Chapter Six
Lady Mary
“I don’t believe my eyes.” I stared at the building before me, my mouth gaping.
Ernest had stopped the carriage across the street from The Red Chemise, and in front of a modest one story office building.
A small bakehouse was on one side of the building and a haberdashery on the other.
And right betwixt the two was the home of the London Society for Morality and Decency, the name of the organization painted in neat letters above the office’s blue door.
I’d known the society had kept an office, but I’d had no idea where.
Of course, it would be across from the one place I would least want the president of the morality society to see me enter.
The neighborhood was slightly worn but the denizens tried to keep it neat.
A neighborhood where a toff wouldn’t feel degraded to visit, but where none of his acquaintances were likely to see him.
The perfect place for a brothel for men of a certain status.
And I just knew my adversary had chosen his office space across from a den of sin intentionally.
I stepped lightly around my coach, hoping the man in question wasn’t looking out his office window.
He was not. He was standing by my rear axle, a loaf of bread in one hand and a shocked expression on his face. “Lady Mary! You are the last person I would expect to find in this neighborhood. Have you come to see me?”
I blew out a low breath, my stomach twisting.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Ryder.” I forced a smile up at him.
He was a tall man, with an attractive face and bearing, one that had always seemed at odds to me with his person.
It didn’t seem right that a moralizer who had planted himself in opposition to me should look so kind.
“I must confess my ignorance that your little society was located here. I’m here to visit someone else. ”
Mr. Enoch Ryder and his morality society had led a campaign to shutter the doors of my Minerva Club.
He’d had a misconception about the activities that took place under my roof.
Our relationship had ebbed from the active hostility his attack on my club had engendered to a wary détente.
I didn’t think my reason for being in this neighborhood would endear me to the man.
He tucked his bread under one arm and offered me the other. “Let me escort you to your destination.”
I flapped my hand, my reticule swinging heavily. I should have left the can of preserved food in the carriage. “No need. It isn’t far.”
“I insist.” He waggled his arm and grinned, the smile crinkling his milk-chocolate eyes and deepening the laugh lines around his mouth.
My stomach spiraled to the ground. Unfortunately, this man was a match to me in determination. If he meant to escort me to my destination, I saw no way to dissuade him.
“Very well.” I tried not to sound churlish. I took his arm. “I am heading just there.” I nodded to the brothel.
He hesitated. “Surely not.”
“Surely so.” Well, if I couldn’t stop the man from knowing my destination, I may as well delight in his discomfiture. “There is a woman there I wish to speak with.”
He sighed but led me across the street. “This has something to do with the man who died on your doorstep, doesn’t it?
” At my surprised glance, he nodded. “Yes, it is much talked about. The Times might not have mentioned you by name, but someone in the magistrate’s office must have let it slip. Tongues will wag.”
I pressed my lips together. Wagging tongues were the least of my problems. “The victim, Mr. Trent, is said to have had a liaison with a woman who works here.” I raised my walking stick and rapped smartly on the brothel’s front door. “I was told the affair didn’t end amicably.”
Mr. Ryder removed his hat, the sun glinting off the silver threaded through his golden-brown hair. “Just because a man dies near your house—”
“At my house,” I corrected.
“—doesn’t mean it is your responsibility to discover what happened to him. Can you not for once leave the matter to the authorities?”
The door swinging open saved me from a tart response. I pasted my most businesslike smile on my face and turned to the man.
If he was the owner of the establishment, he made a poor showing of it. His brown suit was rumpled, his cravat loosely knotted and askew. I peered closely. And a bit of egg had dried in his beard.
I drew my shoulders back. “I’ve come to speak with one of your workers. A Miss Margaret Rogerson.”
The man eyed Mr. Ryder and me with suspicion. “She don’t work fer me.”
“This gentleman is employed here. As steward.” Mr. Ryder cleared his throat. “The manager of the establishment is a woman, a Mrs. McKendrick.”
“A woman who doesn’t have time for your nonsense,” a voice called from down the hall.
It was followed up by an older woman with unnaturally dark hair and a bosom I could have served tea upon.
“As I told you last month, and the month before that, my girls have no interest in your type of saving, Mr. Ryder.”
“It would be honest work,” he protested. “I know the manager of the factory personally, and he treats his workers with respect.”
“Rubbing their hands raw making soap for pence a day.” Mrs. McKendrick rolled her eyes. “No one should settle for that.”
Feeling too much like a spectator at my own show, I stepped forward.
“Good afternoon. I’m Lady Mary Cavindish and I would like to speak to one of your workers.
It has nothing to do with Mr. Ryder and his mission.
” I discreetly put a few more inches between me and the man in question, hoping to make our separation apparent.
“And what does it have to do with?” Mrs. McKendrick drew her brows together as she examined me from head to toe.
“The death of one of her…customers.” The unreality of the situation suddenly struck me, and I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing.
I was at a brothel asking to question a prostitute.
I could only imagine my late husband’s reaction if he’d known I’d do such a thing.
He’d been quite accustomed to my quirks but this would have shocked even him.
I cleared my throat. “I’m hoping she can tell me more about the man. ”
“You mean that Mr. Trent.” Mrs. McKendrick’s mouth twisted. “Good riddance to bad rubbish.”
“You knew him then?” I stepped forward, edging my way inside the building. I didn’t want something as easy as a closed door getting in my way.
“He was a regular,” she said. “That is until he hurt my girl. Then you couldn’t see the back of him soon enough. Didn’t respond to any of my or Peg’s requests for compensation. Put her out of work for a solid three weeks it did.”
I held up my reticule. “I will, of course, pay Miss Rogerson for her time.”
Mrs. McKendrick pursed her lips. “All right. But he stays here.” She jabbed her finger at Mr. Ryder. “I don’t want him giving my girls ideas.”
Ryder stepped inside and planted himself by the door. “I will be right here. If you need anything, holler,” he told me.
I nodded and followed Mrs. McKendrick up a narrow staircase and down a hall.
Most of the rooms we passed were quiet, but a few emitted some noises I didn’t wish to identify.
I wasn’t a prude. I’d been married and had a healthy intimate life with my husband, but that didn’t mean I was comfortable with the intimate lives of others. Especially when it was monetized.
Mrs. McKendrick knocked on a door and didn’t wait for a response to open it. “Peg, someone here wants to talk to you. Charge her your regular rate.”
A woman with lovely strawberry-blonde hair sat up on the bed. She looked to be in her early thirties and was pretty without being striking. She wore a faux-satin wrapper over a provocative night rail.
I started to close the door behind Mrs. McKendrick’s retreating form, then thought better of it.
The aroma of the room wasn’t one I wished to be closeted in with.
I turned to Peg. “Good afternoon, Miss Rogerson. I’m Lady Mary and I’d like to speak to you about Mr. Trent.
” I looked about for a place to sit but there was none besides next to Peg on the bed. I remained standing.
“What about him? He’s dead.”
“Yes. On my doorstep.” I shifted my reticule to my other hand.
My shoulder was beginning to ache from the weight.
The only place to rest it was the low bureau that ran the length of one short wall and a cluttered dressing table.
I considered how many men had probably deposited their clothes on top of the bureau, and other activities that may have occurred on its flat surface, and decided a small ache was preferable.
“Do you know why he might have wanted to speak with me?”
She shook her head. “I never heard him speak your name, but then, we didn’t do much talking.”
Quite. “And how was your relationship with Mr. Trent? I understand he caused you some injury?”
Peg pointed to her right arm, an arm I now noticed she kept tucked against her side. “He wrenched my shoulder. It still hurts me.”
“He was violent?” There could be countless more suspects if the man went around assaulting people.
“He didn’t mean to,” Peg admitted. “But he was careless. He didn’t stop when I told him to.”
I scratched my chin. “How does one accidentally wrench a shoulder?”
Peg rolled onto her knees. “Well you see, I was kneeling like this.” She used her left arm to lower her face to the mattress, her rear end lifted in my direction.
“And my arms were tied behind my back like this.” She brought her left arm behind her.
Her right arm remained resting on the coverlet. “And Edwin was standing behind me—”
“Yes.” I cleared my throat. “I understand.” I didn’t need the playacted visual in my head. “So Mr. Trent was…careless and you were injured.”
She rolled back to sitting. “That’s right, and when I asked him to compensate me, he refused. After all we’d been through together. I always say, the way a man treats his mistress shows what kind of person he truly is.”