His pale brows soared. “Are you, now?” He leaned a hip against the table, and it squeaked loudly as it lurched under his weight. He hastily returned to his feet. “Don’t suppose I could give you that list to research? You know, a favor?”
Saffron tamped down the sense of victory threatening to show on her face. “A favor?” She frowned somewhat melodramatically. “I don’t know …”
He held up his hand, saying, “If it wouldn’t be too much trouble. You’ll be in those journals and books anyway, won’t you? I’ll owe you one.”
She pursed her lips as if considering, while inside she was beaming. Nearly everyone liked Spalding, and his word in her favor could be useful. “Very well.”
Ten minutes later, she was on her way to the library with Inspector Green’s list in her hands.
Light seemed to slip through the windows of the library like water through fingers. The afternoon had barely begun, in Saffron’s mind, and already the warm sunlight had dimmed to a blue-tinted glow.
Ithadbeen hours since she’d begun picking through texts. Inspector Green’s list of chemicals was lengthy, not to mention theywere given as a combination of brands and unnamed mixtures. Haber-Bosch was featured alongside monocalcium phosphate. Deciphering those wasn’t difficult, as she was already familiar with some, but determining what any of them might to do the human body was quite another thing.
Asking Lee was a possibility, but she’d just been to see him. After his parting comment about Alexander, she was wary of asking too much of him. He undoubtedly thought she and Alexander were together, and she didn’t want to make Lee resentful when she believed there was a possibility of resuming their friendship.
There was an entire chemistry department at the university, but she knew no one who worked in it. With her reputation lingering near the bottom of the list of desirability, she didn’t know if she could get any of them to assist her.
But Lee had a friend in Chemistry, she recalled. Hope lit in her chest. Romesh, his name was, and he’d analyzed some cocaine Lee had once been given. Lee had mentioned that Romesh hadn’t been happy about it, but Saffron wasn’t going to bring him illicit substances.
She got to her feet, checking the clock on the far end of the quiet library hall. Over the heads of two dozen students and staff bent over the rows of long tables topped with glowing green lamps, she saw it was a quarter to five. Some would already be gone from their labs and offices, but perhaps Romesh—was that his surname?—might not be.
The Chemistry Hall, just across an alley from the North Wing to the east, had a strange smell. It wasn’t pleasant, but Saffron couldn’t quite put a finger on what was bad about it. It was like the gentle stink of pear tree blooms mixed with the strange fruit a researcher had once brought to the North Wing to share after an expedition to Southeast Asia. Saffron, a student at the time, had wondered if the long journey back to England had made the durian fruit overripe and thus unpalatable, but Maxwell, who’d given her a piece to try, had insisted that the sweet onion flavor was as expected.
The building itself was not so different from her own haunts, white-walled and tiled. Many of the windows were open, likely in an effort to air out the place. They let in the late afternoon chill and thesounds of busy Gower Street beyond. The halls were mostly empty. It was easy enough to find the lab of the man she was searching for or at least make an educated guess. Romesh was not a typical English name, so she searched for a name that was equally non-English sounding.
Datta, she thought, might match. The light was on within, she noted with some excitement. Perhaps she could make further progress in her investigation this evening after all.
She knocked and then knocked again when no one answered. A sound like a chair scraping across the floor preceded footsteps approaching the door.
It swung open, and a petite woman blinked up at Saffron. She had deep brown skin with large brown eyes framed by a messy Eton haircut that, at first glance, made the young woman look almost like a young man. She wore a man’s shirt, complete with a starched collar, tucked into a narrow skirt. Neither her clothing nor her short hair could conceal she was a woman, however.
She looked expectantly at Saffron.
“I’m looking for Romesh …?” Saffron offered, preparing to ask if the woman belonged to that name.
Just then, a man in a white lab coat came striding down the hallway. He was reading a file and came up short when he saw her.
He matched the woman in coloring, his skin a rich bronze and his hair thick and black. His eyes were huge behind his spectacles, not from surprise, but because the lenses magnified them significantly.
“Are you Romesh?” Saffron asked him.
“Yes.” He sounded and looked baffled. He glanced toward his office, saw the woman with the Eton crop, and scowled. “What do you want with my cousin?” He turned to the woman. “Savita, what have you done now?”
Not appreciating the harsh tone, Saffron said, “I came in search of you, Dr. Datta.”
His cousin snorted. “Romesh hasn’t a doctorate. He’s too busy trying to appease his fiancée.”
“Vita!” Romesh scowled at her. “Get back into the office and stop being troublesome.”
The girl’s protests were cut off by Romesh chivying her back from the doorway.
Saffron cleared her throat. “Mr. Datta?”
Romesh turned around, looking exasperated. “I apologize for my cousin, Miss—?”
“Everleigh. Saffron Everleigh, in Botany.”
“Everleigh—Everleigh?” Romesh looked agog at her. “You’re Lee’s associate?”
