Page 62 of Betrayal from Beyond
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“Oh, yes. Iam sure that you have heard an earful from Mr. Norrey.” Mr. Hartford, the tailor, kept a small shop a little further down the main street of Kingston Upon Thames. He stood over his worktable and continued his careful cutting as he spoke. “Mr. Norrey, I am afraid, is apessimist.”
“I never would have known,” Gyda said under her breath.
“He is forever convinced that someone is stealing from his cask of boiled sweets or his barrel of tenpenny nails. I ask you, who is going to build something one or two stolen nails at a time?”
“Surely he might have a point?” Kara lifted a shoulder. “With a large order delivered, received, and gone unpaid for?”
“Perhaps.”
“Can you tell us anything about this uncle that Miss Prentice placed an order for? What was the order? A suit of clothes?”
“Indeed. A very elegant set this time, too.”
“This time?” Kara sent Niall a puzzled look before turning back to the tailor. “Miss Prentice has placed an order from you before, Mr. Hartford?”
“Oh dear.” Hartford finished his cut and looked up, dismayed. “It was supposed to be secret, that first order. And I’ve kept quiet about it, until now.” He thought about it. “Oh well. No harm done, I suppose. She did not ask me to refrain from discussing the new order. It is indeed for a new suit of clothes. Very fashionable.” He gestured to a waistcoat upon a nearby form. “I’ve only just finished the last piece.” It was of gray woven silk and wool in a checked pattern, and sewed to fit generous proportions.
“And Miss Prentice made these orders for her uncle?” asked Kara. “Very unusual, isn’t it? For a woman to order clothes for an older male relative? I would have thought it would be the other way around.”
“That was exactly my own comment, at her first request. But Miss Prentice explained that her uncle is a scholar and an eccentric. He would wear sackcloth, she said, as long as it didn’t distract him from his work. That’s why the first set had to be plain, loose, and comfortable, she said.”
“And the new, fashionable set is meant for the same uncle?”
“I assume so, as I was to use the same measurements.”
“Did Miss Prentice pay you in advance for these elegant clothes?” asked Gyda.
“No, indeed.” Hartford looked amused at the very idea. Niall didn’t doubt he found it droll. Tradesmen were never paid in advance, and often had to invoice for their goods and services several times to receive payment, even when their customers were of wealth and standing.
Niall snorted.Especiallythen.
“Did she pay you promptly for the first set?” he asked.
“Oh, yes. She insisted on coming in after business hours to pick them up herself, but she paid that very evening.”
“Then it was definitely Petra doing the ordering, not Katherine,” Kara whispered to Niall.
“She must have come here while her sister was still alive,” he answered. “Perhaps she was watching Katherine, learning her ways and the particulars of her circumstances and behaviors.”
But Gyda’s attention had not wavered from the tailor. “Are you expecting Miss Prentice to come again and fetch these clothes for her uncle, as well?”
“Oh, no.” Hartford had already begun to cut another sleeve.
“You’ve heard the woman has departed the village?” Gyda asked. “Were you planning on waiting until she returned on another school break?”
“Goodness, no. Now that I am finished, I am to send the suit on to the address she left me. To the school where she teaches, in Chiswick.”
Gyda let out a whoop of relief and triumph. “At last! Now we are getting somewhere!”
The tailor stared, dazzled at her transformation from dour impatience.
“My dear Mr. Hartford,” Gyda said expansively, “we desperately need to see this woman, and quickly. We will be happy to pay in full for her order, in exchange for that address.”
“Oh, I don’t know…”
“We will deliver it ourselves and save you the cost of delivery as well.”
