Free Liza by Irene Carr

forced and left open. But Horace had not finished. He threw out a hand to seize the thief’s clothing and caught the neck of his shirt. He hung on as the man rained blows on him and tried to pull away. Then the shirt ripped apart from the neck, and Horace fell to the floor.
    The burglar was free. He glanced back before he scrambled out of the window, and saw a young girl standing in the doorway, staring at him. Leaving the Gladstone bag where it lay, he yanked aside the curtains and threw himself outside. He ran, with screams shrilling behind him, tearing apart the silence of the night.
    * * *
    Cecily stood in the doorway, open-mouthed. She had emerged from her mother ’s boudoir just as Horace had tackled the burglar. She had seen the open door, heard the commotion and run along the hall. She was just in time to see, by the light of the torch, the intruder: his chest was bare and on it was a tattooed portrait of a voluptuous beauty. Now she ran to the window and peered out but saw no one, only heard the faint hammering of running feet that faded to nothing as she listened.
    Cecily turned back into the room to attend to Horace. She had hardly knelt beside him when the butler appeared, panting, a dressing-gown over his nightshirt and a poker in his hand. Another footman and two of the maids, one of them Mary, were at his heels. ‘I woke and came down to see if Mother had returned,’ Cecily explained, ‘then heard scuffling in here and looked in. Horace was struggling with a burglar. He was very brave and hung on but the man escaped.’
    She was lauded by the butler for her efforts, then sent off to bed: ‘You can leave Horace to us, Miss Cecily. Mary will come with you and see you settled.’
    * * *
    ‘What were you doing down here at near one in the morning?’ the butler snapped at Horace.
    The footman was bruised and bloody, and not a good liar. The best he could manage was: ‘I couldn’t sleep. Had an earache.’ He had one now, left by the battering he had taken from the burglar, and held a hand to his ear. ‘I got up and went for a walk around, then thought I heard a noise in the drawing room. I dashed in and caught him at it, but he gave me the slip.’
    The butler said, ‘Aye.’ He had a shrewd idea of what Horace had been up to. ‘You did well. The master will be pleased.’
    * * *
    Jasper burst into his house and slammed the door with a crash that echoed up the street of decorous and respectable citizens. One or two crept sleepily to their windows to squint out into the night but saw nothing. The neighbourhood sank back into its usual quiet.
    Inside the house Jasper was raging. He panted up the stairs to the bedroom and snarled at Flora, ‘Fetch me a drink!’ She slid out of bed and ran downstairs to do his bidding.
    When she returned with a bottle and two glasses he was sitting on the bed, his torn shirt and waistcoat lying at his feet. She said, ‘My! What happened to them?’
    He cursed, then explained: ‘Some bloody fool came in when I was going through the drawers, tried to get hold o’ me. He ripped the shirt off me as I come away. Then there was some stupid little cow screaming the place down. I had to get out quick. I lost the bag and got nothing! Here, give us that.’ He ignored the glass, set the neck of the bottle to his lips and swallowed. Flora waited until he was calmer, then slid her arms round him. He muttered a final imprecation, then said, ‘I wish I’d done for the pair o’ them.’ He turned to her and thrust her back on to the bed.
    * * *
    The next day Charles called all the servants together and praised Horace, then gave him a gold sovereign. He doubted Cecily ’s explanation; she had not waited up for him and his wife before. ‘You should have been in bed, Miss, not wandering about the house in the dark.’
    But Millicent defended her daughter: ‘Nonsense! I think she was very brave.’
    There Charles agreed with her and handed out another sovereign to Cecily.
    It was at