City of Light (City of Mystery) Page 14

  “Yes, Your Majesty. A friend to me personally and a most loyal servant to the throne.”

  “Which is precisely why we suspect he would understand our reasoning, even if you do not. How do you imagine Detective Abrams might advise you if he were standing here?”

  This time Trevor did not even try to mask his sigh. “He would tell me to stand firm on Your Majesty’s business and to leave French crimes to the French police.”

  Victoria nodded. “And he would be correct.”

  4:50 PM

  Stone silent with disappointment, Trevor and Davy sat nursing their pints at the Tinwhistle Pub. There was little point in conversation. They both knew that the future of the forensics unit was utterly dependent upon the continuing good will of the Queen. Besides, Victoria’s last words still rang in Trevor’s ears, for he knew they were accurate. If Abrams were here at the bar and heard of Trevor’s plans to rush to Paris and take up inquiries in the Graham case, he would tell him not to be such a damned fool.

  “We don’t even understand French,” Trevor said.

  He did not realize he’d spoken aloud until Davy sat down his mug and shifted in his seat. “Miss Emma does,” he said.

  “Speaking of which, I suppose we should still begin making our way to Geraldine’s. My heart’s hardly in it, but if she was kind enough to ask us for dinner on such short notice...” Trevor glanced around the half-filled pub. “I’m surprised Tom didn’t meet us here. He rarely passes up the chance for a pint.”

  Davy nodded, but for once he did not protest when Trevor dug out a handful of coins to pay for both their drinks. Trevor noted the difference, but wasn’t sure what, if anything, to make of it. They pulled on their coats and made their silent way through the wet streets to Geraldine’s house. Up the familiar stone steps, to ring the familiar doorbell.

  After a minute or so, Trevor rang again.

  “Not like them to forget, Sir,” Davy ventured.

  “No, it isn’t,” Trevor said reluctantly. “Perhaps we should go ‘round and knock up the kitchen. If Gage is preparing –“

  Just then the door was opened by Emma, who shot them a quick and somewhat automatic smile before turning back toward the broad staircase. “Careful,” she called up to Tom, who was partnering with Gage to maneuver down a spectacularly large traveling case.

  “Hard to be careful when I can’t see my feet,” Tom called back irritably, and then he added. “Come in, Trevor, Davy. As you can see, we’re in the throes of a project, but Gage did pause to make a pot of his famous Yorkshire stew.”

  “What’s this about?” Trevor said, stepping into the foyer. “I take it someone is going on a trip?”

  “You truly are a great detective,” Emma said drily, closing the door behind them.

  “Thank you, Gage,” Tom said, as they lowered the case to the floor of the foyer. “If you need to get back to the kitchen, I believe I can manage the others on my own. Or perhaps Davy can lend me a hand.”

  “Others?” said Trevor. “Who the deuce is traveling, and where?”

  “A sudden impulse, darling,” Geraldine called down. She had appeared on the landing in time to hear Trevor’s last question and her arms were full as well, with a stack of hat boxes which threatened to topple down the steps at any moment. “An overpowering urge has come upon me to visit Paris, and I’ve asked Emma and Tom to accompany me.”

  “And the reason for this trip?” Trevor asked warily, as Emma bounded up the steps to take the hatboxes from Geraldine.

  “Perhaps you’ve heard, but there’s some sort of marvelous world exhibition in the plans,” Geraldine said, with that brand of overly-innocent sarcasm that was hers alone.

  “And perhaps you’ve heard,” Emma muttered from behind the hatboxes, “that a colleague is in grave danger.”

  “Look here,” said Trevor, “I’m sure when Tom came home with his news of the Queen’s decision you were all distressed, as were Davy and I. But we can’t disband the entire forensics unit to sail across –“

  “The entire forensics unit?” Tom said. “That’s you and Davy, is it not? Rayley’s gone missing and Emma and I are volunteers, which leaves, if my math serves me, precisely two people in the employ of the crown.”

  “She all but forbad –“

  “Now, dear,” Gerry said, giving Trevor’s cheek a pat with her somewhat dusty hand. “I am of course devoted to the Queen, as are we all. That goes without saying. But not even Victoria can prevent a group of private citizens from taking a pleasure trip to Paris.”

  “True enough, but something tells me you don’t intend this as a pleasure trip.”

  “Don’t be cross,” Geraldine said, still utterly unperturbed by his scowl. “Shall we move into the parlor to discuss the particulars?”

  “Come with us, Trevor,” Emma said quietly, reaching forward to grab his wrist as the rest of the group obediently shuffled toward the parlor door. “We need you.”

  Trevor leaned down to her face, his voice as low as her own. “I suppose it was inevitable, but living with the Bainbridges has finally driven you mad. Rayley said that the French police barely deigned to work with him. Do you really think they’re prepared to collaborate with, as Geraldine so aptly puts it, ‘a group of private citizens’? The forensics unit-“

  “Was created to handle the most heinous of crimes,” Tom broke in. He, Davy, and Geraldine were still clustered at the parlor door, openly eavesdropping. “And yet all they’ve given us this month is Cleveland Street. How can you even imply that case is on an equal par with Rayley’s disappearance?”

  “But if we all –“

  “I’ll stay, Sir,” Davy said. “No one pays any real attention to what we’re doing down in the dungeon, you’ve said as much yourself. As long as a report comes out every week or so, the supervisors upstairs may not realize I’m the only one in the laboratory.”

  “You’d give up the chance to see Paris, Davy?” Geraldine asked gently. “Have you ever been out of London?”

  Davy nodded. “My grandpap took me to Brighton once, Ma’am, on a fishing holiday. By the end of the first day, that little boat had cured any desire I’d ever have to cross the channel. Besides, if someone is to remain behind, I’m the sensible choice.”

  “You are indeed, my friend,” Tom said, clasping his shoulder. “No matter what the question, ‘Davy Mabrey’ is the only sensible answer. So what say you, Trevor? If Davy is prepared to single-handedly wrangle the criminal element of London, can you manage to put your archaic scruples aside long enough to accompany the rest of us to Paris?”

  Trevor was still shaking his head. “If I were to disobey the Queen –“

  “You’re not disobeying the Queen,” Emma said. “You’re going on holiday. Really, Trevor. How long has it been since you’ve taken even a day of leisure?”

  Trevor looked from one face to another, knowing he was defeated. “Eleven years.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The English Channel

  April 25

  10:50 AM

  The human populace was divided into two groups, Trevor mused: those who were energized by travel and those who were depleted by it. Geraldine and Tom evidently fell into the first category, he and Emma into the latter. All four of them were miserably crammed into a small private berth that Geraldine had managed to secure at the last minute, for heaven knows what sort of expense. With the Exposition gearing up, travel between London and Paris was at a peak and the small ship was packed to the gills. He supposed they were lucky not to find themselves on the hard benches bolted to the drafty decks of steerage, but still, fitting four adults into a berth clearly designed for two was a bit of a squash.

  Tom and Geraldine chatted happily about some far-flung relative and Emma seemed absorbed in a French newspaper, although Trevor noticed she had not turned the page in some time. Now that he was sure his stomach was not going to betray him in the voyage, he decided he may as well also look for some means of passing the time.

  S
lipping his hand down to the valise wedged between his feet, Trevor pulled out the file which contained all of Rayley’s letters. They had been neatly sequenced by Davy in chronological order, and Trevor flipped through them once again, looking for some small hint he might have somehow missed. It was a sunny day, warm for April, and despite the stiff wind, the passing had been smooth so far. Yet Rayley’s handwriting, which was tightly knotted and hard to decipher even in the best of circumstances, bobbed steadily before his eyes and within ten minutes Trevor could feel the beginning of a headache.

  Abandoning the letters, Trevor settled back on the thin cushions and prepared to feign a nap. The headache could just as easily be from exhaustion as eye strain, for the last twelve hours had been a whirlwind of activity. He had returned to his quarters from Geraldine’s house, hastily tossed some clothes into a trunk, then spent the majority of the night scribbling notes to leave for Davy. He had no doubt that the boy would be able to generate a series of brief reports that would satisfy the admittedly-limited interest Scotland Yard had in the activities of the forensics team and, until Charles Hammond could be found and returned to London, the Cleveland Street case was at a halt. Still, there is nothing like the prospect of being gone for an indefinite amount of time to make a man aware of all the untied threads in his life, and once he had begun writing the notes for Davy, Trevor had found it hard to stop.

  Their ship had sailed at the unconscionable hour of five, but the lad had insisted on accompanying them to the dock for a send off. He had stood, a small and solitary figure, waving a white-gloved hand in the darkness and Trevor had momentarily lost his ability to speak. It was not merely that this would be the first time he had left his mother country to venture to the mainland, although that in itself was enough of an event to give a man pause. It was more that in this early departure he couldn’t help but remember the similar morning last November when Rayley had sat sail. He and Davy had seen him to the same dock, had stood witness as the man crossed the gangplank and then turned, briefly, for a final salute. At the time they had all believed that Rayley faced no greater dangers than embarrassment over his inability to speak French and perhaps a bout of seasickness.

  Trevor exhaled slowly, and deepened his breathing. Although he still felt a bit pirated into this mad scheme, he had to admit that if they were going at all, it was fortunate Geraldine had the right connections and yes, enough money, to make the pieces of the trip fit together so swiftly. The hotels of Paris had proven full, but she had contacted a distant cousin, a man who owned a small apartment on the Rue de Tremont. By the way Geraldine and Tom were discussing the apartment’s proximity to an evidently famous garden, Trevor could only conclude that it was located in a luxurious part of town, the Parisian equivalent of a Mayfair address.

  Geraldine had warned the living quarters would be cramped, although what she considered cramped would probably feel like a palace to Trevor. Not only were they lucky to have quarters at all on the eve of the Exposition, but now that he had a moment to ponder the situation, Trevor realized an apartment would be a far better base of operations than a hotel. The group could confer at leisure about their findings, with no danger of being overhead in a lobby or café.

  Besides, an address in an established neighborhood would lend respectability to their little group and Gerry would be indispensible there as well, he suspected. For all her avant garde interests and left-leaning political views, Geraldine had never hesitated to play her aristocratic trump card whenever she deemed it useful. She and Tom were consulting over a sheet of notepaper which contained a list of the obliging cousin’s social circle, people who would greet the Bainbridges as equals, and thus as friends.

  “These soirees are so tiresome,” Geraldine was saying. “But necessary if we are to find dear Rayley.”

  Behind his closed eyelids Trevor frowned, trying to recall if Geraldine had ever actually met “dear Rayley.”

  From the rustle of paper, he concluded that Emma was putting aside her reading and turning her attention to Geraldine and Tom. “What do soirees have to do with Rayley?”

  “Trevor was quite right when he said a group of English tourists can hardly knock on the door of the French police station and demand to know the particulars of an investigation,” Geraldine said. “So our route to the truth must follow the more winding path of social intercourse.”

  “I gather you have a plan, Auntie,” Tom said.

  “Indeed,” said Geraldine. “Let us summarize what we know at this point in time. Rayley has developed an infatuation with an English woman named Isabel Blout, who last year left her elderly husband and bolted to Paris. Due to her association with a man named Armand Delacroix, whose name she sometimes assumes as her own, she moves in a certain social strata. New money, those who have come to their wealth in recent memory and are eager to join the more established tiers of society. One of the ways to shine in Paris is to throw some of that lovely new money into projects associated with the Exhibition, thus illustrating both your wealth and your nationalism in one fell swoop. The gossips of London have suggested, behind the hand, that this Armand fellow earns his own living as some sort of liaison between the investors, who are seeking a boost in their social status, and the committee, which is seeking cash. Most likely he was first drawn to Isabel specifically because of her position in London society and may not have realized how tenuous that position truly was. He probably still deludes himself that a mistress stolen from the bed or a higher ranking man gives him status with his peers. And, Heaven knows, Isabel’s beauty alone could be a useful entry point into any number of social situations. My guess is that her primary function is to lend a patina to his own place in society.”

  “Bravo, Aunt Gerry,” Tom said with enthusiasm. “Everyone claims you’re daft, but when you put your mind to it, your logic become most admirably linear.”

  “And, as counterbalance, here is my contribution,” said Emma, “although I will freely concede that I’m relying more on conjecture. We must not forget that before Delacroix and before Blout, Isabel was nothing more than a lower class girl whose family worked the mills of Manchester. There is the distinct possibility that during her time there she knew a young man named Charles Hammond. He is also believed to now be in Paris and also believed to be soliciting funds for the Exposition. I feel Isabel and Charles must be somehow connected to each other, although Trevor is less convinced.”

  It was an open challenge, but Trevor elected not to respond. He remained with his eyes closed, mimicking the slow, deep breath of sleep.

  “Quite intriguing, is it not?” said Gerry. “The more rumors that collect around Isabel, the more she sounds like a character in one of my bedside novels and not a real woman at all. But I’m sure all will be made clear when we meet her in the flesh.”

  “Do you truly intend to chase down Isabel Blout by attending a round of parties held in honor of the Exhibition?” Emma said, her voice slightly dubious. “She’s has fled London and turned her back on her life there. What reason would she have to talk to you at all, much less confide the sort of things that would lead us to Rayley?“

  “Expatriates always talk to their fellow countrymen,” Geraldine said with confidence.

  Emma’s mind flew back to the grim countenance of Janet Hammond. The woman had used precisely the same word. “Even if they left their former country under duress?”

  Geraldine nodded. “It’s just…it’s just what we do, dear. You’ll see when we’re in Paris. Besides, I’m rather good at lulling people into confidence. People think I’m a silly old lady and they talk and talk and I just nod and listen.”

  By God, that’s true, thought Trevor. Geraldine Bainbridge probably knows more about me than any other living soul.

  “And another point,” Gerry continued. “I won’t be attending the parties alone. You’ll all be with me.”

  “As your grand-nephew, Tom will certainly be an acceptable escort,” Emma said, “but as a lady’s maid, your invitations hardly exten
d to me.“

  “I didn’t bring you to Paris to act as my lady’s maid,” Geraldine said calmly. “You and Trevor must attend these parties as well, so that we have four sets of eyes in the hunt. I doubt my reputation has preceded me across the channel but if anyone knows anything at all about me, it’s probably that I have inherited funds, inappropriate politics, and a gaggle of nephews. So no one will question the presence of Trevor and Tom. And if we introduce you as the intended bride of one of them, the doors shall swing open for us all. What’s the French term for a betrothed woman, darling?”

  “Fiance,” Emma said shortly.

  “A lovely sounding word,” Gerry said. “We should adapt it into English.”

  “I’m still not convinced this is the proper plan,” Tom said. “Isabel Blout may be nothing more than a pretty, shallow woman and Rayley’s infatuation with her might be purely coincidental to his disappearance. It seems to me the more likely route to discovering who took him and why is to follow the investigation of the Graham murder. Whoever killed Graham is afraid Rayley is also on their trail, and that’s what put him in danger.”