Lucy shook her head. “We were brought here by the Crown—yes, that means the queen—to protect the prime minister and his family.”
“The queen knows about me?” Ada said, her voice a horrified whisper.
“She does,” Lucy lied. “And she’s very disappointed in you.”
“No!” Ada burst into tears.
Duncan shot Lucy a look Ada couldn’t see.
Lucy looked unperturbed. “Ada, stop crying. I can’t help you if you keep crying.”
Ada sniffed. “You want to help me?”
“I told you I did. I don’t want you to suffer for this. Just tell us who hired you, and we’ll help you. We’ll even make sure the queen knows what a help you’ve been.”
Duncan barely refrained from rolling his eyes. Neither of them knew the queen. He kept his face neutral, though, because he could see her words affected the maid. Her face softened, and she opened her lips.
Duncan leaned forward.
The maid closed her lips and shook her head. “I can’t.”
Duncan wanted to grab the woman and shake her, but Lucy merely cocked her head. “You’re protecting him. Why? Is whatever he will do to you worse than hanging? That’s what will happen to you. No judge will look favorably on a woman who tried to poison a little boy. Not only that, but we found your dagger. Was it your plan to slit Johnny’s throat if poison didn’t work?”
“No!” Ada cried.
“But you would have done it.”
“I had no choice.”
Duncan could tell the maid was close to breaking. Lucy had her. Lucy stood. “And the judge will have no choice but to hang you. Do you know what that’s like? Have you ever been to a hanging?”
Ada’s shoulders shook with sobs.
“The crowds jeer and throw rotten fruit and vegetables when you’re marched in front of them. Everyone will be staring at you and screaming hate at you. You’ll almost be glad when they pull the hood over your face.” She grabbed her discarded hood and yanked it over Ada’s head. Ada began to thrash and cry.
Duncan wanted to protest. He didn’t like terrorizing women. But clearly merely asking the maid to tell them who had hired her wouldn’t work. She was too scared. They needed to scare her more than the mastermind of this plot had.
Lucy leaned close to Ada. “You’ll appreciate the hood because it will mean you can’t see the angry faces of the mob. Maybe you won’t feel the rough pieces of rope poking out from the noose when it’s slipped around your neck. That noose is surprisingly thick. It will feel huge around your thin, delicate neck.”
Ada shook with silent sobs now.
“You know what happens next,” Lucy said. “You’ve seen hangings. The scaffolding drops away, and the criminal dangles. One or two in a dozen might die right away, their necks snapped like twigs. But the others. It takes time for the others to die. If their hands are free, they clutch their necks. They kick their feet. They wet themselves. Soil themselves. Minutes tick by with the shouts of the crowd and the stink of the excrement. That sort of death is not slow or easy.” She yanked the hood off Ada’s face. “I don’t want that for you. Tell me his name.”
Ada shook her head. Tears and snot ran down her face, and Duncan took out his handkerchief. Lucy, somehow seeing everything, held a hand up to him, staying him.
“You helped me, Ada. You were kind. On that first day, when the schoolroom was a disaster, you cleaned it up. You put it to rights. That’s the kind of person you are. You put things to rights.”
Ada moaned.
Lucy leaned very close to Ada and whispered. “Let me help you. Let me put this to rights. If you tell me his name, I’ll protect you. Duncan will protect you.”
“I can’t,” Ada sobbed.
Lucy gave Duncan a sympathetic look, and he knew what was coming next.
“Ada, Duncan doesn’t want to hurt you, but he has his orders. If you won’t talk, I’ll have to order him to break your finger.”
“No!”
