“You are,” she replied, with infuriating certainty. “Your shoulders are doing that thing they do when you are displeased with the state of the world and contemplating action.” She tilted her head, studying me. “Preferably involving a duke.”
Heat crept up my neck. “Do not be absurd.”
“It is one of my few unquestionable talents,” she said cheerfully, crossing the room and settling herself on the edge of the chair opposite me. “Reading people. Especially you. Now—what are you investigating?”
I set my quill aside. There was little point in pretense where Claire was concerned. She had known me too long, and too well, and more importantly, she possessed a rare discretion. One might confide in her without fear of whispers finding their way into drawing rooms or onto calling cards.
If I told her what I had learned at the modiste—about the woman who offered promises of better employment, and the house to which at least one of the missing girls had been lured—she might see something I had not. And she might insist upon knowing where I meant to go and why.
That would be a good thing, I told myself. It would not do to walk knowingly into danger without at least one sensible person having been forewarned.
“Young women have gone missing,” I said at last. “Maids, seamstresses, laundry girls. One was found dead in the Thames. And Scotland Yard has done nothing.”
Claire’s color drained at once. Her gloved hands clasped so tightly in her lap that the leather creaked. “And you are looking into it?”
I nodded. “Steele and I both. We engaged the enquiry agent who assisted us before. Through him, we learned how some of the girls disappeared. One vanished while fetching clean linen from a laundry. Today, at Madame Delacroix’s, I discovered that a seamstress was persuaded to accept more lucrative employment at a house in Chelsea.”
Her gaze sharpened. “And you intend to explore this yourself.”
“Yes. I am writing to Steele now—to inform him of what I have learned, and of what I mean to do.”
“Which is to visit Chelsea,” she said, with grim clarity. She knew me so well.
“Yes.”
“By yourself?” She surged to her feet. “That will not do, Rosalynd. It will not do at all. You should ask him to go with you.”
“I have to. Steele would be impossible to miss. A duke making discreet enquiries in Chelsea would attract precisely the sort of attention we wish to avoid.”
She frowned, clearly unconvinced.
“I will not go entirely by myself,” I added. “I shall take a footman with me, if that offers any consolation.”
Claire exhaled, though it was hardly a sound of relief. “I suppose that is something. But if you locate the house, you must not enter it unaccompanied. Have the footman remain with you at all times.”
“I—”
A sharp knock cut across the room before I could finish, and Honeycutt stepped inside with his usual air of grave propriety.
“My lady, the Dowager Countess has arrived. She requests a word.”
This was all I needed. But there was no help for it. “Show her in.”
“She only means well,” Claire said after Honeycutt departed.
“Yes, I know.” Above all, I knew Grandmother loved me.
Claire gazed at me with worried eyes. “Take care, Rosalynd. We wouldn’t want you to get hurt.”
“Grandmother does have a rather sharp tongue.”
Claire laughed. “I best be off before she arrives. If you need reinforcements, I’ll be with Cosmos in the library. He is engaged in some archaeological excavation of the shelves in search of a reference to a rare flower.”
“Claire,” I said quietly—a warning rather than a reproach.
She paused and turned back. “You need not concern yourself about him, Rosalynd. The very last thing I would do is cause him harm.” Her expression softened, and for a fleeting moment, she looked almost surprised by herself. “To my own astonishment, I find that I?—”
Another knock, more peremptory this time.
