“So you’ve decided not to kill me, and to help me instead?”
He nodded. “It seemed a fair trade.”
Montgomery muttered a curse as I stared at Jack blankly. Should I be furious that he’d lied to me, judged me, and nearly murdered me? Or should I be thankful that he’d changed his mind?
It was all too incredible just to believe he was even here, amid his ragtag group in stained satin clothes and heavy cloaks. A new worry twisted my gut. “The rest of your troupe. Are they my father’s creations, too?”
The thin man with the potbelly gut cackled, and the old woman let out a snort.
Jack smiled. “No, but we are all misfits on the edge of the world, and that is enough to bring us together.”
I pressed a hand against my head. I was still reeling from Elizabeth’s sudden death, and from the fact that I still hadn’t told Montgomery about Edward hiding in the attic, and from the fact that Ajax had nearly killed me.
“Why return now?” Montgomery asked.
“To help you, as I said. Elizabeth asked me to locate John Radcliffe and determine if he was a threat. My troupe has been following him over half the country as he’s searched for you. He’s been paying off the police. Working both with them and behind their backs.” His troupe’s faces grew serious, as did his own. “You’re going to need our help, Miss Moreau. He has learned your location, and as we speak he’s on his way with two dozen paid soldiers.”
The air vanished from my lungs. Lucy let out a gasp.
“That’s impossible,” Montgomery said. “Elizabeth kept the manor’s location secret, and he didn’t follow us. I made certain of that.”
Jack signaled to the old woman, who took a rumpled piece of paper out of her pocket and handed it to Montgomery.
“It’s a letter, written to Mrs. Margaret Radcliffe,” Jack explained. “John Radcliffe’s wife. It was delivered a week ago.” He paused. “Written by Radcliffe’s daughter. It gives away the location of this manor.”
Radcliffe’s daughter?
We all whirled on Lucy, and her lips fell open in shock. She took a step backward. “No! I would never do that!”
“It has your signature,” Montgomery said, holding up the letter like an accusation.
“I did write a letter,” she said, looking pale. “That part is true. After that article Papa wrote in the newspaper about how sick with grief he and Mama were, I couldn’t bear to let her worry about me. I wrote a letter to her explaining that I was safe. I sent it from Quick, but I didn’t include a return address, I promise. I certainly didn’t say we were hiding in northern Scotland!”
Jack glanced at the old woman. “Genevieve posed as a wealthy dowager and was invited to their home. She was able to sneak away and found the letter in Mr. Radcliffe’s study. In it, Miss Radcliffe references an obscure type of heather that only grows near Quick. Radcliffe was able to use this information to locate Ballentyne in the tax records and draw a link to Elizabeth von Stein’s family.”
Lucy stifled a gasp. “Oh God, Juliet, you have to believe me. I was just telling Mama how pretty the moors were. I didn’t want her to worry about me. I would never have revealed our location, not in a million years.”
“I believe you,” I said quietly. “But it doesn’t change the fact that he knows.” I turned to Jack. “Where is he now?”
“When we left them, they were preparing to leave Inverness. I took the liberty of opening the levees between here and the village to flood the road behind us. That will slow them down, but not for long. The moors will drain soon enough, or they’ll find some way past the floodwaters. You haven’t much time, Miss Moreau. Where is Elizabeth von Stein?”
A silence fell over our small group.
“She died,” Montgomery answered at last. “Last night. There was a fire in the southern tower. Hensley is gone as well. Juliet’s the mistress now.”
No emotion showed on Jack’s face. He was as unflinching about death as Valentina had been on our first night here, telling me about the vagrants’ bodies in the cellar. Was he just used to death? Or was he one of that particular rare breed of person, like my father, who felt so little, one wondered if they felt anything at all?
“I hope you have a plan, Miss Moreau,” Jack said. “Radcliffe is heavily armed, and he’s planning on storming Ballentyne and killing anyone who gets in his way.”
“All this effort, just in the name of retribution?” I asked in a faint voice.