Reckless in Red

by Rachael Miles

  Clive followed Joe to the map. Clive quickly considered his last ten encounters with women in the bon ton. Dull, duller, and exceedingly dull. Perhaps that explained his attraction to the young woman in Calder’s office. “Do all my interesting experiences involve a woman?”

  “Does this one?” Joe held out several green-tipped pins.

  Clive, avoiding Joe’s question, turned all the sharp ends to point in the same direction, then returned the pins to their compartment in the divided box.

  Joe smiled. “You and I are the only ones who arrange the pins in that way.”

  “When I was a student, one of my teachers cut his finger during an autopsy and died within a week. No one could determine why it killed him, but it’s made me cautious of cuts or pinpricks.” Clive was oddly relieved that Joe had allowed him to turn the conversation. Something about the young woman made him wish not to examine his reactions too carefully.

  “Even if you weren’t a surgeon, it would offend your sensibilities to put the pins in willy-nilly.” Joe held out his hand. “Four blues, please.”

  Clive counted out the blue-tipped pins. “Don’t ask for any blacks, and I’m free to hand you pins all day.” Clive hoped to keep Joe from returning to the question of the interesting woman.

  “All day? Then after this, perhaps you could devote yourself to some record keeping.” Joe waved toward a desk in the far corner. “You will find the relevant forms stacked neatly on the desk you share with your brother.”

  Clive refused to look, taking another set of pins from the box and turning them all neatly in one direction.

  “Silence may be an effective skill in managing your family, but it only piques my interest.” Joe emphasized the last word. “Is she pretty?”

  Clive groaned inwardly. If he were not careful, Joe would ferret out his unexpected response to the young miss before he’d had time to analyze it for himself. He made his voice light and jovial. “I’m not being silent. I’m being deliberate. I’m certain that once or twice my intriguing experiences didn’t involve a pretty woman.”

  “Ah, another deflection. That in itself is . . . interesting. But I’ll allow it. Besides, you didn’t say intriguing. For you, intriguing means some discovery that changes your idea of an assignment. Amusing usually describes some sport, frequently including your brother, fisticuffs, and battered limbs.”

  “At least it’s our opponents who end up battered.” Clive straightened his shoulders. “To be fair, though, the opponents usually start out as Edmund’s. I merely provide a useful confusion.”

  “A useful confusion.” Joe paused, a bit of a smile playing along his mouth. “That could describe most Somerville gatherings. But interesting . . . interesting always means a woman.”

  “Then I meant both intriguing and interesting.” Clive gave in: Joe would not be deterred. The memory was still vivid. Clive could see the young woman once more, her face turning toward him as he entered the room. When her eyes met his, even in memory, he felt the same punch in his gut that he’d felt before. “I found her in the office of Horatio Calder. You remember him, the owner of that new panorama opening soon at the Rotunda.”

  “Ah, so this interesting woman is tied to those murders you keep promising to solve.” Joe didn’t look up from the map. “Six bodies to date, still warm, all bought by one of your colleagues at the surgery schools. Where do we stand on the investigation?”

  “Barkus bought the last body for seven pounds.” Clive shifted his tone and manner to give his report, ignoring Joe’s suggestion that his young miss might be involved. “A child no more than five showed him the location. A woman this time, reeking of gin—Barkus says she was suffocated.”

  Joe shook his head slowly. “Bad business, this. What about Calder? What’s his involvement?”

  “I’m not sure. He left a key on top of his desk. It led me to this.” Clive removed a carved bird from his valise and held it out. “It was hidden in the space behind the locked drawer.”

  Joe examined the bird, noting several deep impressions marring the base of the carving. “These marks here? Do you think they mean anything?”

  “I’m not sure. They may simply result from it being wedged between the drawers.” All the same, he took the bird from Joe and examined the marks again.

  “Sadly, that sort of carving is somewhat common.” Joe returned to his map. “Old soldiers, seamen, even beggars on the street whittle to pass the time.”

  “You underestimate our craftsman.” Clive turned the carving over. “This one is exceptional—delicate but sturdy. The only mistake is in the color of the heron. It should be more gray than blue. But why would Calder leave it for me?”

  “Would the girl know? You remember—the interesting one.”

  “I don’t think so. She was waiting to pay her subscription for the panorama. Pretty in a breathless sort of way.” Clive didn’t mention that he’d been captivated by her lips, flushed and full, wondering if they would taste as sweet as they looked. “She could have been prying about in his desk, but she didn’t take anything away with her. She didn’t even carry a reticule.”

  Joe looked up, meeting Clive’s eyes. Shaking his head, he turned back to the map. The silence drew out between them.

  “Damn.” Clive brushed back his hair. “If she had no reticule, where did she carry her subscription money?”

  “Caught up in a pretty face and missed the big clue. If the key were in plain sight, could she have found something before you arrived? Something that she didn’t need a reticule to carry away with her.”

  “That carving kept the drawer from opening more than a couple of inches. But her arms were slender. I suppose she could have reached in far enough to remove something small.”

  “A pretty face and slender arms.” Joe shook his head slowly. “You broke the first rule of investigations.”

  “I discounted her.” Clive leaned back on his stool. “She appeared to be frightened. I thought I had scared her.”

  “Could she have been afraid of something else?”

  “That’s why I said interesting. At first I thought she was dim, but then she stared me down and demanded I let her pass. It should have struck me as incongruous at the time, but I was too interested in why Calder wasn’t there to meet me . . . and in the key. I could see it from the doorway.”

  “What about Calder?”

  “I’ll see what I can discover at the Rotunda tomorrow. If he’s not there, we might consider adding him to our list of missing persons.”

  “We’ll hope that his body doesn’t appear at one of the surgery schools.” Joe brushed his hands on his trousers. “To change the subject, have you seen your better half?”

  “As I haven’t a wife, I’ll assume you mean Edmund.”

  “Ah, precision. The bane of creativity. Do you have more than one twin?”

  “When I saw him last week, he mumbled something about work in the country. I assumed he was working for you. Do you need him?”

  “No, your skills are the ones we need at present. But Edmund made me a wager, and I want to see if he’s lost.”

  “Wager?” Clive looked at Joe more intently. “Edmund never bets unless he’s sure he can’t lose.”

  “In interesting matters, both you and your brother are equally dim. But I’ll leave him to tell you his tale of woe.” Joe looked up at the clock. “Ah, I must go. I have a meeting with Mr. James to discuss the status of our operations.”

  “Someday I would like to meet Mr. James.” Clive took advantage of the opportunity. “It’s odd to work for this division, however irregularly, and never see the man in charge.”

  Joe looked at him sternly, and Clive raised his hands in acquiescence. “I know. I know. It’s vital to the security of the realm for Mr. James’s identity to remain a secret.” Clive recited the sentence he’d heard for years. “But Montclair has met him, and, as agents go, I’m at least as good as Montclair.”

  “It isn’t an issue of your quality as an agent. Montclai
r simply worked on a plot that required access to Mr. James’s expertise.” Joe’s stern look had turned hard. “He wasn’t supposed to speak of it.”

  “No, no. Don’t blame Montclair. He’s never said a word. I once saw him come out of Mr. James’s offices.”

  “Ah, I understand.” Joe paused, choosing his words. “Mr. James was much injured in the wars, and his appearance is somewhat shocking. He finds it easier to keep to the shadows where his scars do not distract others from the vitality of his mind.”

  “I’m a physician. I might be of help. And by oath, I cannot tell what I see or hear. In the original Greek, my obligation is called a ‘holy secret,’ making it a religious oath as well as an ethical one.”

  Joe’s face softened, and he patted Clive on the shoulder. “If ever we are in need of a physician, I will remember that.”

  “Ah, Somerville, I knew I’d find you here!” Adam Montclair strode into the room and picked up Clive’s hat, gloves, and coat. “I’ll play your valet, but you must come along. There’s twelve and six in it for me, if I deliver you to your crew of surgeons within the next hour.”

  “Twelve and six?” Clive sighed, looking at the wall clock. “I’d pay you to pretend you didn’t find me, but that’s too rich merely to gain an hour.” Clive allowed the other investigator to help him into his greatcoat. “But we must stop by the duke’s; he’s agreed to look over some information related to the case.”

  Joe nodded support. “Perhaps Montclair can offer his wisdom as well. But before you go, answer this: would you recognize that interesting young woman, if you saw her again?”

  Clive remembered her open face, slender waist, gentle bosom, and felt again the same unexpected pull of attraction. “In a heartbeat.”

  * * *

  After Lena left Mrs. Krause’s, she followed a narrow passage behind the shops. When she crossed back onto a main road, she made her path an obscure one. She hid in shop after shop, returning to the street only when it was clear or crowded. In places where she knew a corner shop or tavern had entrances on both streets, she took her way through, hoping to make it hard to trace her movements.

  Though the trip could have taken half the time, she reached her destination an hour later. The sign over the store entrance showed a dark-skinned man holding both a pen and a book; the glass window was lettered THE AFRICAN’S DAUGHTER, BOOKSELLER AND STATIONER.

  A bell jingled as she opened the door, and Lena breathed in the calming fragrance of books, paper, and ink. Lena had taken refuge at the African’s Daughter before. In the long weeks after she’d arrived in London, friendless and alone, she’d spent her evenings at the bookshop. The dramatic rise in the population of the country’s capital after Waterloo had thwarted all her attempts to find rooms in a boardinghouse, and she’d quickly run almost through her reserves staying at the only reputable hotel with rooms available for an unaccompanied young woman.

  Over several nights of frequenting the shop, she’d found in its proprietor, Constance Equiano, a kindred spirit. When Constance had discovered that Lena needed more permanent lodgings, she’d used her network of neighbors and friends to find Lena a respectable boardinghouse with an open flat. In gratitude, Lena had painted Constance a whimsical frieze that ran along the top of the store’s front wall above the windows—a fanciful landscape mixing people and events from Constance’s favorite books.

  In furnishing her bookstore, Constance had placed large convex mirrors in its upper corners, allowing her to see her customers from almost any location in the store. Passing the tables holding new books at the front of the store, Lena stopped before the first section of sturdy bookcases and used the mirror to search for Constance. She found her friend near the middle of the shop next to a comfortable seating area, where a group of women had gathered around the large central table. When Lena had questioned why Constance had sacrificed so much shelving to conversation, her friend had laughed. “The men have their clubs and coffee shops, but we women have the African’s Daughter!”

  As Lena walked deeper into the store, Constance hurried to meet her, arms open. “Lena! Welcome.” As they embraced, Lena could feel the tension in her back and shoulders release. She was safe. For now.

  Constance, always compassionate, studied Lena’s face intently. “What’s wrong? Has something bad happened?”

  “I needed to get away from the Rotunda for a few hours.” She stepped deeper into the shop using the bookcases to hide her from view. “I couldn’t think of anywhere else to go.”

  “You are always welcome here. The African’s Daughter turns no one away.”

  “I . . .” Before Lena could finish her sentence, the sound of women’s laughter made her stop. “I can wait in your office until your customers are gone.”

  Constance gave her hand an encouraging squeeze. “They are friends as much as customers. I can leave them to their own devices. What is troubling you?”

  “Horatio. He left me a note.” She wanted to explain that he’d taken all the money remaining from the sale of the advance tickets, leaving her with only a sixpence left, not enough for rent or dinner. But she couldn’t take the risk, and more than that, she couldn’t find the words. It was all too overwhelming. Instead, she pulled Horatio’s note from her pocket and held it out for Constance to read.

  The woman’s dark eyes widened. “‘Run’? As in abandon the exhibition?”

  Lena nodded, knowing that if she were to speak, she would weep.

  Constance put her arm around Lena. “He should know you’ve worked too hard to let it go now, and he should know you would not give up.” The group of women burst into laughter once more, and Constance inclined her head toward the laughter. “Do you trust me?”

  “I came here.” Lena held up her hands in a gesture of futility.

  “Then I believe my friends can help.” Constance smiled comfortingly.

  “Your friends?”

  “Every month the ladies of the Muses’ Salon meet here. We have tea and cakes while they discuss a book they have read. My patron, Lady Wilmot, began it as a way to bring customers to my shop, but it has become a pleasant habit.”

  “But an expensive one for you. How much profit do you lose serving tea and cakes once a month to a dozen women?”

  “None at all. Lady Wilmot provides everything—the tea, sugar, and cake,” Constance said. “This week, the Muses, as I call them, are quite dismayed by Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s recent revision of his Rime of the Ancient Mariner.”

  “It’s a book club?” Lena pulled back. “A book club can’t help me.”

  Constance patted Lena’s shoulder gently. “It’s an unusual book club, filled with women who are committed to helping those who are in need. Come along—you can at least meet them. Then after the Muses leave, we can talk about your response to this.” Constance handed back Horatio’s note. “Given Horatio’s message, is it safe for you to return to your rooms or even to the Rotunda?”

  “I had intended to wait until after dark,” Lena admitted.

  Constance squeezed her elbow. “You will stay with me tonight. I have a spare cot in my apartment upstairs. It will be no trouble.”

  “May I?” Lena breathed out in relief, the last of the tension leaving her shoulders. “I am afraid to go to my boarding house.”

  “Then it is decided.” Constance took her hand. “But in exchange, you must meet my friends. You’ll be surprised how useful they can be.” Constance pulled Lena toward the women, and after a second’s hesitation, she followed.

  In the middle of the store, six women—all dressed in the latest fashions—sat around a table, intently debating. While they stood to the side, listening, Constance quietly identified each woman. “The salon is primarily made up of women from two families: the Somervilles and the Gardiners. Sophia Gardiner, Lady Wilmot, is the patron, both of my store and the salon. Those three to her left are her late husband’s sisters, Ophelia Mason and the Misses Ariel and Kate Gardiner. The two to her right are related to her fianc�
�, the Duke of Forster: his elder sister, Lady Judith, and their newest sister-in-law, the former Lucia Fairborne, Lady Colin Somerville.”

  For a few minutes, Lena and Constance stood to the side, listening to their conversation. Whenever she met so many at once, Lena played a game to remember names: she would imagine how she would paint each person.

  Ariel Gardiner—a serious woman in her early twenties who reminded Lena of Joan of Arc, champion of France—brandished a smartly bound copy of Sibylline Leaves, Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s latest collection of poetry. “I still don’t understand why Coleridge took nineteen years to revise a poem he already published. Which version does he expect us to read?”

  “This is certainly a more complex poem than before, particularly with all these notes in the margin.” Lady Wilmot, an elegant woman with nut-brown hair, suggested. Her serene expression reminded Lena of the Virgin Mary’s patient cousin Elizabeth.

  “For me, the marginal notes simply muddle things up; in several places, they even contradict the poem itself. What do you think, Judith?” Ophelia Mason waved her hand dismissively. With her lustrous auburn hair flecked with gold and red and black, Ophelia was easy to imagine, not as Hamlet’s betrothed, but as Titania, Queen of the Fairies. But Lady Judith posed a puzzle for Lena’s game. From her slight stature and bright eyes, Lena would have normally painted her as one of Sandro Botticelli’s sylvan sprites, but Judith’s serious expression refused the portrayal.

  Lady Judith spoke after a few moments’ silence. “Perhaps the marginal notes aren’t Coleridge-the-author helping us understand his poem; perhaps they are another character, a reader, like us, who makes mistakes.” Hearing Judith speak, Lena settled on Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, whose enigmatic smile hinted at a thoughtful nature beset by sorrow.

  “The notes remind me of a medieval scribe explaining a manuscript in the margins, and doing a terrible job.” Kate Gardiner’s heart-shaped face and generous smile would be well suited for Botticelli’s Venus rising from the waves. “So, I read Coleridge’s literary essays, the Biographia Literaria, hoping they would help explain the poem.” Kate put her hand on the two volumes in front of her.