A Christmas Promise - Anne Perry [39]
“Yes, I had deduced that,” Balthasar answered.
A slight wind blew through the open doors, and the lantern light wavered again.
“Give it to me, or I’ll kill the girl!” the toff said more sharply. His patience was paper-thin, the pain of need twisting inside him.
“Then you will have nothing to bargain with!” Balthasar snapped, his voice the crack of a whip. “Stanley has the box, and he will give it to you.”
The toff’s eyes shifted from one man to the other, hope and desperation equally balanced.
The silence was so intense that Gracie could hear the horses moving restlessly in the stalls at the far side of the partition, and somewhere up in the loft there was the scrabble of clawed feet.
They waited.
Gracie stared at Minnie Maude, willing her to trust, and stay still.
Stan’s eyes were fixed on the toff. “If I give it yer, ’ow do I know yer’ll let ’er go?”
“You know I’ll kill her if you don’t,” the toff replied.
“Then yer’ll never get it, an’ yer can’t live without it, can yer!” Stan was jeering now, had become ugly, derisive, as if that knowledge gave him some kind of mastery.
The toff’s body was shaking, the skin of his face gray and sheened with sweat where the lantern light caught him. He took a step forward.
Stan wavered, then stood his ground.
Minnie Maude whimpered in terror. She knew the toff was mad with need, and she had no doubt he would kill her, perhaps by accident if not intentionally.
“Give it to him,” Balthasar ordered. “It is of no use to you, except to sell. There is your market standing in front of you. If he kills Minnie Maude, you can never go home! Have you thought of that? You will be a fugitive for the rest of your life. Believe me, I will see to it.”
Something in his tone drove into Stan’s mind like a needle to the bone. His shoulders relaxed as if he had surrendered, and he turned away from the toff toward the nearest bale of straw. He pushed his hand into it in a hole no one else could see, and pulled out a metal box about eight inches long and four inches deep. Even in the dim and wavering light the gold gleamed on the finely wrought scrollwork, the small fretted inlays, and the elaborate clasp. Gracie had never seen anything so beautiful. If it wasn’t a gift for the Christ child, it should have been.
The toff’s eyes widened. Then he hurled himself at it, his hands out like claws, tearing at Stan, kicking, gouging, and butting at him with his head, top hat rolling away on the floor.
Stan let out a cry of fury, and his heavy arms circled the man, bright blood spurting from Stan’s nose onto the man’s pale hair. They rocked back and forth, gasping and grunting, both locked onto the golden casket.
Then with a bellow of rage Stan arched his back, lifted the toff right off his feet, whirled him sideways, and slammed him down again as hard as he could. There was a crack, like dry wood, and the toff lay perfectly still.
Very slowly Stan straightened up and turned not to Minnie Maude but to Balthasar. “I ’ad ter do it! You saw that, di’n’t yer.” It was a demand, not a question. “’e were gonna kill us all.” When Balthasar did not answer, Stan turned to Minnie Maude. “’e’d a killed you, an’ all, fer sure.”
Minnie Maude ran past him, evading his outstretched arms, and threw herself at Gracie, clinging on to her so hard it hurt.
It was a pain Gracie welcomed. If it had not hurt, it might not have been real.
“Yer stupid little article!” she said to her savagely. “Why di’n’t yer wait fer me?”
“Just wanted to find Charlie,” Minnie Maude whispered.
“I ’ad ter!” Stan shouted.
“Possibly,” Balthasar replied with chill. “Possibly not.” He held out his hand. “You will give me the casket.”
Stan’s face hardened with suspicion. He looked at Balthasar, then at Gracie and Minnie Maude standing holding on to each other.
“Like that, is it? Give it ter you, or you’ll kill both of ’em, eh? Or worse? Do wot yer bleedin’ want ter. I don’ need two little girls. Blood’s on yer