by Issy Brooke
“Help me up,” he demanded, and she went to his side.
“Time to retire?”
He muttered something about his age being no barrier, wilfully misunderstanding her, bid everyone farewell with the passion of a man about to embark on an overseas expedition, and let his daughter convey him from the room. She realised that the room had been hot and stuffy as they stepped into the cool hallway, and it revived him somewhat. He lessened his grip on her arm and stood more securely on his own feet.
“Father, I will take you back to the garden wing, but I am concerned that Monahan has got lost.”
“How? Barrington or Dry will have shown him the way.”
“Perhaps they missed him.” They stood in the downstairs hall, and listened. A door clicked at the far end, under the stairs, and the butler, Mr Barrington, emerged.
“Barrington, good fellow, did you see that chap Monahan?” Russell called.
“No, sir, I am afraid I have not. Is he lost in the house?”
“We think so. Take a look downstairs, will you? We’ll go up.”
“That’s not the way to our rooms,” Marianne started to say, but Russell had shaken free of her grasp and was heading up the wide, main staircase, keeping to the carpeted centre to muffle his steps. He turned and put his finger to his lips.
“I do not trust that man,” he whispered. “He will not be in a bathroom, you may depend upon it. He asked Price too many questions and they were too probing. I know exactly where that snake will be, and so do you, if you stop to think about it. Follow, but silently, and if you cannot be silent, well then stay down there.”
She had no intention of remaining at the bottom of the stairs.
He walked with a slight hesitance to his steps. He needed the security of the bannister rail, but did not reach out for it. The extra drugs that she had given him would be working, and he was clearly fighting their effects. For a man so ill, he had strength that came from some hidden place.
They reached the top of the flight and he stopped to listen and gain his breath back. He pointed down the corridor, towards Price’s business room and she nodded. She understood.
The door was closed, but they both pressed their ears to it, assuming that Monahan would be within. If he was, he was moving stealthily, as they could hear nothing.
Russell waved her away from the door. He composed himself, and she saw that he was standing upright with difficulty. He sagged against the frame for a moment, and she reached out to him, but he frowned at her. Then with a deep breath, he grabbed the door handle and flung the door open. He leaped into the room, and she stepped in behind him.
Jack Monahan was standing behind Price’s wide polished desk, looking down at a ledger that was spread open over the green leather top. He froze in horror.
Russell strode right up to him, closely followed by Marianne. He leaned over the desk, slamming his hands onto the cream pages. “Sir! Tell me, at once, without a lie, what you are doing here.”
He blinked slowly, just once, and said in a calm tone, “Fear not. I have authority.”
“You have no authority, you dog! What are you doing in this room? From where do you claim this authority comes?”
Monahan stepped back and smiled icily. Marianne remembered how he had told her that he was always prepared with at least a dozen cover stories to use for any occasion. “Father,” she said. “You cannot trust any answer that he gives.”
“I suspect you are correct. For shame, sir.” In Russell’s scathing tones, sir had more insult in it that you dog. “You are in a private house, and you are here at the request of my daughter. Do you seek to bring a tarnish upon her reputation? I will not have any association between her and you, sir, not any. Get yourself gone from here and we will not see or hear of you ever again.”
“I have one more thing to inspect.”
“You have not!” Russell launched himself around the desk, steadying himself against it as he went. She hoped that Monahan did not notice her father’s lack of balance. “You have two choices here, and I would urge you to take the first one, for my daughter’s sake. Leave now, silently and without being seen, and that will be the end of it.”
“Or?”
“Or I raise the household, and we call the police.”
He smiled smugly. “The police have no authority over me. I am connected.”
“So you say, but I know your connections are tawdry and of no use here,” Russell said. “Even if you could claim some help in lofty quarters, I do not think the police would care for it. They would arrest you, I would make sure of it! But that recourse would involve my daughter’s name, at whose invitation you are here; and I do not wish that. Nor, if you have any scrap of finer feeling, do you.”
Monahan shrugged, lifting one shoulder and letting it drop, while a smile tugged one corner of his mouth. “I have no finer feelings at all, old man; not a one. I care nothing for her reputation or your police or any such thing.”
“Then I shall shoot you where you stand!”
“What with?”
“Damn you, sir.”
Monahan sniggered, and Marianne hated every inch of him. He flipped over a few pages of the ledger, and then closed it. He looked up at Russell, who was glowering by his side, struck almost to stone by his fury and his impotence in the situation. “All done. Right; I shall leave, as quietly as you ask. Marianne, would you pass on my compliments to the cook? She is a true marvel. What do you pay her?”
“We pay her enough.”
“I could pay her more.”
“Get out!” snarled Marianne, shocking her father.
Monahan fled and they followed him out to make sure he left the premises.
Then Marianne helped Russell to bed and went back to the gathering with a grim feeling.
Twenty
Phoebe came into Marianne’s room around midnight that night. She was dressed for bed, and her face was bare, with her hair tucked up under a cotton and silk cap. Marianne was sitting up in bed, nestling against cushions and pillows, and she had her notebook on her lap. She had done many angry scrawlings and crossings-out.
Phoebe slid under the covers alongside her, and peered at the words that Marianne had written.
“Damn,” she read aloud. That was the only word on the page. “That sums it up. Dear cuz, I agree. What a night.”
“You do not know the half of it.” Marianne kept her fingers on the book in case Phoebe tried to flip the pages; she had more incriminating notes about her husband on the other pages. She had lied to everyone on her return to the drawing room but now she had to come clean to Phoebe, as much as she was able to.
“What, there is more? More than Monahan getting lost, and somehow passing out through drink, halfway up the stairs? And your father trying to carry him out – alone! – without calling for Barrington or Dry? And you there, too, assisting? Dumping the ridiculous man on the front steps? Your father going to bed, quite ill? When you came back into the drawing room to tell us this, I thought that Mrs Jenkins was going to faint! What a terrible man he was. But we were warned, were we not. And I do not blame you.”
“I am so sorry that a hint of impropriety now attaches itself to your household.” Marianne put her hand over Phoebe’s.
“Oh, we shall weather this minor upset. The shame attaches to Monahan, not to us.”
“Let me tell you the truth. None of that is as I said that it happened. Except father, who now lies in bed, muttering and twitching.”
As Phoebe listened to the truth, she drew her knees up and hugged her legs, growing more and more alarmed with each revelation. By the end of Marianne’s recount, she was ready to leap out of bed, grab a shotgun from the hunting room, and go in pursuit of Jack Monahan.
“The police should have been called at once!” she said. “He is nothing but a burglar.”
“Here? The police, to one of your esteemed and famous dinner parties? You have that extravaganza planned for next month – would the good Lady Flowers still atte
nd, do you think, if she knew?” There was more, of course. Marianne did not want the police asking questions about Price Claverdon and investigating why anyone might want to look at his business affairs. Far more would be revealed, and she had to protect Phoebe – and keep a roof over her own head.
Phoebe grumbled, but she accepted Marianne’s logic. “Do you think he might have been responsible for the attempted break-in the other week?”
“I suspect it,” Marianne said. “He had one aim, and that was to get access to the work that your husband does here and not at his office. What does he do here?”
“You know I do not know. Ha! For the first time I find that I am in agreement with your father, though. That Monahan man will never more even so much as think about us, and nor we of him. If our paths ever cross, I shall not be responsible for my actions. Do you hear me?”
“I do. And I quite agree.”
“Good.” Phoebe yawned. “At least he threatened us with no physical danger. Tomorrow, I shall do nothing but lounge, like a painting by Rossetti, on comfortable chairs in the rose garden. I might even mope, in a pretty way. But I certainly shall not do anything that involves effort. I shan’t even talk.”
“And all the household counts itself blessed,” Marianne said.
Phoebe elbowed her, laughed, yawned again, and slid out of bed. “Barrington ought to be advised to take extra precautions locking up,” she said as she left.
“I already have done so.”
“Oh, you are so capable. You are a treasure. Good night.”
SHE MUST HAVE SLEPT. When she woke, in a tumble of sheets and notebook pages, she had resolved to think no more of Monahan. He had concluded his business, and that was an end of him. She had nothing to occupy her mind but the investigation into Edgar Bartholomew, who was obviously a fake. She found a scribbled note on her dresser which had been left by her father at some point – she didn’t know when.
Wade Walker’s address in London.
She had evidence that Edgar was a fake, and now she had more of a lead to follow up.
But who was he really – was he Wade? – and why did George have to die?
He had to die because he knew that Edgar was a fake.
Something was still not right.
And so she set out to sort things.
Marianne now stood in a busy side-street where small businesses seemed to be thriving. The rain was pattering down, very lightly, and she tucked herself under the striped awning of a butcher’s shop. She looked across the street to a tall thin house, crowded in among a row of others, which had been split into separate apartments and flats. This was her third appointment of the day, and so far the visits had not been going well.
She had changed her approach. She could not sneak into gentlemen’s clubs and the search there seemed fruitless anyway. She would not ask her father to look into Edgar Bartholomew – he had done enough for her with Monahan, and now he needed to rest.
But she still needed to know what the man known as Edgar Bartholomew was doing when he was visiting mediums.
Therefore Marianne resolved that she, too, would visit these mediums.
Unfortunately her reputation preceded her, as she knew that it would. This was why she had not undertaken this course of action at the start. “Hello, I am Miss Starr, the well-known exposer of fake mediums, can I talk to you about a matter that is private between you and a client? You can trust me.” It was not a conversation that could possibly go well.
And as predicted, it had not been going well at all.
She had lied about who she was to the first medium, who nevertheless recognised her immediately, and would not admit her, adding that “Had you not lied, I might have spoken with you.” Marianne thought it was an infuriating jibe, calculated to annoy her, but she took it on board and when she called, unannounced, on the second medium, she declared exactly who she was.
That medium, a stout woman flanked by her equally stout husband-and-manager, gaped at her, and they both shook their heads. “Why on earth would I speak with you? You ruined Lollie Smith. She is working the streets now. Because of you!”
Marianne retreated hastily. She had heard that the fall of Lollie had been particularly bad. But there had been nothing stopping the girl going into service, she thought angrily. Except probably her lack of references and now her reputation for falsehood.
Marianne had walked away from that encounter with a very heavy heart, and had to tell herself, repeatedly, that Lollie was fallen the minute she had taken on the task of duping people for money and preying on their grief.
Now she stood opposite Miss Deirdre Connor’s address, and she did not want to knock on the door. What would that master of persuasion, that cad Jack Monahan do, she wondered. She had agreed, with Phoebe, that the man would not even cross their thoughts never mind their paths again, but she had found it hard to push him out of her mind.
He would have a wonderful cover story prepared. One that skirted close enough to the truth to be convincing. She would not risk pretending to be someone else – she had to be herself.
So, what might realistically bring Miss Marianne Starr, paranormal and scientific investigator, to the door of a middling sort of medium?
The answer came to her in a flash.
Miss Connor was known to be an understated and quiet medium. She did not go in for public spectacles. She hadn’t crossed Marianne’s path much, because she kept herself close, and only did small and private meetings with carefully chosen people. She had a reputation for honesty, and she did not promise results.
She might, Marianne thought, be one of those people who actually believed in her own powers.
That would be Marianne’s way in.
Before she could talk herself out of it, she marched across the street and rapped on the door. It was opened, eventually, by a small girl who peered at her with suspicion.
“What?”
“I would like to see Miss Connor.”
“No, she lives upstairs. We’re downstairs.”
The girl started to close the door, but Marianne forced her way in. “Ah, sorry, I’ll just go up then.” She ran up the bare wooden stairs. She would never get used to how these houses were all divided up. On the first floor, she found another set of stairs, and a door, with a nameplate screwed into the frame: Miss Connor.
So she lived alone, as a woman of her own modest means? Bold, but a growing trend, Marianne knew and stifled her pang of jealousy. She rapped again, and tried to prepare her opening statement while she waited.
“Miss Connor? Good day. I am sorry to disturb you. I’m Miss Marianne Starr and I was hoping that you would be able to help me.”
The dark-haired woman, as petite and finely boned as a sparrow, folded her arms and kept her face blank. “Oh? But you are the one who goes around trying to trick people like me, aren’t you?”
Marianne nodded. “It is true that my work involves exposing those mediums who are falsely preying on people. And you must admit that there are those who do so. And don’t you think that they bring your profession into disrepute, and must be stopped?”
Miss Connor’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. “Yes, I would agree with that.”
“Then you can help me! Please, do let me in. Have you heard of Mrs Sidgwick and her work?”
“The Census of Hallucinations? Of course.” Miss Connor still looked unsure, but she stepped back, and allowed Marianne into the room.
It was a small and cosy place, with a folding screen across one corner. There were two doors, which she guessed would lead to a bedroom and some other room – she wasn’t sure if this place would have a kitchen, as most people in London who crammed into small accommodation would brew up their tea on the fire, and purchase hot food from the many cheap street vendors all around, available any time of the day or night. Chop houses and eating places abounded, and a hot pie could be had for a few pennies. Muffin sellers would come door to door, and the markets were always teeming with bargains. For someone with a f
ew shillings to their name, they could dine well. For the poorest, they could at least survive, if they didn’t mind oysters and mystery sausages.
There was a small and well-blackened open fire on one wall, and a tea-kettle was nestled near the corner of it, near a shiny orange pan that hung from a nail. Miss Connor, however, did not offer Marianne any refreshment. She waved her to a wooden chair by a circular table in the middle of the room. It was plain, and devoid of ornaments.
“Miss Starr, do you believe any of us are genuine?” Miss Connor asked directly as she took her own seat.
Marianne sighed. “I am a woman who has been trained in rigorous scientific investigation, and thus far, I have not been presented with any evidence. Should any proof come to light, I would of course change my views and accept the existence of spirits with all my heart.”
“But what about the testimony of thousands of people, good, solid, reliable and honest people? Your Mrs Sidgwick must have some faith in their accounts, or she would not be collecting them so diligently.”
“She collects them with an open mind, and it is an attitude I am striving to emulate.”
Miss Connor knitted her fingers together. “So why are you here, and why me? Am I to be your next target for a public unmasking? Do I need to look for alternative employment already? Should I leave town now, before you humiliate me?”
This was going to be difficult. Marianne did not want to compromise her own integrity, but she said, “I will make you this promise, if you can believe my word, that I have no intention of investigating you in any way. If, that is, you can answer some questions for me.”
“That sounds like a threat!” She unlocked her fingers and sat up straight.
“No, no, I did not mean it to sound that way. Let me put my questions to you, and then you can decide. I will not ask for a promise or commitment from you until you have heard the reason for my questions.” Marianne took a deep breath. “I have been engaged, by a man who is now dead, to look into the background of one particular man and I understand that this man has been to see you. He is called Edgar Bartholomew.”