“Miss?”
She was startled back to the matter at hand in the coroner’s office.
The supervisor stood in front of her. He had the face and demeanor of sleet. He sniffed also. “My associate here says you want to read the coroner’s report on a murder?”
“Yes, is there a problem?” Felicity channeled the voice of her father. The one she had observed him applying whenever he knew what he wanted—from the best table at a restaurant to ordering the servants about. She disliked using such an approach but tapped the tone in order to obtain the report.
The clerk and his superior eyeballed each other. The superior answered, “Other than police, elected officials, and newspaper reporters, no one else has ever asked to look at one.”
“Then I shall be the first. It is public, is it not?”
“Why, yes,” the supervisor said.
Both men sputtered like pots of tea ready to boil over.
“The information would be very disturbing to a young woman.” The supervisor sniffed again. The building was damp, so Felicity could not blame them for having perpetually fluid noses.
“Very disturbing,” the younger clerk emphasized.
“I assure you I shall not faint. Is there a fee to examine the report?” She prepared to open her beaded purse.
“No, Miss.”
“May I have it, please?”
The men whispered to each other. The supervisor said, “You cannot remove the document from this office, Miss.”
“Then I shall read it here.”
“One moment,” the supervisor announced.
The men retreated to another room.
The supervisor returned and held out two pieces of paper. “The report on Earl William Kent. You may use my office to read it.”
She followed him. Her bedroom at Carrol Manor was five times larger than the office, which humbled her.
“You may sit at my desk,” the supervisor said.
“How kind of you.”
“Would you like tea?”
She was surprised at the question. “No, but thank you.”
“I’ll close the door for your privacy.”
The report had been written by a Dr. Lawrence Edward, who had stated that a projectile of an unknown nature had made the wound. He noted that the weapon had created a puncture in the front of the body and pierced the deceased’s left lung. The measurements of the wound corresponded to the dimensions of the bolt at the museum. Although she had been ninety-nine and nine-tenths sure, the report removed any uncertainty about her previous conclusion.
The exit wound at the back of Kent’s body was lower than the entrance at the front. She was also right, then, that the killer had stood taller than Kent. The doctor reported that the projectile had also nicked a rib, denoting that it had traveled through the body with force. The cause of death was massive bleeding.
Kent’s belongings at the time of death were listed on a separate sheet. One hundred and fifty pounds sterling. A silver watch. Gold ring. A paper notification about a photographic session with the royal family as part of Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee celebration.
Felicity put down the report. From the description of the wound, William Kent had been facing his killer. He did not die instantly, but lay on the floor of the museum as his blood and life drained away.
She returned to the front of the office and handed the report back to the supervisor with her thanks. “By the way, did an Inspector Davies reread this report?”
“About an hour ago,” the supervisor said. “Did you find what you were looking for, Miss?” He sniffled with smarminess.
“I’m not sure. That’s the worst part,” Felicity replied with all sincerity.
On the carriage ride home, Felicity closed her eyes and imagined the body of her friend on a metal table in this very building. Who did you see holding the crossbow, William? What were you trying to say with your own blood?
“Medra,” Felicity whispered.
Opening her eyes, she looked through the back window of the carriage. Behind was a smaller, dark-brown carriage, the driver all in black, hat pulled low. It was as if death had followed her from the morgue.
She faced forward but heard the sound of the smaller carriage’s wheels in back of them even as they made several turns toward her home.
“Matthew, speed up,” she asked her driver, and he did.
The other carriage did the same.
“Pull over, please, Matthew.”
When her driver did so, the small carriage drove past. From inside appeared the flash of an outline. A man with a large nose. He looked straight ahead.
“Everything all right, Miss?” Matthew asked.
“For the time being. Please, drive on.”
CHAPTER 8
For the entire morning, Felicity didn’t leave her room at the London house. She was teaching herself how to lift fingerprints. After trying different materials, she was ready to practice on a long piece of wood she had found outside near the kitchen door. She asked Helen to come to her room to help her.
“Hellie, please grab the wood at one end and pretend you are going to strike me on the head,” Felicity asked. “Make believe the wood is a murder weapon.”
“Really, Miss,” Helen replied with an intonation combining worry and exasperation.
Helen had often used the same tone during her young mistress’s scientific research—for example, when a twelve-year-old Felicity wanted to repeat the electricity test she had read about. Namely, American Benjamin Franklin’s flying a kite during a lightning storm in 1752.
“Please, Hellie, the wood,” Felicity said.
“Oh, all right.” Helen picked up the wood at one end.
“Grab it good and tight, like you’re going to pound me.”
Helen tensed up on the wood and took on a menacing face.
“Very fine. Now please grab the wood at the other end in case I mess up and need another go.”
Helen did so.
“You can set the wood down on the desk,” Felicity said.
Helen wiped her hands. “Anything else you want me to touch?”
“No, thank you.”
Helen laughed and curtsied. “I’ll continue with me chores, none of which include smashing people on the head with a stick of wood.”
“I hope not,” Felicity said.
With an artist brush she had purchased, Felicity first swept fine charcoal dust over Helen’s prints on the wood. Then she pressed a piece of paper over to record them. Felicity wore gloves so she wouldn’t record her own prints. She had settled on using charcoal dust because it would show up clearly on the white paper. The process took a steady hand, and she had smeared prints more than once during the day. With practice, she had succeeded in removing fingerprints off a glass, a knife handle, and a gun she had borrowed from her father’s set of antique dueling pistols. She grinned when prints on paper were revealed with iodine fumes, thanks to a method developed in 1863 by chemistry professor Paul-Jean Coulier.
The wood was problematic, given its rough surface.
Before starting her experiments, Felicity had read an article in the scientific journal Nature that had been written by Dr. Faulds. He described using printer’s ink to capture fingerprints. She had tried his process—pressing her fingertips on an ink-soaked sponge and then pressing them down on paper. Several handwashings had been necessary to remove the ink, and she had created several black marks on her white blouse and on the wall near her desk, but the trial run had been a success.
She already knew that fingerprints were created from sweat glands in the elevated friction ridges on the outer layer of skin on fingers, toes, palms, and soles of the feet. She ran her hand along the coarse wood she had fingerprinted. One purpose of the ridges on the skin was to transmit texture information to sensory nerves—basically, how things felt, from rough to smooth and in between. They did not exist entirely to catch criminals. Yet, the swirls, arches, and loops of the ridges were distinctive for every
person. Though not religious, she found something spiritual about how each man and woman had their own pattern, as if their soul had been published on their hands and fingers. First to recognize the uniqueness had been German anatomist Johann Christoph Andreas Mayer in 1788.
For years, fingerprint identification had been accepted scientifically. The Metropolitan Police or English courts, however, did not acknowledge the method useful for crime solving, as Inspector Davies had so vividly demonstrated. As with all things inventive, she was certain, fingerprinting would be a tool for future investigations of Scotland Yard. Taking a sip of tea with blackened fingers, she hoped the advancement would take place in her lifetime.
“At last!” After another attempt, she obtained a clear print off the wood. But her good mood didn’t last.
Thanks to the interference of Davies, she had not been able to collect any fingerprints on the crossbow or bolt used to kill William Kent.
After clearing a spot on the desk, Felicity set down her typewriter and put in a piece of paper to organize her thoughts. She loved tapping on the new device. The machine ran not on steam, but on will and thought.
She set down the facts she had discovered.
1. This was no ordinary theft. The killer knew precisely what he wanted—not only the priceless historical document, but to kill William. The culprit could have waited until William left and then stolen the manuscript. Instead, he sought out a weapon for murder.
2. This is a clever killer with a touch of irony. Using an historic crossbow and bolt and then concealing the murder weapon under the very eyes of the police.
3. Medra. The word William wrote in blood. The name of the killer? If so, the victim knew the identity of the man who shot him.
Sitting back in the chair, she rubbed her temples and typed another fact.
4. I need much more information.
* * *
Felicity was absolutely comfortable in the offices of the soliciting firm of Morton & Morton on Oxford Street. That’s because it was the unfriendliest place she had ever had the misfortune to visit. From what she observed, everyone was treated with the same frigid professionalism bordering on rudeness. She had not been singled out for her gender or wealth, which delighted her.
The reason for her visit was much less pleasant.
Throughout the four years she attended the University of London, she and William Kent had spoken often, either in class or at their regular meetings over tea. Their conversations had included a spectrum of topics ranging from history to the arts and present-day affairs. She had looked forward to the stimulating discussions, which made her part of a community of intellectuals. Despite all the chat, she really knew little about his private life, other than the death of his wife many years before and his distaste for attending functions of British society. She required more information about his background, because within it might be a clue as to why he had been murdered and his manuscript taken. She was not convinced by the police theory that a burglar had slain Kent while stealing Le Morte d’Arthur at the museum. To that end, she had made an appointment to talk with solicitor Joshua Morton. His solicitor firm had been mentioned regularly in Illustrated Police News articles. They had been hired by various clients to investigate the circumstances behind crimes, as well as to probe the lives of victim and perpetrator alike in many cases.
A white-haired clerk approached her. “Follow me,” he ordered in an antagonist manner.
Waddling in squeaky shoes, the clerk showed her into the office of Joshua Morton. The solicitor held out his hand toward the black leather chair across from his long but tidy desk. He didn’t stand or smile when she entered. She was content to see that the unfriendliness of the workers extended up to the owner of the firm.
Given the firm’s association with criminal cases, Felicity had been prepared for a grim setting with death masks on the wall, like the office of Mr. Jaggers in Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations. The place did not live up to her expectations. Shelves of legal books lined one wall in an office decorated in the fashion of the time. Stately wood. Forest-green wallpaper. Tasteful chandelier. Fireplace with a bust of the Queen on the mantle. Thick, lavish rugs. On the wall behind Morton was a painted portrait of the lawyer, perhaps ten years younger, with his hand on the shoulder of an older man who had the same close-set eyes. Obviously father and son. During her wait, she’d heard no one ask to see Morton Junior or Senior, so she figured the older partner must have died.
“How may I help you, Miss Carrol?” Joshua Morton asked with the rigidity of a ship’s mast. His gray hair, plentiful both on his head and in his mustache, appeared just as stiff. But his eyes. She could have seen their acumen and fierceness at midnight from a league away.
“I would like your firm to investigate a man’s life. Is that something you would undertake?”
He entwined his fingers on a portly middle. “As long as it is not illegal. Some of our clients’ requests have bordered on the unlawful.”
“This venture would be perfectly legal.” Her certainty increased. “You may have read about the recent murder of Earl William Kent at the British Museum.”
His nod was almost imperceptible.
“I would like for your firm to gather information on his life to help determine why he would have been targeted for murder,” she said.
“I thought he was killed during a robbery.” Morton’s voice was made for oration, though as a solicitor, he didn’t appear in court.
“Mr. Morton, that is precisely what I hope to learn. Which came first, the murder or the theft?” As she talked, Morton struck his finger against a pricy silver watch hanging from a chain attached to his pricy vest. He could have been tapping out in Morse code, Time is money. Time is money. She would not waste it. “I wish for information about his lordship’s friends and enemies. Organizations to which he belonged. If possible, about his finances. Was he a gambler, for instance? Did he have any female companions? Any peculiarities?”
“In other words, the kind of man he was.” He wrote down her list.
“I can see I have come to the right place, Mr. Morton. And in your investigation, you might look out for a person named ‘Medra’ or someone with a name beginning with those letters.” She spelled it out.
“When would you like this information?”
“As soon as possible.” She held up her purse. “I will pay a retainer, and you can inform me if you require more funds. I assume you will exercise maximum discretion in this undertaking.”
For the first time since she had walked into his office, he smiled. A menacing one that might scare others. “Miss Carrol, everyone believes Michael is my middle name. But really it’s ‘Discreet.’ ”
CHAPTER 9
Felicity sat on her bed, a cup of tea in one hand and in the other Song Ci’s book Collected Cases of Injustice Rectified, published in 1247. Song Ci wrote about forensic science and the many crime scenes he had examined while a judge in China. About damaged bodies and how they had been injured, about postmortem exams and causes of death. The book mentioned the particular case of a magistrate who had probed the murder of a peasant by a hand sickle. The magistrate asked people to put their sickles in the sun and watched as blow flies were attracted to the blade with remnants of blood. The owner of the sickle confessed.
“A blow fly, imagine,” she said out loud.
The book had established Song Ci as a founder of forensic science. The book was also called The Washing Away of Wrongs. Felicity loved that title, which put into words what she was attempting to do. Wash away the wrong done to her friend and mentor William Kent.
She recognized Helen’s knock and bid her enter. Helen carried a tray with plates of toast, eggs, and sausage. The ironed newspaper was under her arm. “You have to eat, Miss.”
“I am hungry.” Felicity knew the book about the physical effects of murder on humans should have made her lose her appetite, but the passion to learn only made her hungrier.
Helen handed t
he newspaper to her mistress. “You won’t believe this, but there’s been another killing.”
“When?”
“The day before yesterday.”
Felicity sat up and turned to the article on the front page.
VISCOUNT RICHARD BANBURY’S BODY FOUND IN HOME
Viscount Richard Banbury was found murdered in the den of his gracious home Sunday night. The Metropolitan Police reported that his Lordship had suffered a ghastly wound to his head at the hands of an unidentified robber.
Melinda O’Keefe, who is a servant in the house, came across the body at five in the morning. She said she stopped in to clean the fireplace and made the terrible discovery. The servant saw her master slumped in a chair and screamed when she saw blood sprayed about the room. No one had been seen entering or leaving the previous night or earlier that morning, police reported.
Scotland Yard inspector Jackson Griggs Davies said the murder weapon was not found at the scene of the dread incident. Mr. Davies also stated that a costly twelfth-century tapestry was missing from the room where the late Viscount was slain. No other property was reported as stolen, but the inspector surmised the deceased caught the robber in the act and was slain.
The late Lord Banbury was fifty-one at the time of his death. His wife, Lady Charlotte, and their young daughter died in a rail accident nine years before.
One week ago, Earl William Kent was killed in the British Museum, another victim of robbery of a priceless antiquity. The assailant in that case has not been apprehended.
Davies could not say whether the crimes were related.
Felicity blew out her breath at the last paragraph. When she raised her head, Helen had slipped out of the room.
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