Miss Sweeny slammed her iron-cuffed wrists against the table. “No! It was Stephen. It had to have been. Before she married, my lady wasn’t out in society enough to have met any other unsuitable men. She stayed at home, she and Miss Stroud and Mr. Cowper and Stephen.”
“You said Stephen and Frederick Cowper had a falling out,” Jasper reminded her.
“They did,” she said.
“When?”
She lifted her chained hands and rubbed her temples in frustration. “I don’t know exactly. Everything unraveled between everyone after Master Teddy died. I think it was around that same time.”
Jasper had paced to the door. Now, he held still. The missing phaeton and horse from Cowper Hall had plagued him, especially after finding Stephen’s muddied gig and horse at his farm. Sam Everton had confirmed Stephen had taken Helen to London, too.
So that meant someone else had taken the phaeton and horse from the viscount’s stables. Someone who would have had ready access to them. Someone who would have wanted to reach that little glass tube hidden under a floorboard before anyone else.
Someone who had known about Francine Stroud’s letter and what she’d found in Teddy’s hand.
“Inspector?” the maid queried. He’d been silent too long.
Her voice snapped him out of his trancelike focus, and he wrenched the door open. Sergeant Warnock was still at his desk, though the rest of the department had thinned out. Constable Wiley remained, along with Price and another newer constable that must have been hired while Jasper was in Liverpool.
“Where is Lewis?” he asked sharply.
Warnock grimaced and shot a glance toward Chief Inspector Coughlan’s office. The door was closed, but the Irishman’s grumbling voice could still be heard.
“He’s in with the chief,” Warnock said. “Coughlan’s none too pleased to hear Miss Spencer was involved in another arrest.”
Jasper stilled. “What arrest?”
The sergeant’s lips gaped like a landed fish. “I thought you knew, sir. Mrs. Gleason from Gleason’s Department Store. Some kind of opium smuggling ring.”
“Opium?” Christ. What in hell had happened since the previous evening? He held up his hand. “Never mind. Warnock, Price,” he said. “You’re both with me. Wiley, charge Miss Sweeny with the murder of Stephen Decamp. She has confessed.”
Wiley hoisted himself up from his chair, looking peeved to be given an order this late in the evening. Especially as there would be paperwork to complete and arrangements to be made to hold the prisoner for the night.
Warnock and Price, however, jumped to their feet, and each reached for their coat and hat.
“Where are we going, sir?” Price asked.
“To the hotel at Paddington Station,” Jasper replied, reaching for his own still-damp coat and bowler. “If Frederick Cowper is still there, I need to speak to him.”
“Cowper?” Wiley asked, pausing from his walk toward the interview room. “He was here earlier.”
Jasper’s heels dragged to a stop as he was putting on his coat. “When? What did he want?”
“A half hour ago, or so. He was leaving London and wanted some things belonging to his cousin, the Dalton victim.”
“What things?”
“Didn’t say. Of course, I told him we couldn’t release any evidence until the case is closed,” he said, puffing up his chest with a look of superiority. “And I told Miss Spencer to quit going through the box, too.”
Jasper had started away again, but at the mention of Leo, he stopped and stared at the constable. “Miss Spencer was here as well?”
Wiley snorted derisively. “Aye, she said she was here to give her report to Sergeant Lewis about the arrest of that department store owner. But instead, Mr. Cowper and I found her going through the evidence box for the Dalton murder. Can’t keep her bloody beak out of police business, that woman.”
Jasper clenched his hands into fists at his side. “When did she leave?”
“Same time as Mr. Cowper.”
His pulse skipped. “They left together?”
