If he was aware of his effect, Harris did not show it.
“Just passing,” he said briskly. “Thought I’d step in and tell you what we know about yesterday’s body on the doorstep. It was removed from a paupers’ grave in Holborn which was due to be filled in. One of the workers was bribed to lift the top one and put it on a cart.”
“Bribed by whom?” Solomon asked. “And when?”
“By an old lady muffled up as if it were winter, at about five in the afternoon when the men were finishing up for the day. Couldn’t get much more out of the man. He couldn’t tell her accent because of the scarves around her face, and I don’t think he looked very hard either. A shilling’s a shilling, and he thought she’d be selling it to anatomists anyway.”
“Mrs. Willow? Or the sister?”
Harris sighed. “Your guess is as good as mine, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was one of them. They’re positively vitriolic about Mrs. Silver’s house. Some people get completely addled by religion and lose sight of the point. In any case, I can’t pin it on either of them. They were both out at the right time, claimed to be on church business, but frankly, I don’t have the men to confirm that right now. Just as well, for they have friends in high places.”
Solomon stood up, frowning. “You’re going to let them get away with it?”
“I have no evidence,” Harris retorted. “I am already investigating several murders. And frankly, you can’t have it both ways with the police—no attention one minute and every attention when it suits you. I gave them both a severe lecture on the law, disease, and nuisance, and though they were absolutely livid, I believe they took it to heart. If it was them, I doubt they’ll do anything like that again.”
“You will have no objection if we continue our own investigation?”
“None. As long as you don’t cause your own breach of the peace. I seriously doubt they’re involved in the earlier business, though. They don’t have anything to do with drugs or even herbal remedies.”
“Did they tell you that?” Solomon asked skeptically.
“No, the housekeeper did, and the lady’s maid confirmed it.”
There was a short silence. Solomon sat down again.
“What haveyoulearned?” Harris asked at last.
“That St. John and Neville knew other. Nevvy was a gentleman fallen on hard times. They grew up together. And died together, oddly enough, by accident or design. Also…we think St. John or his family might have been blackmailed by the dressmaker Madame Veronique. Is she known to you?”
Harris’s eyebrows had almost reached his hairline. “I’ll look into it,” he said. “For what it’s worth, St. John’s flask definitely contained opium in quantity, probably laudanum, and brandy. The flask itself was made about two decades ago, but he doesn’t seem to have used it much in the ten years before the night he died. I’m thinking stupid, but accidental death.”
“Only he wasn’t stupid,” Solomon said ruefully.
Harris rose this time and headed for the door. “Keep us informed.”
“Likewise,” Solomon murmured.
He was far from satisfied that the old ladies should get away with nothing more than a lecture. They would keep up their nuisance campaign, probably as soon as police attention moved on from the area. He could not allow Constance—or her girls—to be menaced or even hurt. In his experience, ill feeling only ever escalated.
He was still sitting deep in thought when Constance came in, reporting, as Janey had, that all was well with the establishment. “But all the same, I think I shall go back tonight, perhaps organize some kind of watch.”
She looked rather carefully at Solomon, as though she expected him to object.
“Good idea,” he said. “Harris more or less told me that they’ve ruled the Willow household out of the murder and they’re giving up on the ‘nuisances,’ as he calls them. So it is up to us.”
By the time he had reported everything about Harris’s visit, Hat came in and said a young lady was asking for Mrs. Grey.
Chapter Fourteen
Intrigued, Constance leftSolomon’s office and went to see who was in the waiting room. The very fashionable young lady, who sat there with all the poise of a princess, lifted her veil.
“Miss St. John,” Constance said in surprise. “Is Mr. Cordell with you?”
“No. I am quite capable of hiring a hackney on my own.”
“Then I presume your mother doesn’t know you’re here either.”
A smile flashed across the girl’s face and was gone.
