“And Redstone?” Brodie asked.
Mr. Conner shook his head. “There’s been no word.”
Was it possible that Sir James was part of all of this? I thought of everything over the past few days since his return, and things he had said. I had simply brushed it aside. And what of the injury to his hand, that had obviously happened since our travels together? An accident, he had called it. But what sort of accident?
I stood before the blackboard in the office. I still found it difficult to believe that Sir James was involved in a threat against the Queen. It did not seem like the man I had met years before.
He was from a well-titled family. If he was involved in this, it was against everything he’d been born to. Still, as I thought back to the day before at the Grosvenor, the things he said, and his comments about the Queen. There were indications that I had dismissed at the time as nothing more than the usual conversations one might hear at a social gathering or event. Or perhaps chose to ignore.
I thought of Mr. Conner’s comment about Scotland, not an uncommon sentiment, particularly among the Scots.
Was it possible that with changes Scotland might one day be independent? And what would that mean?
I had added more notes from the information Mr. Conner and Brodie had obtained.
Buckingham Palace was notified as well. Sir Avery was informed that the Queen was adamant, however, in that stalwart manner that people had come to admire about her.“Getting on with it,”as she had been quoted in the past through her own difficulties and losses.
Brodie had also made arrangements to be present the next day where that barrier was to have been placed, alongwith Mr. Conner and a substantially increased number of the Metropolitan Police, Sir Avery’s people, and the Royal Guard.
Hours passed, though it seemed like days, since I had arrived earlier that morning. I caught the scent of food that Mr. Cavendish had undoubtedly brought over from the Public House. However, I had no appetite.
Mr. Conner had left earlier with arrangements made to meet Brodie the next morning. There had been messages delivered by Alex from the Agency as other arrangements were confirmed.
However, there had been no further conversation between Brodie and myself.
I was admittedly hurt, as if he didn’t trust that I would see the truth of the information he and Mr. Conner had obtained. Then I had been deliberately excluded from something that involved both the inquiry case about Dr. Bennett’s murder and the investigation that Brodie was pursuing.
In the past, there had been a partnership between us, the sharing of information, of speculation and thoughts with the notes that I made at the bloody damned blackboard!
Yet today, I had been shut out from the latest information with that comment that I seemed “quite taken with Sir James.”Did he believe that I could not be trusted with the information?
That was perhaps what hurt the most, particularly in consideration of our personal relationship.
After Mr. Conner left, Brodie had encouraged me to make my notes on the board with the new information we now had. However, it seemed gratuitous. Much like a pat on the head for a faithful hound.
“Ye’re still angry,” Brodie said in a quiet voice.
That didn’t begin to describe it, I thought, but didn’t say it. I didn’t say anything at all but continued to make my notes, as if I had not heard him.
There was something more in all of this, something I was convinced that I would find in my notes if I stared at them long enough— my scratchings on the board as Brodie called them.
Or perhaps it was merely a way to ignore him. Although Angus Brodie was hard to ignore.
“I understand.”
The piece of chalk snapped against the board, and my anger with it. I turned on him.
“Do you?” I replied, then vented the anger.
“I thought we had a partnership that included trust, respect, consideration of each other’s ideas, and…” There was that other part, of course. “You set it all aside as if none of that mattered.”
“Dinnae do this, Mikaela. Now, is not the time.”
I ignored the warning. It most certainly was the time.
“Is it all a lie, then?” I continued. “Our work together? It certainly wasn’t on my part. Or was it ambition?
“Perhaps something Sir Avery promised you that got in the way even though you don’t trust the man?” I added.
