“But if she promised—” Val’s smile cut me off.
“A promise to Miss Simms is a promise to the devil. All I had to do was offer the girl, Cass is her name, some coin. Although she hates Miss Simms enough that I think she might well have told me everything simply for spite.”
“What did you discover?”
“Not everything. She confirmed that she often saw Sir Edward and spoke to him. And when I explained to her that his widow had questions, she asked to speak with you directly.”
I stared at him. “Surely you told her no.”
“I did not,” he stated roundly. “You want answers and Cass is willing to give them to you.”
“Val, I appreciate this Cassandra’s—”
“Cassiopeia,” he put in.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Cassiopeia. All the girls are given anom de guerre, for lack of a better phrase, from Greek mythology. To carry out the Pandora theme.”
“Yes, well, that is commendably thorough. All the same, I do not think it at all suitable that I should meet this person.”
But even as I said the words, I regretted them. Val risked his good name and his personal safety to give these squashed blossoms medical treatment. Aunt Hermia provided a refuge for those willing to give up the game and live a more conventional life. And Morag herself, well, it was best not to dwell on Morag. But I could not be happy instructing Val to do that which I could not. I had been attempting to prove myself a worthy partner in this investigation from the very beginning. It was time to show my mettle.
“I am sorry. Of course I shall meet with her. Have you made the arrangements?”
Val did not disappoint me. Knowing the impossibility of meeting either at my home or her place of business, Val had arranged a rendezvous in the Park for the next morning. He had provided Cass with enough money to procure herself a bit of incognita, and he had told her I would be thickly veiled and wearing black. He promised to escort me himself, in spite of Cass’ warning that she would speak only to me.
“You have done rather well for your first foray into investigation,” I told him.
He smiled wearily. “Is it? You have forgotten the Heath.”
I felt myself flush, remembering the way that adventure had concluded. “You had best go to bed now,” I said in my best bossy-elder-sister voice. “We must be out early to catch our little bird in the Park.”
He left me and I retired, but sleep came slowly. Val’s reminder of the adventure on the Heath had caused me to think of Brisbane. I wondered what he was about in Paris. I remembered his cool detachment, his thinly veiled anger the last time we met. I thought of Fleur, and her elegant, dazzling charms, how he confided in her so willingly and turned to her in times of trouble. And by the time I finally dropped off to sleep, I was fairly certain that he thought of me not at all.
THE THIRTY-SIXTH CHAPTER
When sorrows come, they come not single spies,
But in battalions.
—William Shakespeare
Hamlet
The next morning I would have just as soon stayed abed. A chill, nasty wind had blown up, with a dark canopy of grey cloud that threatened rain. If I had looked to the weather for a portent, I would have been highly disappointed. But Cass, the obliging young inmate of Pandora’s Box, proved more informative than I had dared to hope.
She found me, almost as soon as I entered the Park, Val pacing discreetly behind me. She was dressed as a flower girl in a worn coat of threadbare green velvet and a straw hat wreathed in yellow blossoms. She approached me, calling her wares and offering me a fistful of lavender.
“Good morning, your ladyship,” she said, smiling broadly. Her accent was the commonest sort of London speech, at times almost unintelligible. But her face was roundly attractive. She had a charming, winsome manner and a smile that seemed to illuminate her entire face. Her colour was high, and I wondered if she found the whole exercise to be some sort of grand enterprise.
“Good morning,” I returned civilly. “Are you Cassiopeia?”
She smiled, revealing rather good teeth. “That’s what they call me at the Box. My real name is Victoria, just like the queen. Vicky, they called me at home.”
“What shall I call you?”
“Oh, Lord, I don’t care, my lady. Whatever you likes.”
