Rules for a Proper Governess

Bertie kept pounding as the door to the stairs started to splinter. She couldn’t turn to see what Sinclair was doing—every second counted. Devlin being too scrupulous—or cautious—to kill Sinclair didn’t mean he wouldn’t stand by and watch James do it. Sinclair was too injured to fight them all, and Bertie would never win against them.

Which was stronger, a brick and plaster wall or a stout oak door? Bertie would soon find out.

In her favor, the bricks were quite old, the mortar crumbling between them. The plaster soon broke under her onslaught, and then a brick fell through the wall to the other side. Bertie put her hands through and pulled the next brick down, praying that what she found behind those wasn’t more bricks.

She felt air. Foul-smelling air to be sure, but air all the same. “I’m through!” She hit the bricks again, rewarded with more falling inward. “It’s coming down!”

“So’s the door,” Sinclair said.

He sounded stronger. But Bertie had seen enough victims of illness and injury who’d rallied before they’d died to take heart. She turned her head to look for him.

Sinclair had managed to get himself off the cushions. He’d upended the small folding table and piled the sofa cushions on top of it. A barricade, but not a very good one.

“Go!” Sinclair shouted at her, just as the door burst open, admitting men and bright lanterns.

Sinclair had something bulky and black in his hand. There was a roar of noise, a flash, a stench of pistol shot. One of Devlin’s henchmen cried out.

“You brought your pistol,” Bertie shouted.

“Excellent observation,” Sinclair said in his biting tones. “Now get through there.”

“I’m not leaving you!”

“Yes, you are. Go, before I shove you through with my foot on your backside.”

The men in the room, blinded by their own lanterns and the gunshot, took a moment to readjust. Bertie knew that when they did, those who were armed would open fire.

“Bertie, damn you to hell.” Sinclair started for her. Which would leave him exposed, and Devlin was shouting at his men to douse their lanterns.

Bertie dove through the opening. She’d done such a thing many times as a girl, throwing herself through windows for her dad, or through holes in walls to escape the approaching bobbies. She landed on a pile of bricks, mud, and slime, hearing the drip-drip of water from a pipe somewhere in the room.

Light flared as a hand thrust a lamp at her, then the hand was gone. Bertie was alone in a cellar full of damp, rotted timbers, and the beady eyes of rats. Behind her, noise filled the room she’d left, and voices.

James’s fury. “Get her!”

Devlin, annoyed. “He’s got a shooter, you daft Irish bastard.”

“How many bullets can he possibly have?”

“Five,” Sinclair said clearly. “I have five left. There’s five of you, and I’m a dead shot. Want to wager on me missing any of you?”

Bertie froze, unable to move. By the light of her lamp, she saw that the cellar she stood in was small, and about an inch of water covered the floor. A wooden stair on the other side of the room led up to a door. Locked, probably, though it looked flimsy.

Had Devlin sent men around to the other side to wait for them to pop out? Possibly, but then, would Devlin know which house it was? The warrens around here were tricky.

Sinclair was ready to shoot all those men, and risk that he could before they shot him back. Run! Bertie’s mind screamed at her. Bring help!

That would be sensible, but her feet wouldn’t move. If she went for help, she’d never be able to get back in time to save Sinclair. Devlin or James would have killed him by then.

What do I do? What do I do? Bertie had only one weapon in her arsenal, the post she held. Unless she could command the rats to attack—Bertie had one giddy vision of the rats swarming in to terrorize Devlin, before her eyes alighted on her second weapon.

Sinclair fired, and another man grunted in pain. “Make him stop!” James cried.

“Damn your hide,” Devlin snarled, though whether at Sinclair or James, Bertie couldn’t tell.

Bertie ran across the room and up the stairs. She didn’t like rats, but she didn’t fear them—they were simply trying to survive like the rest of London.

The door at the top was closed fast, but as Bertie yanked at it, she found it was only latched. Another yank tore the latch from the wall on the other side, the piece of metal clinking onto a stone floor beyond.

Bertie opened the door and peered into the passage. All was dark and quiet, but that did not mean the house wasn’t inhabited.

Bertie didn’t much care at the moment. She raced down the stairs again and snatched up her lamp, rushing back toward the hole.

Sinclair fired again. This time James shouted and cried out. Whether Sinclair had hit him fatally or only grazed him, Bertie couldn’t tell, but she had no time for assessment. I’m a dead shot, Sinclair had said, with chilling conviction.

Bertie scrambled back through the hole and grabbed Sinclair, who was crouching behind his barricade. The look on his face was that of a grim soldier who knew he would likely fall to his enemy, but who would take as many as he could down with him.

He glared at Bertie when she tugged him, but she didn’t wait to explain. Rising, she lifted her lamp high and threw it at their pursuers.

Devlin swore, as did his one thug left standing. Bertie caught up the second lamp and tossed that one as well. The lamps were nearly empty, but there was enough kerosene in them to catch and burn.