“I want to see where he was kneeling, Graham. Get a lantern,” Alexander said and turned back to Jeffers. “Tell me exactly where you saw him.”
“Lock the door behind us,” Graham said. “Don’t open it unless I give you the signal. We should be no longer than ten minutes.”
The two men walked through the gardens and past the stable and the carriage house, into the alleyway. Alexander turned right and pointed. “I think he was kneeling there, behind that shed. That is what Jeffers was describing.”
The walked hurriedly and looked through the high weeds against the small building. Graham found the door and shook his head. “They couldn’t have been inside. The lock and the latch are rusted shut. If they left something, it would have been there.”
Alexander shook his head. “It doesn’t make sense. What would they be doing at this property? Hiding weapons? The grasses and weeds aren’t even bent over.”
“It makes sense if they wanted to get you or I out of the house, though,” Graham said.
Alexander looked at him, his face distorted and grim from the lantern’s shadows. “Well, they’ve succeeded if that was what they set out to do, then, haven’t they?”
“Let’s go!” Graham started to run down the alleyway, back to the Pendergast mansion, the lamp swinging wildly in his hand.
Alexander hurried to follow him, running down the alleyway and turning through the gates of his mother’s elaborate gardens, close to the heels of the man in front of him. Graham skidded to a stop and pounded three times on the door, waited, and pounded twice more. The door swung open, and they went inside just as all the gas lights and sconces sputtered off. They were plunged into darkness.
“Shut the door and lock it!” Graham shouted and held up his lantern.
“The gas line!” Alexander shouted. “Careful with that lantern, Graham.”
Alexander could hear shouting and a rumble of feet running on the marble floor above him, even though many of the kitchen and serving staff were screaming. He knew he could not afford to be distracted, but for a single moment it occurred to him that the enemy was here, in his mother’s home, looking to steal away a young boy and maybe harm others in the process. Elspeth. He felt the warrior yell that he’d heard from James and MacAvoy bubbling up in his throat. He wanted to tear down walls and stab men in the heart. He recognized that he was not quite sane in those brief moments, that there was something primitive about what he felt, that he would do physical damage to those opposing him, and he knew just as well that he must use his head before he used his fists.
“Come on, Graham, back outside. There’s a gas station in a small building that serves this house and a few others.”
Alexander unlocked the back door and went outside, Graham on his heels, running across the patios and around the fountains. He quickly opened a nearly invisible door in a fence and went through. Ahead there was a small brick building, its door hanging wide open.
“Do you smell anything?” Graham asked.
“Just my mother’s roses,” Alexander said. “I’m going to have to go inside and see if they’ve broken a pipe or just shut off our valve. Don’t come any closer.”
Alexander walked across the mowed lawn toward the building, sniffing the air as he did. There was very little breeze that evening, but Alexander crept slowly closer, listening intently for hissing pipes even as the noise from his parents’ home was a cacophony of sound in the background. The building was still and silent. He looked in the open door and heard nothing and smelled nothing unusual. Thankfully, there was enough moonlight for him to see the valves on the wall, Pendergast painted above one of them on the wood. There was a large wrench on the floor below it.
“Looks like they shut off the valve here,” Alexander shouted. “Check the basement of the house where the gas lines come in and make sure no one’s tampered with anything before I turn this back on.”
Graham hurried away, and Alexander was left with his thoughts. His stomach lurched, and the hair on the back of his neck stood up. Where was Elspeth and the rest of her family? Were his mother and father and sister safe? Something wasn’t right with someone in his orbit. He could feel it in his gut. But he could not move one inch until he heard Graham give the go-ahead. He would have to wait and sweat and worry and try to keep himself from punching a brick wall.
“Good to go, Pendergast,” Graham yelled.
Alexander knelt on the stone floor and picked up the wrench, fitting it to the valve.
“I don’t think they sabotaged it anywhere else,” Graham said.
“I hope you’re right,” Alexander said and looked over his shoulder.
“They’re diabolical, it seems, but not suicidal.”
Alexander stopped. “You’re saying they are in the house? That they didn’t want a gas explosion because they are in the house!”
“Turn the wrench. We’ve got to get inside.”
Alexander turned the wrench and heard gas running to the pipe marked Pendergast. He ran, following Graham to the back door, securing it behind him as one of Graham’s men stepped in front it, his gun in his hand. Graham was shouting directions to his men in the now well-lit kitchen, and Alexander hurried past him and up the stairs to the main floor. The scene was chaos. Guests were hurrying this way and that, women crying, the men grabbing wraps from harried and frightened servants. He worked his way through the crowd looking for any of the Thompson family, but especially for Elspeth. He heard his uncle’s voice shouting over the din.
“Has anyone seen Isadora?”
Alexander found him as his father put a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Nathan?” his father said.
“I can’t find her anywhere! She was near the ladies’ retiring room when the lights went out.”
“We’ll find her, Uncle Nathan,” Alexander said. “Graham and his men are doing a thorough—”
“Pendergast! Pendergast!”
Alexander turned and saw James Thompson running to him, his face white, his teeth clenched.
“She’s gone!”
“Who’s gone?” Alexander said, but he knew. He knew in his gut and in his heart, and his world shrank to a very small and dangerous place. He marshaled his disoriented thoughts. Maybe she was hiding. Maybe she was angrier that he’d left her alone all evening than he’d thought. Maybe someone had clubbed her over the head and stolen her away.
“Elspeth,” he said to James. “Elspeth is gone?”
“Yes! She’s gone!”
“Where are your other siblings?”
James pointed into the ballroom, and Alexander hurried through the crowd. Kirsty was crying on her aunt’s shoulder, and Muireall was beside her, grim-faced. Payden was next to Muireall, and MacAvoy had an arm around him, his gun drawn. The young man was red in the face and straining to be free from the arms around him.
“What have you done?” he shouted. “My sister is gone! What have you done?”
James held up a staying hand. “We are not going to assign blame at this time. We are going to find Elspeth.”
“And then what, James?” Kirsty said, tears running down her face.
“And then there’ll be punishment on those who dare touch a MacTavish,” James growled.