Prologue
EARLY DECEMBER, 1891, OXFORD STREET, LONDON
He watched…
From the shadows as streetlights slowly glowed to life along the sidewalk, mist wrapping around the golden light...
As icy rain began to fall...
As a young woman crossed the street and entered the print shop.
He watched. Then crossed the street, and waited.
There was no sense of time, only the waiting.
Then, the sound of the merchant’s bell above the door, a printer by trade. And she was there, a package tucked under her arm as she paused and drew the collar of her jacket up against the damp and cold, then turned.
The waiting was over. He saw the surprise in her soft blue eyes, a question she might have asked.
Then, after all this time, it was quickly done.
He gently lowered her to the sidewalk, her expression startled, her lips moving as the last breath left her, the contents of the package scattered to the pavement stones. Ink on the invitations ran like blood.
“Forgive me,” he whispered as he laid a single red rose across her body, then disappeared into the night.
One
I had been strugglingover the next chapter in my latest Emma Fortescue novel since Brodie and I had returned from Scotland.
In my two previous novels, she had ventured into the nasty business of murder, stumbling upon one during her adventure in Budapest, then being drawn into another one by a character of dubious reputation who coincidentally had a dark gaze, was most proficient with a firearm, and had rescued her from a very dangerous situation.
True to her nature, Emma Fortescue, promptly left Budapest when the murderer was caught, only to find the man ofdubious characteron the same train as it barreled toward Paris.
I had ended that particular novel there. Let the reader think what they might, with Emma’s next adventure to be taken up in the book I was presently laboring over at the behest of my publisher, James Warren.
That previous novel had, he had informed me, quite literally flown off the sales table at Hatchards. It did seem that my readers had an appetite not only for adventure, but murder with a little romantic mystery thrown in.
“We are receiving letters daily,” he had informed me in the weeks after it was released. “Readers are demanding to know when the next book will be released and who, precisely, the dark-eyed man of questionable reputation might be.”
And then his most recent reminder when we last met.
“You simply must have the book ready before Linnie and I leave for the south of France after the wedding.”
I stared at the blank page in my typewriting machine. Said wedding was three weeks away and they were planning to leave the month following for an extended stay in France, then possibly to Italy.
For whatever the reason, the words did not magically appear on the page before me. I did wonder if Mr. Dickens had the same issue when starting a new book.
Of course, it could have been due to the recent change, said thedark-eyed characterwho had finally taken up residence for the most part at the townhouse after I pointed out that it was quite acceptable for people who were married to live together.
The winning aspect for my argument had actually been two things. Brodie was particularly fond of my housekeeper’s cooking skills, which I had few of—some would argue none—and which I made absolutely no claim to.
And then there was the shower compartment in the bathing room at the town house, which was far more convenient than the one down the hall from the office, and it did have other…attributeswhich I appreciated as well.
Of course, he insisted that it was Mrs. Ryan’s skill in the kitchen and the promise of her Irish stew that had lured him back to the town house the previous evening after another long day at the office on the Strand.
A handful of inquiries awaited our return from Scotland, either by way of a note sent round, or through Mr. Cavendish, who always had his ‘ear to the street’ when it came to suchthings. It did seem there was no end to crimes across the East End and even into greater London.
Brodie had been following up on the potential cases that included a missing payroll at a local mill, along with another from a man, somewhat older, who wanted him to make inquiries about his much-younger wife, whom he suspected was having an affair.
