A Study in Silks (65 page)

“I’ve heard that theory.” Tobias looked grave. “Some believe the nation will go so far as to crumble into petty kingdoms, each with its own baron. Such will be the demise of the Empire.”

Bancroft was turning pale. From what little Evelina knew of his politics, not long ago he would have agreed with his son. However, Jasper Keating had been his guest not many nights ago. If he’d switched sides to further his career, it wouldn’t sit well to have his son arguing against the Gold King in front of strangers.

Unfortunately, Uncle Sherlock had a mischievous look in his eye. “If the nation is in danger of breaking into factions, it is best that we preserve what unifying ideals we can.”

“Such as?” asked Lord Bancroft.

Holmes looked around the table. “I play my small role in the upkeep of justice, and can speak first hand of the deficiencies of the system. If we as a community cannot give the people justice and the rule of law, can we blame them for looking to men like Jasper Keating for protection?”

Lord Bancroft narrowed his eyes. “Is that how you see your role? Supreme upholder of justice?”

Holmes lost his air of mockery. “I do not flatter myself so much. However, I have become increasingly conscious of the precarious balance of the nation. Power breeds resentment, and there is plenty of both in the air.”

“I ask again, are you advocating revolution, Mr. Holmes?”

The word made Evelina shiver. She wanted to think it was just the cool air from the window behind her, but she dreaded the idea of riot in the streets. Too much would be destroyed—businesses, homes, schools, hospitals. She remembered what it was to be only a step ahead of hunger.

Her uncle inclined his head, considering. “I am merely sounding a note of caution.”

“To whom?”

“To the guilty. To those who will not pursue the solution of a crime, especially when the poor and helpless have been victims.”

Evelina tensed, catching the allusion to Grace Child. So did everyone else. The room became deathly still, only the distant bustle of the rest of the house audible.

Her uncle turned so that he faced Bancroft. “Don’t you agree, Lord Bancroft?”

Lord Bancroft frowned. “You overreach yourself. No man can be judge and jury.”

Holmes gave a dry smile. “I am a consulting detective. I detect.”

“And in doing so, you restore the natural order of things?”

Sherlock’s eyebrows drew together. “So I would hope.”

“Then I would ask you to restore order to my household and remove your niece.”

Shocked, Evelina’s fork slipped from her fingers. “My lord?”

“She has been throwing herself at my son.”

“Father!” Tobias exclaimed.

Evelina’s heart froze. She was half out of her chair before she realized she was standing. A protest formed on her lips, but she realized with horror that she had no grounds to defend herself. She hadn’t thrown herself at Tobias, but she’d not discouraged him, either. Not really.

Tobias was on his feet, too, features rigid and angry. “How dare you! Evelina is innocent.”

Bancroft drained his glass, pointedly ignoring his son. “Forgive my boy, Mr. Holmes. He enjoys his dramatics. Should have been on the stage, like all his whores.”

His statement was so stunningly clumsy that no one spoke. A heavy silence followed, broken only by the sound of Bancroft’s glass hitting the table.
He’s drunk
.

Imogen grabbed her arm and pulled her back to her seat. Evelina felt her friend trembling, but her own hand was oddly steady. Maybe she’d been expecting this moment all along.

Her uncle remained seated and silent, watching everything like a cat about to pounce. “I understand the maid who was murdered was with child.”

Bancroft snorted loudly. “No doubt it would have been a waste of air, like all my children.”

Tobias turned to his father, his face white. “A waste of air,
like all your children
?”

Bancroft’s face slackened. Evelina couldn’t believe what she had just heard.
Lord Bancroft was Grace’s lover?
Lady Bancroft sat frozen, like a woman turned to marble.

Tobias looked around the table, his gaze quickly touching on each person there, and then landing again on his father with a look of horror. Then he stormed from the room.

Bancroft lurched to his feet, his napkin slithering to the floor. He swayed a moment, as if letting the wine fumes settle. He turned to Holmes. “You’re nothing but a busybody with a chemistry set.”

Holmes gave a slow blink. “Indeed. And I know how to make an admirable stink.”

Wordlessly, Lord Bancroft marched for the door, staggering just a little to navigate through the opening. Silence fell, breathless and seemingly endless.

Evelina caught sight of Lady Bancroft’s pale face. The woman was distraught. “I’m so incredibly sorry. I have never … he’s never …” Words failed her as her chin began to tremble. “I’ve not seen him like this since …”

She seemed incapable of finishing a sentence. Evelina exchanged a quick glance with Imogen, who rose to comfort her mother. Uncle Sherlock was staring after Bancroft. Evelina fingered her water glass, half temped to throw it, if she were only certain whom to blame.

“Very instructive,” Sherlock said almost to himself.

“How?” Evelina demanded.

“Judging by the evening as a whole, Bancroft would be a formidable opponent when sober. But of course, that is just the start of it.”

Imogen was helping Lady Bancroft from the chair, no doubt to assist to her bed. Evelina rose to help. She had barely taken one step to the side when she felt a rush of air skim her cheek. At the same moment, glass shattered behind her. Instinct made her drop to the ground, letting the soft carpet cushion her fall. A chair crashed, and Lady Bancroft screamed, high and shrill. A cascade of smashing china cut her cry short.

Sour fear filled Evelina’s mouth. She blinked, trying to look around without moving her head. Was it safe?

The pool of light cast by the gas chandelier spilled over the edge of the table. Evelina was curled on her side, knees tucked to her chest. She had dived for the dark space beneath the dining table, and the forest of chair and table legs made a comforting barricade.

Glass littered the carpet like misplaced chips of ice. Carefully, she rolled to her hands and knees, bumping her head on the table as she went. The cloth had been pulled halfway off the far side of the table, making a tent. It blocked her vision, but she could hear everything. Running feet. Servants’ voices. Lady Bancroft crying. She crawled for the edge of the table, but pierced her hand on a shard of glass. Cursing, she eased out from the lip of the table, rising cautiously.

It was chaos. Lady Bancroft was swooning in a chair, Dora cradling her head while two footmen braced to lift her limp form. Imogen was down on the floor, bending over the dark shape of Sherlock Holmes.

“What happened?” Evelina demanded.

“He’s shot!”

Evelina was around the table in a moment. Imogen looked up, her eyes huge. She was pressing a napkin against his shoulder, staunching the blood. Her hands were slick and red, the skirts of her dinner gown splattered beyond repair. “What do I do?”

Heart hammering, Evelina knelt for a better look. Her hands shook, and not just from the shock of the attack. For all her uncle’s frustrating habits, she genuinely loved him, and not just because he was a genius. He understood her. They never tried to fix each other. They never played games. She couldn’t afford to lose him.

His face was in shadow, but she could see his teeth were clenched against the pain of his wound. No spurting blood, no shards of bone glistening in the lamplight, but it was still serious. She found his good hand and squeezed it. To her surprise, he returned the pressure.

“I’ll send for Dr. Watson,” she said, forcing her voice to sound level.

He gave a barely perceptible sigh of relief. “Preserve the scene. Do it. I’ll survive.”

Exasperated, Evelina swore under her breath. “I don’t want to leave you.”

“Miss Roth can hold my hand, but she cannot investigate. She doesn’t know my methods. You do.”

Evelina wanted to protest, but instead, she nodded. Evidence didn’t seem to matter now, but it would later.

His mouth twitched. “Good.” It was so faint she might have missed it.

A dozen thoughts jammed as the last moments replayed themselves. The bullet had nearly hit her. If she hadn’t stood, would she be dead? Or had the shooter been waiting for her to move? Evelina rose just as Bigelow hurried into the room.

“What is happening, please?” he demanded in the voice of a man whose universe was imploding.

“Send for Dr. Watson,” she said, struggling to recall where the doctor lived now that he was married. The mental exertion helped. She was calmer by the time she remembered the address and wrote it down. “And help Miss Roth to make my uncle comfortable.”

She slipped out the side door of the house, moving as silently as she could. Some of the servants had run into the garden, but none had gone far. There was someone out there shooting people. Without one of the men of the house leading the charge, who would put themselves in harm’s way?
Me, apparently. No one else is looking for clues
.

The garden was bathed in the eerie glow of a full moon. The gold-tinged gaslights that lined the street didn’t cast their beams that far. Evelina shivered in the cool night. She didn’t see anyone moving in the yard. Were they already gone?

Memories stole over her—of the garden party, of sitting with Imogen looking at the gold and gems in the tiny silk bag. Too much had happened in the last handful of days. People were dead. She prayed her uncle wouldn’t be next, the victim of a fevered wound.

She struggled not to let her thoughts go further than that,
but they did. If the father of Grace Child’s baby was Lord Bancroft, that gave him a very close link to the victim. But that wasn’t what bothered her, because plenty of men slept with their maids and then tossed them into the street when they grew round with child. It would play badly during a political campaign, but it was a scandal most men could survive, though it might cause a few cold silences at the dinner table. And no doubt Lord B had appetites like any man.

What bothered her was that Lord Bancroft, as far as she knew, would have been more likely to seek out a sophisticated woman for his pleasures. What would a serving girl, however pretty, have to offer? It was the gold that complicated things. As her uncle had pointed out, Grace had probably been waiting for someone when she had been killed.
And Lord Bancroft had fallen asleep in the study
. If she was right, he was the one who was to receive the gold.

She had desperately wanted to protect the Roth family. She still did. But what if Lord Bancroft was guilty—maybe not of murder, but of some other crime? Her uncle’s unerring instincts had already ripped the matter open like a surgeon exposing an infected wound. He could be brutal, but he was very rarely wrong. And so someone had shot him.

A shaking deep in her gut found its way to her limbs in a long, horrified shudder. She had been strong inside the dining room, wishing herself to be as steady as Imogen, as cool as her uncle. Now it would be too easy to sit down and wail like a scalded cat.

Which accomplished exactly nothing. She clenched her jaw and forced herself to think rationally, one step at a time. There was a sundial surrounded by a clump of low bushes that sat a stone’s throw from the side of the house. It was the only possible cover. From there, the shooter could have seen straight into the dining room window.

“Evelina.”

She turned to see Tobias coming from the front of the house. “What are you doing out here?”

The moonlight silvered his hair. He’d taken off his tie, so the open collar of his shirt showed the strong muscles of his
throat. She felt his heat as he drew closer, tantalizing in the cold air.

He put his hand on her arm. There was no mistaking the affection in his touch. “You’re cold.”

“I came to look for evidence,” she said.

“Oh.” He looked around, as if expecting to see a smoking gun on the grass. He smelled like whisky. “I’m sorry about what Father said. I went to try to talk to him. He’s passed out in his study. There’s no point tonight.” His voice was so tight it sounded painful. “But I will. I promise you that.”

“My uncle …”

He leaned close. “I know. Terrible.”

“The police …”

Tobias made a resigned motion, but he sounded strained. “I’ll send word to Inspector Lestrade. I just wish that they didn’t need to see Father this way. It will do his career no good.”

There was a bit of irony, given how Bancroft had tried to conceal Grace’s death. She bit her lip, holding the words back. “I’ve sent for my uncle’s friend Dr. Watson.”

“That makes sense.” Tobias’s tone eased. “But Evelina, forget what Father said about Grace’s baby. Don’t tell anyone, for Mother’s sake. It’s just too hard for her. And don’t tell Lestrade. That would just make things look bad, and it doesn’t prove anything.”

His fingers brushed her cheek, coaxing. She looked away, too confused to answer.

“Please.” Gently, he turned her face back so that she looked into his eyes. “Do this for me. For Imogen.”

“All right,” she said, her heart winning over reason. He brushed his lips to her forehead gently, but she still felt miserable.

The ground had shifted between them. The dizzying happiness had been sullied. She wanted to argue, to rage, to plead the last hours away until they were back to that brief second where everything looked possible. But not even magic could do that.

She tried to gather her wits. “We should check the grounds for clues so I can get back to Uncle Sherlock.” Though she
wondered, if she did find traces of the shooter, whether it would be anything she could take to Lestrade.

Tobias studied her for a moment, but then his face relaxed. “Lead the way, my pretty detective.”

Evelina nodded, desperate to trust the affection in his eyes.