Chapter Nineteen
Armed with Richard Harvey’s letter of introduction, Janey and Lenny arrived at Percy’s rooms off Piccadilly at about eleven o’clock in the morning.
The manservant, Darren, sniffed in a resentful kind of a way, but let them in. “Mr. Harvey wrote that I should expect you. I already spoke to Mr. Grey. Days ago.”
“We know,” Lenny said calmly. “But that was before we knew Mr. Percival was dead. Do you know where he kept his pistol?”
“His pistol?” Darren was clearly startled. “In his bedchamber, usually. But he took it with him when he traveled, so I doubt it’s there.”
He led the way through a good-sized sitting room and opened the door on the right, going straight to the small desk beneath the window. He pulled open the top-middle drawer and rummaged.
He straightened. “It isn’t there.”
“Would you mind if we looked around?” Janey asked cheerfully.
It was a rhetorical question, for Lenny was already going through the open drawer more thoroughly. Darren looked for a moment as though he would object on principle, then he simply threw up his hands and walked away.
“Have you taken anything out of these drawers?” Lenny called after him. “Or from anywhere else, come to that?”
Darren swung back to face them, his expression one of offended dignity.
“As Mr. Harvey, senior, instructed, I have removed several monogrammed handkerchiefs and jewelry, which I shall carry to Channing House tomorrow when I attend the funeral. I believe they are intended for Mrs. Harvey. Mr. Harvey himself will see to any papers and other personal property. The clothes will be given to Mr. Percival’s favorite charity. ”
“What is that?” Janey asked. “His favorite charity?”
“I have no idea. Mr. Percival did not discuss such matters with me.” On that lofty utterance, the valet made his exit.
Janey opened the wardrobe door and felt all around the empty shelves, and inside the shoes and boots that were lined up along the bottom.
Percy’s clothes had already been packed away into two open trunks, so kneeling beside them, Janey went methodically through everything.
By the time she had finished, Lenny was searching beneath the mattress of the stripped bed without a great deal of hope.
They moved through to the sitting room. Lenny shook out the few journals on the shelves, while Janey went through another desk and its drawers and compartments, finding nothing but bills and demands for payments, plus a couple of letters from his mother and some notes from friends about dinners and theatre parties. No love letters.
On top of the desk were a few cards of invitation to London soirees and balls. And beneath the ink stand, a notebook. This seemed more promising, though when she opened it, she found only rows of figures in columns.
“Lenny? Can you make head or tail of this? Is it his living expenses? Makes my eyes water if it is. Who needs to spend that kind of money?”
He came over and took the book from her. “No one. In this case, I expect it took him a few years. I think these are debts.”
She believed him. Lenny ran his own carpentry business and understood figures. “Lummy. My eyes are still watering.”
“I think his were too,” Lenny said. “It looks to me as if he was finally trying to work out exactly what he owed to whom. Perhaps he was making an effort to get his affairs in order.”
“Or working out what he needed to borrow to get debtors off his back?” Janey suggested. “The shady fellow that herself was asking about and Tulip knows—Henry Hope—does a bit a moneylending by all accounts, and he ain’t the man to welch on. Comes round and breaks your legs.”
“Maybe that’s why Percy went home. He’d borrowed the money already and wasn’t making his payments?
” He flipped over some more empty pages.
“There’s nothing here to show that he did or didn’t.
Just a list of debts that look long-standing—a list of initials with several figures for each, all added up.
Would this shady moneylender really have this kind of sum to lend?
And would he lend to such a bad risk as Percy? ”
“There ain’t no risk,” Janey said. “’Cause Percy’d have sold his soul and had to pay for the rest of his life. As well as get his legs broken.”
Lenny raised his eyes slowly from the book.
He had beautiful eyes, did Lenny, intelligent and quick, and layered with the tragedy of his past, when he had annoyed the wrong people and been reduced to living in a dangerous slum, where the roof had collapsed and killed several people, including his wife and child.
Lenny battled his own demons, as she fought hers. But she thought they were both winning.
He wasn’t smiling, though. “Or get killed?”
Janey caught her breath. “As an example? Jesus, I never thought of that.”
“Find anything?” Darren asked from the doorway.
“No pistol,” Lenny replied. “Tell me, did you get paid for your services to young Mr. Harvey?”
“Yes.” For a moment, Darren’s nostrils flared with disdain, then his lips twisted. “When he remembered.”
“Or when he happened to be in funds before he lost it all again?” Janey suggested.
“Something like that,” Darren admitted.
“What’s your first name?” Lenny asked.
Darren blinked. “Alfred. Why?”
“I think you’re listed in this book of debts: AD. He hadn’t forgotten about you.”
“His father will cough up the quarter’s pay,” Darren said gruffly. “That’ll do till I get another position.”
“We’re going to take the book,” Janey said. “I’ll write you a receipt for it, though.”
When they left the building, Lenny offered her his arm, as he often did, just as though she were a lady. Or at least respectable. It still gave her a thrill to touch him, to walk with him.
“I think,” Lenny said, “I have to track down Hope the shady moneylender. Mrs. Grey asked us to, after all.”
“You ain’t going alone, Lenny Knox, so never think it.”
“I’m certainly not taking you with me.”
“Lenny, I know these kinds of people. I grew up with them. You’ll never even find him without me, and if you do, you’ll likely wind up as dead as Percy Harvey. We go together, and that way we might stay alive.”
*
Dr. Owens breezed into Solomon’s temporary bedchamber not long after nine o’clock in the morning.
He seemed to be in a rather better frame of mind, so Constance made the most of it, flattering his care of Solomon’s wound—which the doctor pronounced clean and doing well—and the neatness of his stitches.
“Are you the only doctor in Channing?” she asked artlessly as he applied fresh ointment to Solomon’s head and reached for a fresh dressing. “I don’t wonder you are always so busy.”
“There is another physician in the town, but I am still more favored by the respectable families.”
By which she understood he meant the wealthy families.
“But you also have poorer patients,” she reminded him. “Because I know you were in that part of town the day Percy Harvey came home.”
Owens’s lips thinned slightly, though he merely nodded and began winding the bandage around Solomon’s head.
I wonder if you were there at all, Constance thought. And if you weren’t…
Solomon clearly had the same thought, for he said, “Perhaps you saw the vicar there that day.”
“I may have noticed his carriage standing in the street,” Owens muttered. “I can’t quite recall. I often see it while he is visiting his flock, so the occasions don’t stand out. Not when one is busy.”
“Of course, it is a large area to cover for one man,” Constance said sympathetically. “But perhaps your daughter is able to help to some degree?”
“Of course she does. She keeps my appointment book, delivers medicines on occasion, visits a few of my convalescing patients, that kind of thing. And, of course, she keeps house for me.”
“Which will stand her in good stead when she marries,” Constance said. “Although you are bound to miss her terribly when she does.”
“Every father must prepare himself for such an event.”
“Is it imminent?” Constance asked bluntly.
Owens hesitated. “There is little opportunity for her to meet eligible suitors. But I have hopes.”
Constance smiled expectantly, catching and holding his gaze, but he said no more, merely tied off the bandage and rose to his feet.
“Unless you see any signs of infection, you should not need me again. Just change the dressing each morning. A doctor will have to remove the stitches, of course, in a week or so, but I imagine you will have returned to London by then. Good day!”
“Interesting,” Solomon murmured as the doctor’s footsteps faded away. “Did he invent seeing the vicar’s carriage to make us believe in his presence in that part of town?”
“Maybe. We couldn’t find any patient visited by the doctor that day, could we? Though our search was hardly exhaustive. But if Percy was annoying Penelope too, getting in the way of her marriage prospects with Everett…”
“We need to talk to Penelope. And to Everett.” Solomon threw back the covers and began to climb out of bed. Constance hurried to steady him, but he showed no signs of unbalancing.
“Back to Channing House first to change,” she suggested. “And then perhaps you should rest while I visit our suspects.”
She saw him bite back his words and knew that whether or not it was good for his health, he would insist on accompanying her.
*
At Channing House, something of a surprise awaited them. The butler directed them straight to Harvey’s study, where a familiar figure arose from one of the armchairs.
“Inspector Harris!” Constance exclaimed, going to him with her hand held out. “How do you do?”
“I sent to Scotland Yard yesterday,” Harvey said with a shade of anxiety, as though his action might have offended them. “I felt I had to as soon as I heard of this new shooting. How are you, old fellow? Are you sure you should be up and about?”
“It’s really no more than a graze,” Solomon said cheerfully, pausing to shake hands with Harris. “I’m pretty much recovered. The bullet only grazed my temple, so I have nothing more to worry about than a bit of a headache.”
“Sit down, sit down,” Harvey urged. “Did you see who did it?”