Everyone spoke at once until James held up his hand for quiet. “How do you know?”
“My men persuaded one of theirs to tell us where they were holding her,” Graham said. “And there’ll be no police involved with this. One of the men they captured is a lieutenant at a nearby precinct. We don’t know the exact building, but we know which block, only a few streets from the harbor.”
“That’s why they want Payden at six o’clock. Tides will be going out at eight. Enough time to negotiate, gather their men, and be on board to sail,” MacAvoy said.
Graham nodded. “Makes sense. Otherwise, why not make the exchange before sunrise, when it’s still dark and there is less chance of witnesses? My men are staying where they found the men they’ve taken per my command. I don’t want to spook their leaders. Here’s a map of the city,” he said and spread the paper out. “Here’s where we’re holding, here’s where I think the other groups will be, and here’s where I think they’re holding your sister. On Neff Street, near Myrtle.”
“Let’s go,” Alexander said. “Every minute here is one more minute that she’s in their hands. Let’s go!”
His urgency had every man pulling on dark coats and hats and checking knives and guns. He’d never been armed in this way, but he was prepared to battle to the death. It felt foreign to him but righteous as well. He’d never served in the military, but he could handle the gun James gave him from a massive leather trunk in the man’s sleeping room that was filled with weapons: guns, bullets, daggers, swords, and a lethal-looking ax James had called a lochaber. All were in excellent condition, oiled and wrapped in fabric. This family had been prepared to battle.
Aunt Murdoch pulled on his sleeve as he was leaving and looked up at him, scowling fiercely. “You will find her and you will bring her home, Mr. Pendergast.”
He bent his head, kissed the old woman’s cheek, and whispered in her ear, “If it is the last thing I do on this earth.”
Alexander, James, MacAvoy, and Payden left from the kitchen entrance, creeping up the stone steps and to the alleyway behind the Thompson house. They were quickly two streets over, to where a young man held the reins of four horses. Alexander pulled himself up in the saddle and adjusted the stirrups. They were thirty blocks from their destination. Alexander turned his horse’s head and kneed his mount. He would not be leisurely in this ride.
The rough-voiced man opened the door just as Elspeth loosened the last knot. She’d left her wrists tied but could easily slip her hand through when she must.
“May I have some water,” she whispered.
“What will you be doing to get it, girl?” he said with a laugh.
Elspeth shook her head. “Never mind.”
He walked toward her and grabbed her by her hair, shaking her as he did. “I’ll give you some water when you give me what I want.”
“No. I don’t need any water.”
The man slammed her head into the stone wall behind her. Her eyes rolled up for a moment with the pain, but she focused on his face and tried to think about when she would kill him. She thought she might vomit but swallowed and closed her eyes. She slumped back against the wall.
“What do you mean they didn’t answer you?” Elspeth heard the giggly man say from the outer room.
“I couldn’t find them, I looked,” another man said, fear in his voice.
“You didn’t look hard enough, then. Jasper?” the giggly man called, and the one holding her closed his eyes.
“What?” he shouted.
“Come out here. We may have a problem.”
Jasper turned away from Elspeth, but not before smacking her face open-handed. She could taste blood on her lip and willed away the pain as she tried to slow the pounding of her heart. She wondered who hadn’t answered who. Did they have lookouts? And why wouldn’t they answer their own leaders? Could it be that Alexander and James were coming for her? Elspeth would not allow herself to feel hope. She would not.
Nearly an hour later, James jumped down from his horse. They were at the site that Graham had said was five blocks from where Elspeth was. James held up his fist for them to stop near an alley where he could see boxes of rotting apples and fish heads at the entrance. He took a breath through his mouth.
“Sir Isaac Newton said . . .”
A voice came out of the back of the alley. “Kill the apple.”
“That’s the correct response.” James put the gun back under his belt. “Come on.”
The alley was dark, even though the predawn sun was lightening the sky, as Alexander picked his way through garbage until he saw two men standing by a covered doorway. He recognized Graham’s man Jeffers.
“You got hit over the head, man,” Alexander said. “What are you doing out here?”
“I don’t take kindly to being made a fool of, sir,” he said and turned to two men propped up against a wall, their hands tied behind them and their mouths stuffed with rags. “Their bossman already sent someone to check in with these two, but I didn’t let them answer. I didn’t trust what they’d say. They’ll be back, I imagine.”
“What’s the plan?” James asked.
“We think there were two of them checking the last time. I’ve got men ready to intercept up to four. We’re getting close to six o’clock, though, and Graham doesn’t think there’s any time left for games or strategies. The boy will go to Clearfield and Bath Streets, watched by our men and yours. Graham and others are getting in position to storm a warehouse on Neff Street a block away. We saw two dead men beside the building. One of them was in dress clothes; probably the man who lured Miss Thompson and Mrs. Pendergast down that hallway.”
“I’m with Payden,” James said.
“Take MacAvoy too,” Alexander said. “I’m going to that warehouse to get Elspeth.”
“I should go for my sister,” Payden said.
MacAvoy shook his head. “You’re the decoy. The three of us are going to take to the roofs and climb down a rope we’re going to drop from the top. That’s what’s in this bag on my back. Heavy too.”
“So they’ll be looking for us in the alleys and on the streets, and we’re coming at them from above.”
“That’s my plan,” MacAvoy said. “They’ll be looking to kill you right away, James. We can’t just wander down the avenue like we are on parade.”
“Why does everything I do with you involve scaling buildings?” James asked, and Alexander could see his very white teeth as he smiled.
Payden cleared his throat and turned to Alexander. “We’re trusting you to get our sister. Don’t disappoint us.”
Alexander had not expected a young man of Payden’s age to command respect the way he did. But maybe there was something in his birthright that had shaped him, some presence passed down that gave him an innate ability to lead. He was still young, and he’d still make mistakes, but James would guide him. Even Jeffers and the other man were watching him and nodding.
“I intend to rescue her, and I intend to marry her, if she’ll have me.” There was something very calming about those words. The clatter in his brain relegated to a background symphony when he allowed himself to dream of a future with Elspeth. He’d not spent hours considering the good reasons and the wrong ones for marrying her, and yet he was completely confident that she was the reason for his very existence on this earth.