Page 69 of The Knight's Pledge
Lucan glared at her. “Of course, I’m sure—that satchel is priceless. I hung it on the post before I went to bed, and when I woke, it was gone.”
“The front door was open.” Chumley spoke from the end of the table, where he cradled a mug of warmed wine in his hands—he didn’t look up from the contents of his cup. All eyes turned to him, including Lucan’s. “I thought it was the innskeep sweeping the dooryard or fetching wood or some such bollocks and she’d not pushed it to afterward. But when she came through from the kitchen with the tray, she gave me a nasty look before walking over and slamming it shut. She’d thought it wasme, I suppose.”
“It could have been anyone, then,” Bob offered glumly. “Gone before we woke, to who knows where.”
In Lucan’s peripheral vision, Gilboe crossed himself.
“Come,” Thomas was saying gently to Effie as he led her back to her spot at the table. “Let’s just think about this a moment. Nae need to getall a-fluster.”
“There is a need, Tommy,” Effie insisted loudly. “That satchel is the only thing saving you from the gallows. The only thing!” She placed her forehead in her hands. “Without it, you daren’t return to London.”
“Well, now,” Thomas began, easing back down into his own seat.
“She’s right,” Lucan said, needing to squeeze the words through his constricted throat. All Iris’s work, the risk she’d taken with her very life… gone. All gone, while under Lucan’s protection. “Going back now guarantees your death.”
Gorman shot to his feet. “Are you suggesting we simply abandon George?”
Thomas looked up at Gorman. “Nae one is suggesting any such thing.”
“You’ll get your son back,” Lucan said. “I swear it.”
“You shouldn’t promise such things,” Effie said in a low voice across from Lucan, her head still in her hands. “You have no power to sway Henry—it’s Caris Hargrave’s, Vivienne Paget’s, word against yours. And mine.” She raked her fingers back through her hair as she looked up at him. “Me, you, Tommy—all three ofus are damned.”
“How could you not know someone crept into your chamber last night?” James demanded. “No one can so much as shit without your nose uphis backside.”
Lucan tried to stay calm, but he felt his ears heat. “I don’t know,” he said hesitantly. Winnie hadn’t taken her eyes from him the entirety of the time, and Lucan’s skin was crawling. “I noticed the bolt on my door was missing the sleeve, but…I don’t know,” he repeated. “I was…”
“Drunk?” Chumleyoffered mildly.
“Yes,”Lucan murmured.
“Oh-ho!” James Rose barked. “It seems the saintly knight of the realm has executed a…how do you say?... faux pas!”
Dana frowned disapprovingly. “Stop. That is unnecessary, James. I’m quite certain Sir Lucan feels badly enough about losing the only evidence that could exonerate Thomas and freelittle George.”
“I didn’tloseit,” Lucan insisted. “It was stolen.”
“Iris warned us not to travel with it,” Effie whispered. Her eyes were on the tabletop, but she seemed to be looking through it.
Lucan scrubbed his hands over his face with a growl of frustration. “We can’t leave now.”
“What, you’re hoping whoever stole it will bring it back?” Gorman scoffed. “There’s nothing of value in it to anyone else. Any common thief would realize at once that it was only paper and toss it in the river or burn it.”
“No,” Lucan insisted. “It wasn’t a common thief. It couldn’t have been. Nothing else in my chamber was touched—my sword, my boots, my own bag. Easy plunder.” He broke off as the answer occurred to him. “We’ve been followed. This whole time.”
“No, we haven’t,” James Rose said with a roll of his eyes.
“We have,” Lucan stood up, unable to sit still with the realization. “I saw him on the Tower Road—I thought he was a villager or the sheriff late returning. But then I saw him set out before us the next day. He rode a sumpter, witha black tail.”
“A man in a deep hood,” Effie said. “With a pack across the back of his saddle. His sleeves were fur.”
Lucan’s gaze went to her, his blood chilling at the confirmation. “Yes.”
She looked across the room at him. “He was following us on the road yesterday. I saw him after our row, although he dropped back when I turned to watch him. It could have been the same man we encountered at the inn.”
“God damn it!” Gorman shouted, and he too stood up to stompabout the room.
Gilboe winced and crossed himself.
