Chapter 11

Eleven

"Ye visited with Mrs. Mallory for quite some time," Brodie commented as our driver pulled away from the residence, Mr. Hobbs standing sentry at the entrance to make certain that we left.

"Hmmm." I wasn't certain what I had learned, if anything.

"The poor woman is grieving," I explained. "She and Charlotte were apparently extremely close, and planning Charlotte's wedding to Daniel Eddington."

"Aye, to be expected. However, ye managed to speak with her at length and obviously learned something."

"It is more an impression than something specific that she said."

"Is that anything similar to yer woman's instinct ?"

"Or, perhaps a police investigator's sense of something when interviewing someone?" I suggested.

I caught the twitch of a smile at one corner of his mouth. It did seem that at least he knew when not to argue the matter.

"Ye were saying."

"I explained the situation of our first inquiry case, how difficult it was, that even the smallest clue was important."

"Sharing yer experience, no doubt."

"You were the one who explained that it is important to build rapport, that it might bring about something remembered."

"I will have yer promise that ye won't be explaining other details about things we have shared."

"Whatever do you mean?" I asked with wide-eyed innocence.

It was endearing to hear that he didn't want me sharing the more intimate aspects of our relationship. Not that I would. As for a man? I had heard rumors of conversations men had among themselves.

"What else did ye speak of?"

"The planning of the wedding. I asked her if Charlotte intended on having roses for her wedding flowers… red roses."

That dark gaze angled toward me. "That is direct. What was her response?"

"There wasn't one. Yet, her manner immediately changed. She became quite agitated when I mentioned red roses, and ended our conversation."

"It might simply have been that the poor woman was overwrought over the death of her daughter."

"It was not that," I insisted. "I know what I saw. She became quite upset, and then seemed to think that someone might have been listening to our conversation.

"She left, and there wasn't an opportunity to question her further. What were you able to learn from Sir Mallory?"

"The man has not changed since my encounter with him some years before in a case that was brought before the court. He has a reputation for being thorough and aggressive, and has won several well-known cases before the court."

"What did you sense about him in your conversation?" I caught that narrowed gaze he directed at me, and couldn't prevent a smile.

"I sensed that he perhaps knew something that he chose not to share." He shook his head. "There was no prying it out of the man, and ye saw his manner when ye returned after yer conversation with his wife."

"You believe that he knows something about his daughter's murder?"

"Perhaps. And perhaps Daniel Eddington might be able to tell us something about that."

"This has undoubtedly been devastating for him as well," I replied. "To be planning a wedding and then it all ends with a funeral. When will you speak with him?"

"This afternoon if it can be arranged, and before Sir Mallory has a conversation with him. Unless he already has."

"Do you believe that he would encourage him to withhold information? For what reason?"

"That is what I would like to find out."

I was thoughtful as we returned to the office on the Strand.

"We will need to speak with Judge Cameron as well. Aunt Antonia might have some connection there through Sir Laughton. He is quite well acquainted with those in law. And I do need to visit Lily."

"What will you tell her?" Brodie asked.

"The truth. That we have little information so far. But we did promise to keep her apprised of what we learned, and I will not leave her dangling. She is not the dangling sort."

"No, she most certainly is not. Much like someone else I know."

Traffic was particularly congested even past the noon hour. The weather that had threatened to set in since early morning gathered ominously over the city. Ladies with shopping baskets over their arms hurried about the marketplaces. Draymen who usually made deliveries after hours clogged the thoroughfares with their carts and wagons as they rushed to get in one more delivery for the day.

All the while workers and shopkeepers took precautions against the high tides from the river that were expected with the heavy rain.

In the past, the lower floors of buildings along the river front had flooded, furnishings were destroyed, and people displaced. The best to be done was to seek a higher floor then clean and repair the damage.

For those of the professional sort with offices on the high streets, sandbags were brought in by the score and placed in strategic positions to divert the heaviest runoff.

We arrived back at the office on the Strand. Brodie paid the driver as Mr. Cavendish wheeled up from down the sidewalk, Rupert the hound beside him.

"Wot do ye say about the storm that is coming?" Brodie asked.

Mr. Cavendish cast what might be described as a weather eye toward the sky. He was quite an authority and usually quite accurate. Although I supposed that predicting rain over London was much like predicting that the sun would rise of a morning. It was a constant.

"Felt it earlier in my bones, Mr. Brodie," he shrugged. "We're in for a good solid rain."

He hooked a thumb over one shoulder in the direction of the sand bags that were being delivered across the way.

"It's early in the season yet. But there will be a big one comin' later. There always is most usually after the holidays, and those sandbags won't be enough. You remember the one five years past?"

Brodie nodded. "Aye. Good to hear this storm won't be that bad."

"Do you believe him?" I asked as we climbed the stairs to the second-floor landing.

"He's been right most every time."

So much for Dr. Merryweather with his leeches in bottles that supposedly predicted a change in the barometer before a storm, even though the predictions had been printed in the dailies according to my great-aunt.

And then there was the weather bureau founded by Vice-Admiral Fitzroy after his retirement from the Royal Navy. He gathered information from across Britain and compiled it along with maps. Somewhat more accurate than leeches in a jar.

Brodie put out a call to Judge Cameron's office and was informed that Daniel Eddington had left earlier but would be returning for appointments that afternoon. It seemed that even death was not a reason for time away from work. Brodie made an appointment.

"I want to be there when he returns," he commented.

"And I need to make notes from our visit with the Mallorys, and then I should go to Sussex Square. I promised Lily that I would let her know what we've learned. If I don't, I fully expect her to return here and demand an update. She can be most insistent."

He gave me an amused look. "Verra much like someone else I know."

"I have no idea what you are talking about," I replied.

He rose from behind the desk and leaned over where I sat.

"Ye are a cheeky lass."

Oh, that wicked smile.

"When is your meeting with Daniel Eddington?" I asked as a diversion.

"He's to return by two o'clock this afternoon," Brodie replied, not the least diverted as he brushed my cheek with his fingers.

"It is the middle of the day," I reminded him.

"Aye, it is." Which was immediately followed by a curse as the bell on the landing sounded insistently.

"Food!" I enthusiastically announced, as Mr. Cavendish had departed for the Public House just after we returned.

"I need to have a word with the man," Brodie grumbled.

"You may have a word with him after we've eaten," I replied. "For all the good it will do you."

"He does seem to have a fondness for ye," he added as he went to the door of the office.

Lunch indeed! Potatoes with tender cooked meat—I was not a fan of fish. And there was cobbler, almost as good as Mrs. Ryan's.

"Oh!" I exclaimed as I opened the brown paper sack. "Bread that is still warm from the oven."

"I dinna know the reason ye are not the size of one of yer aunt's coach horses," Brodie remarked as I divided the luncheon then handed him a bannock.

"I believe it might be hereditary," I commented as I enthusiastically ate. "My mother was quite slender. And our great-aunt is most slender as well, for a woman her age, and she still has a hearty appetite."

He sat across from me at the desk.

"I may need to increase our rates to clients in order to feed ye."

" Dinna fash , Mr. Brodie. I am quite capable of providing food for both of us."

"Aye."

I heard that faint grumble, a complaint, if I wasn't mistaken.

He had been most vocal in the past about providing for both of us, with no need for my money unless it was something I particularly wanted.

It was, of course, something most men took quite seriously—their ability to be the provider of the family. And a Scot, even more so. I handed him another bannock.

"I can afford food for the both of us," he insisted. "Along with Mr. Cavendish. I draw the line at the hound."

"You may draw the line wherever you wish," I replied with a smile.

Brodie left afterward to keep his appointment with Daniel Eddington.

I remained to add notes to the chalkboard, then departed for Sussex Square.

Lily had taken Charlotte Mallory's death very hard. Charlotte had been the first friend she had since arriving in London. True friends were few and far between, as I knew all too well.

For me, even with our recent difficulties, I knew that Brodie was a true friend, as I was to him.

As for Lily, she kept her true feelings with most people carefully hidden. She was slow to trust, something else I could identify with as well.

Mr. Symons, my great-aunt's head butler for over forty years, greeted me as I arrived.

"Good day, Miss Mikaela. It is always good to see you." He glanced past me as the coachman gathered the team to return to central London.

"Mr. Brodie is not with you?" he said with a slight frown.

Since my sister and I first arrived at Sussex Square, he had appointed himself not only guardian of the door, but guardian over two young orphan girls as well.

"He had business to attend to."

"Very well, miss."

"Is that Mikaela?" Aunt Antonia called out. "Do join me in the ballroom, dear." Her voice echoed down the long hallway.

As I handed off my coat and umbrella, I looked at Mr. Symons, usually an accurate source for whatever was happening at Sussex Square.

"She has been with the wood carver most of the morning," he explained in that stoic manner that I was familiar with.

"Wood carver?" Repairs of some sort or perhaps a new piece of furniture?

"I believe it is about the dragon's head," he replied with a faint roll of the eyes.

"I see. Thank you, Mr. Symons." Of course, I didn't see at all and could only imagine what I might find as I headed in the direction of the ballroom.

"Here you are," my great-aunt exclaimed as she sailed across the enormous hall that had seen entertainments, feasts, and perhaps a sword fight or two over the generations since it was built several hundred years earlier.

It was one of a handful of original estates in London that had survived and dated back to that original ancestor, William the Conqueror.

"We are quite through here. Thank you, Mr. Sturgess, for your thoughts and suggestions. I should like to see a drawing by next week along with a schedule for the work. We are planning a wedding before Christmas. I don't imagine that I will have need of it until after that."

"Of course, madame." Mr. Sturgess nodded as we passed. He did seem a bit pale.

"New furnishings?" I inquired, thinking of the reception after Linnie's wedding that our aunt insisted be held at Sussex Square. Perhaps a new banquet table or two?

She smiled as she took me by the arm and we sat at one of the long tables that had been in her family for centuries, complete with a few battle scars.

"I believe we have enough to accommodate a few hundred guests," she replied. "I requested Mr. Sturgess's thoughts regarding a dragon's head for the boat."

She made a sweeping gesture to the Egyptian boat that had graced the ballroom since another reception she had given the year before.

"I do want everything to be as authentic as possible when I sail off."

As in that Viking funeral she had spoken of since I was a child, complete with sails aflame as she sailed off to… wherever she intended to sail.

I was convinced that she would have her way in this, and thought it a perfect way to end one's stay in this life, as my friend Templeton had explained it.

She communicated with the somewhat disagreeable spirit of Sir William Shakespeare. Particularly when one of his plays was not being represented as he thought it should.

Of course, that is if one believed in spirits in the afterworld. I left that particular door open and thought a Viking send-off was quite exciting. It did seem as if my great-aunt had taken that notion to a new level.

"A dragon's head?" I asked with growing interest.

Aunt Antonia smiled. "It is all quite daunting for Mr. Sturgess. His work came highly recommended by Captain Turner, and he should know, with his experience on different vessels."

Captain Tom Turner was a long-time acquaintance. He had a lengthy career, sailing between England and the Orient on all manner of ships. He had lost a leg during an encounter with pirates in the South China Sea, and retired to the canal boats he owned in Richmond.

It was there we had met. He brought cargos of fresh food from the countryside in the spring and summer, then returned with passengers traveling to small villages along his route to escape the heat and smell of London.

Linnie and I had made his acquaintance years before on one of those excursions. More recently, he had provided important information in that first inquiry case when Linnie disappeared.

He was gruff and could be quite churlish. However, much like the hound, he had a particular liking for sweet biscuits, which I had been known to take to him. We got along quite well.

"Yer not like the other ladies that take a trip to the country, with their frilly parasols, fancy gowns, and a bothersome piece of fluff for a dog," he had once told me.

I took it as a compliment. However, he had not met Rupert, who also had an appetite for sweet biscuits.

"Mr. Sturgess's work?" I inquired, as I studied the sailboat that was obviously the subject of her latest project.

"He and his assistants have worked in the shipyards and created some of the most intriguing figureheads for sailing vessels," my great-aunt explained. "And for the royal family over the years."

Oh my.

"I was most interested if he could create a dragon figurehead for the sailboat, to be utilized for my send-off."

Startled, I look at her with some concern.

"Not to worry, my dear," she assured me. "I am in perfect health, much to the consternation of my personal physician. However, one must see to these things while one can or have it left to others. Although," she continued, reaching over to pat my hand. "I know that I may count on you to see my wishes carried out."

"What did Mr. Sturgess have to say about it?" I asked, relieved that her interest was not due to her impending demise.

"It seems that it could be quite complicated, although not beyond his abilities. Still, he did suggest that I might simply have a Viking longboat built at the shipyard. Although I shouldn't need one of any great length. It would burn far too long. Do you think a smaller version would suffice?"

I could imagine the issue with a longboat, Viking invasions of the past in mind, and that sort of thing.

"A smaller one might be best," I suggested.

If this was anyone other than my great-aunt, I might have thought the conversation most bizarre. However, I was quite used to what some might have called her eccentricities.

My view of it all was, at her age and with rumored enormous wealth, she should be able to do whatever she wished. As long as it caused no harm, or caused her to be arrested.

Not wanting to wander further into the depths of that conversation, I inquired where Lily was.

"I believe she's in the sword room with Mr. Munro. After presenting her with that knife for protection, he insisted on showing her how to use it. They've been at it for some time. It does remind one of when he showed you how to handle a blade."

The sounds from the sword room reached me long before I arrived at the entrance. It did seem that a robust lesson was underway, including a few colorful curses from Lily.

I slipped inside the room and quietly closed the door behind so as not to disturb. I did want to see how she was progressing without drawing attention, Lily being somewhat younger than I was with my first lesson.

They maneuvered around each other in mock attack with Munro in the role of the villain as he came up behind her and attempted to overwhelm her. Lily drew the knife from the pocket in her gown, efficiently sidestepped, turned, and thrust at him.

"Take that, ye bloody varmint!" she told him.

Lesson number two, I thought—never assume that the initial strike would subdue the attacker, as Munro seized her wrist, pinched it, and the blade dropped to the floor. She retaliated with a punch to the nose.

Munro grunted and suddenly stepped out of arm's length, with a somewhat surprised expression.

"That will do for the day," he announced, massaging his nose. It was then that Lily saw me.

She scooped up the knife, folded it, dropped it into her pocket, then ran excitedly toward me.

"Did ye see, miss?"

I assured her that I had with a glance at Munro, none the worse for it, but still rubbing his nose.

"I best see to the accounts," he said as he moved toward the door. "Ye still have a lot to learn, miss."

"A blow to the face is not the best option," I commented when he had gone. "The objective should be to remove yourself from being that close to the attacker."

It was something I remembered well and had improved upon afterward.

"Mr. Munro said ye learned something called self-defense on one of yer travels," she commented. "Would ye teach me?"

There were moments when I felt that I had been somewhat remiss in my responsibilities after bringing Lily to London. Even though Lily had assured me that the arrangement for her to live at Sussex Square suited her quite well.

Here she had a somewhat normal household. I emphasize the word somewhat, whereas for me to continue working with Brodie might find me at the office on the Strand at all hours. Or, at the town house at the end of the day, or anywhere in between following up information for a client.

And I suppose that for Lily, as it had been for my sister and me, Sussex Square was far more interesting with the things my great-aunt was always into.

"Very well," I told her. "I can show you the basics, and then a move that will almost guarantee that you will be able to subdue an attacker and then flee if necessary."

Two hours later we were both exhausted, my hair had come down, and my forehead was damp from the exertion. Lily was much the same, but with a very determined look on her face.

"Wot about that move ye were goin' to show me?"

She was a very quick study, focused on everything I had showed her. Not to mention that she, like Brodie and Munro, had learned a great deal on the streets of Edinburgh. She was also quite slender and a bit smaller, as I gauged her height and weight.

"Very well. We'll stage a mock attack," I told her. "You're to come at me, face-to-face as if you intend to strike me."

She looked at me with a hesitant expression. "Are ye certain ye want to do this?"

"Quite certain. I will play the part of a lady out shopping and you are to approach me as if you intend to take my handbag."

She grinned, and for just a brief moment it seemed that I glimpsed myself at her age.

I took my position, pretending to be shopping among the displays of swords and shields along the wall.

As we had discussed, she approached in a most innocent manner, and then suddenly lunged for that imaginary handbag.

I caught her by the wrist with my left hand then launched a mock blow toward her face with the heel of my other hand. My final move was to sweep her completely off her feet with my right foot, dumping her on the floor with a stunned sound as the air left her lungs.

She made a muffled sound as the color slowly returned to her face. I held out a hand to help her back to her feet. She glared at me.

"Ye might have given a warning," she exclaimed as she finally took my hand.

"Would you give a warning to someone who came at you on the street?"

"No," she replied, then said, "I want to know how ye did that."

"With a great deal of practice," I replied. "And I left out the last part."

"Wot is that?"

"The part where I am no longer there but safely away."

I agreed to show her how it was done, along with the series of moves that led to it.

"The heel of your hand to the nose is far more effective than a punch with the fist. It will momentarily distract your attacker, and then you can sweep his feet out from under him."

"Where did ye learn to do that?"

"A fellow traveler introduced me to it. She was a very independent woman and often traveled alone. She had learned it in the Far East."

"Does Mr. Brodie know about it?"

That was a conversation for another time, as we left the sword room and returned downstairs, where my great-aunt sat at a table in the solar with rain washing the glass walls in late afternoon gloom.

"How is Mr. Munro?" I inquired.

"He will survive," my great-aunt replied with an amused expression. "Was it Lily or you who landed the blow?"

Lily confessed. "That was before Miss Mikaela showed me how to sweep someone off their feet," she added with what could only be described as keen excitement.

What might have passed for a decanter of tea sat on the table, along with a pitcher of lemonade. I discovered that her ‘tea' was actually some of my aunt's whisky with water.

My aunt poured a glass of lemonade for Lily as I explained to her what we had learned with our inquiries so far.

"That man with the Times—Burke, I believe is the name—has certainly been writing about the murders a great deal," Aunt Antonia commented. "It does have the entire city of London astir, very much the same as the Whitechapel murders that have never been solved," she commented.

"It does remind one of another murder some years ago, it must be very near five years now. You wouldn't know of it," she continued. "You were off on one of your travels at the time.

"There was quite a to-do about it at the time," she added. "The man was eventually caught through someone who saw something or some other such thing."

"Was there a trial?" Lily asked.

"Oh, yes. Such a tragedy the way it all turned out," my great-aunt went on to explain.

"What happened?"

"It seems that the man who was accused of the murder—Ormsby was the name from the Ormsby family as I remember it—had been spurned by the young woman."

"Spurned?" Lily asked, scrunching up her nose as she had a habit of doing.

I smiled to myself, obviously a new word for her.

"She rejected him, and according to the Gazette at the time, he killed her in a fit of passion," my aunt explained. "Such a tawdry affair. He was eventually caught, charged with the murder, and taken to trial.

"Was he hanged?" Lily asked as I took a biscuit from the refreshment plate and continued to listen to the story. Aunt Antonia thoroughly enjoyed the moment.

"That was the scandal of it," she replied with great drama. "The man's family acquired the services of the best lawyer money could buy for his defense, and apparently the witness in the case disappeared."

Lily frowned. "How could he disappear?"

"That, my dear, is a very good question. The judge had no choice but to dismiss the case."

"What happened to the man who murdered the young woman? That was the end of it? He got away with murder?" Lily exclaimed.

"Not precisely," Aunt Antonia replied. "The young man was found dead with a broken neck sometime later, an apparent accident while out riding in Rotten Row."

"Rotten Row?"

I had to laugh at Lily's response to that, not to mention her expression at the odd name.

"It's in Hyde Park," I explained. "Gentlemen and ladies ride their horses there when the weather allows."

"Seems like justice was served, filthy bugger."

We did need to work on improving Lily's choice of words, however I caught my great-aunt's amusement.

"Yes, quite," she replied with a chuckle. "But that was not the end of the tragedy. Just after the trial, the young woman's mother died, from grief according to the newspaper, and the father perished in a fire at the family business that had been in London for decades—a coffee import company, as I recall.

"Of course, there were those who said that the family must be cursed, though I never put any stock in that," she continued. "Such a tragedy to have suffered so much loss. And the mysterious part of it all," my great-aunt added with great suspense, "according to the newspapers at the time, a bouquet of flowers was delivered to the young woman's grave each year for several years on the anniversary of her death."

"Who would send them?" Lily replied. "Everyone was dead."

"That was the mystery. No one seemed to know. However, I am most grateful that there are people such as Mikaela and Mr. Brodie with their private inquiries, who find those who commit these dreadful crimes."

I appreciated the vote of confidence; however, I wasn't quite as confident as my great-aunt, in consideration of the few clues we had.

Was the murderer perhaps a spurned suitor as Charlotte Mallory planned her wedding to another? Or was it something else?

And what of Margaret Cameron's death? With that rose that had been left on each body, it seemed obvious the two were connected. But how?

I was hopeful that Brodie might learn something from Daniel Eddington that could provide a clue, perhaps something Sir Mallory wasn't aware of that might prove important.