A Conspiracy in Belgravia

by Sherry Thomas

  Once inside Mr. Finch’s room, she would discover everything she needed to know.

  She led the way up to the first floor. The darkness smelled of linseed oil and beeswax, reassuringly domestic. The carpet in the passage muffled their footsteps. An almost imperceptible glow emanated from the high window at the far end of the passage, light from the streetlamps that had somehow managed to penetrate the fog.

  By Mr. Finch’s name plaque they stood and listened, Mr. Lawson with his ear against the door. When he was satisfied, Charlotte let some light out from the pocket lantern she was holding. Mr. Lawson unrolled his pouch of tools and got to work.

  One floor up someone was tapping slowly on a typewriter. From time to time the house creaked, shrinking in the coolness of the night. And twice there came the unmistakable whistle of a distant train.

  But it was quiet enough that the tiny flame inside the pocket lantern seemed to whoosh and crackle like a bonfire. Mr. Lawson’s breaths, through a slightly blocked nose, brought to mind the wolf huffing and puffing at the third little pig’s house. And his lock-picking implements, which had sounded so soft and gentle in the beginning, now made Charlotte think of her walking stick clashing against Mrs. Watson’s.

  Mr. Lawson stood up, almost colliding with Charlotte. In the dim light cast by the pocket lantern, his face was tense.

  What’s the matter? she mouthed.

  He put his ear to the door. She did likewise, her fingertips tingling, her heart beating fast.

  Silence, deep, wide silence. Clack, clack, clack—but that was only the typewriter, still being used. Wait. Was that a footstep? There it was again, closer.

  A succession of quick clicks—the unmistakable sound of a revolver cocking.

  She and Mr. Lawson looked at each other—and ran.

  Fourteen

  THURSDAY

  “This is unacceptable. Completely unacceptable,” said Charlotte, with an extra sniff for emphasis.

  She was back at Mrs. Woods’s, this time in the parlor, in a gold-and-scarlet visiting gown that Livia, whose sensibility was better suited to classical Greece, had variously deemed “dire,” “ghastly,” and “absolutely tasteless.” Charlotte hadn’t thought much of what else the gown could accomplish—her eyes were simply drawn to things that Livia considered “absolutely tasteless.” But as it turned out, such an ensemble was perfect for intimidating the Mrs. Woodses of the world, its ostentation translating into stature and authority.

  The landlady, who no doubt had hoped not to see “Mrs. Cumberland” again for a millennium or so, was all but wringing her hands. “I beg your pardon, ma’am, but exactly what is unacceptable?”

  “Any number of things, Mrs. Woods, any number. Of course you are not solely to blame for them—my brother is a grown man, after all. But I am deeply disappointed nonetheless. I had expected better of this establishment.”

  “Ma’am, please, if you will only let me—”

  “Oh, yes, I will let you know. I visited my brother’s firm day before yesterday. He submitted his resignation two months ago—they have no idea where he is. Now this is not your doing. But I also visited the other two references you furnished. The landlady in Oxfordshire has never heard of him. And the solicitor retired six months ago. Did you not check either of those references?”

  Mrs. Woods’s mouth opened and closed, opened and closed. No doubt in dismay, to be caught at being less than thorough in her selection process. Also, astonishment, at being blamed for Mr. Finch’s less-than-laudable conduct.

  But this was how Henrietta derived a large part of her dominance, because those she accused of various shortcomings were often too rattled to defend themselves—and too polite to tell her that she was being an unfair arse.

  “I . . . um . . . It must have been a very busy week when Mr. Finch applied for a place. And you must understand, Mrs. Cumberland, he’s a most winsome young man. I never imagined that—”

  “That is what references are for, Mrs. Woods, so that we are not so easily guided by mistaken impressions. I am further disturbed to find out, upon inquiring about your place, that according to some sources, you allow overnight female guests. What kind of lassitude is that? Do you uphold no standards here? Is that what my brother has been doing, entertaining women in his rooms instead of going to work, as he properly ought?”

  Mrs. Woods’s horror was complete. “Certainly not! These are baseless rumors. I am a Christian woman running a most respectable establishment for Christian men.”

  “Then let me see his rooms,” said Charlotte with a severity she did not need to manufacture. “Let me see for myself that it is not crawling with disreputable females.”

  Mrs. Woods shot up the stairs with the speed of a racing greyhound. As Charlotte followed in her wake, she reflected rather grimly that this was what she ought to have done in the first place. Why break the law when all she needed was to cast a few aspersions?

  Thankfully, nothing had happened the night before. She and Mr. Lawson had sprinted down to the basement, out the service door, and into the waiting carriage. Mr. Mears, witnessing their flight, had needed no urging to get the coach moving. And the fog, which had offered concealment when Mr. Lawson had worked on the service door, had quickly obscured them from potential pursuers.

  But Mr. Lawson had been sincerely frightened. Charlotte had been sorry to be the cause. And this morning it had taken rather a lot of convincing for Mrs. Watson to let Charlotte out of her sight.

  Mrs. Woods stopped before Mr. Finch’s door and knocked.

  “I thought you said he’s out of town.”

  “Oh, he is. It’s a habit, ma’am. I always knock. I don’t wish to walk in on my gentlemen without warning and I’m sure they don’t wish it any more than I do.”

  The door opened to a largish sitting room, furnished with oriental motifs that would have been the height of fashion when the regent had been the first gentleman of Europe. There was a smaller room that seemed to serve as a study, with a blank notebook sitting on top of a desk.

  Mrs. Woods threw open the bedroom door with great drama. “See, no women here at all!”

  She proceeded to show Charlotte the attached private bath with the same trembling energy. Charlotte pushed her lips to one side, as if saying, Very well, but I remain skeptical in the greater scheme of things.

  What she truly wanted was to have a look at the photographs. At last Mrs. Woods had presented all the spaces in the rooms that could possibly—but didn’t—contain a disreputable female. Charlotte, with a very Henrietta-ish tilt of the chin, headed straight for the mantel.

  The photographs were small, one and a half by two inches. All were of scenery and only scenery.

  Charlotte stared.

  “Surely, Mrs. Cumberland, there can be nothing the matter with his pictures.”

  Except Charlotte had seen these photographs before.

  Recently.

  When she went through Mrs. Marbleton’s rooms at Claridge’s, Mrs. Marbleton being the alias of Mrs. Moriarty, née Sophia Lonsdale.

  Two young people, who were registered as her children Frances and Stephen Marbleton, had gone around the country, traveling as photographers. During their travels, they had recorded a great many scenic views, which were practically unidentifiable. But unidentifiable didn’t mean that Charlotte didn’t remember what they looked like.

  She dismantled the frames.

  “Mrs. Cumberland—”

  “Shhh.”

  She was becoming worse than Henrietta. But the give-no-quarter persona worked. Mrs. Woods meekly held her tongue.

  It wasn’t until she’d taken apart all the frames that she found what she was looking for: In one frame, another photograph behind the one that was on display. And this one did feature people, two men. One standing with his back to the camera, the other looking at it.

  Charlotte immediately re
cognized the person facing the camera. There was a beard, a Newmarket jacket and trousers, even a walking stick, but it was a woman. Frances Marbleton.

  She showed the image to Mrs. Woods. “Is this what Mr. Finch looks like nowadays?”

  “No, no, that isn’t Mr. Finch. But I’ve seen him before, that’s Mr. Carraway, Mr. Finch’s friend.”

  That would explain the woman’s voice in these rooms—Charlotte remembered voices very well, but the only other time she had heard Frances Marbleton, the latter had spoken in a broad Cockney accent, with a nasal twang to boot. And it could very well have been her the night before, cocking her revolver on the other side of the door.

  “Mr. Finch is still of medium height, slim build, brown eyes, and hair with a slight hint of red to it?”

  “Yes. He’s grown a beard in the time he’s been here, but yes, that’s how I would describe him.”

  Charlotte set down the photograph.

  Were Stephen Marbleton and Myron Finch the same person? She supposed it was possible. She didn’t know anything about Mr. Marbleton’s life before or after his brief appearance in hers earlier this summer. He could very well have spent most of his life as Myron Finch, illegitimate son of Sir Henry Holmes, unfortunate suitor of Lady Ingram when she was Miss Alexandra Greville, until he’d joined Mrs. Marbleton as an associate of some stripe.

  But that was a slender possibility compared to the overwhelming likelihood that he was not Myron Finch.

  It would explain so much, wouldn’t it, if they were two different men? Stephen Marbleton didn’t meet with Lady Ingram because he knew nothing of the secret pact between Lady Ingram and the man he was impersonating. For the same reason he remained in a state of oblivious cheerfulness while Lady Ingram lost a little bit of her mind every day. And of course, then they could have stared right at each other at the Round Pond without either seeing any significance in the other.

  But why was he impersonating Myron Finch?

  And where was the real Myron Finch?

  Where was her brother?

  Her hand tightened into a fist. Now she knew why she had felt uneasy about the case. Now she understood her urgency the night before, throwing caution to the wind. Now it became rational, her decision to return as soon as possible to the scene of her failed crime and to persist until she had at last gained entry into these rooms.

  But was she too late? Would Stephen Marbleton dare to openly impersonate Myron Finch if he didn’t already know, with complete certainty, that the latter was not going to barge in and put an end to it?

  Assuming that Stephen Marbleton had truly been away, as he had told his landlady, if Charlotte were Frances Marbleton, staying in a place she considered safe enough, only to hear her lock being picked in the middle of the night, how would she leave? She would first make a sweep of anything incriminating—probably not too many items as they had been at such covert activities for a while. And then, would she leave a message for her cohort?

  If she had, knowing that there was outside interest in this location, knowing that it might be searched, she would have done so in such a way as to ensure that it was easily overlooked.

  Charlotte remembered the blank notebook in the smaller room. It was still blank when she returned to examine it more closely. But as she scrutinized it from the side, one page near the middle appeared slightly thicker than the rest. And when she opened to that particular page, she saw that it had been pricked with a pin.

  She closed her eyes briefly before slipping the notebook into her handbag. “Do inform Mr. Finch that we are most disappointed in him, Mrs. Woods. He will have a great deal of explaining to do.”

  Charlotte expected Morse code. But when she held up the notebook page that had been pricked, the dots were in Braille.

  Braille.

  That in itself would not have been particularly interesting, had she not, only a few days ago, found Braille inside a dead man’s jacket.

  Slowly she lowered the notebook and closed it, feeling as if she were putting the lid on a casket. She’d thought herself the kind of person who was always prepared for the worst. But knowing that something awful could happen and facing the certainty that it had—that was the difference between reading about canne de combat over a cup of tea and a piece of plum cake and the humerus-jarring reality of it, all shaky thighs and labored breaths.

  She gave herself half a minute to calm down, then knocked against the top of the hackney. “I wish to alight right here!”

  She had been on her way from St. James’s to Mrs. Watson’s house, but the intersection of Duke Street and Oxford Street had become the perfect place to get off.

  Since she was now headed for Portman Square.

  Fifteen

  It was not often that Inspector Treadles wished that an interviewee would be less forthcoming. But there was no stopping Mrs. Egbert, the small, grey-haired widow who was frightfully organized.

  Upon receiving Treadles and Sergeant MacDonald in her study, she had immediately presented a pile of documents. I’ll ring for tea after you’ve had a look at those.

  She and her late husband had owned nearly five dozen dwellings in the environs of London. He had passed away six years ago and had left her all the properties, even though they had grown sons. “He knew very well our boys had no head for business. A decent lot, but not a single one of them capable of looking after what we had built.”

  For a moment Treadles saw not Mrs. Egbert behind the impressive desk, but his own wife, so hardened and efficient that she couldn’t be bothered to offer a cup of tea and a bit of pleasantry.

  He prayed, for the first time in his life, for his brother-in-law’s well-being and longevity.

  “The house you are interested in was built in ’69,” said Mrs. Egbert. “For the first few years, the tenants were a young family. In the winter of ’72, the husband and the children all died from influenza. The widow quit the premises that summer. We put the house up for let again and advertised in the papers. Usually those who have an interest in a vacancy write and ask for an appointment to see the place. Mr. de Lacy, however, inquired only whether we would accept a postal order for a year’s rent.

  “We had no objections at all to a year’s rent in advance. Once we had received the postal order, we sent him the keys to the house, to be called for at the General Post Office, as he had instructed. The understanding was that an agent of ours would inspect the property at least once a year—more often should there be cause for concern. And our condition was readily agreed to.”

  She showed them the letters from de Lacy and the duplicates of letters that had been sent to him, the canceled postal orders, the neat numbers in a ledger that listed all the monies received from the property and all the expenses related to its upkeep.

  “That was the extent of our initial contact with Mr. de Lacy. In subsequent years, he sent a postal order, without fail, a month before the period paid for in the previous year ran out. And you can see, each year we wrote him and arranged for a date on which our agent might inspect the house. He always agreed to the time we proposed—and always said that he would be away from London at the time and that our agent should feel free to enter the house using the key in the agent’s possession.

  “I have here all the inspection reports. Now that I know something terrible has happened, Mr. de Lacy does seem too good to be true. But I have hundreds of tenants, some of them quite irksome, and I was all too happy to overlook a few oddities on the part of a tenant who was never any trouble and always paid his accounts in advance.”

  Treadles, faced with page after page of meticulous recordkeeping, wished then that Mrs. Egbert were a little cagier. If he had the sense that she was concealing anything, then he would have gained a toehold. But her transparency forced the conclusion he’d been afraid of in the first place: that this was another dead end, as far as his investigation was concerned.

  He g
ave the appearance of studying everything carefully, and even asked a few questions. But in the end, he left Mrs. Egbert’s house with nothing to go on—and a spiraling sense of dread that he wasn’t even scratching the surface.

  That the surface was there somewhere and he was a hundred miles away, trying to feel his way out of a shipping crate.

  “Let me see if I have understood you correctly, Miss Holmes,” said Lord Bancroft. “You posit that one, Finch is the name of the dead man found in Hounslow; two, he happened to be your illegitimate half brother; and three, he is currently being impersonated by Stephen Marbleton.”

  He and Charlotte were seated in an eye-watering drawing room: This was the house in which Lord Bancroft had intended for them to live as man and wife, done up in what he gauged to be her taste before the first time he proposed, when he had been certain of his impending success. Charlotte had never heard the whole story from Lord Ingram, but it seemed reasonable to assume that after Lord Bancroft failed to win her hand, he had decided to turn it into a place of business. The crown’s business.

  Usually Charlotte enjoyed being in the house: Lord Bancroft’s estimation of what she liked in terms of decor was barely three percent wide of the mark. But today all she could see was the dead man in Hounslow, his face a mask of agony and shock.

  Had that been her first and last look at Mr. Finch?

  “Precisely,” she said. “If Mr. Finch’s former sweetheart hadn’t come around begging for help because she was convinced something terrible had happened to him, no one would have known anything about his disappearance and the police would simply have one more unidentified corpse on their hands.”

  “That isn’t entirely true in this case. The victim has been identified as a Mr. Richard Hayward by a friend.”