Page 10 of A Treacherous Trade
“With your permission, Mrs. Chamberlain,” I said. “Might I peek in on the scene?”
The color of her eyes changed from frosty to downright frigid. “You won’t be needing my permission so much as from that lackwit Orson Davies, who fancies himself a detective inspector. He’s as corrupt as he is ugly.”
“I can hear you, you know.”
I jumped at the sound of a waspish, masculine voice as it was thrown down the stairs just outside of the open door to the parlor.
“I’m painfully aware of the acoustics of my own establishment, thank you,” Beatrice said, with such vexation that I almost wanted to duck to make sure the venom in her tone didn’t splash all over me.
Swift, angry footsteps descended toward us.
I stepped to the side to make room for the squat, red-faced man who charged through the door, his balding head down like a Spanish bull.
“I should arrest you for a bawd, Beatrice Chamberlain. See if I don’t put you in chains one day.” His accent was as far from highborn as Whitechapel was from Buckingham Palace, so to hear him talking down to the erudite, elegant women in front of him was right peculiar.
Beatrice stood, drawing herself up to her full height, which was a good several inches over his. “I invite you to try, you lackwit. You know as well as everyone that this establishment caters to more than half the papermen and publishers in this town. One more threat from you and I’ll make certain you’ll be immortalized in the press, Inspector Davies. Imagine, if you will, the things I could have written about you. Things done in this very place.”
“I’ll sue you for libel, you harpy,” he growled, through teeth as crooked as a stool pit rat’s.
“Find a solicitor or advocate who isn’t indebted to me, I dare you.”
“A challenge I’ll have to accept at some point,madam.” He spat the word, leaving no mystery to which way he meant it.
Turning on his heel, he faced me, dismissing the two women at the couch by giving them his back. “I’ve heard of you, Miss Mahoney,” he said, his tone changing from one of conflict to conviviality in the space of a blink.
The fleetness of emotion left me a bit dizzy.
“I sometimes enjoy a round of golf at the club with Inspector George Aberline and Dr. Doyle, his optician friend, who is a crime writer of some growing consequence,” he bragged, hooking his thumbs in his vest pockets.
I darted a glance over his head at the ladies, knowing I needed to play nice with him, but also not wanting to incur their wrath.
“I am a great admirer of Inspector Aberline’s,” I said carefully. “We work together often.” Aberline was the original inspector on the Ripper case, and had engaged me several times since then. He was a wonderful advocate of my position.
“I thought it right strange what you do at first, scouring up organs and whatnot and scrubbing up murder scenes of people that i’nt your kin.” He grimaced in such a way that made him impossibly less attractive than before. “But Aberline, he helped me to see it’s a kind service you perform for the grief-stricken.”
“That was lovely of him to do so.” For as long as I could, I would refrain from complimenting this blighter. I disliked him intensely.
“You met on the Ripper case, then, eh?” he asked with avid interest.
“Indeed.”
“Gave you a soft spot for whores, you was saying… Can’t blame you for that. You’ve a kind heart, an’ all.” His eyes were glued to my chest, with little to no interest in the heart that beat there.
I proffered him a smile I hoped was both shy and winsome, even though Croft’s words from this morning still echoed in his voice, like smoke snagging over shards of cut glass.
You look terrible.
At least the lighting in the place was meant to be as kind as possible to a spinster like me. Because even though I found the man in front of me insufferable in the extreme, I needed his good graces to get what I wanted. So I did what I did with all detestable cretins like him when I needed their permission: I appealed to his ego.
“It seems, Detective Inspector Davies, you’re the man to talk to about gaining access to Jane’s room?”
“I am theveryman.” He beamed, casting a glance over his shoulder as if to check if Mrs. Chamberlain was taking notes on how to address him.
“Would you very much mind if I poked my head in to see what I’m up against? It’s easier to prepare my delicate constitution, you see.” I cast my gaze downward, but not so quickly to miss that his own eyes narrowed in such a way that I worried I might have laid it on too thick.
“It’s against protocol…”
“When has protocol ever meant a lick to you?” Beatrice snapped. “You’ve set bedposts to knocking against the walls in this very place while you were supposed to be on duty.”
