Vanquished (18 page)

"Wherever a noble deed is done, 'tis the pulse of a hero's heart is stirred. Wherever the right hath triumph won, there are the heroes' voices heard."

--M
ARY
L
EE,
South Australia Register,
1890

F
air wages for women, now. Fair wages for women NOW!"
Carrying makeshift placards, the women marched up and down the factory walk, their carrying voices beginning to attract the attention of passersby.

From inside the gated entrance, the proprietor, Mr. Hardcastle shouted out, "Shove off or I'll call the bobbies on you bloody bitches, and don't think I won't."

Balanced atop the vegetable crate that served as a makeshift speaker's platform, Callie called back, "We are on the public street, sir, and well within our rights. If anyone is disturbing the peace, it is you."

"Is that so?" He elbowed the barrel-chested foreman next to him.

With a grin, the foreman shoved away from the wall and sauntered though the open gate to the protestors. He stopped before Iris Brown and, reaching across, wrenched the sign out of her grasp. "Take this, bitch." He hefted the placard high and brought the end of the wooden handle down atop Iris's head.

"Mum!" Screaming, June rushed over to her mother, who'd folded to her knees, blood spilling onto the cobbles.

Mayhem broke out with more men pouring out from the factory doors, converging on the women with fists and clubs.

Caught up in the chaos, Callie didn't see the shop foreman coming toward her until hard hands encircled her waist, pulling her off the crate and flush against his thighs. "What's a tasty bit o' crumpet like yourself about making mischief 'ere?" His thick-lipped mouth covered hers in a foul-breathed kiss.

"No!" Callie drove her knee upward, catching her assaulter in the groin. With a howl, he dropped back to clutch himself.

Looking beyond him, she searched the sea of flailing bodies for Hadrian, but he was nowhere to be found. She started forward but a dark shape blocked her way.

The foreman hefted a heavy hand. "Bloody bitch, you'll get your comeuppance, I'll see to that." The backhanded blow caught her squarely across her cheek. She staggered, the gate at her back breaking her fall.

"Bastard!"

The fist whizzing past caused Callie to duck only this time the blow wasn't meant for her but for her attacker. Bare knuckles connected with the man's bulbous nose in a cartilage-crushing crunch that dropped him to his knees.

Sidestepping the fallen man, Hadrian rushed to her side. "Come, we've got to get you out of here." Throwing an arm about her shoulders, he steered her away from the scene.

Digging in her heels, she said, "But I can't just leave them. I--"

Somewhere in the near distance a police siren blared. Hadrian tightened his hold. "Callie, for bloody once do as I say. Take hold of me and run. Run, Callie, run!"

Hadrian led them through a maze of winding streets, concealed courtyards, and rubbish-strewn alleyways, navigating like a seasoned ship's captain charting his course around a storm. Later Callie would marvel at how he seemed to know without stopping to think just which way to turn--but for the moment all she could manage was to fill her lungs with great gulps of icy air and run for dear life.

They ducked into a gin shop alley just as a police wagon sped by. Breathing hard, Hadrian leaned back against the crumbling stone wall. "I think we managed to give them the slip. We'll rest here . . . for . . . a moment."

Callie fell back next to him, one hand pressed to the invisible knife stabbing at her side. "What . . . what just happened?"

He turned to look at her. Like her, he'd lost his hat. Sweat streamed the side of his face, darkening the golden hair at his temples. "It seems Hardcastle made good on his threat and sent someone to call out the bobbies after all."

"But that's outrageous. It was he who ordered those men to come after us. Oh, Hadrian, he must have planned it all along." And she, Callie, had stepped right into his trap, leading the other women to follow. She shoved away from the wall. "I have to go back and explain."

He grabbed her arm, pulling her back. "Don't be a fool or a martyr either. You can't very well help if you're jailed alongside them, now can you? Tomorrow you can post bail, give a statement if you like. For now, leave it."

Leave it. How many times in the span of the past few hours had he told her to do just that and how many times had she brushed aside his objection, assuming she knew what was best. Now instead of being at their liberty, Iris Brown and the others were beaten and on their way to incarceration.

Thinking of June Brown cradling her mother's bleeding head in her small lap, she felt perilously close to crying. "I was only trying to help them and, dear Lord, look what I've done. Thanks to me, they're worse off than they ever were."

"Hey, you." He wrapped an arm about her, his body an anchor of comfort against a world gone suddenly to sea. "It's not all bad."

Fighting tears, she shook her head. "Isn't it?"

Eyes fixed on her face, he said, "You gave those women hope, a sense of purpose. Because of you, they were able to stand tall and proud, perhaps for the first time in their lives. They may not have prevailed today but because of you they may do so tomorrow or the next. At least now they'll have the tools, the resolve, to try again."

She fitted a hand to her forehead, damp with perspiration despite the raw air. "I doubt that will afford anyone much comfort tonight as they're lying on a hard jail floor with throbbing heads and empty stomachs."

He looked at her with the same mixture of tenderness and weary resignation she might have shown little June. "Sometimes it's the beauty of the struggle that makes an action worthwhile. I should think a warrior princess such as you would own the truth in that."

"I don't feel much like a warrior, even less a princess."

He laid his hand along her cheek. Now that they'd stopped running, the place where she'd been hit had begun to throb. Tracing the bruise that was surely taking shape by now, he looked into her eyes and said, "My brave, beautiful Caledonia, whatever can I do to make you see the wonderful truth of who you are?"

Callie didn't think first, only acted, a condition that was becoming more and more frequent since Hadrian had come into her life. "You could kiss me."

"Could I now?" He smiled but his eyes boring into hers were disconcertingly sober.

"Yes." Lifting her face to his, she felt something cold and wet strike the tip of her nose.

Hadrian must have felt it too. He pulled away to look up. She followed his gaze to the sliver of white sky visible through the arc of sagging rooftops. Blast, but it was snowing.

Unwinding his woolen scarf, he wrapped it about her neck. "We'd best save that kiss for later. For now, I have to get you inside somewhere safe and dry until this business blows over. Fortunately I know just the place."

It was coming on twilight when they reached Hadrian's friend, Sally's house. The streets in this part of the city were not only narrow and winding but poorly lit. The new electrical lights had yet to make it this far eastward, and from what Callie could see maintenance of the old gas fixtures was spotty at best. That left large patches of darkness relieved only by the odd lit window or doorway. In contrast, the gabled house Hadrian led her up to was glowing like a Christmas tree, Chinese lanterns festooning the gated entrance and the three tiers of windows, splashing their gaily colorful iridescence onto the bricked courtyard and cobbled street.

Sally Potts was a prostitute, Callie could see that straightaway. Unlike the ragged, careworn creature she'd encountered in the market, the woman who answered Hadrian's knock, or rather three sharp raps, was plump and handsome, her low-cut taffeta gown suited for evening though it was barely four o'clock.

They stepped inside the entrance hall, the walls decked with flocked paper and pier glasses, the etched glass sconces fired with electric, not gas. Closing the door behind him, Hadrian said, "Callie, this is an old friend of mine, Sally Potts. Sally, I'd like to introduce Miss Caledonia Rivers."

Callie stared, she couldn't help it. Face paint, lots of it. A prodigious quantity of powdered bosom protruding from a square-cut bodice. Red hair, obviously dyed, elaborately curled and piled high with combs. Likely the woman was at best a few years Callie's senior, and yet the elaborate artifice made her seem at least a decade older.

"Never say old, not in my line of work." Jabbing Hadrian in the side, Sally tossed back her head and let out a loud laugh.

"Mrs. Potts, a pleasure." Extending her hand, Callie bestowed the title as a courtesy though she heartily doubted the woman had ever been married.

Sally turned curious eyes on Callie, making Callie aware of just what a mess she must look, hatless and with her unpinned hair falling wild about her shoulders. Despite Sally's frank appraisal, though, she appeared neither unfriendly nor unkind. "Any chum of Harry's is welcome here."

"Harry?" Was it Callie's imagination, or did Hadrian stiffen beside her?

"Oh, did I say 'Harry'? Bless me, I meant to say Hadrian. Lud, I'd forget me own name some days if there weren't friends to remind me of it." Again that thunderbolt of laughter, this time rather studied, or so Callie thought.

Hadrian cleared his throat. "We're in a spot of trouble, Sal. Oh, nothing too serious, mind, a bit of bad business over at the match factory. Might we stay here until the heat dies down? Just an hour or so, and then we'll be on our way."

Sally shrugged, the motion causing her breasts to slip even farther out the top of her low-cut gown. "Stay as long as you like. Business always drops off the beginning of the week. It's not like I can't spare the room."

Hadrian glanced toward the scarlet-carpeted stairway. "Something with a window facing out onto the alley would be just the thing. Just in case."

"No problem; I have a solution."

Hadrian and the woman exchanged knowing looks, and Callie felt her heart lodge in her throat.
They're lovers,
she thought, and even as she told herself she shouldn't care, that what she'd had with him so far had only been a silly kiss and a bit of a fumble, after all, the stab of anguish she felt was a very real thing, a warning that history was about to repeat itself if she wasn't careful.

Sally led them upstairs, taffeta skirts swishing. At the top, she turned down a long, sconce-lit hallway. Following closely behind, Callie heard the sound of a slap, and then a woman's giggle, coming from behind one of several closed doors. Face heating, she ventured a look over her shoulder at Hadrian, but he didn't meet her eyes.

Sally stopped at the closed door at the very end of the corridor. Opening it, she stood back and announced, "Here we are, loves, my very favorite room in the house." She shot Hadrian a wink. "As you can see, the window faces out to the alley. Not the best of views, mind, but practical at times and not so high you can't climb out if the need arises. In the meantime, I'll send up some refreshments and a beefsteak for the lady's eye."

"Thanks, Sal. You're the best," Hadrian said, and Callie didn't miss the easing of his taut features. For the first time it occurred to her she hadn't been the only one in danger of being carted off to jail.

Sally tossed back her head, painted lips parting into a smile of tobacco-stained teeth. "Oh aye, that's what they tell me." Catching Callie's eye, she sobered and said, "I'll send one of the lads off to check out the situation and then knock on your door to give the all clear. Three sharp raps."