He’d had a week of seeing Dom every day. A better week than he’d ever had in his life, in comfort and warmth, with Dominic Frey, who loved him. He probably ought to face the gallows in contentment knowing he’d had that week.
In fact, the thought of it just made him want to hit someone, because if there was anything worse than having nothing, it was having everything and then seeing it snatched away.
Time passed, hours in the dull grime of the cell. The small barred window was too high up to see out, but the little light was fading to twilight when he heard the commanding, ice-cold notes of a wildly out-of-place voice in the corridor outside.
“No, I shall not be patient. I have been patient throughout an excessively long period in this repugnant cesspit, and my patience, sir, has expired. Do you intend to do your duty, or shall I be obliged to raise my voice further?”
Everyone turned, a fair few of them jerking upright as if by habit. No surprise, because if ever Silas had heard the voice of an officer, that was it. Crystal diction, born to command, and cold as a witch’s tit.
The lock rattled. There was a bellow from outside, warning the men crowded inside to move back, and the heavy door was flung open.
A dandy stood on the threshold. He wore a waistcoat that sparkled with silver thread, a pale blue coat, and an expression of frozen revulsion.
“There you are, Mason,” he said. “Come on, I don’t have all day.”
Silas stared at him.
Julius Norreys exhaled through his nose. “I assume you have been struck dumb by your sufferings. I have done violence to my feelings by dragging myself to this dreary locale, I was obliged to converse with the most tedious Jack-in-office to procure your bail, and you might consider my feelings and depart this squalid pit with a little more alacrity. I am quite distressed.” The word came with a viper’s hiss. The officer behind him, a stolid, foursquare man, swayed back a little. He looked as though he’d been talked at.
Silas got up. Made his way through the mass of staring men, past the staring officer. Followed the dandy through the corridors of Bow Street.
“My coat,” Silas said suddenly.
“Forget the coat,” Norreys said.
Silas grabbed Norreys’s arm, slim but strong. “No. I need it.”
Norreys shot him a look of remarkable malevolence. “You do not. Stow your prattle, now.”
Silas had to bite his tongue. He wanted to shake the man, but drawing attention to that accursed coat would be even worse.
They headed past the desks and out of the door, onto the street as though he were a free man.
Norreys’s hand closed on Silas’s sleeve. “If you even consider running, I shall cut your hamstrings,” he said in a conversational tone. “That carriage, over there.”
“The coat—” Silas began.
“Is Dominic’s. We are well aware of that. Come on, will you?”
Silas followed him. It was near dark, but he could see that the carriage bore a crest on the door.
“What’s this?” he managed.
“Get in.”
Silas climbed in. Norreys followed after, slammed the door, and rapped on the roof with his cane. The coach moved off. Silas hadn’t been in many coaches, since London wasn’t too big to walk and he’d never felt the need to go anywhere else, but those he remembered had been bone rattlers. This one had a smooth motion that barely jolted at all.
“Right,” Norreys said. “First things first. Dominic assures us you cannot have been part of this conspiracy because you were committing crimes against nature with him well into yesterday evening. Is he deluding himself? Were you part of this? And don’t lie to me. We are going to prevent you from having your neck stretched either way, for Harry and for Dominic, but we need to know what we’re up against.”
“I knew about it,” Silas said. “Wasn’t at Cato Street for it, didn’t want to be part of it.” He set his teeth, knowing the next thing wouldn’t be believed. “I went to stop them. The whole thing was government entrapment. I wanted to warn them.”
“So you were there.”
“Aye, too late. A man, a government spy, saw me on the street. He’s claiming he saw me in the stable.”
Norreys’s breath hissed out in the darkness. “Very well. Now listen to me. You are going to cooperate with us, fully and without argument. If you are tried for conspiracy to murder and treason, let alone convicted, you will damn Harry for good, and if you do that, you gutter-blood werewolf, I shall kill you myself if I have to mount the scaffold and fight the executioner for the privilege, do you understand?”
Silas understood that very well, and it was a relief in this quagmire to know that someone competent and determined had an eye on Harry. “I hear you. Cooperate in what?”