“I’ll be looking at the daily reports from the divisional chief inspectors for anyone answering the girl’s description.”
The inspector picked up Clark’s report. “She’s described as a young woman in her middle twenties, auburn-haired, wearing a gray coat and hat.”
“I’ll be sending a pair of constables along to check the hospitals,” O’Malley said. “A country girl from Ireland looking the wrong way? A cab may have knocked the poor lass down in the streets.”
Tennant scanned Clark’s report again. “Last seen at the Chapter House around the corner from St. Paul’s Cathedral. A copper interviewed the desk clerk.”
“St. Paul’s … I’m remembering something about a cab going missing thereabouts.” O’Malley retrieved a stack of reports from his desk and shuffled through them. “Here it is. On Tuesday night, a hackney driver never returned with his cab. His turf was Cheapside and the neighborhood around the cathedral.”
“All right, Paddy. Track down the copper on that beat and talk to the Chapter House desk clerk again. I’ll interview Lady Styles at Marlborough House.”
A pair of young mud larks had waited until midmorning for the tide on the Thames to turn and the gray water to recede, leaving a band of slime-slickened mud. The boys had come equipped with rubber boots, rakes, and a basket. They headeddown the cobbled roadbed of Trig Lane. The stone steps at the bottom of the street gave access to the oozing strand where they planned to dig for treasure. Almost anything would do. Even an old shoe could be dried out and sold for scrap.
Near the top of the lane, the sharp-eyed older lad spotted a battered tin near a broken crate.
“Empty,” he said. “Might be worth a ha’penny.” He dropped it in his basket. “Here, what’s this?”
He squatted, retrieved a red, hairy mass, and smoothed out a false beard. The boy fitted the hooks around the ears of his younger brother. “You could do a turn at the music hall with this, Sammy. Let me try.”
They took turns hooking on the beard and laughing at themselves. Then they stopped at the old warehouse near the turnoff into Trig Wharf.
“Oy, Bert. Look,” the younger lad said. “Somebody’s gone and smashed the lock.”
“Funny, that.”
They’d tried to explore the abandoned building earlier but hadn’t found a way inside. That morning, they heard neighing and banging behind the door.
The broken latch and the strange sounds were irresistible.
Tennant and a constable took a hansom from Scotland Yard, driving along the Mall, keeping St. James’s Park on their left. The cabbie turned right on Marlborough Road and rolled to a stop in front of a three-story brick mansion, the London residence of the Prince and Princess of Wales.
The inspector paid off the cabbie and looked up at the columned portico that sheltered the front door. Then he walked up to the entrance.
“Blimey,” the young copper said. “Begging your pardon, sir, but you’ll not be knocking at the front door?”
“Certainly, Constable.”
The footman who answered hesitated when Tennant gavehis name and rank and asked to see Lady Styles. Then the servant led the two policemen down a short flight of marble steps to the entry hall and asked them to wait. The young copper stood rooted at the room’s center; the inspector crossed the Persian carpet to examine the tapestry on the wall.
Tennant turned when someone said, “La Primavera.” A tall, fair woman dressed in a gray-and-black day frock stood in the doorway. “It’s an exquisite woven copy of the Botticelli masterpiece.”
“Lady Styles?”
“That’s right, Inspector.” She descended the steps and offered her hand. “There’s a small drawing room in this wing where we can speak in private. The maids light a fire in the morning, and I often sit there before luncheon.”
“Thank you.”
She opened a door and smiled. “It feels a little less like sitting in a museum.”
Tennant and his constable followed her into a bright, south-facing room with a large window that afforded a garden view. The inspector and Lady Styles sat in facing armchairs by the fireplace. The young copper stood, waiting for instructions.
The inspector held up his bandaged hand. “With your permission, my constable will take the notes for this interview.”
When Susan said, “Of course,” Tennant nodded to the young policeman who fished a notebook and pencil from his tunic pocket.
“Lady Styles, a constable interviewed the Charter House desk clerk. He described Brigid Dowling, reported her arrival on Monday, and said she left at two in the afternoon on Tuesday. In your own good time, tell me about the girl and Marlborough House’s interest in her.”
Lady Styles began at the Isle of Wight with the discovery of Lizzie Dowling’s body, ending with her sister’s note and failure to keep the appointment.
