فصل 17

CHAPTER 17

A FAMILIAR FACE

MOST OF THE TIME, Molly’s captors kept her in a small, damp cell. There was a barred window in the door, through which Molly could look out into a passageway lit every twenty feet by bare electric bulbs, the dim light from which provided the only illumination for the cell.

She was somewhere close to the Underground—that much she knew from the rumble and screech of trains in the distance—but where exactly, she had no idea. Her last memory had been of aboveground when the hackney driver had swerved suddenly into an alley, and three men, their faces hidden behind scarves, had grabbed her, pulled a hood over her head, and carried her roughly into a building, then down some stairs, and still more stairs, then through a maze of dank corridors, and finally into this awful cell.

Once established here, she had pleaded with her captors, then shouted at them, but to no avail. They told her nothing, refusing to speak a word. Three times a day they brought what passed for food—bread as hard as bricks, a slimy potato or carrot—sliding a wooden plate under the bolted door. Molly had learned to eat quickly, and to then slide the plate back out when she was finished, because the rats would come looking for it. A few times a day the men took Molly down the hall, where she was allowed the use of a crude toilet; this was her only time outside the cell.

Twice each day—Molly assumed it was morning and evening, though she had no way to keep track of time—prisoners were herded past her cell door. There were eleven of them, by Molly’s count, all men, chained together at their ankles, the chains clanking on the corridor’s stone floor as they shuffled past. They were covered from head to toe in dirt and grime, as though they’d been digging.

The first time they’d passed, Molly had spotted James immediately, seventh in line. She had called out his name. He looked at her and quickly shook his head. The guards, big men who carried pistols, shouted at Molly to be quiet and roughly shoved the prisoners forward, causing them to stumble into one another.

After that, the prisoners knew better than to try to talk to Molly. But some of them, always including James, glanced in her direction each time they passed, their expressions ranging from exhaustion to desperation. Molly watched them, her face pressed to the bars, trying wordlessly to communicate some comfort and to receive some in return.

Because of the filth covering the men, it was difficult for Molly to make out their features. But two of them, aside from James, seemed familiar to her. One of them looked like the missing Underground passenger whose picture had appeared in the newspaper the day James had come to her house. The other was the man who was always fourth in line. He always looked at Molly intently, as if he wanted to say something. Each time he passed, Molly became more certain that she knew him from somewhere. But from where? Another picture in the paper? A neighbor? A businessman or friend of her husband’s? Who was he?

For long, bleak hours in her cold, cramped cell, Molly pondered this question, along with others: Why had she been kidnapped? Why brought here along with the others? Why was she still being held? Certainly it had something to do with the Starcatchers, with everything James had told her; but why the Underground? Why were men being captured to dig?

The questions multiplied in Molly’s mind, but no answers came. One thing she knew and clung to: her absence would be noticed. George would be frantic by now. She felt awful for him, and the children—how worried they must be. There would certainly be people looking for her. Half of Scotland Yard, if she knew George! They were looking, and they would find her.

Wouldn’t they?

Molly pulled her coat tight around her, shivering against the unrelenting chill of the cell. She heard the scratching of a rat in the corridor.

Please let them find me.