The Commissioner has provided what he promised. The reports on the missing women. The coroner’s summary of the body recovered from the Thames. You will, I think, wish to read them for yourself.
If you are willing to do so, come to Steele House this evening. We can go through them together.
Yours,
—S
I sanded the note, folded it, and rang the bell. Milford appeared with his usual speed.
“Have this taken to Rosehaven House at once,” I said. “Into Lady Rosalynd’s hand, if possible. If not, into Honeycutt’s.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“Tell the footman he is to wait for a reply.”
Milford nodded and withdrew with the note.
I turned back to the papers. As the light outside the window began to thin, lamps pricked to life along the square. I left my own unlit a little longer and read by what remained of the day.
The mortuary ledger entry for the drowned girl was worse than the coroner’s report in its way.
“Female. Unknown. Taken from river. Transferred for burial after inquest. No claimant.”
No description beyond the barest facts. No note of hair or eyes. No distinguishing marks. Nothing that might one day help someone match a memory to a lost face.
She had ceased to exist the moment the jury pronounced its formula, and the clerk wrote those words. Found drowned.
What seemed like moments later, the door opened again. Milford stepped in, a folded note upon a tray.
“From Rosehaven House, Your Grace.”
I took it. The script on the outside already familiar.
S,
Eleven. I will come by the back door.
—R
Eleven o’clock would keep us out of sight of most of London. It also cut things close to the border of scandal. The thought brushed against another I refused to examine closely. I slipped the note into my waistcoat.
“See that the back door is unbolted shortly before eleven. When Lady Rosalynd arrives, bring her straight here. No one else needs to attend us.”
“Very good, Your Grace.” Milford hesitated. “Shall I see that the household retires early?”
“Yes. There is no need for anyone to be underfoot.”
“May I bring you something to eat, Your Grace?”
It would not do to go without sustenance, not with so much yet to be done. “Bread and beef will suffice. Some cheese as well. And ale.”
“Very good, Your Grace.”
Once he had gone, I lit a lamp. Too many hours remained before eleven. I used them as best I could, tracing the lines the reports suggested and following each implication to its end.
Milford returned with a plate and a tankard. He set them before me without comment and withdrew, leaving me alone once more with my thoughts.
Once I dealt with the food and drink, I marked on a map the last known locations of each girl. A laundry in Lambeth. A dressmaker in New Bond Street. A house in Bloomsbury. St Agnes in Clerkenwell. The city scattered them like pins on a gaming board. When I added the place where the body had risen from the river and the rough line of the current, a different shape emerged.
