Page 3 of Undercover with the Heiress
Taylor leant back in his chair and nodded. ‘That’s it. Couldn’t quite spot it myself. It’s been nice working with you, Babbage. I’ll miss your eye, but more so your logic. Which way you headed? North? East?’
‘South. Very, very south.’
Back at his desk, Phineas lined up his pens, rulers, pencils, and inks like usual, as if it was just another day coming to an end. Around him, clerks tucked umbrellas under their arms. They were completely unnecessary beneath the blazing Junesky, but every clerk in London brandished one like a sword, even Phineas. He gave his desk one last tap in a mute farewell.
Monday he’d send a note to say he was unwell. In a week, another letter, to ask for extended leave. A month later, he’d notify the managers that he was moving for his health. They’d barely remember his name by then. They barely remembered it now.
And he’d be long gone, with fathoms of sea and sky and land between him and this city.
Clerks filed out, eager to get home to their small dwellings over shops. The ledger sat unattended on Taylor’s desk. Phineas hesitated. He should at least find something to tell Iris, given that she was a stockholder in the company, to warn her of a problem if there was one. He opened the book once again, searching for some other clue. He flipped through the pages one by one but saw nothing out of place except for the overwhelming perfection.
Curiosity will do you no good. You can’t keep getting involved in these people’s lives. It’s time to move on.
Phineas closed the book, clutched his umbrella, and set off home.
Chapter Two
The first one had been the four-leaf clover. The second a teacup, followed by a frog. After that, the robin. Or had it been the fox? She had almost a dozen lucky charms now, and after the first few, she struggled to keep the order of their arrival straight in her memory. It had been almost a fortnight since he’d sent anything new. What might the next one be? Rosanna turned the last charm he had sent—a butterfly—on its link to better appreciate the pink enamel. It was so pretty. So perfect.
‘Rosie! Are you listening?’
Rosanna jerked out of her daydream to look up at her father. He was leaning over the opposite side of the desk, looming over a large map of southern England.
‘Of course I am,’ she said. ‘I heard every word.’
‘So your suggestion is…?’ Her father raised a suspicious brow. Never one for indictments, Lawrence Hempel had a way of leading his children into the depths of their own lies or attempts to evade detection. When he suspected them, he never made accusations. He only fed them more rope to see if they would hang themselves on their own falsehoods.
Rosanna scanned the map. Before her thoughts had drifted, he’d said the wordsfurther expansion. They had two hotels in London, and one in York. This one, where they sat ensconced in the warm office, the original Aster, was the most luxurious and exclusive of them all. His hand half concealed Wales…
‘Brighton,’ she said with ready confidence. ‘It’s become increasingly popular as a holiday destination. The pier is a marvel. The fried fish is excellent.’
‘Not too popular with the middle and working classes? Toffs like to be ahead of the game, not alongside it.’
Rosanna drummed her fingers on the table. ‘It is popular with all strata of life, but old and new money like to be seen. If it were me, I wouldn’t want to go to all that hassle to holiday somewhere quiet, just to be with the same people I could meet at a house party. I’d wantlotsof people to see my new frocks and finery, especially if I were new to society and hoping to make an impression.’
Her father’s gaze narrowed. His lips moved as he muttered to himself while his finger traced first a line from London to the coast, then from Bath to Brighton. He knew every railway that fed in and out of the city, the small roads that were comfortable by carriage, and the inns along the way… every point of comfort, or possible discomfort, that might thwart a journey. He nodded, grinning as broad as a roof beam. While he’d let his children hang themselves, as a man raised roughly by the streets, he also appreciated a cunning mind that found a way of escaping when almost caught. Especially when the slip of the noose was handled with finesse.
‘I’ll make enquiries and begin canvassing suitable locations for renovating. Johannes!’
Rosanna’s brother, working on a desk in the corner, stayed hunched over the stack of cyan-coloured plans. He withdrew apencil from behind his ear and, in a mimicry of their father, muttered as his fingers walked across the page.
‘Johannes.’ Rosanna leant across and lightly touched his shoulder, and he jolted as if scalded. ‘We’re going to look for a new hotel location. In Brighton.’
‘I was lost,’ he said, answering a question no one had asked. ‘Wait… Brighton? The sea?’
Rosanna smiled at her brother’s absent-mindedness, even as her father tutted and rolled his eyes. The two men were so similar at times. But while her father planned business empires, her brother was far more concerned with aged wood, clay, and days gone by. Two years her junior, Johannes loved buildings and architectural plans. He came into the hotel office to work on his designs and ideas, claiming Number 3 was too noisy to focus. His well-worn copy of John Ruskin’sSeven Lamps of Architecturewas never far from his grasp, and he poured over it, seeking inspiration for his own grand designs. He preferred to carve a balustrade or hand-tile a mantelpiece rather than instal something produced in a factory. He relished the flourish on a window moulding or a well-crafted brass handle, but after devoting himself to his studies, he had yet to find a position with a firm that was prepared to take on the gentle giant and his passion for the mediaeval, the gothic, and the handmade.
Johannes said he lacked opportunity. Father said he lacked bite.
‘I’d like you to take a train and scout Brighton to find a suitable property for conversion,’ their father said. ‘Put all that ridiculously expensive study to use. At least tell me how much it will cost to stop the right building from falling down once we start renovations. I want something old and grand and opulent. New won’t suffice. It should make the hobs think of their glory days, not remind them the world is moving on. Make sure youcheck the footings. I don’t have the patience for another Park Lane.’
‘I don’t want to check footings. I want to create my own buildings,’ Johannes grumbled as he bent back over his plans and papers.
‘One must design pavilions before one can build castles. Brighton. Or find yourself steady employment and a means to support yourself.’ Their father threatened Johannes with homelessness at least twice a week, although they both knew he’d never follow through.
Johannes frowned, his sharp yet achingly precise mind working through a reply, one that might not form clearly in his mind until the moment had long passed.
Just go, Rosanna mouthed.
