Not that she was fooled for a moment. Nor was I.
It was a familiar excuse when Munro was off seeing to some other matter that he chose not to discuss. That other matter being Brodie, a fellow Scot, who was also his very good friend.
After supper, my great-aunt provided her driver, Mr. Hastings.
“Do be careful of Bitsy,” she said in parting. “The creature can be quite a nuisance.”
I’d already had experience with that. The thought did occur that I might take Rupert with me when next I met with Kitty Ambersley. He did have a particular preference for small furry creatures. Although that might be somewhat off-putting for Kitty Ambersley.
BRODIE
He slipped a coin across the table to the man who sat across from him, a man with knowledge of the streets who had been a source more than once in his time with the MET.
Sir Bartholemew was the name he went by, an affectation that spoke of his scorn for members of the ton, which included a habit of relieving them of their purses. A master pickpocket who had his portion of encounters with members of the constabulary, including Brodie.
Petty thievery, until he decided to ‘up his game,’ as it was called, and had relieved several well-heeled nobs in their coaches, which earned him the reputation as the ‘thief of St. James’s,’ years earlier, when Brodie first made inspector.
Brodie had set a trap, once he figured out the man’s usual scheme of waiting outside the residence of one of London’s wealthier clients while posing as one of their own with the MET.
A stop, as a courtesy, to warn the passenger of trouble in the area, and the man or woman was relieved of their coin and valuables. An enterprising scheme, until it wasn’t.
Once his scheme was discovered it was simply a matter of setting up a situation of a ‘wealthy passenger,’ leaving a St. James townhouse, and springing the trap.
Sir Bart, as he was known among his fellow thieves, had been more than surprised to find Brodie in the coach he stopped.
He had roared with laughter at the scheme that had put an end, at least temporarily, to his endeavors.
“It would take a thief to catch a thief!” he had exclaimed at the time, having met Brodie in a previous encounter before he joined the Met.
“I consider it a compliment, sir.”
Sir Bart had served a sentence of three years and was then released, having claimed that he’d had a visitation from God and changed his ways.
A new scheme for the schemer.
The next time Brodie encountered him was in a matter of a theft from Mikaela’s great-aunt, Lady Antonia Montgomery, after he had left the MET and worked for her in private inquiries.
“The old girl won’t miss a few bottles of whisky,” Sir Bart had pled the excuse when caught. “And you owe me for my time in Newgate.”
“A fate of yer own makin’,” Brodie had replied, then levelled a revolver at Sir Bart.
“Lady Montgomery is a client. I’ll not have ye stealin’ from her. But the choice is yers.”
There had been some additional conversation after that, but in the end Sir Bart had decided that a bullet was perhaps not in his best interest.
As for wot Brodie owed him, he was not above keepin’ a man in his back pocket, as the sayin’ went.
It was always a good policy, particularly in the inquiry business, to have certain people he could rely on for information in exchange for an occasional favor, as in putting the word out to Sir Bart, with his new business enterprise, that certain people were looking for him.
Sir Bart scooped up the gold sovereign.
“Business must be good. And then there is that nice piece I heard ye got yerself married to.”
Brodie ignored that, for the moment. He took out another coin and laid it in front of himself at the table.
“Wot do ye hear about the murder of Constable Martin?”
“A friend of yours, as I recall,” Sir Bart commented with his usual affectation in keeping with that borrowed name.
