Page 98 of Her Majesty's Necromancer
"Very well. Tell her I'm thinking of her."
"I will."
She brushed past him and he shut the door before her carriage rolled away. He came over to me in the library doorway. "Apparently Lady Harcourt is thinking of you."
"You didn't tell her that you know she blackmailed me into summoning Gurry?"
He shook his head. "I can if you like."
"No. There's no need. I don't want things to be even more awkward between her and me."
"She's not your enemy, Charlie. She's…unhappy."
"I know. I don't think of her as an enemy, but I'm not sure we can be friends." I laughed at my own ridiculous statement. I was a maid and she a lady. There was no chance of friendship between us anyway. "Do you think there's any cause to worry about her stepson?"
"Possibly. I'll have to investigate now, anyway. She'll present it to the ministry in such a way that they'll feel compelled to find out where he went."
"It's not like we have anything better to do."
"We?"
I smiled. "Yes, we. Now, do you think luncheon will be far away? I'm starving."
***
We resumed training after lunch. All of us. Seth arranged a series of firearms on the kitchen table and he and Lincoln went through the particulars of each one while Cook and Gus set up targets outside and a chair for me to sit in. I'd only fired off three bullets, missing all of the tins each time, when a man approached from the side of the house. He wore checked trousers and a brown coat over a black waistcoat. He was a middle aged fellow with brown hair and a graying beard. A uniformed policeman trailed after him.
"Is one of you gentlemen Mr. Lincoln Fitzroy?" the man asked.
Lincoln stepped forward. "I am."
The newcomer introduced himself as Detective Inspector Darby. He didn't introduce his spotty faced constable. "Is this Miss Holloway?"
"Yes," I said with a smile. "You have some questions for me about the abduction?"
"I do, miss, but first, I must inform you that the fellow known as Captain Jasper is dead."
I gasped. Oh God. Had I killed him? "How…?"
"Throat was cut while he was in the cell."
Not me, thank God. Still, what an awful outcome.
"Blimey," Gus muttered. "A cove ain't safe anywhere these days."
"Sometimes those holding cells can get quite full," I said. "And when you put a group of criminals together…" I knew from experience how violent the holding cells could get.
"He was alone, miss," the inspector said.
"Then who killed him?"
"We don't know. It happened in the night. Whoever did it got in and out without anyone seeing him." The inspector shook his head. "It's a mystery."
Seth shifted his weight and I glanced up at him. But he wasn't looking at me. He was staring at Lincoln. Lincoln, however, wasn't looking at anyone. His gaze was fixed on a point on the horizon. His expression was unreadable, his body still.
"What of the two men who worked for him?" I asked. "Did you catch them?"
The inspector shook his head. "They disappeared. I had men stationed at places they frequented, but there'd been no sign of them until this morning. They turned up dead in the river."
