Chapter 15

Lizzie crawled under the taut web of threads. Along with the other children, she pressed herself to the floor as the machinery rolled over her head. It rumbled back the other way and she quickly pulled herself forwards, snatching up wisps of stray wool as she went.

Down here, she was out of Dimmock’s line of sight. With luck, she could slip out without him suspecting anything. As for what came next … well, she’d just have to make it up as she went along.

She crawled back and forth for five minutes, gathering wool, just to be on the safe side. Her knees and elbows felt scraped raw, and for one terrifying second she felt a tug on the back of her head as the machinery passed over. She winced as a few hairs were torn out.

It sickened her to think there was nothing to protect her, nor any of the other children, except for quick reflexes. The rolling mass of machinery would crush a child’s head as easily as a fairground coconut.

Now, she thought. Quick as a ferret, she scurried out from under the spinning mule and behind the sheltering mass of a weaving machine. A few pairs of eyes glanced her way, but to her immense relief nobody shouted an alarm.

There was a gantry up above, running around the outside of the room. If she could get up there somehow, she could look for Amelia among the crowds of workers. Her honey-coloured hair should be easy to see.

The ladder up to the gantry was on the other side of the factory. To get there, she’d have to run across an open area. Dimmock, who sat on a platform at the end watching like a Cyclops, would be sure to see her. She needed another plan.

She peeped out from behind the machine. No sign of Amelia anywhere.

But then she noticed the door of dark wood up by Dimmock’s platform and the shiny brass plaque affixed to it. A. MACDONALD, it read.

Of course. Why in God’s name had she been looking for Amelia on the factory floor? There, the workers would recognize the missing girl, whose photograph had been in all the newspapers. Her uncle must be hiding her in his office!

Determination made her bold. The whale-oil lamps lit up most of the factory floor, but not all of it. If she kept close to the wall, she could move through a region of deep shadow, then dash the final few feet. She had to try.

She took a breath, counted to three, and ran.

She very nearly made it to the door. But then a hand grabbed her collar from behind, choking her with a sound of tearing fabric. Dimmock wrenched her around to face him. He held her by the shoulders and shook her.

‘What the devil are you about, eh?’

Jostled and shaken, Lizzie couldn’t even speak.

Dimmock flung her to the ground. Jolts of pain shot up from her knee and elbow where she landed.

‘I knew you’d be trouble,’ he leered. ‘From the second I laid eyes on you. We’ve had your sort in here before. Think hard work’s beneath them.’ He took a short leather whip, like a riding crop, from his belt. Lizzie’s eyes widened as she saw it. ‘You just need to be broken in. Like a bad dog.’ He advanced on her, whip raised and ready to strike.

Lizzie sprang to her feet and balled her fists. ‘Get away from me!’

Dimmock stopped in his tracks and a look of momentary confusion passed over his face. Lizzie guessed nobody had tried to fight back before – all around, workers were staring at them.

Then Dimmock went on the attack. The whip lashed out. Lizzie darted to one side. The whip struck the wall with a sound like cracking bones. He grunted, slashing again. ‘Hold still, ye wee she dev—’

Lizzie snatched up the pitcher of milk from the lunch trolley and flung it at him.

Drenched, Dimmock staggered backwards, spluttering and howling, while Lizzie stood amazed at what she had done. A girl gasped.

Right then, the door to the office flung open from inside and Alexander MacDonald stood there glaring. ‘What’s all this commotion about?’

‘I’m blinded!’ Dimmock howled. ‘Call the police!’

‘Lizzie?’ MacDonald stared at Lizzie in complete confusion. ‘What are you … ? Never mind. Get in here!’

‘She’s an animal!’

‘That will do, Mr Dimmock,’ MacDonald said firmly. ‘Put Deakin in charge, and take ten minutes to calm yourself.’ With that, he grabbed Lizzie by the wrist and pulled her into his office.

The door shut behind her with a slam and Lizzie glanced around the luxurious room. The carpet was wine-red, the desk as dark and shiny as a coffin. Tall portraits loomed down from the oak-panelled walls. Had she seen this room before, in one of her visions? She couldn’t even remember. Her day of mind-numbing work, coming on the heels of a sleepless night, had left her dizzy and slightly hysterical.

She could see the safe in the wall was open, and piles of money lay on the desk. It confirmed everything suspected. Yes, she thought. He’s doing it for the money. If he’s killed Amelia, then the whole mill is his.

She rounded on him. ‘I know Amelia’s here!’ she yelled. ‘Where is she?’

For the second time, MacDonald stared at her, completely perplexed. ‘What?’

‘Have you done it yet?’ Her voice shook. She was crying, she realized, but it didn’t seem to matter. Nothing mattered any more except Amelia.

‘Done what, you preposterous girl?’

‘Have you killed her?’ Lizzie asked in a half-scream. ‘Please don’t. Please tell me she’s not dead!’

MacDonald retreated behind his desk, poured himself a whisky and downed it in one. ‘You aren’t making any sense,’ he said wearily. ‘Let me make a deal with you. Calm down, stop screaming, and I will tell you what this money is for. Then you can tell me why you are here in my mill, causing trouble. Agreed?’

‘All right,’ Lizzie said. The room felt like it was spinning. She sat down heavily in a velvet-lined chair.

‘I’m emptying out the safe to pay Douglas Grant his fee,’ MacDonald said. ‘All this money – it’s meaningless compared to finding her alive.’

Lizzie’s mouth fell open. ‘He’s asking that much?’

‘Yes.’

‘In return for finding Amelia?’

‘Yes. So far he has told me nothing. Except to accuse you, of course. And yet, here you are…’ His voice trailed off. On the wall hung a photograph of Amelia, smiling, in an oval frame. MacDonald propped himself against the wall with one hand and stared at it. Tears filled his eyes. Suddenly he lifted it off the wall and hugged it to himself, sobbing and rocking back and forth. ‘I love her so much,’ he whispered through his tears. ‘More than anything in this whole rotten world.’

Lizzie stood up. Seeing MacDonald like this had brought her to her senses again. ‘Grant is just using you, sir,’ she told him. ‘He cannot help you. But I believe I can.’ Very gently she put her hands on the photograph. ‘May I?’

MacDonald hesitated, reluctant to let go, and then nodded.

Lizzie turned the photograph around. She looked into the little girl’s smiling face – and the link was suddenly there, sure and clear, like a memory jolted back into life. For some reason, the photograph captured more of her essence than a whole room of her possessions. A vision formed in her mind, so intense it made her head hurt.

She was looking through Amelia’s eyes. From the shape of the windows she could see and the background noises she could hear, Lizzie knew the girl was inside the mill.

Amelia opened her mouth to speak, but a hand came down to cover it up. A voice said, ‘Shh, Amelia, you don’t want your uncle to find you, do you?’

Even before the voice spoke a word, Lizzie realized who it was.

The hand was missing a finger.

‘It’s Maisie,’ she said.

‘Her nursemaid?’

‘Yes! Maisie’s got her. And she’s here, inside the mill!’

MacDonald’s eyes blazed with anger. ‘Come with me!’

Factory workers stepped aside, staring in silent amazement, as Lizzie and MacDonald burst out of the office and ran past them together. ‘Up the stairs!’ he shouted. ‘Amelia, come out!’

‘Amelia!’ Lizzie yelled. ‘It’s all right, we’re coming!’

They stampeded up the stairs to the next floor, where a sea of looms was whirring and clacking. MacDonald ran ahead, still shouting his niece’s name. Lizzie wove back and forth, looking to the left and right, straining for any sign of Maisie or the girl.

She tried to match the factory floor she saw with what she’d seen in her vision, but the windows all looked the same, and the vision had been over so quickly. Swearing to herself, she ran between two looms, almost falling over a scruffy little boy who darted out in front of her.

‘Move!’ she yelled at him.

The boy grabbed at her sleeve and Lizzie stepped back and looked at him – his big blue eyes, his shaved head – and wondered where she might have seen him before. For a moment, she had the mad thought that he could be a changeling. Despite his grubby clothes, the little boy had the other-worldly look of a fairy child about him.

‘Lizzie!’ the child said excitedly.

It couldn’t be. Lizzie stared down at the child’s stubbly head. The tiny hairs were golden. In that moment, she knew. Someone had done their best to disguise the child, dressing her up in shabby boys’ clothes, shaving her head and smearing her face with dirt, but this was no little boy.

‘Amelia?’

‘Don’t tell Uncle Ally I’m here!’ Amelia whispered, putting her finger to her lips. ‘I’m playing hide and seek.’

Lizzie let out a sob of relief and joy. ‘Oh no you’re not, my darling. You’re coming home.’

She reached out with both arms and stepped forward to gather Amelia up.

Next moment, a hand with one missing finger descended onto Amelia’s shoulder and pulled her back, roughly. A harsh voice rang out.

‘Not another step, Lizzie Brown, or I’ll throw her in the machine!’