The Hidden Blade (26 page)

Leighton debated with himself.

He could take a P&O liner on the eastern route via the Suez Canal. But the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company had a steamer leaving in two days that would deposit him at Colón, Panama, where he would take a train across the isthmus and then get on another steamer on the Pacific side. And that particular steamer would call upon San Francisco.

Did he dare visit Mother and Marland before setting sail across the Pacific?

Hobbling a little—his feet hurt with every step—he visited the ticket agent for the P&O line. Then, spying a chemist’s shop, he bought some bandaging and sticking plasters and dressed his feet so that they wouldn’t chafe so badly. Feet somewhat better and more than a little bold, he called on the ticket agent for the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company for more details concerning its passage to Shanghai via Panama and San Francisco, of which only the most skeletal information had been given in the
Bradshaw
.

As he was about to walk into the ticket agent’s office, a meaty hand took hold of him by the arm. “There you are, young Master Leighton. If you would come with us nice and easy, we will take you back to your uncle.”

For a moment his entire vision turned black; his head roared as if a tornado hurtled through. He turned to see a beefy man with a red face.

“Kindly unhand me,” he said. “You have the wrong person. My uncle is dead and I don’t see how you can possibly reunite me with someone six feet underground.”

“Cool as a cucumber, ain’t he?” said the beefy man to a smaller man next to him.

Leighton took an instant dislike to the other man, who had cold, calculating eyes. Compared to him, the beefy man looked almost jolly.

“My name is James Ashburton and I suggest you take your hand off me this instant.”

The beefy man chuckled. “Or what, young master? You are going to knock old John Boxer on his back?” He turned to the other man. “Show me the picture again, Jenkins.”

Jenkins brought out a framed photograph, an excellent likeness of Leighton, from Christmas last. Leighton had always thought Sir Curtis’s promise to send the pictures to Mother too much kindness. Now he knew he was right: Sir Curtis wanted his image captured only so that Leighton would be more easily found, should he choose to run away.

“See? That’s you. I’ll wager my last farthing,” said Boxer. “So why don’t you come with us, young sir? If we are wrong, then no harm done.”

“Of course there could be harm done! You could make me miss my steamer’s sailing.”

“Then I’ll have you booked for the next passage,” Boxer answered cheerfully.

There was no malice to his words—he was but going about the task he had been assigned, retrieving a wayward child and returning him to the bosom of his family. But there was also no room for bargaining: He clearly considered Leighton a minor who could not be relied upon to make his own choices.

And now he propelled Leighton firmly forward, toward a waiting carriage.

Leighton braced himself to face Sir Curtis, but the carriage was quite empty. Boxer and Jenkins sat down on either side of him, wedging him in tightly. At the railway station they each held one of his arms. On the train they again sat closely together, packed like matches in a box.

Leighton veered between panic and misery. He considered somehow breaking the window of the train and throwing himself outside. He considered screaming kidnap. But the former would probably give him broken limbs, and the latter would only bring him to the attention of the law. And the law, unfortunately, was squarely on Sir Curtis’s side.

He felt faint as they approached London, even fainter as they piled into a hansom cab. But he persisted in his protest. “You’ve got the wrong man, I tell you one last time. Aren’t you going to be embarrassed when whoever this uncle fellow is has to apologize? And make no mistake, I am going to report this to the police.”

“Then why haven’t you?” said Jenkins, his voice reedy and unpleasant.

“Because you would have made a scene. And I have been taught to never make scenes,” said Leighton, with as much certainty and scorn as he could muster. “Now, where are we going? Where are you taking me?”

“I already told you, to your uncle’s house in Mayfair,” answered Boxer.

How tightly secured was Sir Curtis’s house? Would he be able to effect another escape? And if he couldn’t, would he be able to tolerate the next almost seven years before he came of age?

Sir Curtis’s house was situated in the middle of a row of town houses, with redbrick facing, a wrought-iron railing, and a green park opposite. To Leighton’s surprise—and a sudden burst of hope—when his captors rang the bell, no one answered.

“Didn’t you wire ahead to say we were coming?” Boxer asked Jenkins.

“I did. Maybe we traveled faster than the cable did?”

“No, we can’t have, you blockhead,” said Boxer casually.

Jenkins gritted his teeth. “I don’t mean we traveled faster than the electrical currents. I meant the post office still needs to write out the message and then send it for delivery.”

“Still, it’s been at least two hours since we left Southampton. Ring again.”

Jenkins did, his jaw tight.

This time the door opened. The two men both drew in a breath at the sight of Lady Atwood.

She looked at each of them in turn, Leighton included, in that haughty way of hers. “Who are you and why are you calling at this residence?”

Leighton almost gasped in astonishment. “I am James Ashburton,” he said immediately, willing his voice not to shake. “I have no idea who they are, but they keep insisting I am someone I am not.”

Boxer lifted his hat. “We are men acting on Sir Curtis’s behalf. We’ve brought back his nephew from Southampton.”

“I am Lady Atwood, and I can tell you I have never seen this boy. He is not my nephew.”

Leighton hoped no one could hear his heart pounding—to him it was as loud as explosions.

“Are you sure, your ladyship?” Boxer asked uncertainly.

“Are you telling me I don’t know what my own nephew looks like?”

Her hauteur was daunting. Boxer shrank a little. “No, no, of course not. But you will agree that he bears a remarkable resemblance to the photograph we’ve been given.”

He gestured at Jenkins, who produced the photograph and extended it toward Lady Atwood. But Boxer snatched the picture from him and handed it to her himself.

Jenkins’s jaw worked.

“That isn’t my nephew,” Lady Atwood said coldly. “You had better come inside.”

They followed her to a dark parlor, its curtains drawn. She reached for a large silver-framed photograph on the mantel and showed it to the men. “
This
is my nephew. See the family resemblance?”

This
was a boy of about seventeen, who looked very much like Lady Atwood. One of her brothers, probably.

“What have I been telling you all this time?” Leighton said. “I told you and told you and told you that you made a mistake. One of my mother’s cousins is a judge. How would you like to be sentenced for kidnapping?”

Boxer blanched.

“Now, now, young man,” said Lady Atwood, as impersonal as ever, “there is no need for unnecessary threats. My father was a judge, and I can tell you that in such circumstances, when an honest mistake has been made, it is quite unlikely for anyone to be prosecuted. But you have my apology, and these gentlemen will kindly escort you to Victoria Station and buy you a ticket for wherever you need to go.”

“That’s it? That’s all the recompense I am to receive?” said Leighton, since it seemed a reasonable thing to demand, if he had truly been kidnapped by mistake.

“Very well then.” She left the room for a moment and returned with a reticule. Reaching inside, she took out a few sovereigns and dropped them into Leighton’s hand. “Enough recompense for you?”

She was extraordinarily convincing, almost as if she’d had time to— Of course. If Sir Curtis was out arranging for Leighton’s capture, she would have been the one to receive the cable—and she would have had a bit of time to prepare.

Leighton was beyond grateful. He would like to thank her profusely, but doing so would jeopardize his newly regranted freedom. So he only nodded. “Very decent of you, ma’am.”

“Then off with all of you.”

“What about the photograph, ma’am?” asked Jenkins.

Lady Atwood turned an arctic gaze his way. “You no longer require the photograph, as you no longer work for Sir Curtis. I’ve had to dip into my own funds to buy off this young man. Do you think he would tolerate that sort of incompetence? When he comes, I will tell him that you have found better employment elsewhere.”

Boxer looked both defeated and apologetic, Jenkins just as tight-faced as before. Leighton hoped he appeared vindicated and appropriately scornful, rather than boneless with relief.

In silence they arrived at Victoria Station. From his own pocket, Boxer paid for a second-class ticket to Southampton for Leighton. “Sorry about all that, Mr. Ashburton.”

Leighton took the ticket from him. “I hope never to see either of you again. Good day, gentlemen.”

The two men left. Leighton breathed for what seemed like the first time this day. He climbed into his rail carriage, sat down, and bowed his head in prayers of thanksgiving.

A hand gripped his arm. He started.

Jenkins.

“What do you want
now
?”

“I want you to get off this train nice and quiet and come with me. Boxer is a fool, but I can always tell when a woman is lying. You are the one we’re looking for, all right. And this time I’m going to take you straight to Sir Curtis himself.”

Leighton felt as shattered a glass hurtled across the room. Was there to be no escape after all? Was he doomed?

“What is it to you? Why do you care so much?”

“There is a nice reward for your return, don’t you know?”

“How much?”

“Fifty pounds.”

“Let’s make a deal,” he said, his voice strangely calm, even as his head throbbed and his palms perspired. “If you walk out of this train, I will give you sixty pounds.”

Forty pounds would still get him as far as Bombay. He would worry about the rest later.

“You don’t have that kind of money.”

Leighton removed his right shoe with a wince and pulled out the three twenty-pound banknotes he’d put in there in the morning. “I do have that kind of money.”

Jenkins’s eyes narrowed. He was not a particularly unsightly man, but to Leighton he was all ugliness. “Take off your other shoe.”

“What?”

“You heard me. Take off your other shoe.”

Thirty seconds later, Jenkins had the other forty pounds from Herb.

Leighton was beginning to tremble. What would he do with less than ten pounds and half the circumference of the Earth to cover?

“Now your waistcoat.”

Leighton couldn’t even exclaim in dismay—a giant fist seemed to have closed around his throat.

“That’s right. Don’t think I haven’t felt the coins in the lining. Now hand it over.”

Leighton felt as if his entire person had turned to wood. He could almost hear his arm creaking like a rusted door hinge as he struggled out of the waistcoat. What was he going to do with no money whatsoever?

“And now the money the woman gave you.”

Leighton had forgotten the four sovereigns Lady Atwood had dropped into his palm. With that memory came a sudden infusion of angry resolve. Slowly he turned to Jenkins. “No.”

Jenkins was taken aback. “No?”

“No,” Leighton repeated, his voice low. He felt the weight of the syllable as it left his lips, a thing of substance, as cold and hard as an artillery shell.

Jenkins’s expression turned nasty. “Then how would you like to come with me after all? Another fifty pounds for me on top of everything else.”

Leighton realized that it had been Jenkins’s plan all along to bilk everything he could from Leighton, and then turn him over to Sir Curtis for the reward.

Strangely enough, he felt himself smile. “Guess what I will tell Sir Curtis when I see him? I will tell him that you took two hundred fifty pounds from me. And guess whom he will believe?”

Jenkins blinked.