Secret Admirer

by Michele Jaffe

  She chuckled despite herself. “No. I think I always pictured it from above. All the colors, all the movement. I imagined it being more like watching dragonflies in the summer, the way they move from one place to another, however and whenever they want. More like that and less, well, stiff.”

  “More chaotic you mean,” Lawrence said dryly. “What a surprise.”

  “I’m sorry, I must sound like an idiot to you, my lord.” She was staring at his shoulder as she added, “Actually, being here tonight has made me think I owe you a more serious apology.”

  Lawrence made a show of peering around them. “Have we entered one of those enchanted circles where everything goes backwards? I thought I was supposed to do all the apologizing.”

  “Very witty, my lord,” Tuesday complimented him. “I wanted to tell you that I am sorry if I have been difficult in the course of this investigation. I have, um, a hard time submitting to other people’s rules.” Lawrence grunted, but it was a laughing sort of grunt. She looked at him with mock hardness and said, “You have not exactly been a lamb to deal with yourself.”

  “You astonish me, Lady Arlington. It was my impression that I have been charming.”

  “Be careful or I shall stop apologizing.”

  Lawrence pressed his lips together in enduring silence.

  “Good,” she went on. “What I wanted to say was that, until tonight, I had not really realized everything you’ve given up to help me. All this—” she looked around the splendid room, “—all these lovely people, all this luxury, all this order. This is what you are used to. And instead you’ve been forced to sleep on a lumpy settee in my disorderly studio. I promise that I will be more cooperative from now on and that I will do anything I can to make the investigation go faster, so you can move out of my house as soon as possible and get back to your real life. So we both can. I want you to know that I am very grateful for the sacrifices you’ve made and—”

  “You have nothing to thank me for,” Lawrence said brusquely, interrupting her. Halfway through her speech his smile had drained away and his eyes had moved beyond hers. “And there is nothing to be grateful for. I have just been doing my duty. Nothing more.”

  Tuesday looked over her shoulder, then back at him. “Why do you always stare at doorframes when I am trying to speak to you seriously? Are you making sure there’s nothing to block your escape route?”

  “I do not stare at doorframes.”

  “You were doing it just now. And you did it tonight in the coach on the way here when I tried to thank you for my necklace.”

  “That is ridiculous. I don’t—”

  Tuesday took her hand from Lawrence’s shoulder and placed her fingers lightly on his lips to silence him. When she spoke, her voice was choked, little more than a whisper. “Please, Lord Pickering. I don’t know what it was, but obviously I said something wrong. I did not mean to upset you.” She moved her fingers away and looked up at him. “Could we not talk anymore? Could we just dance? I—I have been waiting all night for you to ask me.”

  She was never able to learn what the strange expression that came over Lawrence’s face then meant, because at that moment Tom pushed through the crowd on the dance floor and announced feverishly, “This time we’ve really got him.”

  Chapter 22

  “ ‘E calls hisself the Lion,” Joey began, and it flowed from there. The Lion dressed expensively, showed up often at the Dancing Fawn, limped, and liked to eat walnuts. He gave himself his nickname because of a mark on his forearm shaped like a Lion’s head. Apart from this, all their information was a long list of nevers: the Lion never ordered but one ale a night, never touched the women who came in—not to say he didn’t look hard enough at the merchandise—never chitchatted, never met anyone there, never ate the mutton stew—pretty good, tis, if ye haven’t eaten in a month—never told anyone where he lived, or what he lived on. From time to time he had received written messages at the bar, which made them think he lived nearby, but neither he nor Can Can Kyle, who came along with him to make the report, could read so they didn’t know what they said. Once they had speculated that he was an apprentice in one of the printer’s places around the corner in Saint Paul’s churchyard because he was always going around with them little books, unbound, but Kyle had observed that he never had ink on his hands.

  Lawrence sent home the men who had been out all night and ordered a fresh set to blanket the neighborhood around the Dancing Fawn, despite the duo’s admission that they had not seen the Lion in over a week.

  Reports came flowing in fast then. A fruit vendor up the street thought a man who looked like the Lion had been loitering around recently, but hadn’t seen where he went. Two of the girls from Helen’s Harem swore he had stood on the street opposite the place for three nights running but had never entered.

  As witnesses and reports filtered in, the large table was cleared off to make way for a map of London. By half past two in the morning, the map was speckled with red marks indicating places the Lion had been seen. Although they were scattered around the city, they definitely clustered in a circle around the Dancing Fawn. Unfortunately, that zone was also densely populated, and finding anything in it would take either days or luck or both.

  Lawrence and Tuesday were individually mulling over this fact when the skylight squeaked open. Three guards instantly had their pistols out and aimed at it, so that when Lucy Burns, the eldest of the Burns children, poked her head through, her eyes got huge. “I saw the light on,” she explained awkwardly.

  “It is all right. Come in,” Tuesday assured her. Lawrence motioned for the guards to stand down and Lucy dropped to the ground. She stood shifting from one foot to the other. “Do you want to sit down, Lu?” Tuesday asked finally. “Is there something I can do for you?”

  Lucy thoughtfully gnawed on the end of a braid. “Not really.”

  “Oh.”

  “How did your poem go?” Lawrence asked.

  Lucy blushed and the braid fell out of her mouth.

  “Very well, Lord Pickering, sir, thank you.”

  “Is everything all right at home?” Tuesday asked.

  Lucy nodded. Then in one motion crossed the studio, threw herself on Tuesday, and began to sob.

  “H-h-have you ever been in love, Tuesday?”

  If Tuesday had been making a list of questions she most wanted to answer at that moment in front of three armed guards and Lawrence Pickering, that one would not have made the top hundred. “Of course,” she said vaguely.

  “Then you understand. I am desperately worried.”

  “About what?”

  “Not what. Him.”

  “Him?”

  Lucy dried her eyes and looked soulfully up at the ceiling. “George.”

  “You love George Lyle?” Lawrence asked with unconcealed astonishment. Tuesday glared at him, but Lucy just nodded.

  “Yes. He is a dear dear man. I know he is years older than I am, but I think we have twin souls and—”

  “Why are you worried about him?” Tuesday asked.

  “He’s missing. Since yesterday.”

  It was true that George had not appeared for his daily proposal that morning, Tuesday reflected. “I am sure he is just out—” on a binge, she almost said, but stopped herself.

  “No. I have asked everywhere and been to his rooms. No one has seen him.”

  “Perhaps a trip to the country,” Tuesday offered, then seemed to remember something. “I distinctly recall him saying he wanted to see his aunt in Essex. I am certain that is where he went.”

  Lucy brightened. “Do you really? So you think he is safe.”

  “Of course.”

  “Oh good. It is just that, with Sir Curtis being murdered and everything, I just worried. But I am sure you are right. Good night, Tuesday—” she gave her a warm hug, “—good night Lord Pickering, sir—” gave him a deep curtsey, and then exited via the window.

  As soon as she
was gone, Tuesday’s frown returned.

  “George did not really mention going to visit his aunt, did he?”

  “He has no family that I know of.”

  “Are you worried?”

  “No. Not really. I suspect George is somewhere with a new mistress.”

  “Not likely given how he was carrying on about you the other night, ma’am,” one of the guards put in.

  “What do you—”

  “We’ve found him!” Grub announced, bursting into the room and pushing all thoughts of George Lyle from everyone’s mind. “No mistake this time. We’ve found his lodgings.”

  Before anything else could be said, Lawrence shot out of Tuesday’s favorite chair and stood blocking her path to the door. He gave her a serious look. “There isn’t anything I could say to persuade you to stay here, is there?”

  “No. Not if you are going.”

  “And if I weren’t?”

  “I would go anyway.”

  “Be reasonable, Lady Arlington. It is not safe.”

  “Why is it safe for you? Because you are a man? I might point out that he seems interested in killing only men. By that logic it would be safer for me to go alone.”

  Lawrence muttered something and clenched something and frowned at something and led her to his coach.

  “He came back tonight.” The windows were all closed so there was no reason for Mr. Carter, the jeweler, to be whispering but he felt bad, as though somehow he was conspiring against his nicest tenant, and he didn’t want the lad to know about it. “I can’t believe what you’re saying about him. He’s a lamb, I say. Never had no trouble from him at all.”

  “You are very fortunate,” Lawrence told him. He seemed to fill the small kitchen where they were gathered, awaiting word that the men were in position outside the building. It was a four-story house, one story more than the law proscribed, and at first Mr. Carter had been unwilling to talk to them for fear they were the building inspectors. But when Grub had first pointed out that most building inspectors did not do their work at three in the morning, and then made it clear that he didn’t give a damn about who built the place, just who lived there, Mr. Carter had knotted his dressing gown, unlatched his door, and let them in.

  The man called the Lion, who he knew simply as Edward, had taken the rooms on the top floor a year earlier, he explained. He was a tinker, traveling around the countryside fixing people’s pots and things, and wasn’t home that often. But when he was there he was quiet like a mouse, kept good hours, didn’t bother no one. He never had guests in, but he didn’t seem really to miss them. Mr. Carter’s only complaint was that he used extra candles, staying up reading, but that was hardly a problem compared with blind Mrs. Slipson always falling down the stairs or what the bloke on the second floor got up to. One time there had been four different women in there at once, each of them—

  A glance at Tuesday had ended that story, although she had been the most interested auditor. “How’s this going to work, then?” Mr. Carter asked nervously.

  “As soon as my men have surrounded this area and escorted the other tenants out of the building we’ll take Edward away with us.”

  There had been disagreement between Tuesday and Lawrence in the coach about whether it would be necessary to empty the building of its inhabitants. Tuesday, claiming to know the killer’s mind better than anyone, said yes, that he was liable to take hostages or hurt anyone he could. Lawrence disagreed, pointing out that clearing the area would give him more time to run away.

  “Very well. It can be on your conscience if he does something horrible,” Tuesday acquiesced politely.

  Deciding that his conscience had enough to bear at that moment already, even without knowing what lay in store, he decided to evacuate the building.

  “In fact,” Lawrence went on now, “If you, Mr. Carter, would not mind waiting outside, I think we can begin.”

  “I’m not leaving the store,” Mr. Carter said with finality. “I built this with my own hands and no one is going to drive me away.”

  But Lawrence Pickering was not no one and his powers of persuasion—which included the offer of a ride in his coach around the city—were too much for the jeweler. Mr. Carter and all but one of his tenants were duly escorted out, Lawrence’s men were silently escorted in, and the operation was underway.

  Lawrence was the first up the stairs. Tuesday had agreed to let him lead, and to stay behind the first group of guards, in case shots were fired. Waiting in the unlit stairwell now she studied the shadowy silhouettes of the men in front of her. The small space vibrated with their tension, with the silent racing of nine hearts and the sweating of eighteen palms. Time seemed to have stopped as they hovered there in the dark.

  Thwack-groan-bang rent the silent air, and light trickled into the corridor as the door of the Lion’s apartment fell to the floor under Lawrence’s kick. Heavy footsteps rang out over shouts of “don’t move” and the muffled sound of shoulders hitting as the men crammed through the door, weapons ready.

  The apartment was small. There was only a single room, single door, single window. On one side was a bed, the other a chair. Jugs of what looked like water were tidily lined up along a wall next to a small fireplace hung with few cooking implements, a mirror, and a basin. There was a square table next to the chair with a lit candle and a book, a manuscript it looked like, lying open on it as if someone had just been there reading it. Had been there. Was now gone.

  Lawrence shouted something along the lines of “Damn hell damn!” but it was hard to make out the exact words because his head was out the window. The open window, through which, he surmised, the Lion, alias the Secret Admirer, alias Edward, had made his escape.

  Lawrence was too angry to even spare a glance at Tuesday as he stalked out of the room, issuing commands for his men to blanket the area. He stopped the last four from leaving and instructed them to keep Tuesday there, right there, in that room, until he got back, his suspicion that she was at the very least a coconspirator in the murder rekindled—after all, evacuating the building had been her damn idea.

  The near pleasure Tuesday had felt only a half hour that the man as described and then drawn by her existed, was now completely extinguished. For a brief moment, when Mr. Carter confirmed the man was his tenant, she felt exalted, as though the voices of doubt were not her instincts but her insecurity. As though she should, she could, trust her judgment.

  She had been wrong. She moved around the room, not really seeing, berating herself. Why had she even interfered? Why not let Lawrence Pickering do the sorts of dashing things he was famous for? Why—

  Why didn’t she see more books, another part of her mind asked. Everyone commented on how this man was always reading, but there was only the one book there. She moved over to examine it. It was in manuscript, a small neat hand. Across the top of each page was written “The Prince by Nicholas Machiavelli,” and the text appeared to be about how to be a good leader. It seemed an odd choice for a homicidal maniac. Even stranger was the line that had been underscored in dark red ink: “In addition to all this, at the appropriate time of year the ruler ought to keep the people occupied with spectacles and festivals.”

  Once again she had the sensation of being duped, of being given not real evidence but instead pieces of a carefully constructed puzzle. Even the room she was standing in felt staged, like it was drawing in around her, trapping her. Nor did it smell very good. She was moving toward the window for some air when a door, recessed in the wall and almost completely hidden, caught her eye. Probably where all the books were. She pushed at it gently and to her surprise, it swung inward.

  The guards were standing by the window, longingly observing their colleagues engaged in the exciting search for a deadly criminal, so they were surprised when they heard her muttering, “Blast blast blast blast!”

  “What is it, Lady Arlington?” one of them asked as they lined up behind her around the opening of the narrow cupbo
ard.

  “Oh!” another exclaimed when he saw.

  Tuesday had not found books. She had found something more like a shrine. Made of pieces of ribbon clipped from the hems of her gowns, the lace that she had thought snagged and ripped off the collar of her night shift, four locks of her hair, a garter, a key to her house, and a half-dozen sketches of people’s faces she recognized as her discards. All of which only confirmed that the previous night had not been the Lion’s first visit to her room.

  You are mine, Tuesday. Mine.

  Tuesday did not think that there could be anything worse than seeing such bald evidence of the fact that someone had been observing her, following her, touching her for months, evidence that her suspicions had been right, that she had been stalked by a murderous lunatic who was killing men to—to what? To get her attention? To get her?

  Then she saw the neat pile of items stacked off to one side of the cupboard and knew she was mistaken. There was something worse. The stack contained:

  One brown wig

  One metal tub hand-labeled “Noodle’s Theatrical Wax: for noses, chins, ears, and scars”

  One pair of shoes, specially made so one was wider and higher than the other, causing its wearer to limp

  One left-handed glove with blood on it

  Which, added together, made one disguise. Meaning that the man who had been watching her, touching her, observing her could be anyone. And that Lawrence and his crew did not stand a chance of finding the killer they were looking for.

  He had tricked them all. She was so furious that she could barely breathe and she felt like her blood really was boiling. Now she understood the meaning of the underlined passage, “keep the people occupied with spectacles and festivals.” He had kept them occupied. He had been fooling with them—God she was hot—and she had fallen for it—she could use a glass of water—and now they were looking all over London for a man—maybe from one of the pitchers—a man who did not—what was that smell?—even exist, a man who, who—oh my God, the—