by Y. S. Lee
In all, Mary was as free and private as a young woman could possibly be. James had seen her flat only once, before she’d moved in. Nobody else visited. When she closed the front door behind her, she was the creator and sole inhabitant of her own small world.
Mary shed her rain-heavy cloak, lit a small lamp and stoked up the fire in the sitting room. She balanced a kettle on its tripod over the bright fire.
She had just exchanged her walking dress for a dry woollen gown when her doorbell rang. James. She skimmed down the steep flights of stairs, unlocked the front door and threw it open with a broad smile – a grin that slackened into astonishment when she beheld the thin, neat, middle-aged lady standing before her.
Several long moments passed. Mary knew she was gaping, yet couldn’t quite summon the appropriate greeting. Eventually, she settled for a weak, “Miss Treleaven?” Her first, panicked, thought was that Anne had seen James depart. It was more than likely.
“Hello, Mary.” The Agency’s past and present manager, Anne Treleaven, smiled sedately. “May I come in?”
It wasn’t really a question. Mary nodded, stepped aside to let her in and assumed something approximating a serene expression. “Of course. How lovely to see you, Miss Treleaven.” It wasn’t a lie; she was extremely fond of and grateful to Anne Treleaven, who, with Felicity Frame and the rest of the Agency, had rescued, educated, trained and supported her for so many years. Mary owed them, quite literally, her life. Yet this unannounced visit was disconcerting, to say the least.
She led Anne up the stairs at a much more conventional pace than her usual two-by-two. She needed the time to gather her thoughts. Inside, Anne removed not only her cape, but also her hat and gloves, confirmation that this was no fleeting social call. As if there had ever been a chance of that.
As Mary showed Anne into her small sitting room, she became intensely aware of its spartan appearance. She’d rented the flat unfurnished, preferring not to live with others’ bits of cast-off history. Yet, Mary had discovered, shopping was tedious. Once the initial flush of novelty had worn off, she could think of half a dozen things she’d rather do than browse mediocre furnishings in Tottenham Court Road. As a result, the sitting room was oddly bare – a single sofa, a low table, a rug – calling to mind her simple room at Miss Scrimshaw’s Academy for Girls rather than a lady’s parlour.
They perched awkwardly on opposite ends of the small sofa and spoke of safe things at first: Mary’s new life as mistress of her own flat; the fierce public debates that had raged all through the summer and autumn over Mr Darwin’s incendiary book, On the Origin of Species; the capture of Beijing yesterday by British and French forces and its repercussions for the opium trade; school life at Miss Scrimshaw’s Academy, which covertly housed the Agency in its attics and where Anne was head teacher.
Mary poured boiling water onto fragrant tea leaves and discovered two remaining biscuits in the tin.
Anne made no mention of her former fellow manager, Felicity Frame, and her departure, which had fractured the Agency. Mary understood the divide in terms of ideology. Felicity had wanted to employ male sleuths and expand the Agency with the help of her new, high-ranking contacts in government. Anne thought the Agency should concentrate upon its speciality, placing female detectives in discreet situations. But Mary couldn’t imagine what Anne’s new reality must be like, having worked for so long and so intimately with Felicity. She was both anxious to ask and reluctant to hear the answer. But before she found the right opening, Anne leaned forward and came to the point.
“I am here to ask if you’d consider one more job for the Agency,” she said, taking charge of the teapot. A not-so-subtle power play, wondered Mary, or was Anne showing signs of nervousness?
Mary permitted herself to look surprised, but said nothing.
“You’ve a comfortable life here, that’s clear. I also realize you’re disappointed in the way things ended between Felicity and me… You’re not the only one,” she added.
“Disappointed” failed to come close, as a description. Anne Treleaven and Felicity Frame had been much more to Mary than the managers of the Agency; they’d been closer to stepmothers, an unlikely and extraordinarily effective duo whom Mary had tried to emulate in all things. Their falling-out nine months ago had torn apart the Agency and, with it, Mary’s life. She had lost both her surrogate family and her home.
Mary silently offered Anne a biscuit, but neither woman took one. The tension was already too high.
“But I’ve come to you first, because you’re the best choice for this assignment,” said Anne, at last. “Do you wish to hear more?” This was the same phrase that Anne had always used when offering Mary a chance at an assignment. From this point on, all they discussed would be in strictest confidence. Mary searched her face for a sign, but Anne’s spectacles were as good as a mask.
Faced with this familiar challenge, Mary felt a peculiar swirl of emotion: intense curiosity, a surge of suspicion. Why couldn’t an Agency member do the job just as well? Above all, though, she had a sudden, powerful desire to be on assignment for the Agency once last time.
It had been nine months since the events at Buckingham Palace that launched her independence. Nine months since the rift in the Agency. Nine months since she and James had founded their own fledgling detective bureau, Quinn and Easton. She didn’t actually need the Agency any more. But just as surely, she missed it, in the way one might long for a childhood home.
Mary leaned forward in her chair and nodded. “Yes, please.”
There it was: a gleam of satisfaction in Anne’s steel-grey eyes, distinct even behind the spectacles. An instant later, it was gone. “You recall, of course, the Thorold family.”
How could Mary ever forget? Her time with the Thorolds had been her first experience of detective work: a routine exercise that had suddenly ballooned into a swift and deadly criminal plot. “Naturally. Mr Thorold admitted his guilt with regard to insurance fraud and was sentenced to life imprisonment. Mrs Thorold fled the country. ”
Anne nodded. “Henry Thorold stoutly denied any involvement in the piracy scheme, and his denials rang true: there was no logical reason for him to be involved in attacks on his own merchant fleet. Scotland Yard views his wife’s flight as an admission of guilt, and she remains their prime suspect for the acts of piracy and the deaths of so many Lascars. The sheer scale of Thorold’s marine losses over the years – dozens of ships sunk, dozens of Lascar crews dead, extremely valuable cargoes never recovered – point to somebody with inside knowledge of the vessels’ routes and cargoes. The circumstantial evidence is compelling: Mrs Thorold had both means and opportunity to commit those crimes.
“There is also her attempted murder of James Easton, and the suspected murders of two others. As you know, Mr Easton’s testimony will be conclusive. Yet until Mrs Thorold returns to England, our police are powerless to arrest her.”
Mary nodded. This seemed obvious enough. “So much for the parents. What about Angelica? She announced her intention to study music in Germany. Did she do so in the end?”
Anne nodded. “She studied first in Germany, where her music teacher had connections, and later in Vienna. She has never returned to visit her father in jail, until now. Henry Thorold is dying, Mary. As his next of kin, Angelica was notified of this. She embarked on the journey from Vienna to London last week.”
“Was Angelica never regarded as a suspect? Why seek the mother but not the daughter, who also promptly fled for the Continent?”
“Angelica was interviewed by the Yard and judged to be profoundly ignorant of the family business. You must remember that she’d been away at boarding school for several years before coming to live at home again that spring.”
Mary frowned. “And Mrs Thorold?”
Anne’s smile held little amusement. “Scotland Yard’s best guess as to her location is ‘somewhere in Europe’. But you’re right. They are very interested in the possibility that she may return in order to see her hu
sband one last time.”
“Why on earth? It’s not as though they were fond of one another, what with Mrs Thorold using pirates to raid her husband’s merchant ships.”
“Yes, but if she could persuade him to make a deathbed confession…?”
Mary sat up, scalp prickling with the possibility. “Thus clearing her name, and freeing her to return to England?”
“Precisely. The police ensured that the news of Thorold’s illness – a cancer, it seems – was well known. He has suffered a slow decline, but the prison physician believes he now has only a few days to live. We – the Agency – have been asked to watch for Mrs Thorold’s return.”
Mary swallowed hard: a difficult gesture, given the lump in her throat. Her first thought was of James, whom Mrs Thorold had very nearly murdered. Her second was a fervent prayer for his safety, in this moment and those to come. “She’ll be in disguise,” she managed to say. “You’re watching all the ports?”
Anne paused, clearly surprised to be questioned in this way. “Yes. But she’s extremely practised in changing her appearance, as you know, and very few members of the Agency have actually met her face to face.”
“What about the banks? She must have left a nest egg somewhere, under a false name.”
“The name is Mrs Fisher, actually, and the bank’s been notified.” Anne looked amused. “Anything else, my dear?”
Anne was treating this like a game. Didn’t she realize how deadly the situation was? “Another house, under a third name?”
“Not that Scotland Yard are aware of.”
“What about former associates? She had a junior partner in the piracy scheme.” Mary’s mind raced ahead. Someone else who could set the stage, even before Mrs Thorold was on English soil…
“Ah, yes. He confessed to everything, but most unhelpfully died before his trial. We’re not aware of any other assistants.”
Mary nodded as the scene emerged clearly in her mind. “So you’re asking me to watch the prison, since Mrs Thorold will need to make personal contact with Thorold.”
“Yes. You’re the most likely to recognize her, having lived in her household.”
“She played the invalid matron to perfection throughout my time there. It was a genuine shock to see how she really spoke and moved when she thought herself unobserved.”
Anne nodded. “She is a formidable adversary.” The two women fell silent as they remembered Maria Thorold: accomplished dissembler, unhesitating murderer. Such a vengeful woman was unlikely to have a short memory. After a pause, Anne finally acknowledged what was only too evident. “I realize, of course, that you’ll be in an exceptionally dangerous position if Mrs Thorold learns you were the cause of her initial downfall. Mr Easton is also at risk, of course.” Anne inclined her head. “I believe you are in frequent contact with him?”
Mary nodded. More silence. Finally, she asked, “Where is Thorold being held?” Her thoughts went to Pentonville or Millbank prisons, so-called “model” jails, recently built on humanitarian schemes. They were tidy and orderly and clean. Nothing like her own brief experience of incarceration.
Anne’s hesitation prepared Mary for the answer. “Newgate,” said the older woman at last. “He’s in Newgate.” She leaned forward and touched Mary’s arm with a light, hesitant hand. “I’m sorry, my dear. I am deeply reluctant to ask this of you, but Mrs Thorold is an exceptionally dangerous criminal who remains at large.”
Mary nodded, her blood suddenly roaring, nearly too agitated to be contained by her veins. Of course it was Newgate. Where she had narrowly escaped hanging, after an ill-judged attempt to steal a piece of gold plate from a deceptively well-guarded house. Unbidden, the stench of its corridors suddenly entered her nostrils: dung and filth and fear. She forbade herself thoughts of the jail, blinded herself to memories of its dank cells. She tried, at any rate. And after several moments, a measure of logic asserted itself against terror. “Surely not Newgate?” she finally managed. Her voice was loud in the quiet room, but she didn’t care. “Newgate holds prisoners who haven’t yet been tried.”
“And those awaiting deportation,” said Anne, “neither of which is the case for Mr Thorold. I, too, thought this highly unusual and looked into the matter. He’s being held under a relatively obscure classification, as a person convicted of offences on the high seas.”
Logic had its limits, and Mary found this explanation of little reassurance. Fear still clawed her insides at the very word “Newgate”, and her memories of its dark interior remained vivid. She held herself as still as possible so that she didn’t curl into a ball. She tried to breathe slowly, focusing on the high, wide window of her parlour, the warmth of her own fireplace. She was her own woman. She was free.
When she recovered herself, Anne was saying, “I should count it as an enormous favour, Mary, if you were to accept this assignment. I know there’s nothing now to tie you to the Agency…”
Except gratitude, thought Mary. And memories. And very real affection for this woman, who’d rescued her from jail and changed her life beyond recognition. Everything in the world still tied her to the Agency … except her loyalty to James Easton, and their hopeful new partnership. She cleared her throat and Anne instantly became attentive. “Before I can give you an answer, Miss Treleaven, I must discuss the matter with Mr Easton. He is my business partner now.”
Something very like regret compressed Anne’s features, but she quickly smoothed her expression. “Naturally.”
It was only in that moment that Mary realized what else was wrong about the conversation: Anne’s use of “I”. When Felicity Frame had been part of the Agency, she and Anne had always spoken as “we”. Mary had always thought they meant the Agency as a whole, the collective of clever and unconventional women to which she was privileged to belong. But Anne’s use of “I”suggested otherwise.
“I realize this is an urgent matter and shall endeavour to give you an answer as quickly as possible.”
“Tonight?”
“Tomorrow,” said Mary firmly, and rose. It was impolite of her, of course, all but demanding that Anne depart, especially with a cup of tea unfinished. But what was decorum compared to the problems she and James now faced? Her mind whirled. James was Mrs Thorold’s primary adversary in England, the essential witness in any case against her. Mary’s anxiety on his account was reasonable in its foundation, but distorted by emotion: it was unlikely that Mrs Thorold was already on his trail, ready to do him harm. It would be excessive to interrupt his work with a message, and she would see him in a few short hours. Logical as her thoughts were, they offered little comfort.
“I shall await your reply,” said Anne, recalling her to the present moment. “At any hour of the day or night.”
Mary nodded. “Thank you.”
She saw Anne down the zigzagging flights of stairs and into a hansom. The rain had stopped, the dank chill subsided. But as Mary closed the front door behind her, she shivered.
Three
The same evening
Near Leicester Square
The venue, if one could grace the place with such an exalted name, was a public house near Leicester Square and it was called, improbably, the Crown Inn. It stood a few doors down from the notorious Cambrian Stores, arguably the rowdiest and most violent pub in all of London. The Crown Inn was several degrees grottier.
Even from the street, James had the measure of the crowd: poor, male, drunk, aggressive. All about them, people simmered with pent-up frustration, a ferocity both tempered and stoked by their Saturday wage packet and a grim determination to make the most of the weekend. It was an obvious powder-keg, an exceptionally foolish place to be on a Saturday evening. They should never have come. James glanced down at Mary, noted the determined line of her jaw and said nothing.
Her boy’s costume was nearly perfect: the jacket and breeches well-worn, the boots just a few miles from falling to pieces. The only flaw was her hair. Instead of cropping it short again, she had covered it with a t
attered cap. He hoped it wouldn’t get knocked off her head. On any other night, he’d have quietly insisted upon leaving. But something was different about Mary this evening. She was generally intense, focused – qualities they shared. But tonight, she was drawn as taut as a violin string. Tighter, possibly.
For Mary, this was clearly more than an irresponsible escapade. It was a compulsion that seemed to include an element of homage to her father, the paying of a debt. He could understand that. She’d concealed her family history for so long. Would have to continue to do so, at times. But this evening, it was time to explore it. His role tonight was simply to accompany, to acquiesce, to help her however he could.
There was a burly man at the door, taking money. “How much?” asked James, trying to peer inside.
“Tanner.” The man glanced at Mary with bored eyes. “And half-price for your brother.”
James was genuinely surprised. “Steep that, innit?”
The doorman shrugged and gestured with his chin at the seething mass of bodies packed into a stripped-down room. “House rules, take it or leave it.”
James dug into his trouser pockets – he’d left his billfold at home, along with his bespoke boots – and counted out ninepence. “Better be worth it,” he muttered.
Inside, their shoes scuffed against the packed sawdust that had been thrown down to soak up beer and blood. The Crown Inn wasn’t so much a pub as a boxing den that sold indifferent mugs of ale at inflated prices. It had nothing to offer beyond a large sparring ring, a few tiers of benches against each wall and a ceiling that amplified the spectators’ jeers and roars. The spirit within was heady. It reminded him of the festival atmosphere outside Newgate on a hanging day, come to think of it.
Boxing matches, both amateur and professional, were difficult to avoid in London. It was a city of casual brawls, where men – and the occasional woman – seemed to glory in stripping to the waist and locking horns. Boxing was a way to settle disputes, entertain one’s mates, earn a little money and let off steam, all at the same time. At the Cambrian Stores, the retired bare-knuckle boxing champion Nat Langham held prizefights at least once a week. The sight of professional fighters sparring for a cash prize often inspired patrons to fisticuffs of their own.