Chapter 16
Sixteen
It was end of the workday at the MET, but I was informed that Mr. Dooley was still there. He eventually appeared, his face lined with fatigue. Still, he looked with some amusement at Rupert, who lay at my feet.
“I see that you persuaded the desk officer to allow the hound,” he commented.
“He persuaded the desk officer,” I replied. “He does have a particular dislike for someone ordering another person about.”
“I know it well,” he replied. “What is it brings ye here, Lady Forsythe?” That strong Irish accent seemed particularly strong, along with the weariness.
I explained briefly what I had learned on behalf of Lady Ellsworth.
“Has he been questioned about the night his brother was murdered?” I then inquired.
“He spoke of an early meeting between the brothers, then he left.”
I described what I had discovered at Sir Anthony’s residence that afternoon.
“There might be any explanation for it,” he pointed out.
He was right, of course. I’d had that same conversation with myself.
“What are ye suggestin’, Lady Forsythe?”
The truth was, I didn’t know—a feeling, intuition as Brodie had pointed out in the past.
He nodded. “I’ll go round meself first thing of the mornin’, and then have a chat with Sir Anthony about the matter. He’s no doubt taken himself off to his private club or possibly an acquaintance.”
I thanked him.
I did appreciate that he was willing to satisfy that nagging little voice, whatever it was.
After leaving the Yard, I had Mr. Jarvis return to the office.
While I had not been to the townhouse the past days, there were notes to be added to the chalkboard. I still hoped to hear from Brodie, and...
It was the ‘and’ part of it.
After the loss of our residence at Mayfair to fire, the office seemed more like home than Cadogan Square, which was only a temporary replacement.
The office on the Strand with the adjacent bedchamber was where we first worked together after my sister’s disappearance. Where we often stayed over, working late on a case or when it was easier to remain due to weather.
The bottom floor had once been a tea shop, then was vacant for some time according to Brodie.
He had taken the second-floor space for an office when he left the MET and began taking private inquiry cases.
It was plain when I first inquired about his services. A desk, chair, the coal stove, and the bed in the adjacent room, rather than taking a flat somewhere.
There were changes since. A carpet against the cold on the floor, a bathing chamber attached to the bedchamber. A cold box for food that Mr. Cavendish brought back from the Public House. And the lift, in addition to the stairs from the street below.
Simple improvements that Brodie had grumbled about the cost of, in keeping with his Scots upbringing and other things.
And...then the deed to the building that my great-aunt had insisted upon, that made him an owner of property. He had been taken back by the gesture. Only one other time had I known him to be overcome in that same way, yet different...
Now a habit of the past several years, as I stepped down from the coach, Mr. Cavendish rolling up the sidewalk on his platform as the hound jumped down, and a glance up at the office. A habit, and yet...
Far more than the townhouse at Cadogan Square or my residence at Mayfair, this felt like home once more, along with the man my great-aunt had described in her usual manner.
“A man who could make my toes tingle.”
I had not asked how she came by that bit of knowledge.
I did not have to ask now, as Mr. Cavendish gave me the morning newspaper and mail from the day before.
“There’s been no word, miss.”
“And how is Miss Effie today?” I inquired as I tucked the paper and mail into my bag.
“Right as the rain,” he replied.
“In other words, you apologized.”
He squinted up at me. “Aye, that would be the way of it.”
“Good man.”
“It’s painful, though.”
“How is that?”
“Havin’ to admit that I might have been wrong in the matter.”
“Might have?”
“I would swear the woman might have been a redhead as a young woman.”
“Oh?”
“No offense, miss. But Mr. Brodie has said that ye can have a fierce temper about things. She’s the same. It takes a mite gettin’ used to.”
I bit back the laughter that came over me until I reached the office, considering the gravity of the matter.
“Oh my,” I exclaimed as I set my bag on Brodie’s desk. I didn’t realize how much I needed that.
I took supper at the Public House that evening and shared a smile with Miss Effie.
“Ornery old sea dog,” she commented as she brought my supper. Still, there was a smile.
“But he’s a good man, and capable of learning. Who would have thought?”
I returned to the office with a carton of food for Rupert. Mr. Cavendish then made his way to the Public House.
There was still no word from Brodie.
I spent the remainder of evening making additional notes and going back over everything I had learned. I worked late, aware that Mr. Cavendish returned when the hound lifted his head, then lowered it and dozed once more.
I retired for the night very near midnight, then lay awake for two more hours when I never had difficulty sleeping.
I had got along perfectly well sleeping quite soundly in the past on my travels and adventures aboard a rolling ship, on a train as it jolted and lurched, and in a tent in the desert with the wind blowing everything about.
Yet here in a quiet and familiar place, I lay awake unable to sleep...
The jangling of the telephone wakened me. Light streamed in through the bedroom window as I made my way to the office. It was Inspector Dooley.
“I’ve made arrangements to call on the residence with an officer from the Yard. I might well regret this, but he has said that you can be like a dog with a bone. And you have been known to step a bit over the line in the past.”
I assumed he meant Brodie, as I had heard that before. As for stepping over the line, that did depend on where the line was.
“One o’clock this afternoon at the townhouse. And yer not to arrive before.”
Of course, I thought, as the call ended.
Perhaps Brodie would have returned by then.
I have never been good at waiting. He has said that it must have something to do with being a woman, or possibly a ‘dog with a bone,’ worrying a thing until something happens.
I could have taken offense at that. However, he was quite right, whereas he had the patience of a saint that undoubtedly had something to do with having served with the MET as an inspector.
“There are times ye have to wait for the animal to step into the trap,” he had told me more than once.
I told myself it was highly unlikely we would discover anything at Sir Anthony’s residence. It was possible, though unlikely by the amount of mail that had collected, that he might have returned.
The question then—where was he staying if not at the townhouse? At his club, as Mr. Dooley suggested? Or with a woman? And what reason to let correspondence simply continue to add to the growing pile?
I let Rupert out, dressed, then put coal on in the stove and set a pot of coffee. As the business hour approached, I placed a call to Crofts Bank, ignoring that inner voice that said I was being like a dog with a bone.
Once again, I was informed that Sir Anthony was not available.
It was well ahead of the time I was to meet Mr. Dooley when I donned my coat, then tucked my umbrella into my bag and took the lift to the sidewalk below.
Mr. Cavendish was not about.
I found a driver and gave him the address for Crofts on Fleet Street.
And once again asked to see Sir Anthony when I approached the clerk dressed in the costume of a head butler.
I gave him my full name. I informed him that it was regarding investments for my great-aunt, Lady Antonia Montgomery, and that I would only speak with Sir Anthony.
It had helped in the past to use her name, a woman who was wealthier than the Queen and knew people who knew people.
“I apologize, Lady Forsythe. I am told that Sir Anthony had not yet arrived for the day. Might someone else perhaps assist you?” the attendant informed me when he returned.
Still had not returned. What did it mean?
I thanked him but declined to meet with anyone else, then left Crofts.
I found another driver and gave him the address for Sir Anthony’s residence near St. James’s.
We arrived in a timely manner. Mr. Dooley and a constable were already there.
“It does seem as if Sir Anthony has taken some time away,” Mr. Dooley commented after observing the mail just as I had left it the day before.
“And there don’t seem to be any servants about,” he added. “We’ll take a look about the street and to the back of the residence. No need for you to come along.”
They both departed.
I am not good at waiting.
As they were gone quite some time, I retrieved the lock pick from my bag, then proceeded to pick the lock.
It was an expensive lock, not the sort found in flats at the tenements, with a double set of tumblers that Brodie had told me about. I worked slowly through one set of tumblers, then past the mechanism for the second set and one by one...
The lock opened and the door as well, as Mr. Dooley returned.
“Lady Forsythe...”
“Were you able to find anything?”
“Nothing out of the ordinary other than an empty waste bin, and what are you about here?” He glanced past me.
“There are some, perhaps Sir Anthony, who would consider this unlawful trespass,” he pointed out.
“As for unlawful, I was merely assisting as a consultant to the police. And as you can well see I have not trespassed at all, merely assisted. Would you care for me to lock the door once more so that we may begin again? It is much more efficient than breaking the glass or the door,” I added.
He shook his head and called to the constable who had accompanied him. “You will remain, Mr. Hodge. I will see what is to be learned.” He entered the foyer of the town house.
I smiled at Constable Hodge, then followed.
Whatever I might have expected was far different from what we found when we stepped inside. The town house had been completely turned out.
Broken furniture, paintings scattered to the floor, and broken fixtures, along with bottles of wine and brandy shattered, the contents spilled about the parlor with frightening precision.
The dining room across the hall had fared no better, china and crystal shattered, the dining table overturned, damask fabric on the chairs sliced and shredded, a cabinet overturned.
“Sir,” the man he had brought with him stood in the entrance to the dining room. They spoke in quiet tones.
Mr. Dooley returned. “It is the same in the rooms upstairs. I will call for additional men to find out what happened here. Your driver is still here?”
I nodded, trying to make sense of it all, trying to understand how this fit with what I already knew. It didn’t. Not at all.
“You must leave, Lady Forsythe. I will have Constable Hodge escort you back to your coach.”
It wasn’t necessary, as I left with a last look about at the chaos in the dining room and then the parlor.
It wasn’t the sort of thing I had seen before, someone frantically searching for something in every drawer.
This was different, the furnishings destroyed as well, paintings slashed and stripped from the walls. Methodical, with purpose as if someone was determined to destroy everything.
Mr. Cavendish met me as I returned.
“This arrived after you left.”
It was a telegram, sent overnight from Paris.
I tore it open and pulled out the telegram. It was from Brodie.
I read it, then read it once more. The message was cryptic and urgent.
There was no explanation, only that I must stop my inquiries until his return.
Something had happened.
It had been several days since I had last seen him and now a request that began with that word that had a warning—urgent.
Brodie was not one to make idle comments. Something had happened that had caused him to send that telegram. But what had that to do with my inquiries into Thomas Ellsworth’s murder, and when would he return?
“There was nothing more?” I inquired. “No other telegram?”
Something that might explain what this was about.
“No, miss,” Mr. Cavendish replied.
Up in the office, I stared at the chalkboard.
Lady Eugenia hadn’t seen or spoken to Sir Anthony since the funeral for his brother.
I supposed that wasn’t unusual. She was grieving the tragic loss of her grandson.
I could only imagine the strength and determination it had taken for her to make that call on my great-aunt, then request that I make inquiries into the brutal crime that had taken Thomas’s life.
Yet, my inquiries had taken me in different directions with answers, if at all, that still made no sense.
Sir Anthony’s reluctance to meet. It might easily be explained by that same tragic event, an unwillingness to discuss something very painful.
His absence from Crofts. Again, that could be explained by his brother’s death and a respectful mourning period.
Still, there were other things I had learned from Edward Baldwin that were part of this as well.
A long-standing difficulty between the brothers that went back to their childhood.
A father’s favoritism for one son over another, Thomas’s choice to attend a different university, with that small exclusive club of the Three Musketeers to set right injustices from others.
The pursuit of a career far different from Sir Anthony that had set even more distance between the brothers.
The arranged marriage of the woman Thomas cared deeply for to the brother whose shadow he had lived in his entire life, followed then by her death.
Resentments and arguments through the years, a painful loss, a tragic death. And what I had discovered at Sir Anthony’s townhouse with Mr. Dooley.
I returned to Brodie’s desk and stared down at the telegram he’d sent.
What had this to do with the inquiries I had been making, that so far had only led to more questions?
As I continued to stare at that telegram, there was someone who could tell me more.
I locked the office, returned to the street below, and waved down a driver.
“Miss?” Mr. Cavendish inquired. “If Mr. Brodie should return, what should I tell him?”
Bloody hell!
I could almost hear his response when he learned where I had gone.
“Ye have a habit, Mikaela Forsythe, of takin’ yerself off where ye should not! “And I suppose it is my fault that ye disobeyed me.”
Of course, dear man, I thought. If he was there, it wouldn’t be necessary for me to go to the Home Office.
Mr. Cavendish made a sound that could only be disapproval.
“You best take the hound with you then,” he reminded me. “He wouldn’t want ye out and about without the lad.” He let out a long shrill whistle.
Rupert appeared from his latest turn about the street with a bone hanging out of his mouth. I did hope someone on the Strand hadn’t gone missing a leg.
“Come along, you foul beast,” Mr. Cavendish told him.
The driver had arrived, and Rupert immediately leapt inside the coach with the bone.
I gave the driver instructions for the Home Office.