Neil had no doubt Victor could set two terrified captives into a boat and have them vanish in the river’s mists before morning. He had picked his vantage at a careful remove: near enough to make out the single lantern by the Greenery’s door, far enough to keep the building from filling his entire sightline.
The lantern burned as if waiting. Neil felt the cold of a trap settle about his shoulders. Perhaps it was already sprung. Perhaps, in the carriage on the way here, Victor had seen to both Maggie and Emma with his own hands. Perhaps the Thames now took them, and the currents would carry them out to sea, where they would never be found.
That thought rose like bile. He forced a breath, slow and measured, until his pulse steadied, and then he walked forward. The lantern’s light swung from his hand as he unhooked it and touched the door. Knocking felt absurd—ritual in the face of menace—yet he struck the wood as if it were a gauntlet.
“The door’s open,” Victor called from within, voice oily in the dark.
Neil pushed the door and stepped into a narrow passage that reeked of rot and river-sour. He moved toward the only open doorway at the far end, the lantern throwing brief, treacherous pools of light along the corridor. Doors lined the walls: some barred, some ajar. Beyond them, he imagined, the Greenery ran like a rat’s nest—dead ends, cellars, hidden alcoves. It was not his task to map that maze; it was his to meet the danger inside.
He pushed the last door. Candlelight revealed two figures bound in a low stone room. Maggie sat upright in a chair, bundled against the damp; Emma crouched on the floor at her feet. Both were gagged. A single candle guttered on a table, incapable of reaching the far corners where shadow pooled.
Victor stood behind Maggie, grinning broadly. When Neil took a step towards him, he casually lifted a silvery hunting knife, its blade glinting as if it were on fire. Neil stopped walking.
“That’s far enough, I think,” Victor remarked. “You know, your Grace, I didn’t imagine that you’d come here. I thought you might be sensible enough to smell a rat from some distance. Or perhaps you did, and came anyway?”
Neil gave a brittle smile. “I suspect you know the answer already.”
“Yes,” Victor answered thoughtfully. “I do.”
“Have you given any thought at all to the price I must pay to get back my niece and her governess? It can’t be money – you have plenty of that. So, what will it be?”
It was clear that Victor was enjoying himself. He lifted the blade to his lips, delicately tapping the tip against his closed mouth.
“In games of hazard, one need not sacrifice a piece—one merely stakes and awaits fortune. You understand, I hope? May I call you Neil? This is, after all, an informal occasion.”
“Call me what you will, so long as you release them,” Neil said.
Victor’s smile widened in frank malice. Neil saw then, in the ease of the man’s posture, that release was never intended. The trap had been set for him alone.
In the gloaming corner, a movement caught Neil’s eye: a man curled on the floor, arms drawn about his knees, a thatch of hair hiding his face.
“Pay him no mind,” Victor said with a shrug. “He is nothing. I had meant to break him properly, as I do all of my debtors, but he is already quite broken.”
The man looked up. One green-gold eye, set against a face of grime and ruin, met Neil’s. Recognition struck him sharp and sudden. “Thomas Camden,” he murmured. “You are Maggie’s father.”
“Enough of him,” Victor snapped, pouting. He leaned forward and pulled the gag off Maggie’s face. She coughed, spitting to the side, and gave her head a quick shake, reorienting herself. Then she glanced up at him.
When their eyes met, a recoil of fear rushed through Neil.
I am sorry,he thought, hoping in vain that she might understand his thoughts and accept his apology.I should have made it clear that I knew about all this. If I’d only been honest with you, perhaps I could have kept you safe.
Too late now, of course.
“It’s a trap,” Maggie said plainly, voice steady. “You should not have come. His men wait in the hallway. There is no escape now.”
Victor gave a chuckle of amusement. “I knew you would come alone. I knew you wouldn’t risk their lives.”
Neil squared his shoulders. “You are right. I would not take that risk. So where are your men? Drag me off and throw me in the river if you prefer, but will you at least tell me whether you intend to parley or to murder us first?”
Victor furrowed a brow, irritated. “Pete! Matthew! Jeremiah! Now, do come and—” His voice died. The corridor returned no answer. The smile left his features, and he tightened his grip on the knife’s handle.
Neil met his eye clearly. “Huh. I guess they’ve missed their cue.”
A shuffle in the hall drew his gaze. When he stepped back into the doorway, he saw a familiar, disordered figure: Simon, clothes muddied, a cudgel in one hand and an unfired pistol in the other; a bruise stained his cheek but he stood upright. Behind him, others—footmen and household servants, not constables—emerged to show that they had not come alone in spirit.
“We found three men in the rooms off the hall,” Simon said. “We surprised them and bound them. They’re secured.”
Neil turned to Victor; the colour had drained from his face. “My housekeeper suggested we take a few trusted footmen and men-servants rather than call the constables,” he said quietly. “They were willing to search and to act.”
