Page 95 of Miss Moriarty, I Presume?
“Not since he went to see his friends before Christmas,” said Mr. Steele. “Why, is anything amiss with him?”
Mrs. Steele too, turned around.
“No,” said Charlotte. “I just realized that I haven’t met him, that’s all. I’ve met everyone here except him.”
Mr. Peters’s countenance grew even darker.
Charlotte was never going to omit him in her questioning. “Mr. Peters, when was the last time you saw Mr. Craddock?”
“Three nights ago.”
“It was dark that night. Did you see his face?”
Mr. Peters’s voice became ever brusquer. “No.”
Dr. Robinson sauntered to the edge of the plot, glanced around, and said, “Oh, have we already started spring planting?”
“I hearyou are a sworn enemy of Moriarty, Miss Fairchild,” said Mrs. Watson.
With Miss Ellery having gone with Dr. Robinson to see what was happening around the kitchen garden, Mrs. Watson invited Miss Fairchild for a walk. John Spackett, who had just closed the gate after the Steeles went out, opened it for them again.
The two women rounded south of the compound. Mrs. Watson kept her gaze on the uneven ground underfoot—she did not want to add a bad stumble to her list of troubles. Miss Fairchild, however, glanced several times behind them, at the men who were still putting up one last tent, her expression not so much one of fear as one of consternation, as if she faced not agents of Moriarty, but an infestation of weevils.
They went down to the promontory. A few miles from the coast clumps of dark cloud hung low, rain falling in their shadows even as the surrounding sea continued to gleam under the sun.
Miss Fairchild’s attention had been behind them. A man stood at the edge of the headlands—one of the campers. She had scanned him, her bearing straight, her face severe.
At Mrs. Watson’s statement, however, her expression congealed. Her head turned, a fraction of an inch at a time, until she looked Mrs. Watson in the eye.
“I hear that you are a sworn enemy of Moriarty’s, Miss Fairchild,” Mrs. Watson repeated herself. “And that the blame also falls on him for the condition of your vocal cords.”
Miss Fairchild said nothing, only continued to look at Mrs. Watson.
Mrs. Watson genuinely liked and loved people, but in return she also liked to be liked and loved to be loved. It was disconcerting to be on the receiving end of Miss Fairchild’s flat gaze.
Miss Charlotte had quite a stare, too, powered by her sometimes-overwhelming perceptiveness. It could produce an effect of mortification, of believing that one had turned into glass and that every last closely held secret was now open to scrutiny.
Miss Fairchild’s look did not make Mrs. Watson feel as if she’d been put under a microscope. Rather, it was as if she studied Miss Fairchild through the wrong end of a spyglass, with the silent woman appearing much farther away than she actually was.
Mrs. Watson steeled herself. “I also hear, from the same reliable source, that the Garden of Hermopolis has been, over the years, a place for those who oppose Moriarty to find temporary refuge.”
Miss Fairchild persisted in her stony silence.
“We have said nothing to Mr. Baxter, of course. We are neutral parties—Miss Baxter, in allowing us to come here, bears testimony to our neutrality.
“It must be a terrifying time for you, with these ‘campers’ openly staking an observatory post outside your front gate. It is an equally unnerving time for Miss Holmes, Mr. Hudson, and myself. We are only investigators. Mr. Baxter asked us to ascertain Miss Baxter’s safety; we came. He asks us to ascertain Mr. Craddock’s safety and we have returned.
“We do not want to be thorns in your side. We only want to know about Mr. Craddock and then leave as soon as possible.”
More silence from Miss Fairchild, before she pulled out a stubby pencil and a small notebook and began writing.
Mr. Craddock is on a meditative retreat. He is not to be disturbed.
Mrs. Watson felt a stab of disappointment. “Do you really believe that, Miss Fairchild? While I don’t know why the men outside the Garden came today, I don’t think they came for you. Not yet. But I have the unhappy feeling that given time, they might make you a target, too.”
Miss Fairchild scribbled another answer.I have nothing to tell you about Mr. Craddock, other than that he is doing precisely what he came to the Garden to do.
“How can you know nothing, Miss Fairchild? For years, this man occupied a cottage from which one cannot see Miss Baxter’s lodge. All at once he was transferred to another one that was a stone’s throw from hers. Similarly, he ambled about for years, only to become a hermit at the exact moment he was moved.
