Epilogue

Emma Fortescue, adventuress and world traveler, leaned over the bow of the felucca, one of those small sailboats on the Nile, as it bumped against the wood pier, a body covered with flies pinned between.

Her guide, lean, with dark hair that waved over the collar of his shirt, cautioned, "There are many dangers on the river, miss."

Perhaps not as dangerous as the heat in that dark gaze fastened on her…

"Are ye finished then?" another man with dark hair and an equally dark gaze asked as I looked up from my type-writing machine.

It was Brodie of course, who had somehow slipped into Miss Emma Fortescue's next adventure.

"There's just the ending to add and then I will send it off to Mr. Warren," I replied. "He's been most patient in consideration of our last case."

That last case being our inquiry for Helen Bennett in the matter of the disappearance of her husband, and the Agency's investigation into rumors of a conspiracy against the Crown. The two cases connected in ways we hadn't foreseen and with devastating possibilities had we not exposed and stopped the conspirators.

I added additional lines to that ending page, clattering away at the keys. It was Brodie's suggestion that I bring the machine to the office on the Strand as I spent a great deal of time there. With him out and about on various matters, I had more than enough time to finish my latest novel.

Not that I didn't think of the case, or rather two cases, that we had solved.

We had both called on Helen Bennett afterward. She deserved to know that justice had been served in the matter of her husband's death.

Soropkin had been remanded to Newgate, there to await trial on charges of conspiracy and murder in the deaths of at least two others who had provided information to the Agency, not to mention countless people across Europe in the attacks that had taken place earlier.

However, Brodie speculated that he might not live long enough to be brought to trial. In spite of the horrible crimes committed by others imprisoned at Newgate, it seemed that there was a certain code of justice, if one could call it that.

Among those who were imprisoned for life or condemned to death, where there was most often no loyalty to anyone but self, there was a deep, abiding loyalty to Queen and country. It was very possible that Soropkin would meet another sort of justice there.

Sir James Redstone's part in all of it initially was far more complex and difficult to comprehend.

He had been raised amid wealth and privilege. His family was one of the oldest, going back generations to the Reformation when an ancestor was presented both title and lands by Henry VIII for his loyalty. No small honor. Not to mention the wealth that went with it.

However, it was discovered that James' father had fallen to drink and gambling and the repercussions that came with it— something I knew a little about.

The vast lands gifted by a king centuries earlier were gone to pay debts. As was the family estate in London in the past year, seized by bankers— and by extension, the Crown.

During very near twenty years of travel to other countries, including those I had shared along with others, he'd nurtured a growing undercurrent of intense dislike toward those he felt had wronged his family.

In addition to the loss of everything that defined who and what Sir James Redstone was and the bitterness that came with it, he found himself drawn more and more to others who had been impoverished and trod upon, cast aside by those they saw as the elite.

With that anger burning inside him, the step into their world and the promise of a new order was a tempting lure. And then with his connections into that world of wealth and privilege, with many unaware of his family misfortunes, he became the proverbial "wolf in sheep's clothing."

The perfect plot unfolded to strike at the heart of British power and wealth. Parliament was seen as the heart of power along with those who created the laws. Then, very much like that plot centuries earlier, the decision was made to bring down Parliament and murder the Prime Minister, and the perfect plan was set in motion.

However, not quite perfect…

They hadn't counted on former police inspector Angus Brodie, who had gone back to the streets and had followed rumors and speculation to Dr. Bennett's secret office.

From that note found among the doctor's papers, it seemed very likely that he had been blackmailed with a threat against Helen Bennett's life, into performing the surgery that allowed Soropkin to move about unsuspected to carry out his part in the plot— the murder of Lord Salisbury.

Of course, there were others who deserved credit as well— Alex Sinclair and that message that was intercepted along with countless people in other countries who remained nameless at the risk to their lives.

Then, there was Lily. Who would have thought that a young girl who was once a maid in a brothel would be able to decipher the code of that message that revealed the plot to strike against Parliament and then assassinate the Prime Minister?

Lord Salisbury had been found alive although somewhat bruised, bound and gagged very near his office. If the plot to blow up Parliament with those explosives Brodie found had succeeded, the end goal of the conspirators would have been complete. He would have died in the explosion along with countless others.

It was all there on the blackboard, my notes complete in the aftermath. I should clean it, I thought, with a look across at Brodie.

There were never any feelings for Redstone, not in the way Brodie had assumed. Perhaps fascination with someone who was widely traveled at the time. It was never anything more, and I had told Brodie as much.

I thought it important to be completely honest, no "ghosts from the past" suddenly reappearing at the doorstep.

The bell on the landing suddenly rang bringing me from those thoughts. He went to the door, then down the stairs for some message that had arrived.

I had just pulled the last sheet of my manuscript from the machine when he returned. He had opened the envelope and read the note, his expression thoughtful, then a frown.

"From Sir Avery?" I inquired. "I do hope it's not a new inquiry case with the one just concluded."

There was no response. That did not bode well.

I had been hoping that we might find some time away now that we were past the case and the holidays. I looked up.

I have learned to "read" certain things about Brodie in our time together, something he once described as "reading a person," acquired from his time on the street and with the MET. An ability to see beyond the obvious that often led to surprising revelations and clues in the inquiries we have taken on.

A person's body language, their reaction to something said, a look, the sudden shift of the body, the refusal to meet one's direct gaze— all of it quite remarkable in what it might reveal.

There were also those, through a great deal of experience and deception, who were masters at disguising those things. That in itself was often a clue.

What I now saw was a total lack of expression. In the past I had seen just that same reaction, or lack of one on two occasions. Both instances were supposedly to protect me, he said at the time.

"Has something happened?" I asked and thought of my great-aunt at her advanced age, although admittedly she seemed to be defying everyone's expectations for a woman of her advanced years.

Was it something about my sister? Or possibly Lily? That seemed the more likely given her penchant for rapiers and swords, and escaping her lessons with regularity.

"A matter… I need to attend to." He looked at me then, and for an instant there was the shadow of something there, then it was gone. Or hidden.

A matter he needed to attend to?

There was always something it seemed, new inquiry cases that arrived almost daily, along with his work for the Agency.

However not usually with this sort of reaction, that sudden sense of urgency and the look I had just seen in that dark gaze.

"Should I have Mrs. Ryan plan supper?" I inquired. "Or have it brought from the Public House?"

Not an unusual question since we often worked late at the office. His response was most cryptic.

"No. I have no idea… when I might return."

Which told me absolutely nothing. He then grabbed his coat and umbrella from the coat rack, and left…