Persuasion in the Pantry [Maid for More #1]

Chapter 14: Men in the Morning

The Duke of Wyvenstone was up at the crack of dawn. He had an important meeting with the Bow street Runners and things were not progressing well  with his team in Provence. Jay scaled the wall out of his room and dipped into the still shadowed crevices of the garden hedge-way. Although his house staff could be trusted there was never any telling who would be lingering out the front steps of his London townhouse.  A decadent duke, or dandy even, was not seen up before at least noon and very often did not even rouse till the early portion of the evening. So, concealment was to be the order of the day.

After purchasing a hired hack Jay made his way across the dimly lit streets, thankful that the London dawn still offered a measure of cover beneath the morning fog. He paid  the driver no more than necessary and looked to the untrained eye to be an unremarkable lawyer or doctor on his way to Harley Street. Exiting the coach he skirted a shaft of sunlight and slipped into the narrow lane beyond. Quickly pacing the cobblestones he turned the corner and entered Bow Street to find a small problem. Half a dozen brutes with pistols, ropes and decidedly uninviting expressions blocked his path.

Not again. Jay sighed, the warmth of his breathe misting the chilly air.

A few moments later the inadequate troop were dispatched, sprawled in various awkward poses on the alley floor as Jay buried his knee into the spleen of their leader.

"Now we can do this the hard way or the harder way. Who is your informant?" he deadpanned on his opponent.

The man on the ground seemed un-used to the rules of the game or simply incompetent because he chose that moment to swing his right hook and hoped it made contact despite two black and swollen eyes obscuring his vision. Unfortunately for him he was not successful; even less fortunate, that Jay was not amused.

The back of the attackers head hit the pavement so hard it was sure to leave a dent in the more pliable surface, which was not the floor that now became coloured a ghastly shade of red. Jay thought that Mina would like bright colours like red, maybe he should buy her a set of paints. She seemed to like painting.

Woah. He paused for a fraction of a second. The thought had slipped unnoticed into his mind and now he had a feeling it was going to grow and develop if he did not manage it. Deciding to concentrate on work  he pushed through the odd sensation trickling back from the night before, of sitting in trees eating apples, and bore down on his assailant.

"We know we have a traitor in our midst. Give me a name, boy."

When the man seemed caught between a reluctance to divulge and an imminent loss of consciousness  Jay helped him on his way to temporary darkness and stepped off the most recent hired guttersnipe in a ever growing series of men. He grabbed the man's' pistol and shot the third window up on the second floor of a nearby building knowing  that it would soon set the runners in motion and his agent of the Home Office would arrive in due course.  He used the spare moments to rifle through his attackers clothing and weapons for anything signifying their allegiance. Jay was starting to get tired of being attacked in alleyways by inadequately trained men. Once was fine, even twice- but four times in one week and one would think that whoever was leading the poor folk was trying to get rid of them, rather than him. It was obvious one of the Queen's own spies had turned rogue, but it still was not clear who- and till that time, everyone was a threat. It almost seemed that this insider had the information even before it could reach his own hands. This new development did not bode well for his upcoming trip to France, and with the Season in London starting it would not do for a person such as himself to be so obviously absent.

Bending down to retrieve one of the assailants pocket books Jay felt a twinge in his upper left arm. He brushed his hand over it and winced- not good. It appeared as if one of the men had somewhat adequate aim, it may have only grazed him, but a few inches right and he would have been the one on the floor. Jay didn't stop to entertain the thought but kept his eyes peeled for more danger as he ripped the nearest man's shirt into strips to tie around his bicep and control the bleeding.