A Spy in the House (22 page)

With Mrs. Thorold still in her room and Mr. Thorold long departed for the office, only the servants were present to note Mary’s return to the house at Cheyne Walk. To them it would seem as though she’d gone out with Angelica but popped back to retrieve something. And, in a way, she had.

She went directly to the drawing room, to the music chest beside the pianoforte. Some of the sheet music was printed and bound, but much was painstakingly hand-copied by Angelica and the pages pinned or clipped together. Her enthusiasm for music was striking. Most young ladies’ music collections consisted of simple verses set to pretty tunes. In contrast, Angelica favored a challenging repertoire from modern composers — Mendelssohn, Chopin, and especially Schumann. As she searched, Mary wondered what it must be like to be Angelica: pretty, spoiled, and destined for marriage. Had she ever wanted anything more? Perhaps to be a musician, like Clara Schumann? Mary couldn’t shake the idea that Angelica’s tantrums and sulks might themselves be a form of unhappiness.

Near the bottom of the music chest, Mary found a pianoforte concerto by Schumann. It had been specially bound in handsome maroon leather and dedicated
To A.T. on her eighteenth birthday, from M.G.
The gift of Angelica’s favorite music given by Angelica’s favorite admirer. The kick of her pulse told Mary that this was it. Sure enough, folded into the back were a dozen or so loose sheets of paper, closely covered in neat handwriting. She scanned the pages carefully. Balance sheets — records of payment — notes on shipping insurance — and, crucially, letters between Thorold and an employee of Lloyd’s. Yes. There was enough information here.

The drawing-room clock struck one thirty, and Mary remembered that she was due at James’s office. There was no time to make a copy, and removing the whole sheaf would distress Michael and Angelica if they checked on it. As a compromise, Mary took a small selection of documents. Three or four sheets of paper, she reasoned, would not be quickly missed. She stuffed it into her pocketbook, thinking longingly of her father’s roll of documents. In two days, this would be over and she could return to the refuge to learn more. In the meantime, it was simpler not to think about him at all.

When Mary turned up at Great George Street, James was waiting in the entrance area. He didn’t greet her but instead took her arm, marched her briskly into his private office, and shut the door firmly.

“What’s the matter?” Mary was amused.

“I don’t want my brother to recognize you.”

“I’m only a servant,” she said. “I doubt he’d recognize me if I looked him straight in the eyes and told him my name.”

James grinned. “Oh, he remembers you. After what you said about the Crimean War last Sunday, he thinks you’re an evil influence who oughtn’t be allowed within a hundred yards of Miss Thorold.”

“Oh.” This morning’s events would only confirm George’s opinion of her.

“That’s it? ‘Oh’?”

“What do you think?”

That wiped the smile from his face. He looked at her for a long time, his eyes unreadable. “I think you’re trouble,” he said slowly. “But you’re very interesting.”

Mary felt herself blushing under his scrutiny. She didn’t know how to respond, so she sat down and removed her gloves.

James cleared his throat. “How are your inquiries coming on?”

“I’ve located copies of some documents pertaining to some fiscal irregularities in Thorold’s company.” She produced her “borrowed” pages. “This is only a sample. They should be sufficient to show evidence of financial dishonesty . . . enough, at least, to warrant searching further.”

He leaned forward to study the sheet. “Tell me more.”

“This is an internal memorandum from Lloyd’s of London, the insurance firm, tallying Thorold’s claims over the past five years. Taken separately, each claim seems ordinary; modest, even. Yet they occur a bit more frequently than the average, and they happen over a sustained period of time.”

“So either Thorold has rather poor luck or he’s making fraudulent claims.”

“Precisely.” She waved a second page at him. “Lloyd’s seems to have begun an internal investigation. They daren’t accuse Thorold of anything without proof, of course, but they’re suspicious and they’re doing their research. And this is where things become interesting: The investigation is assigned to a Joseph Mays. A fortnight later, Thorold begins to write checks to one J. R. Mays. Here, and here, and here.”

James whistled low. “Rather large sums, considering the frequency.”

“How much would Joseph Mays earn at Lloyd’s? Two hundred a year?”

“Much less, I think. So Thorold is more than doubling the man’s salary.”

She nodded. “But he’s still ahead: the payouts to Mays are cheaper than having his insurance claims denied.”

“D’you think Thorold’s ships really sink that often? What could possibly be happening to them?”

“He might be lying about their sinking. Double collecting.”

He frowned. “That’s the simplest solution. . . .”

“But?”

He took his time framing the question. “But what if he really was sinking them? Not deliberately, of course, but by overloading them — out of greed or carelessness or false economy.”

As he spoke, a long-forgotten memory flashed into Mary’s mind. A man in a suit standing at her mother’s door in Poplar. A man explaining that her father was dead because the ship had capsized in a storm. Her mother refusing to accept what the man said. Neither adult had realized she understood every word.

Mary’s face flooded with heat and the backs of her eyes prickled with tears. She would not cry. Not here in front of James.

“Mary? What’s wrong?” His voice was unusually kind, which only made things worse.

“N-nothing. It’s just a bit warm in here.”

“It is.” He covered her hand with his. “Are you certain it’s the heat?”

She cleared her throat and pulled her hand from his clasp. “Of course. Where were we?”

He gave her a long, steady look but when she glared at him, he shrugged. “All right. I suggested that Thorold might overload his ships, causing them to sink.” He paused, studying her face. “Mary? Are you sure you’re feeling well?”

“Er — yes.”
Concentrate!
“If the ships are grossly overloaded, they’d ride so low in the water that it wouldn’t take much of a storm to sink them. They’re called coffin ships among sailors.” It was difficult not to sound bitter.

“Thorold once told me he preferred to engage foreign crews because they’re cheaper. The other benefit is that if the ships go down, there are fewer people to ask questions of him in England.”

Mary’s eyes hardened. “Hence the donations to the Lascars’ home.”

“Buying his way out of guilt?”

“It rather looks that way.”

In the grim silence that followed, Mary’s stomach rumbled loudly. She tried — and failed — to cover it with a cough.

James glanced at his desk clock. “It’s quite late; will you let me give you some luncheon? Afterward, we might have a look at the register.”

“Oh, no. I couldn’t. Indeed, I’m not really —” She was betrayed by another vigorous stomach growl and subsided into silence.

He grinned provokingly. “You couldn’t, because ladies never eat except as a social diversion. Nor do they drink, sleep, or have other gross, vulgar, human functions. I know.”

She had to smile at that.

“Come on, then. I haven’t lunched either. Won’t you join me?”

“I can hardly nip down to the pub for a sandwich and a pint,” she reminded him.

“Damned inconvenient, isn’t it? How
do
ladies manage?”

“We go home,” she said tartly.

“And if you’re far from home?”

“We faint from inanition, of course. I’m surprised you didn’t know that, too.”

They lunched quickly on sandwiches and pints of ale brought in from a nearby pub. They didn’t talk much, but it was a friendly silence. Afterward, James smuggled her out of the office (they could hear George somewhere, practicing a syrupy ballad on his accordion) and down to the curb, where they hailed a cab.

When he handed her up into the hansom, she couldn’t repress a small smile. “That’s the first time you’ve offered your assistance.”

“It’s the first time you’ve let me,” he murmured, settling in beside her.

The light was yellow-gray, bright enough to make one squint but without the appearance of actual sunshine. In its unflattering glare, all of London appeared dingy. Even new buildings, like the Palace of Westminster with its unfinished clock tower, looked sad and weathered. As the cab prepared to negotiate a slow left turn up Parliament Street, Mary suddenly jumped.

“What is it?”

She leaned back as though avoiding scrutiny. “Look.”

James couldn’t see anything special in the usual scrum of unwashed humanity, hard-worked animals, yapping dogs, and clouds of dust jammed into a few hundred square feet. He leaned closer to Mary. “What am I to look at?”

“The carriage about to pass us on the far side of the road. It’s the Thorolds’.”

“That’s straightforward enough.”

She shook her head impatiently. “No, it’s not. Thorold never takes the carriage. He and Gray used to take the ferry. Now they ride.”

“Thorold loves that stinking river, doesn’t he?”

She ignored that. “It must be Mrs. Thorold in the carriage.”

“I thought she was an invalid.”

“She is.” The Thorold carriage trundled past, southbound. “Damn, damn, damn!” She turned to him. “Quickly, we must follow them!”

“I thought we were after Thorold.”

“
Please,
James. The driver won’t listen to me with you here.”

With a resigned look, he gave the cabbie his mysterious instructions, and the cab immediately began a slow U-turn, much to the irritation of a flower girl they nearly bowled over. She was still shouting curses after them as they joined the thick stream of traffic oozing slowly down toward Millbank. They were only five or six vehicles behind the Thorold carriage.

“Tell me again why we’re following a hypochondriac housewife about town?”

“Doesn’t it strike you as odd that Mrs. Thorold should be driving across Westminster Bridge? She hasn’t a single reason to be in the area.”

“It could be a similar horse and carriage,” he said reasonably.

“I recognized the coachman, Brown.”

“I still don’t see your point.”

“She drives out most afternoons, either for an airing or to consult one of her physicians. If you wanted air, would you drive to Lambeth?”

“No, but perhaps she’s going to the physician’s.”

“She’s a long way from Harley Street.”

“He might be one of those homeopathic snake-oil types. They’re fashionable, and they set up shop in all sorts of peculiar districts.”

“Well, Brown thinks something’s amiss. He says she goes to a private house in Pimlico on most days.”

“And you believe him?”

“Why would he lie?”

“Perhaps for the pleasure of gossip, or because he thought it was what you’d like to hear. When did you question him, anyway?”

“He made a point of telling me one day, by the kitchen stairs.”

He felt a stab of irritation. “Sounds as though he’d have said anything to attract your attention.”

“Oh, please. He was dying to tell somebody, and I was the first candidate to come along.”

“Hmmph. What else did he tell you?”

“He intimated that Mrs. Thorold was having an affair.” Mary blushed at the memory of Brown’s other suggestion: that she and James were lovers. Then she was promptly annoyed with herself for blushing.

“What nonsense.”

“Hm? Oh!” She forced her attention back to the real subject. “It might be rubbish. But if so, the question remains as to what she does in Pimlico several afternoons a week. There’s nothing for a lady to do in Pimlico. It’s not as though she could be shopping or visiting friends.”

“What about charitable work?”

“Mrs. Thorold?”

He shrugged. “It’s a possibility, however remote.”

“All right, then. It’s not absolutely impossible that she might be engaged in some missionary scheme or seeing a homeopathic physician. But I’d like to be certain in case she’s linked in some way to this scheme of Thorold’s.”

“That seems even less likely than the charitable work.”

“I know,” she conceded. “But I won’t feel easy until I’ve seen it myself.”

At the junction of Vauxhall Bridge, a brewer’s cart toppled over. Carriages, hansoms, carts, and drays from all directions juddered to a halt as ragged men and women, street urchins, and girls carrying babies all scrambled to nab a share of the spilled beer. One particularly large laborer applied his mouth directly to the leak in a cask, cheered on by his mates. The cart driver made no attempt to clear the thoroughfare. Instead, he mounted guard in front of the intact beer casks, using his horsewhip and a steady stream of colorful threats to fend off those who approached.

“For pity’s sake,” muttered Mary.

“I don’t suppose you could be persuaded to abandon Mrs. Thorold?” he muttered.

“Absolutely not. Besides, we can’t even turn round.”

He craned his neck to look and groaned. In just under a minute, traffic had become jammed for hundreds of yards around.