CHAPTER 11
The following evening, Inspector Tennant’s cab pulled up to number seventeen Finsbury Circus. It delivered him to the Lewis house narrowly in time for his dinner engagement.
Mrs. Ogilvie smiled a greeting and assured the inspector he hadn’t delayed the evening’s proceedings.
The housekeeper handed a maid his top hat and cape and led him into the drawing room.
Tennant followed, pulling at his cuffs and settling his white tie.
When Mrs. Ogilvie opened the door, Tennant recognized the sonorous voice inside.
“The tragic chain begins with two generations of chaos,” Mister Lloyd said. “The dislocations from opium wars with Britain, floods, famine, droughts, even swarms of locusts—there’s something biblical about China’s plagues.”
Julia’s Aunt Caroline said, “But to sell one’s daughters, Mister Lloyd!”
“Lady Aldridge, it shocks you, I know.”
Mrs. Ogilvie cleared her throat and announced Inspector Tennant.
“Richard, my boy.” Julia’s grandfather stood to greet him. “We’d almost given you up.”
“My apologies, Doctor Lewis. I’d almost given up as well.”
“You’ve met Mister Lloyd, but I don’t think you know his sister, Mrs. Davies.”
A woman in a widow’s half-mourning mauve smiled and offered her hand. She was as darkly handsome as her brother and spoke with the same musical cadence.
“The inspector and I met yesterday, as it happens.” Mrs. Davies added quietly, “I wasn’t sure whether to be sorry or glad that Jin couldn’t help you identify that poor girl.”
“I felt the same, Mrs. Davies.”
Tennant turned to greet Lady Aldridge. He had met Julia’s Aunt Caroline several times and admired her as a shrewd and formidable woman.
She took his hand. “Richard, Mister Lloyd has been telling us about the selling of girls in China.”
“A father doesn’t think of it that way, Lady Aldridge,” Lloyd said. “He is securing his child’s future as a prospective wife, not selling her into domestic slavery. And families are compensated for losing a daughter.”
“It seems a fine distinction to me,” Lady Aldridge said.
Julia asked, “Are we so different, Aunt? Consider the dowries some families dangle to make advantageous matches for their daughters.”
“My dear niece, it’s hardly the same thing.”
“Hmm . . . I wonder.” Julia smiled at her grandfather. “What’s my going rate would you say?”
“My dear, you are a pearl without price.”
Tennant caught Lady Aldridge’s eye and smiled. Then he crossed the room to join Julia. “I’m sorry I kept you all waiting.”
“Never mind,” she said. “I barely beat you here—for the last time, I hope. Gregory Barnes will switch his Thursday evenings at the clinic to Wednesdays.”
“Are you happy with the young doctor?”
“Very. What delayed you? End-of-day developments?”
“I arrived directly from a command interview with my chief.”
Julia eyed his evening clothes. “Did you change at the Yard?”
He nodded. “Clark caught me putting the last loop in this.” Tennant patted his white tie.
She smiled and straightened it for him. “He must have enjoyed that.”
Tennant’s working-class chief resented his more polished junior. The inspector had been educated at Sandhurst, served in an elite regiment, and was the godson and namesake of the Yard’s commissioner, Sir Richard Mayne. Clark loathed the whole list.
“Just one more nail in my coffin,” Tennant said.
“Which does the old boy find more irritating? That white tie or your regimental striped one?”
“As ties go, it’s probably a tie.”
The door opened, and Mrs. Ogilvie announced, “Dinner is served.”
Julia took his arm. “We made it just in the nick . . . both of us.”
Tennant sat at Julia’s left at the table, ceding the floor to Mister Lloyd at her right. The clergyman and his sister had visited Whitechapel that morning, and Lloyd was full of praise for the clinic and its doctor. The inspector couldn’t fault anything he said, and Lloyd said it so well.
At the end of the meal, Julia replaced her napkin and looked around the table. “Will you all follow me to the drawing room?”
Mister Lloyd stood and offered Julia his arm.
Her grandfather drew back his dining partner’s chair. “We’re an eccentric household, Mrs. Davies, by English standards at any rate. The legacy of Julia’s American grandmother, also named Julia.”
She smiled. “Eccentric in what way?”
“No tea after dinner and no separation of the sexes.” Doctor Lewis offered his arm. “We will enjoy our port, sherry, or barley water, if one prefers, in the drawing room together.”
Julia’s aunt took Tennant’s arm. “You seem quiet this evening, Richard.” She smiled faintly, glancing at Mister Lloyd and her niece. “And a little . . . watchful.”
“And you, Lady Aldridge, see too much.” He leaned in closer. “I would have you in the Yard if I could.”
“Dear boy.” She patted his hand. “Julia’s been telling me about the case. She said you knew Louisa Allingham.”
“The last time we met, I was her escort for an endless French opera. My reward was to make way for Charles Allingham.”
“Never mind. I’ve lived long enough to know that life presents unexpected compensations.”
“A hopeful thought,” Tennant said as they followed Doctor Lewis and Mrs. Davies to the drawing room.
Mrs. Ogilvie offered drinks to the guests; Mrs. Davies accepted a sherry and Tennant a port. She smiled at him to invite conversation, so he followed her to the settee.
“Thank you for your assistance yesterday, Mrs. Davies.”
“I was worried, but Jin proved strong enough for the ordeal.”
Tennant said, “Sometimes, it’s a fine line between pressing a witness and victimizing her again.”
“You managed the delicate balance.” A ripple of doubt crossed her face. “Now, I’m wondering if we’ve navigated equally well, Owen and I.”
“What do you mean?”
“Perhaps our reticence with Jin was wrong, and we should have encouraged her to speak.”
“As you say, it’s a delicate balance,” Tennant said. “As for the interview, you handled it admirably. May I ask how you came to be so proficient in Cantonese?”
“Our parents were missionaries in China.”
“And we moved to Hong Kong as young children,” Mr. Lloyd said.
He had joined them with Julia on his arm. Tennant stood to make room for her on the settee.
Mrs. Davies said, “Owen followed in the family’s footsteps. Rather like you, Doctor Lewis.”
“Yes, we have physicians galore in the clan,” Julia said. “My grandfather, my father, and a rather famous American one on my grandmother’s side, Doctor Benjamin Rush. He signed the Declaration of Independence.”
“Headstrong and rebellious, just like my Julie,” Doctor Lewis said. “Am I right, Richard?”
“I wouldn’t contradict you, sir.”
Julia’s grandfather chuckled. “I blame it on the Rushes.”
Tennant said to Julia, “Your middle initial . . . R for Rush?”
“We keep it quiet on this side of the Atlantic. Tell me, Mrs. Davies, was your husband also in the missions?”
“Gareth was an officer in the Royal Navy.”
“And a sore disappointment he was,” her brother said, smiling.
“Now Owen, just because he bested you regularly in chess . . .”
“I let him win so he’d keep coming back to see you.”
“What nonsense.”
“As a young lieutenant, my brother-in-law cut a fine figure. But as a Welshman . . .” Lloyd shook his head mournfully. “Gareth was sadly wanting. A tone-deaf Cardiff man—whoever heard of such a thing?”
Mrs. Davies laughed. “He would try. Do you remember him singing ‘Bread of Heaven’ in that tiny church in full voice and off-key?”
“And Father’s pained expression,” Lloyd said. “He forgave him. For that and for taking you away. My brother-in-law was a thoroughly good chap, and I miss him sorely.”
Mrs. Davies looked at Julia. “The last thing I expected was to marry a navy man. Life with a husband in the missions is what I’d planned.”
“That’s natural,” Julia said. “Common interests surely strengthen a matrimonial bond.”
She nodded. “Especially for women who want to do more than—”
“Stay at home as wives and mothers?”
“Yes. I saw myself wedded to some good man like my father, working side by side, toiling together in God’s vineyard.” Mrs. Davies shook her head and smiled. “Having fixed ideas about one’s straight path can be fatal. Life so often presents a corner to turn.”
“Yes . . . I suppose that’s true,” Julia said slowly.
“Sometimes, we complicate things,” Mrs. Davies said. “Things that are simple, especially in matters of the heart.”
Lady Aldridge looked at Tennant, smiled faintly, and sipped her sherry.
Dr. Lewis trilled the piano’s keys. “Do you play, Mrs. Davies?” When she nodded, he said, “Will you indulge us?”
“Delighted, if my brother accompanies me.” She stood and offered Lloyd her hand. “Unlike my late husband, Owen is a fine baritone.”
He led his sister to the instrument and pulled back a piano bench of gleaming, golden nutwood.
“What a handsome Bosendorfer.” Mrs. Davies sat and ran her fingers over the keys. “It has a lovely tone.”
Lloyd asked, “Have you made your choice, Sister?”
“‘Simple Gifts,’ I think.” Mrs. Davies looked at Julia. “An American at our mission in Hong Kong taught it to us. It’s become one of my favorites.”
She began with a five-note, descending phrase that she played twice. Then Mr. Lloyd joined in.
“’Tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free, ’tis the gift to come down where we ought to be.
And when we find ourselves in the place just right, ’twill be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gained, to bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed,
To turn, turn will be our delight, till by turning, turning we come ’round right.”
Tennant stood to the side where he could see Julia’s face and watch the performers.
Mrs. Davies introduced the melody again. When her brother joined in, she stopped playing, and he sang the lyrics a second time unaccompanied. The effect was haunting, and Julia looked rapt, her eyes shining with unshed tears. When Lloyd finished and the company clapped, she looked away, blinking.