“Gallows!”
“What do you think becomes of them that kidnap girls from their homes, you fool?”
“I didn’t. I insisted I go so she wouldn’t be scared. I thought that Wiggins fellow might get ideas, and I could keep her safe.”
“You tell that to the court, and maybe they’ll believe you better’n I do.” Harold walked out in disgust.
Gareth offered Erasmus his arm. “You will have to stand now, and come outside. There will be other questions.”
Eva helped Erasmus too. Together she and Gareth got him out to the garden. Mr. Crawley already sat there, firm-jawed and resolute. Harold stood nearby, weapon at the ready. Lord Ywain sat twenty paces away, his pistol on the bench beside him. When he saw them emerge, he walked over.
“He is not speaking. Not a word. Moreover, he finds something about this very amusing.”
“It does him no good to cooperate,” Gareth said. “To give you the location of the other pictures would only prove he had taken them, after all.”
“We need that information, however.”
Gareth examined Crawley’s self-satisfied expression. “He waits to hear that you will let him go once the pictures are retrieved. Their location is his only card, but it is an ace.”
Lord Ywain’s face turned to stone. “Are you suggesting that I—”
“Do not pretend you never have before, if it were the only way to learn what you needed.”
Lord Ywain looked at Eva. “I apologize that you are hearing us bargain with justice, especially since it is your family’s justice that will be denied if we do this. Say the word and we will settle for a partial loaf regarding those missing paintings.”
Eva looked at Crawley. He had decided it would be a game to the end. She wondered if it had been a ball from his pistol thatcondemned her to five years of penurious drudgery with a bitter, melancholy Nigel.
Did it matter? She wanted this over. Finished. She wanted Crawley and the paintings gone. She wanted her life back, so she could look to the future, not the past.
“If you can make him leave England, I do not care what bargain you strike. But if he goes free, so do Erasmus and the others.”
“See if you can find out who the other gentlemen were,” Gareth added. “I doubt he will tell you, but try.”
Lord Ywain paced over to Mr. Crawley.
“You do not have to agree to this,” Gareth said to her. “We could try to beat it out of him.”
“Your brother would never agree to that.”
“You do not know my brother very well.”
She had to smile. “My generosity is not pure, I am ashamed to say. I am hoping that if Mr. Crawley is shown mercy, I will be as well. I am trusting that in light of so much bald thievery, your brother will not care much whether I copied those pictures with innocent intentions, or deliberately forged them.”
“I think he has forgotten about that entirely.”
“For now, perhaps. But he will remember it soon.”
“He will not care about that. It is not part of this mission.” Gareth took her hand and drew her farther from the others. “They will leave soon. When they do, stay here.”
“My sister—”
“Have them take her to the Neville sisters. She should do normal things today, not turn the remaining hours into a monument to her ordeal.” He raised her hand and kissed it. “Stay here with me.”
She closed her eyes so nothing distracted her from how that kiss touched her like the stroke of a velvet brush. Happy pleasuremoved in her, reminding her that her own normal had been wonderful recently.
“I fear that if I agree, I will be in danger again,” she said.
“Stay anyway.”
