‘Freddy meant her parents’ house,’ I explained, not sure if I really had to. ‘Were the two houses of a similar design?’
‘Identical.’ Freddy viewed Sidney Grice warily. ‘Except that our house was rendered.’
‘Rendered what?’ He tensed his thumb and the blade shot open.
‘With stucco.’
‘And did you sleep near your parents?’ He tossed the knife high into the air to crash through the greenery overhead.
Freddy shook her head. ‘My parents preferred the opposite wing to mine.’ She paused as the knife hung at its zenith before hurtling down. ‘They liked to watch the sunrise.’ Freddy cringed as Mr G closed his eyes and caught his missile by the blade. ‘But I always thought Lucy and I had the best rooms,’ she battled on. ‘We could spy on people coming and going, and our side windows looked straight into each other’s across the hedge. In fact we used to put our favourite dolls on our window ledges to watch over each other.’ She looked sideways at her friend in embarrassment. ‘All very childish, I know.’
‘Very,’ Mr G agreed heartily. ‘If we might return to our monstrously neglected client and my unhappily misinterpreted question.’ He clinked the tip of the blade against his false eye. ‘My which – if you can cast your agile mind back through the miasmas of time – pertained not, as you so recklessly assumed, to which house, but to which convent?’
‘St Philomena’s,’ Lucy answered sharply.
‘I shall write and ask if they would like a charitable donation.’ He ran the blade repeatedly under his chin in a shaving motion.
‘I did not think you liked nuns.’ I was puzzled, especially as he was not in the habit of giving to any charitable cause.
‘I liked one nun very much.’ He flicked the steel up his hairless philtrum. ‘So much so that I went to watch her being garrotted.’ The knife disappeared as mysteriously as it had arrived. ‘I only know one completely truthful person and I inhabit his body – for I have no choice in the matter. Pray continue with your dubious account.’
Lucy folded her arms. ‘I do not think we are compatible, Mr Grice,’ she said, and he surveyed her coldly.
‘If you mean that we will never be friends or become romantically attached and elope to Gretna Green, then I am forced to agree.’ My godfather extruded a tiny length of lead from his pencil and somehow made that action look almost as dangerous as his antics with the knife. ‘But I see no reason why we cannot have a professional relationship. I am the finest personal detective in the empire and you are wealthy and clever – two excellent attributes for a client.’
‘Why clever?’ Lucy asked uncertainly.
‘Because there are four hundred and nineteen men masquerading as independent detectives for hire, many of them fictional, all of them charlatans, and yet you chose to consult me,’ he said, and she coughed in amusement.
‘Very well, Mr Grice. Where shall we begin?’
‘With a simple yet pregnant question. Why—’ Sidney Grice pressed a finger into his chin, moulding the dimple that it already had—‘have you not reported the assault to the police?’
Lucy flushed. ‘Do you think I want another brute mauling me?’
‘Not all of the officers are brutes,’ I assured her, though there were a few I would not expect much sympathy from.
‘I am talking about the police surgeon,’ Lucy explained. ‘I have heard talk—’
‘Most women have heard very little else,’ Sidney Grice interrupted.
‘Lucy meant—’ Freddy began, but he silenced her with an upheld hand.
‘You may go now.’ He flexed the ankle of his raised foot.
Freddy bristled. ‘I am not a slavey for you to command,’ she retorted, and he shrugged.
‘You may go nonetheless.’
Freddy put down her cup. ‘I shall not be spoken to in this way.’
‘I am afraid he speaks to everybody like that,’ I told her.
‘Then he needs to learn some manners.’
‘I have created my own manners.’ Mr G threw back his head. ‘And I am overweeningly proud of them. They are not agreeable, nor are they intended to be. There are things I need to discuss with Miss Bocking. Go away.’
Lucy glowered at Sidney Grice, but he surveyed her as if he were watching an unamusing play.
‘It might be best,’ she said at last. ‘I will tell you all about it later, dear.’
‘That would be foolish but, being female, you probably will,’ Mr G forecast.
‘I am sorry he did not put it more nicely,’ I apologized.
‘He could not have been more obnoxious,’ Freddy fumed.
‘I promise you he could.’ I pushed something spikey out of my ear.
‘Goodbye.’ My guardian wiggled his fingers in farewell and Freddy jumped up and stormed out.
‘That was not very nice of you,’ Lucy complained as the spike crept back in.
‘Quit the effeminately adorned drawing room,’ he called playfully.
And Freddy stamped away and slammed the door.
‘You did not have—’ she tried, but he hushed her again and called more loudly. ‘Go.’
And the door handle rattled and there was a crash so violent that an ornament fell to the floor.
I nibbled at a corner of my Garibaldi.
‘I am sorry I evicted her now,’ Mr G broke the silence, ‘before she had the chance to pour me another tea.’
I refreshed our cups as he proceeded.
‘Now, Miss Bocking.’ My godfather rubbed his left temple with the heel of his left hand. ‘Regale me with your account of that eventful night. Give equal weight to that which you judge to be significant or trivial, pedestrian or dramatic. Tell me only what your youthful senses told you and not what you imagined, and do not waste time crying. You may weep to your heart’s despair when I have departed.’ He bowed towards her. ‘Tell me what you believe to be the truth, Miss Bocking, and I shall put almost all my efforts into resolving this matter once and for all.’
His fingers danced in all directions and, surreptitiously, I slipped the stalk down the side of my cushion.
11
The Hollow Shepherd
SIDNEY GRICE PALMED the spoon from his saucer as if trying to pilfer it.
‘Freddy and I were bored,’ Lucy began.
‘Why?’ he demanded, and Lucy shifted uncomfortably.
‘The life of a modern girl in London out of season is tedious in the extreme. There are no balls, nothing new at the theatre, no dinner parties, no—’
‘I know what tedious means.’ Mr G chipped at his tea as if the meniscus were a thin sheet of ice. ‘I have to converse with Miss Middleton daily and I once sat through an entire production of Hamlet without being allowed to interrupt it once. This tea, incidentally, is horrid. And so what remedy was proposed for this insipid languorousness and by whom?’
‘Freddy had been to a few opium dens in the past. They sounded terrifically racy and she had never come to any harm in them – except once when she had her purse taken on the way home – and so we decided to give it a go.’
Mr G took his spoon by the tip of the handle between his thumb and fourth finger, and stirred his black tea with great attention.
‘So it was Freddy’s idea?’ I clarified.
‘Well, yes, I suppose it was.’ Lucy stretched her arms as if about to dive off rocks into the sea. ‘But I did not need persuading.’
‘You went by cab?’ I asked, trying to ignore my guardian’s sigh at my use of another leading question.
He shook the spoon dry and hid it under the corner of a napkin.
‘It was the coachman’s night off,’ Lucy confirmed, ‘and besides we did not want the servants to know what we were up to. It sets such a bad example.’
‘Who instructed the driver and what instructions was he given?’ Sidney Grice fingered the jackal ring on his watch chain.
‘I said Limehouse, if you please, but,’ Lucy let her arms drop heavily into her lap, ‘he did not plea
se in the least until Freddy offered to double his fare, and then he seemed quite pleased after all.’
‘How did you decide which opium house to go to?’ I asked.
‘Luck really.’ Lucy pulled a wry face. ‘Rotten luck as it turned out. The cabby was getting nervous – beggars were crowding round us and children were climbing on the back for free rides, people were shouting coarse remarks and somebody threw dung at his horse. We came to the top of an alley that looked quite well-lit with lanterns in some of the windows or over the lintels, so we told him to stop there. We got out, but nothing would persuade him to wait or come back for us.’
‘From which side did you disembark?’ my guardian asked.
‘The left.’ Lucy touched her broken cheekbone gingerly. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘Because it is immaterial.’
Lucy tilted her head to the right. ‘I am confused.’
Mr G mirrored her action. ‘People inventing stories do not expect to be cross-examined on irrelevancies.’ He straightened his neck and she followed suit. ‘It flusters them to be diverted from their rehearsed versions with details they are unlikely to have considered. In many cases their whole account will instantly unravel and even the best of actors tend to direct their eyes to the left whilst their brains sift through plausible responses.’
Mr G drew a squiggle. He and she blinked simultaneously.
‘So you know I am telling the truth?’ Lucy curled a tress around her finger but he did not.
‘It is not an infallible test.’ Sidney Grice tapped a line of dots down the page. ‘But, in future, if you decide to create a fiction without notice in my presence, you will fix your eyes in an unnatural manner.’ He joined the dots in a sweeping curve. ‘Beside which there are seven other signs which I stalk.’ He underlined the squiggle. ‘Continue.’
‘We made our way down the alley. A group of ragged children followed us but Freddy got rid of them by tossing a handful of coppers over their heads into the court where we had been dropped off. They all chased after them and we ducked through one of the lit doorways.’
‘Who chose which one?’ I asked and Lucy hesitated, nonplussed.
‘We saw a name on the wall written in Chinese, and under it in English The Golden Dragon, and we just dashed in.’
‘What was the place like?’ I asked.
‘Seedy,’ Lucy said. ‘Gloomily lit and frowsty. There was an outer room with a tall Chinaman sitting on a stool. Freddy took charge. She asked if they sold poppy dreams and he nodded and smiled. He was very polite and formal. She asked how much and we gave him a guinea each.’
‘Oh, I would only have paid ten shillings,’ I said. ‘Clearly you look more prosperous than I.’
My guardian’s lips worked silently.
‘Or more stupid,’ she said. ‘A boy showed us through.’
‘Describe,’ Mr G commanded.
‘The boy?’
‘I am not interested in your grandmother’s wart at present,’ he rejoined and she stifled a giggle. ‘It is no laughing matter,’ he reproved and Lucy’s face stiffened.
‘I do not need you to tell me that, Mr Grice.’ She licked her lips again. ‘The boy was about ten years old, I would say, Chinese in his features, dress and accent.’
‘What did he say?’ I asked and she put her hands together.
‘Velly good evening, madams. Pleasee come this way. Ahh, so you likee—’
‘Oh dear,’ Mr G butted in. ‘I was unprepared to hold an audition for an amateur production of one of Miss Middleton’s melodramas.’ I thought this rather unfair, as I had written my plays when I was a child and he had come across the jottings during a search of my room. He clipped his pince-nez on the tip of his long thin nose to scrutinize her over the gold wire frame.
‘Where did he take you?’
‘Through a secret door,’ she said, ‘though not very secret. The wall was covered with bamboo screens and they just slid one aside. It led down some wooden steps into a cellar.’
‘Lit how?’ He circled a symbol four times.
‘By oil lamps hanging from the ceiling.’
‘Were you not scared?’ I asked.
‘Terrified,’ she admitted, ‘but I was dashed if I was going to show it.’
‘What was the room like?’ I asked.
‘Save that for your memoirs,’ Mr G snapped. ‘Let us cut to the chase. Presumably – correct me if I am uncharacteristically wrong – it was decorated in lurid pictures of an indecent nature and had couches round the walls. How many?’
‘Four.’
‘Occupied?’ He scribbled dashed and fenced it into an ellipse.
‘Only one of them – by a man.’
‘Describe.’ He pointed at her with the blunt end of his Mordan mechanical pencil.
‘It was too dark to see him really well – average height and solidly built.’
‘Could you see what he was wearing?’ I asked and my guardian indicated towards me proudly.
‘See how well I am training her – a relevant question at last.’
Lucy shook her head in mild amusement. ‘No, but he was well-dressed.’
‘How could you tell?’ I smoothed down my dress and wondered if Mr G’s pernicketiness was contageous.
‘I heard his boots creak,’ Lucy explained. ‘So they must have been new. Old leather does not make a noise like that.’
‘Wunderbar.’ Mr G clapped his hands together. ‘What an excellent client you are evolving into.’ His hands flew apart as if they repelled each other magnetically. ‘With your exemplary perspicacity we have travelled one thirty-fourth of our journey towards the resolution of this matter.’
Lucy wrinkled her brow. ‘Because I noticed that a man had new boots?’
‘Precisely so.’ Sidney Grice’s hands seemed drawn by the same power towards his knees, but he resisted the force and left them hovering a few inches above his immaculately pressed lilac trousers. ‘The Putney Pickle Purifier might never have been caught had he parted his hair less carefully.’
Lucy tossed me a bemused glance, but it was not a case with which I was familiar. Mr G permitted his hands to rest on his knees, gradually and one at a time.
I struggled to get back on track. ‘Who showed you how to smoke opium?’
‘Freddy.’
‘How many pipes did you have?’
‘I think I only had one. I was unused to it and the effects were very powerful, and the next thing I knew—’ Lucy made a fist and crammed it between her teeth.
Sidney Grice shook his watch and put it to his ear. ‘Time has not stopped. Why have you?’
Lucy fought back the tears.
I rounded on him. ‘Can you not see how painful this is for her?’
‘Of course I can,’ he said. ‘And I have reconsidered my position.’ He slipped his watch away. ‘I shall have a Garibaldi after all.’ Sidney Grice reached over and helped himself. ‘I hope I shall not regret it.’ He bit a crescent out of one of the long sides and chewed meditatively. ‘I am happy to say that my hopes were dashed.’
‘Happy?’ I echoed automatically.
‘It will be a sad day that my hopes are satisfied by an adhesive confection.’
‘Why are you rambling about Garibaldis when Miss Bocking is on the verge of nervous collapse?’ I demanded.
Lucy took her hand from her mouth and said, ‘It is all right, March. He has brought me back from that brink.’
Mr G put the part-eaten biscuit on an empty plate with such care it might have been a unique piece of exquisite porcelain. ‘I have already remarked that our client is that rarest of creatures – an intelligent woman.’ He pushed the lead back into his pencil. ‘I shall return tomorrow, Miss Bocking, at nineteen minutes to eleven in the morning since you have no tea fit to brew after that hour.’
Mr G snapped his notebook shut and put it into his satchel. Lucy opened her mouth and closed it before gasping, ‘But we have not finished.’
‘What on earth gave you that idea?
’ He sprang to his feet. ‘You have become attached to a botanical specimen, Miss Middleton.’
I rose and saw that the broken stem had caught by one of its hooked leaves to the side of my dress.
‘We can see ourselves out.’ He pressed the bell button.‘But we shall not.’
I looked at Lucy, shocked and desolate in her chair.
‘I am sorry about this.’ I detached the stalk and placed it guiltily on the table. ‘But we will bring the man who hurt you to justice.’
‘Just catch him.’ Lucy looked up at me, a new fire in her eyes. ‘You can leave the justice to me.’
Lucy’s head dropped and she did not react as I touched her arm in farewell and, when I looked out, my guardian was creeping across the drawing room round a hollow shepherd that lay in three segments and a hundred shards. He put a finger to his lips and signalled at me to stand back, wrenched the china handle round and threw open the door.
‘By Jupiter,’ he cried as it crashed against the display cabinet, upsetting a powder-blue shepherdess on to her back, ‘has that woman no shame?’ He exuded indignation. ‘She is not even eavesdropping.’
‘No need to frow ’em ’cause I’m ’ere to sew ’em,’ the cobbler chanted from across the road as the maid showed us out of Amber House.
He had hung a sign with a picture of a shoe on the railings and pushed his cart into the bushes overhanging the railings.
‘A poet laureate in waiting.’ Sidney Grice opined, knocking against the sign so it fell, bent, to the ground. He sniffed, then stepped delicately over an earwig before brushing it carefully aside. ‘I am so very sorry,’ he apologized to it.
12
The Great Flood
I DID NOT speak to my guardian until after I had unbent the sign as best I could, rehung it and given the owner a shilling. ‘What on earth was that all about?’ I asked as calmly as I could.
An unoccupied hansom went by, but Sidney Grice made no attempt to hail it.‘Did you not understand any of it?’ He set off in the opposite direction to home. ‘At your suggestion Miss Bocking contacted me by letter to request that I attend her house to—’
‘I am not a complete idiot,’ I cut in.
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