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She took Miss Decima’s hand and shook it briskly. Miss Decima glanced at her hand afterwards, like it had just been licked by a stray dog.

‘I just wanted to say how grateful I am that you’re doing all this,’ said Flora. ‘Helping Lavinia, I mean. I can’t believe that I’m saying this, but … I don’t think I trust the police in this matter at all. Not after what I heard them saying yesterday. I know that she’s innocent. So any help that I can offer you, please just ask.’ She turned to me with a glowing smile. ‘After all, you know where I live. Ha, ha!’

‘Thanks,’ I said. I couldn’t work out why she was blushing so much.

‘Not at all!’ she replied quickly. ‘Well, best be off. Don’t want Old Ripley to see me. She’s in a foul mood, a real stinker! Marching around the building and screaming at the top of her lungs. Something about a priceless vase that belonged to her late grandmother.’

She made to turn away, and then paused, as if she’d just thought of something.

‘I overheard what she said to you in her office, by the way – about not knowing Lavinia was in the WSPU. It’s nonsense. They had a barnstorming row about it just last week – Ripley threatened to have Lavinia thrown out, but Lavinia said something or other that changed things. I’ve no idea what she said, but she was ever so pleased about it afterwards. If you ask me, Ripley’s just lying to save face. Well – ta-ta!’

She scurried off, stopping to give us a final wave as she reached the door. Even from this distance, I could see that she was still blushing. ‘Well! That was interesting, Miss Decima,’ I said.

‘It certainly was,’ she grunted. ‘Share your thoughts, Stephen.’

I cleared my throat. ‘Well – if we’re following the principle of Osbert’s Shaver, with the most obvious answer being the right one and all that, Mrs Ripley is a chief suspect. She had the opportunity to commit the murder, seeing as she was campaigning outside the Hall on Saturday and could easily have sneaked into the road to lie in wait for Constable Watts. She had the means to steal Lavinia Welford’s reed blade and use it as the murder weapon, given that she could enter her bedroom whenever she wanted. And, from the sound of what Flora just said, she had some kind of motive for framing Lavinia, too.’

Miss Decima gave a single slow nod. ‘Quite. Then again, it does make you wonder why Flora felt so compelled to pass on that piece of information.’

I blinked. ‘I don’t follow.’

Miss Decima tapped her lip with her walking stick. ‘If we are following the principle of … Osbert’s Shaver, Flora fulfils those exact same criteria. She says she was ill in her bedroom on the night of the murder, which would give her ample opportunity to sneak out and lie in wait for Constable Watts. She had the means to steal that knife, too, given that she was Lavinia’s roommate, as well as the ribbons that Lavinia was hiding.’

I gazed at the door to the building into which Flora had just disappeared. ‘What’s her motive, though?’

‘Who knows?’ she said crisply. ‘She may not have one. She may be perfectly innocent. But, either way, I’m not entirely convinced that she followed us outside to express her fondest gratitude. I suspect she had another reason entirely.’ She gave me another weighted look – the weightiest one yet. ‘Bit of rough. Never fails, eh?’

My ears burned so much I thought I might pass out.

‘So!’ Miss Decima barked, suddenly energized. ‘We have three suspects: Peter, Mrs Ripley, Flora. We shall have to keep a close eye on them all over the next few days. I suspect that, like most murderers, they won’t be able to fight the urge to return to the scene of the crime.’

I scowled. First Peter, now Flora. I was beginning to wonder if Miss Decima was going to accuse everyone that I liked of murder.

She rapped her stick on the pavement. ‘Home! We have much to do, Stephen. I shall send an Ivy to Mrs Pankhurst for Theodora Gussett’s correspondence details. Then I’ll need you out of the apartment for the afternoon – I have another job for my secret source. Thankfully, you have an awful lot to be getting on with anyway.’

I blinked, caught between the raft of instructions. ‘I do?’

‘Of course! You need to comb the streets for this missing beggar.’

I went weak at the knees. I was sick and exhausted. My clothes were stained and torn and sticking to me with Lord only knew what. The prospect of pounding the streets in the baking sun for the rest of the day was not appealing. ‘Is there any chance I can lie down for a bit first, Miss Decima?’

She fixed me with her most imperious gaze. ‘Crime takes no naps, Stephen. It stands to reason that neither do you.’

27

Monday, 19 June, 4.33 p.m.

Trying to find one man in London was like … well, like trying to find a hatpin in a drawer filled with a thousand hatpins.

I spent hours trudging the streets. I found plenty of other beggars – dozens of them – but none of them were the one I’d spoken to on Saturday. After the riot outside the Hall, most had probably been moved on by police to other parts of the city. He could be halfway to Essex by now.

Still, I couldn’t go home – not when Miss Decima was meeting her secret source. I grumbled at the injustice of it. It was ridiculous, her keeping secrets from me like this. It wasn’t as if I had anyone I could tell. I wondered if she’d ever make her secret source comb the streets in a heatwave, or if she saved all her worst drudgery for me.

With a weary groan, I went back to the spot where I’d first seen the beggar, then cut into Kensington Gardens to see if his blanket and penny were still in the bushes. Both had disappeared – no surprises there. Whatever he had seen that day had vanished along with him and his belongings.

That’s when I felt it again: a prickling across my shoulder blades, like heat rash. I knew, without needing to be told, that someone was watching me.

I turned around. There were six policemen standing on the steps of the golden Albert Memorial. The exact spot, I realized, where Peter had whispered his big secret to me last night. Five of the policemen were inspecting the steps, muttering to each other, standing guard.