“Which means he trusted Tiny? Except, as you say, Mort could have cleaned up easier than poor Tiny, so it must be someone else.” Eleanor worked her way through the people Tiny might have helped. Or who may have paid him to help, since he liked money?
“Presumably, they knew Greybourne was heading this way and they had to hurry. But the killer must have been smaller than Mort if he needed Tiny’s help.” Hunt continued working it through his engineer’s mind.
“Percival,” Arnaud suggested.
“Stupid Stew,” Grey added in disgust.
“Or both,” Hunt decided grimly. “They’re a pair of mewling lackwits. Let us adjourn this discussion until tomorrow. I’m famished and I don’t want to ruin my supper.”
Never very good at playing patient, Eleanor stood up, signaling for the men to remain seated. “It seems we have a lovely new table and chairs. Let me see if our brilliant cook has prepared an adequate repast from her market shopping this morning.”
Grey stood anyway, his expression of concern returning. “You took a nasty blow today. We should be waiting on you.”
She loved his concern, but their futures were at stake here. Her head was mostly clear now. She understood she couldn’t have what she wanted, not realistically, but she could pretend to be what he needed for a little while, until he learned how to have family and friends around him—instead of vile worms.
“While you were battling Tiny, I was resting. You really should change out of those boots.” Giving him something else to think about, she consulted with Miss Fields.
The young cook’s eyes sparkled at the notion of a dinner party. “Mr. Leonard brought in the prettiest china and silver! Mrs. Barton and I polished them up and set them on that lovely table. I even have a tureen for the soup and a serving platter for the ham!” She gestured at the meager stove. “Do you think it is enough?”
“We’ll have bread and cheese to fill up the truly hungry. No one can expect a full course meal on the spur of the moment. Thank you for preparing ahead!”
“You said I was to prepare for the unexpected. A day like this. . .” The young cook hesitated. “I heard some of what was said out there. Mr. Tiny, he was the runt of the litter and always following orders from his older brothers. If he were the one to hit you miss, I’m right sorry I didn’t warn you sooner.”
“He never hurt you, did he?” El asked in alarm.
“No, miss. I stayed in the kitchen and outta their way. They was always quarreling.”
“There is nothing more you could have done. Let us set the table and feed the hungry.” El had no desire to think about villains while showing Grey she could hold dinner parties as well as any socialite he might encounter.
Obviously, her mind was fuzzier than she realized.
Once everyone was seated and Mrs. Barton began serving, El deftly steered the conversation from grisly murder, unsuitable for digestion, to Grey’s scholarly book. After that, she brought up Hunt’s idea for more gas lighting and Thea’s expectations for the gallery.
“I do hope Grey can find a way to bring in more artists and their patrons,” Clare murmured to Eleanor as others turned to the fruit and cheese tray Peg carried in to finish the meal. “It’s a disappointment that Percival will not be writing an article, and we may lose Mort’s talent. Thea is finding it difficult to bring in respectable people this far from London.”
“I believe the professor has already sent off a few scholarly articles, although he’s not much given to writing pieces for popular journals.” El lowered her voice beneath an argument erupting over feeding the poor. “We have to keep him alive if we wish to see more articles. It seems Percival and Greybourne’s heir may have been trying to kill him, possibly for years. If we can’t find enough evidence to hold them, they will only try again.”
“Not Tiny? Isn’t he the one who attacked you?”
“Have Captain Huntley ask who was paying him. He’s not very bright. He may have been protecting any of the artists or Percival—or himself. I cannot think he has aught to do with Greybourne.”
“I cannot write a novel this complicated!” Clare cried. “There are far too many scoundrels.”
“Do not highwaymen roam in gangs directed by a single leader?” El asked, having spent far too much of her youth reading newssheets.
“And when the leader is hung, the gang disappears,” Clare finished thoughtfully. “A snake of many tails and only one head to direct them.”
“Off with his head,” El said sedately.
Forty-two
Rafe
Saturday morning, Rafe dodged Captain Huntley’s irate pacing. In the the late earl’s small, crowded study, the indignant wave of Hunt’s walking stick invited decapitation.
“Why wasn’t this Tiny scoundrel locked up with the rest yesterday and is his name really Tiny?”
Rafe backed against a bookshelf, dodging the next swing. “We ran out of cells and guards. Everyone said he wasn’t no more than a servant, fixing, cooking, running errands. They claimed he wasn’t bright and too scrawny to cause harm.”
