He did not say it.
Was it possible, I thought, that he no longer considered me a chit, a troublesome baggage who needed a nanny to constantly watch over me as he had once told me rather strongly. Not that it would have worked to tame my ‘wild ways,’ as he called them.
“After what happened at the marketplace...” he added.
I understood, really I did. And it would take me considerable time go to back through the letters while he was gone and I searched for any information that I might have missed.
I nodded.
“Yer word that ye willna take yerself off alone again.”
I wrestled with that.
I was reminded that Mikaela Forsythe had been forced to change, somewhat, her independent habits in the inquiry cases she took with Mr. Brodie. At least, as far as he knew.
“It’s the nature of men,” she once explained to me when I questioned something she had done after Mr. Brodie spoke against it.
“They believe they must protect us.”
“But ye protect yerself well enough,”I pointed out.
“Of course, yet there are times when I will admit I cannot do without him. And there are other things...”
“Wot other things?”
“If you are fortunate, you will discover it someday. Trust me, the arguments and the anger will seem unimportant.”
All well and good, I thought. Still...
“You will be careful,” I said as he turned to leave. He did deserve the caution, considering the stories I had heard about him from Mr. Brodie and Mikaela. And the truth was, I knew that I could not do this by myself.
That sharp gaze narrowed. Not angry. I knew that well enough, but something different.
“I will try not to get myself killed. Ye would have a difficult time explainin’ it to her ladyship.”
With that, he left, the door to the library snapping closed after him.
I turned back to the table and the task at hand.
I had the letters Dory had sent, as well as the ones I had sent to her. When I went back through her letters to me earlier, I was looking for something she might have mentioned about a new gentleman ‘friend’ from the tavern.
Or possibly someone she had encountered and didn’t like or was afraid of. There had been nothing I found then to indicate that she was concerned about anyone.
Still, it was possible that I had missed something, and now, after the attack on myself, I was looking for something different in those letters.
I spread them across the table in the library and began to read back over them again, one-by-one.
It was tedious and time consuming, particularly since the scrawl in her letters was often difficult and almost impossible to read. Still, I continued as the hours of the afternoon crept by and Munro had still not returned.
What might he learn from the man, Campbell, about what had happened at the marketplace? A man who apparently knew everyone and everything that happened in the parts of the city that he and his people protected.
How did Munro know of him? Obviously from past encounters, perhaps in business situations for her ladyship. Or from before?
I looked up. Simon approached from the hallway that adjoined Sir McQuarrie’s office and the front office beyond.
“Mr. Munro said that ye had work ye needed to do. I thought ye might want some coffee,” he said with a smile.
I accepted the invitation and stood to join him.
