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“I— I HAVE NO IDEA how I got here,” I said.
“One too many pints, I’d say.”
“That’s just it. I don’t remember drinking more than a glass of wine at dinner.”
The bartender grunted in disbelief, as I sat up, trying to remember the circumstances that brought me here . . .
I’d had dinner with Miss Atwater.
When I tried to stand on my own, a wave of dizziness came over me.
“Can’t hold your ale, eh?” the man said, catching me.
It was easier not to argue with him.
“Lucky I heard the ruckus out here,” he continued, taking a step back once I was safely on my feet.
I looked around, trying to remember what happened. The sight of my father’s brass-handled cane, shoved into the trash heap next to us, brought with it the vague memory of someone calling me “Lord High and Mighty” as they threw me on the ground. I turned to the barkeep. “I appreciate your help.”
“Seems to me a gentleman such as yourself might offer a reward for saving your neck.” He held out his hand, demanding payment. “Those blokes might’ve slit your throat, had I not walked back here when I did. At great risk to myself, I might add.”
Grateful, I felt in my coin pocket, surprised to discover money still there. Relief turned to fear as I recalled Miss Atwater’s sudden disappearance. “Did you see a lady with them? Was anyone talking about a woman?”
“Don’t rightly know.”
“You said you heard the ruckus. Think carefully, man. What did you hear?”
When a look of suspicion crossed his face, I pulled out several coins. “Tell me exactly what you heard.”
He eyed the money, then me. “One bloke said he knew you’d follow the water. The other two laughed.”
A fresh wave of nausea struck me as I thought of Miss Atwater, frightened and alone. “What else?”
“They dumped you here and said to meet in forty or fifty.”
“Were they actually discussing time? Or could it have been something else?”
The man eyed me as though the question was absurd. “Don’t rightly know. Just that when they saw me walking out here, the first man said to leave you where you were. That you wouldn’t have the guts to go after them.”
Had it simply been the Grey Ghost or the coveted forty-fifty engine, I would have been content to call a night watchman and be done with it. But the realization that they’d taken the innocent Miss Atwater spurred me to action. I knew, though, that I couldn’t go after her on my own. “I need to get a message to someone.”
The man grabbed the coins from my palm and turned back toward the tavern, giving the refuse heap a wide berth. “Funny how you toffs think I’ve got nothing but time. Got a business to run here.”
“I’ll pay double what I’ve given you.”
He stopped at the door, looking back at me. “Triple, and I’ll send a lad ’round.”
“Triple, then. To Mr. Isaac Bell at the Midland Hotel. Tell him Miss Atwater’s been kidnapped and to meet me—” Meet where? I realized the location was never mentioned. Still, if it really was Reggie behind all this, there was only one place he’d go. “Meet at my father’s warehouse. The same message to Byron, Lord Ryderton.” I gave him the address.
The barkeep muttered something about men who couldn’t hold their drink, as he started to walk away.
Stomach roiling from the stench of the garbage and the blow to my head, I grabbed my father’s cane from the refuse pile, breathing in the fresher air, trying to gain back my equilibrium. “Forty-fifty . . .”
Only one meaning behind that phrase, and not something that some cutthroat might have knowledge about.
I pictured my father’s warehouse, wondering how I hadn’t thought of it before. Perhaps my reluctance was because I’d refused to believe that Reginald was guilty of stealing the Grey Ghost. Now that I knew it was he, it really was the only place the car could be hidden.
The stolen car, however, was the last thing I worried about.