by Y. S. Lee
"There's no need to be theoretical about this. The difficulty is what it is."
"And you are what you are!"
"Pray tell," he drawled, coldly angry now.
"Arrogant, high-handed and controlling!"
"Rather that than arrogant, impulsive and irresponsible."
She flung herself up from the sofa and stalked around the room. "It's my life, not yours! Can't you understand that?"
"What I understand is that you'd rather risk your safety on Monday than admit I'm right."
"Untrue! You may well be right about Keenan, but I don't agree with your method of dealing with it. And I certainly won't permit you to give me orders, simply because – because-"
He'd risen when she did, as a gentleman ought. He stood now with his arms folded across his chest. "Go on – say it. 'Because…'"
Here she floundered, unwilling to articulate just how she felt about James. Unable to assume that he felt the same way, now that he was staring at her with those cold, angry eyes. As she struggled, her sense of righteous indignation began to seep away, leaving only despair. It didn't matter how this argument ended. Suddenly, she felt bone-weary. Deep behind her temples, a headache was blossoming. "Because," she said wearily, "you're concerned for my safety. I know that, and I am too, and I'll not be cavalier about it. But I refuse to go to the police just yet."
He was silent for a long moment. Then he said, "What about Monday?"
"I've not decided."
"What do you propose to do now?"
"Well, what about working out the precise nature of the link between Harkness, Keenan and Reid?"
Instead of replying, he pushed the tea tray towards her and said, "Will you pour?" The familiar rituals helped to smooth things between them: tea, cream and sugar, sandwiches, cakes. Once their hands were occupied with small matters, it was easier to pretend their thoughts were, too.
"We might be jumping to conclusions about Harkness," said Mary at last, when it seemed that James intended to stare into his teacup for ever. "As you said before, Reid might have filched the envelope from his desk."
He nodded slightly. "But if Harkness is truly innocent, I don't understand why he hasn't reported the thefts. Or sacked Keenan and Reid. He's involved with them, and it seems personal."
"Well, he does seem to feel a sense of responsibility towards the men. Towards Mark Quinn, for example – trying to teach as well as employ."
"True." James crumbled a scone with his long fingers. "So perhaps he's trying to lay a trap for them, or persuade them to give up their bad ways?"
"Possibly. All I'm saying is, why not try to learn more about their connection before assuming the worst? If you report your suspicions to the police and Harkness turns out to be blameless, you'll never forgive yourself."
"Neither will he," he said with the faintest of smiles. The clock on the mantel chimed six o'clock in silvery tones. Both looked at it, then at each other, with surprise. "I'm dining at Harkness's home tonight. I might learn something there." He drained his teacup, set it down decisively, and flashed her a charming grin. "Care to join me?"
"Wearing your nightshirt?" she laughed.
"Oh, you won't need it."
"I beg your pardon?!" She felt the blush wash over her in a swift, comprehensive wave.
"Tut tut, Miss Quinn – not as pure of mind as a young lady ought to be."
"You must be terribly disappointed."
He laughed aloud at that, a sound of pure joy. "Never less so in my life."
Another great roll of warmth rippled through her body and she couldn't stop smiling. "Go on, then – how am I to join you this evening?"
"As Mark Quinn, of course. I'm surprised you had to ask." Twenty-one Leighton Crescent, Tufnell Park
The Harkness home was a broad, blocky villa in Tufnell Park, part of a tightly packed estate built a decade before. Viewed together, the houses reminded Mary of nothing so much as a row of false teeth plonked into a field. Or perhaps that was simply her jaundiced eye. Despite tonight's promise of adventure and discovery, she was exhausted. And even after a large dose of willow-bark powder, her headache continued to swell, pounding against her temples in time with her footsteps. Her mouth was dry and thick. Either she was falling ill, or these were the after-effects of too much drink. Perhaps there was something to Harkness's teetotalling gospel, after all.
She pulled her cap lower over her eyes and considered the house before her. Despite the lingering dusk, for it was not yet eight o'clock, the house was brightly lit, as for a party. A neat row of carriages lined the street just outside. The first-floor curtains were still open, and ladies and gentlemen in evening dress paraded back and forth in the large windows. As she strolled past the house, a fourth carriage drew up and disgorged a stout mother-and-daughter pair. They were quite spectacularly alike, from their bulging eyes to their jewelled silk slippers. Although the evening was far from cold, each had a stole wrapped about her neck, the fur slightly wilted now in the humid evening.
The mother frowned at the house. "Well, I suppose it's not a bad size – but my dear! The location!"
Mary paused to watch as a footman opened the door to them. The hall blazed with gaslight and she received a fleeting impression of plenty of highly polished ornaments before the door closed once again. Quickening her pace now, she walked to the corner of the road and turned into the back alley. Even if she hadn't known which house was Harkness's, it would have been evident from the extraordinary level of light and noise emanating from its grounds.
The hum of conversation floated out of the first-floor windows, punctuated by barks of masculine amusement and the occasional bright squeal. At times, this was nearly drowned out by the clatter and half-panicked exclamations of servants on the lower levels. As Mary stopped to listen again, there came a smash of crockery and a cry of dismay, followed by ugly haranguing and then, perhaps inevitably, the wail of a slapped woman. Nearer her, the stable was alive with the whickering of horses and the rustle of hay, and even the quiet whistling of a man at work. He had by far the best job this evening. The atmosphere in the house was clearly fraught, she could tell even from here.
The noise and chaos were to her advantage. She'd been worried about gaining access without lock-picks or a skeleton key; people were generally so careful about keeping doors and windows locked. But tonight, the first window she tried slid up quite easily. She found herself inside the darkened breakfast room. The door had been left ajar and, in the corridor, feet pounded swiftly up and down with rather less grace and discretion than generally desired. One could almost measure the distance between the private and public spaces of the house by listening to the point at which the footsteps slowed, the hissed instructions ceased, and a harried expression was smoothed to a mask of impassive calm.
This was all very well, thought Mary, crouching behind the door, but if the servants didn't stop scampering past, she'd never be able to leave the breakfast room. The clock on the mantel, a squat thing heavily embellished, ticked off the minutes. Five. Ten. A quarter-hour. And then came a different sort of stampede – languid of pace, brightly chattering – down a staircase near the front of the house: the guests going in to dinner. Another five minutes and through the wedge of open door, Mary saw a pair of footmen bearing soup tureens, moving with perfect sangfroid – a denial of the frantic scurrying she'd witnessed earlier. When the dining-room doors closed, Mary peered out into the hallway. Empty. She had a good interval while this course was served. If she didn't move now, she'd be caught in the changeover between soup and fish.
The corridors were wainscotted in dark wood and papered in a smudged floral design that looked a peculiar greeny-brown by gaslight. The house, so far, seemed a testament to someone's violently rich tastes: ornate rosewood breakfast table and chairs, enormous tiered chandelier in the entry hall, walls jammed with paintings in gilded frames. Mary's eyes widened as she noticed a suit of armour – an actual suit of armour! – standing sentry by the broad staircase. It se
emed a far cry from Harkness's rather puritanical posture on site. She walked on, wide-eyed. Surely this faint, stirring queasiness owed as much to the decoration as to all that beer this afternoon…
Fortunately, there were only so many places to locate a study in a house like this. In rambling, aristocratic homes, one could wander for ever before finding the correct wing, let alone the study door; in the slums, one could become thoroughly lost in the rabbit warren before working out which families shared which rooms. But in square bourgeois houses like this, thought Mary, the study was generally – here.
The doorknob turned easily in her hand, and not a moment too soon. Far down the corridor, she heard an approaching half-shuffle, half-scurry. A servant retrieving or delivering something. Quickly, she slipped into the room, closed the door behind her and turned the key. It took a while for her eyes to adjust, and in those few seconds she had a sudden, vivid recollection of her first meeting with James. In the dark. In a study. In a wardrobe. She shivered slightly, and the room suddenly felt cool. Her headache, though, was beginning to lift.
She had a candle stub and a box of lucifers in her pocket. Though the single small flame seemed meagre after the yellowy glare of the rest of the house, it was enough. And as the details of the room became visible, she was thoroughly startled. She'd expected a study to match the rest of the house: a cacophony of the most expensive and oppressive furnishings one could buy. What she saw, instead, was a room as austere as a monk's cell. No Turkish carpet, no wallpapers, no vases or figurines or paintings. Just a wide, slightly battered desk and a few mismatched filing cabinets. There was nothing here to make the room comfortable. Not so much as a cushion on the upright desk chair.
Harkness's office at the building site was essentially a haystack of rumpled papers that threatened to subsume the furniture. Here, today's Times lay folded at one corner of the desk and there were no other papers in sight. Mary shivered again. There was something pathetic about the contrast, as though Harkness spent little time here, or as though a ruthless domestic routine had purged the room of his personality. And yet…
As she looked about the room in amazement, Mary realized that this room did indeed belong to Harkness. This was the study of a man who denied himself wine, who did his clumsy best to help his workers do the same (regardless of whether they wished to), who wanted to help Mark Quinn better himself. The blotter on the desk was covered in those black-and-white triangles, layer upon layer of them, a testament to the fidgety frugality of the man who worked in that space. She stood there in wonder, simply staring at the room, for a few minutes. Then, across the hall, the dining-room door clicked open and the burble of conversation grew loud. Despite its showy decoration, the walls in this house were thin.
Right. Time to start. Her first act was to unlatch the window, in case she should need to make a rapid exit. After that, however, her momentum faltered. Somehow, she was loath to inspect Harkness's filing cabinets, to sift through his personal correspondence. This wasn't the first time she'd felt these sorts of scruples: she'd struggled before with the notion of prying, but always managed to justify it because she was trying to do right; to uncover truths. But tonight, in this sad, bare cell, she found herself suddenly in doubt.
It wasn't that she thought Harkness blameless. He was certainly linked to Keenan and Reid, and if he was trying to combat their thefts he'd chosen a very strange and indirect method. He was much more likely to be co-operating with them. But there was something tragic about this study. Mary felt that she'd somehow stumbled onto a distressing personal secret just by entering the room.
Nevertheless, she was here, and this was her task. The desk drawers glided smoothly, rather to her surprise. She'd half-expected them to be stiff with age and disuse. The top drawer held the usual bits: pens, pen-wipers, an extra bottle of ink, the rules and T-squares and protractors of the architectural draftsman. She opened the other drawers: writing-paper. A handful of loose penny stamps. A postcard from Margate from someone signing herself "Hetty". A file of newspaper clippings about the clock tower (favourable mentions only). And, finally, in the bottom drawer, the things she'd been looking for, stacked neatly one on the other like presents.
Cheque book and register.
Bank book.
She paused to listen to the dinner party under way. The rumble of polite conversation swelled and ebbed like a tide, interrupted occasionally by laughter. One man had a high, yipping, nasal sort of laugh which sliced through the rest, through the walls of the house, so that Mary felt as though she were seated next to him at table. She wondered who that might be, and whether he would ever be asked back. She wondered how James was faring, as a reluctant guest at the Harkness table. She wondered-
She hadn't time to wonder, and abruptly opened the cheque book. Harkness wasn't a man for writing cheques except to cash, and if the monthly sums were surprisingly large, they were also fairly consistent. Although… Mary flicked back a page or two in the register. There had been a steady increase in the amount of cash Harkness had required over the past year. Increased household expenses, she supposed; the cost of supporting a large family. Or perhaps the redecoration of the house, or new clothing for all the family. The Harknesses certainly seemed to enjoy shopping. Although the numbers seemed high to her, Harkness might have private means to supplement his salary.
However, the bank book told a different story. The last entry, dated perhaps six months earlier, showed Harkness to be two hundred pounds overdrawn. Two hundred pounds would be – what? A third, or even half, of his annual salary. It was certainly more than most men earned in a year, and much more than Peter Jenkins could ever hope to see in his lifetime. And there were no further entries showing it as paid off.
She began to rifle through the remaining drawers now in earnest, looking for other documents. If Harkness had gone into overdraft six months ago and not repaid the money, there would be other loans. Loans from family members or friends, loans from banks, perhaps even a loan from the sort of private moneylender who served only the desperate. All her reluctance had fallen away, now, and she had to force herself to slow down. To search methodically. To handle only what was necessary. After all, one couldn't scrabble quietly.
In the end, she found only a memorandum book. It was large and quite empty, with the occasional appointment ("Dr Fowler, 11") or family anniversary ("Amy's birthday") recorded. But as she flicked through the pages to July, a genuine sense of urgency surged through her veins. The last remaining page in the book was Sunday, 10 July: tomorrow. It, too, was blank. But every following page had been torn out. According to Harkness's diary, there was no future. She stared at the book, possible interpretations flooding her brain. It was clearly the end of something: the end of his involvement with Keenan's gang. But apart from that obvious starting-point, there was no sign of what he intended.
She stood and stretched muscles stiff from long crouching. As she did, a squiggle at the edge of the blotting pad caught her eye. It was so unlike all the other marks on the pad: a looping, dramatic flourish that stood out in contrast to Harkness's tense, scratchy penmanship. It looked like somebody else's handwriting, yet it was the only indication that a second person had used this blotter. She bent to inspect the ink mark, frowning. Ran a finger over it, mentally reversing the letters. At that, her eyes widened. Good Lord. Could it be? It seemed rather far-fetched, but it was certainly possible. Yes.
Although it was a large risk, she tore away the edge of the top sheet of paper, removing the mark in question, and slipped it into her pocket. She turned to leave, then had a second thought. From the stationery drawer, she carefully withdrew a single sheet of writing-paper and pocketed that, too. Another rumble of laughter erupted from the dining room, that same hyena laugh making goosebumps rise on the back of her neck. As she eased out of the study window and dropped quietly into the shadowy garden, Mary hoped that James enjoyed at least part of his evening here. For what she was about to suggest to him would certainly spoil his night. Twenty
-two
That laugh! That piercing, grating, hysterical yipping. James had seldom heard anything like it, and certainly not from Harkness. The man had always been sober. Earnest. Pompous, even. And now the sound of his mad laughter rang ceaselessly in James's ears as he and Barker drove through Tufnell Park, on the lookout for a small lad in the dark.
Mary was at the meeting point they'd arranged, a few yards from a quiet-looking pub in Leighton Road. She'd been all for somewhere less noticeable – a park or a church, say – but James had prevailed, saying it would be easier for her to blend in near a busy shop-front. He'd not dared admit he was worried for her safety in a dark, deserted park. She was a tricky, stubborn proposition, Mary Quinn, and despite his anxiety, at the thought of her a deep excitement stirred within him.
"Good dinner?" she asked, as she climbed in. The carriage, which hadn't entirely stopped, now accelerated smartly towards Bloomsbury and home.
He shrugged. It had been a good meal, as far as food was concerned, although the total absence of wines and spirits had been strange indeed. The sweet, fruit-flavoured drinks accompanying the meal had made it seem rather a children's party, and eating Stilton without a glass of port had seemed rather pointless. "I'm worried about Harkness. He seems to have gone completely round the bend."
Mary's eyes went round. "The mad laughter – that was Harkness?"
James nodded. "Telling desperately poor jokes, and then laughing at them. His wife hadn't the faintest idea what to say or do, and neither did the rest of us."
"Any idea what…?"
"What made him behave like that? Well, he wasn't tipsy, that's certain."
"The pressures of the building site…"
"They're not new. He's been on that job for years, now." She was silent, then, looking at him with concern in those luminous eyes. He felt a sudden impulse to bury his face in her neck and weep. Instead, he looked out of the window, concentrating on the gaslamps as they whizzed past. Each light was surrounded by a gauzy yellow halo that vanished when he blinked. "His behaviour. The account books. Everything points to his guilt, doesn't it?"