“I want to read through it again.”
She smiled. “You are so provincial.”
I refrained from reminding her that I was from Cambridge, not the country. It wouldn’t matter to Flossy. Anything outside of London was “provincial” to her and therefore dreadfully dull. Only London and its endless amusements could satisfy her zest for life.
Aunt Lilian joined us and asked Flossy to fetch her bottle of tonic from her dressing table. Flossy hesitated.
“Now,” Aunt Lilian snapped.
Flossy bowed her head and hurried off.
I returned to the luggage room, which also acted as a cloakroom, and rifled through the pockets of my coat until I found the program. I was crossing the foyer again when the beak-nosed man who’d been talking to Mr. Hirst emerged from the stairwell beside the lift.
He scanned the area, spotted me, and hesitated. I smiled and he touched the brim of his bowler hat in greeting before heading for the front door.
On a whim, I said, “Mr. Clitheroe.”
He kept walking.
He exchanged glances with the night porter. The night porter did not open the door for Mr. Clitheroe as he ought to do for a departing guest.
I joined my aunt, cousin and their guests inthe small sitting room, but didn’t feel like joining in the conversation. Mr. Clitheroe had got me thinking. It wasn’t just that he didn’t respond when I said his name, or his furtive demeanor, it was also his clothes. He wore a well-made suit that wasn’t out of place during the day, but didn’t belong in a luxury hotel in the evening. All the gentlemen guests were dressed in tailcoats, bow ties, stiff white shirts with winged collars, and low-cut waistcoats with silk top hats, but Mr. Clitheroe wore a single-breasted coat and high-cut waistcoat with a simple necktie. A guest of the sort the Mayfair attracted wouldn’t leave the hotel in the evening wearing his daytime suit.
Which meant the beak-nosed man was not a guest at all.
“Haveyou seen the papers this morning?” Harmony stood in the doorway connecting my bedroom to the sitting room, a folded newspaper in hand.
I sat up, blinking away sleep. “What time is it?”
“Eight.”
“I asked you to wake me at nine today.”
“Did you? I don’t remember.”
I lay down again and pulled the bed covers up to my chin. “Come back later. It was a late night, and I’m tired.”
“Your breakfast will get cold.”
My stomach rumbled. I pushed off the covers and picked up the dressing gown folded over the back of the chair. “I suppose you want to know all about the show.”
“Oh yes, how was it?” Harmony led the way into the sitting room and deposited the newspaper on top of the tray’s flat lid where I couldn’t fail to see it. She proceeded to plump the sofa cushions until I invited her to join me for a cup of coffee.
She gave up the pretense of tidying and sat on the other chair at the small breakfast table. It was a little charade we went through every morning. She came to wake me, usually at eight, and sat with me while I ate breakfast, enjoying a cup of coffee. She should have been tidying my suite, and as far as the housekeeper was aware, that’s precisely what she was doing, but I kept the rooms tidy myself. After breakfast,Harmony often stayed to do my hair. The morning routine had given us time to become friends, as much as a woman and her maid could be friends. More often than not, we spoke to one another as equals. Harmony had quickly learned that I didn’t put on airs and wasn’t used to an idle, luxurious life like my aunt and cousin, and I’d realized she was clever and had a thirst for knowledge. I’d taken to borrowing books from the hotel library and giving them to her to read on her time off. Not that she had much spare time.
I handed her the program for the Hippodrome’s opening show and described some of the spectacular acts. While she made all the right sounds, I knew she wasn’t particularly interested. I cut my account short and turned to my breakfast tray and the newspaper she wanted me to read.
I didn’t even have to turn the page to know what had piqued her interest. It was right there on the front in bold type: ACTRESS FALLS TO DEATH AT THE PICCADILLY PLAYHOUSE.
“How terribly sad,” I said as I read the article. “That must be why the theater was in darkness last night. It says here the show was canceled following her death in the afternoon.”
Harmony moved up alongside me. “It says it was suicide.”
According to the article, Miss Pearl Westwood had thrown herself from the second tier dress circle. Her body had been found by the theater staff preparing for the evening’s performance.
“The poor woman.” I folded up the newspaper and set it beside the coffee pot and cups.
“Poor Lord Rumford.”
