Page 69 of A Ruse of Shadows
“Did she ask after Mumble?”
“Not in the very least,” said the bookbinder with great certainty. “On her first visit, she inquired into wedding stationery, and I told her that unfortunately we would not be able to assist her with bespoke invitations. She came back a few days later and said that she planned to ask all her guests for handwritten good wishes and could I help her turn the collection into a bound volume. To that I said yes—if she brought the pages, we could make an exceptionally handsome book.”
He shrugged. “But then I never saw her again.”
?Earlier, Charlotte had decided against going to the tea shop where Jessie worked: Not only would she arrive too late to catch Jessie, but she was still dressed as a man, and a man hanging about asking forJessie would not have pleased the proprietress, who seemed to be the sort to implement strict rules concerning her female employees.
But after Mr. Rosenblatt’s disclosure, she changed her mind.
In décor and general atmosphere, Mrs. Hatfield’s tea shop was not very different from the many tearooms that had sprung up in recent years: clean, cozy places that smelled of sugar crust and baked fruit and catered to a female clientele, offering them a safe, welcoming place to dine in public.
But men, as it turned out, enjoyed tea shops, too. They did not always wish to deal with the noise and drunkenness of a pub or a tavern when all they wanted was a decent meal at a decent price.
Mrs. Hatfield’s tea shop, therefore, did not turn away male patronage, but had a reserved section to one side, with an older waitress who had salt-and-pepper hair. As soon as Charlotte showed her Mrs. Claiborne’s picture, she said, “Oh, I remember her. Mind you, sir, we have a great many pretty ladies that come in, but she was just lovely. I saw her only that once, but I think, from talking to the girl who served her, that it wasn’t her first time as a patron.”
Since Mrs. Hatfield would frown upon waitresses not assigned to the gentlemen’s section sidling over to chat with one, Charlotte passed a coin into the older server’s hand and asked her to speak to the one who had waited on Mrs. Claiborne.
The senior waitress came back some minutes later and reported that Mrs. Claiborne had heard about the reputation the tea shop enjoyed for its unadulterated breads, and so the server who attended to her had proudly boasted about how even fancy hotels were coming to them now, to order rolls and whatnot for their fancy tables.
“Did she ever ask about anyone working here?”
“Pauline didn’t say. And why would such a fancy lady know any of us? Even Mrs. Hatfield isn’t grand enough for her, if you ask me. But Pauline did say that the second time she came in she wanted to know which hotels ordered rolls from us and how the rolls were delivered.”
“And Miss Pauline knew that?”
“Oh, we all know. That would be the Dolphin’s Crown, the Round Oaks, and Pettifer’s. And we have a girl with a truly strong back. She’s the one who does the deliveries.”
Pettifer’s was the hotel where Mrs. Claiborne had asked to meet with Charlotte and Mrs. Watson, and where she had claimed to run into the young man and the young woman who had tried to break into her town house.
What were the chances that shedidn’tknow, when she proposed the meeting, that Jessie, on behalf of the tea shop, was a frequent visitor to the hotel?
?Lord Ingram returned to the hotel as Holmes and Mrs. Watson were sitting down to a simple supper. Mrs. Watson leaped up to embrace him. To his surprise, Holmes did likewise. Not that she never did, but certainly not in front of others—and so casually, too.
He was slightly embarrassed and exceptionally gratified.
Mrs. Watson, hiding her own surprise, pressed a plate of food into his hands, and told him what they had found out this day.
“You see, my lord,” she said as she sawed at her beefsteak, “Mrs. Claiborne told us a pack of lies about being ignorant of Mr. Underwood’s boxers. She even knew where Mumble and Jessie worked.”
“I caught Johnny just before he left work,” added Holmes. “Interestingly enough, neither he nor the construction foreman recognized her—though to be sure a month ago Johnny was working at a different site. After that I went to the Unicorn of the Sea. Mr. Mowlem, the publican, also said that he was sure he’d never seen her in his life.”
She turned her face to the side and yawned into her hand before digging into a jacket potato. He, too, felt like falling face-first into his plate.
Only Mrs. Watson still had the nervous energy to ruminate on the investigation. “All the lies would have made me cross with her, were she not already dead. What was she thinking, really, to allow someone into her parlor while she was on the run—very possibly in the middle of the night?”
Holmes sprinkled salt and pepper on her potato. “Perhaps she opened the door to Mr. Underwood?”
“But he was dead!” exclaimed Mrs. Watson.
Even Lord Ingram was taken aback by the idea. He took a bite of his sandwich and glanced at Holmes.
“We don’t know Mr. Underwood’s precise time of death,” said Holmes. “Or that of Mrs. Claiborne’s.”
“But why would he wish to kill her?” Mrs. Watson demanded to know.
Holmes shrugged. “Maybe he finally learned that she’d been holding conjugal meetings with Lord Bancroft?”
After all, those had taken place only after Mr. Underwood could no longer spend time at home regularly.
