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When we informed Maclean of our suspicions about Reverend Jamieson, he was more inclined to break down his door, brush the servants aside, and drag the minister out by his collar.

We convinced him that might not be the best method of convincing him to talk, and that it would almost certainly result in outrage from the public given Jamieson’s status.

As his temper cooled, he conceded that our plan was more circumspect and logical, and promised to arrange for its implementation.

In the meantime, Gage and I paid a visit to Picardy Place in search of Mr. Rimmer.

We found two carts pulled up out front, monitored by their drivers and a policeman, and Mr. Winstanley and his employees in a flurry of activity inside.

It seemed they’d finally been given permission to move the collection to safer premises, and the auctioneer was making the most of the clearing in the clouds to transport what he could.

Winstanley’s spectacles were askew and his cravat was rumpled, revealing how frazzled he was.

I imagined the loss of two employees—one of them being one of the assistants on whom he so heavily relied—had made matters much more difficult.

As such, I didn’t take it personally when he rounded on us after having instructed several of his men on what to carry out next.

“What do you want?”

“A word with Mr. Rimmer,” Gage replied calmly.

“Must it be now ?” he demanded.

“I’m afraid so.”

He heaved an exasperated sigh, before flinging his arm toward the door leading to the servants’ staircase. “He’s supposed to be locating a tarpaulin or canvas. And he’s taking his good time doing so.”

I turned to Gage to see if this statement concerned him as much as it did me. Mr. Rimmer might simply have been enjoying a reprieve from his irascible employer, but I feared there might be a different reason for his prolonged absence.

“Stay behind me,” Gage murmured as he pushed open the door, proving he shared my unease.

As the noises from above receded, we paused partway down the steps, listening for any sounds from below.

I heard a faint drip of water coming from somewhere, but otherwise it was silent save for the periodic creak of the floor above.

As we continued, I had to remind myself that the building had been inspected and was secure.

That the creaks and groans we heard were normal.

When we neared the bottom, I wasn’t as surprised as maybe I should have been when Gage reached beneath his coat and extracted the pistol he’d tucked into the waistband of his trousers.

Perhaps because I was also carrying a gun in the reticule dangling from my wrist. Given Fletcher’s and Jamieson’s unconfirmed whereabouts and the previous attack on me, I’d decided it would be best to take my Hewson percussion pistol with us.

The corridor was silent as we inched our way down it, listening for any indication of occupation.

If Mr. Rimmer was searching for a tarpaulin or canvas, he was doing so remarkably quietly.

We peered into vacant rooms lit dimly by the light from the corridor and shrouded windows high on the walls, but nothing seemed disturbed.

Gage moved with far more confidence than I did, but then I remembered that he’d been here before with Maclean searching for ladders and checking the locks.

I’d never ventured belowstairs, though it appeared to be laid out much like the servants’ quarters in our town house.

He stumbled to a stop as we rounded a corner, and I soon realized why. There was a stack of folded canvas lying on the floor, but no sign of Mr. Rimmer. That haphazard pile made me anxious for Rimmer’s safety, for if he’d been gathering supplies as instructed, why had he stopped?

We found our answer inside the scullery. Mr. Rimmer lay crumpled on the floor, the back of his head matted with blood.

I sank onto my knees beside him. “Mr. Rimmer,” I gasped, touching his shoulder, which was still warm. Pressing my fingers to the underside of his jaw, I felt for a pulse. When I found it, I exhaled in relief, nodding to Gage, who looked on. “He’s alive.”

But I didn’t know for how long. It depended on how serious his head injury was, and there was no way to tell that just from the quantity of blood coating his hair and pooling onto the floor. Head wounds always bled rather alarmingly.

I glanced about me for something to stanch the bleeding. “Those towels,” I said, catching sight of a stack near the sink. “Pass them to me.”

Gage fetched them and then helped me to press them to the wound as I rolled Mr. Rimmer over to his back.

“We should send for a physician or…or a surgeon,” I vacillated, uncertain which was the appropriate medical man for the job.

Gage jumped to his feet, but then hesitated. “Do you have your pistol?”

“Yes. Now go.”

His footsteps swiftly receded down the corridor, and I cautiously examined Mr. Rimmer for further injury, all the while speaking to him and trying to coax him awake. “Mr. Rimmer, please. Who did this to you? Was it Mr. Fletcher?”

He seemed the logical choice. After all, he would know the layout of the house.

But why had he returned? And why had he attacked Mr. Rimmer?

Did he think his former colleague knew something that could implicate him, or perhaps foil whatever his future plans were?

If so, that would be valuable information, indeed.

And it made it all the more imperative we find out.

“Mr. Rimmer, please, wake up,” I begged.

But his eyelashes didn’t even flicker.

Mr. Winstanley returned with Gage, looking genuinely distraught at the sight of his assistant.

He lingered as a surgeon who happened to live in the next block over arrived to examine Mr. Rimmer.

The young man didn’t wake through the entire process of examining the wound and checking him for other injuries.

But while the surgeon couldn’t promise Mr. Rimmer would recover, he found his reflexes and general health to be a hopeful sign.

However, he would require constant supervision and care until he awakened and regained complete control of his faculties.

Mr. Rimmer remained insensible as the surgeon snipped the hair around his laceration and then carefully applied sutures.

“I…I suppose I can hire someone to nurse him,” Mr. Winstanley turned away to stammer to me and Gage, clearly still shaken. “Yes, I shall have to. Though the White Horse is not the most conducive quarters for such a thing.”

No, a busy coaching inn was no place for a man to recover, and the hospital would only expose him to further disease.

“Have him brought to our house on Albyn Place,” I urged, trusting Gage would not argue. “We can care for him there.”

“Oh, but we couldn’t impose in such a way,” Mr. Winstanley protested, clearly shocked by the offer.

“It’s not an imposition,” I insisted, though Gage’s expression suggested otherwise.

“The truth is, he may know something critical to our inquiry. He and Mr. Fletcher shared lodgings, did they not?” I watched as Gage’s brow smoothed and the same realization I’d already come to lit his eyes.

“Then he might know something that could help us lead to his apprehension. Why else would Mr. Fletcher risk coming here to attack him?”

Mr. Winstanley’s eyes widened with alarm. “You think Mr. Fletcher did this? Then…are we all in danger?”

“Not if you don’t know anything.” My gaze slid to meet my husband’s and then back. “But we need to make sure Mr. Rimmer is secure so that Mr. Fletcher doesn’t try again.” And so that when— if —Mr. Rimmer woke, we could probe him about what he knew.

At the White Horse, he would be an easy target, either unconscious or too weak to defend himself should Mr. Fletcher decide to ensure he remained silent forever. At least, at our house, he had a chance of recovering.

“If you’re certain you wish to do this?” Mr. Winstanley looked to Gage to confirm. “Then I would be much obliged.” The anguish in his eyes was genuine when he turned once more toward poor Mr. Rimmer. “He is not one of my sons, but I still care for him like one.”

The matter decided, I dashed off a missive to warn our staff to prepare the second guest chamber and gave one of the lads who were lingering to watch the goods loaded into the carts out front a coin to deliver it.

The surgeon instructed me and Gage in the care Mr. Rimmer should be given while several of Mr. Winstanley’s men carried the still-unconscious assistant out through the garden to the mews, where our coach was now waiting.

As we rumbled slowly away from the vacant carriage house toward the tunnel which would lead out to Broughton Street, Mr. Rimmer’s body jostling lightly from side to side where he lay across the squabs opposite us, Gage took my hand.

“You do realize that by taking Rimmer home, we might also be provoking Fletcher to come after us?”

I did, but that did not make hearing the words or the grim tone in which they were spoken any less unsettling, particularly knowing our helpless daughter slumbered in the nursery.

I swallowed past the tightness in my throat. “We shall simply have to remain vigilant.”

And pray we didn’t come to regret it.

· · ·

“Here they come,” I murmured as Trevor and Henry came striding down the pavement.

From my and Gage’s perch on a bench partially concealed by surrounding shrubs, we could see Reverend Jamieson’s arched doorway and that of his neighbor to the right, as well as periodic stretches of the pavement.

Trevor and Henry disappeared behind some of the vegetation blocking our view before appearing again.

Even to my knowing eyes, they looked like two ambling gentlemen at ease.

Trevor even swung a walking stick jauntily at his side as if he’d not a care in the world, though I knew he was perturbed—about this venture and our sister’s reaction to his courtship of a tradesman’s daughter.