“Hello to you, too,” she said smartly. “And I have no intention of shaking Bennett loose. In fact, we came because we need your help.”
“’Ain’t ’eard that before,” Doolittle muttered. “All right, to the office, the pair o’ you.” Turning to his lover, he said, “Keep watch, Sal, and don’t ’esitate to put that talent o’ yours to use.”
“Which talent, Alfredkins?” Sal purred, running her fingers through his hair.
“With the pistol, you tart.” Doolittle gave her bottom an indiscreet squeeze, and Sal giggled. “Your other talents’ll keep ’til bedtime.”
A moment later, all business, Doolittle crooked his finger at Harry and Tessa, and they followed him through the curtain.
His office turned out to be a surprisingly well-appointed room at the back of the shop. The furnishings were of high quality, though mismatched. There was an oak desk, a half-moon rosewood table, and a zebrawood curio cabinet crammed to the gills. Peering inside the last, Harry saw a familiar-looking pig bladder device; he narrowed his eyes at Tessa, who just gave him a cheeky grin and tugged him over to a chintz settee.
Doolittle took the leather wingchair by the fire.
“State your business,” he said as grandly as any lord of the manor.
“First of all, I want to return these.” Tessa opened the large knitting bag she’d brought with her, and Swift Nick’s head popped up. In his mouth was yet another familiar item: the pack of naughty cards Tessa had used to fleece Dewey O’Toole.
“If it ain’t the furry bandit,” Doolittle drawled.
The ferret relinquished the deck to Tessa and, grinning, vanished back into the bag.
Tessa set the cards on the coffee table, next to a chess set missing several pieces. “Thank you for lending them to me.”
“Come in ’andy, did they?” Doolittle said easily. “’Eard about the bull and cow at Stunning Joe Banks’ establishment.”
During his tenure in the Black household, Harry’s vocabulary of rhyming slang had grown considerably. Thus, he knew that “bull and cow” meant a row.
“Let’s just say the cards provided the necessary distraction,” Tessa said.
Seeing the conspiratorial smile that passed between her and their host, Harry frowned. “How, precisely, do you know one another?”
“Known Tessie since she was a poppet with eyes bigger than ’er ’ead,” Doolittle said.
“Alfred and I met at The Underworld when I caught him stealing,” Tessa added fondly.
“Worked for the previous owner o’ the club, see, cove by the name o’ Hunt.”
Harry jolted. The prior owner of The Underworld was Gavin Hunt, and Hunt’s wife Persephone happened to be as thick as thieves with Harry’s sister-in-law, Marianne. The Hunts and Kents were friends, and, before he’d left for Cambridge, Harry had spent no little time in the company of the Hunt family. The fact that this Alfred Doolittle had a connection to them as well made him wary.
Yet he didn’t think he’d met Doolittle before. Nor did the other evince any sign of recognition as he palavered on.
“Now Hunt didn’t mind my borrowing a pair o’ candlesticks now and again, so ’ow was I to know that the rules were changed under new management?” Doolittle’s tone was utterly reasonable, his expression as innocent as a babe’s. “Turns out, Tessie’s pa don’t take lightly to a bit o’ skimming. ’Is ’ounds caught my scent, so I took cover in one o’ the wenching rooms. Imagine my surprise to find it already occupied by this wee chick. And my further surprise when she didn’t make a peep when the guards arrived and asked if she saw anyone come in. Not a single peep, even though she saw me dive under the bed not a minute earlier—”
“And we’ve been friends ever since,” Tessa finished.
“Ah,” Harry said as if it were perfectly normal for a girl to befriend a thief. But that was his sprite: her loyalty was unfaltering. It was a trait apparently shared by Doolittle, for he looked at her with undisguised—and, fortunately for him,brotherly—affection.
“Right, then. What do you need your ol’ chum Alfred for this time?” Doolittle said.
Tessa glanced at Harry, who nodded. He trusted her judgement.
Moreover, they needed all the help they could get.
The connection between Inspector Davies and Black’s would-be assassin Loach had been too glaring for Harry to ignore. Not knowing who to trust, he’d asked Ambrose to make discreet enquiries into the activities of Inspector Davies. Yet this added another burden to his brother, who was already looking into De Witt’s financials and had his own cases to investigate.
Furthermore, Harry’s gut told him that the meeting at Nightingale’s had been a portent of bad things to come. Black had thrown down the gauntlet; anything could happen in the next sennight. It was imperative that they hunt down the villain before the bastard struck again.
Enter Tessa’s plan involving Doolittle.
