“They haven’t been slept in,” she snapped.
“Ah, but I always feel a good passionate sobbing fit is always helped by clean, warm sheets. Embraced by the mother’s womb, it feels like.”
The Widow Foster stared at me and then sighed.
“Very well, but in and out, mind you. A lady should not be seen like this.”
“Ah, well, perhaps it’s better she stays,” William said. “That way we have a witness. To show nothing untoward happened between an unmarried man like myself and one such as you.”
“Oh, who would believe that, you flappy ponce?” Widow Foster asked.
William grinned.
“Do be a bit more careful, dear Poppy. Enquiring minds like to talk,” he said. “Come. Tell us what ails you. Is it about our earlier conversation? Tilt your head back a bit. Have you got hair pins about?”
“Yes,” she said, and opened a drawer. “That trapper that Tremblay has hired as man-about. He threatened me. Said if I didn’t drop it and leave, I would face dire consequences. Me! How dare he threaten a lady like myself.”
“Indeed,” Corcoran said. “There we are, one pin down, thirty to go. I’m afraid this will be rather a pain for my hands as they are. Perhaps I brought a wig abouts in my bedchambers.”
“Yours are all wont to make me look boyish.”
“There are some who would fancy that.”
“Corkie, you tease. No. I just don’t know what to do. I haven’t any leverage left against Tremblay. I’m afraid I’ll never… well, you know.”
“Yes, yes,” he said, between some pins in his lips. “I am afraid we all have our dangling treasure at the end of a long road of life. I believe that, come the end of this evening—within the striking of two chimes of the hour—your long suffering shall be no more, my dear.”
“Whatever do you mean?”
“We both are after something precious,” he said. “Both golden. I aim to ensure that Tremblay pays his dues.”
“What are you up to, Corkie?”
“Never you mind,” he said. “There are... oh, how do I put it? I studied here and there, you must understand. Part of my global tutelage. I have happened across certain techniques, ones that expand one’s sense of self. No single man craves to be bound by a single set of perceptions, I hope you agree.”
“No single woman, either,” Poppy said.
“And I have perhaps imparted some of that wisdom upon our dearest host this evening,” Corcoran said. “Tremblay has wealth, assuredly, but what he does not have is the ability to see into the hearts of all who surround him. He is absolutely positive he’s surrounded by a coterie of angry, itinerant hangers-on waiting for scraps to fall from his mouth. And he’s not half-wrong, the Divine bless him. I am rather hoping that by this evening, his perceptions are altered, however slightly.”
“Do you wish to elucidate any further?”
Corcoran stared into the mirror, and his gaze met my own.
“No,” he said. “I believe I shall wait for a refreshment. I’m parched, you understand.”
I took my cue, bundling the linens and making a show of bustling out the door. I sat and waited, ear against the wood, and could only hear hushed mutterings.
I shook my head, and stalked back towards the dance hall, tossing the sheets on a nearby chair. I was after Vic.
* * *
The next chime rang to the sound of toasts in the next room. The brown-suited past version of Tremblay was giving a fanciful, rowdy speech. I found Vic in the supper hall, talking with the soup girl. There was a knot of intense anger that bobbed to my throat, and I swallowed, breathing in deeply before I tugged at his shoulder. He followed me to a darker corner.
“Hey,” I said. “I spoke with the Widow Foster. She ran off because the past you was hired to intimidate her about her daughter. William Corcoran came to calm her down. I heard he has a plan—something he picked up during travel, something he said will ‘broaden Tremblay’s perceptions.’ They talked about something else—something about getting Tremblay to pay his dues.”
“That sounds serious.”
“Corcoran said it would happen in an hour.”
