Page 75 of A Conspiracy in Belgravia
“What?What?!”
Miss Redmayne’s voice rose shrilly. The next moment she slumped over into Charlotte’s lap.
“Oh, dear. Oh, dear!” cried Charlotte with plenty of fearfulness, though she stopped short of actually wringing her hands.
“Shall I—shall I send for a doctor?” said Mr. Gillespie, with the expression of a man who wasn’t sure whether he ought to laugh or drink heavily.
Charlotte was of half a mind to ask the man outright whether he knew who she was, but decided to carry on with the charade. “The poor dear will be so embarrassed. Let’s see if she comes to on her own.”
They both stared at Miss Redmayne, Charlotte tapping her on the cheeks a few times. When Miss Redmayne showed no sign of “reviving,” Charlotte decided that the former meant for her to take over the conversation.
“I tried to warn her, Mr. Gillespie, I did. I told her that it was foolhardy trying to find a man who doesn’t want to be found. But you can’t tell young people anything, can you?”
“No, you cannot. Not these days.”
His expression was more under control. Had he, like her, opted to keep up the farce?
“Was the lady who came to see you a tall, slim, beautiful brunette with dark eyes, about twenty-six, a beauty mark at the corner of her mouth?”
“Why, yes.”
Charlotte clutched the buttons of her bodice. “Oh, that cad! We saw him with her one time and he swore up and down it was his cousin, visiting from Stokes.”
“I am most distressed to learn that Mr. Finch should turn out to be so faithless. But he is illegitimate, and it was a mistake on your charge’s part to hold his character in high regard.”
Charlotte sighed exaggeratedly. “Well, she is very young. I hope this will prove to be a valuable lesson to her.”
A knock came at the door. Mr. Gillespie’s secretary stuck in his head. “Sir, Mr. Malcolm is here and he’s in a hurry to see you.”
Miss Redmayne, hearing this, slowly sat up. “Oh, my,” she said vaguely, “how strange I feel. What happened?”
“I’ll tell you later, my dear.”
“But wait,” said Miss Redmayne to Mr. Gillespie. “Do you have Mr. Finch’s last known address? I have need of it.”
For a moment Mr. Gillespie looked conflicted.
Miss Redmayne rose and stamped her foot. “You must. I will not leave until I have it.”
“Yes, yes, of course. I’m all too happy to oblige.”
But Charlotte knew that he didn’t oblige them at all. When they had left Mr. Gillespie’s office, she told Miss Redmayne that she could give the piece of paper from the solicitor to the next scrap collector they came across.
Miss Redmayne was dismayed. “This isn’t the correct address?”
“No,” said Charlotte. “But I saw the address in the dossier he took out, ostensibly to write it down for us.”
“But he put his hand in front of it.”
He had, but a fraction of a moment was enough for Charlotte, looking at the address upside down, to memorize every line.
“That didn’t matter,” she said. “I say we did well.”
The pub was a hard place and smelled of cheap ale and indifferent food. But it was also a good deal cleaner and sharper than it had any reason to be, in imitation of its proprietress, a flinty-looking woman who seemed to have never been pretty but was put together with the precision of a Swiss watch.
Treadles didn’t know how he knew, but he was certain the woman had been a prostitute at one point.
He did not enjoy questioning prostitutes, to say the least.
