Finessing Clarissa (16 page)

He felt better after the walk. His head had begun to clear. He gratefully drank two cups of strong tea and wondered how to get Clarissa alone to see if he could get the papers.

He decided to see if he could get upstairs to the bedrooms unnoticed. He rose to his feet. ‘May I be excused, ladies?’

Since he did not pick up his hat and gloves, no one was rude enough to ask him where he was going. His destination was obvious.

Once outside the drawing room, he took a deep breath and darted for the stairs. He let out a yelp of surprise as he nearly bumped into a small housemaid.

‘I beg your pardon,’ he said. ‘I was looking for the . . . er.’

‘The Jericho, my lord. It’s in the garding. This way, my lord.’

Cursing under his breath, he followed her downstairs, where he was turned over to a tall footman who then conducted him out to the earth closet in the garden and then conducted him all the way back up the stairs to the drawing room.

‘More tea?’ Amy asked.

He did not want any more tea but he simply had to stay as long as possible. Had Greystone not spiked his guns, he would have asked leave to pay his addresses to Miss Vevian and then begged a few moments in private with her.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I am still very thirsty.’

He was just holding out his cup when Harris entered. He addressed the Tribbles. ‘There is a person from the constabulary to see you,’ he said. He added with gloomy relish, ‘Mrs Loomis, the housekeeper, has been found.’

‘Then where is she?’ demanded Amy as she and Effy got to their feet.

‘Dead as a doornail, with a knife stuck in her heart.’

Effy turned pale and Amy put an arm about her and snapped at the butler, ‘Stop enjoying yourself, you ghoul, and conduct us downstairs.’

‘I was merely giving you the facts,’ said Harris, sounding injured. ‘The constable found this address in the pocket of her petticoat when they was searching the body. He wishes you to view the corpse and identify it proper.’

‘I don’t think I can,’ said Effy.

‘Oh, I’ll do it,’ said Amy, ‘but come along with me, Effy. Sandford, you must see yourself out. No, Clarissa, we don’t need you. Practise your scales or read some Italian or something.’

‘How dreadful,’ said Clarissa when they had gone.

‘Shocking things happen in London,’ said Lord Sandford mournfully. ‘I am glad to have this opportunity to speak to you alone, Miss Vevian.’

‘Oh, no, please don’t,’ begged Clarissa. ‘I should be most embarrassed. I humbly apologize for having obviously given you the wrong idea.’

‘No, no, nothing to do with that,’ he said hurriedly. He stopped and listened. Voices from the hall and then the slamming of the street door. The Tribbles had gone.

‘I have a confession to make, Miss Vevian,’ he began, twinkling at her in a boyish manner. ‘A few years ago I became embroiled in a liaison with a married lady. She wrote very passionate letters to me. I should not have kept them. My valet stole various items from me, along with the packet of letters. He was staying at The Bell at the same time as yourself and hid the letters in the bottom of your jewel box. You see, evidently the militia arrived to look for some government papers and he hid the stolen items in various rooms. All were recovered, but I could not ask too closely about the letters. The poor fellow repented of the theft and confided everything to me. Should the letters fall into the wrong hands, the poor lady might be blackmailed.’

Clarissa remembered that rabbity young man. But he hadn’t looked like a valet. She was still shocked at the news of the murder of the housekeeper and could not think clearly. She moved her hands in a helpless way and said, ‘But there is nothing but jewellery in my jewel box.’

‘Oh, please go and look again,’ he said. ‘I beg you.’

‘Very well,’ said Clarissa. ‘Wait here.’

On her way up to her bedroom, she met Baxter, the Tribbles’ lady’s maid, who was dressed to go out. ‘They should have taken me with them,’ said Baxter. ‘Miss Effy’s bound to have hysterics. If you are looking for Hubbard, miss, she has the headache and is lying down in her room. I am just going to join my two ladies.’

‘Do what you can to help them,’ said Clarissa. ‘Poor Mrs Loomis.’

‘It’s a wicked city, this,’ said Baxter.

She went on down the stairs. Clarissa went up to her room and threw back the lid of her jewel box and lifted out the trays. She moved aside necklaces and bracelets and felt at the bottom of the box. Her fingers touched what she had previously assumed to be packing which Hubbard had put at the bottom. Her eyes widened. She searched for the corners until she found an edge and pulled out a flat packet sealed in black oilskin.

And then her heart began to hammer against her ribs. What if this contained the missing government papers? She could not hand the packet to Lord Sandford without making sure. The packet was stitched all round. She found her sewing scissors and loosened the stitches along one edge and drew the papers out. One brief look was enough. Clarissa turned white. Her first impulse was to call for help. But just as she opened her mouth to shout, she closed it again. Whom could she trust? Only Hubbard, who would scream the place down. Someone had been in her room that night. Any of the servants might be aiding and abetting the spies.

She must get rid of Sandford and then wait for Amy and Effy to return. She seized a novel and quickly cut out several of the pages and then, forcing herself to be calm, she put them in the packet instead of the government papers and stitched up the packet again.

She shoved the government papers under her mattress, picked up the packet, and ran down the stairs.

‘What an age you have been!’ cried Lord Sandford. He saw the packet in Clarissa’s hands and darted forward and seized it. ‘Thank you. I shall be ever grateful to you, Miss Vevian.’

Clarissa looked at him solemnly. ‘You had better be on your way, my lord,’ she said. ‘You should not be alone with me when my chaperones are absent.’

‘Servant, ma’am,’ he cried, seizing her hand and kissing it. He ran from the room. Clarissa crossed to the window, opened it and leaned out. He emerged after only a few moments and ran off down the street.

She sat down with her legs trembling. Should she put on her bonnet and go to the nearest magistrate? But look what had happened to Mrs Loomis. That could have just been a straightforward murder not connected with any spies, but Clarissa was sure it was not. Amy and Effy could not be long. All she had to do was sit tight and wait.

Lord Sandford ran all the way to his club, sure of finding Sir Jason there. Sir Jason was lounging in the coffee room, reading a newspaper.

‘Got ’em,’ said Lord Sandford triumphantly.

Sir Jason smiled. ‘You see how easy it is to clear your debts? That packet is worth a fortune to us. Now we walk to a certain address where arrangements will be made for your trip to Paris.’

They strolled together in the direction of Charing Cross. The fine weather was beginning to break. The sky was becoming dark.

At last they arrived at a seedy tenement in a long street which led down to Hungerford Stairs. Sir Jason led the way up to the first landing and rapped twice on the door. ‘Enter,’ called a voice.

They went into a darkened room furnished only with a table and three chairs. A small sallow man was sitting at the table. ‘Mr Ryan, who will arrange your journey and supply you with enough money to live in Paris like a king,’ said Sir Jason expansively.

‘The papers,’ demanded Mr Ryan in a hoarse voice. Sir Jason threw the packet down on the desk.

‘Good,’ said Mr Ryan, fingering the packet. Then his eyes narrowed. ‘What is this?’ he demanded.

‘What is what, dear fellow?’ asked Sir Jason.

‘The stitching down this side is new and of white thread. I assume you checked the papers and sewed the packet up again yourself.’

There was a long silence. Sir Jason turned and looked at Lord Sandford, his eyes flat and obsidian.

‘No, I didn’t look,’ said Lord Sandford. ‘Bound to be right, though. She didn’t suspect a thing.’

Mr Ryan took out a long slim knife and sliced the white stitching. He drew out the papers and looked down at them. Then he raised his eyes and looked at Lord Sandford.

‘These are pages cut out of a novel,’ he said.

Sir Jason moved like lightning. He struck Lord Sandford full across the face, his diamond ring gashing the young man’s cheek.

‘Damn you!’ shouted Lord Sandford, raising his fists.

Then he lowered them. Mr Ryan had drawn out a pistol and was levelling it at him.

Sir Jason looked at Lord Sandford with contempt. ‘Has she had time to go to the authorities?’

‘Perhaps not,’ said Lord Sandford. ‘She was alone, apart from the servants. Those Tribbles had to go off to identify some body. Their housekeeper has been found murdered.’

‘Then all may not yet be lost,’ said Sir Jason. He looked at Ryan. ‘I will need to leave the country. I will be back here shortly.’ He moved to the door.

‘What about me?’ cried Lord Sandford.

Sir Jason did not look at him. He looked at Mr Ryan instead.

‘Get rid of this fool,’ he said, and then he went out and shut the door behind him.

Clarissa paced nervously up and down the drawing room. Night was falling and the Tribbles had still not returned. There was nothing for it. She would need to get the papers and go out and get help.

Harris entered with a card on a tray. ‘Sir Jason Pym has called, miss.’

‘Enter first murderer,’ thought Clarissa wildly, remembering the story of the widow of Brighton.

‘Tell Sir Jason we are not at home,’ she said firmly.

When Harris had left, she sat down suddenly. Her knees were shaking.

She would wait until he left, give him good time to get away, and then she would make her escape. If only there were someone she could trust. There was Yvette, but Yvette was so heavy with child she could barely move, and it would take ages to get some sense into Hubbard’s head. She thought of the household servants, but her frantic mind began to imbue them all with sinister features.

She heard Harris mounting the stairs again and called, ‘Has he gone?’

‘Yes, miss,’ called Harris.

‘Then where are you going?’

‘I am calling all the staff down to the servants’ hall, miss. There has been a theft from the kitchen.’

‘A theft of what?’ called Clarissa with a hysterical edge to her voice. There was a silence, and then Harris’s voice came again. ‘A skillet, miss.’

Clarissa waited. With all the servants in the hall down in the basement, she would be able to slip out of the house unnoticed. She would wait until she heard them descend, wait a little longer, and then go up to her room and get those papers.

She felt very young and weak and helpless. She wanted her mother. She wanted the Earl of Greystone. She wanted the Tribbles.

Harris could not get Yvette to move. She was lying on her bed, her face covered with a thin film of sweat. ‘I think my time has come,’ she said.

The butler decided to leave her. There was only Hubbard to rouse and push, protesting, down the stairs.

Grumbling, Hubbard went into the servants’ hall and then let out a scream. Sir Jason was standing at one end with a pistol levelled at the servants, who were huddled at the other. ‘Good,’ said Sir Jason. ‘Lock the area door and give me the key.’

Whimpering with fright, Hubbard went to join the other servants.

When Harris handed him the key, Sir Jason put it in his pocket and then backed away to the door of the servants’ hall. ‘Remember, all of you,’ he said. ‘One cry for help, one attempt to escape, and I will kill Miss Vevian first and then all of you.’

He went out of the servants’ hall and locked them in, and then ran up the stairs.

‘What do you want?’ demanded Clarissa, and then she saw the pistol in his hand.

‘The papers,’ he said. ‘Get them.’

And then down below the street door slammed. The Tribbles had come home.

He pressed the pistol into Clarissa’s side. ‘Call them,’ he said.

Clarissa called through white lips, ‘Miss Amy! Miss Effy.’

She heard Amy’s answering call and then footsteps on the stairs.

‘Do not harm them,’ she whispered. ‘I will give you the papers.’

Amy, Effy, and Baxter came into the drawing room. They saw Sir Jason holding the pistol against Clarissa’s side. ‘Over by the window, all of you,’ he said. He pushed Clarissa a little way and stood with the pistol covering them all.

Then from the top of the house came a long, loud scream.

‘Yvette!’ said Amy, identifying that scream. ‘She has gone into labour. I don’t know what you want, but in God’s mercy, sir, I beg you to let me go to her.’

‘Shut up!’ said Sir Jason. ‘You stay here while Miss Vevian gets me some papers from her room. If you move from here or call for help, I will kill her.’

Yvette screamed again.

‘And I’ll silence that noisy wench when I’m up there,’ he snarled.

Amy had never thought so frantically or so quickly in all her life. She wanted that baby of Yvette’s. The house in Holles Street should have that baby. She and Effy were past the age of child-bearing, and all Amy’s frustrated maternal feelings had concentrated on that baby.

‘Wait!’ she said. ‘She does not have the papers. I have.’

She looked at Clarissa as she spoke, her whole mind screaming a silent message to the girl to be quiet.

‘They’re here,’ she said, kneeling down by a low cupboard in the corner.

Effy knew what Amy was going to do and let out a bleat of fright and clutched hold of Baxter. There were no papers in that cupboard but there was a hideous stuffed cobra which Mr Haddon had brought back from India and given to Amy as a present.

‘Here they are!’ said Amy. She seized the cobra and flung it full at Sir Jason.

What he saw flying towards him was a hideous venomous snake with glaring eyes. He threw up his hands to protect his face, and Miss Amy Tribble flew clean across the room and brought him down by cannoning into him with all her force.

Winded and desperate, he squirmed on the floor, his hands reaching for the pistol he had dropped.

Clarissa jumped down on his searching hand with all her force while Effy seized the pistol and held it in one shaking hand.