I'm so sorry this took me so long! I was almost done with this chapter when I decided to scrap it and start over!
I own nothing!
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"And you're sure that they're not in the house anywhere?" Officer Hartsfield asked as his eyes roamed the main hall of Downton. Robert sighed and looked at Bates and Matthew who were both ready to pace a hole in the rug.
"I'm positive." He said, watching as the policeman marked some notes down in his pad. "Shouldn't you have brought more men? I mean to help with the search."
"It's not necessary." Hartsfield muttered as he closed the notepad. "They haven't been missing long enough to call in the squad. I could get some constables out to patrol the woods, but we can't do more until they're at least gone for forty-eight hours."
"Forty-eight hours?" Matthew stopped his pacing and glared at the officer. "Who knows what could happen to them in that time?"
John closed his eyes at the implication of the younger man's sentence. He was trying his very best not to imagine the girls in a dangerous environment. At this point though, that could be the only explanation for their disappearance. Anna would have called him and reassured him that they were safe if it were so. "Can we please continue our search if the police aren't going to be of any help?" He asked Lord Grantham as he turned his back on the apathetic officer.
"I'll finish here." Robert said to the two men. "You two go on. Get the men downstairs to help you."
Bates nodded and rubbed his forehead wearily as they headed back outside.
/
Mary groaned as she leaned her head back against the wall. It had felt like hours since Wolfe left, when in reality it had only been about twenty minutes. She was feeling extremely weak from lack of food and water and she was in a great deal of pain from Wolfe practicing some of Dugan's interrogation methods on her. He wasn't quite as rough on her as his partner was on Anna, but she could still feel the marks from his large fingers on her cheeks.
She was relieved that he had untied her before leaving. Her shoulders were so sore, that she welcomed the tiny bit of freedom with great relief.
But as time wore on, her worry began to return. Where was Anna? What were they doing to her? Did she tell them the truth? Did they free her? Did they kill her because they found her to be useless in their grand scheme?
Her pondering came to a halt when she heard voices in the hall. They were muffled, but she could tell that the men were arguing. Scrambling to her feet, Mary crept closer to the heavy wooden door.
"What did you do to her? She looks like hell!" She heard Wolfe bellow.
"I was trying to get answers out of her! She wasn't talking straight!" Dugan defended himself. "Besides, she's still standing ain't she?"
"You're a bloody idiot, did you know that?" Wolfe was grumbling as he unlocked the door and swung it open. He smiled when he saw Mary standing there. "Hello Poppet!" He greeted her.
Mary looked around him to see Dugan dragging a bloodied and beaten Anna in behind him. "Look, there's your buddy!" He growled pushing the tiny woman into the room. Mary lunged forward and caught her before she could hit the ground. "Now, you two sleep up! You have a busy day tomorrow!" The men chuckled maliciously as they slammed and locked the door behind them.
"Anna?" Mary looked down at her friend. Cuts and bruises covered Anna's pale face. She was awake, but her eyes just stared blankly up at her. "Anna what did he do to you?" Mary cried as she tried to wipe some of the nearly dried blood off of the girl's cheeks.
"Lady M-Mary?" Anna whimpered. "Is everything alright?"
Mary laughed and nodded, "Everything's fine, I'm okay." She assured her. "Just try and relax." She looked around their prison miserably. She kept praying that she was just having a horrible nightmare. She wanted so badly to open her eyes and be in her bed at Downton with Matthew sleeping soundly beside her. She wanted for Anna to be safely in her cottage, with Bates. She wanted to be anywhere else in the world.
/
It was nearly four in the morning when Matthew and John finally took a break from their search. They sat wearily on an old bench near the outskirts of the woods and sipped on some tea that Alfred brought out to them in a thermos. "I don't understand it." Matthew sighed setting his cup aside and resting his elbows on his knees.
John nodded. "It feels wrong sitting here." He murmured, staring at the dense line of trees.
"This whole thing feels wrong." Matthew replied. "It's like they've vanished off the face of the earth.
"No, they've got to be nearby." John argued. "I feel it. I know she wouldn't have gone far, neither would Lady Mary."
"I know, I know." Matthew nodded and stood up. "I just want to find them! I can't go on much longer without her here—If only I knew where they went. I wouldn't car if she decided to stay in a lodge because I have upset her, again. That's fine with me! If only she'd tell me!"
He looked at Bates whose expression clearly said that that scenario wasn't very likely. He sighed and gestured the path that led back to the woods. And with that, the two men continued their search.
/
"Wake up!" A voice shouted, waking the two women quite suddenly. Mary startled as she sat up from the cold concrete that had been her bed for the evening. Her back was terribly sore, but she tried to ignore it—she didn't want these monsters to see her pain.
Anna on the other hand, had a hard time hiding her agony as she laid curled up next to her. Her sides had been bothering her all night; she was convinced that Dugan had broken a couple of her ribs when he had kicked her for being stubborn. Her right eye was nearly swollen shut and her jaw ached. And a night of sleeping on the hard ground did not help at all.
"Get up, pretty girl." Wolfe sneered as he pulled Mary to her feet. "You shall be our messenger today." He patted her cheeks.
"M-messenger?" Mary's voice sounded like gravel. She wanted so much to have a drink of water.
"Yes indeed. You will go back to Downton and give this to the Crawley's." Dugan shoved a folded sheet of paper into her hands. "You tell them to do what this says and they'll get their daughter back. Or at least what's left of her after last night." He laughed evilly but stopped when Wolfe gave him a look.
"B-but I'm their daughter…" Mary whispered, looking back at Anna in despair.
"Be that as it may, I doubt this little thing would have gone through what this Nasty Beggar did, and still call herself the daughter of the Earl if it were a lie." Wolfe said. "Besides, it doesn't look like she'll be walking anywhere for a while." He gestured to the Lady Maid's frail and shaking form on the ground.
"Now come on!" Dugan grabbed her arm and yanked her out of the room.
"No! No please!" Mary cried looking back. "Let Anna come with me! She can't stay here!" She shrieked when a gag was put back into her mouth and a sack was thrown over her head. She struggled as they tied up her hands, but of course they over powered her.
"No more of that little girl." Dugan sighed. "We got a bit of a trip now, and I don't want to hear your whining."
She stumbled as she was dragged up a small creaky flight of stairs. She heard a door open before they stepped onto soft ground. She could feel a breeze and smell fresh air and she knew they were outside. She would have enjoyed it a lot more if she knew her and Anna were going home. But as she was forced onto the floor of the backseat of a car, and covered with a blanket, she knew that Anna's chances of ever making it home were diminishing with every second she was in that cell.
/
"But who would want to take them?" Daisy asked Mrs. Patmore as they set the table for the servants' tea.
"Someone very stupid if you ask me." Alfred gave his input, taking a bite of the lemon cake Ivy was carrying. "They're not going to get away with it!"
"We don't even know if they WERE taken!" Mrs. Hughes interrupted them sitting down next to Carson at the head of the table. She had been a nervous wreck all morning, and she was trying desperately not to let it show to the other servants. "Now, Mr. Crawley and Mr. Bates will find them and bring them back. But in the meantime, we need to get on with our work."
Everyone looked at the Housekeeper as she shakily poured herself a cup of tea.
/
She didn't know how, but she freed her hands from her binds less than two minutes into the car ride. She prayed that whoever was driving wouldn't look in back as she ripped the sack off of her head. Looking up slightly, she saw that both of the men were in front.
So they had left poor Anna alone? Mary had to fight back a growl as she looked around to find an escape route. The car was so loud and the road was so bumpy, she doubted they would hear her open the door, but she had to act quickly.
Risking one more glance behind her, she reached up and pulled on the silver handle and breathed a silent sigh of relief when the door nudged open. Sliding on her stomach towards the opening, she peaked down at the ground, and was glad to see the ground wasn't moving too quickly beneath her. Maneuvering herself into a squatting position, she pushed the door open a little more and rolled out of the car without another thought.
/
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