Reddening, Lucy nodded, taking her arm. ‘There’s a dress that’sperfect, a blue one from Dickens and Jones.’ Her laugh lilted with uncertainty.
Was she unsure about the dress or the lunch itself? It was hard to tell with Lucy these days. When Miranda had been in the launderette last week, the attendant gave her a few things that Lucy had left in the machine – including a set of racy black lingerie. Once again, she hoped the man she was seeing wasn’t playing games with her.
‘Please, Miranda. I paid back the last loan, didn’t I?’
Miranda wondered where she’d been getting the money. ‘Did you join Morris’s band?’
‘Not for now,’ Lucy replied as they headed into the station. ‘If my meeting works well, I’ll have far bigger stages lined up.’
Reluctantly, Miranda opened her purse and handed her a few banknotes. ‘I hope you know what you’re doing.’
The bustle and light of the ticket hall was welcoming. Soon Miranda would be home, Betty making her a cup of tea as they caught up on their days. It surprised Miranda how used to it she’d become, the routine, the easiness of the place.
But this evening, she knew what they’d be discussing. Everyone in the palace was talking about the underbutler leaking palace stories to the press. He’d been thrown out of his job with legal action pending.
Miranda’s pulse quickened at the thought of it: how quickly they’d closed in. How she could be banished from the palace, ejected from Betty’s home should the truth come out.
With her next article due and the suspected underbutler gone, the palace would start looking for other suspects. Could she be next on their radar? Miranda hadn’t anticipated that they’d register a weekly column in a small New York paper so quickly – like others before her, she’d underestimated the British tabloids’ ferocity at searching the world for the next big story.
Nor had she considered that her link to New York would look so obvious.
Thank heavens they were expecting the villain to be a man. She rolled her eyes at the thought of it. Did they really think so little ofwomen? And even worse, was she hoping that they would overlook her for this reason?
As she led them both through the front door, the smells and sounds of Betty’s cooking coming from the kitchen, she was reminded of another detail in the matter. The underbutler’s colleagues who had supposedly helped him had also been reprimanded, and the senior butler who had hired him was deemed responsible and fired. Miranda couldn’t help thinking of Betty and the others.
If Miranda were caught, would they, too, be fired?
MIRANDA WAS STILL THINKINGthis over as she made her way to the telephone box later that evening. She’d been putting off calling O’Hara, but tonight she had her future to think about.
Outside, a wind had picked up, and an empty beer bottle clinked as it rolled against a wall. Rain lurked in the air, so she pulled her coat tightly around her and trotted across the street. The gang in the alleyway didn’t appear to be there today, probably due to the brewing storm, but through habit she sped around the streets.
Inside the telephone box, she slotted in a number of coins and listened as O’Hara picked up the phone. ‘What have you got?’
‘I have more information about possible saboteurs. As well as the Scottish rebels and the IRA, the palace’s main worry is the communists. Only a few years ago a couple of Soviet double agents were rooted out of Westminster, and there’s a rumour that other members of the group have infiltrated the palace.’
‘Do they plan to disrupt the coronation? That would cause a great stir around the world.’
She wavered, knowing that O’Hara wouldn’t be happy with the truth. ‘It appears that the risk is low, to be honest, sir. Any group that manages to bypass security and sabotage the event is likely to become very unpopular by a world longing to see the beautiful young queen in all her finery. Instead of gaining support, that group would be loathed the world over.’
There was a pause, and she heard the cigarette lighter going, O’Harainhaling before he raged, ‘Give me real stories then, Miranda. I’ve warned you before, if you can’t get me anything sensational, I don’t know why you’re even there.’
And for a brief second, she wasn’t quite sure either. Why was she there? Was it because she needed to keep a job she loathed? Was it because she hated living in her friends’ flats, hated going home, hated how empty her life had become? Were there so many things wrong with her life in New York that she’d cheated herself into believing that she was escaping to keep her job?
As she put the receiver down, she let her hand linger on it a moment. ‘I need to buck up,’ she whispered crossly at herself.
Although these words would usually refocus her, tonight she felt unravelled. First there was the palace on her trail and the worry about what would happen to her friends if she was caught. And then there was Lucy – what was she up to? And now she kept having to shove Sinclair out of her mind, too. How stupid she’d been for opening herself up to him – what had she been thinking?
Outside, she hurried to get home, eager to jot things down in her notebook. It was raining now, so she pulled up the collar of her coat and made a dash for it through the dark alleyway. Betty might have warned her about the dangers, but Miranda had looked after herself in the Lower East Side, for heaven’s sake. It was a shame she didn’t have a gun, but there was a pocketknife in her purse. That would do the trick if necessary.
The alley wasn’t long, but as Miranda started down it, she became aware of every sound.
A movement in the shadows made her flinch, but it was only a rat scurrying around an old shoe and some crumpled newspaper.
Repulsed, she increased her pace, her high heels echoing around the bleak fences.
It wasn’t until she reached the end that she realized where the men had gone.
There, just before the street, four of them barred her way.
