“You know,” he said sullenly. “You took my favorite trousers yesterday, and I only have so many.”
“This is my only wig,” she retorted.
“I’ll drop off your clothes at the Ferry Building again, but only if you leave the clothes you’ve taken. Someone is going to start noticing my missing male garments.”
“Deal.”
“And I’ll see what else I have lying around.”
Lotario knew she would not accept money from him, but clothing and supplies were another matter. She appreciated the offer.
Isobel began shedding clothes. “What else did you learn?”
“Violet was friendly enough, but she kept to herself—no enemies that I could discover. It’s not as if her fellow actors were fighting for her roles. She had a small part in the current production of Carmen, but who can say with actors; everyone is trying to claw his way to the top. The incident at the Columbia was deemed an unfortunate accident by the police.”
“What about the Kiralfy Theatre Company?”
“There is no such company,” Lotario stated.
Isobel paused. “None?”
Lotario shook his head. “I checked—thoroughly.”
“Where was she for a full year, then?”
“I couldn’t think of a discreet way to ask,” he admitted.
“Her story will be in the newspapers tomorrow. That might give you an opening.”
“I suppose I could think of an excuse to speak with Lola again,” he sighed. “The newspapers have their uses.” It was said with distaste. The elusive Madame de Winter was a popular target.
“So they do. I wrote the article,” she very nearly preened. Instead, she transferred needed items from her handbag to pilfered coat, and stuffed the rest of her feminine clothing into a sack.
“Vulture.” His eyes glittered.
“A girl’s got to make a living.”
Lotario snatched the sack from her. “You’re going about it the wrong way. Whoring pays far better.”
“I played the whore for two months as a married woman,” she said dryly. “I didn’t much care for it.”
Sympathy flashed in Lotario’s eyes, and she turned away, slapping a battered bowler on her short hair. He eyed the tattered suit she had selected. “What viper’s pit are you venturing into now?”
“You’ll only worry if I tell you.”
“Bel,” he hissed. “What if you don’t return?”
“Then I’ll be dead twice over.”
He tried to growl, but it was more huff.
“Don’t worry,” she said, patting her coat pocket, “I’m armed.” She picked up her ambiguous umbrella, and paused, turning to her flustered twin. There was worry in his eyes.
“For the love of God, can’t you tell me—just in case?”
Lotario did not like nighttime adventures, or daylight ones for that matter—or much of any excitement that took place outside of a luxurious hotel.
Isobel took pity on her twin brother. She told him. But from the look in his eyes, he was not reassured. Before he could protest, she stepped into the hall, nearly running into a group of tipsy socialites.
“Pardon me, ladies.” Isobel tipped her hat, and quickened her pace, seeking the cool, concealing mist of the night.
19
The House
THE PROBLEM WITH BREAKING into an abandoned house was the creeping worry that it was not empty. Isobel shifted on her feet. She stood beside a hedge wall, across the street, watching the silent house where Violet’s grandmother had died. Light from its neighbors’ homes poured through cracks in the curtains, but the warmth didn’t reach the overgrown yard.
When the fog thickened, and the lights in the surrounding homes began to flicker, Isobel detached herself from the hedge and walked down the street. The young person with bowler and umbrella turned the corner, circled the block, and strode down the deserted access lane.
Moving stealthily on rubber-soled shoes, she nudged the loose fence board aside, and slipped into the yard. Isobel crouched in the foliage, listening to the night. A fog horn bellowed, and the leaves rustled with the tell-tale whisper of a passing possum. She relaxed, stowed her bowler and umbrella beside the fence, and moved swiftly to the back porch.
All was quiet. She peered into the deeper shadows, searching for the porch-dweller. If the vagrant hid during the day, then he would likely roam the nights. Just to be sure, she gave a hushed hiss, listening for movement.
There was no answering noise.
Isobel slunk around the side, gripped a window ledge, and pulled herself up, squinting through a break in the curtain. No light; no movement. As her eyes adjusted to the dark, blobs of paleness became apparent—the indistinct outline of covered furniture.
Isobel lowered herself, walked a few feet back, and reached for the cast iron drain pipe. She began to climb. An easy ascent for a girl who had spent her childhood climbing the mast in a heaving sea. In seconds, she reached the second story, and stretched her fingers towards a window sill. The ornate siding gave her toes purchase, and she edged along, until she came to her chosen window.
An unnerving stillness lay beyond the glass. Clinging to the side of the house, Isobel waited, listening to the creaking wood and rustle of leaves far below. She shifted, maintaining balance, and fished out her Tickler, unclasping it with a single hand.
The flat, thin blade slid easily beneath the gap at the bottom of the sash window. With the tip of her blade, she caught the crescent-shaped lock, and nudged it out of the hook. Isobel pocketed the blade, eyeing the disrepair. Wood shrunk in cold weather, which caused windows to rattle in their tracks. Putty fixed the issue, but she doubted anyone had serviced this window in some time.
The low, mournful call of a fog horn sounded in the distance. She opened the window. The rattle shook her nerves. But before the horn’s echo died, she slipped inside, and shut the glass.
The room was dismally dark. Blood roared in her ears. Still as a statue, she waited, her mind conjuring lurking enemies. Monstrous shapes emerged from the black. She swallowed fear, and turned the beastly spider back into the table that it was, the floating face into its porcelain mask, and righted the reaching hands to lamps on the wall.
A musty smell crept down her throat. She tasted abandonment; a dry emptiness where nothing was left to rot.
Isobel walked lightly across the room, and pressed her ear to the wood. The house groaned; a soft release, like a breath from pained lungs. Unease chilled her bones.
Despite all her cold logic, Isobel could not deny the feeling. Call it womanly intuition, or a primal sense; this house held secrets.
Isobel brushed the door with her fingers and grasped the handle. The door cracked open. She peered into the hollowness. It smelt of dust. No whispers, or sleeping breaths. Ducking back inside, she unfolded her pocket lantern, and put match to candle.
Dim, reflected light deepened the shadows beyond her little orb of sight. Ready to snuff the candle at a whisper, she stepped into the hallway, and crept towards the back. The house creaked, but not from her footsteps.
A large, canopied bed sat in the master bedroom. Its curtains were drawn. She tried to swallow down her fear, but her throat was filled with dust. She waited, listening to the room. When nothing stirred, she moved forward, nudging the curtains aside. The bedclothes were flat. No sleepers, or decomposing bodies. A fine, even layer of dust covered the quilt.
No one had disturbed this bed in quite some time. Gaining confidence, she moved through the other rooms, conducting a cursory search. All were empty.
Keeping to the side of the stairs, where the wooden slats sat closest to the wall, Isobel snuck down to the first floor. The wood fussed anyway, but its groaning was constant; not enough to alarm any lurkers.
Dusty sheets covered the furniture in both parlors and dining room. She moved into the kitchen. The faint aroma of burnt wood lingered in the air, the counter gleamed, and the water basin was near to glowing in the wick’s flam
e. An overzealous cleaner had been here. Her mind skipped to Mr. Leeland’s room.
Isobel shone the lantern over the grocer’s door. There was no key. On a whim, she tried the door, but found it locked. With her lantern close to the floor, she retraced her steps to the dining room. She crouched, studying the carpet. The dust was disturbed near a large window. She shone her light over the window. It looked out of place.
Isobel had seen its like before. Running her finger along the base of the wall, she felt for a small groove, and was rewarded with a latch. A jib door, used for moving large objects in and out of the house, specifically coffins.
With a quiet heave, the heavy door slid upwards with ease. Unlocked. She let it slide down, and moved towards another stairwell. Most Queen Anne style homes had a ballroom. Not the fancy, ornate ones of a palace, but a simple wooden room where family and friends might gather and dance.
She descended the steps. A faint smell pricked her senses. Coldness, cleanliness, a lack of dust, and a whisper like a biting day. She hugged the paneled walls to the hollow ballroom, moving along their border like a tense wraith.
In front of a large hearth lounged a spacious divan with a clean pillow and folded blanket. Ashes swirled in the hearth grate. At night, especially in the fog, smoke from a chimney was unlikely to be noticed, and the windows that ran the length of the room were high, but low to the ground outside.
Was this where the porch-dweller spent his nights, or was it, as Isobel suspected, a rendezvous for two lovers: Violet Clowes and Henry Erving?
Isobel tore her gaze from the only signs of life, and walked across the floor on light feet towards an adjoining hallway. The first room was a small cloakroom, the next was storage. Both had keys protruding from their locks.
The hallway curved with the house. She peered into a launder’s room with a barren sleeping cot, and then turned the key to the next room. The first thing she registered was the smell: a cool sharpness like a fish on ice. She passed from a small, empty bedroom into the adjoining bath. Sight came next. The lantern’s light illuminated a head, neck, and shoulders in a claw-foot tub.
The breath in her lungs fled. And for a moment, she waited, willing the man in the tub to move, to spot her and give a cry of indignation, but there was a wrongness in the air—the head bent too far back. She stepped over the threshold.
All her hopeful imaginings of finding a corpse had not prepared her for the reality. Throwing all the rules of investigation to the winds, she moved forward, her own mind chastising her action as laughable, and placed her fingers on the man’s neck, searching for a pulse.
She held up her lantern and looked at the face. There was no life left in Henry ‘Hal’ Erving. He wore the mask of death.
A click penetrated her shock. She backtracked, moving into the hallway. The air stirred. Someone was here, in the house. Isobel smothered her light. Moving quickly, she withdrew a key from its lock, palmed it, and darted into the storage room.
She turned the key from the inside, and dropped it into her coat. Air returned to her lungs. Isobel crouched, peeking through the keyhole. Footsteps worked their way around the ballroom. Two pairs, she decided. The hallway lightened, and she moved to the back of the little room, drawing her pistol.
The footsteps clicked past her door.
She crept closer, waiting, straining to hear a whisper of a voice, an exclaim of surprise over the dead man in the tub, some reassuring sound that didn’t scream that a murderer had returned to gloat over his victim.
Light erupted in the keyhole, blinding her. Isobel leapt back. The door flew open with a crash. She fired off a shot. The tang of metal and hot air filled her throat. A light blazed, a shotgun cocked, and a man’s voice pierced the echo of gunpowder.
“Shoot first and ask later, Bel?”
“That’s one way to get the police here,” another voice grunted.
Isobel stood in the center of the storage room, blinking away spots.
“Are you going to lower that pistol, or are you planning on shooting at me again?” A tentative head, now hatless, poked around the corner.
She scowled at Riot. “Don’t you ever announce yourself beforehand?”
“I thought you were in trouble.”
“In a storage room?” she snapped, tensing her arm. The head disappeared. “How the devil did you know I was in here?”
Isobel realized she was still pointing a revolver at the open door. She took a breath, eased the hammer down, and lowered her arm. The sound brought Riot into full view.
“It’s the only door without a key.”
“So you kicked it down?”
“It seemed infinitely logical at the time.” He sounded flustered.
“Logic would have shouted a warning.”
Riot picked up a handheld box light and directed the beam on the floor. The dark, moist outline of her deck shoes led right to the door. Heat filled her cheeks, and Riot ducked back behind the wall.
Isobel followed him into the hallway. “If I was in trouble there would have been two prints, and a whole mess of a fight.” She nodded to Tim, who held his shortened shotgun like he still had need of it. A top hat lay on the floor.
“Who the blazes kicks down a door wearing a top hat?”
Given that Riot was still dressed in his formal attire, it was obvious. He did not answer. Isobel started to walk down the hall, realized her lantern was dark, and silently cursed the man and his fancy electric box. She struck a match. “This is my murder investigation, Riot.”
“This isn’t a game,” he said, firmly.
“Life is a game.” She closed the reflective case with a snap.
“You keep telling yourself that and one day you’ll believe your own lie.”
Isobel stopped at the doorway. “That’s my plan.”
“It’s a piss poor one, Bel.”
“Then I’ll be left with the piss.”
“And a dead man in a bath. I’ll leave you to deal with the police.” Riot bent to retrieve his hat.
“Is your lady friend here, too?” she asked of the man in evening wear. “I wouldn’t want to accidentally shoot her.”
Tim edged along the wall like a slow moving statue.
“No, she’s not,” Riot replied primly. “I dropped the lady off at my harem.” He settled his hat at a jaunty angle.
The words gave her pause. Her lip twitched, but the stirrings of humor turned cold when she noticed a hole in his coat. A pit opened in her belly.
“Did I shoot you?” she breathed.
Riot glanced down, surprised. He stuck a finger through the hole. “Only thread deep.”
Heat drained from her cheeks. She felt cold as a corpse, and Tim rushed forward, arm out. She batted him away. “I’m not about to faint.” The old man hopped back and she took a deep breath. “I apologize, Mr. Tim,” she said civilly. “It’s been a long day.”
“Looks that way,” the old man cleared his throat.
“Are you going to ask her, Tim?” Riot inquired.
“Ask me what?”
“Never mind,” Tim’s gaze bounced between the two. “I’ll just be going outside to wait for the police.” When neither answered, he bolted.
Isobel looked at Riot, felt a whole jumble of confusion, and decided that the corpse would be easier to deal with. Shoving all the unwanted emotions into a nice tidy box and sealing it with more locks than were decent, she marched into the bathroom.
20
Convergence
A THROAT CLEARED. A warning, before Riot drifted near. The man was not taking chances.
“It’s my first corpse,” Isobel said by way of apology. She stood at the threshold of the bathroom.
“I tend to trip over them.”
Isobel looked at the detective, searching for any sign of humor. There was none. She crouched, lowering her lantern to study the tiles. “Lotario told you I was here,” she stated.
“I threatened him on pain of death.” And here a hint of humor crept into his dee
p voice.
“I’m sure my brother suffered greatly.”
“I twisted his arm and everything.” Riot shone his box light at the gas lamp. “The mantle is intact.”
“And the floor is wet as if someone recently scrubbed it.”
“Did you notice any marks when you first entered?”
The flare of a match and scent of gas produced light. The bathroom glowed with the lamp as Riot shook out his flame.
Isobel closed her eyes, dredging up memory. “I don’t remember,” she admitted. Fear had given her a tunnel-like vision and the corpse had been at its end. “I shouldn’t have walked in without checking.”
“I checked the man, too.” Riot crouched beside her, studying the tiles. “I don’t see any other marks.”
“I suppose you are a tracker, too?”
“No where near as gifted as the scout who taught me.”
Isobel clenched her jaw. The wind was determined to throw Riot on her course. She had not imagined that her Indian scout would be dressed in top hat and tail coat.
“I apologize for treading on your crime scene,” he said, softly. “If you’d like me to leave, I will, but I’ve been wanting to speak with you all day.”
Isobel arched a brow in question.
“Bert Dunham hired Ravenwood Agency to discover why his wife Elma killed herself. She drank carbolic acid on Wednesday, right after a woman named Violet visited.”
She blinked, mind reeling at the implications. “What are the odds?”
“Given Ravenwood Agency’s reputation and lower fees, I’d wager on those odds,” he said matter of fact.
“Tell me all—later.”
“If you’ll return the favor,” he bargained.
Isobel offered a hand, and he shook it with an amused glint in his eye. Both detectives turned to the latest unfortunate. As she moved forward, Riot stood, watchful. She took her cue, and began a cursory inspection.
There were no obvious marks from the shoulders up. No bruises, cuts, or contusions. The head arched backwards, as if to rest on the edge of the tub, only the rim was too low, and the neck arched severely back. Isobel carefully parted the cadaver’s brown hair, searching his scalp for any signs of trauma. She bent close, sniffing near the lips. Nothing abnormal aside from the sickly stench of death. She peeled back his lips. The jaw was clenched tight and his arms were stiff with rigor mortis. Her gaze traveled down, into the murky water.
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