Chapter 10 #3
He leaned back, elbow resting on the chair arm, and stroked his top lip with his finger. “You’ve made progress. Well done. I knew you would.”
“I haven’t solved it yet, but I do need your help.”
“I ought to start charging you.”
“Or you could just agree to make me your partner and we can halve the fee.”
He laughed. “You don’t give up, do you?”
“It’s an annoying habit, so I’ve been told.” I opened my purse. “Since you won’t agree to become my partner, yet, I’m happy to pay you for your time.”
He shook his head when I tried to hand him some money. “Put it away, Miss Fox. That was a joke. I don’t want payment for accompanying you when you speak to dubious characters. What kind of man do you take me for?”
“One who thinks I’m attacking his pride.” I dropped the money back into my purse. “I don’t want you to accompany me anywhere, this time. I want your opinion.”
My retort about his pride had stung him into silence and I wished I could take it back. Sometimes I needed to check myself before saying whatever came into my head.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled. “But I really do want your opinion on something. Two things, actually. As someone who worked in a luxury hotel for many years, I think you can offer a unique and valuable perspective.”
“Apology accepted. There’s no need to lay it on too thickly.”
I gave him a withering glare. “I wasn’t.
” I adjusted my position in the chair, suddenly feeling uncomfortable as he stared back at me.
“It’s about Lady Rumford. Two separate people have now mentioned seeing her, one at the opera, the other at the theater.
But she isn’t staying at any of the premier hotels.
Lord Rumford doesn’t have a London residence, so she must be staying somewhere. ”
“With a friend?”
“But wouldn’t Lord Rumford have been informed by that friend?”
“A friend to her, but not to him, perhaps.”
That was certainly a possibility, although it seemed odd that no one seemed to know where to find her. “If she was staying with a friend, wouldn’t she have caught up with other friends while in London? So far, we only have the occasional secretive sighting, which is causing everyone to gossip.”
He steepled his fingers and tapped his thumbs together. “There’s one other possibility. Something that, if true, means she doesn’t want her friends to know she’s here.”
“Because she came to London to commit murder.” I sat forward. “Go on.”
“She could be staying at a hotel under an assumed name.”
“I suppose she could. If she came here with the intention of killing Pearl, she wouldn’t check in using her own name. That’s a brilliant deduction, Mr. Armitage.”
“For what it’s worth, I think you’re barking up the wrong tree.”
I looked up. “Why?”
“If she killed Pearl, she’d be foolish not to leave London immediately. But even more importantly, what does she gain by killing her?”
“The removal of her rival for her husband’s love, of course.”
He humphed.
“What’s so amusing?” I asked, defensive.
“You. I hadn’t pegged you as a romantic.”
I wasn’t sure if he meant it as an offense or not, so I remained silent.
“You said there were two things you wanted to discuss with me,” he went on. “What’s the second?”
I told him what I’d seen and heard on the stairs and in the hotel foyer last night. He listened attentively, a small crease forming across his forehead. But not for the reason I suspected.
“Why are you here, Miss Fox?” he asked when I finished.
I blinked. “To tell you about the man who appeared to be paying Mr. Hirst and the night porter.”
“You have no evidence of any wrongdoing, just suspicions and speculation. Added to which, you could have taken your suspicions and speculation to my uncle.”
I bristled. “Next time, I will. I just thought you would be interested in investigating it further. I see I’m wrong. And anyway, my other reason for coming was to ask your opinion about Lady Rumford. You were actually quite helpful in that regard.”
“You would have worked that out yourself. Or, again, talked it through with my uncle. He has more experience when it comes to hotel guests than me.” He sat forward and crossed his arms on the desk. His smile was positively wicked.
Something inside me flipped. He’d managed to unnerve me with one little smile. I wasn’t sure I liked it.
“So why did you come here, Miss Fox?”
“I’m no longer sure.”
He laughed softly.
“Are you making fun of me?”
He put up his hands in surrender. “I wouldn’t dare.”
I stood. “Good day, Mr. Armitage. Thank you for your assistance.” I turned and walked out.
How had that meeting deteriorated so quickly? Mr. Armitage was being deliberately provocative and I couldn’t fathom why. We’d been getting along well, and I’d hoped we could become friends. Clearly he had no interest in doing so if he was going to sabotage our fledgling friendship like that.
I put Mr. Armitage from my mind and considered my next step in the investigation.
I needed to narrow down my suspects. There were too many.
Jealousy and hurt over a possible rejection were looking like strong motives for a number of my suspects, both former and current lovers, their wives and even Pearl’s understudy, Dotty Clare.
Both Lord and Lady Wrexham and Mr. Culpepper had known Pearl for several years, and someone who might be able to give me a better insight to those older relationships would be Pearl’s sister.
She claimed she didn’t know Pearl all that well anymore, but she must have an opinion on the people from Pearl’s past.
I fished out the paper on which she’d written her address from my purse.
I wasn’t sure of the area so I caught a hansom.
Some fifteen minutes later, the driver deposited me at the entrance to a court surrounded on three sides by indistinguishable tenements.
Small children played a chasing game and a woman hung out washing, although I couldn’t see how it would dry in this weather.
I nodded at her as I passed and felt her gaze on me as I approached Millie, sitting on a stoop. The little girl was humming to herself and staring straight ahead, her body rocking to the rhythm of her tune.
“Good morning, Millie,” I said.
She stopped humming and lifted her face, although she didn’t look directly at me.
“Do you remember me? I’m Miss Fox. I met you at your aunt’s home.”
She began humming again.
“Is your mother inside?”
“You won’t get no answers from her,” the woman said from the washing line. “She’s not deaf, she just don’t talk much. If it’s Mrs. Larsen you’re after, she’s inside.”
“Thank you.” I knocked and, as I waited, thought of a question for the neighbor. “Did you ever see Mrs. Larsen’s sister here?”
“The actress? Aye, I saw her at Christmas. She only ever came Christmastime.”
“How did she seem?”
The woman shrugged. “Fine to me, but I only caught a glimpse. She was real pretty, and so fancy looking with her fur coat and matching hat.”
The door opened and Mrs. Larsen smiled in greeting. “This is a surprise.”
“I want to ask you some questions about Pearl.”
“Come in.” She clicked her tongue at Millie, blocking the way. “Let Miss Fox past.”
Millie continued to hum and didn’t move.
“Millicent! Move!” She rapped Millie’s shoulder with the back of her hand and Millie shifted to the side.
I squeezed past her.
“Forgive me, but I’ll have to receive you in the kitchen.
We’re having some work done in the parlor.
” She led me along the corridor, past closed doors and the staircase, until we reached the warm kitchen.
A pie baking in the oven filled the entire house with its delicious smell.
“You remember my husband from the funeral?”
Mr. Larsen stood. He nodded at me before gathering up the boot he’d been fixing along with his tools, and left.
“He’s a man of few words,” Mrs. Larsen said, somewhat self-consciously. “Tea?”
“Thank you, that’s very kind.”
I sat and watched her fill teacups from the teapot warming on the stove.
The kitchen was a sizable one with a large central table that Mrs. Larsen had been using as a place to knead dough.
A large pie had been set aside, ready to be baked in the oven when the other one finished.
It was too much food for the family of three.
Perhaps Mrs. Larsen baked them for neighbors or sold them.
On the wall above the table was a shelf full of neatly labeled jars and above them hung a wooden cross.
A pink glass vase stood empty by the window, as if waiting for the first signs of spring to fill it with flowers.
It was a very pretty vase and looked out of place in the drab kitchen.
It was more to Pearl’s taste than her sister’s.
Mrs. Larsen must have taken it from the flat that day I’d met her there. I wondered what else she’d removed, and how much of it she’d already sold.
She handed me a cup and saucer. “I’m so sorry, but I don’t have cake today.”
“It’s very good of you to receive me. I do apologize for calling on you without notice.”
“How may I help you?”
“What can you tell me about Pearl’s—Nellie’s—prior relationships? The ones before Lord Rumford came on the scene. And the ones during.”
Her lips pinched. This wasn’t a conversation she wanted to have. “I know very little. As I told you, my sister and I weren’t close. She rarely confided in me.”
“What do you know?”
“She was with another lord before Rumford. I can’t recall his name.
She didn’t like him much, and when I asked her why she would ruin her reputation over someone she didn’t like, she got angry with me.
She told me she needed him if she was to get anywhere in life.
” She stared down at the teacup, held in both her hands.
“Nellie wasn’t satisfied with the life she had.
She wanted more glamor, more amusement. She hated being bored so she’d make trouble, just to entertain herself. ”
“What kind of trouble?”
“All kinds. Like seeing one man when she already had another.”
“For example…?”
She regarded me over the teacup. “You said it yourself. You wanted to know about the man or men she saw while she was seeing Rumford.”
“Can you give me their names?”
She contemplated her tea. “I don’t like naming names. I’m not a gossip. But you should ask that theater manager. They were close.”
“Close enough to be jealous of her seeing other men?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
I let her mull that over for a few moments, but when she didn’t elaborate, I decided to change tack. “Did Nellie ever mention the wives of her benefactors?”
She snorted. “If Nellie cared about them, she never showed it.”
“You don’t think she considered their feelings?”
“No. It’s not all her fault, mind. The lords have to take some of the blame.
Most of it, I suppose.” She sighed and put down the teacup.
“Nellie just did what came naturally to her. She flirted and smiled her way through life, taking all she could while she could. I suppose one of her lovers ended her life out of jealousy.” She shook her head sadly. “So very, very selfish.”
I wasn’t sure if she was referring to Pearl or the murderer.
Silence weighed heavily on us, each of us lost in our thoughts. It was only broken by Millie’s humming.
The girl approached along the corridor, her hand running along the wall. She stopped when she reached the kitchen. “I’m hungry.”
“Not now, Millie, we have a guest.”
Millie seemed to consider this. “Will I eat at school?”
Mrs. Larsen clicked her tongue. “Enough! I’m tired of hearing about that place.” She took her daughter’s shoulders and turned her around to face the corridor. “Go back outside.” When Millie didn’t move, she gave her a little shove. “Go!”
Humming to herself, Millie headed off.
“She seems a content child,” I said.
“She’s simple.” Mrs. Larsen sat down again. “Simple children are often content.”
“Is that why she’s going to school at a young age? I hear that can be good for children who have difficulty learning, to give them the best start. How old is she?”
“Four this March.”
She didn’t answer my other question, and I wondered if she was sensitive about Millie being slower to develop compared to other children her age. But that wasn’t what intrigued me about the girl.
I put down my teacup and watched Mrs. Larsen very carefully. I wanted to see every flicker of her lashes, every flinch, when I said what was on my mind. “She looks like her mother.”
Mrs. Larsen’s gaze sharpened and a muscle in her cheek twitched. “We have the same shaped face, and I was blonde too, at her age.”
The twitch gave me enough of a hint that I was onto something with my line of questioning. I pushed forward, even though it was one of the most uncomfortable questions I’d ever asked anyone. “She’s Nellie’s daughter, isn’t she?”
She almost dropped the teacup. It clattered in the saucer. “She’s my child. If she weren’t, do you think I’d keep her? I’d give her back to her mother, even if that mother was my own fool of a sister.”
Her harsh words did not sound like a mother’s.
Or, rather, they didn’t sound like a loving mother’s words.
There was a ring of truth to them, however.
I couldn’t imagine Mrs. Larsen taking in a simple child that was not her own.
She didn’t seem to have a kind enough heart for it.
That destroyed the theory brewing ever since seeing Millie walk down the corridor—that Pearl had asked for her daughter back and Mrs. Larsen had killed her to stop her taking Millie.
“I’m sorry for asking,” I said. “I must look at all possibilities.”
Mrs. Larsen’s lips pursed. “More tea, Miss Fox?”
“No. I must go.” I rose and saw myself out.
Mr. Larsen stood by a cart with Millie sitting on the back of it.
He was teaching her a clapping game which required her to copy him then add something to the sequence, which he then repeated.
He had a lot of patience and Millie quickly picked up the rhythm.
A moment later, she’d changed it to something equally rhythmic yet different.
He smiled at her then caught sight of me. He nodded. I nodded back and left the court behind.
A few minutes ago, I’d had two potential candidates for Millie’s father, based on her age—Lord Wrexham and Mr. Culpepper. After watching Mr. Larsen with her, I now had a third.
Despite Mrs. Larsen’s protests, I was absolutely convinced that she didn’t give birth to Millie. Her sister had. But for some reason, Pearl—Nellie—couldn’t, or wouldn’t, raise her.