“Thanks, Break—”
The front doors crashed open. In ran a man in a tattered coat, sleeves frayed, his trousers patched at the knees and stained with dirt and grime. The smell of human waste wafted about him like a noxious cloud. A night-soil man. He’d bet on it.
“There’s been a terrible accident!” The fellow rapped the counter with his fist. “Someone’s bound to be hurt or worse.”
Charles glowered. “And you didn’t stay to help?”
“Oh no.” He shook his head, his greasy beard swinging in an arc against his coat. “The sight of blood makes me positively green.”
Pah! The man’s stench was enough to make Charles vomit.
“Where at?” Breakhouse asked.
“Over on Poultry and Queen Victoria.”
Breakhouse faced Charles. “I know you’re supposed to be off duty, but could you? We’re a bit short-staffed at the moment.”
Well. So much for four hours of shut-eye.
“I’m on it.” He sighed. “Summon a doctor for now and pray we won’t need the coroner.”
Fortunately the intersection wasn’t far away. Fortunate as well that the sky hadn’t broken yet, for the scent of rain hung thick on the air. But if the weather held, and depending on how long this incident took, he just might swing by Martha’s on his way home for a cup of coffee.
Several streets later, he turned onto Poultry. In the distance he spied the dark hulk of an overturned carriage beneath a streetlamp, another carriage behind it yet upright. As he drew closer, he also made out the silhouette of what appeared to be two people huddled together, sitting on the kerb away from the crash. Apparently the night-soil man needn’t have worried about tossing his accounts, for clearly they’d made it out alive.
But the closer he drew, the more a cold sweat formed on his brow. He couldn’t identify the crashed coupé, but that barouche parked behind it looked suspiciously like the one Jackson had requisitioned. He upped his pace.
And then his step hitched.
Jackson sat on that kerb, his arm around his wife. Kit bent so that her face wasn’t visible, curled over the still form of a child. Blood darkened the side of her blouse and skirt.
He ran the last few steps, barely breathing, eyes pinned on little Bella. “Great heavens! Is she…?” His throat closed tight, refusing to voice the abominable thought.
Jackson glanced up, eyes glassy, face haggard. “Charles? What are you doing here?”
Clearly the shock of what had happened was too much for Jackson. It would’ve been for any man. Though he hated to part them, Charles offered his friend a hand. He wasn’t a husband yet, but instinct told him Jackson wouldn’t speak candidly in front of a grieving wife and mother. “A word, Jackson, if you are able. We won’t be but a moment, Mrs. Forge.”
Kit didn’t acknowledge him.
Jackson took his hand, allowing him to pull him to his feet. The contact lasted less than a breath, but long enough to note the clamminess of Jackson’s skin. Charles strode a few steps then turned to him. “What happened?”
Jackson rubbed the back of his neck as he stared up at the night sky. In the glow of the streetlamp, he looked years older. “Child double-crossed me. He didn’t show at the warehouse because he was at my home. He and his hired dogs held Kit at knifepoint and then…” He dropped his hand, his gaze now burning into Charles’. “He took her, Charles. Child took my girl, and I—Kit and I gave chase. I thought…oh, I thought—” Jackson’s Adam’s apple bobbled, his eyes turning red.
Charles struggled to maintain his own composure. There was a time once when he’d been a lad and came across a boy several years his junior. The boy wept great tears over his pet bunny that lay in the gutter with a twisted neck, bullies mocking behind him. And the same awful mix of horror, fury, and gut-wrenching sorrow clenched his hands as tightly now as it had then.
“We’ll need a coroner,” Jackson murmured.
“Yes, of course.”
“And a doctor.”
Charles studied his friend. He appeared to be whole apart from some blood smeared on his sherwani, blood which Charles suspected was not his own. But on the off chance, he asked, “Are you hurt?”
Jackson shook his head. “Kit needs a doctor. She’s lost a lot of blood. Oh, and send a constable to my house. She took down another man there.”
“What about Child? He inside that carriage?” He tipped his head towards the wreckage.
Jackson’s face hardened to granite. “He is. Ironic, is it not, that the very monster who wished to harm my daughter ended up saving her.”
