“Oh! Look what she does. She tries to kill us both!”
“Hardly, Pascal.”
Gwynnie let the fire burn as she darted from the room, dropping the poker and running as fast as she could. She glanced back at Esme, whose eyes still hadn’t opened in the kerfuffle, as Tombstone tried to get the burning log back into the fire and Pascal waved his cane manically in the air.
Gwynnie sprinted down the corridor, picking up the skirt of her gown so she would not trip. She knew she wouldn’t be able to hide easily: in this stained gown, she would be noticeable. And Tombstone would find her if she went back to her chamber. No, she had to find somewhere else to hide, somewhere that no one would think to look for her.
Rather than fleeing through the door and out into the courtyard, she took another door and darted up a spiral staircase that led to the lawyers’ chambers. Glancing up and down the corridor, she searched for an empty room. She found a door standing ajar, the sunlight bathing the bedchamber in a cool glow.
Gwynnie hurried inside and closed the door behind her. At the far end of the room, underneath the mullion window, was a rather plain wooden coffer. Lifting the lid, Gwynnie reached for the black robes inside that were so identifiable as a lawyer’s. She flung them over her gown, then reached for a full crown black bonnet, pleated at the front with a hawk’s brown feather thrust into the hem. Gwynnie pulled the bonnet over her head and tucked the strands of her loose hair under the rim.
She looked down at her stained boots. The black robes were so long that they hid her feet. She turned to a looking glass that hung from a hook on the wooden panelled wall. Her cheeks were no longer stained, since she had washed in Tombstone’s chamber, but her eyes were still red and her face was too feminine. Returning to the coffer, she shifted the clothes to the side, delving deep to find something that could hide her features. Tucked away at the bottom of the coffer, she found a white lace collar, greying with age. Wrapping the collar around her throat, she flicked it up over her chin and mouth, hiding half her face, then pulled the brim of the bonnet lower over her head.
Breathing deeply, she headed toward the door and calmly stepped out. Moving along with her head bowed, she inched toward the spiral staircase, taking the steps carefully. When she reached the lower corridor, she could see a great tumult.
Tombstone was marching up and down, asking every lawyer and gentleman he passed if he had seen a maid running by. Pascal followed, striking his cane into the floorboards in his anger and looking tempted to strike the nearest gentleman who claimed not to have seen her.
“Someone must have seen her!” Pascal boomed. Those that hadn’t yet been drawn out of their rooms by the great cries now pushed their heads out of their doors, looking around in wonder. “Come forward now. Who has seen her?”
“A young woman, you say? A maid?” Although her heart was pounding, Gwynnie calmly pointed to the spiral staircase from which she had just emerged. She deepened her voice and turned her head away, her face hidden by the collar and brim of the hat. “I saw a maid running upstairs just now, sirs.”
“Thank you.” Pascal thrust the cane at Tombstone. “Go. Find her!”
Tombstone walked past Gwynnie, not giving her a second glance as he ran up the stairs. Pascal returned to Tombstone’s office, evidently going to check on Esme.
Gwynnie released the breath she had been holding and stepped out into the courtyard. She had escaped, for now, but everything had changed.
It seemed that Renard and Fitzroy’s plan had worked after all. Despite everything Gwynnie had done in the hope of pointing Tombstone toward Florian’s killer, suspicion had fallen on her instead. It wouldn’t be long before Pascal questioned why Gwynnie would have hurt Esme. Perhaps he would even start to question why Emlyn had been seen by Donsen Tower on the night that the jewels had gone missing.
“I’ll hang for this after all,” Gwynnie muttered to herself.
Knowing she couldn’t go back to her chamber, she crossed the courtyards and headed to the laundry rooms. By now, her mother would have risen and no doubt be at work.
Gwynnie stepped inside the room, keeping her head bowed low.
“Sir, you should not be back here.” Emlyn was sharp as Gwynnie appeared beside her. Water splashed and Gwynnie looked up to see her mother moving quickly around the room. Her face was flushed, her movements frantic, and Gwynnie could tell at once that her mother was worried. “Please, leave. I have laundry to attend to.”
“Ma?” Gwynnie’s voice made Emlyn stagger against the nearest barrel, causing it to tip over, the water and lye spilling across the cobbles as the chemises fell out too.
“Gwynnie? Where have you been?”
Gwynnie lifted the bonnet off her head, allowing her hair to fall down around shoulders.
“Everything has changed, Ma. Pascal has ordered Tombstone to take me to Newgate.”
CHAPTER 23
Gwynnie stood by the riverbank, gazing out across the water. Her hands fidgeted beneath the thick lawyer’s robes she still wore.
Her mother wore a dark brown cloak and a red cap over her head. She’d also rubbed some dirt on her chin, that at a casual glance looked rather like stubble. The heavy cross around her neck suggested she was now a gentleman of the clergy.
“Shall we just swim across, do you think?” Gwynnie said with such an ironic tone that her mother sighed audibly. “Easy, is it not?”
“I did not say it was a good idea, only that it was an idea.”
“It is a knave’s idea.”
“I know, I know. Bite the stone, not the hand that throws it.”
Gwynnie looked out over the Thames once again. It may have stopped raining, but the river was still so high that the wherrymen had not been seen out on the water. Emlyn and Gwynnie had come down to the riverbank in the vain hope that maybe one wherryman would have had the gall to work today, but their prayers had not been answered. The river was bare, and there was no way out of the palace.
“We could try the other side, Woolwich Road. The flooded lawn is retreating. We could reach the heath.”
“It hasn’t retreated enough.” Gwynnie shook her head. “I had to swim through that icy water the other day. It arrests one’s movements with its coldness. I do not believe we could reach the other side of that flood without drowning.”
All day, they had been hiding in plain sight. The palace was searched not just by Tombstone, but also yeomen, in pursuit of Gwynnie and Emlyn. So far, they had not returned to their chamber, fearing that a yeoman guard might be waiting for them there.
“Even if we manage to flee, how would we survive?” Emlyn whispered as the wind whistled up from the Thames and buffeted their loose robes. “We need money. If we were to steal, we would draw attention to ourselves. We need those jewels.”
“You know as well as I that we cannot risk going back to our chamber now,” Gwynnie insisted. “Our best hope is to wait out the flood, and either cross the Thames or the south bank when we can.”
“You think it will be that easy?” Emlyn turned toward Gwynnie, the wooden dock creaking beneath her. “You do not know what it is like to be the hunted killer. They search for you savagely. They might as well set the dogs on you. If Pascal is now convinced you hurt Mistress Battersby, and her husband before her, then you’re as good as discovered already.”
“Ever the optimist, Ma. You are like a ray of pure sunshine.”
“Hold your tongue, girl.” The sharpness of her tone made Gwynnie flinch. It had been a long time since her mother had talked to her in such a way.
Reddening almost to the colour of her crimson robes, Emlyn turned back to face the Thames. “Well, we cannot escape across there.”
