Chapter 10 #2
Mrs. Gordon touched the silver cross brooch. “We received a letter from her last month begging us to allow her to visit.”
“She didn’t beg,” Mrs. Buchanan said testily.
Her sister-in-law stiffened. “It was strongly worded, asking us if we would have her for a while. Of course we agreed, despite our reservations.”
“What reservations?” Mrs. Buchanan asked. Apparently this was news to her, too.
Mrs. Gordon clasped her hands together on her lap. “We didn’t know what to do with her once she arrived. We live quietly, and Juliette was always such a lively girl when she was young.”
“She isn’t a child anymore,” her mother pointed out.
“Precisely. How would dull, childless people like us entertain her? We don’t know any other young people except the local curate, nor do we go to social events. I could take her to church, but would she want to go? We worried that Juliette would be bored.”
I understood their view. As someone who also led a quiet life, I wouldn’t know what to do with a lively young woman thrust into the midst of my life either. I’d be quite nervous to suddenly play host to one.
“Why was she so insistent?” Oscar asked.
“She wrote that she wanted to get to know us better,” Mrs. Gordon said. “I am her late father’s sister, after all, so I suppose she hoped I could tell her more about him.”
Mrs. Buchanan rolled her eyes. “Juliette thought Edinburgh would be more interesting than Aberdeen. I don’t know how she got that into her head, but she suddenly thought life with me rather ordinary and hoped a change of scene would offer something more.”
“Suddenly?” Miss Wheeler prompted. “Did something happen to plant the idea in her head to come to Edinburgh?”
“What do you mean?”
“Did she meet someone who urged her to come, or did someone write to her?”
All three frowned at Miss Wheeler. “Write to her,” Mrs. Gordon echoed. “Are you suggesting my niece wanted to come to Edinburgh to meet someone? That she was carrying on a secret affair after her arrival, right under our noses?”
“Of course she’s not implying that,” her husband said. “Are you, Miss Wheeler?”
“Juliette snuck out of the house at dawn,” Miss Wheeler told him firmly.
“She didn’t sneak out. She went for a walk.”
“Without telling anyone? At dawn?”
He sank back into the sofa, rubbing his bearded jaw in thought.
Miss Wheeler turned to Mrs. Buchanan. “Did Juliette have a paramour in Aberdeen?”
Mrs. Buchanan teased the damp handkerchief between her fingers.
“No.” She blinked rapidly and suddenly looked down at her lap.
“She did receive more correspondence than usual of late. It was all from a particular friend but…I had my doubts. The writing on the envelope was masculine, and this friend had never written before. After the first letter, Juliette would pounce on the post when it arrived and immediately retreat to her room if she received anything.”
Mrs. Gordon twisted in her seat to regard her sister-in-law better. “What did the letters say?”
“I didn’t read them. They were private.”
“But if you suspected they were from a man and not her friend, why wouldn’t you read them? You could have stopped Juliette coming to Edinburgh.”
Mrs. Buchanan burst into tears. “Don’t you think I’ve realized that?”
Mrs. Gordon patted her sister-in-law’s shoulder, only for Mrs. Buchanan to jerk away. Mrs. Gordon snatched her hand back as if it had been slapped. “Are you suggesting someone wrote to Juliette in Aberdeen, lured her to Edinburgh, then lured her outside to the garden to kidnap her?”
“It’s a possibility,” Oscar said.
“There’s no evidence those letters are linked to her disappearance,” Mr. Gordon pointed out. “Indeed, there’s no evidence they even led her to come here.”
“Are the letters still in Aberdeen?” I asked Mrs. Buchanan.
She nodded as she dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief. “I left in such a hurry yesterday after receiving the telegram about Juliette’s disappearance that I didn’t make the connection with the letters until I arrived.”
“Juliette may have brought them,” Miss Wheeler said. “That’s what I’d do if the letter writer was dear to me.”
“The police have searched her room,” Mr. Gordon said. “As have we. No letters were found.”
“May we look?” Oscar asked. “Another search can’t hurt.”
“Of course,” both Mrs. Buchanan and Mrs. Gordon said. They studiously avoided looking at one another before Mrs. Gordon rose. “I’ll show you the way.”
We were joined by Mr. Gordon and Mrs. Buchanan, too. Fortunately, Juliette’s bedroom was a sizeable one and we comfortably fit. While Oscar and I searched under watchful gazes, Miss Wheeler continued to question them.
“We understand that Juliette had just discovered her magical powers.”
Mrs. Buchanan nodded. “She inherited it from my side, although I’m artless.”
Mrs. Gordon touched her brooch. “We didn’t know my sister-in-law’s family were magicians.”
“I didn’t know either,” Mrs. Buchanan snapped. “Not until recently. A cousin informed me that it ran in the family.”
“Her family was in trade,” Mrs. Gordon added.
“Three generations ago!” Mrs. Buchanan huffed, frustrated.
“My cousin told me a spell that he’d found in our grandmother’s things years ago.
He and I both tried it and nothing happened, but when Juliette spoke the words while holding a woolen hat, the fibers strengthened.
They became unbreakable. Neither a sharp pair of scissors nor a knife could cut them. She was excited by the discovery.”
“Indeed,” Mrs. Gordon said tightly. “Her first letter to us mentioned it. A lot.”
“Did she have any plans to use her magic?” Miss Wheeler asked.
“Use it how?” Juliette’s mother asked.
“To start a business, or work in a wool mill.”
Mr. Gordon wrinkled his nose. “Good lord, no. She’s a young lady, not a factory worker.”
“Some young ladies wish to work to earn their independence.”
“Not my daughter.” Mrs. Buchanan frowned then added, “Not that I know of.”
“She wasn’t in need of money,” Mrs. Gordon said. “My brother left his widow quite well-off.”
Mrs. Buchanan echoed her sister-in-law’s words. “Juliette didn’t need money.”
Miss Wheeler watched Oscar as he knelt on the floor in front of the fireplace and peered up the chimney. “Independence is not always about money,” she murmured, somewhat absently.
A distant clock chimed the hour. Mrs. Gordon touched her husband’s arm and gazed up at him. “I have to go. Will you change your mind, just this once, my dear? For Juliette?”
He shook his head and turned away. “Anything, Mr. Barratt?”
“Nothing, but we haven’t finished yet.” Oscar signaled for me to help him move a chest of drawers.
Mrs. Gordon sighed. “I’m going to the kirk. There’s a special service to pray for Juliette’s return. And for the maid, too.”
The tension between the three seemed to ratchet up a notch.
Ordinarily I’d mind my own business, but the situation was dire.
I was extremely worried about both missing women and if the tension had anything to do with the disappearances, I thought it best to crack that particular shell and see what spilled out.
After moving the chest of drawers, I dusted off my hands while Oscar inspected the floorboards where it had stood. “You’re not going with your wife, Mr. Gordon?” I asked.
“No.”
“My husband and I don’t share the same faith,” Mrs. Gordon said, her voice snippy, “and my sister-in-law is a heathen.”
Mrs. Buchanan threw up her hands. “I am not a heathen, as well you know. I attend service every Sunday back home, but I want to be here in case there’s news of Juliette.”
“If you put your trust in God, He will bring her home to us.”
Mrs. Buchanan gathered up her skirts. “I prefer to put my trust in the people investigating her disappearance.” She spun around with a snap of her skirts and strode out of the room.
A moment later, Mrs. Gordon left, too.
Miss Wheeler helped Oscar and I with the search, but we found nothing.
If Juliette brought the mysterious letters with her from Aberdeen, she must have kept them on her person.
The letters had to be behind Juliette’s desire to come to Edinburgh, I was quite sure of it.
The timing was too coincidental for it to be otherwise.
As we left the bedchamber with Mr. Gordon, I asked him if Juliette had met anyone since her arrival in Edinburgh.
“No,” he said. “She’d only been here two days.”
“Did she seem eager to go out? Did she often go for walks, for example?”
“Only the once before her kidnap, and not alone. The maid who accompanied her was questioned by us and the police and she assured us all that Juliette didn’t stop to speak to a soul. Why would she when she didn’t know anyone here except my wife and me?”
The footman known as Jack worked at a different house on Moray Place, according to Agnes, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t slipped messages to Juliette through a member of staff in this household. “Had she made friends with any of the servants?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he said, frowning. “Certainly not among our staff, anyway.”
“Are you suggesting she made friends with the staff of other households?” Oscar asked.
“I’m afraid I don’t know.”
“Presumably her maid was questioned about Juliette’s acquaintances.”
“She didn’t have her own maid. Two of the female staff shared the extra work that came with having a young lady in the house.
They’ve been questioned thoroughly by the police, as have the rest of the staff.
I assure you, they’d have been found out by now if they were in any way a party to the abduction. ”
We returned downstairs where Mr. Gordon told the butler to show us out. “Please don’t hesitate to ask more questions if you think of them,” he said. “We are all eager to have Juliette back.”
He returned upstairs while the butler led us to the front door. Mrs. Buchanan stood there, waiting, the damp handkerchief pressed to her nose.
“I’m sorry for leaving the room suddenly,” she told us.
“My sister-in-law’s zealotry tries my patience.
” Her face crumpled and she pressed the handkerchief to her mouth while she composed herself.
After drawing in a deep breath, she continued, “She believes prayer will bring Juliette back. I’m more pragmatic.
Anyway, I need to be here at the moment. ”
“We understand,” Miss Wheeler said gently. “Do you mind if I ask one more question?”
“Go ahead.”
“Do you know anyone named Jack?”
She blinked in surprise. “No one we’re particularly close to, and certainly no one with a close connection to Juliette. Why?”
“It’s a line of inquiry.”
Oscar addressed the butler who’d busied himself retrieving hats and gloves to allow us to speak to Mrs. Buchanan in private. “It’s Anderson, isn’t it? Can you account for your whereabouts at the time of Juliette’s abduction?”
“I was asleep in the room I’ve been sharing with the coachman since a leak rendered my bedchamber uninhabitable.
The floor creaks dreadfully and we are both light sleepers and would have heard if the other got out of bed.
Before you ask, there are no other male members of staff here.
The police have already asked this information, sir. ”
The testy response didn’t put Oscar off his interrogation. “Are you familiar with the footman named Jack who works at number eight?”
“No, sir.”
He opened the door for us, but Mrs. Buchanan had more to say. “I know you think Juliette ran off with a man.”
“It’s just a line of inquiry,” Miss Wheeler repeated.
“Yes, but…” Mrs. Buchanan tapped the damp handkerchief bunched in her fist against her chest. “My daughter was taken against her will. Perhaps she was lured outside by someone she was corresponding with, but she certainly didn’t leave the garden willingly with that person.”
“Why do you say that?”
“For one thing, there’s a witness who heard her cry out.
For another, she left this behind.” She removed a bundle of soft butter-yellow wool no bigger than my smallest finger from up her sleeve.
“It’s wool that was used to make the hair of her favorite doll when she was a child.
She keeps it with her, always, and has done so for years.
Even before she discovered she was a wool magician, she kept this in the pocket of the outfit she was wearing.
It’s her good luck charm. It may have fallen out of her pocket in a scuffle, but I think it’s more likely she left it behind for me to find, as a message, of sorts. ”
Oscar held out his palm. “May I?”
Mrs. Buchanan placed the bundle in his hand. He briefly touched it before giving it back. “There’s magic in it.”
“Oh,” she murmured through her tears.
Anderson handed hats and gloves to Oscar and me and gave Miss Wheeler her umbrella. We started to leave when Mrs. Buchanan grasped my arm.
“Please find my daughter,” she said, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
I wanted to promise her. I wanted very much to assure her Juliette would be found alive and well and be home by nightfall. But it wasn’t in my power to make such a promise. “We’ll do everything we can,” I said instead.
It felt woefully inadequate.
As we headed down the steps to the pavement, I was keenly aware that we were no closer to finding the two missing women. Not only that, I also couldn’t think where we should go next.
Fortunately, Oscar and Miss Wheeler had an idea. With nothing but an earnest look exchanged between them, they strode off along the pavement together.