“He loved her in his desperate, dogged way, that man,” I commented. “Though revenge is an utterly empty emotion.”
“Mr. Hope seemed far too satisfied to be considered empty,” Irene answered.
I regarded her. Here we sat in humble yet comfortable circumstances with a ring that represented the violent deaths of four people, given to us by a man whose fingers virtually clutched the very knocker of death’s door, and Irene was squinting over a small-print advertisement.
“The Telegraph item is useless now,” I said definitely. “Mr. Hope regained the ring, even if he didn’t keep it. We’ll never know whether the finder meant to trap him or not.”
“You would do well to read the agony columns more closely,” Irene returned. “That is where the real stories are written in a metropolitan newspaper.” Her alabaster forehead furrowed. “Two-twenty-one-B Baker Street... I have read this address before. But where?”
She rose and paced before the fire, her brocade wrap rustling around her like half-folded wings. I took advantage of her abstraction to survey our surroundings. On arriving at the top of four flights of stairs in an anonymous structure around the corner from where Mr. Hope had left us, I had been relieved to find Irene’s rooms clean and cozy.
Yet she kept the ceiling gasolier and table lamp turned low, whether to obscure our modest surroundings or merely for effect I could not tell. Irene Adler seemed to be highly enamored of effect. The parlor thronged with an exotic geography of furniture, and shadowy artifacts crowded us like ill-seen but close friends.
Earlier, Irene had retired to her bedchamber to loosen her laces and trade her street ensemble for a crimson silk Oriental robe dramatic enough to clothe a Borgia, preferably Lucrezia.
“Baker Street.” Irene stared toward the ceiling gaslight, oblivious to the exotic picture she presented. “I have seen that address printed before with peculiar requests for information.”
“It is near Regent Street,” I volunteered.
“I know where it is! I wonder what it is.”
“Likely a doctor’s consulting rooms.”
“So far off Harley Street?”
“A beginning doctor, with a small, struggling practice.”
“Brava, Nell. You show a talent, however small, for extrapolation.”
“No one’s ever called me ‘Nell’ before.”
“They should have. You make a perfect Nell.”
“I don’t understand what you mean by that.”
“There, you see! A perfect Nell would say that. Besides, you have nicknamed me as well.”
“I have not! I call you by your formal first name.”
“You call me ‘Eye-reen-ie.’ The American pronunciation is ‘Eye-reen.’”
“Indeed, how primitive. I doubt that the proper English pronunciation could be considered a ‘nickname.’”
“However, I take no offense. The French say ‘Ear-ren-ay’ and the Russians ‘Ih-rain-ah.’ I will allow you to call me ‘Eye-reen-ie’. A more Continental pronunciation may aid my performing career.”
“This island England is not Continental!” I corrected, uncertain how I had been put on the defensive for having objected to a liberty taken with my name.
Irene smiled as if the matter were perfectly settled, then tapped the newspaper. “But back to our Dr. Watson. He may not practice at this address. He may live there.”
“And why not? It is a perfectly respectable address, far more so than—”
“Than mine? Ah, you cannot help letting that tone of disapproval, that cat-swallowed-the-lemon-tart pucker, enter your voice. I listen to people as well as watch them.”
“It’s not that I’m not grateful... Irene.” I pronounced the name as I always had. “Your lodgings are more than I have—” I paused at this bald admission.
“Why do you think I invited you to share them?”
“You knew?”
“I guessed, which often is as good as knowing. You looked so forlorn, with your shabby carpetbag and tattered pride. If I hadn’t taken you in you would have been taken in by far worse, believe me, Nell.”
“I’ve never said—”
Irene shook her head, lay the newsprint atop a cluttered end table and vanished into the bedroom with a crisp flounce.
She returned bearing a parcel I knew well, announcing, “Dinner will be warm.” She began putting our stolen bounty on the fender to toast, a line of dainties that fairly made my mouth water.
“You must eat alone, Irene. I... cannot.”
“You mean you will not.”
“You said yourself that you were as poor as I.”
“Not quite. I have lodgings yet. And dinner. And—” She flourished something from behind her back. “A bottle of vin ordinaire. I was saving it for a special occasion.”
“I don’t... drink alcoholic beverages.”
Irene stabbed the cork with a lethal-looking steel buttonhook and expertly tussled out the stopper. “I think you ought to tonight, for medicinal purposes. We’ve had quite a day, you particularly. First you were nearly robbed, then you became the accomplice of a thief, and last but not least, you met a murderer.”
“You mock me.”
“Why should I not? Someone must. Oh, give it up, Nell. Events are completely out of hand. Forget what you would do if you could, and do what is sensible under the circumstances.”
“Which is, in your opinion?”
“Eat, drink, and, if you cannot be merry, forget your difficulties until tomorrow.”
“That is not a forward-thinking philosophy.”
“Most philosophies are not forward-thinking, but instead hark drearily back to the past. There they dwell on former sins and lost opportunities until the fool’s hope of a heaven is all there is to anticipate. I myself would prefer hell, which at least promises some interesting company in the hereafter. Have a scone, it’s quite toasted now.”
“I will not! Irene, only hours ago I heard you tell that miserable man that his dead angel, Lucy, watched him from heaven—”
“Bunk,” Irene mumbled, chewing on the hard-toasted scone I had rejected.
“I beg your pardon?”
“And well you should, for spreading such bunkum. That’s a good old American word for tommyrot. I told the poor fool what he wanted to hear, Nell. No point in disagreeing with the dying. They’ll find out soon enough. Do have some wine.”
I was so shocked—and my throat so parched by the nearby fire—that I raised the glass to my lips. “But you can’t not believe in heaven... in God, Irene.”
“Then let me put it another way. I believe in earth and in humanity, or some parts of it.” She smiled suddenly. “You may be a parson’s daughter and obliged to preach, my earnest sparrow, but I am only a professional nightingale. I cannot be expected to speak seriously on great issues. It matters nothing what I think, so long as you remain certain in what you think, is that not so?”
“Yes,” I agreed, feeling my cheeks grow feverish in the firelight. Another swallow of sour, dry wine cooled my throat. I sampled a toasted cucumber sandwich from the fender.
“But I do think that you should room with me for the time being,” Irene said, snatching another tidbit.
“I have no money.”
“Nor have I,” she retorted with cheery disregard. “You will find another position. I myself take our encounter with Mr. Hope as a sanguine sign. We theater folk are inclined to superstition, you know. There is an audition at the Hopewell Theatre the day after tomorrow. Perhaps I will get a role. You will find employment, too.”
“I fear not.” A great hiccough interrupted my thought.
“Of course you shall.”
“I have no recent reference, save from families that formerly employed me as governess.”
“Then I shall write one!” Irene swept back a crimson sleeve to flourish her pen hand.
I hiccoughed again, a sound disturbingly like a sob.
“Why, Nell... Penelope, I didn’t mean to distress you. Of
course I shan’t forge a reference for you, although I could do a splendid job of it. I was jesting—”
“I don’t have a current reference because I was ... let go”
“Many have been let go—and lived.”
“For... theft!” There, the horrid word was out of my mouth. I rinsed my tongue with more wine.
Irene leaned against the faded brocade armchair, looking so much like one of Mr. Burne-Jones’s languishing painted ladies that I was quite surprised to hear her actually speak. Speak she did.
“Tell me.”
I told her. It was a sordid enough yet simple tale. Whiteley’s emporium in Westbourne Grove, Bayswater, offered its clientele, most of whom came by the public omnibus rather than private carriage, a staggering array of goods. The founder, William Whiteley, had begun as a draper but had expanded a series of neighboring shops into a depot of goods for every taste, until he dubbed himself a “Universal Provider,” almost as if usurping the Deity, I felt.
“Shocking,” Irene murmured insincerely.
“We female clerks were lodged two or three to a bedroom in Hatherly Grove near the emporium,” I went on, determined to make a clean confession of it. “It was not a bad position in many ways. We were fed in communal dining rooms in the shop basement six days a week, excepting Sundays, when we were required to desert our rooms for wherever would have us. In my case, it was the park.
“The pay was not high, but we were housed and fed at least. Mr. Whiteley’s one-hundred-and-seventy-six house rules addressed nearly every aspect of our lives within the twelve to fourteen hours a day we labored at the emporium and any hours we did not. Disregard of the rules would mean fines deducted from our wages. Worse, a list of offenders and their offenses was posted daily at the emporium.
“We had all signed a form stating that no notice was required either way—for dismissal or voluntary leaving, without reference, of course, at an instant’s notice.”
‘The drapery clerks must have been on pins and needles,” Irene interjected, sipping her wine. It precisely matched the shade of her blood-red gown.
“Indeed. Of course, I never broke any of Mr. Whiteley’s rules—”
“Of course.”
“Except—”
Irene sat forward. “Now, I fancy, we come to the interesting part. Your theft.”
“It was not my theft! It was Lizzie’s.”
“Lizzie?”
“Liz Cheake, a dreadful, common girl. I don’t know how she got taken on at Whiteley’s, but she took a dislike to me, particularly as customers were partial to me and I could never be caught out breaking a rule. Lizzie broke all one-hundred-and-seventy-six, though no one caught her—or those who did had broken rules of their own and a bargain was arrived at.”
“A politician, our Miss Liz.”
“A liar,” I retorted hotly. Irene raised an eyebrow, but I went on. “I had seen enough to know that if a customer too enthusiastically inspected a bolt of cloth and left her reticule aside for a moment—”
“Things vanished,” Irene finished. “A pound note here, a sterling silver change purse...”
“Yes, exactly. Whiteley’s employed private detectives to see that the customers did not rob us, but none were set to watch the clerks. I... seemed to be the only one who saw Lizzie. I didn’t know what to do, and while I was debating my duty—”
“She accused you of her crime, a stolen item was found under the mattress of your bed and you were threatened with the police. Before you, in your astonished innocence, could object, you found yourself on the streets.”
“Have you worked for Whiteley’s?” I wondered.
Irene burst into laughter. “I have worked for Whiteley’s in a hundred guises, most of them theaters. Oh, my poor country lambkin, debating duty will never arm you for an ugly world, nor did a childhood at Parson Huxleigh’s holy knees! London is not Shropshire.”
“I know.” I hiccoughed again, drowning the affliction in more wine. “Now,” I added direly, “Have you ever heard of such perfidy?”
“I have acted and sung even greater.”
“But I only did right! How could I have done differently?”
“You could not have. That is the tragedy.” Irene rose, looking suddenly weary.
I stared up at her, struck by her commanding presence. “You know so much of the world,” I admitted meekly. “May I ask how... old you are?”
She smiled. “Twenty-two, but I was born in New Jersey.”
The reference escaped me. “I am four-and-twenty myself. Surely I should be the wiser.”
“And will be by morning,” Irene promised, bending to take the empty wine glass from my hand. “Come, I’ve a curtained alcove with a couch that can play a bed. I suggest rest. We have much to do tomorrow.”
“But we are both unemployed,” I protested, overcome by drowsiness for some reason.
“That doesn’t mean we have to be idle—oh no, my dear Nell. We have scales to balance.”
“I was very good at scales, at weighing ribbons and laces. I was really very good at everything at Whiteley’s.”
“Yes, of course you were—far too good for Whiteley’s, don’t you see? No, you don’t. Never mind. Here’s the alcove and I’ll help you out of your things...”
Morning came in a cymbal clash of sunshine through the open blinds of my alcove windows. I found myself ensconced in a bay, a great fern suspended over me like Mr. Poe’s pendulum, and a line of drawn curtains separating me from the parlor.
“Up at last?” Irene’s voice called from the room beyond.
The curtains whipped open. Irene, already dressed, wore a magnificent copper taffeta walking suit lavished with frills, like the pleated paper ruffs that house French chocolates.
“Come, Nell. I’ve a cup of hot milk and tea ready. You must dress quickly.”
“But why?”
“No time for questions. We’ve an omnibus to catch.”
Irene’s entire manner bristled with a wicked energy. The tea scalded my throat, and she had me attired in a thrice.
“Such a plain ensemble will not do for where we are bound, Penelope.”
No sooner had she spoken than an alien bonnet was settling on my head, nearly blinding me with a fall of veil and ribbons. Irene snatched up a reticule glittering with black jet, best suited for evening use. A hat nearly as overbearing descended upon the intricate arrangement of her hair and was promptly fixed with a hatpin long as a dagger.
I had found Irene Adler an intimidating figure the previous day; now she shone like some gaudy bronze sunset, far too grandly gowned for a daylight expedition.
“But,” I began.
“Say nothing.” Irene’s gloved finger crossed her lips in a commanding gesture. “Do as I do. Watch, listen. And learn.”
She would speak no more, but ushered me down the four flights to the street, where a wave of stale garlic and a rush of excited foreign speech washed over me. Swarthy young hooligans threaded the docile crowds, but Irene sailed with such confidence through the mob that a path cleared before us.
“Buon giorno,” a voice would call now and then as Irene waved a hand in greeting. The same Italian phrase rolled off her tongue with a gusto I had only heard previously from a street vendor.
She virtually herded me up the rear spiral stair of an omnibus, its patient horses as well reined as myself. She steadfastly refused to answer any questions as our vehicle bore us, with fitful stops and starts, through the morning bustle of London.
Irene’s manner alone quelled me. She had donned an aura of intense concentration like a veil, her beautiful dark amber eyes smoldering with purpose and latent anger. Her lips were taut and her gloved hands lay folded upon her lap, but despite the outward composure of her figure, I sensed that some overwhelming emotion fired her inner mood. I imagined she must look just so before moving on-stage to perform—a creature of harnessed energy and leashed force of personality, like a sleek thoroughbred straining at the gate before its race-keen inst
incts are released to follow their natural bent.
I had never encountered a person of such volcanic temperament before and admit it took me aback. I rode in silence beside Irene and did as she had suggested—watched and listened and learned.
When we finally descended from the omnibus, I recognized the neighborhood with a sinking feeling.
“Irene... not Whiteley’s. I couldn’t—”
She drew me before a shop window to meet our faint reflections in the glass.
“You look nothing like yourself. See what a simple change of headgear may do for a woman? That is all I require of you, Nell—look nothing like yourself and accompany me into Whiteley’s. Only nod when you spy the enterprising Lizzie.”
“I never want to see her again!”
“Once more into the breach, dear friend,” she cajoled.
“Oh, Irene, I couldn’t. I should be mortified.”
Her hand clasped my wrist in a fixed grip. “Do you believe in right and wrong?”
“Of course!”
“Do you believe in wrongs righted? In justice?”
“Naturally.”
“Then follow me and say nothing.”
No explorer has entered the darkest African jungle, no soldier has faced the unknown foe with greater trepidation than I did on finding my feet crossing the threshold of Whiteley’s again.
My heels echoed on the wooden floor as smartly attired manikins peered stiffly over the rails from the three floors above us. Human heads turned as we passed, but I needn’t have worried. They all regarded Irene, not myself.
The main floor held the yard goods. I could hardly bear to view the familiar bolts, to pass the measuring stations. Then a tall, whip-thin hateful figure riveted my gaze.
My fingers tugged Irene’s coppery sleeve. “There,” I whispered.
She looked once in the right direction, then nodded.
“Fade away among the trimmings, Nell; I have business elsewhere.”
Obediently I ambled among the reels of lace and ribbons, while watching Irene through the glamorous fog of my veil.
Good Night, Mr. Holmes (A Novel of Suspense featuring Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes) Page 4
