by Lisa Tuttle
Mr. Jesperson looked sour. “A gold ring, would, I suppose, be more informative?”
“Much!”
“Or a diamond-studded bracelet?”
Her eyes glittered. She smiled and kissed the tips of her fingers. “But you no geeve me anyting like dat. Only dat book and now cards.”
“I did tell you,” said Gabrielle with a reproachful look. “She has done the best she can with inferior materials.” She leaned over and gave Fiorella a warm hug. “You’ve done very well, my dear! Very well, indeed. I’m not sure Mr. Jesperson appreciates how hard it is. Just fancy, all those questions, to a pack of cards! We know she is alive—that is very good. But how can we find her? Please, darling, will you try again? Ask the cards. For the sake of poor, dear Miss Jessop, who never could afford any jewelry. I know you want to help the poor lady. Just think, Fiorella—if it had been you.”
The gentle, coaxing words stirred some sort of fellow feeling. Fiorella’s expression changed, and she stood up, clutching the pack of cards to her bosom.
“Maybe another way. I try read cards like that poor lady. Maybe we learn more.”
She made her way to the plain deal table at the far end of the room. This was used for dining and for work, and now it offered an uncluttered surface upon which the cards could be laid out.
Mr. Jesperson fetched a cushion and adjusted her chair. Signora Gallo bent her head and brought the deck close to her lips as if praying to them before she began.
Riffling through quickly, she removed one card—“La Papessa”—which she put down first. This card showed a nunlike woman in a voluminous blue robe and headdress, her face veiled, seated on a throne. Next, Fiorella shuffled the cards and cut the deck three times in one direction, three more times the other way, then instructed Gabrielle to make three more cuts and draw three cards at random.
These cards showed, in order, a skull-faced character riding a white horse, a tower struck by lightning, and finally a man in a pointed red cap, wand in one hand and a disk in the other, standing behind a small table on which were displayed a variety of trinkets.
Looking up, Signora Gallo held out her hand. Mr. Jesperson understood the gesture and took a small coin from his pocket. He used it to sketch a cross above, then dropped it into her palm.
For a moment I thought she’d object—it was only a thr’penny bit—but she closed her hand upon the small coin, accepting this token wage.
Stroking La Papessa with one finger, she informed us that it represented Hilda Jessop. The next card indicated her recent past, when she had been carried away out of her life. Hilda had not suffered an actual, bodily death as her friends feared—yet it was a profound change in her circumstances that might yet lead to death, for the tower struck by lightning was a perilous place, filled with flames, and if she could not escape, she would most certainly perish. The third card represented the possibility of a future in this world. This was the Juggler, representing cleverness, skill, and subtlety. These, rather than brute force, were the qualities that might set the prisoner free.
“And I sink,” said Signora Gallo heavily, “she cannot free herself. One man put her in there, and another one must bring her out. I sink dis one”—she tapped her finger on the Juggler card—“I sink he is you.” On the last word she looked up at Mr. Jesperson.
He sketched an ironic bow. “I should feel more confident if I had some clue as to where this flaming tower actually is.”
“You must find the clues,” she replied swiftly. “You are a detective, no? Is what detectives do.”
“The cards can’t tell you the name of the skeletal chap on the horse who put her in that blasted tower, I suppose.”
“The cards don’t work like that,” Gabrielle chided. “They tell a story, but we have to work out its meaning for ourselves.”
“I could have made up a similar story without the aid of those garish little pictures. An unknown villain is behind the disappearance of Miss Jessop. If she is not dead, she must be confined. If she is not rescued, she must die. And as no one else is looking for her, there is no one but me to play the part of the juggling fool.” His voice and manner were chilly.
Gabrielle tried to win him back. “You must not blame the cards or their interpreter. We are all trying to find Hilda.”
Signora Gallo abruptly pushed back her chair and stood up. “We go now.”
“Oh—” Conflicting emotions did battle on Gabrielle’s face. I knew very well that she was not ready to leave us, but neither did she want to risk a quarrel with her protégée. She could not afford to lose Signora Gallo to the dangers and temptations of London, so she must follow. “If we must…But you will let us know if there’s anything more we can do?”
When they had gone, Mr. Jesperson went to invite his mother to bring a fresh pot of tea to the front room, where he shared out the parcels of pastries, and we enjoyed a second breakfast.
“Enjoy, for this will be the last,” he said in doom-laden tones.
I looked up sharply. “Do not say that Cook thinks you are now quite fat enough?”
“To serve at a cannibal feast? Certainly not. I meant only that I shall be spending no more nights on guard duty to Mr. C.”
“Why not?”
He gave me a look of reproach. “Do you need to ask? Now that we know the significant factor is a telephone call, and since I have tested the possibility that Mr. Creevey might walk again the next night if his attempt were foiled on the first—we must wait for the next telephone call. That there will be another is, I think, certain, and it will be soon.
“I was late returning this morning because I was making arrangements with Creevey’s wife and his office boy that they are to let me know the very moment he receives another ‘wrong number’ via the telephone. When that happens, I will be waiting outside the house, ready to follow.”
Some time after this discussion, the second post arrived, with a letter addressed to me in an unknown hand. The letter was written in French and signed Nadezhda V. Chase.
She sent her apologies that her health had prevented her from making an appearance last night and begged me to gratify her with my company at my earliest possible convenience. She was accustomed to receiving visitors at Lord Bennington’s house, in the small drawing room, where we could be quite private, from half past ten in the morning until one o’clock, and begged me to come very soon—tomorrow, or the next day.
“Not bad news, I hope?”
I looked up from the page to find Mr. Jesperson gazing at me with some concern. “No, not at all,” I said. “If I frowned, it was from the strain of reading a language not my own.” I took a deep breath, trying to settle my nerves. “It is from the wife of Mr. Chase. She has the curious desire to meet me—and as soon as possible.”
“What is so curious about that?”
I looked down at the letter without seeing it. My cheeks felt unpleasantly warm. What had Mr. Chase said to make his wife so eager to meet me? She had wasted no time in sending this far from casual invitation. She must have written it late last night or early this morning and posted it immediately. I had not told Mr. Jesperson about Mr. Chase’s unpleasantly intense interest in me at the dining table. Indeed, I had not shared any of my personal, embarrassing feelings from the previous night, preferring to discuss the things we had seen together in a more intellectual and theoretical way, and I still felt disinclined to lower the tone. Mr. Chase’s interest was not something I had invited or wished to encourage; even speaking about it to someone else might make it seem more important than it was. If he had mentioned me to his wife in a way that made her jealous…The idea that I could be the cause of a wife’s jealousy or distress was as uncomfortable as it was unaccustomed; but if that should prove to be the case, I would deal with it. I should be able to make her understand she had nothing to fear from me.
Mr. Jesperson was still waiting for my reply. I looked back up at him and attempted a casual shrug. “Of course, she may wish to make more acquaintances in London; why
not start with me? But there can be no urgency about our meeting. I simply cannot think why she should summon me like this.”
“Perhaps she finds herself in need of a detective.”
His words lifted my concern. All at once, I had a new way of interpreting her letter, and, no longer dreading an uncomfortable encounter, I became eager to meet Mrs. Chase.
Chapter 16
Tête-à-Tête in Belgrave Square
I set off the next morning more curious than nervous about my impending meeting with the Russian princess. It had been foolish of me to imagine that anything Mr. Chase said to her about me could have aroused any feelings of jealousy or suspicion in her breast. She might simply be curious to meet a female detective, but the emphasis on speed in her letter made me anticipate a mystery to be solved.
The fog had cleared away, and as it was neither raining nor snowing, I found the cold bracing and enjoyed my walk through the busy streets. It seemed no time at all before I was once again standing outside the house in Belgrave Square, then ringing the bell, and then admitted by the same superior butler.
“Good morning, Miss Lane,” he murmured. “Mrs. Chase is expecting you in the small drawing room. Please allow me…”
We went through corridors to a drawing room that could only be described as “small” by comparison with the very large one in which the séance had been held. It had a huge marble fireplace, thick Turkish carpets, large windows decked with heavy draperies, several sofas, numerous chairs and tables, bookcases and writing desks, floor vases with dried flowers and ostrich plumes, sculptures, and other ornaments and furniture in such an array it was quite bewildering. I would hardly have known where to look, or in which direction to turn, if not for the guidance of the voice that thanked the butler and welcomed me from a corner of the lavishly furnished room.
Mrs. Chase—for so I guessed the semi-recumbent figure must be—wore a yellowish-green gown that clashed slightly with the blue-green velvet of the chaise longue on which she reclined. She did not rise, only beckoned to me to come nearer, and then, patting the cushion, to sit beside her.
She was a small woman, her skin pale and fine as porcelain, her golden hair in old-fashioned yet undeniably becoming ringlets, all of which combined to give her a doll-like appearance, but I did not understand how Lady Florence could call her “a child,” for she looked to my eye nearer thirty than twenty. Of course, illness can be aging. And when I came closer, I found something sharp and suspicious in the way she watched me, something very far from childlike.
Although my spoken French was rusty, the old formulae of politesse flowed readily enough; I was able to assure her that meeting her was an even greater pleasure for me, to express my concern for her health and hope that she was better, and so on, and it was easy, too, to understand her equally formulaic replies.
It was only when that business was past, and I had paused, waiting for her to raise the next topic of conversation, that I suddenly realized we were not alone in the room.
Mr. Chase stood motionless near the window, his olive-green suit blending into the eau-de-nil curtains. When he saw that I had noticed him he stepped forward with a strange smile on his bland, round face.
“Good morning, Miss Lane. How nice to see you again. I am pleased you were able to answer my wife’s invitation so swiftly. She appreciates your interest. It will be good for her to have a friend in London.”
I found his gaze as disconcerting and as intimate as before, but this time it was easier to look away, as I returned my attention to his wife.
“It will be my pleasure to call you my friend, but I’m sure you don’t lack for company here. Although he is widowed, Lord Bennington entertains widely, and of course his sister-in-law—Lady Florence—you’ve met her, I know—surely she has—”
I stopped, guessing from her blank expression that she had not understood a word, and tried to say the same thing again in French. But I was flustered; I stumbled and groped for the right phrases while she gazed at me in silence.
“Relax,” murmured Mr. Chase, disturbingly close to my ear. “Relax, and trust me. I will not interrupt your tête-à-tête—I can make it possible. Remember, I am a medium, a channel, a conduit. The spirits speak through me, and so can you. My wife is happy to do so; you must agree. It will be much easier if you let me be your translator.”
He moved to stand at the back of the chaise longue, placing himself between us as if he were a living telephone with magical abilities, and if I spoke into one ear in English, and Mrs. Chase into the other in French, our words would come out of his mouth in a way we both could understand.
I would have to trust him to translate accurately—and I did not trust him, and yet…it was somehow impossible to refuse. It would be an insult to him and his wife if I asked him to leave us alone together, but as long as he stood between us I might never know her real reason for summoning me. Perhaps she had a secret to confide, something only a detective might help her with?
Somehow, I must get through this awkward visit. At least my understanding of French was better than my ability to make conversation; if I noticed him taking liberties when he translated, I would call him on it at once; he might pretend to be offended, but he would have to explain himself.
In the meanwhile, I thought my best course of action was to accept his presence without allowing it to inhibit me; I would try to pretend he was no more than a mechanical translating machine, an object like a telephone, and I would speak to Mrs. Chase about whatever I chose. What did I have to lose? She might tell me what he had not.
I began, prosaically enough, by asking her how she found London. She said she had scarcely seen anything of it; everyone had been extremely kind, but since their arrival more than six weeks ago, ill health had kept her largely confined to the house. This was not new; she had been born with a weak constitution.
This was my cue to inquire about her illness, causes, treatments, whatever, but after a brief expression of sympathy I stuck to my plan, regardless of how bizarre it might seem, and asked how their servants liked life in this city.
Our translator’s gaze flickered with surprise, but he managed my question smoothly enough.
Widening her eyes, she murmured that she did not understand.
“It is not difficult,” I responded. “You have a maid, I suppose?”
“Bien sûr.”
“And your husband—a manservant?”
“Oui, Pyotr, mais…”
“They are Russian, non?”
“Non,” she said firmly. Then she shook her head, admitting that her husband’s man, Pyotr, was certainly Russian, but her own maid was a sweet, intelligent girl from Normandy—and, she added, she was baffled by the interest I took in this matter.
I claimed that, in addition to my work as a detective, I also wrote articles for magazines, and said I was currently working on something about “the servant question” for that excellent journal The Lady. Before Mr. Chase had time to translate this little fabrication, I added swiftly, “D’ou vient votre cuisinier vivre?”
Mr. Chase forgot his rule of non-engagement long enough to stare at me and ask, “Did you really mean to say ‘Where does your cook live?’ ”
I set my jaw stubbornly. “But of course.”
Mrs. Chase giggled. Then she said, her French so slow and distinct that I could not fail to understand: “We have no cook. Lord Bennington’s cook is an Englishwoman—and I suppose she lives somewhere upstairs—or perhaps in a room adjoining the kitchen—I do not know; I have not inquired. Why should I? Why do you think we have our own cook, when we are living here as the guests of Lord Bennington?”
I felt almost as a big a fool as she must have thought me. “I do beg your pardon, madame,” I said softly. “I hope you did not find my question insolent. I admit, it sounds absurd, but…I am afraid I have been listening to gossip. I was led to believe that due to your husband’s special dietary regime and your own illness, you traveled with your own retinue of servants, includi
ng a cook.” At the last moment I decided not to mention the part about the separate house required by these imaginary servants.
She laughed and, shaking her head, wondered where such an idea could have come from! She had a maid—but so did most ladies, n’est-ce-pas? Her husband’s manservant was in reality an old family retainer; he had no skills as a valet, but it had been an act of charity to take him on, to give him a place to live. Had I not seen the Cossack for myself, I might have imagined she spoke of some doddering relic.
Eager to change the subject, I reverted to her health. Perhaps she would find a specialist in London who would be able to suggest a cure?
She sighed and shook her head. There could be no cure; it was not so much an illness that plagued her as a constitutional weakness. She had her good days—like today—and her bad ones. Her heart was not strong. She had been advised not to tax it, to rest, lead a quiet existence, and not to overexert herself.
“But what sort of life is that? I want to live—I must live until my heart gives out. Then I shall die. I had rather die young, doing what I want to do—with the man I love—knowing I am alive—than to live like a solitary little mouse wrapped in cotton wool, afraid to run, afraid to squeak, only for the sake of a few more years, to die in that nest, worn out at the age of forty instead of burnt out gloriously at thirty.”
I was moved by her emotion—it was strange and not very pleasant to hear her fluent, passionate French words turned into English by the flat American monotone clinging to her like an aural shadow. I found myself feeling more sympathetic, now that I understood her situation. Perhaps we could be friends, after all.
But there were so many more interesting things to talk about, she went on; she did not wish to dwell on her physical health; sometimes it seemed to her that was all she ever talked about, and it was really so dull. She would rather hear about things that happened beyond her limited horizon—beyond the walls of this house, splendid though it was. Wouldn’t I tell her something about my experiences as a lady detective? It must be so exciting! Was it dangerous? She could scarcely imagine. What case was I working on now?
