Chapter Seventeen
“O h, yes. I know her.” Mr. Norrey of Kingston Larder and Goods managed to infuse quite a large amount of disdain in so few words. “Or, at least, I thought I knew her. I had thought her to be a well-bred lady of morals and decency.”
Kara, Niall, and Gyda had arrived in Kingston Upon Thames just after noon. They had taken the measure of the high street and decided to start their search for information on Petra at the general store. A wise choice, it seemed.
Kara raised a brow at the shopkeeper. “Would you share the lady’s name, sir?”
“Of course. That is Miss Katherine Prentice.” He returned her expectant look. “May I ask why you are looking for her?”
Kara shared looks with Niall and Gyda, but didn’t answer right away.
“Some trouble, I take it?” The shopkeeper leaned in, as if inviting her to share the secret.
“You might say so.”
Norrey sniffed. “I will take the liberty of warning you away from any idea of doing business with her.”
“Is that what changed your opinion of the lady?” asked Kara. “A disagreement in business?”
“That’s not what I would call it,” he replied, surly.
“What would you call it, then, man?” Gyda asked sharply. As an attempt to blend into the traditional village, she had tried to tame her fierce braids by sweeping them up into a knot, but the effect was still a little…unruly.
“Outright thievery,” he said indignantly. “It can be named naught else. Though I would never have thought her capable of such a thing, not so long ago.”
“What, exactly, was her offense?” asked Niall.
“None at all, for near on to three years. I counted her a good, if infrequent, customer. Her parents took a cottage hereabouts and she visited them—that’s when we would see her about. After the parents died, she continued to come and stay for a few weeks at a time, during school holidays.”
“Is the cottage here in the village?” asked Gyda.
“Just outside. A pretty spot, right on the river. She would come in once a week when she was here. Her orders were always modest, but she always paid in full.” His lip curled. “Until recently.”
“Miss Prentice made an order without paying for it?”
“Two, in fact, and both deuced odd, if you ask me. The first appeared normal enough. She made her selections, but didn’t carry them away or pay me right then, as was her custom. It was market day, and I was busy, so I didn’t press her. But didn’t she come in a few hours later, acting as if the first visit had never happened? I gave her the chance to pay for the earlier order, but she refused and practically ran out of the shop.” He heaved a sigh of disapproval.
“And the second?” Niall prompted him.
“Well. That one was odd. She wanted canned salmon and tinned vegetables. Oh, yes, and dried meat.” Norrey straightened. “I ask you, is this the sort of product a village general store would carry, in the normal course of things? No, indeed. I told her I was not in the way of outfitting jungle expeditions or filling the galleys of the ships in the Royal Navy. But she insisted. I had to make special orders to get everything she requested. She wanted enough of them to fill a trunk. I know, because that’s how I sent it out to her.”
Kara frowned at the others. “What could she have intended to do with it?”
“She didn’t intend to pay for it, that much I can tell you,” said Norrey. “When I arranged delivery, she told my man she would be in early the next morning to make payment for it.”
“But she did not?”
“No, she did not. In the afternoon, I sent the man back and told him not to return without her payment. And what do you think he found? The cottage left open, with Miss Prentice gone, along with her supplies and everything of value in the place!”
Kara was still stuck on the strange order. “Canned, tinned, and dried foodstuffs?” she mused.
“She did tell Tom she meant to change hiding spots,” Gyda reminded her. “Perhaps the new spot is remote?”
“No, she told him she wanted to move closer to Town,” Niall said.
“Perhaps she didn’t want to be seen?” Kara guessed. “With those sorts of supplies, she could hide away for a good while without venturing out.”
“Or she might be planning to feed more than just herself,” Niall offered.
“Did anything she said give you an idea of where she meant to go with all those supplies?” Gyda asked the shopkeeper.
“No. I just assumed she returned to her teaching position. In the usual way.”
“Petra did say her sister was a teacher,” Kara said.
“Do you know where she taught?” asked Niall.
The man stilled. Kara thought he must have noticed Niall’s use of the past tense.
“I… Well, now that you ask, I suppose I do not.”
“Come, man, surely you can recall something?” Gyda was growing impatient. “Listen, we need to find this woman. If you tell us something to help us find her, we’ll settle her accounts.” She glanced askance at Niall, who nodded.
“I can’t recall… Well, she once did remark upon the quieter nature of the village,” Norrey said. “I took that to mean she normally resided somewhere closer to London.”
“We cannot stop in to enquire at every school between here and London,” Niall said, exasperated.
“We will, if we must,” Gyda declared.
“Perhaps her uncle will know the name of the particular school, if you can locate him?” Norrey suggested.
“Uncle?” they all said in unison, staring at the shopkeeper.
“Yes, well, I’ve never met the man, to be sure. But I am not the only merchant Miss Prentice left with unpaid bills. Mr. Hartford, the tailor, has been engaged to make something for Miss Prentice’s uncle. I don’t believe he has finished yet. I told him to stop and give it up for a lost cause, but he believes Miss Prentice will honor her order. He told me himself that he expects he will be paid.”
“Why does he think so?” Gyda asked. “Has he reason to?”
“I very much doubt it.” Norrey leaned in as if making a confession. “Mr. Hartford, I fear, is an optimist .”
*
“Oh, yes. I am sure that you have heard an earful from Mr. Norrey.” Mr. Hartford, the tailor, kept a small shop a little further down the main street of Kingston Upon Thames. He stood over his worktable and continued his careful cutting as he spoke. “Mr. Norrey, I am afraid, is a pessimist .”
“I never would have known,” Gyda said under her breath.
“He is forever convinced that someone is stealing from his cask of boiled sweets or his barrel of tenpenny nails. I ask you, who is going to build something one or two stolen nails at a time?”
“Surely he might have a point?” Kara lifted a shoulder. “With a large order delivered, received, and gone unpaid for?”
“Perhaps.”
“Can you tell us anything about this uncle that Miss Prentice placed an order for? What was the order? A suit of clothes?”
“Indeed. A very elegant set this time, too.”
“This time?” Kara sent Niall a puzzled look before turning back to the tailor. “Miss Prentice has placed an order from you before, Mr. Hartford?”
“Oh dear.” Hartford finished his cut and looked up, dismayed. “It was supposed to be secret, that first order. And I’ve kept quiet about it, until now.” He thought about it. “Oh well. No harm done, I suppose. She did not ask me to refrain from discussing the new order. It is indeed for a new suit of clothes. Very fashionable.” He gestured to a waistcoat upon a nearby form. “I’ve only just finished the last piece.” It was of gray woven silk and wool in a checked pattern, and sewed to fit generous proportions.
“And Miss Prentice made these orders for her uncle?” asked Kara. “Very unusual, isn’t it? For a woman to order clothes for an older male relative? I would have thought it would be the other way around.”
“That was exactly my own comment, at her first request. But Miss Prentice explained that her uncle is a scholar and an eccentric. He would wear sackcloth, she said, as long as it didn’t distract him from his work. That’s why the first set had to be plain, loose, and comfortable, she said.”
“And the new, fashionable set is meant for the same uncle?”
“I assume so, as I was to use the same measurements.”
“Did Miss Prentice pay you in advance for these elegant clothes?” asked Gyda.
“No, indeed.” Hartford looked amused at the very idea. Niall didn’t doubt he found it droll. Tradesmen were never paid in advance, and often had to invoice for their goods and services several times to receive payment, even when their customers were of wealth and standing.
Niall snorted. Especially then.
“Did she pay you promptly for the first set?” he asked.
“Oh, yes. She insisted on coming in after business hours to pick them up herself, but she paid that very evening.”
“Then it was definitely Petra doing the ordering, not Katherine,” Kara whispered to Niall.
“She must have come here while her sister was still alive,” he answered. “Perhaps she was watching Katherine, learning her ways and the particulars of her circumstances and behaviors.”
But Gyda’s attention had not wavered from the tailor. “Are you expecting Miss Prentice to come again and fetch these clothes for her uncle, as well?”
“Oh, no.” Hartford had already begun to cut another sleeve.
“You’ve heard the woman has departed the village?” Gyda asked. “Were you planning on waiting until she returned on another school break?”
“Goodness, no. Now that I am finished, I am to send the suit on to the address she left me. To the school where she teaches, in Chiswick.”
Gyda let out a whoop of relief and triumph. “At last! Now we are getting somewhere!”
The tailor stared, dazzled at her transformation from dour impatience.
“My dear Mr. Hartford,” Gyda said expansively, “we desperately need to see this woman, and quickly. We will be happy to pay in full for her order, in exchange for that address.”
“Oh, I don’t know…”
“We will deliver it ourselves and save you the cost of delivery as well.”
Full payment and a savings on delivery? The tailor was no fool.
“Oh. Very well, then. Seeing as you are traveling that way, and mean to see the lady, I suppose there would be no harm.” Hartford nodded. “I’ll just pack it up for you, then.” He gave them a crook of a smile. “And then I think I shall just stroll down to Mr. Norrey’s shop and tell him that everything worked out, just as I predicted.”