Page 39 of The Housebreaker's Assistant
Penny shrugged. “I’m just proving my worth,” he said, taking the money from the billfold and discarding the leather case that had held it. If they’d been in London, he would have fenced it, but so far from home, he was loath to be caught in the possession of stolen goods. The cash, however, was a different matter.
They were dead lucky to catch a coach heading up the coast within half an hour of locating the inn. If they’d waited too much longer, they would have ended up sitting for hours, vulnerableto the gentleman from The Mermaid searching for them. Penny decided at once he didn’t particularly like stuffy, rattly, old coaches, but it took them where they needed to go.
They reached the single inn in the small village of Porthcollon just as the sun began sinking toward the horizon in earnest. The tiny, seaside village was perched on a hill that turned into a cliff on the north side. From the top of the High Street, the imposing sight of Trebarral Castle was just visible, limned in the light of the sunset.
“That’s it?” Penny asked, nodding to the horizon as they stepped down from the coach in front of the inn.
“It must be,” Greer said, studying the distant castle with a frown.
Penny spoke the words Greer must have been thinking. “They did say it was formidable.”
Greer grunted, pulled his gaze away from the castle, then looked at Penny. “Having second thoughts?” he asked.
Penny laughed. “Not on your life.” He winked at Greer, then stepped ahead of him into the inn.
Perhaps because it was the only inn, as far as Penny had been able to tell, in the small town, the place was crowded. Most of the patrons looked like jolly fishermen enjoying a pint at the end of the day. There were only a few empty tables, but Penny was able to snag one that, coincidentally, had a lovely view of the castle while Greer sought out the innkeeper to see about a room.
Luck was on Penny’s side. Once he was settled at the table, after a grey-haired woman with an ample bosom had come over to see if he wanted supper and beer, before Greer returned from taking their cases up to whatever room he’d been given, Penny caught a snippet of the conversation one table over.
“Dalhurst wants the whole thing taken care of before the end of the week,” a gruff, beefy man was in the middle of telling a tough, wiry man with pocked skin on his face.
“Moving that kind of cargo isn’t as simple as he seems to think it is,” the pocked man said peevishly.
“Well, it has to be moved,” the beefy man said. “Hammond has reason to believe the cargo has been located and someone who shouldn’t is coming to collect it.”
Penny’s back went stiff. He knew Dalhurst was the man currently holding Lord Fabian prisoner, hoping to sell him on, and Hammond was the leader of the gang, or club or whatever people who fancied themselves posh called criminal operations, in London. He didn’t like the fact that all those bad men knew he and Greer were coming as well. It could make things tricky.
“I can’t just up and take the boy,” the pocked man said in a low growl. “Not in his condition. Not without somewhere to put him before Underhill is ready for him.”
“And when will Underhill be ready for him?” the beefy man asked.
Penny wanted to know, too, but before the pocked man could answer. Greer strode over to the table. Behind him was the grey-haired woman with her hands full of beer and stew.
“They have a room for us, but it’s not much,” Greer said, taking his seat, completely unaware of the information Penny had been on the brink of discovering.
Of course, Penny couldn’t exactly tell Greer to hush or the woman to go away so he could eavesdrop on the conversation next to them. He wanted to scream in frustration at having vital information so close and then losing it.
“Whatever the conditions, I’m sure I’ve slept in worse,” Penny said with a playful smirk that hid what he truly felt.
“There’s more bread if you fancy,” the woman said, standing back after plunking down their supper. “It’ll cost you a penny per slice.”
“Thank you,” Penny told the woman with his most charming smile.
The men at the table leaned in closer to each other, almost as if they knew they were being overheard now.
Greer picked up his spoon with a tired sigh and started eating as soon as the woman left them. It took him a few bites before he seemed to notice Penny’s mood. “Is something amiss with the stew?” he asked, sniffing the spoon he’d just lifted.
Penny shook his head and took a bite. As he chewed it, he jerked his head slightly to the men at the table next to them.
Greer still didn’t understand, and irritatingly, the two men finished up their meal, then got up to leave.
Penny continued eating as if nothing were wrong, all the while praying that neither of the men had realized he’d been listening or that he knew what they’d been talking about. He didn’t catch them eyeing him before they left, but that did not mean Penny was in the clear.
Even though Greer stared at him all through their meal and clearly knew something was wrong as he tried to start half a dozen small conversations with him before the stew, bread, and beer was gone, he didn’t say anything until they were upstairs in the cramped closet of a room Greer had secured for them.
“Are you still sore that I tried to leave you in Newquay?” Greer asked at last, as they shed their boots and trousers, stripping down to their shirts and drawers for the night.
The walls around them were as thin as paper. Penny could hear someone on the other side of the wall breathing.
