Chapter 1: Part One
1883
"Don't come any closer," snarled Black Jack Cutler, leveling his Colt .44 pistol. He cocked
the hammer of his well-used and deadly weapon. The sound echoed in the tiny cabin like a
hundred lethal snakes waiting to strike.
Lorna Jane swallowed past the hard lump of fear that had lodged in her throat as she stared
down the barrel of the gun. "You won't shoot me, Cutler," she cried, "because I know the secret
of the map! And the secret is—"
"Lady Xavier! Lady Xavier!"
Sighing, Lady Olivia Xavier tucked Lorna Jane of Glittering Gulch; or The Map of Don Diego by Captain
Frederick Livings into her reticule and attempted to smile at the woman approaching her. Olivia had been hoping to
wait for her carriage undisturbed so she could catch up on the latest escapades of the often hapless Lorna Jane. But
that was not to be. Her brewery, Greywell's, had the immense misfortune of being located almost directly across the
street from Prudence Culpepper's Eternal Flame Mission. Though Olivia usually managed to avoid Prudence through
judicious scheduling, sometimes their paths did cross.
Now Prudence, determined, gray and hulking like an iron-clad battleship, bore down on Olivia as she stood on the
curb outside her brewery.
It was nearly six o'clock, and everyone at Greywell's had gone home. The night watchman was not due for
another hour, which meant that after she completed her paperwork and locked the gates behind her, Olivia was alone.
Prudence locked the doors to the mission behind her and gave them a sharp tug for added security. There was
nothing of value inside the mission, unless the thieves of Wandsworth had any interest in stacks of Bibles and
armloads of bunting donated and sewed by the fine ladies of the Eternal Flame Good Works Society—but Prudence
rarely left anything to chance, including trapping Olivia in conversation when an opportunity presented itself.
"Lady Xavier," Prudence said, "I had one day hoped you would finally come to one of our little meetings." She
gave Olivia a look that was at once smug and censorious, one of Prudence's specialties.
"I have often meant to," Olivia answered politely. "But business has kept me away."
"Business?" Prudence's expression left no room for doubt that she considered the thought distasteful, at the least.
"My brewery does keep me exceeding busy," Olivia said. She looked up and down the narrow block for her
carriage. Where the devil was Arthur? She needed rescuing from the good intentions and harsh judgments of
Prudence Culpepper.
"Most women would have ceded the actual running of a business to someone more suitable for the position,"
Prudence reminded her. "When Lord Xavier left you this brewery, I am certain his intention was not to have you
sully yourself with such vulgar matters."
Olivia felt her patience begin to fray. Everyone had something to say about the terms of her late husband's will. It
wasn't uncommon for a man to leave his wife some interest in a business venture or two, but it certainly was unusual
for that wife to involve herself in the daily running of the business, especially if that property was a brewery.
"Why, Mrs. Culpepper, I had no idea that you could communicate with the dead!" Olivia said. At Prudence's
bewildered look, she explained, "How else could you possibly know what my husband's intentions were?"
"Such impudence," Prudence huffed, inflating.
"I find your judgment of my actions impudent," Olivia returned. She was very, very tired of this conversation,
since she had been having it for the past three years. Once Olivia left off her two years of deep mourning, everyone
had an opinion as to how she should spend her time. Her parents urged her to move in with them and pursue a life of
quiet emptiness and widowhood. Her friends wanted her to attend parties, operas and outings. And society bulwarks
such as Prudence wanted her to fill her days with useless, time-eating charity work that produced little gain for those
who actually needed it most.
"How can you defend your actions, Lady Xavier?" Prudence demanded. "Your business provides the lower classes
with the means to ruin. Have you not read the temperance tracts?" She fumbled with her rather enormous reticule
for just such an item, but Olivia held up a hand to stop her.
"I run a brewery, Mrs. Culpepper, not a gin palace. I ensure that the beer I produce goes to upstanding pubs that
provide honest, hard working men and women a place to relax and enjoy themselves after a long day. Besides," she
added pointedly, "I fail to see how providing corsets and religious tracts assists the deserving poor."
"Those pitiable wretches haven't the sense to tend to themselves," Prudence said tightly. "We must give them
moral guidance to see them through the dark wilderness of their lapsed state. I do not think that offering demon drink
shall improve their lives."
"I offer employment at my brewery to those that seek it," Olivia replied. "Men and women."
"You would take a woman out of the sacred domain of her home?"
"I would give a woman a means of sustaining herself and her children, particularly if she has no husband. Can you
say the same, Mrs. Culpepper?"
Just then, Prudence Culpepper's carriage clattered to a stop at the curb and she snapped to her coachman,
"You're late! Everyone has gone."
"Sorry, madam," the coachman said without any remorse. A footman jumped down to open the carriage door for
Prudence. After helping his mistress inside, the footman turned to Olivia, but a look from his mistress held him back.
"I shan't offer you a ride," Prudence said. "You may let your modern views provide you with a means home."
Olivia would rather stare down the barrel of Black Jack Cutler's .44 than be trapped in a carriage with Prudence
Culpepper for over four miles.
"Thank you for your trenchant assessment," Olivia replied dryly.
Prudence pressed her thin lips together as the footman jumped back to his post on the carriage. With a frown, she
rapped sharply on the roof. The carriage lurched forward and Olivia happily waved it off.
As soon as she was alone, Olivia gave a very unladylike roll of her eyes and started to reach for her dime novel.
Finally, peace. She'd already sat through a long meeting with the brewery's managers and chemist, and then endured
Prudence Culpepper's shrill jeremiad. She wanted some quiet time, just her and the savage outlaws of the American
West.
Night was falling, however, and she was finding it difficult to read the print. Where could Arthur be with the
carriage? He was running rather late at this point, and she started to grow worried. Wandsworth, located on the
southern bank of the Thames, wasn't a notorious slum like Whitechapel, but it was still very far from genteel
Bayswater.
Peering into the settling fog, Olivia suddenly became aware that she wasn't alone. She’d nearly dismissed the
feeling as exhausted nerves, but then three figures emerged from the growing shadows. Cold apprehension crept up
the back of her neck. The men walked deliberately towards her, and she fought the urge to step back against the
locked gates of the brewery. Don't show fear, she reminded herself as she tipped her chin up. These men might just
be factory workers heading home.
But no. They wanted her.
for the next installment!