Murder in Grosvenor Square (16 page)

“What games do you play, Captain?” a second butterfly asked. Her perfume was expensive, her clinging silk gown as much so.

That she knew who I was did not surprise me—everyone knew the captain who had become Grenville’s privileged friend. The lady must have been instructed when we’d been seen entering. “I am not the gambler Grenville is,” I said truthfully.

The woman betrayed no disappointment in her liquid dark eyes. She was very young for this game, her face unlined and a little bit plump. Her look was practiced, however, and no woman would be allowed to work here without having proven herself an expert at beguilement. “Whist, then?” she suggested in her velvet dark voice. “It is a game of skill, not chance.”

“It’s a bit of both, actually.” I moved away from the gamers to an empty table, exaggerating my limp as I went. “I will rest while Grenville enjoys himself. Perhaps you can keep me company.”

The young woman did not want to—no doubt she received a portion of the winnings from those she dragged into games—but she gave me a gracious look as she sat next to me.

“You were here last evening?” I asked. “Perhaps you saw a friend of mine. Mr. Leland Derwent?”

She stilled, her acting so well-done that had I not been watching, I might have missed the uneasiness in her eyes.

I decided to press her. “You must have seen him. Young lad. Very blond hair, as well dressed as Grenville. I imagine he looked a bit out of place.”

“I did not notice in particular.” The woman’s smile returned. “Play was quite exciting last night. I am afraid I was not paying much attention.”

She lied smoothly, but it was a lie nonetheless. “I am anxious about him. Mr. Derwent was badly hurt and is near death’s door. I would like to find out who did that to him.”

My voice hardened as I spoke. Leland was dying, his family plunged into grief. Here, gamers bent over tables, and ladies like this one washed their hands of another’s suffering.

Her gaze lost its softness as she truly looked at me. “What do you mean, near to death’s door?”

“Just as I say. Mr. Derwent was hit quite hard, enough to kill him. He is at home now, but we have no idea whether he will recover.”

“Oh.” The young woman bit her lip. “I had nothing to do with that. I never saw—” She cut off the words and rose swiftly from her chair, gliding off without another word.

The woman moved so elegantly that for a moment, I didn’t realize she was running away. By the time she reached a door at the far end of the room, I was on my feet, after her.

Grenville was deep in conversation with a hard-faced man at one of the tables, along with the butterfly who’d attached herself to him. None of them noticed as I moved by.

The door through which the lady exited slammed before I reached it, and when I tried the handle, the door was locked. I rattled the handle in frustration, but the door itself moved under my buffeting, its hinges flimsy.

One hard shove broke the door from the frame, which let me into a narrow hall that ended in a blank wall. The elegance of the rest of the house was gone here—peeling paint and damp floorboards held prominence. I heard staccato, hurried footsteps and followed, keeping a tight hold of my walking stick.

A draft told me a door to the outside had opened. I hastened forward and found a short flight of steps upward to my left. I climbed the stairs and went out another door into a grimy, confined yard.

These yards hidden behind the houses of wealthy neighborhoods could be as rundown as St. Giles slums. Slops left by nightsoil men lent a stench, and rubbish and mud filled the corners.

I spotted the lady making for a narrow gate that led to a passage behind the houses. I hurried forward, ignoring the strain on my leg, and seized her just as she wrenched the gate open.

She swung to me, fury in her eyes. Gone was the pleasant-voiced butterfly who had cajoled me to game and then condescended to sit with me. Now I faced a harpy, her face blotched with rage, who tried to rake her claws across my face.

“Leave off,” she said in East End cant. “They don’t pay enough for this. Lemme go!”

We struggled, the young woman strong. She managed to land a single blow across my face. The next moment, a large pair of hands grabbed her wrists and jerked her away, and Brewster slammed her against the wall.

“Stop,” I told him, my breath coming fast. “Don’t hurt her.”

“Nah, don’t go soft on her, guv. She’s got a knife in her pocket and will slash both of us. Won’t you, luv?”

She spat at him. I folded my arms, walking stick dangling. Now that we were in daylight, I could see that the lady’s dark hair had a red cast, her true color, I surmised as her eyebrows and lashes were the same. Rain glistened in the ringlets that now straggled across her face and on the silk finery of her dress. The anger in her eyes also showed desperation and hint of true fear.

“If I talk to you, they’ll kill me,” she said, blinking rapidly until tears wet her eyes.

“Huh,” Brewster said, not impressed. “But you don’t know what
we’ll
do, do ya? Open yon gate, Captain.”

I did not know what he had in mind, but I pushed open the gate the young woman had unlatched. Beyond was a passage that ran parallel to Jermyn Street toward St. James’s Street, where traffic rumbled by.

The woman didn’t fight much as Brewster pulled her down the lane toward the main road. If she expected help to come from the Nines, she did not get it.

When we emerged into St. James’s Street, Brewster split the air with a whistle. Moments later, a coach, one I did not recognize, stopped for us.

“In we go,” Brewster said. “You first, Captain, to make sure she don’t dash out the other side.”

I had no idea who this coach belonged to—if Denis, it would be the least opulent vehicle he owned—and I did not relish climbing into it with my leg now aching from the cold rain and my pursuit of the woman. But curiosity overcame hesitance, and I scrambled up, clenching my teeth against pain.

I settled myself where I could block the lady from hurtling herself out the opposite door, and Brewster lifted her in. He followed her inside the coach so quickly she’d have had no chance of escape. The coach lurched forward and the open door banged shut with the momentum.

Brewster gave no direction to the coachman, but the horses picked up speed and turned us east onto Piccadilly. We were going who-knew-where and moving toward it at a rapid pace.

I at first assumed Brewster was taking us to Denis, but we began heading quite the wrong direction. Any chance of turning north and west to Curzon Street quickly fell behind us.

The lady in the coach had collapsed into the seat, her eyes filled with bright fear. The fight seemed to have gone out of her, but I did not relax my guard, and neither did Brewster.

We rolled through Leicester Square and went north and east, past the roads that led in to Seven Dials, and so on to St. Giles. In a narrow street here, one almost too small to admit the coach, the driver stopped.

Brewster immediately had the door open and was dropping out of the coach, hauling the woman after him. I climbed down, the coach rolling a bit as the horses moved nervously in their traces. I nearly lost my footing and had to slam my stick to the dirty cobbles to keep my balance.

Brewster had already entered one of the crammed houses on the street. I went through the open front door after him, and found myself in a musty hall with a staircase. Brewster was climbing the stairs with the woman, who’d regained her spirit enough to start trying to fight him. Brewster, unbothered by her, pulled her up past the first floor and started toward the second. I followed as quickly as I was able.

The landing at the top of the second flight of stairs had been scrubbed clean. The other two floors were grimy, but not so this one, still damp from whoever had labored to wash it.

Brewster’s boots left muddy tracks as he approached the door, which jerked open before he reached it.

“’Ere,” a woman’s voice rang out. “Watch what you’re about, Tommy. I’ve just done that bit.”

“Sorry, love,” Brewster answered. “I’m bringing the captain in.”

Chapter Sixteen

A curse sliced into the hall and then the woman the voice belonged to charged past Brewster as he hauled his hostage inside.

I found myself looking down at a woman of medium height, thin but given to plumpness in arms and hips, her face narrow and lined. Her brown hair, which was peppered with gray, was done up in a loose knot. She gazed up at me with brown eyes that held fire and also strength.

“You should have sent word,” she said, not to me, but to Brewster. “I’d have tidied the place.” She shook her head. “Never learns, does he? Well, you’d better come in, love.”

I was ushered into a sitting room that was low ceilinged and dim but scrupulously clean. The mismatched furniture, some of it cobbled together from scraps, was free of dust, the threadbare upholstery on the old sofa, spotless. A small fire burned in the grate behind gleaming andirons. The sole decorations in the room were pictures cut from ladies’ magazines and artfully pinned to the faded wallpaper. The place was worn but homey, clean, and smelled of soap.

Brewster had dragged the courtesan to the sofa to unceremoniously plop her onto it. The woman moved to them and stood over the courtesan, hands on hips. “Who’s she, then?” she asked Brewster.

“Ladybird what fleeces at the Nines,” Brewster answered. “I thought maybe you’d know her.”

The woman leaned down and peered into the young woman’s face before pronouncing her verdict. “Nah, never seen her. Who’s your mum, girl?”

The young woman gave her a sulky look. “Sally Pryce.”

“Ah, Sally.” The woman nodded, enlightened. “Old Sal is a mate of mine. You must be the daughter she worries herself to death over.”

“Nothing wrong with me,” the butterfly said churlishly.

“Can’t be right, or my Tommy wouldn’t have dragged you home with him.”

Brewster leaned against the mantelpiece and tugged off his thick gloves. “She knows something about the murder last night. The captain here starts asking her questions, and off she goes.”

The woman questioning the butterfly straightened up and turned to me, where I’d remained, nonplussed, by the front door. “You should sit down, love, and I’ll fetch you some coffee. I’m Tommy’s missus.”

I glanced at Brewster, who shrugged. Mrs. Brewster pointed at the nearest chair as she strode out a door at the far end of the room. Presently we heard the clatter of crockery. I took myself to the chair and eased into it.

I supposed I shouldn’t be astonished that Brewster was married. I knew so little about him—the men who worked for Denis remained rather faceless, rarely revealing themselves to be human beings at all, which was likely part of the job. Brewster had grown more talkative with me, but he’d made no mention of his private circumstances. He might have been married several times and had thirteen children tucked away in rooms upstairs for all I knew.

Mrs. Brewster came back in bearing a tray with a coffeepot and cups on it. She poured, handed me a steaming cup and her husband another. She didn’t take one herself and offered nothing to the sullen young woman.

“This here is Bertha Pryce,” Mrs. Brewster announced once Brewster and I had our coffee—Brewster’s thick with cream and sugar, mine plain and bitter. “Her mum, Sal, was on the game, just like she is, but her mum never tried to help a house cheat money from fancy gentlemen.” Mrs. Brewster sent Bertha a disapproving look. “They get a cut there, the butterflies at the Nines, don’t they Bertha?”

“Yeah,” Bertha said, scowling.

“Is that what happened with Mr. Derwent?” I asked sharply. “Did they try and cheat him?”

“That one was a right fool,” Bertha said. “Like a babe in the woods. I tried to stop them …”

“Don’t lie,” Mrs. Brewster said without heat. “You helped, like they told you to, for some of the profit. Now, why don’t you tell the captain all about it?”

I took a sip of the coffee. It was very good, rich and full. I suspected Denis supplied it, perhaps as part of Brewster’s wages.

Bertha picked at the fingers of her gloves, pulling at the stitching. She seemed far more cowed by Mrs. Brewster’s admonishments than Brewster’s strength. “He was supposed to be easy,” Bertha said. “Rich and not knowing a blessed thing. But the bloody lad wouldn’t sit down to cards or take up the dice. He kept going on about how he promised his dad and mum he wouldn’t wager, not like they do at the Nines, anyway. He’d brought his friend in to prove to him how low the place was, that’s what he said.”

“And his friend,” I broke in. “Was he as reluctant to wager?”

“No, but I could see he wasn’t going to do much with the pious blond lad hanging about him.” Bertha scowled. “I tried to steer Mr. Derwent to another room, where we could chat by ourselves, but he said he promised his mum not to have anything to do with low women like me either.”

“Mr. Derwent would never have said that, not in those words,” I protested. Leland never insulted anyone—he saw women like Bertha as downtrodden and deserving of compassion. If anything, he’d have tried to reform her.

“Of course he didn’t say that,” Bertha went on. “Butter wouldn’t melt in his
mouth. He was polite as anything, but he wouldn’t leave his friend’s side. Plastered there, trying to talk him out of tossing down the dice and laying his bets. Mr. Travers won at first, then he lost—a pile of coin, it was. Then Mr. Derwent starts saying how the croupier is cheating, and Mr. Travers shouldn’t a’ lost all that money. He talks about marching out of there and informing a magistrate he knows. Mr. Travers and some others tried to make him be quiet, but Mr. Derwent was very upset.” Bertha drew a breath. “And so the owner, Mr. Forge, says I need to bring him upstairs.”

My hand was tight on my cup. “And Leland went to him?”

“Eager to.” Bertha looked the slightest bit pleased with herself. “I led him in, with Mr. Travers trying to stop him and urging him to run out the front door. Mr. Forge apologized for the misunderstanding, and offered to return Mr. Travers’s money. Very prettily he said it too, I thought. But Mr. Derwent, he’d have none of it. He kept saying how the Nines was a bad place, and he was going to bring his father to it,
and
the magistrates, to shut it down. Well, Mr. Forge couldn’t be having that, could he? He told his men to take Mr. Derwent and Mr. Travers out into the yard and teach ’em a lesson. And promise more if they went to a magistrate.” Bertha wiped her lips with her fingers, a nervous gesture. “But I swear to you, I never thought they’d hurt ’em bad. They were supposed to scare ’em a little, that’s all. Nothing Mr. Forge hasn’t done before. Works a charm.”