Seven Dials (7 page)

“I come for yer advice,” she said meekly. “If yer can spare me ’alf an hour or so.”

He was startled by her unusual courtesy, and only after a moment realized it was for the constable’s benefit. His lean face softened with an unusual touch of humor. “I’m sure I could do that. Is Mrs. Pitt all right?” It was not good manners that made him ask-he cared profoundly. Pitt and Charlotte were as close to him as anyone he knew. He was a stiff, proud, and lonely man, and friendship did not come easily to him. He had resented Pitt when they first met. Pitt had been promoted to a position Tellman felt was only suitable for gentlemen, or those who had served in the army or navy. The son of a gamekeeper had no qualifications for command, and for men like Tellman to be expected to call them “sir” and offer them the deference of position stuck in his throat. Pitt had won his respect only a step at a time, but once earned it was a loyalty as deep as a bond of blood.

“Well, this isn’t a right place for you,” Tellman said, regarding Gracie with a slight frown. “I’ll walk you to the omnibus, and you can tell me what it’s about.” He turned to the constable. “See you in the morning, Hotchkiss.”

Hotchkiss stood up obediently. “Yes, sir. Good night, sir. Good night, miss.”

“Good night, Constable,” Gracie replied, then turned to Tellman as he moved past her and led the way, parting the crowd for her. She followed him out of the door onto the pavement, where they were now alone. “It matters, or I wouldn’t ’a bothered yer,” she said gravely. “There’s someone as is missing.”

He offered her his arm, and impatiently she took it, then found to her surprise that it was rather pleasant. She noticed that he shortened his step to make it easier for her to match stride with him. She smiled, then realized he had seen it, and became instantly sober again. It would not do to let him know it mattered. “It’s me friend, Tilda Garvie,” she said in a businesslike tone. “ ’Er brother Martin ’as gone from the ’ouse ’e works in. Said nothin’ to ’er, nor to no one else, just gone. Three days now.”

Tellman pursed his lips, his face dark, brows drawn together. He walked with his shoulders a little hunched as if his muscles were tight. It was a fine evening, but the lamps were lit and the wind gusting up from the river smelled damp. The street was quiet, just one carriage in the distance, turning the corner away from them, and in the other direction a couple of men arguing good-naturedly.

“People leave jobs,” Tellman said cautiously. “More likely he was dismissed. Could be a lot of reasons, not necessarily his fault.”

“ ’E’d ’ave told ’er!” Gracie said quickly. “It were ’er birthday, an’ ’e never sent ’er a card nor flowers nor nothin’.”

“People forget birthdays,” he dismissed it. “Even when there’s nothing wrong, let alone if they’re out of a job and a roof over their heads!” he argued, his voice impatient.

She knew he was angry with the injustice of the dependence, not with her, but it still irritated her, perhaps because she did not want it to be true, and there was a whisper of fear at the back of her mind. She was not prepared to hear a policeman’s view of it.

“ ’E’s never forgotten ’er birthday before,” she retorted, keeping up with him with an effort. He was unaware that he was walking more rapidly. “Never ever, since ’e were eight years old!” she added.

“Perhaps he’d never been thrown out of a job before,” he pointed out.

“If ’e were thrown out, why didn’t the butler say so?” she countered, still holding on to his arm.

“Probably because household matters like that were none of his business,” he answered. “A good butler wouldn’t discuss domestic unpleasantness with an outsider. Surely you know that even better than I do?” He shot a sideways glance at her, a very slight twist to his lips, as if it were a question. They had argued about the dependence of a servant upon pleasing a master or mistress, and how fragile was the safety of the warmth, the food, the roof over their heads.

“I know wot yer talkin’ about!” Gracie said crossly, pulling her arm away from his. “An’ I’m sick o’ tellin’ yer that it in’t always like that! O’ course there’s bad ’ouses an’ bad people in ’em. But there’s good ’ouses too. Can yer see Mrs. Pitt ever puttin’ me out inter the street ’cos I overslept or was cheeky an’ answered back… or anythin’ else, for that matter?” Her voice rang with challenge. “You daresay as yer could, an’ I’ll make yer wish yer’d never opened yer mouth!”

“Of course not!” he retorted, and stopping abruptly, pulled her over to the side of the pavement near the wall and away from the two men now walking towards them. “But that’s different. If Martin left the Garrick house, then it was for a reason. He was obliged to or he chose to. Either way, it’s not a police matter, unless the Garricks place a charge against him. And I imagine that’s the last thing Tilda wants?”

“A charge o’ wot?” she said furiously. “ ’E in’t done nothin’! ’E’s just disappeared-don’t you listen ter nothin’ I say? Nobody knows where ’e is!”

“No,” he corrected. “Tilda doesn’t know where he is.”

“The butler don’t know neither!” she said exasperatedly. “Nor the bootboy!”

“The butler isn’t telling Tilda, and why on earth should the bootboy know?” he said reasonably.

She was beginning to feel a kind of desperation. She did not want to quarrel with Tellman but she was on the brink of it and could not help herself. They were on the corner of the main thoroughfare now and the noise in the street rumbled past them, wheels, hooves, voices. People passed back and forth, one man so close as to brush Gracie’s back. Tilda’s fear had caught hold of her and she was losing her ability to think without panic overtaking her.

“ ’Cos bootboys see an’ ’ear lots o’ things!” she snapped at him. “Don’t yer learn nothin’ questionin’ people? You bin on crimes in big ’ouses often enough! Yer’ve listened ter Mr. Pitt, ’aven’t yer? Does ’e ever ignore people just ’cos they work in the scullery or the pantry? People notice things, yer know; they got eyes an’ ears!”

He kept his patience with an effort she could see even in the lamplight, and she knew he did it only because he cared for her. Somehow that made it more annoying because it was a moral pressure, a kind of obligation to respect him when inside she was bursting to shout.

“I know that, Gracie,” he said levelly. “I’ve questioned plenty of servants myself. And the fact that the bootboy doesn’t know there is anything wrong is very good evidence that there probably isn’t. Martin might have been dismissed and left, and if that is so, maybe he didn’t want his sister to hear about it until he found another place.” He sounded eminently reasonable. “He’s trying not to worry her… or perhaps he’s ashamed? Maybe he was dismissed for something embarrassing, some kind of mistake. It would be only natural he wouldn’t want his family to know about it.”

“Then why don’t ’e send ’er a card or a letter for ’er birthday from somewhere else?” she challenged, pulling farther away from him and staring up into his eyes. “ ’E din’t do that, so she’s gonna worry twice as much!”

“If he lost his position, and his bed and board at the same time,” he replied, keeping his voice unnaturally calm, “then I daresay he had more pressing things on his mind, like where to sleep and what to eat! He wouldn’t have remembered what day it was.”

“Then if ’e’s in that much trouble she’s right ter be worried-in’t she?” she said triumphantly.

Tellman let out his breath in a long sigh. “Worried, yes, but calling in the police, definitely not.”

Gracie clenched her fists by her sides in an effort to hang on to the last shred of her temper. “She in’t callin’ in the police, Samuel! She told me, an’ I’m askin’ you. You in’t police, yer me friend. Leastways, I thought yer was. I’m askin’ yer ’elp, not tryin’ ter start a case.”

“What do you expect me to do?” His voice rose in indignation at the sheer unreasonableness of it.

She bit back her response with a mighty effort and forced herself to smile at him with the utmost sweetness. “Thank yer,” she said charmingly. “I knew yer’d ’elp, when yer understood. Yer could start by askin’ Mr. Garrick ’isself where Martin is. Yer don’t ’ave ter say why, o’ course. Mebbe ’e were a witness?”

“To what?” His eyebrows shot up in disbelief.

She ignored it. “I dunno! Think o’ summink!”

“I can’t use police authority to go and question someone over something I invented!” He looked offended, as if his morality had been insulted.

“Oh, don’ be so… so…” She was almost lost for words. She loved him as he was, stiff, awkward, full of indignation, covering his compassion with regulations and habit, the rigidity he had been taught, but sometimes he infuriated her beyond endurance, and this was one of those times. “Can’t yer see beyond the end o’ yer nose?” she demanded. “Sometimes I think yer brain is shut inside yer book o’ rules! Can’t yer see that lives, feelin’s, wot’s inside people’s wot matters?” She drew in breath and went on. “People are ’eart an’ blood, an’… an’ mistakes an’ things. An’ dreams! Tilda needs ter find wot ’appened to ’im… an’ that’s real!”

His face hardened. He clung on to what he understood. “If you break the rules, in the end they’ll break you,” he said stubbornly, and in that instant she knew she had lost him. He had made a statement he could not go back on. He was right as he saw it, and she understood more than she could now admit. She had been unfair, forgetting he was working for Wetron now, not Pitt, and there would be no latitude granted him for anything. He had already risked his job once to save her and Charlotte and the children, and done it without thought of himself. Another day, when she was not so angry, and when it would not look like either apology or trying to win him back, she would tell him so. Just at the moment her thoughts were centered on Tilda and what had happened to her brother.

“Well, if yer won’t ’elp ’er, I’ll ’ave ter do it misself!” she said at last, swinging around to move a step away from him. She could not think of anything cutting and final to say, which was very frustrating. All she could do was stand and stare for a moment, as if she were about to deliver the final blow, then let out a sigh and leave.

“No, you won’t!” Tellman said abruptly. “You’ll do nothing of the sort!”

She spun around to face him again. “Don’t you tell me wot ter do, Samuel Tellman! I’ll do wot I ’ave ter, an’ you don’t ’ave nothin’ ter say about it!” she shouted, but she felt so much better that he had responded.

“Gracie!” He took a long stride after her as if he would reach out and grasp her arm.

She shrugged exaggeratedly and did a little skip to elude him, and then walked as quickly as she could without looking back, mostly because she wanted to think he was staring after her, perhaps even following her, and she did not want to find out that he was not.

When she reached Keppel Street and went in through the scullery to the kitchen, she was still just clinging on to anger, but unhappiness had almost drowned it out. She had not handled the encounter with Tellman well. Even if she could not have persuaded him to investigate Martin Garvie’s disappearance, and just possibly he had something of an honest reason for not doing so, at least she could have behaved so that they parted friends. Now she had no idea how to retrace it so she could speak openly to him next time they met. It was amazing how sharply that hurt her. She had not expected it to matter as deeply as it did. One day quite soon she was going to have to face the fact that she cared for him very much.

Fortunately there was no one else in the kitchen, so she could blow her nose and wash her face quickly, and then try to look as if nothing were wrong. She had the kettle on when Charlotte came in.

“Would yer like a cup o’ tea?” she asked almost cheerfully.

“Yes, please,” Charlotte accepted, in spite of the fact that it was only half past six. She sat down at the table and made herself comfortable. “What’s wrong?” she asked, waiting motionlessly as if demanding an answer.

Gracie hesitated for a moment, debating whether to say that there was nothing wrong or to tell her at least part of it-the bit about Martin Garvie. She had not realized that Charlotte could read her so well. That too was a little disconcerting. And yet they had known each other for so long that if Charlotte had not ever hurt her, it would mean she did not care, and that would have been worse.

“Saw Tilda Garvie this mornin’,” she replied, banging the lid onto the tea caddy unnecessarily hard and keeping her back to the table. “She in’t seen ’er brother fer days, an’ she’s real worried summink’s wrong.”

“What sort of something?” Charlotte asked.

The kettle began to whistle and Gracie put her hand around the pot holder as she lifted it off the hob. She scalded the teapot, pouring the water down the sink, then put the leaves in and filled it from the kettle. She could no longer find any excuse for not sitting down, so she did so stiffly, avoiding meeting Charlotte’s eyes.

“ ’E in’t livin’ in the ’ouse in Torrington Square where ’e worked,” she answered, “an’ the butler says ’e don’t work there no more, but ’e din’t tell ’er wot ’appened or where ’e went.” She had not intended to look at Charlotte, but suddenly the reality of Martin’s situation outweighed her own pride. “An’ if things was all right ’e wouldn’t do that, ’cos they’re real close,” she went on hurriedly. “They got nob’dy else. Wotever’d ’appened, ’e’d ’a told ’er, ’specially since ’e missed ’er birthday, an’ ’e in’t never ever done that before.”

Charlotte frowned. “What did he do at the house in Torrington Square?”

“Valet ter Mr. Stephen Garrick,” Gracie replied immediately. “ ’E weren’t just a footman or the like. An’ Tilda said Mr. Garrick relied on ’im. I know people can get throwed out easy enough if they do summink daft, or even if it jus’ looks like they did, but why couldn’t ’e ’a said summink ter Tilda? Just ter keep ’er from worryin’.”

“I don’t know,” Charlotte said thoughtfully. She reached over and poured the tea for both of them, then replaced the pot on the trivet. “It does sound as if he was very distressed about something, or he would surely have told her he was moving. He may even have found a better position. Can Tilda read?”

Gracie looked up, startled.

“Well, it would be harder to send her a letter if she can’t,” Charlotte reasoned. “Although I suppose somebody would read it for her.”