Page 15 of The Missing Maid
Harry was about to make a second attempt to cross the road when another sudden movement caught her eye. An immaculately dressed girl of around nineteen had rounded the corner of Duke Street, where Harry seemed to recall Selfridges had a side door. She was panting slightly and glancing over her shoulder, as though she feared pursuit. Whatever she saw seemed to set her at ease; as Harry drifted towards the window display, she watched the girl straighten her shoulders, run her hands lightly over her dress in the manner of someone checking they had all their belongings, and turn briskly to cross Duke Street, leaving the department store behind.
Keeping her gaze fixed on the goods in the shop window, Harry counted to thirty, then followed. She couldn’t be certain this girl had been part of the gang Mildred had been running with – couldn’t even be sure she was a thief – but her suspicions were aroused. Following her might be a waste of time or the trail might lead to Mildred. Only time would tell.
It did not appear to have occurred to the girl that she might be being followed, although she kept up her lively pace. Harry maintained a discreet distance, pausing every now and then to gaze at a shop window while keeping one eye on her quarry. When the girl crossed the road, Harry did too and suddenly realised her destination: Bond Street Underground station. Perhaps Mildred had made her way here too and was now somewhere in the labyrinth of tunnels that lay beneath London’s streets, lost to Harry all over again.
She sped up, determined to keep the other shoplifter in sight. Bond Street only serviced one line, which meant the girl could only go east towards Oxford Circus or west towards Marble Arch, but it was imperative Harry knew which way she intended to go. Jostling her way past several other travellers, who tutted at her poor manners, she joined the queue for the booking office two people behind the girl. When she reached the clerk, Harry peered past the bodies in front of her and strained to hear the girl’s destination. ‘Elephant and Castle, please. Third class.’
She passed over some coins and took her ticket. Harry waited impatiently for the customers in front of her to be served and moved to the front of the queue. ‘Elephant and Castle, third class.’
Hurrying to the circular staircase that led to the platforms, Harry peered ahead for a glimpse of the brown felt hat. Now she knew which station the girl was going to she could relax a little, perhaps even board the train in a different carriage to prevent her from realising she was being followed, but first Harry needed to ensure they caught the same train and that meant she could not back off too far. She used her fellow travellers as cover, pretending to study the posters on the arched walls even as she watched the girl.
The journey to Oxford Circus was uneventful. Harry waited until her quarry had stepped from the train and moved along theplatform to slip after her. She stayed as close as she dared on the Bakerloo Line, sensing this was the time she was at the greatest risk of discovery. When she had dressed that morning, she’d had no idea she might need to blend in with the crowd; her cloche hat was a lamentably bright green, with perky white feathers attached to a gold brooch on one side. It was not, Harry had to admit, ideal for undercover work but going hatless would be even more noticeable. As the train juddered along the darkened tunnels, she reached up and unobtrusively removed the brooch. It wasn’t much but perhaps it might help.
Elephant and Castle was not an area of London Harry was familiar with but the hustle and bustle that assaulted her senses on leaving the Underground station reminded her very much of Piccadilly Circus. Lorries and buses trundled across the junction, directed by a policeman who seemed indifferent to the noise and danger from the passing vehicles. A tram rolled by, following silver tracks that bit into the road.
Harry blinked several times as she took in the scene, then remembered why she was there. The girl was heading east, waiting to cross the busy thoroughfare. Settling in behind her, Harry did her best to remain unobtrusive, even as they left the smarter streets behind and ventured into a maze of narrow roads. These were home to ugly, smoke-blackened brick houses, sandwiched together so tightly that they seemed to hunch over the thin street to block out the sky. Paintwork peeled from window frames and tattered fabric hung behind the glass, where there was any covering at all. One house seemed to be abandoned altogether, with no glass in the windows and no front door. Rubbish jumbled with decaying autumn leaves across the doorstep. Overhead, clothes lines criss-crossed the street between upper floors, carrying grey, sagging items that had no hope of drying in the damp chill of November.
Harry hung back as she passed beneath them, aware she was horribly out of place and certain she would be observed at any moment, but the girl she was following did not look back, not even when she reached her apparent destination – a house towards the end of the street. Harry watched her vanish inside, counted to one hundred, and began to walk along the road.
Number 25 Tea Cutter Row was in no better state than its neighbours; the windows were grimy and the door had an ill-fitting look, as though it had warped in its frame. No lights shone inside in spite of the gloomy day but that was hardly a surprise; it was only a little after midday. She didn’t pause outside the house and, when she reached the end, she turned the corner into Britannia Avenue and paused beside a slender alleyway that cut between the back of Tea Cutter Row and the next street along, uncertain of what to do next. The grimness of the area sapped some of her confidence. Even the best parts of London were grey compared to Abinger Hall but she had never been somewhere as impoverished as this.
She forced herself to think. There seemed little to be gained from passing along Tea Cutter Row again, unless she could invent an excuse to knock upon the door of number 25, but she had nothing on her person that might give her a reason to do so – no charity tin or basket of foods she could offer. In fact, she imagined anyone knocking on the door of any house in this area would be met with extreme suspicion or even outright hostility. And yet she had come all this way, had tracked the girl to this lair. What had been the point if she simply turned tail and went home?
Painfully aware of how much she stuck out, Harry took a few steps into the alley, allowing the shadows to cloak her. She would knock on the door of number 25 and ask for Mrs Cartwright, she decided, feigning puzzled embarrassment when told no such person lived there. What appeared to bean innocent case of the wrong address might allow her the opportunity to spy inside the house. Surely no one could take offence at that. But just as Harry was reaching a decision, she became aware of footsteps approaching. She shrank back further into the shadows as a figure loomed in the entrance of the alley, blocking out what little light there was. ‘Who’s there?’ a sharp female voice called in a distinct London accent.
Harry said nothing. Could the woman see her? She didn’t know. ‘Come out here and show yourself,’ the speaker went on. ‘Only thieves and guttersnipes hide in dark alleys and we have ways of dealing with them you don’t want to find out about.’
Harry’s heart thudded in her chest as she considered her options. There was nothing for it – she would have to do as the unseen woman instructed. Perhaps she could claim to be lost. Steeling herself, Harry stepped forward. ‘I think I’m a little off course. Could you help me?’
There was a gasp and a loud curse. ‘You!’
Frowning, Harry moved clear of the alley. And then she understood. The woman staring back at her in furious disbelief was Mildred Longstaff. ‘Hello again,’ Harry said, once she’d mastered her own surprise. ‘I’ve been looking for you.’
Mildred’s lip curled. ‘Why? You don’t look like the police.’ She eyed Harry’s outfit in suspicion. ‘You from Selfridges? I didn’t steal nothing – you can search me if you like.’
Harry had no doubt that any stolen goods were long gone, perhaps stashed somewhere safe along the way home. But that wasn’t her business. She took a breath and did her best to smile. ‘No, I’ve been sent by your family, Mildred. They’re desperately worried about you.’
Whatever Mildred had been expecting Harry to say, it clearly wasn’t this. Her jaw dropped. ‘You what?’
Her astonishment was so complete that it gave Harry a moment’s pause. ‘Your sister, Esme, wrote to – wrote to me after you disappeared and I agreed to see if I could find you.’
The girl shook her head. ‘Well, you’d best keep looking, Miss Nosy Parker, ’cos I don’t have a sister and I ain’t called Mildred. Never heard of anyone who was.’
It suddenly occurred to Harry that Mildred’s current accent held no trace of the Surrey village she’d grown up in. Moreover, her reaction to the news of her family’s distress was not what Harry had expected either. Clearly the girl had been badly traumatised by her treatment at the hands of Lady Finchem and had adopted a whole new persona to deal with it. That she had fallen so far into a life of crime was testament to the depth of her desperation.
‘You don’t have to lie to me,’ she said gently. ‘All your family want is to know you are safe, and for you to understand that you are always welcome to return home.’
Mildred laughed. ‘Quite the do-gooder we have here. I’ll say it again, I ain’t Mildred.’ She stepped nearer and thrust her face into Harry’s. ‘And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll scuttle out of here sharpish and forget you ever saw me. You won’t like what we do to nosy parkers, either.’
With that, she turned on her heel and strode towards the corner. Harry hurried after her. ‘Mildred, please, if you’ve fallen in with a bad lot then I can help you.’
It wasn’t until they were level with number 25 that Mildred spun round to face her. ‘This is my last warning – go away and never come back. No one here needs your help.’
Before Harry could respond, she had pushed back the warped front door and was gone. Harry curled her fingers into fists, and stared up at the house in frustration. She hadn’t expected to be met with open arms by Mildred but she certainly had not anticipated that the girl would deny her very name. Butthere seemed little more she could do here – at least she could let Esme Longstaff know her missing sister was alive, if not exactly well.
With a discouraged sigh, Harry stepped back and was about to turn away when she saw movement in the topmost window of the house. Squinting, she peered up. An indistinct figure hovered behind the dirt, pale-faced and unmoving as it gazed down at Harry. Optimistic that Mildred had changed her mind, Harry raised a hand to wave but the figure did not respond. A second later it vanished. She waited as long as she dared but no further movement came and, eventually, Harry gave up.
By the time she reached Elephant and Castle station, she had almost convinced herself the figure at the window had been a figment of her imagination. But the unhappy truth about Mildred had not been imagined. Harry could only wish she had better news for the Longstaffs, although she was sure it would bring them a measure of relief. Even so, the first letter she composed on Monday was going to be a difficult one.
