Chapel Noir (27 page)

Mr. Holmes undid the ties with his storklike fingers. What an Ichabod Crane of a man he was, ungainly yet secretly aspiring to a woman well beyond his reach. I glanced around, looking for the vile instrument, but saw no sign of a bow or violin. He must have been playing in the bedchamber. I quickly banished both bedchamber and violin from my mind.

At first glance of my sketches he drew back, braced his face on his lean, steepled hands, and lifted an eyebrow.

“Your
sketch work?”

“Of course. Irene depends upon me.”

“So I understand.” A smile quirked his thin lips. “As I depend upon Watson.”

“The good doctor no doubt means well.” Certainly I had him to thank for my insight into the consulting detective’s unnatural interest in Irene. “Why is he not here?”

“Have you forgotten my remark that a doctor in Whitechapel would have fallen under instant suspicion?”

“Of course not. I forget nothing, because I write it all down afterward. But, unlike the London constabulary, the French police are not blaming these latest atrocities on someone with surgical skill.”

“That is correct.” He gazed aside, as if protecting my eyes from what his had seen. “The injuries are not so . . . surgical here. The body organs are not . . . excavated as they were in Whitechapel.”

He glanced at me through slitted, wary eyes, like Lucifer. I meant the cat, of course, not the Archangel of Darkness. “You are aware of the injuries that have been perpetrated here?”

“Of course,” I said boldly. If I did not say too much, and listened well, I might leave here knowing more. “Quite distasteful.”

His fingers drummed the tablecloth. I was disconcerted to encounter a habit I had thought of as Adlerian in a Sherlockian form. They had nothing in common, these two, but a natural rivalry, as a cat and dog. Naturally Irene was the elegant, pristine, and enigmatic cat, and Mr. Holmes was the slobbering, noisy hound with distasteful personal habits.

“I suppose Watson could have come,” he said out of the blue with a trace of wistfulness, “but I had been sworn to secrecy by one so highly placed that even faithful old Watson was not allowed.” His look sharpened itself on me like a razor on a strop. “Do you and your operatic adventuress have any idea what eminent personages would be outraged by your meddling in these frightful murders?”

“I am sure not,” I admitted, “but we have a highly placed clientele of our own to answer to.”

“Really?” He sat forward. “I will soon know whom, although I suspect already. I do not doubt that both our sponsors are concerned for similar, but perhaps not mutually inclusive reasons. Serving the mighty is always a difficult business. They expect loyalty, but are congenitally incapable of giving it, as your friend discovered with the King of Bohemia. So. She still insists in dabbling in private matters rather than sharing her magnificent vocal gifts with the world, does she?”

“She has a long history of private inquiry work, perhaps as long your own, beginning with the Pinkertons in America. That she should be sought out by persons of influence is not unlikely. As for ‘dabbling,’ is not your own investigative work a personal following rather than any official position? I would dare to say you also are a ‘dabbler.’ ”

“I would much like to see you and good old Watson go head-tohead on this topic, Miss Huxleigh. I am not sure which of you would be the more vigorous in defense of your companion.”

“I do not believe that I would ever care to engage in anything you would like to see, Mr. Holmes. As for Irene neglecting her vocal gifts, that is a true profession, almost nigh to a religious vocation, and a very demanding one. The operatic stage would consume all her energy and time, which is no longer possible now that she has been forced to live anonymously for some months, thanks to you and the King of Bohemia!”

“That may be, but she forgave him. Perhaps she can forgive me.”

“I doubt it. Certainly I cannot.”

He thrust a thumb into his waistcoat pocket as he settled into argument with familiar relish. I had the oddest notion that I was providing him with a favorite exercise. “Is it the events of last spring that have interrupted her operatic career, or her marriage to Godfrey Norton?”

“Godfrey encourages her to continue a stage career! How can you suggest otherwise?”

“He encourages her. Then he is more than a pretty face, I see. No doubt he is a forward-thinking man when it comes to women. To employ a typewriter-girl such as yourself at his office at the Temple, after all, was quite bold for these times.”

“My employment was more a tribute to Godfrey’s kindness than his boldness, but he is not lacking in manly strength both physical and mental. I have never known a gentleman of such rare qualities: noble, wise, and yes, possessed of such chivalry toward women as only a knight of the Round Table could practice, especially in these latter days.”

“Rare indeed to encounter such sterling testimony anywhere other than beside St. Peter’s gatepost in Heaven. Given the man’s virtues, it is a wonder that you did not yourself marry the gentleman.”

“That is an outrageous suggestion, sir! Godfrey would never encourage such a notion, and it is unthinkable that an orphaned parson’s daughter should even dream of committing her mind and heart so far above her station.”

“Yet a disgraced opera singer was not beneath his station?”

“There is no disgrace in expecting better of people than they are able to be. With the King you had a man who would have immured Irene away from her profession for his own convenience. With Godfrey, you have a man who encourages her to restitch the shreds of her career.”

“Why does she require encouraging? Perhaps she no longer wishes to devote long hours to practice, rehearsal, and performance now that domestic bliss has become her lot. I presume that her hasty marriage has led to domestic bliss.”

“Hasty only because of your foul subterfuges on the behalf of that miserable Bohemian royal person! She was denied a proper wedding ceremony, with friends and, er, friends present only because you were harrying her for the photograph of herself and the King. That photograph, I’ll have you know, was taken at the
King’s
insistence. She kept it solely as a reminder of her misplaced loyalty. Only his guilty conscience made him fear that she might reveal evidence of their past association to doom his royal wedding to the unfortunate Clotilde.”

“She never harbored ill feeling toward the King?”

“Quite the contrary. She was delighted to discover in the nick of time that he would cast aside true sentiment for a loveless aristocratic marriage, that he would further offend all reason by expecting her to enter into an alliance without honor.”

“How was such an honorable woman misled by him in the first place?”

“You did not see them together, Mr. Holmes. He was the picture of devotion. Any woman might have expected such attentions to be purely honorable.”

“Any woman, yes! But we are talking about a woman of unsurpassing wit, possessed of angelic talent. Why did she for a moment allow herself to be taken in by the then Crown Prince of Bohemia? It is not reasonable.”

He was by then sitting forward, interrogating me like a barrister with a prisoner in the box.

I took a deep breath. How cleverly he had goaded and maneuvered me into presenting an apologia for Irene. In my zeal to defend my friend, I had revealed far more about her history and present life than I would wish the likes of Sherlock Holmes to know.

As I stared into his clear, gray eyes, afire with the heat of argument, I realized that I had fallen completely into his trap.

“Reasonable, Mr. Holmes?” I allowed my own temper and vocal tone to cool. “Human beings do not perform according to the syllogisms of logic, although consulting detectives may. If you have to ask these questions, you would never understand the answers. You may have an admirable mind, but you have no heart, so there will be some mysteries that all your reasoning and deduction and investigation will never solve.”

He sat back, winded as if he had run a race against an invisible opponent. I could hardly dare think it was I. In fact, I believe that he was engaging Irene in some way, through me, humble substitute though I was. My own breath came irregularly. Odd how mental differences could excite the emotions.

When he spoke again, his voice was sharp, cool, and aloof.

“I agree that we do not speak the same language. Now. Show me your schoolroom sketches, Miss Huxleigh. I gather that you were sent here as a diversion. Then, divert me.” His expression implied that very little in life, or even death, did.

“I do not claim to be an artist,” I said briskly, “but I try to be at least accurate.” I fanned a card hand of five sketches from between the covers of my case. “The murder chamber at the
maison de rendezvous
had a central carpet with an unusual black background. It took tracks very well, almost like fresh soil, Mr. Holmes, so I copied them and then enlarged the original drawings to match the measurements I made.”

“Measurements! Tracks! On your knees in that chamber of horrors drawing footprints!” His voice rang with triumph, but his avid gaze was on my poor “schoolroom” drawings. “You are an unexpected form of bloodhound, Miss Huxleigh,” he murmured. “As it happens, I consider footprints the keystone to the art of detection, especially if they maybe preserved. I have written a small monograph called The Tracing of Footsteps, with some Remarks upon the Uses of Plaster of Paris as a Preserver of Impresses.’ Plaster of Paris is really gypsum, as you may or may not know, and great quantities of it underlie the granite that supports the city, which is why it is called plaster of Paris. As for my monograph, le Villard is translating it into French so that the police of this city will also find good use for their Paris plaster. Was it he who directed your attention to the footprints?”

As usual, he had prefaced the question he wanted answered with a great deal of superfluous details, the better to wear down his victims.

“Alas, no,” I was happy to say. “Irene herself pointed out that the black background of the rug would take impressions, as black velvet will show fingerprints at the least provocation, which any woman who has worn such a fabric would know instantly.”

“Indeed. My experience of black velvet has been confined to curtains, which are made of much sturdier stuff than gowns and far less subject to impressions. I am disappointed that le Villard missed this most interesting element. The fools! The entire Paris Prefecture had trampled that carpet before le Villard could stop them and I arrived from England. I did examine it, but by then it had been trampled into the chaos of a rugby field.

“I am most intrigued to learn what footprints were discernible to a fresh eye on the scene,” he added as his long fingers pulled more of my recently disdained sketches into view with the almost-trembling reverence owed to lost Rembrandt studies. “And when did you and your friend set dainty foot on the scene?”

“Within three to five hours, I would think.”

His forefinger speared one drawing to the tabletop. “I saw some female boot prints, but this first sketch is the boot of an early official on the scene, I think. Not le Villard. He has studied my methods and knows better than to tread so openly on the surrounding ground. But his hands—and feet, in this instance—were tied. This?” He held up another sketch.

“The first to discover the deaths. A Miss Pink. It is an evening slipper.”

“I am familiar with Miss Pink and both her slippers.” He sat back, patting his pockets for something. “What do you think of her?”

“I? You wish to know what I think? I thought it was your job to do all the thinking.”

“Indeed. But you were there first. I am always interested in the testimony of witnesses. They often see more than they know.”

“I know what I saw. Miss Pink is a brash American girl who finds it a lark to lead a scandalous life. She seems to have come from a moderately respectable family, save for a villainous stepfather, so I cannot imagine why she would wish to follow such a sordid course, of her own free will, it seems.”

“She is indeed a puzzle, Miss Pink, but her presence on the murder scene is purely coincidental. And this?”

“The workman’s boot. I cannot say how, or when it got there. Unless—”

“Unless?”

I hesitated. His energetic interrogation had surprised an unwelcome thought from my mind. I wished to share it only with Irene, but she was off on mysterious errands with Elizabeth. How much had she failed to share with me?

“Unless
, Miss Huxleigh? Come. You are a moderately acute observer. Such treasures must be shared.”

Moderately acute! Schoolroom sketches, indeed!
“Unless
, Mr. Holmes, the piece of furniture upon which the two women died had only
that day
been imported to the chamber, specifically for the er, occasion that was to follow. At least one workman would be needed to install it.”

His trespassing fingers crawled under the folder of my case to withdraw my sketch of the exotic two-tier sofa in question.

“A workman or two.” He gazed at the article I had so painstakingly sketched. “I confess that I do miss Watson. He would have more personal knowledge of such matters.”

I recalled reading the secret text in Dr. Watson’s London office months ago, in which this more worldly friend assessed Sherlock Holmes as an inhuman thinking machine, immune to any emotion, even the love between man and woman. Did this also exempt him from the lust that rules so many men? If a man without love for women could still lust, might he not also be able to kill?

“That is to your credit,” I found myself saying, to my horror, referring to his admitted ignorance of the bordello world compared to his physician friend. “Not his.” How galling to have to approve of anything about Mr. Sherlock Holmes, who already approved of himself so very much.

The look he gave this speech was icy and imperious enough to stop an Attila in mid-gallop. Luckily, I am an English parson’s daughter, and less impressionable than a Hun.

“I have been much disappointed in the Prince of Wales, as a result of these events,” I said stoutly. “It matters not the high position one occupies, but rather the high ideals with which one pursues life.”