Jane tore herself away from the peaceful world of the garden and back to the violent one of the city. ‘I thought you didn’t approve of French opera singers, Mama?’
‘This is not approval. The count and countess were friends of your brother. We will pray for them, poor souls.’
Not to mention that Mrs Austen was wildly curious, as were Jane and Cassandra, to find out more. Death held a horrible fascination and, sadly, at a distance it could even be entertaining, though Jane was depressed by what that said about the human condition.
‘Henry and I are both at a loss to explain why such a violent end befell two worthy people who came to England for sanctuary. Poor Julien, their son, is left all alone. The rumour mill is grinding but the perpetrator shot himself after he killed his employers so the story will smoulder, producing a lot of obscuring smoke unless we can find someone who can investigate and blow it away.’
‘Why must Henry and Eliza be like this?’ said Mrs Austen. ‘Why not let sleeping dogs lie?’
‘I would say the dog in this case wasn’t so much sleeping as being slaughtered,’ muttered Jane. ‘I fully sympathise with the frustrations of not knowing the end of the story,’ she said more plainly. Not that she’d ever use such material in her own novels. She thought of her writing as miniatures painted on ivory with a fine brush, depicting the world she knew best, not vast bloody canvases like those painted by historical artists.
‘As with Mozart and the incomplete chord– one has to get up and finish it,’ said Cassandra.
‘Exactly,’ agreed Jane, skimming the rest of the letter. This she would keep from her mother: her sister-in-law wrote that she was concerned Henry’s reputation might suffer as it was known that he had been close to the D’Antraigues– and trust was what underpinned a financier’s affairs. Henry wanted the matter cleared up and tidied away or his business was at risk. Ah good: they had a solution. ‘Eliza writes that Henry has an idea. Frank told him on his last leave that he knows someone who investigates this sort of thing.’
‘This sort of thing!’ Mrs Austen’s cap ribbons trembled. ‘How often does this sort of thing happen among Henry’s acquaintances?’
‘Not very often, one would hope. He has written to Frank to find out their address in London.’
‘Who does Frank know?’ asked Mrs Austen querulously. She claimed that many of her grey hairs were down to her two sons who were rising in the ranks of the navy. Frank and Charles were constantly doing battle with the French– and now they had the Americans to fight too! Frank, the son born between Cassandra and Jane, a captain in the navy, was somewhere in the Channel on HMElephantso the letter might take some time to reach him. ‘How does he know anyone in London who investigates murders? He’s been at sea for most of the last ten years!’
Jane read through the rest of the letter. ‘And it is at sea that they met. Frank knows a military surgeon, Dr Jacob Sandys, brother to Viscount Sandys.’
‘Jacob Sandys? Why is that name familiar?’ asked Cassandra.
‘Because he is the man whose life Frank saved at the evacuation from Corunna.’ Jane folded the letter away. Perhaps now, she thought, it would be Jacob Sandys’s turn to save the Austens.
Chapter Two
18 August 1812
Bruton Mews
Dora surveyed her little room with satisfaction. Two doors down from their office, she had taken lodgings with a retired wigmaker. There was far less call for wigs– only judges, priests and footmen continued to wear them– so Mrs Jones had given up the trade and let out rooms instead. Yarton, Lady Tolworth’s inestimable butler from the big house across the way, had arranged everything. Dora’s bedroom was on the first floor and looked out onto the cobbled mews. Right now, she could see Kir, their office boy, playing football with some off-duty servants from Lady Tolworth’s house. He had free passage between both establishments– the investigative agency and the grand house the lady kept– and was taking to his new life as if born to it. Rescued from life as a camp follower in the border town of Berwick, the orphaned Kir had even begun to develop a London accent, dropping his Scottish one.
Children, mused Dora, were like the chameleons on display at the Tower Menagerie, able to change their colour. They sensed when it was easier to fit in than stand out.
Moving away from the glass, she prowled her den.
‘A room of my own,’ she murmured. She touched each object she had unpacked: her small library of novels and plays, the commonplace book she had created with her late brother that contained samples of handwriting from many famous people, her grey great coat and scarlet redingote hanging on pegs along the wall. They were joined by a few reluctant bonnets and a row of happier hats. Bonnets were such stupid things, their only advantages being that they did not fly off so easily when chasing a villain and they were a good disguise as they hid the wearer’s features. On the whole, she preferred hats and was gathering a selection between which she could alternate when tailing someone. Luckily there was plenty of space for them. She guessed the pegs had once been used to display the huge variety of wigs the previous generation had thought indispensable, puff balls like clouds with birdcages and boats as ornaments. How tame the present generation was in comparison, wearing their own hair with nary a sniff of powder.
After a month of travelling in the north, it was good to be home.
The thought took her by surprise. When had London become her home? She had been raised in Liverpool and, after quitting her father’s house, travelled with a troupe of players on the northern circuit, offering Shakespeare plays and Restoration comedies to agricultural labourers and the workers in the new manufactories. She was still learning her way around the streets here, still finding the size of the city daunting.
She gazed over the slate roofs to the murky blue skies, cooking fires dulling the summer’s day.
Perhaps it wasn’t the city but the person who lived here that gave her a sense of being settled. It had become home when she had thrown in her lot with Jacob Sandys, she acknowledged. Also, thinking more practically, the capital was the best place to start an agency dealing with private enquiries, which meant she was unlikely to have to pack up and move on for some time. That was a very pleasant prospect because her life for the last five years had been nothing but shifting from place to place.
Two sharp whistles came from the mews. That was Kir’s signal that a customer was approaching their office. As Jacob was at his bank this morning dealing with the financial consequences of his father’s death, she was in charge of greeting new clients. Quickly straightening her gown and checking her hair in the mottled mirror– it would do– she hurried downstairs.
Opening the door to their office, she found Kir had already done his job and seated the visitor in the chair opposite the desk. The caller looked to be in his middle years, a handsome man with a long face and intelligent eyes under dark brows. When he stood up on her entry, he revealed himself to be of above average height and with the lean build of a sportsman or soldier. His clothing was impeccably cut, showing an almost French flair in the details on cuff and collar– an attractive man, used to female attention.
‘Ma’am.’ He bowed politely.
She approached, holding out a hand. This was business, not a ballroom, so he could greet her as a fellow professional. ‘I’m Miss Fitz-Pennington.’ He shook her hand with a bemused smile at her forthright ways. ‘Please do take a seat.’
Obediently, he sat. ‘Is Dr Sandys away, Miss Fitz-Pennington?’
