Michaels came in just then. “Oh, Girlie,” he said softly, “Sometimes that’s all it takes for us little people to be in deep trouble. All that has to happen is for us to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Like gettin’ pressed into duty on what turned out to be a pirate ship. Lord a’ mercy, I’d like as not be in Davy Jones locker had not me captain tuck sick.”
“How did you hear?” Lucas asked. “Only McClellan and I were in the room.”
“If you whisper somthin’ loud enough for the elephants in Africa to hear, you can just about count on other people knowin’,” Michaels rebuked him. “But not to worry. I can help, I think. Grace, do you know where Tiffany’s old clothes are?”
“In the clothes press at the foot of my bed,” Tiffany said softly, wiping her nose with her sodden handkerchief.
“I’ll get them,” Grace said. “Sophie is taking tea with the others, and holding forth on how she always knew that there was something strange about you.”
“But won’t I look guilty if I run?” Tiffany asked.
“Better to look guilty than to get caught,” Michaels put in. “You go on to the laundry, an’ pull yourself together. I’ll put together some journey rations for you whilst Grace gets your clothes. I think it will work best if you slip out with your friends when they come for food. I’ll make up the parcels like always.”
Grace hurried away, and Lucas rearranged some of the clothes racks in the laundry room to create a temporary hiding place.
Shortly, Grace returned with her old street clothes, and Tiffany struggled into them. She discovered that they were no longer a good fit. She had rounded out in several places where she used to not be round at all.
Too much good food and soft living. I should have gone much sooner.
Soon Michaels tapped on the frame of one of the racks and said, “They are here. Best you go quickly. They are expecting you.”
Sure enough, Davy, Lisa, and Emily were waiting. Michaels handed out packages of food and a large tin pail of soup. Then he added a small jar, and a heavy bag that he handed to Davy. “Keep makin’ that fine bread, Girlie,” Michaels whispered. “Best you all go quick now. An’ you young’uns best not come around for a while. No tellin’ how the rules will change with Tiffany not in charge o’ the kitchen.”
With almost uncanny swiftness they slipped into the shadows, pulling Tiffany with them. She let Emily slip her hand into hers, and draw her along, as if they were sisters. Lisa slipped in on the other side, helping shield her from prying eyes.
After traveling in a circuitous fashion, they slipped through hidden passages in the ravaged, overgrown thickets that had once been a formal hedge, and into a crumbling cellar entrance, then up a stair into a shadowed room. There was a low fire on the hearth, and all across the floor were the mounded heaps of sleepers. Some were sleeping alone, some slept in pairs, while others were jumbled together like litters of puppies in a pile.
Old Elizabet rose from the wingback chair where she had been sitting by the fire. “What did you bring, children?” she called softly.
“Soup, bread, some meat scraps, and thrown out vegetables, an’ Tiffany,” Davy announced.
“Tiffany?” Old Elizabet opened her arms. “Oh, child. What happened?”
Tiffany allowed herself to be drawn into the old woman’s embrace, where she told her the entire story. “I can’t stay here long,” she ended. “I am sure that if I do, I will put everyone in danger.”
“Nonsense, Tiffany. Of course you can stay here. Do you think we’ve not been searched for runaways, strays, and even accused murderers before? You’ll stay in the priest hole, of course. That will be safe enough until we can hear the word on the street. Since you can read, we’ll even get some newspapers. Might be a bit used, but we’ll get some.”
“But…”
“No, no, I’ll not hear a word of it. You’ve done right by your’n, an’ you’ve done right by all of us. The soup might get a little thin without the gifts from Northbury, but we’ll manage. ‘Tis coming on high summer, we’ll manage.”
Tiffany worried for a few minutes about what sort of lodgings the priest hole might be. She had sheltered in some dubious locations in the two years that she had been on the street, but she would rather not contend with hordes of rats or other vermin.
She was pleasantly surprised when Lisa brought her to a neat little room, artfully concealed behind a pile of rubble. The inside of it was lined with brick that had been whitewashed, and carefully mortared. The ceiling was blackened beams. There was ventilation from somewhere for the air was fresh, and even warm.
“This was my room when I was sick,” Lisa said. “It’s up against the back of the chimney, so’s it gets warm an’ stays dry.”
The bed was made of rope stretched on a scrap wood frame with a straw tick mattress thrown on top. A worn, but clean sheet was stretched across the straw tick, and two patched and darned blankets were folded across the foot.
“Am I putting you out of your bed?” Tiffany asked.
“No. Now that I am almost well, I sleep by the hearth with the others. Old Elizabet found jobs for all of us, so we can help out here, an’ still have a little for ourselves.”
Tiffany hugged Lisa. The girl was still far too thin, but she felt less fragile than she had in the months after Samuel was taken up. “I’m glad,” Tiffany said. “I worried.”
“I know,” Lisa said. “Michaels told us. We would have known anyway. We missed you, but we are all right. So will you be. I’ll leave you the candle in case you need the chamber pot. It’s under the bed. That’s the only bad part about this room.”
Tiffany hugged Lisa again, and said good night.
