Emma recoils into her seat. “Good Lord. Was she prescient?”
Just then, the door to the private room swings open. A waiter stands in the doorframe, presumably to announce the readiness of our table. Emma casts a pointed glance at Ngaio, who huffs at the reminder that she must enter the dining room discreetly, through the servants’ hallway. Even though the club is broad-minded, certain standards are enforced. And it simply won’t do to have Ngaio stride through the lobby in her pants.
It is then I notice that the waiter has been rendered immobile. When I follow his gaze, I see that the timeline has caught his attention. I suppose the University Women’s Club isn’t the usual spot for a murder investigation.
“May we help you?” I attempt to reanimate the young man.
“Apologies, ma’am.” In his gloved hand, he holds up an envelope. “This came for Mrs. Fleming.”
I reach out, knowing immediately who sent the missive. Only Mac calls me Mrs. Fleming. To everyone else, I am Dorothy Sayers.
Opening the unsealed flap, I slide out the note, skim it, and announce, “There’s been a development in May’s case. A confession.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
MARCH 29, 1931
LONDON,ENGLAND
We file into the police station, squeezing through the narrow front door of the Metropolitan Police precinct house. One by one, we arrange ourselves in a semicircle around the intake desk. A ginger-haired officer looks up at us; he doesn’t bother to hide his bemusement at the sight.
“May I help you ladies?” he asks with a smirk, as if he’s offering his elbow to a bunch of unsteady old women trying to cross the street. Assistance that, in truth, a few of us could use. “On the hunt for a lost cat?”
The Queens turn toward me, Ngaio’s pursed lips telegraphing her clear irritation at this condescension.How the policeman underestimates this group of women,I think. I clear my throat and say, “We understand you’ve received a confession in the case of Miss May Daniels.”
The policeman’s smirk remains plastered on his lips, but the light in his eyes dims. He is less tickled now and more leery. “Who told you that?” he asks.
Mac is responsible for the message at the University Women’s Club. Acknowledging my request for ongoing information about Miss Daniels, he sent it as a sort of love letter. And he wouldn’t have directed me to a police station to indulge my curiosity unless he felt fairly confident about his source.
Emma answers for me. “We know lots of things.” Her tone is imperious, and even her posture is that of a baroness.
“You maythinkyou know about a confession, ma’am. But use your loaf. Even if you’re right, I wouldn’t tell you one way or the other, and I wouldn’t share any details. All that would be confidential.” The policeman’s accent may be Cockney, but his bearing is every bit as haughty as Emma’s. Emma, her eyes wide, looks positively flabbergasted. I suppose this is one of the few times she’s been thwarted.
In a small, unassuming voice, Agatha asks, “How can it be confidential if we already know about it?”
She’s unnerved the officer. He doesn’t know what to make of her. I can almost see the cogwheels of his mind turn, torn between the soft inquiry of her very good question and the possibility that she might be patronizinghim.
The front door of the precinct house slams open. Two policemen storm in, pushing a couple of handcuffed men ahead of them. Grubby and sweating, the criminals are crowded into the entry space. Emma clutches her handbag, holding it tight next to her pearls—as if the manacled men could accost her—while Agatha and Margery retreat to the corner. Only Ngaio and I remain in position.
More people pour into the station. A family of four—impossibly young parents with a toddling young son and an infant who tug at my heartstrings. And a silver-haired man with a strikingly similar-looking younger fellow, both wearing aprons tucked under their coats. We are standing cheek by jowl, and the smell isn’t fresh.
The intake officer is done with us. “Ladies, we have criminals to book and citizens with real problems to address. If you’ve got no business with us other than this so-called confession, please take your leave.” He directs us to the exit.
We weave through the throng of people and police and wedge ourselves through the door single file. As we gather on the sidewalk outside, Ngaio says, “Well, that was a waste of our efforts. Yourhusband had no more information other than the station where the confession was delivered?”
“That’s it.”
She presses on. “Any more contacts from whom we can glean information?”
“Mac didn’t mention anything. And I can’t reach him because he’s in the throes of writing up a profile on the Tarrington case, desperate to meet a deadline.”
As we consider our next move, a voice calls out to us, “You ladies the ones asking the police about a confession?”
We turn to examine a young man with dark curls escaping from his cap. I recognize him more from his apron than from his facial features or hair. He’s the one who entered the police station after us with an older gentleman I assumed to be his father.
“We were,” I answer. “May I ask why you are curious?”
“Because I’m the one who found the confession.”
