Rising from the corpse pose, Kendra donned a robe and slippers and made her way to the library. In the hallway, a maid gave her a strange look, clearly not accustomed to encountering ladies running around before seven o’clock, and certainly not in dishabille with their hair tumbling down their back.
“My lady. A-are you looking for your maid?”
“No, I’m sure she’s still sleeping. But I’d like coffee to be sent to the library, if it isn’t too much trouble.”
Another strange look. “No trouble at all, ma’am.”
Kendra spent the next fifteen minutes reworking the slate board to her satisfaction. The coffee arrived and she held a cup, sipping occasionally as she studied the new information.
Murder investigations, she reflected, were a little like the embroidery upon which Lady Atwood spent so much time. You began with dozens of colorful skeins that needed to be separated into individual threads. Each thread was then applied to cloth, and slowly, slowly, a picture began to emerge.
The analogy reminded Kendra of Edwina. Clever with the needle, Prudence had said. Where was the girl? Was she even alive?
Edwina had worked with the theater’s seamstress, Old Beatrice, who had insisted to Sam that she didn’t know anything. But was that true? Maybe she was like young Bridget, and didn’t want to talk to law enforcement. Or maybe she needed time to think, to remember something that might help them find the girl.
After she met with Goldsten, Kendra would pay Old Beatrice a visit.
Kendra looked back to the slate board. Less than a dozen names now. Burnell’s was at the top of the list. She didn’t like him; he reminded her of her father. But that wasn’t the reason he was the top suspect—was it?
She reviewed the evidence. He didn’t have an alibi, had been home alone for both murders, for Christ’s sake. But that bothered her. Burnell wasn’t stupid. If he was going to kill someone, wouldn’t he have a ready-made alibi in place?
Of course, he was also an arrogant prick. Maybe he was egotistical enough to think he didn’t need to.
The library door sprang open and, with some surprise, Kendra watched Molly barrel into the room in a flurry of skirts.
“Miss—Oi mean, milady!” The maid put her small hands on her hips and glared at Kendra. “Ye can’t go about lookin’ like that! It ain’t proper! Ye ‘aven’t even brushed yer ’air!”
Kendra glanced at the clock on the fireplace mantel. Time, she was shocked to see, had slipped away from her—it was close to eight-thirty.
“I was up early and wanted to work on a few things. I didn’t want to wake you.” Why was she apologizing? She was pretty sure there were rules in this era that ladies did not apologize to their maids and maids did not lecture ladies.
Molly’s freckled face scrunched up in a scowl. “’Tis me job! If’n ye wander about ’alf-dressed, w’ot does that say about me?”
“So, what you’re really concerned about is your reputation as a lady’s maid?”
“It’s the only reputation Oi ’ave, my lady,” she sniffed. “It means somethin’ ter me, even if ye don’t care if Oi’m a laughingstock.”
Kendra could deal with Molly’s irritation, but not the hurt she heard in the girl’s voice. “I’m sorry,” she said—rules be damned. “I was trying to be considerate. It won’t happen again.”
Good grief, did she really just promise tonotbe considerate?
Shaking her head, she started for the door. “Let’s go. I’ve got an appointment at ten. I don’t want to be late.”
Molly sniffed again, scurrying after her. “If ye’d ’ave waken me like a proper mistress, ye wouldn’t ’ave ter fret about being late for yer appointment, now would ye?”
Though in the end, she didn’t have to worry about being late for her appointment with Mr. Goldsten. Molly was putting the last touches on Kendra’s hair when a note arrived from Sam Kelly: The surgeon had died at his clinic from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Chapter 33
Throngs of men—apprentices and patients alike—were huddled outside the door to Goldsten’s laboratory. Kendra bulldozed her way through, earning a few grunts and annoyed exclamations.
“Son of a bitch.” The profanity was torn from her as soon as she crossed the threshold and her gaze landed on the surgeon sprawled on his back on the floor. Goldsten’s eyes were open and glassy. A pistol lay at least a foot away. A black hole drilled into his right temple. Blood congealed on the floor and spotted Goldsten’s cheek.
Sam was standing with two other men in front of a seated man. Kendra glimpsed red hair and a face pale enough to fit in with the patients in the ward. The man’s expression was blank, his eyes pinpricks of shock.
“What the hell happened?” she demanded furiously.
Sam stepped over to her. “Self-murder.”
