Page 77 of A Ruse of Shadows
“Not as much as I thought I would be.”
She chortled. She wanted to say something more to him, but Mrs. Watson called from the next room, “They’re here!”
The dear lady ran down, the late Dr. Watson’s service revolver in hand, to reinforce Lawson, in case Mrs. Farr tried anything unwise—or brought a larger contingent than Lawson could handle.
Charlotte left Lord Ingram to keep an eye on Mumble and Jessie and reached the ground floor as two visitors were admitted to the house, Mrs. Farr and a woman with a scarf pulled across her face.
Charlotte nodded at a stony-looking Mrs. Farr. Then she addressed the veiled woman. “My deepest condolences, Mrs. Claiborne.”
?The autumn before, when Holmes and Mrs. Watson—and even the Marbleton siblings—had met Mrs. Farr, Lord Ingram had been stuck at Stern Hollow, facing a murder investigation. He had, therefore, only seen her image in the photograph taken by Mrs. Harcourt.
Holmes had told him, emphatically, that she no longer looked anything like her old self. But such was the power of first impression that he couldn’t help staring at the ravage writ large on her face, her once stately beauty now only bent lines and tattered angles.
Had she paid any attention, she might have taken offense at his involuntary reaction—even though he quickly remastered himself. But she rushed to her comatose foster children and didn’t give him a second glance.
She didn’t hasten to feel their foreheads or check their pupils, but bent over the side of the divan and gazed upon their features, as if they were sleeping infants and she the mother who had prayed long and hopelessly for their arrival, her tenderness completely at odds with her otherwise harsh aura.
“As you can see, not a scratch on them,” said Holmes, who had come to stand beside Lord Ingram.
At her words, Mrs. Farr stiffened. She touched Mumble and Jessie briefly on their faces and walked out of the boudoir. Holmes, with a similarly brief touch on Lord Ingram’s arm, followed. Mrs. Watson,after serving coffee to their guests, came in and took up a spot at the foot of the divan.
Lord Ingram moved a few feet to his right so that he straddled the doorway and could keep an eye on both their captives and the newcomers in the parlor.
He had seen the counterfeit Mrs. Claiborne’s photograph in the locket. The real Mrs. Claiborne was in her mid, rather than early, thirties and, despite her currently splotchy face and swollen eyes, possibly even more ravishing.
When Mrs. Farr took a seat next to her, Lord Ingram realized with no small shock that the two black-clad women were, in fact, not that far apart in age, Mrs. Farr being only a few years older. Yet she could have passed for Mrs. Claiborne’s stern, gaunt-looking aunt.
His chest constricted at the cost of her survival.
Holmes sat down with her profile to him. She had donned men’s attire tonight, not those suits tailored for a sizable paunch, nor the form-revealing jacket and trousers she had sported once to practicecanne de combatwith him—which had been very distracting—but loose-fitting garments that managed to obscure most of her curves while retaining some sense of structure and style.
“My apologies,” said Holmes to Mrs. Claiborne, “for breaking the news of Mr. Underwood’s passing in so abrupt a manner. But I had to break it to you.”
“It—it could not be helped. It would have been the worst news no matter how it was delivered,” replied Mrs. Claiborne.
She managed to have barely any accent and yet sound smoothly and indubitably French.
“I believe you can see it now, too, Mrs. Farr, why I had to go into your house. Before Mr. Underwood entrusted Mrs. Claiborne to your care, he must have cautioned her against saying anything, anything at all, that could put her—or you, for that matter—in danger’s way.”
Mrs. Farr gave no sign of any such understanding. In fact, she gave no sign that she’d heard Holmes.
Mrs. Claiborne, despite her grief, was at least able to concentrate on the conversation. “But how did you know that I was there, Miss Holmes, at Mrs. Farr’s, when even she didn’t know, until mere days ago, that Mr. Underwood had any knowledge of Miss Mimi Duffin’s death?”
“We were engaged by Lord Bancroft Ashburton to look into Mr. Underwood’s disappearance.”
The mention of his brother’s name was a barbed pang in Lord Ingram’s chest. Sometimes he felt nothing toward Bancroft. And sometimes there was anger enough to burn, confusion enough to drown.
As if sensing his agitation, Mrs. Watson glanced at him. He gave her a small smile. She smiled back, then went to take Jessie’s wrist to check the girl’s pulse.
“Lord Bancroft provided us, essentially, only two pieces of information,” continued Holmes. “One, that Mr. Underwood had connections with boxing, and two, his mistress’s address. I take it you know of this counterfeit Mrs. Claiborne?”
The real Mrs. Claiborne nodded.
“When we met her, the counterfeit Mrs. Claiborne spoke more prettily and for longer than Lord Bancroft did, but in the end probably told us even less. One detail that stood out was her mention of the scent of perfume on Mr. Underwood’s person, a scent that she herself did not use.”
“What?” Mrs. Claiborne cried softly.
“Something else that we found strange was that she had called on Lord Bancroft regularly, under the guise of conjugal visits.”
