Lil looked eagerly at Joe. ‘Course I’ll help, if I can,’ he said, with a smile and a shrug.
‘Hurrah!’ said Lil. ‘That’s settled then!’
‘Lil and I will go and see this Miss Whiteley tomorrow,’ said Sophie with a decisive nod. ‘Then let’s meet again after the store closes, and we can tell you all about it.’
CHAPTER FOUR
Song was angry. ‘What on earth were you thinking?’ he demanded.
‘That’s no way to talk to your father!’ snapped out Mum. ‘I’ll thank you to take a more civil tone!’
‘But they might have killed you!’
Dad gave a little snort. ‘It would take more than that gang of brainless thugs to finish me off,’ he muttered.
Mei stared at him anxiously across the table. She hated to see him so white and tired-looking. The bruises on his face were a constant reminder of the moment she had found him, crumpled on the ground – she had been quite sure that he was dead.
Song looked at their father for a long moment, then sighed and sat back in his chair, his hands bunched into fists in front of him. ‘All I’m saying is that you can’t just refuse to pay the Baron’s Boys,’ he said in his usual quiet voice. ‘That isn’t how things work.’
‘It’s a matter of principle,’ said Mum, rather stiffly. ‘People round here look to us to set an example, Song, you know that. We all work hard. We’ve all got precious little as it is. We can’t let them turn up here and demand our money. It’s nothing more than bullying. If we all stand up to them, maybe we can put a stop to it.’
Song made a noise of frustration in the back of his throat. ‘But you can’t stand up to them, Mum. That would be like . . . one mouse against a hundred cats! Besides, no one else is going to put themselves in danger, especially when they see what happened to Dad. People are afraid .’
There was a long pause. Then Dad spoke. ‘Song is right . . .’ he said slowly. His voice was heavy. ‘We can’t stand against the Baron, Lou. He runs the East End. Everyone knows that. We should be grateful it’s taken him this long to reach into China Town.’
Mei felt a slow chill creep over her. She knew about the Baron, of course: everyone in Limehouse did. He was the villain of every whispered tale – the monster who was ‘coming to get you’ in all the children’s games. No one had ever seen him, but almost everyone claimed to know someone who’d caught a glimpse, just once, and come to a bad end. To see the Baron himself would be the worst of all bad omens – worse than a black cat crossing your path, worse than breaking a looking glass. There were dozens of stories about him. Some people said that he was a bloodthirsty murderer who had left a trail of horribly dismembered victims all across the East End. Others said he had once been an ordinary man, until he had sold his soul to the devil. Either way, everyone was afraid of him. To Mei, he was the dark shadows underneath the bed, the creaking floorboards, the distant shriek in the night.
But the Baron was much more than just a fairy tale, a bogeyman from a child’s nightmare. He was the top man in the East End and everyone knew it. His net stretched from Spitalfields to Bow. The Port of London Authority might think that it ran the docks, but the folk of the East End knew better. They knew that the Baron had eyes on every load that came in or out of every ship that docked. They knew that he did his own business there too, and they carefully looked the other way when ships slipped in and out under the Baron’s protection. No one would dare to cross him.
As for the Baron’s Boys, they were almost as feared as the Baron himself. They were the ever-growing gang of toughs who did the Baron’s business – legitimate or otherwise. They collected his rents – the protection money he demanded from most of the East End – and dealt with those who got in their way. People hurried in the opposite direction if they saw them standing on a street corner. Conversation fell away when a group of them swaggered up to the bar of the Star Inn, demanding the landlord’s best beer, or when one or two came striding into the fish shop for their penny bit and ha’p’orth of chips. And now they had been here, to Lim’s shop.
Mei felt sick. The back room had always seemed like the safest place in the world when the family were sitting around the table, in the warmth of the range. But suddenly it was just a room, any room, small and cold. All the laughter had gone out of it. The green parrot in the corner was silent, and even the twins sat still and quiet, their eyes round as saucers.
As if it was their silence that had suddenly reminded her that they were there, Mum glanced over at the twins. ‘Boys, go outside,’ she said curtly. ‘Run along now, chop-chop.’
Dad shook his head weakly. ‘No, Lou. I don’t want them out there. It’s too dangerous,’ he said.
‘Upstairs then,’ said Mum firmly.
‘But, Dad – we’ve got to go out.’ Jian spoke up, looking alarmed and astonished. ‘We’re s’posed to meet Spud and Ginger for a kick-about after tea. They’ll be waiting for us!’
‘Well they’ll be waiting a long time, then, won’t they?’ snapped Mum. ‘You heard your father. You’re not to go out. So upstairs you go. And Mei, you can get started on clearing things up in the shop.’
They wanted them out of the way so they could talk, Mei knew. There was no sense in arguing. She got up, and obediently shepherded the boys out of the back room and up the crooked stairs towards the bedroom. The twins had forgotten about the Baron’s Boys already. They were babbling away in the funny mixture of playground slang and their own peculiar twin language that they used when they were speaking to each other. Now, they seemed to be jabbering something about a game of cowboys and Indians.
‘Come and play with us, Mei,’ said Jian. ‘We’ll let you be the squaw.’
‘We’ll make Song’s bed into our fort,’ said Shen with a grin.
But Mei shook her head. Normally she’d have been happy to have the excuse to join in with one of the twins’ make-believe games, but today, she couldn’t think about anything beyond Dad’s bruised face and the Baron’s Boys.
Instead, as they bounded up the stairs, she went slowly through into the deserted shop as Mum had told her. It looked quite sad and unlike its usual self. The door was locked and bolted, and Song had nailed boards over the broken windows so that only one or two beams of light broke through. Dust motes danced in the shafts of light.
She decided to light a lamp to try and break through the gloom, but the glow it cast out seemed somehow feeble. She looked around her, feeling despondent. There was so much to do that she hardly knew where to begin. Listlessly, she took up the broom and began to sweep the floor, making a little mound of spilt tea and tobacco and broken glass.
She could hear more voices now, in the back room. It sounded like Ah Wei, Song’s boss at the Eating House, and Mr and Mrs O’Leary from the baker’s, and Mrs Wu from the Magic Lantern Show. Their voices sounded solemn and grave. Traces of their conversation reached her as she swept: ‘. . . can’t go on like this ’, ‘. . . that sort of money ’, ‘. . . making an example ’, ‘. . . far too dangerous ’.
She didn’t want to hear them. To block them out, she began to tell one of Granddad’s stories to herself, an old tale about a talking fox, but she could not concentrate. She was getting it all wrong. The story of the fox kept getting mixed up with the cobbler’s warning, with Dad lying crumpled on the floor, and then with Granddad himself. Thinking of Granddad made her want to cry, and that would not do – Song would say she was being a cry baby. He said she needed to grow up now she had left school: she was too old to be a feather-brain; she shouldn’t spend so much time playing with the twins; she oughtn’t to always have her nose buried in a book.
Once, she and Song had been the best of friends. They had done everything together; told each other all their secrets; but things had changed. He seemed so much older, all of a sudden. She could hear him now in the back room, his voice forceful and authoritative, although she couldn’t make out what he was saying. When had he become one of the grown-ups?
Then someone i
n the back room made an unhappy gasping sort of sound – a strangled sob. It wasn’t Mum or Dad or Song, but all the same it pulled her up short. She even stopped pretending to sweep. Instead, she sat down on the stool behind the counter, and wedged her hands over her ears. There was a copy of yesterday’s newspaper lying nearby, and she pulled it towards her and opened it, hoping for a new episode of the serial story to distract herself with. She turned the pages rapidly over a report of a murder in Whitechapel, and a robbery in Shoreditch, but there was no story today, so instead she fixed her attention upon the society pages. She liked to look at them, sometimes, intrigued by the pictures of young ladies in white dresses with elegant-sounding names like Lady Cynthia Delaney or Miss Louisa Hampton-Lacey . The fancy descriptions of grand balls and elegant gowns could have so easily come from one of her favourite fairy tales.
Now, she read them with grim determination, taking in every word of an account of a charity fashion show at a West End store; a report on the upcoming marriage of a glamorous actress; and an article about a lavish society ball. The voices rose and fell in the back room, but Mei read on, filling her mind with words like opera and bazaar and waltz .
Then she stopped short. Two words jumped out at her from the page, and all at once, it was as if the sounds in the next room had vanished into abrupt and ominous silence. She saw and heard nothing: all that was left were those two words, printed in smudgy black ink, in the middle of a paragraph: Moonbeam Diamond.
CHAPTER FIVE
The Ladies’ Lounge at Sinclair’s was a most elegant place. Arrayed like a fashionable drawing room, it was decorated entirely in white and gold, with bowls of flowers set here and there, and plenty of soft chairs and comfortable sofas. It was no wonder it had become a favourite destination for London’s society ladies to meet after a busy day of shopping. That afternoon, the room was full of them: ladies drinking iced lemonade in tall glasses served to them by maids in frilled white aprons; ladies talking vigorously in lively groups; ladies sitting alone, studiously reading the newspaper. There was a low buzz of civilised conversation in the air, and the delicate chink of china and silverware. As Sophie and Lil entered the room, they could not help feeling a little awkward, unsure of exactly who they were looking for, or what they ought to do.
But almost at once, one of the maids came up to them, and directed them to a corner over by the window. Glancing at each other apprehensively, they hurried over. Sophie was not quite sure who she had expected to find, but it certainly was not the young lady who sat waiting, small but very upright, in a large velvet armchair, coolly drinking a cup of tea.
‘You are Miss Taylor and Miss Rose, I suppose,’ she said in a high, rather petulant voice, looking them up and down critically.
‘Yes, I’m Sophie Taylor. How do you do?’ said Sophie, holding out a hand. The young lady looked at it uncertainly for a moment, then gingerly took it in her own lace-gloved fingers.
‘And I’m Lilian Rose,’ said Lil, seizing the young lady’s hand in her turn and giving it such a hearty shake that she looked alarmed and pulled her hand hurriedly away.
‘My name is Veronica Whiteley. I am pleased to meet you,’ said the young lady, with a haughty nod. Sophie looked at her in surprise. The tone of her letter had conjured up a vision of an elderly spinster, but this girl was young – really, she couldn’t have been much older than Lil – and she was dressed very beautifully in a much ruffled, lace-trimmed ivory gown. She must be one of this season’s debutantes, and a particularly wealthy one at that. What was more, Sophie realised that she knew her. She was one of the three young ladies who had been in the Millinery Department the previous day – the one who had tried on the Paris hat.
But Miss Whiteley gave no indication that she recognised Sophie. ‘Do sit down,’ she said, giving a queenly waft of her hand towards the two hard chairs placed opposite her. As they took their seats, Sophie watched the young lady with interest. Although her clothes were expensive and beautifully made, Sophie couldn’t help thinking that they didn’t suit her very well. She was pretty, with china-white skin, a small pink mouth and carefully waved red-gold hair. But all the frills and flounces made her look rather like one of the expensive porcelain dolls that were on sale in the store’s Toy Department. Yet there was nothing at all doll-like about her expression: she was looking at them both with eyes like gimlets, a frown creasing up her white forehead as she sipped tea from a bone-china cup.
‘How can we help you?’ Sophie asked curiously.
‘I have been told that you were responsible for finding Mr Sinclair’s stolen jewels,’ Miss Whiteley began, assuming a very formal manner. Lil opened her mouth to say something, but Miss Whiteley was evidently not expecting there to be any interruptions, and swept onwards. ‘I contacted you because I wished to discuss a similar commission. It is of a highly confidential nature – I trust I can be assured of your complete discretion.’
They said she could, and she went on:
‘I was recently given a gift by a gentleman. It’s one of a kind and extremely valuable – a jewelled brooch in the shape of a moth, made especially for me. Last week it went missing, and I would like you to undertake to find it.’
Veronica found that her hand was shaking slightly as she replaced her teacup in its saucer. She had borrowed her haughty manner from the Dowager Countess of Alconborough, always so imperious in her black velvet and jet beads, assuming complete control of any conversation. Today, she wanted to be no less impressive. It was imperative that these girls took her seriously: she would not be dismissed as just another idiotic debutante.
Although, looking at them again, her lips pursed. She had not expected them to be so very young . Why, the smaller one looked even younger than she was herself ! She had expected them to be older: sophisticated and perhaps a little daring, women of the world, like the heroines of the rather scandalous novels she borrowed from Isabel, her stepmother, on the sly. These two looked more like a pair of schoolgirls than young lady detectives! But it was too late: she had already told them about the jewelled moth, and she would simply have to go on with it now.
It was quite a ridiculous position to find herself in, she thought crossly. If only she were an adult, she would have been able to hire a real detective to find the missing brooch for her. But being a debutante meant that every moment of the day was supervised, from the moment that her maid woke her in the morning, to the moment she went to bed at night after yet another ball or reception. Father and Isabel treated her as if she were a baby. She’d had far more freedom back in the schoolroom with her governess! Now, she was chaperoned every minute of the day, and there was no chance whatsoever that they would ever let her go off alone to a secret appointment with a private detective.
Thankfully Sinclair’s department store was different. Here, Isabel didn’t mind letting Veronica wander off on her own to look at the hats and gloves or the counters selling scent and powder, whilst she shopped and gossiped with her friends. It was here that Veronica had first had the idea of hiring someone to help her find the jewelled moth. She didn’t read the newspapers much – all dreadfully dull stuff about the navy and taxes – but it had been impossible to miss the stories about the dramatic robbery at Sinclair’s. Everyone in London had been talking about it, and she’d heard that Mr Sinclair’s private detective had been helped by two fearfully clever young ladies who worked at the store and who had been the ones to find the jewels. The idea of hiring them to find the jewelled moth had seemed rather a stroke of genius. After all, no one could possibly make a fuss about her talking to two other young ladies in Sinclair’s department store. She had felt as clever and daring as one of the characters in Isabel’s novels.
But now she wondered if it had been quite such a brilliant idea after all. They were so very ordinary. The tall one, Miss Rose, was rather unusual-looking, she supposed, but otherwise they could have been any old shop girls in plain, cheap-looking frocks and no ornaments at all. They didn’t look particularly clever either
.
Well, she would simply have to hope they were brainier than they looked, she thought with a sigh. She had to get the moth back and would do anything to find it.
‘I must have the jewelled moth in time for my debutante ball next week,’ she said firmly, as she fixed the two girls with her most haughty, determined look. ‘You’ll be well rewarded, you may be assured – but you must return it to me .’
Half an hour later, Veronica was back with Isabel, up in the Marble Court restaurant, acting as if she had done nothing more that morning than look for a new fan. But she couldn’t stop thinking about the jewelled moth. Telling those girls about what had happened had made her uncomfortable all over again, and she found herself simply toying with the fish course instead of eating it. She felt tense and irritable. This was supposed to be the most thrilling time of her life, and now it was quite spoiled, all because of the loss of the brooch.
Of course, she reminded herself, it wasn’t as though everything about being a debutante was so very thrilling. There were the endless boring dress-fittings for new gowns, where she was stuck all over with pins as though she were a pincushion; the tedious dinner parties where she had to make polite conversation with fearful old bores; and the balls where she got lumbered with partners who trod all over her feet – but all the same, most of her first Season had been splendid. Now, all of a sudden it did not seem glittering and exciting; instead it was simply horrid.
She couldn’t even concentrate on the conversation going on amongst her luncheon companions, who were ranged around a table covered in spotless damask and arrayed with gleaming silver. Instead, she eyed them from under her eyelashes. First of all there was Isabel – Veronica’s very own not-so-wicked stepmother, her round blue eyes widening at something the Countess of Alconborough was saying. As usual, Isabel looked exactly like a fashion plate, with her crimped blonde hair, carefully rouged and powdered face, and outfit straight from the pages of La Mode Illustrée . Next, the Dowager Countess herself: tiny yet stately in her rustling black gown. Then, beside her, Lady Alice, the Countess’s daughter: taller, plumper and infinitely more insipid, nodding in agreement after every word her mother said.
The Mystery of the Jewelled Moth Page 4
