Chapter Twelve
As it turned out: splendidly.
“Are you quite finished?”
Foxcourt’s exasperation did nothing to stop my next experimental long stride, relishing the freedom of movement. The tassels
on my too-large boots gave a charming little twirl as I kicked one leg out, then the other, simply because I could.
It was a testament to the past and present Lord Foxcourt’s peculiar work that no one, even the buttoned-up Fleming, seemed
the least bit scandalized by my gentleman’s attire.
I twisted around to admire myself in the hall mirror, tugging at my linen jacket and striped waistcoat. They still smelled
of the cedar chest they had been stored in following the late Lord Foxcourt’s death—that and the man’s fascinating essence:
Vanilla planifolia, dribbling ink, the house itself, damp night, and what was either gunpowder in truth or merely a long, deep-seated anger.
“Thank goodness you’re close in size to his late lordship,” Felicity said, chasing after me to snip the thread she’d used
to tailor the jacket. “You make a darling lad.”
I glanced in the mirror again. I did look rather jaunty.
A movement in the glass made me turn just as Tommy sidled up beside where Foxcourt leaned against the wall. He stooped, slipping
a small missive into a satchel at his feet. Foxcourt’s nod of acknowledgment and the quick thank-you he signed had me curious.
“Do you really think the disguises necessary?” Willie asked, scratching at the neck of his stiff livery collar. “Seems a bit
much. I could—”
“Yes, it’s unfortunately necessary,” Foxcourt interrupted. The way his brows rose, almost in warning, deepened my frown. Rude,
as usual. “The house is being closed in advance of the estate moving through probate. The perfumery’s shareholders have asked
the new City Police to guard the house against thieves in the meantime.”
“Really?” I’d forgotten that the new police would be out on the streets this week. “We’ll see how long they last at their
posts.”
The newly formed police had the rare honor of unifying all of Linden against them. No one wanted yet another arm of the government skulking about, prying into matters of a personal nature—their mere presence was a threat to our freedom.
And yet, somehow, over the last few months, the home secretary had convinced the upper echelons that the police were a necessary
evil to combat Greystone’s growing power and his gang’s penchant for larceny and violence. The old borough watchmen and Reed
Corner Runners were too ineffective on their own.
Or perhaps the Patricians had simply realized they would not be the ones the police would be bothering.
“They’ll last,” Foxcourt said, pushing off the wall to place a top hat firmly over my pinned-up hair. “The home secretary
has too much riding on its success to allow them to fail. At least Briarwood Palace will keep its treasures.”
“If the police don’t nick the goods themselves first,” Willie muttered.
I couldn’t have said it better myself. Some of the police were former soldiers, but who knew where the rest had come from.
Foxcourt checked his fob, his silver spectacles sliding down the bridge of his nose. I had to admit that I had been wrong;
Foxcourt was such a tall, striking, dark-haired figure, I was certain he wouldn’t be able to vanish into his disguise as a
stiff-shirted solicitor. Just then, however, I nearly forgot whom I was looking at; it was as though he’d slipped inside another
skin entirely.
Foxcourt had used wig powder to lighten his hair to a steely gray, and someone had drawn a distractingly large mole on his
cheek, which I supposed was the point of it. Even his manner of movement changed, becoming stiffer, his shoulders sloping
as he curled over a walking stick.
“I think a limp would suit,” Mrs. Keyes told him, as if well-versed in the crafting of a disguise. I watched, utterly captivated,
as he demonstrated one for her. “You need to put more weight on it—yes, like that.”
My brows rose until I was sure they’d disappeared beneath the rim of my top hat.
“We’d best be off,” Foxcourt told me as he straightened.
“Good luck,” Willie said, giving me a wink. “If you’re uncertain of what to do or say, just be insufferable, like most solicitors
are.”
“Right,” I said, amused.
We were posing as solicitors from the House of Rosebourne’s legal firm, Hornsby & Featherson, as no one would question their appearance to take a supposed inventory of the house. One hoped.
Foxcourt led me through a short servants’ hall, following the fading trail of pastries to the spiced heart of the house. I’d
expected to finally meet the mysterious Mrs. Silver and thank her profusely for her clever little sandwiches and delectable
baked goods, and was sorely disappointed by the sight of the empty, cooling kitchen.
It was a cavernous, impeccably kept space. Copper pots and pans gleamed from their rack near a surprisingly modern stove.
My nose sorted through meals consumed long before I’d arrived: spicy lamb, vegetable stew, and beef.
How strange that Foxcourt looked perfectly at home in this space and now seemed ready to use the door out into the back garden.
Half the toffs in Linden probably couldn’t find the kitchens in their homes even with the threat of murder hanging over them.
The other half would have been quickly driven out by staff protective of their realm within the house.
But like the rest of Foxcourt House, there was a strange sense of melding here, as if the service and family worlds had relaxed
and naturally folded into each other.
A bitter herbal scent asserted itself then like a piercing wail. I examined the racks of drying herbs and flowers, searching
for its source—it reminded me of unripe tomatoes, with a hint of floral delicacy . . . My eyes trailed over a large oak cabinet
in the far corner of the room, and the brass lock fixed on its latch.
The memory slipped into place at the front of my mind, stilling even the glee that had bubbled in me at my disguise. I knew
that scent. I’d smelled it before, in one of the Radcliffe & Sons apothecaries. Oliver had swiftly warned me away from it.
Nightshade.
It was a highly poisonous plant, rarely used and only in the smallest of doses, with the utmost care and reluctance, to treat
certain maladies. And yet, there was so very much of it here.
“Come along, Lockwood,” Foxcourt said, holding the door open to the back garden. “Unless you’ve lost your courage?”
I gave him a surly look. “Perhaps you ought to try a more tolerable personality to go with your disguise.”
“After you,” he said, sweeping his hand toward the waiting garden, and I was a moment too late in grasping his double meaning.
A riot of floral scents greeted me at the door. I should have known Foxcourt House’s exterior would be as wild and rambling
as its interior. My feet slowed on the gravel path, my eyes and nose at odds over which could take in the sprawling flower
beds around me first.
Rather than manicured to perfection, the flowers had been left to grow in as they would, tangling colors and textures. Beds
of bright hyacinths, irises, peonies, and primroses lined the borders of a small kitchen garden. A carpet of violets had seeped
into the bluebells as they raced to meet the rose shrubs in full bloom.
And there, at the center of it all, was the small pond Felicity had spoken of last night, nestled beneath the sweeping arms
of a weeping willow. A small, whimsical stone statue of two frogs in a lily pad boat had been placed at its center.
Tearing my gaze away from it, I found Foxcourt watching me, his expression unlike any I’d seen him wear before. Expectant,
almost. It certainly couldn’t have been hopeful. He turned away before I’d completely unraveled it, stirring that annoying
need of mine to decode him.
“My great-uncle was an avid gardener” was his only comment.
An avid gardener, I thought, and home secretary and . . . a spy? That would explain the presence of nightshade—but in the
kitchen, beside the parsley and sage used to season his dinner? Entrusted to his cook? Within reach of a housekeeper who smelled
of blood?
Suspicion rolled around in my mind like a loose billiards ball, but I forced it to still.
The law of the Brickbats boiled down to this: Pay no mind and be paid no mind, see no evil and have no evil enacted upon you.
Their business was their own, as mine belonged solely to me.
And whatever the reason for it, I would not reside in this house long enough for the poison to be used on me.
Linden rolled past in a blur of midday activity, looking refreshed after yesterday’s rain. The cool air whipped my cheeks
pink, the usual reek dulled to something approaching lovely by the wisteria- and rose-covered shops.
I took it all in as if for the first time as we sped toward Queen’s Park in a hackney coach. To be fair, it was the first
time I’d ever ridden in one. Paying for a ride anywhere in the city had always been well beyond my means.
“First time in a hack?” Foxcourt guessed from his seat across from me.
I scowled. “Stop doing that.”
“Doing what?” he asked, a touch too innocuously.
“Presuming to know my mind,” I said. “It’s . . .” Unnerving. “. . . annoying.”
Even more so because it was impossible to return the favor. I may as well have been deciphering the forgotten fairy language.
“Then you may wish to do a better job of disguising your feelings,” he said, crossing his ankle over one knee as he reclined.
“We’re nearly there. I’d advise you to let me do most of the talking.”
I lowered my voice, doing my best imitation of him. “But of course, Master of Disguise.”
He preened at that, damn him.
“Are you not even a little worried about being recognized?” I asked. “Wait, what am I saying? Your fellow peers would deem
you charmingly eccentric.”
The Patricians forgave their peers anything short of murder and unfashionable clothing.
“You are very sure of your sweeping judgments about the Patricians,” Foxcourt noted, “though you’re soon to join their ranks.”