Page 17 of The Missing Maid
The sentiment might have been more convincing if she hadn’t slurred her words. Once again, Julian patted her hand. ‘No real mystery,’ he said kindly. ‘Either the agency got it wrong or you did. Both fairly common events, in my experience.’
Eugenia consoled herself with more wine and grew a little tearful as she insisted she remembered who had worked for her. Harry squirmed in her seat, unable to shake the feeling that she was responsible for some of the other woman’s distress. By unspoken agreement, she and Seb made their excuses not long after and left. As they shared a taxi back to Mayfair, Harry shook her head. ‘Remind me to say no next time you try to drag me into a dinner Mama has arranged.’
Her brother laughed. ‘Only if you remind me to do the same. Philip isn’t a bad sort but his parents are fairly awful and he’s no match for you.’
That was half the trouble – Philip was nice enough, if a little condescending, but not the least bit attractive to Harry. ‘Do me a favour and tell Mama that when you see her,’ she told Seb.‘She’s determined to marry me off to the first man with a decent income.’
Seb stretched and sighed. ‘Ah, the perils of being female.’ He gave her a sidelong look. ‘Do you think you’ll ever marry?’
‘No,’ Harry said, with some force; too many conversations with her mother had made her dislike even the thought of giving up her independence to become someone’s wife. Then she softened. Thousands of people got married every year – they couldn’t all be wrong, could they? ‘Maybe, if I met the right person at the right time. But not now.’
‘The right person,’ Seb repeated thoughtfully. ‘Who might that be, I wonder? You wouldn’t have already met him, by any chance?’
Harry felt her cheeks grow warm and was glad of the darkness surrounding them. He meant Oliver Fortescue, of course, the lawyer son of their father’s best friend. He was four years older than Harry, had gone to university with her eldest brother, Lawrence, and there had been a summer when she’d followed them both around like a puppy. But Oliver had been bright and brilliant and destined for greatness at the Inns of Court. He’d had little time for teenage Harry and she imagined he would have even less time now. ‘No,’ she said firmly.
Seb held his hand up in mock surrender. ‘Okay, just thought I’d ask. You know the only way to stop Mama’s meddling is to find someone yourself.’
There was a kernel of truth in his words that Harry preferred not to examine. ‘Like you have?’ she parried.
‘I am a confirmed bachelor and plan to enjoy that happy situation for as long as I can,’ Seb answered, with equal firmness. He leaned forward to tap the glass window that separated them from the driver. ‘And speaking of which, just here, please.’
Harry glanced out of the window to see they were outside the Cosmo. ‘Rather you than me,’ she said. ‘I’ve got work tomorrow.’
‘I haven’t,’ her brother said cheerfully, and planted a kiss on her cheek before opening the car door and climbing out. ‘Sweet dreams, Sis. See you soon.’
LORD ROBERTSON BURGLARY
Deanery Street Theft An Inside Job
Maid Held For Questioning
The headline was splashed all over the newspaper sellers’ stands as Harry made her way to work on Wednesday morning, their cry of ‘Read all about it!’ strident over the buzz of traffic. She didn’t make a habit of paying attention to the morning editions, preferring to buy an evening paper on her way home to flick through as she ate her supper, and there were several publications she would not touch under any circumstances, but on this morning there was no escaping the story. Every newspaper being held aloft and rustled on the Underground bellowed the crime from the front page and, as Harry’s vision drifted along the wall of newsprint, she felt her curiosity catch. What had been stolen from Lord Robertson, she wondered, and by whom?
With a subtle shift, she began reading over the shoulder of the man seated beside her and felt her blood run cold before she had finished the first paragraph. The burglary had resulted in the loss of a significant amount of jewellery and money, but it was not the list of stolen goods that made Harry read the words all over again. It was the name of the maid, the girl who had beendetained on suspicion of masterminding the crime: Mildred Longstaff herself.
Harry bought a paper of her own the moment she left Baker Street Underground station and absorbed the details as she walked to the bank. The theft had taken place the night before, while Lord Robertson and his wife were enjoying a trip to the theatre. They came home to find their butler incapacitated and items of considerable value missing. Mildred had been arrested on the spot, even though she proclaimed her innocence, and was being held at Vine Street Police Station.
Harry found it hard to concentrate on her work that morning. When Bobby arrived with the day’s deliveries, he whistled disapprovingly through his teeth as he eyed the folded-up newspaper on the floor beneath her hat and coat. ‘What’s the world coming to?’ he asked, shaking his head for sorrowful emphasis. ‘But I’ll tell you this for nothing – if I was going to steal some jewellery, not that I would, I wouldn’t stash the loot under me pillow. Asking to get caught, that is.’
Harry brooded on his words long after the post boy had continued on his rounds. The similarities to the tale told by Lady Finchem were not lost on her and she had to admit her faith in Mildred’s innocence was almost gone. It seemed long past time to face the fact that she was not the girl her family thought her to be. But Harry had not considered her unintelligent when they had met – why would she repeat the same crime in her new position, with exactly the same mistake in hiding the stolen loot? It didn’t make sense.
The evening newspapers added more lurid detail. Mildred had appeared at the Magistrates’ Court on Marlborough Street and tearfully protested her innocence, declaring she hadn’t even been at the house when the burglary happened – a claim disproved by several witnesses. She had not been able to explain the presence of stolen jewellery under her pillow, either, and hadsimply insisted she hadn’t put it there. The magistrate had taken a dim view of her protestations; bail had been denied and she had returned to prison to await trial. Police suspected she was not working alone and had appealed for anyone who might have noticed anything unusual on Deanery Street between the hours of eight and elevenp.m. on the night in question.
Harry shook her head sadly. Things did not look good for Mildred, which made her feel even more sympathy for her long-suffering family. She doubted they could bear the expense of a lawyer.
By the following morning, the headlines had moved on to a tragic mining accident in Wales that had drowned twelve men, and Mildred had been consigned to lower down the page. Harry boughtThe Timeson her way into work, hopeful that Mildred had been exonerated but the evidence of her guilt did not seem to be going away. It made for depressing reading and Harry could only imagine what the Longstaffs were going through. Things were likely to get much worse before they got better, for both Mildred and her family.
Doing her best to put the matter out of her mind, Harry spent the morning responding to the latest pile of letters to Sherlock Holmes. She telephoned Mr Babbage to request another filing cabinet, as the one she had was very nearly full, and she requisitioned some new typewriter ribbons. But although she undertook her work with the same attention to detail as always, she found herself restless and irritable. More than once she was tempted to tell Mr Holmes’ correspondents exactly what she thought of their wild accusations and frankly insane stories.
Rubbing her temples in an effort to shift the headache that lurked there, she gazed around the small office and sighed. Perhaps it was time to stop cutting off her nose to spite Simeon Pemberton, who had probably forgotten she even existed. Perhaps it was time to find a new job.
Deciding she was sorely in need of fresh air, Harry took her lunch to Regent’s Park and spent a restorative thirty minutes feeding the ducks her leftover crusts. As she made her way along Baker Street towards the bank, she was surprised to see a young woman waving at her from the other side of the street. ‘Miss Moss!’ she cried, hurrying across the road and eliciting angry shouts and toots of horns as she did so. ‘Goodness, I am so relieved to have found you.’
Harry stared at her in astonishment. Esme Longstaff was the last person she’d expected to see. ‘Good afternoon, Miss Longstaff,’ she managed, having glanced both ways along the street to see if Mr or Mrs Longstaff were nearby. ‘What a pleasant surprise to see you again. Are you well?’
Clearly flustered and a little out of breath, Esme took a moment to compose herself. ‘I am in good health, thank you, but I must confess to finding Baker Street most confusing. I have walked its entire length searching for 221b but cannot find it. Either I am very stupid or the numbers are muddled.’ She tipped her head. ‘But now you are here, you can relieve my bewilderment. Where are the consulting rooms of Mr Holmes, please?’
Harry kept her gaze firmly averted from the entrance to the Abbey Road Building Society, where she was sure the doormen were watching her curiously. ‘Mr Holmes is not currently in residence at Baker Street, as I’m sure you recall.’ She paused. There was only one reason she could imagine for Esme’s presence in London and it was not something she was in a position to help with. ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you.’
