CHAPTER 2
The morning after the skating tragedy, Julia hailed a cab and gave the driver the Allinghams’ address.
He pushed his hat brim with his whip handle and scratched his head. “Marlborough Mews?”
For a moment, Julia thought she’d done something extraordinary. Have I stumped a London cabbie?
“Just off Kensington Road, miss?”
“That sounds right. Blenheim Lodge. It’s near the Royal Horticultural Society’s gardens.”
On the way, they passed streets of terraced town houses with columned porticos as white and regular as perfect teeth.
When the cab turned right into the mews, it stopped in front of an older residence.
Blenheim Lodge, a red-bricked, ivy-covered mansion, was set back from the road in a broad, tree-covered lot.
Julia paid off the cabbie and paused, looking up at the house.
The door opened, and Mary Allingham appeared, her tall figure framed in the doorway.
She’d tied her long, fair hair to the side.
It spilled across her shoulder like a pony’s tail.
Her apple-green “artistic dress” fell like a column from the bodice with simple lines and an absence of voluminous underskirts.
It was an unfussy style that Julia also favored.
“You found us, Doctor. I’ve been on the lookout.”
Julia smiled up at her. “You caught me admiring the house. It’s quite different in style from the rest of the neighborhood.”
“Blenheim Lodge is a good century older. Why it’s called a ‘lodge’ escapes me. It sounds so rustic and cottage-like.”
“Perhaps it’s the trees,” Julia said.
“A horticultural chap said the ancient yew in the back is a thousand years old.”
“Heavens.” Julia smiled. “Here before William the Conqueror.”
She mounted the steps. Up close, Julia detected signs of strain in Mary’s face: purple smudges under her eyes and tension around her mouth. “Before I ask about your brother, how are you?” Mary frowned, and worry lines etched around her eyes.
“No need to fret about me.”
“But I do worry. Yesterday . . .” Julia shook her head. “It was a hellish day. I’m wondering, did you sleep?”
Mary bit her lower lip and shook her head. “I was exhausted. But when I went to bed, sleep wouldn’t come. Only sounds and images—the cries and screams. And those bodies.”
“It will stay with you, but time ...well, it requires patience, but time will bring relief. Still, we can do something about the sleeplessness now. I’ll leave you a mild bromide powder to take tonight.”
“Thank you, Doctor. It’s what didn’t happen to Charles but might have happened. That’s what haunts me. The thought goes around like a nightmare carousel.” Mary shook herself and stood back from the door. “Please come in.”
“How is Mister Allingham this morning?”
“I looked in a few minutes ago. He was breathing easily, and Louisa said he slept peacefully through the night.”
“Good signs, all of them.” Julia smiled. “Just what a doctor wants to hear.”
“It’s Lou who worries me now. Last night, she bustled his valet and me out of his bedroom and insisted on caring for Charles herself. This morning, she seems . . . stunned is the word. When I took her hand, it felt like marble.”
“The ordeal has caught up with her. I wouldn’t worry too much. Still, would you like me to look in on her?”
Mary shook her head. “She’s sleeping now.”
“Then we’ll let her rest.”
They crossed a red-and-gold Turkish carpet that covered the marquetry floor of the two-story entrance hall. Curved archways framed the entrances to the upstairs east- and west-wing hallways. Art was everywhere, oil and watercolor portraits and landscapes.
At the top of the stairs, Mary turned right into the east corridor and stopped at the last door. “You can ring if there is anything you need. Alfred is the footman.”
Julia jiggled the handle of her medical bag. “I have everything, I think.”
“I’ll let you get on with it. I’ll be in the studio. Will you meet me there?”
“Your studio?”
“I’m a painter. Turn left at the bottom of the stairs. French doors in the drawing room will take you out to the terrace. The studio is to the left at the back of the garden.”
“I’ll find you there in a half hour or so.”
Julia watched Miss Allingham stride away. Mary had called herself a painter, as Julia would say, “I’m a doctor.”
An unusual young woman.
* * *
Forty minutes later, Julia descended the staircase and followed Mary’s directions to the back garden.
She faced two brick-and-stone buildings, one ivy-covered, its south wall pierced by four sets of oak doors wide enough to admit two carriages.
The other, clearly Mary’s studio, had large, south-facing windows.
Julia rounded a flagstone path to the studio’s entrance and halted in shock in front of the door’s smashed panels.
She took a few steps, and glass crunched under her feet.
Inside the studio, a tall, gray-haired man in a coachman’s caped coat and a young constable writing on a notepad faced Mary.
She stood amid the tangle of toppled easels and scattered sketches, looking dazed.
Good God, Julia thought. What hellish timing for the poor girl.
The constable looked up from his notepad. “You have rooms above the stables, Mister Taylor?”
The coachman nodded. “A noise roused me in the night.”
“What time was that?”
“Late,” Taylor said. “Past midnight. I circled the house with a lantern, checking the doors and windows. Saw naught to worry me.”
He righted an overturned easel and set a damaged painting on it. A large emerald W marred the picture’s center, and the intruder had sliced the canvas from corner to corner, cutting through the subject’s face and cascading auburn curls.
“I’ll see about repairing the window, Miss Mary,” Taylor said. The coachman passed Julia, touching the brim of his cap.
Julia stepped across the threshold. “I’m so sorry.”
Mary raised her hands and dropped them, her shoulders sagging. Then she turned back to the policeman. “Are we nearly finished?”
“Just a few more questions, Miss Allingham. Have you or your servants noticed any strangers in the neighborhood?”
“I haven’t, but you might ask our housekeeper, Mrs. Drew.”
He made a note of the name. “No quarrels with tradesmen? No one else with a grudge against you or your family?”
Mary’s gaze slid to the damaged painting.
A few seconds ticked by before she shook her head.
The constable looked surprisingly young, barely out of the schoolroom.
His tunic’s collar seemed too large for his neck, as if he planned to grow into it.
There’s something Mary’s not saying, Julia thought.
A more seasoned copper would have spotted her hesitation.
The policeman closed his notepad and strapped on his helmet. “Thank you, Miss Allingham. I’d like to speak to the housekeeper before I leave.”
While Julia waited for Mary to return, she studied a large, undamaged painting leaning against the wall.
In the foreground, an auburn-haired woman reclined on a green velvet settee, her left arm stretched across the backrest. The subject sat in profile, dressed in creamy lace and pearls, the high collar of her gown skimming her earlobe.
Crunching glass announced Mary’s return. “It’s called Repose, of all things.” She laughed hollowly. “I’d been brooding over it, so it was upstairs in my bedroom.”
“Thank goodness for that. It’s striking.”
“Mister Taylor carried it down for me this morning. That’s when we found . . .” Mary buried her face in her hands, shaking.
Julia plucked a wrap from its peg and draped it across Mary’s shoulders. “Come. Let’s sit.” She led her to a pair of chairs.
“I’m sorry to be so feeble,” Mary said, pulling a handkerchief from her pocket and wiping her eyes.
“Feeble? No. All this after yesterday?” Julia smiled.
“At least on that score I have some good news. Your brother’s pulse, temperature, and reflexes are all normal.
His color is good, and his lungs are clear.
He was quite proud of himself when he walked the length of the hallway and back, showing no signs of dizziness or excessive fatigue. ”
“Thank God.”
“Mister Allingham asked for his wife. He became quite agitated when I explained she was resting after nursing him all night. He was calmer when I left him, but you may want your brother’s doctor to examine him, too.”
“Is there still some danger?”
“I’ve no reason to think so, but I’m afraid my examination wasn’t as thorough as I wished.” Julia smiled. “Your brother clutched his nightshirt like a bashful maiden when I tried to unbutton it.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake.”
“Not an unusual reaction, I assure you. All in all, he’s a lucky man.”
“As am I.” Mary shuddered and drew the wrap tighter. “I would have been out on the ice, too, but for a pair of balky skates. That’s another thought that keeps me awake.”
“This should help you.” Julia removed a small envelope from her medical bag. “Dissolve this powder in water and drink it shortly before you retire. May I return tomorrow morning? One last visit to assure myself that all is well?”
“Yes, please. That’s kind of you.”
“Now, what would you like to do? Wait until tomorrow to deal with the studio?”
Mary shook her head. “The thought of someone here, touching my things, pulling out a knife . . . the hatefulness of it. The sooner it’s cleared away, the better.”
“That sounds sensible.” Julia clapped her hands on the chair armrest and stood. She asked, “Shall we get started?”
They spent the next twenty minutes picking up scattered paint tubes, canvases, and drawings. Mary shuffled through the sketches and looked up. “That’s odd. I just realized that several drawings are missing. Studies of Margot Miller. She’s the sitter in the damaged painting.”
“An art-loving thief?” Julia won a wan smile as Mary bundled the remaining sketches into a folder.
Julia spotted an oozing, emerald paint tube, evidently the source of the slash across the canvas. She picked it up with her handkerchief and read the label.