Chapter 17 #2
Caroline met his hazel eyes and curled her lips into a brittle smile.
The Frenchman had never been anything but kind to her.
He had escorted her to Brick Lane on that terrible day when she had followed Rab into the alley.
He always offered to help if he saw her struggling with an armful of bed linen or a full mop bucket.
But he had warned her, that first morning, on the second-floor landing. Our neighborhood is not kind to those who wander. The words, taken at face value, were not a threat. Why had they felt like one?
Beside Monsieur Rodart, Senhor Perreira and Mr. Tythe were in a spirited discussion about the different strains of fermenting yeasts.
Caroline tried and failed to avoid the spray of the Portuguese’s saliva as she topped off his glass.
Black-bearded Mr. Jacobs, who had made the unsavory comment at the last supper about Caroline being nicer to look at than poor, murdered Polly Nichols, kept his eyes determinedly on his lap as she passed him.
Mr. Bajwa smiled meekly up at her and shook his head at the proffered jug, as always. But his eyes did not focus on her face.
Caroline had never seen the Sikh drink a drop of wine. But there was something about him, about all of them, that was different than the last supper. Something intensified, which sent a rippling warning up Caroline’s spine. Something was different.
“More wine, Mr. O’Riley?”
“Sure, darlin’.”
As the American slid the wineglass toward her, Caroline stared at his hand around the stem. It was calloused and suntanned. She blinked back the image of this hand holding a knife. Wrapping around a woman’s neck.
“You all right?”
“I’m fine, thank you.” Caroline’s heart thudded uncomfortably as she poured.
“It’s a right itchy one,” said Mr. O’Riley to no one in particular. He scratched at his neck absentmindedly beneath the collar of his shirt. “Ooo-ee, but it’s an itchy one.”
Beside him, Rab’s chair sat empty.
Caroline glanced around the table, but his tumbled curls were missing from the fray. Her heart beat an unpleasant tattoo against her ribs. Where was he?
Across the table, Mrs. Easton was gesturing to her.
“Refill the wine jugs,” the landlady said when Caroline had rejoined her at the sideboard.
“And then fetch the next course, would you? I’ll start serving the croquettes.
” She slid a handkerchief discreetly from her sleeve and dabbed at her beaded forehead.
“They’re eating quickly tonight. At this rate, they’ll be through dessert in thirty minutes. ”
The landlady’s hand trembled as she shoved the kerchief back up her dress sleeve, and Caroline examined the older woman’s face. Her lips were pale, her pupils widened to the edges of her irises. She had never seen Mrs. Easton frightened. Concerned, irritated, angry. But never frightened.
Caroline glanced over the landlady’s shoulder at the raucous party. Mr. O’Riley was standing, acting out some hideous barnyard task. Mr. Jacobs was shouting across the table at a trembling Mr. Swartz, who had not so much as touched his elaborate appetizer.
There was something different about this night.
Her mind fought to rationalize it. The volume of the men’s voices, the surprising heat in the room, the energy confined to such a small space.
But in her guts, in the true compass of her body, she, too, was afraid.
Not just about her task ahead, not just at the danger of being caught.
There was something sharp and metallic in the air.
And every ancient instinct told her to flee.
“I’ll be right back with the croquettes.”
As the dining room door closed behind her and muffled the light and conversation, she stood for a moment in the dark.
Keep to the plan, she told herself. Finish serving supper. Give them no reason to suspect you. Watch, and wait, and listen.
Caroline took a deep breath and descended the cellar stairs.
—
She had left two lamps burning on the chopping block. Only one remained, illuminating the rest of the feast beneath its silver cloches. The other shined from the threshold of the open larder door.
Caroline froze on the last stair.
She knew it was Rab. His cedar cologne hung in the air, lacing through the odors of roasted meat and rosemary.
A clink of glass on metal, a heavy footfall. Then he appeared in the pantry doorway.
“Hullo,” said Rab, wiping the surprise from his face and replacing it with bland pleasantness.
He carried the same tray she had seen at the last supper, stacked with cups and the cut-glass decanter of purple liquid.
“I was hoping you’d come down. How’s it going up there? They eat the silverware yet?”
Caroline didn’t return his smile. “What are you doing?”
“I told you last time,” he said, balancing the tray on his hip and bending to lift the oil lamp. “Old family recipe.”
“Is it a nerve tonic?” Caroline asked, remembering Mary Jane’s story. Was this the same medicine that she had begged him to give her a second time?
A grimace flitted over Rab’s face, exaggerated by the long, swinging shadows cast by the lamp. “Something like that. Have you tried the medicine I brought you?”
He took a step toward the staircase. Toward her.
Caroline shook her head. “Not—not yet.”
Another step, quiet as a jungle cat. “And how do you feel?”
“Fine.” Her voice was thin, unconvincing. She dropped her hand to her belly, felt the comforting line of the penknife beneath her stomacher. He was only feet away now. “I don’t think I need it, actually—”
“I’ve been watching you, Miss Huxley.” He was close enough that she could smell him, smell the canary on his lips and the sweat beneath his arms. “And you don’t seem fine.”
Caroline swallowed. “How do I seem?”
Rab’s voice was soft as velvet in the air between them. “On edge. Nervous.”
Only four of Dr. Hoffman’s pills remained, but Caroline had taken a whole one that day, hoping the sedative would calm her enough to complete her tasks without the careful facade crumbling.
It was not enough. Not nearly enough. Her pulse roared in her ears; her pounding heart seemed to fill up her whole chest.
The banister bit hard into Caroline’s spine. She would not move. She would not let him know how frightened she was.
“I’ve seen your lamp burning at all hours. You haven’t been sleeping.”
She could not brandish her little weapon. She could not give herself away. Not yet, not yet, when there was so much she still did not know—
“It’s dangerous,” Rab went on, “to stop a medication like that. One you’ve taken for…how long, did you say?”