Before stepping down from the cab, I handed him the wrapped package that contained cakes as well as biscuits with sausage from breakfast that Mrs. Ryan, my housekeeper, had sent.
Food was always a good strategy to prevent my clothes from being muddied when Rupert the hound grinned a greeting at me from the sidewalk.
Others, Brodie in particular, would of course have argued that what I considered a grin was in fact a snarl. Nevertheless, Mr. Cavendish, keeper of the alcove and the latest word on the street, knew better, and so did I.
The hound and I had a special bond, although those same ‘others’ who claimed to be such experts would have called it my imagination.
We had our own language which he usually obeyed.Usually,because there had been times when he was not of a mind to obey, most particularly in taking down an attacker on the street, for which I was most grateful.
There had been an extra basket of cakes for him after that episode, most particularly my housekeeper’s sponge cakes which he was particularly fond of.
And, despite Brodie’s argument against it, he had proven himself to be most capable in tracking down people—namely those of a criminal sort—in our inquiry cases.
He had also warded off other potentially dangerous situations when I was out and about London on my own—Rupert’s presence a precaution Brodie insisted upon, despite his criticism of the hound’s investigative talents.
“He’s a bloody animal with a brain no larger than a walnut,” Brodie had argued in one of our conversations.
“He has excellent instincts,” I had replied in the hound’s defense.
I had then pointed out that according to Mr. Brimley, who had studied medicine before opening his pharmaceutical shop, some of thehumanspecies—notably men—seemed to possess a brain no larger than a walnut.
To say that had not gone over well is an understatement. In his usual way after one of our conversations with differing opinions, Brodie had thrown up his hands, declared that there was no arguing with me, and had immediately changed the subject. I did so enjoy our conversations.
As for the previous day and several more before, Brodie had been deeply involved in our most recent inquiry case, regarding counterfeit currency that had been found circulating at several business establishments in London.
I had left him with his report to Sir Avery the previous afternoon, while I had followed up on an appointment with mygreat-aunt’s personal banker, Aldous Trumble, at the Bank of England.
My great-aunt was also a stockholder of the bank, so our inquiries had a dual purpose, and I attended on her behalf.
“Not that I’m concerned about the matter,” she had told me.“If the entire English currency was worthless, I always have the family jewels.”
Thefamilyjewelswere a collection of gems, gold baubles, and other valuable pieces from over the centuries, and also included several pieces of armor and weapons that her lawyer insisted belonged in a museum rather than the game room at Sussex Square.
Her family included William the Conqueror, along with a list of other noteworthy and notorious persons, one well-known highwayman, and a pirate who had done some rather nasty business in the Caribbean.
I didn’t ask how the family jewels had been acquired. Possibly best to leave that part of our family history just that—to history.
She did have a particular affection for Scotland, that wild, untamed place, just as I did, and was in favor of self-rule. I had visions of family treasure hidden in some cave near Old Lodge in Scotland.
“The English tried to conquer Scotland,” she had once told me over one, or possibly several, drams of whisky produced at Old Lodge, her estate in the north.
“But they will never conquer that spirit. Take Mr. Brodie for example, or Mr. Munro.”
Mr. Munro was manager of her estates, and had a somewhat shadowy past that included Brodie.
The short version of their boyhood together on the streets of Edinburgh had included working odd jobs to get by until they found their way to London.
The somewhat longer version, that I eventually learned from Brodie, had included a bit of petty thievery—mostly food, occasionally a coin or two someone had dropped on the street, and running numbers for gambling.
And then there was murder, most particularly in the case of Brodie’s mother, that had left him to the care of his grandmother for a short time.
As for Munro’s history before he joined Brodie in that life of crime, that was, as they, say a somewhat blank slate.
His background, dealing with all sorts, made him the perfect manager of my great-aunt’s estates. There was never a farthing or a keg of whisky unaccounted for, or the party responsible was made to account for it. I didn’t ask how that was done, only that the party involved was not seen again, according to my great-aunt.
“He takes care of the matter,” she had once explained. “I don’t ask the details.”
And in consideration of my great-aunt’s somewhat eccentric life, from rumors of a wild girlhood, three marriage proposals—none accepted—and the ‘love of her life,’ who had disappeared under somewhat mysterious circumstances and about whom little was known, I didn’t pry.
