Jewel of the Thames (A Portia Adams Adventure)

by Misri, Angela

  We had booked an overnight compartment for our train trip south, so I watched the sun set over Toronto as we pulled out of the station, saying a silent goodbye to my home of so many years. My companion quickly fell asleep with her book lying over her chest, so I closed it and pulled a small blanket out of the overhead cabinet to cover her with. It took me a few hours to fall asleep. Even the rocking motion of the train did not soothe my churning brain. So it was, as we pulled up into the station in New York, that I raised with my new guardian the subject of continuing education.

  “Well, it just so happens that I have written ahead to a friend, well, let’s call her a friend for now … and applied for your admission to Somerville College,” she offered, a sparkle in her eye.

  “That is most kind of you, Mrs. Jones,” I answered, my heart beating wildly at the opportunity, “but surely the tuition—”

  “The cost is not your concern, my dear. I can afford it,” she interrupted. “Does studying at the college appeal to you?”

  “Very much so,” I replied, shaking off the guilt as best I could, and only partially succeeding. My brain seemed to want to linger on the life I had enjoyed with my mother, and my heart seemed to want me to feel bad for anything else.

  Mrs. Jones broached the subject quite unprompted the morning after arriving in New York, in the downstairs lobby of the hotel, asking what my mother’s plans had been for me.

  “For if I am to stand in as your guardian, I should know what your mother wanted for you,” she explained.

  I looked down at the scone that had until moments ago smelled heavenly of blueberries and butter. Now it might as well have been a finely formed rock; that’s how my appetite changed at the mere mention of my past life.

  “She worked so hard to make sure I had the best education, that I wanted for nothing,” I started to say, my eyes still on my plate, “I…”

  “You miss her,” Mrs. Jones finished, reaching across the table to cover my hand. I nodded, not looking up.

  “You will miss her,” she continued. “You will miss her every single day for a long time.”

  The melancholy in her voice made me raise my eyes to meet hers, the trembling of her lower lip underscoring just how deeply she sympathized with my situation. I guessed that she had lost someone important to her, perhaps recently, and I was grateful for her experience.

  “And then you’ll miss her a tiny bit less, and a tiny bit less,” she continued, tilting her head to the side as she spoke, the low tremor in her voice still apparent, “but if you think you are doing her memory justice by feeling guilty about pursuing a path she would have chosen…” Mrs. Jones shrugged daintily, allowing me to finish the logical argument she had made without any words at all.

  “Who is it you have lost, Mrs. Jones?” I asked, swallowing down the lump in my throat.

  She jerked away from me at the question, her eyes on her lap as she struggled to regain her composure.

  “I can only assume that your advice comes from experience,” I explained, watching her take a deep breath.

  “Yes, well, my dear girl, when you get to my advanced age,” she answered finally, carefully taking up her teacup, “a great many of your friends and family will have passed. And it is sad every single time.”

  I still believed her to be talking about a specific loss, but in a moment of sensitivity that I usually ignored, I let it pass.

  Our conversations on that long trip grew when we boarded the ocean liner that would take us across the Atlantic. I had never traveled by ship before and was understandably excited by every aspect of this new adventure. Mrs. Jones had booked us into first-class suites along the outside of the ship, so that my small porthole looked out over beautiful views no matter what time of day. Not that I spent much time in my suite, preferring to walk the decks and explore everything from bow to stern. Waiters followed first-class passengers everywhere, an aspect of the journey my guardian enjoyed more than I. I became quite impatient with being continually asked about my comfort but found that if I explored below decks, in the second- and third-class areas of the ship, I was left to my own devices. I also had to admit (if only to myself) that I felt more comfortable amongst these folks, with their simple chipped teacups and sandwich-dominated meals, than at the extravagance of the buffet table in the first class dining room.

  I discovered early on that Mrs. Jones had a remarkable singing voice, which she carefully managed, not over-stressing it and gargling every night with salt water. She had spent some time on stage, that much was clear from her regal bearing, the way she projected her voice and even the professional way she applied her makeup.

  The details of her relationship with my grandmother were still rather unexplained, a situation that annoyed me to no end, though I did manage to glean a most interesting fact: she had also known my grandfather! He was a source of great mystery in my family, especially to my late mother, who had grown up without him. The circumstances of my mother’s birth were, it seemed, a closely guarded secret — so much so that my grandmother had refused to speak of them, saying only that “he” was gone.

  When my own father died in the war, my mother confessed that she had expected my grandmother to finally share her own loss of a husband, if only to comfort her daughter. But she was wrong; no clarity was ever given to my poor mother as to her filial heritage.

  “But then you knew my grandfather, really?” I repeated to Mrs. Jones as the sea pitched beneath us.

  “Oh, heavens, yes, I knew your grandfather,” she chuckled, puffing on a tiny clay pipe, an affectation that seemed wholly out of place in so dignified and feminine a person.

  “What was he like?” I demanded, rapt with attention despite my uneasy belly.

  “Like?” she repeated thoughtfully. “He was, well, John was just so remarkably kind and human. Without ego or avarice, sympathetic and caring…”

  I nodded, forming in my mind’s eye this paragon of a man.

  She leaned back, closing her eyes and blowing out a thin wisp of smoke. “He was always a good-looking man. Your eyes are from him, the same blue, but you are slimmer of build and have your grandmother’s exotic face rather than his rounder, friendly one. He was a bit of a bounder, as men of his looks are apt to be.”

  I grinned at this, adding to my mental picture.

  “He married as often as…” she blinked, laughed, “well, as often as I did, I suppose, though my reasons were infinitely better.”

  She glanced keenly at me. “Your grandmother was the first and best of his wives, and he would have been a far happier man had he come to this side of the pond with her rather than returning to England and marrying Mary.”

  That was all I could persuade her to say that night, and indeed I despaired of gaining any further insights into my grandparents until almost four days later. I was mournfully ill, bent at the waist over my basin, weak and sweaty from seasickness. The voyage to this point had been relatively calm, but as of this morning the skies had darkened, and the seas all around had become choppy and violent. I had missed two meals that I would have normally enjoyed above deck, but was too ill to even pass word to Mrs. Jones excusing myself.

  She arrived as I had just managed to regain my bunk, dragging the basin with me onto my stomach as I lay back.

  “Oh, my dear, you should have sent for me,” she said as she took in the pathetic scene.

  I mumbled something barely intelligible about being too weak, but she ignored me, sweeping in, soaking a wet cloth and pressing it over my closed eyes.

  I sighed at the relief that brought and took her ministrations with gratitude. So much was I relaxing that I nearly missed her whisper, “Both your grandparents suffered the same seasickness, I remember.”

  My eyes flew open as I tried to sit up. “They did?”

  “Lie back down, you silly girl,” she commanded, easily pressing me back into a prone position because of my weakened state.

  “But—” I protested.

  “If you lie still and tr
y and regain your spirit, I promise I will answer your questions,” she said.

  I nodded a little too eagerly, bringing on a new wave of nausea. I shut my eyes, willing the sea to cooperate. Meanwhile, she re-soaked the cloth and applied it to my brow.

  “As I recall, your grandfather never traveled by sea without a tincture of ground mint to add to cool water,” she explained.

  “Mint?” I said, taking care not to move.

  “A self-prescribed antidote. Do you want me to ring for some from the galley?”

  I did, and said so, my reason being as much to relieve my present state as to feel just a little closer to my mysterious grandfather. We sat in rocking silence until the attendant arrived with some fresh mint leaves. I watched Mrs. Jones crush a few leaves into the jug of water, the pungent smell filling the cabin, and then she soaked the cloth before applying it to my forehead. Whether it was actually a cure or just a placebo of faith in a lost relative, I do not know. I know only that I awoke the next day feeling better than I had in two weeks.

  Chapter Three

  I expected that we would go straight to Mrs. Jones’s home in London (I had learned that she had residences all over the world), but instead she directed the cabbie at the train station to my inherited property. I peppered her with questions about every landmark we passed: the gothic look of Tower Bridge, the imposing structure of Big Ben, the crimson-dressed guards in front of Buckingham Palace, Lord Nelson’s statue in the middle of Trafalgar Square. Everything fascinated me, and she had a story to tell about each.

  “Those bronze lions were remarkable when they were put in place under Nelson,” she whispered, pointing at the regal feline statues as we passed. “It is one of my fondest memories as a child, when my father brought me to their installation. Though by then Sir Edwin was quite mad, at least according to the gossip at the time.”

  The traffic in Whitehall took my breath away with the mix of horse carriages, trucks, cars, bicycles and pedestrians all vying for the lane that would allow for the quickest route through the heart of the city.

  In between my barrage of questions, Mrs. Jones sang to herself under her breath and her eyes grew moist as we passed through the city.

  I was not above my own sense of wonder at finally arriving at my new home, taking in the differences and similarities between Toronto and bustling London. The age of the city struck me again and again, in its architecture and condition. It was at once more beautiful and more mysterious than any other city I had been in before, not that I had traveled much at all — once to Montreal, twice to Ottawa in the past ten years and those few days in New York with Mrs. Jones. New shiny awnings fought for my attention with crumbling façades, and every darkened alley seemed to be positively alive with hidden movement. The sheer number of people on the streets amazed me, and the varieties of dress as well as the different shades of skin were all new. Toronto had its share of immigrants, and a fair number of native Canadian people as well, but they were very much in the minority, especially in the downtown core of the city. I had been introduced to more than a few immigrant groups through my mother’s myriad of professions — from house cleaner to nanny to librarian — but in limited circumstances, and never socially. Here people of all races, colors and classes mixed and mingled, bustling through the streets in an equal hurry toward their respective destinations.

  I wished that my mother were alive to see it, and I had to blink away a tear remembering her kind face and soft voice. She loved to travel but finances had restricted her ambitions, especially after my father’s death. Their move from San Francisco to Toronto when I was a toddler had been made out of necessity as they sought more job opportunities and lower rents. But she would bring home brochure after brochure from the local travel agency as a way to feed that hunger for new cities and new cultures. I had never really shared that ambition myself, preferring places I knew to places I did not, but no one could be unmoved by my mother’s enthusiasm, not even me. It had been a few weeks since her death, but I still felt her absence sharply and wished for the hundredth time that she were still at my side. Not that Mrs. Jones was failing in her new role as my guardian… I looked over at the older woman. On the contrary, in some ways she and I got along better than my mother and I had. But she would never be able to fill that place in my heart for the only person who had loved me above all others. And whom I had loved the same way.

  It took almost an hour for us to wend our way to our destination, and upon arrival, both Mrs. Jones and I leaned out of the cab in excitement.

  Before us stood a brick townhouse in reasonable condition, two floors at least with very serviceable steps leading to a nondescript dark green door. The semi-circular stained glass window above the front door displayed the number in black, and a light could be seen within. On the left, or west side of the townhouse, stood an ancient-looking bakery, Greek if I had to guess by the writing on the sign and the smells wafting from it. To the east were another seven townhouses obviously designed by the same hand, and having the same framing, stained glass and style of door.

  “If’n you ladies are lookin’ for help, you might be better off with the boys at the Yard these days,” the cabbie remarked as we made no move to disembark.

  I thought that a strange comment, and said so, but he just shrugged and said, “Mr. Holmes hasn’t been seen here nigh on fifteen years, I’d say, if not more. But it’s your lot, I said m’piece.”

  Mrs. Jones had by now extended the correct fare to the man and was exiting the cab, so I did the same. As the cabbie pulled away, I turned to Mrs. Jones. “What did he mean — Mr. Holmes?” I asked, looking at the door and feeling my memory claw at me. “Surely he did not mean Sherlock Holmes, the detective?”

  Mrs. Jones had meanwhile picked up the doorknocker and given it a sharp rap. “None other, my dear,” she answered.

  “But why?” I said, stepping back from the front door to look at the full façade of the townhouse. “How did he come to live in the building?”

  The door swung open to reveal a good-looking gentleman only a few years my senior, with a half-eaten red apple in one hand. He was almost six feet tall, with wide shoulders, an athletic build and dark brown hair that curled at the forehead over inquisitive brown eyes. For the first time in almost a month I wondered how I looked and reached up to pat down what I was sure were unruly curls trying to escape my hat.

  “Afternoon, ladies, what can I do for you?” he asked in a cordial bass voice. His trousers were half of a uniform, though I couldn’t place them right away. I glanced at his sleeves and decided against kitchen worker, and then at his hands, deciding against maître d’. Finally my eyes lit on the small loop on his belt revealing the uniform’s requirement to carry a baton.

  “This is Miss Portia Adams,” offered my companion, “and I am Mrs. Irene Jones.”

  “Ah yes, Mrs. Jones, your letter arrived two weeks ago,” he replied, his smile revealing a pair of dimples as he took a bite of his apple and stood aside to allow us entrance into a narrow hallway. “My parents have been expecting you.”

  I closed the door behind us as the young man was taking my guardian's coat. He took mine with another dimpled smile, and then beckoned us to follow him through a door and into the large sitting room on the main floor.

  There sat two middle-aged persons with three middle-aged dogs sitting between them, all in various states of dozing. The sofas and chairs were all covered with a loud floral fabric that had only slightly dimmed over the years, their wooden legs a mix of styles that told a simple story of frugality I recognized from my own mother’s furnishing habits.

  “Excuse me, they are quite hard of hearing,” the man said apologetically, and then taking a deep breath said in a much louder voice, “Mother, Father, our new landlady has arrived.”

  I blushed at this characterization, having never owned anything to this point, let alone land with tenants. I glanced at the wallpaper in the room, which was as loud as the furniture, with large circular stamps in sha
des of gray and blue. The mother jerked awake with a start, turning sleepy eyes on us, but the older gentleman slept right on through, as did the three dogs. I didn’t recognize the breed of the dogs, though they all seemed to have a bit of bulldog in them from this angle — at least from their size and the amount of saliva barely held within their jowls. The young man leaned in now to speak directly in his mother’s ear.

  “Miss Portia Adams, daughter to Marie Jameson is here, remember? She has taken ownership of the house.”

  This was enough to spark a memory in the woman, and she kindly asked us to sit down and take our ease with a cup of tea.

  “We were of course told of your mother’s untimely death, my dear,” said the woman, who had introduced herself as Mrs. Dawes, reaching out to pat my knee. “How terrible for you, poor thing!”

  I thanked her for her solicitude, and she continued. “Your mum was a fine mistress. Raised the rent lightly, left management of the house to myself and now to my son. And we have been good tenants, if I do say so m’self.”

  I had no idea if they had been, having never heard of this property before the day of my mother’s funeral. Mrs. Jones spoke up at this point. “And the upstairs tenant?”

  “Oh, moved out months ago. Brian here was takin’ advantage of the pause between tenants to fix it up a bit,” the woman said, nodding toward her son, who stood behind her chair finishing his apple. “We were about to put an advertisement in the paper to rent it when the lawyer’s letter arrived.”

  “Ah, perfect! Then Miss Adams will be moving in upstairs as soon as possible,” Mrs. Jones said approvingly.

  Once again my guardian had made a hairpin turn. I could scarcely mask my surprise. Everyone else in the room, at least those who were conscious, seemed equally surprised.

  “Really?” Mrs. Dawes said, looking at us. “The two of you?”

  “Oh heavens, no, I travel far too much to be considered an occupant of any one home,” Mrs. Jones answered haughtily, dipping her biscuit in her tea. “I will of course drop in from time to time to check on my charge, but I would like to enlist your help in ensuring her safety and care, madam.”