse?
I was about to go after them when Brodie returned. He shook his head. They had not found her.
Anger was followed by tears that stung my eyes. She was here, somewhere.
“We have to find her!”
He nodded.
“There are several shanties along the wharf,” Munro said. “She could be in any one of them.”
And it would take time to search them. Time we might not have.
Rupert grew restless beside me. He had gone with Brodie and Munro into both warehouses and had found nothing.
He knew Lily. In fact, the two had struck up a strong friendship when he had accompanied me to Sussex Square. He had tracked me, more than once. Yet I knew it was from his sense of scent.
I whispered to Brodie, my hand resting on top of Rupert’s head.
“He might be able to find her.”
I knelt down beside Rupert.
“Find Lily,” I told him. “You must find Lily. Go.”
Rupert looked at me expectantly and I began to think it wouldn’t work. My heart sank. Then he was off, as I had seen him before, nose to the ground, tail sticking up straight as an arrow. I went after him.
Brodie and Munro followed, searching the first shanty at the wharf as Rupert circled then ran to the next one. And the next one, as my thoughts raced.
As it grew darker with the fading light, we ran along the waterfront, Rupert racing before us. And all I could think of was Carney.
Was he in one of those huts? Where was Lily? Was she still alive?
