The Willing Game

by Issy Brooke

  “Was it a success?” he asked, and recoiled as she pushed the bundled sheet at him. “By God – that stinks!”

  “Yes. Are you riding in the cab with me?”

  He glared at her. “With that? You know that I will not. Now remember our bargain. I have aided you, and you must now help me. You have my address. Let us attend a dinner party together, soon, at Woodfurlong, and then we will proceed.”

  “We are basically to show the world that we are courting lovers?”

  He shrugged. “I think it’s for the best. If I do not hear from you within a week, I shall call on you most publically. You will not like the scene that I create. We are partners, remember?”

  She leaped into a cab and did not bother to reply. As they drove away, she realised, with a slight pang of guilt, that she hadn’t actually thanked him for his help.

  Thirteen

  “Father?”

  Russell Starr was reclining in a darkened room. Dusk was coming early to his quarters. The curtains were drawn almost fully, letting in only a half-foot of bright light that made a searing vertical line in the otherwise gloomy room. He muttered something which she decided was probably “Come in, dear daughter” but could just as easily been a raving about sparrows and their evil ways.

  “Are you well today, father?” she asked in a low voice.

  “I am not dead, which is as good as it gets, these days.”

  “Does the light still hurt your eyes?”

  “Like knives, Marianne. Like the sharp bitterness of my erstwhile colleagues. Like the professional jealousy of a man of letters.”

  “You seem quite lucid.”

  “I am always lucid. I always speak sense, but sometimes the world is not ready to hear sense. But I am always most perfectly lucid.”

  She took a seat on a padded chair near to his chaise longue. “You’re not,” she said. “Two days ago you were trying to look at the moon through a microscope.”

  “What of it? Maybe I saw it, too. Not the moon. Perhaps a moon. Like the ghost of a flea.”

  “Don’t read Blake, father. You know he will give you nightmares.”

  “Are you come here to lecture me?”

  “No. Actually, I would like your help.”

  He sighed. It became a long and protracted exhale. It went on for so long that she half expected him to deflate and become nothing but a pile of clothes. Eventually he dragged in a fresh breath and said, “Go on.”

  “There is an awful lot of explanation that I ought to give you, to explain how I have got to this point...”

  “Do I need to hear it to answer your immediate questions?”

  “No.”

  “Then leave it. Life is short. I should not wish to die before you get to the important points.”

  “A man has died, and I would like to know how it happened.”

  “It was the will of God. Next question.”

  “Father! No, listen. You are an avowed disbeliever anyway. He was poisoned, I am sure of it. I went to see him – oh, it’s complicated, I shan’t say how – and he had stomach ache, and nausea. He was racked by pain, in truth. There was a strong smell in the air –”

  “Almonds?” he asked. “You would know what that means.”

  “No, it was garlic.”

  “Hmm. Curious. Interesting. Go on.”

  “And the next day, he was dead.”

  “More details. Come on, girl. Were you trained for nothing?”

  She had been trained mostly in electricity and its wondrous properties, not chemistry, but she didn’t argue. “His stomach was distended and his skin yellowish. His eyes were yellow-brown where they should have been white. I took a sheet from his room, which I have left outside in the corridor, as it smells most vile.”

  “Anything else?” he said. He began to stand up, unsteadily, and she went to his side. “Come, fetch that sheet and let us take it to the laboratory. Is there blood on it?”

  “Blood at the very least, yes.”

  “Excellent.”

  The laboratory was in a perpetual state of readiness. Half a dozen experiments were in progress, or forgotten and abandoned, making the place rather dangerous to the unwary. They spread the stained sheet across one of the polished benches. Marianne could not help grimacing at the smell. Russell merely sniffed once and said, “Yes, garlic.”

  They looked at the sheet. There was a crusting of various things, and the blood had run for some way. “Was he bleeding heavily?” he asked.

  “No,” she said.

  “Look at these patterns,” he said. “Either he had been injured, maybe stabbed, or the blood that did flow from him carried on flowing.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I am trying to say that the blood was not clotting as it ought to have done.” Russell leaned on the bench and tapped his fingers on the surface. “Garlic. Blood flowing, not coagulating. Distended stomach – liver? Yellow skin. Yes. Liver. Stomach cramps. Did you look at his stools?”

  It felt like a horrible thing to admit to. “Yes. It was strange, but I had a fancy that they ...”

  “They glowed,” Russell said, and he smiled, for the first time in many weeks.

  “Yes! How on earth did you know?”

  “It is the garlic. He was definitely poisoned, this poor friend of yours. White or yellow phosphorus, I should say. If I could have access to his body, I should be able to confirm it.”

  “No, that’s impossible. We have enough evidence here, though.”

  “Not for a conviction.”

  “Maybe not yet.” Marianne pulled up a stool and sat down. “Who uses phosphorus?”

  “Match manufacturers,” Russell said. “Those poor girls – their jaws fall off.”

  “Not so much these days, father. But there is another group of people who use phosphorus,” Marianne said. “And they are the bane of my life ... and my livelihood.”

  MARIANNE COULD NOT get Phoebe alone that evening. They had a few of Price’s friends over for dinner, and they monopolised the drawing room afterwards, leaving Marianne no chance to get to her cousin. The next morning, she hastily grabbed Phoebe as they went into the breakfast room. Price was waiting, impatiently. Marianne pressed Phoebe against the wall. “We must have a dinner party soon where I can invite Jack Monahan,” she said.

  “Oh my goodness! Why? Oh, do not say that you have fallen for him. We spoke about this, Marianne!”

  “Fear not. But listen, I know how George Bartholomew died – he was poisoned by phosphorus. And in getting this knowledge, I made a promise.”

  “Ladies, please,” Price called from the dining room. “I wish to eat.”

  “Marianne! Tell me all.”

  “I will find you later.” They scurried into the room and Phoebe soothed the grumbling Price.

  But halfway through breakfast, Phoebe was called to a crisis in the nursery, and Marianne ate quickly to escape the disapproving and silent glare of Price. Rather than hunt for Phoebe, Marianne left the house and made her way quickly into town, and to see her friend Simeon. She told him everything that had happened recently, and asked for his advice.

  “I need to find out more about Edgar Bartholomew,” she said. “He is my main suspect and my main concern. You said you would help; I think the idea of breaking into rooms next to his séances will not work. I have considered it, but there is too much risk. You were right. But I had another idea. There must be clubs where he would be known, don’t you think? If he is not at home, he must be somewhere. Sometimes he is at the houses of mediums but at other times, he is a man of society – he must go somewhere, surely?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Would you be able to gain access to them? These clubs? Dining rooms? Coffee shops, even?”

  “Not the exclusive ones, no. Yes, I can get into coffee shops, but that is all. You know that I cannot move in the right circles.”

  “But could you ask around?” she begged. “I would not ask if I had other options.” She was scraping the barrel. S
he had known all along that Simeon would not get into the higher clubs, but surely someone would know someone who knew someone. That was how it worked, was it not? Among men? Even she had her own club now.

  “Marianne, you have evidence now – so you must take this to the police.”

  “I intend to, this very day. I am asking you to help me because I think it is linked to what George asked me to look into. Please, Simeon.”

  “I am so busy,” he said. Then with a sigh, “Yes, I will try. But you must promise to go to the authorities.” He sank into silence for a moment, before suddenly declaring, “You know, I am delighted that my instruction in lock-picking had paid off at last. I shall make a magician’s assistant of you yet.”

  “What has happened to your last one?”

  “She objected to my manner. I don’t know what she meant. What is wrong with my manner?”

  “We’ve spoken about this. You don’t meet people’s expectations of a flamboyant showman.”

  “No, because the magic should speak for itself.”

  “People want to be entertained, not educated.”

  “Well, they are wrong,” Simeon snapped. “People simply don’t know what is best for them.”

  “You look tired,” she said, and went to make a cup of tea.

  “You mean, I am grumpy,” he said. “Of course I am tired. I have been on the trail of the men who have stolen from me, all night in fact.”

  “Oh, Simeon. Not this again.”

  “It simply won’t do, Marianne. I cannot continue like this. I am a good magician, am I not?” he added imploringly.

  “Of course you are! Dear Simeon. You are marvellous.” She brought him the hot drink and sat down, leaning forward to gather his hands in her own. “But I cannot fill your head with empty platitudes just to make you feel better...”

  “Why not?”

  “Don’t pout, it is unbecoming. No, if I lie to you, it will do you no good. Your act is brilliant magic, Simeon, but poor showmanship. People want spectacle and drama. Even, dare I say it, moments of laughter.”

  “Laughter? I will not have them laugh at me.”

  “Not at you. With you. At your wit and splendour.”

  “I do try. I wear greasepaint though it makes me itch. Marianne, will you help me?”

  “I will do anything.”

  “Will you be my assistant and devise a new routine with me?”

  She nearly broke his hand in shock and horror. “I cannot! Oh – but I am honoured that you ask me. But you know that I am busy, with my business and my father too. And even if I were not, I have no show experience at all.”

  “Yet you advise me as if you have.”

  “No, I am speaking as a member of the audience. You need an experienced assistant who has worked with others. Like Nellie.”

  “Nellie who has left me because of my manner?” He snorted with derision and got up. “Look at all this! All this! For what? For others to steal from me, and for my closest friends to tell me that I need to be laughed at.”

  He stamped around, picking things up and discarding them, occasionally running his hand through his hair, and growling at everything. He was like a demented spider, skittering from corner to edge to table to chair, full of pent-up frustration.

  “You need sleep,” she said. She got up to leave. “I’ll come by again, soon, when you’re rested, and I will help.”

  He turned to her as if he were going to beg her to stay, but she didn’t have time, and when he saw her face, he knew it, and kept silent.

  SHE KEPT HER WORD, and she went to the same police station that had dealt with George Bartholomew’s death. She boldly went into the wood-panelled room to speak to someone, hoping that she might see the same policeman that she had met before. The desk officer was an elderly man with a bald head and grey whiskers, and he got up from his stool with difficulty. His eyes were kind and he spoke softly.

  “I would like to report some suspicions around the death of George Bartholomew – do you know if Sergeant Giles is available?”

  “He is not, miss, but if you will give me all the details, I shall be sure to pass them on.” He spoke in a friendly way and it put her at her ease.

  “Very well. I am Miss Marianne Starr and I discovered the body. My father is Russell Starr.” She paused but the policeman gave no hint that he recognised the name, and unless his hobby was chemistry, there was no reason why he should. “Due to the circumstances around the man’s death, we believed that he had not died accidentally. Upon closer inspection, we have determined that he is likely to have died of the ingestion of white phosphorus – and not by his own hand.”

  The policeman wrote it all down and then tapped his pen nib on the paper. “Upon closer inspection,” he said. “Can you expand on that? When, and what did you do?”

  “It was simply that when I found the body,” she said, “there was a strong odour of garlic in the room. When I had seen him previously, he had complained of stomach pains and sickness. His belly was distended and his ... his ... his stools glowed in the dark.”

  The policeman snorted and then swallowed his laugh hastily. He laid the pen on the desk. “Thank you, miss. I shall be sure to pass these on to the relevant authorities.”

  “Please do. There needs to be a proper autopsy and now they know what to look for.”

  “Indeed. Thank you, and good day.”

  “Do you want my address? You can contact me or my father for further information.”

  “Thank you. We have everything we need. Good day.”

  “And you’ll investigate this further?”

  “Of course. Good day.”

  “Someone killed him!”

  “Indeed, indeed. Good day miss.” He started to inch his way around the counter as if he intended on propelling her out of the door.

  She turned and huffed out of there.

  It was very clear that the paper he had written on would be nothing more than kindling for a fire before the day was out.

  MARIANNE WALKED AIMLESSLY for a while through the ever-crowded streets, wanting to kick at things. She wove her way into the fashionable West End, where theatres and opera-houses and galleries all vied with more and more eating places. Women were enjoying a freedom that was unknown to their grandmothers, and they were making the very most of it. The exploding class of merchants and middle classes led to wealthier wives, and they had to fill their days with something: culture, art, shopping, gossiping, visiting, eating, and walking around so that other people could see them. As Marianne found herself shoved against a shop window by the passing of a family of daughters, towed along by a stout matriarchal figure, she felt a pang of loneliness. She missed Newnham College. The atmosphere there had been lively, yes, but studiously so.

  It was true that many of the women who attended the university were simply rich daughters who were filling their time before marriage. Not everyone took their studies as seriously as Marianne had done. But the overriding impression was one of eagerness to seize the new opportunities and make the most of every moment.

  The family had passed by now, but Marianne remained where she was. Simeon was too busy to help her. Phoebe was likewise pulled this way and that by her domestic duties, with the added restrictions of her position in society. She was expected to be at home at certain times, and to repay the visits at other times. She had to show her face at charitable events, and become a patron of worthy causes. She didn’t attend church or help out there, not half as much as she ought to have done. And now the police had shown themselves to be stupendously unconcerned.

  So Marianne was on her own.

  I can do this, she told herself sternly. She drew herself upright and turned around. She would not linger any longer in the showy part of town. She had investigations to make.

  Fourteen

  George Bartholomew had told her that he had a man in the city that acted for him – a man that Marianne could trust. She had his name and address on the wavy-edged card, and found him easily in a
busy part of town. Mr Harcourt occupied a rich set of offices in a building shared by other solicitors, lawyers and agents. She was shown into a pleasant waiting room of polished wood and brass, and brought tea until Mr Harcourt was available to talk to her.

  But he could not tell her much that she did not already know.

  He expressed all the usual sympathies about his client’s death, and assured her that he was aware of her role, and that there was a significant sum of money set aside for her, should she be successful.

  “And what do you think of Mr Bartholomew’s claim?” she asked the yellow-toned man.

  “I am afraid that I cannot comment on that matter.”

  “Professionally? Or because you simply don’t know?”

  He opened his hands and ducked his head to one side. It was a complete non-answer. She said, doggedly, “Had you met Mr Bartholomew often?”

  “Twice only. We were not of a long acquaintance. But he seemed trustworthy enough.”

  The solicitor’s manner was far cooler than she had expected. She had thought to find an old family retainer of many generations’ standing. “Do you think his death was suspicious?”

  “It was deeply unfortunate.”

  Again, a non-answer. He was either guiltily tied up in things, or he was simply an infuriating boor who liked to control situations just for the sake of exercising power.

  “What do you know of his situation at his company?”

  “Bow Imports, as you know, is a global trading concern and he was one of their overseas agents. That is all.”

  She blinked. “What?”

  He repeated himself slowly but she had heard him perfectly well; she simply hadn’t understood what he meant. Bow Imports. “Where is their office?” she asked.

  He wrote out an address on a slip of letter-headed paper. “Here,” he said, and handed it over. “Please wait; there is one more thing.”