A Christmas Promise - Anne Perry [26]
Bertha’s voice was husky. “I di’n’t see ’er terday.”
A dark fear fluttered in the pit of Gracie’s stomach. “Wot did she take a miff about? Were it summink ter do wi’ Jimmy Quick, or the chestnut man?”
“It were summink ter do wif ’er always meddlin’,” Bertha replied. “Stan lost ’is temper wif ’er summink awful. I were afeared ’e were gonna ’it ’er, but ’e di’n’t. ’e jus’ lit out, white as paper, swearin’ witless, an’ next thing I know, she were gorn too.”
Gracie was too frightened to be angry, and she could see that beneath Bertha’s arrogance and self-defense, she was frightened also. There was no point in asking her for help.
“Well, if she in’t ’ere, no point in me lookin’,” Gracie said, as if that were some kind of reason.
Bertha opened her mouth as if to answer, then closed it again without speaking.
Gracie turned and left, walking away across the yard and out into the street again. She did not go back toward her own home; there was nothing to see that way. Where would Minnie Maude go, and, more urgently, why? What was Stan so angry about, and why was Bertha afraid? If Bertha were just afraid that Minnie Maude had been gone all night, she would have been looking for her herself, not standing around working in the kitchen.
Gracie’s step slowed because she had no idea where to begin. One thing she was certain of as the wind sliced through her shawl, chilling her body, was that no one stayed out all night in this weather without a reason so harsh it overrode all sense of safety or comfort. Minnie Maude was looking for Charlie, but she must have had some idea where he was, or else there was something she was so frightened of at home that staying out alone in the icy streets was better.
What Gracie needed was to work out what Minnie Maude would have done. Something pretty urgent, or she would have waited until today, and told Gracie about it. Unless she’d thought Gracie had given up!
She stood at the curb watching the water flecked with ice running high over the gutters, as the wind whined in the eaves of the houses in the street behind her. The hooves of a horse pulling a dray clattered on the stones, wheels rumbling behind it.
Gracie had promised Mr. Balthasar not to ask any more questions about Uncle Alf’s death. Minnie Maude knew that Gracie had meant it. Minnie Maude wouldn’t have gone to look for Gracie; she would have gone off on her own. But where? Jimmy Quick wasn’t going to tell them anything more. Even Minnie Maude wouldn’t wander around the streets hoping to catch sight of Charlie. She must have gone somewhere in particular.
Which way had they gone before? Gracie looked left, and right. Minnie Maude would have gone down to the Whitechapel High Street and over into Commercial Road, for sure, then into the narrower roads with people’s names, on either side of Cannon Street. If Gracie could just find those streets, she would know where to begin.
She set off briskly, and was on the far side of the goods yard before she was lost.
She looked to the left and couldn’t remember any of the shop fronts or houses. She turned the other way. There was a broken gutter sticking out in the shape of a dogleg that she thought she’d seen before. That was as good a reason as any for making a decision. She went that way.
She passed an ironmonger’s window with all sorts of strange tools in it, things she couldn’t imagine using in a kitchen. She couldn’t have been there before. If she’d seen those things, she would have remembered them.
Where on earth had Minnie Maude gone? It was Gracie’s fault. She should have known better than to trust her. Minnie Maude loved that wretched donkey as much as if it had been a person, maybe more! Donkeys didn’t lie to you, or swear at you, or tell you off, say that you were useless or lazy or cost the earth to keep. Maybe Charlie even loved her back. Maybe he was always happy to see her?
All right, so maybe Minnie Maude wasn’t stupid to be loyal to a friend, just daft to go off without telling anyone. Except who cared anyway? Bertha? Maybe, but she didn’t act like it. She was more scared