Strolling up to the lad, hands sunk in his greatcoat pockets, he used the line of patter he’d developed over the past hour. “I was supposed to meet my sister here this morning, and, of course, I slept in. She was supposed to go to the bank back there and meet me outside, but now I don’t know if she came and left, or if she hasn’t shown at all. She’s a lady, and she would have been wearing a veil—she usually does when she travels here.”
“Yeah?” The boy eyed him. “So what does she look like, this sister of yourn? Other than being female and wearing a veil?”
Barnaby rattled off the general description—brown hair, middle height, about Barnaby’s own age.
He could barely believe it when the boy nodded. “You saw her?” he asked in response to the boy’s nod.
“Aye.” The boy pointed along the street. “She came walking up from Threadneedle Street, and I’m sorry to have to tell you this, guv, but a gentleman was waiting for her in a coach pulled up to the curb just along there.”
“A gentleman?” Swallowing his leaping excitement, Barnaby adopted a resigned air. “I expect that must have been my cousin. Did you see him?”
“Not well—he stayed in the carriage. Just opened the door and gave the lady his hand to help her inside.” The boy looked at Barnaby questioningly.
Barnaby sighed, pulled out a half crown, and held it up. “So what did he look like?”
“Gentleman—couldn’t say how tall ’cause he was sitting down.” Like a magpie’s, the boy’s eyes had fixed on the shiny coin. “He didn’t have a beard but those side bits as is common now, and his face was roundish, and he had brown hair.” The boy looked at Barnaby as if to ask if that was enough.
“One last thing—how old was this gent?”
The boy blinked. “Thought he was your cousin—don’t you know how old he is?”
“I have several cousins. I’m trying to decide which one it was.”
“Oh.” The boy hesitated, then screwed up his face. “Can’t be sure, can I? I didn’t see him clearly, but . . . the same age as the lady?”
His tone made it clear that his estimation was pure guess. Nevertheless, Barnaby handed over the coin. “Good enough.”
The boy had told him enough to be sure that the veiled lady was working with—or perhaps for—one of the five Halstead males.
Barnaby turned to leave, then halted, hunted in his pocket, and pulled out a sovereign. He swung back to the lad, who had pocketed the half crown. “Here!” When the boy looked up, Barnaby tossed him the sovereign.
Swift as a hawk, the boy plucked the coin from the air. The dawning wonderment in his face as he turned it between his fingers and realized his good fortune made Barnaby grin.
When the boy glanced up, Barnaby jauntily saluted him. “That’s for being observant. Put it to good use.”
He left the boy staring at the wealth in his palm. Feeling thoroughly pleased, Barnaby strode down the street toward Montague’s office.
After returning to Chapel Court and his office, Montague’s first act was to check on Pringle. Seated at the desk Slocum had cleared and assigned to him, Pringle was steadily working his way through the accumulated Halstead financial records.
“They go back nearly thirty years.” Pringle held up one account. “Sir Hugo dealt with young Mr. Runcorn’s father, who had the business before him. I can’t tell whether it was the villain who did it, or the constables when they gathered them up, but the papers are in a right jumble.”
“So you can’t yet say if anything’s missing?” Montague asked.
Pringle shook his head. “Not until I get everything in order again.”
Leaving him to it, suppressing his impatience to get on and do—to analyze the accounts and find the murderer and so ensure Violet Matcham was safe—Montague spoke with Gibbons and Foster, reviewing their on-going work with the firm’s clients, then he confirmed the arrangements to have the pair take over all scheduled meetings for the next several days. His own slate thus cleared, he retreated to his office and settled behind his desk.
The papers Pringle had copied and sent to him sat in a thick sheaf to one side. They beckoned, but Montague resisted. There was one other effort he could and should make, an avenue he could pursue to directly identify the odd payments. Returning to his copy of Lady Halstead’s bank statement—the document that had given rise to the intrigue of money and murder—he made a neat list of all the odd deposits stretching back over the last fourteen months.
List completed, he studied it, then called in Slocum and dictated four letters.
Each letter was a separate request, reminding the recipient, each of them one of his peers, of a past favor done for them by Montague or his firm, before describing the pattern of deposits into the Halstead account and asking whether the recipient was aware of any similar deposits made into their clients’ bank accounts, and, if so, if they had identified the source and the purpose behind said deposits.
Within the circle of select men-of-business to which all those he’d elected to contact belonged, absolute discretion was assured.
As Slocum retreated to dispatch the letters, Montague stared at the list of deposits, then grimaced. “Who knows? Perhaps this is a more widespread occurrence, something that’s happening to others as well.” Alternatively, one of his peers might have some insight into possible sources of such not-quite-regular mystery deposits.
Inwardly sighing, he turned to the Halstead records, the pile comprised of the papers Runcorn had initially given him, as well as those documents Pringle had subsequently copied and sent; lifting the inches-thick pile, he placed it squarely on the center of his wide blotter. Leaning back in his chair, he considered the stack.
Could Runcorn have been a party to whatever scheme the murderer had been running?
In his mind, Montague returned to his meeting with the younger man-of-business, studied again his fresh, open face, reviewed again his eager expression, his patent wish to please . . . the touch of awe he’d accorded Montague.
Everything Montague had sensed about Runcorn had rung true; even in hindsight, he could see no reason to change his assessment of the honesty and trustworthiness of the younger man.
“So”—Montague refocused on the pile of papers—“Runcorn had no idea what was going on, but the murderer believed that when Runcorn reviewed the file to get Lady Halstead’s affairs in order, he would discover something, enough to be alerted to whatever illegality the murderer was engaged in.”
Getting a client’s affairs in order involved, among other things, a complete listing of all assets, including all investments currently held, an estimate of their current capital worth, and an accounting of the income deriving from them, as well as a complete reconciliation of bank accounts and monies in the Funds and similar deposits. The last review of the Halsteads’ affairs would most likely have been done ten years earlier, at the time of Sir Hugo’s death.
Between them, Runcorn and Pringle had extracted, copied, and had delivered to Montague all the papers necessary for him to perform such a review, essentially to get both the Halstead estate’s affairs, as well as Lady Halstead’s personal affairs, in order.
“Which means,” Montague murmured, reaching out to check the numbers inscribed in Pringle’s neat hand at the bottom left corner of each page, “that somewhere in this pile should lay some sign of what the murderer has killed twice to conceal.”
Confirming via Pringle’s notations that the pile was assembled earliest to most recent, Montague lifted the top sheet and started at the beginning.
The clock on his desk stolidly ticked on. Immersed in the documents though he was, checking and making notes on past and present investments, he found his gaze drawn, again and again, to the list of the odd, unaccounted-for deposits that he’d made earlier and had laid aside.
An hour passed. Then another fifteen minutes and he could stand it no longer.
Setting aside the larger pile along with his notes to that point, he picked up the list of depo
sits, studied it one more time, then rose and went to his door. Looking over the outer office, he called, “Gibbons?”
When Frederick Gibbons looked up, Montague waved the list. “If you would, I’d like your opinion.”
Sometimes a fresh pair of eyes saw matters more clearly.
Gibbons promptly rose and followed Montague back into his office.
Returning to his chair, Montague waved Gibbons to a chair before the desk. He waited until Gibbons sat and leveled a curious look at him, before saying, “I want you to look over this list. It’s a set of deposits made into a bank account—I’ve listed both the amounts and the dates on which each deposit was made. I’m trying to identify what the source of these payments might be.”
With that, he extended the list.
Gibbons took it.
Montague watched as Gibbons scanned the amounts, noted the dates.
“It’s not payments from an investment—not quite regular enough in the timing, and the amounts vary too much . . .” Gibbons glanced up. “These look like deposits from trade of some sort—from sales of something.”
Montague blinked. He’d never dealt with trade accounts, but before he had joined Montague and Son, Gibbons had.
The list of figures he’d recently written flashed through his mind; reaching across the desk, he waved his hand for the list. “Give me that.”
Gibbons handed it over. Setting the list before him, Montague picked up a pencil and went to work, jotting amounts and sums alongside each of the deposits.
Figures were his forte; all his mind had needed was the clue Gibbons had provided and he had the solution.
Gibbons leaned forward, angling his head to read the sums Montague was writing down the side of the list.
Reaching the end of the list and finishing the calculation to account for the last payment, Montague picked up the list, scanned it again, then handed it back to Gibbons. “What do you think?”
Gibbons looked through the deposits, his eye following the line of Montague’s calculations. Reaching the list’s end, Gibbons nodded decisively. “That’s it. Each deposit is the payment from sales of between five and nine items, with each item being worth two hundred and fifty pounds, minus an amount of between two and three percent.” Gibbons glanced at Montague. “Were the deposits made by courier?”
“We don’t yet know—someone is checking that now—but most courier services charge between two and three percent.”
Gibbons was staring at the list again. “I’m trying to imagine what items one might sell at two hundred and fifty pounds each, and have such a level of consistent sales. Five minimum, month to month, reliable and regular.”
Montague thought, too, then shook his head. “It might be lucrative, but it’s almost certainly not legal.”
Gibbons snorted and handed back the list. “If it were legal, I wouldn’t mind getting into that trade myself. Nor would a host of others.”
“Indeed.” Taking back the list, Montague glanced at it again. “But this, it seems, is something someone has already killed twice to hide.”
“In that case”—Gibbons pushed back his chair and rose—“count me out. Is there anything else?”
Montague smiled. “No. Thank you, Frederick—you’ve been a great help.”
Gibbons grinned and saluted, then went back to his desk.
Montague studied the list and the notations he’d made. His smile turned grim. It was but a small breakthrough, but he felt they’d made headway. At least he’d have something to share with Stokes and Adair when they arrived later in the day.
As Penelope’s carriage rocked around the corner into Dover Street, she was still shaking her head over the wealth of information she and Griselda had gathered thus far that afternoon. “I will never not notice a shopgirl again.” When Griselda laughed, Penelope insisted, “No—it’s true. Now that I know how much they remember of what one says and does, I’ll be forever minding my p’s and q’s.”
“I rather think the Halsteads are a special case,” Griselda said. “Difficult behavior is always remembered.”
She’d taken Penelope to visit a long row of shops in Kensington High Street, within easy walking distance of Lowndes Street, where Lady Halstead had lived; as it transpired, those were also the shops favored by Mrs. Wallace Camberly, who lived with her husband and son in Belgrave Square, and, even more importantly, by their household staff. While Penelope had played the lady, examining items with a view to purchase, Griselda, in the role of lady’s maid, had chatted with the shopgirls at each of the establishments.
“Yes, indeed, but behavior aside, the comments and information passed on by the Camberlys’ staff were . . . well, amazing.” Behind her spectacles, Penelope widened her eyes. “Amazingly detailed.”
“It helped that the shop assistants still remembered Mortimer and his family from before they moved out of the area.” Griselda glanced out of the window as the carriage slowed. “So what we heard wasn’t simply bad-mouthing on the part of the Camberlys’ staff but attitudes the shopgirls had had confirmed by the Halsteads’ staff directly.”
The carriage halted.
“Regardless”—Penelope sat up and eased toward the carriage door—“we’ve now got one quite definite view of the Halsteads and the Camberlys. Let’s see what the grandes dames can add.”
When the groom opened the door, Penelope let him hand her down to the pavement, waited until Griselda joined her, then spoke to the coachman. “We’ll walk home, Phelps.”
“Very good, ma’am.”
With a salute, Phelps set the coach rolling again; Albemarle Street was only a block away.
Turning, Penelope led the way up the front steps of the house of her aunt-by-marriage, Horatia Cynster.
“Are you sure my presence won’t be . . . well, awkward?” Griselda murmured. “I’m not the sort usually found swanning about ladies’ drawing rooms.”
Halting on the narrow porch, Penelope threw Griselda a reassuring glance “Don’t worry. Horatia’s at-home is such a regular event it goes like clockwork. By this time, the only ones left will be the Cynster ladies and perhaps Lady Osbaldestone. All of them have met Stokes at one time or another, and all of them know he’s helped the family at numerous times. They know he helped Henrietta and James, and that was only recently.” Lips lifting mischievously, Penelope turned and plied the knocker. “Trust me, if anything, they’re going to be quite interested in meeting you.”
Griselda shut her lips on a tart retort as the door swung open, held by a rather stiff-looking butler, who, on lowering his gaze to Penelope, immediately unbent enough to smile. “Mrs. Adair—a pleasure to see you again.”
“Thank you, Grantley. Is her ladyship still receiving?”
“Not in general, but in your case I’m sure Lady Horatia will be delighted to have you join the ladies still here.”
Leading the way into the front hall, Penelope inquired, “So it’s the Cynster ladies, and who else?”
“Only Lady Osbaldestone, ma’am.”
Penelope allowed Grantley to take her pelisse, then waved at Griselda. “This is Mrs. Stokes, Inspector Stokes’s wife.”
“Indeed.” Grantley bowed. “Welcome, ma’am. May I take your coat?”
Griselda nodded. “Thank you.” She mimicked Penelope’s earlier stance, allowing the butler to help her out of her coat.
“The drawing room?” Penelope inquired.
“Indeed, ma’am.” Grantley crossed to a door. “Allow me.” Opening the door, he announced, “My lady—Mrs. Adair and Mrs. Stokes.”
Penelope, of course, swept over the threshold; quashing a sudden attack of nerves, Griselda raised her chin and followed.
Only to have the doubts she’d harbored over being welcomed into such an august and exclusive social circle instantly banished. Five ladies were seated on the sofa and the armchairs arranged before the fireplace; they smiled warmly at Penelope, but the instant their gazes moved on to Griselda, their eyes lit and expressions of expectant d
elight bloomed across their fine features.
All of the ladies were older matrons, and one—who, Griselda assumed, was the notorious Lady Osbaldestone—was bordering on ancient.
One dark-haired lady, presumably their hostess, Lady Horatia, rose to greet them. “Welcome, Penelope, dear!” She pressed Penelope’s fingers and they touched cheeks. Immediately she released Penelope, Lady Horatia’s bright eyes fixed on Griselda. “And this is Mrs. Stokes? Inspector Stokes’s lady?”
“Yes, indeed.” Penelope glanced at Griselda with a smile that clearly said, I told you so. “Griselda, I’d like you to meet . . .”
Griselda smiled, shyly touched fingers, and exchanged greetings with Lady Horatia, Lady Louise Cynster, Lady Celia Cynster, Helena, the Dowager Duchess of St. Ives, and, finally, with Therese, Lady Osbaldestone.
While Griselda was so engaged, Lady Horatia instructed Grantley to set chairs for her new guests. Once the introductions were over, and Penelope and Griselda were seated and supplied with cups of nice, strong tea and tiny, delicate tea cakes that Griselda quite approved of, Lady Osbaldestone rapped the tip of her cane on the floor—much as if calling a meeting to order. “So, my dears, how can we help you?” Her ladyship’s finely drawn brows arched over quite terrifyingly piercing black eyes. “I presume that is why you are here?”
Transparently unrattled, Penelope nodded. “We—by which I mean Barnaby and Stokes, assisted by myself and Griselda, and also, in this case, Mr. Montague, who you all also know—are trying to unravel a puzzling case which we believe has led to two murders. The first victim was Lady Halstead, who lived in Lowndes Street, and the other was her man-of-business. Griselda and I have spent the last hour learning what we can about the Halsteads and the Camberlys, Lady Halstead’s children and their families, from more general sources, and have now come to see if you can tell us more about both the Camberlys and the Halsteads from a social perspective.”
Four of the five faces looked blank. Lady Celia said, “Exactly who are these people, dear?”
Penelope grimaced but answered, “Mortimer Halstead and his wife Constance—Mortimer holds some reasonably senior position at the Home Office—and they have two children, Hayden and Caroline. The Camberlys are Mr. and Mrs. Wallace Camberly—he’s a Member of Parliament, and they live in Belgrave Square and have one child, a son, Walter.”
The Masterful Mr. Montague: A Casebook of Barnaby Adair Novel Page 14