Page 15 of The Secrets of Lord Grayson Child
Baines glared at Perkins, who had the sense to look cowed.
“Right.” Baines turned back to Izzy and Gray. After a second of inner debate, Baines bowed to her. “My apologies, Mrs. Molyneaux. Obviously, someone could have come in from the lane—”
“Or,” Gray interjected, “Quimby could have brought a friend or acquaintance with him.”
Baines looked like he’d just sucked a lemon, but inclined his head and went on, “And whoever killed Quimby could have left by the back door, unseen and undetected, as well.”
Izzy was not happy that Perkins was still hovering. Although she didn’t look directly at him, she was aware his beady eyes remained locked on her.
Baines drew in a breath, then let it out. “Let’s see if we can’t get straight in our heads exactly what happened with the pair of you and Quimby this evening.” He looked at Gray. “You said you arrived here at five o’clock?”
Gray nodded. “The bells pealed, and in less than a minute, the door opened, and the staff streamed out. I saw them walk down the street as I approached. They were walking past the third property along when I opened the door.”
Baines looked at her, then back at Gray. “Was this an arranged meeting?”
She left it to Gray to say, “No. I wished to discuss an upcoming article with Mrs. Molyneaux and wanted to catch her at a time when we might talk with some degree of privacy. She appeared to be the only one about when I arrived, but if Quimby had been in the darkroom, I wouldn’t have noticed.”
“If Quimby arrived before the other staff left, they would know.” Izzy gestured toward the workshop. “You’ve seen the place. There’s no chance he could have entered via the back door and reached the darkroom without someone noticing him. They all knew him.”
Baines focused on her. “Where were you when the staff left?”
She waved at her desk. “Here, reconciling the accounts for the past week.”
Baines noted the clutter on her desk. “Right, then. What happened when his lordship came through the front door?”
“Well, the bell tinkled, and from my chair behind the desk”—she tipped her head that way—“I couldn’t see who had walked in, so I got up and went to the doorway to find out. I expected to see one of the staff who had forgotten something.”
“But instead,” Baines said, “it was his lordship.”
Izzy’s wariness increased, but she nodded. “Indeed.”
Baines was looking shrewdly from Gray to her. “But that wasn’t the first time you’d met.”
A guess, no doubt fed by observation; she and Gray hadn’t been acting like complete strangers who had only just met. “His lordship and I are acquainted, but we haven’t seen or spoken to each other for…” She glanced at Gray and arched her brows. “It must be close to ten years.”
He nodded. “Almost a decade.”
Baines glanced at Littlejohn to confirm he was jotting that down, then returned his gaze to her and Gray. “So what happened then?”
“After the usual greetings, we came in here. I sat behind the desk, and Lord Child sat where I am now, and we discussed the article he’d come to see me about.”
Baines glanced toward the workshop. “Did you close the office door?”
Both she and Gray shook their heads. “No,” Gray stated. “It remained open throughout the time we were in here.”
“I shut it when we left,” she said, “but before that, it was as it is now.”
“And,” Baines continued, “you both remained here, together, until you decided to leave?”
Again, they nodded.
“So what happened when you ended your meeting?” Littlejohn asked.
“I put on my coat and bonnet”—she gestured to the black bonnet sitting on the desk—“then we went out into the foyer. I shut the office door and, as I always do, glanced one last time down the workshop. That was when I noticed the darkroom sign was set to Occupied, and that meant Quimby was in there.” She paused, then went on, “Quimby was obsessive about that sign. He never left it up if he wasn’t in the darkroom, because he’d drummed it into everyone’s head that if the signwasup, then he was definitely in there working with his negatives and on no account was anyone to open the door, much less go in.” She glanced at both policemen. “If light fell on his negatives at the wrong time, they would be ruined.”
Littlejohn grunted. “I’ve heard about that.” He glanced at Baines, then at Perkins, still hovering by the door. “Perkins said you told him Quimby often worked late. So what made you go and check on him if him being there wasn’t unusual and he had his own key to the back door?”
She sighed and repeated what she’d earlier told Perkins.
