Page 29 of The Trick of the Treasure
Only as she was about to rise did another question strike her. She sat back. “Mr. Devine, did you wait in the garden until Jemimah had gone back inside?”
“Of course.”
“Did she lock and bolt the door behind her?”
*
Since Mrs. Lloydwas convinced that her husband meant to eat a midday meal at Barker’s Club in St. James, Solomon elected to beard him there rather than kick his heels at the house for several hours.
At first glance, there was little to make it stand out from the surrounding buildings. Solomon was surprised that Lloyd was not a member of some more imposing club, such as the Athenaeum or White’s. Until he considered the fees and Lloyd’s apparent shortage of funds.
“Good morning, sir,” the porter greeted him with frosty politeness. “May I help you?”
“I hope so. I’m looking for Mr. Barnabas Lloyd.”
“If you will take a seat here, sir, I shall inquire.”
“You needn’t trouble,” Solomon said. “If you don’t know where he is, I shall find him myself.”
The man’s eyebrows flew up. He had clearly perfected the art of gazing down upon undesirables in a superior manner that drove them from the door. In this case, the effect was spoiled somewhat by the fact that he had to tilt his head backward to do so, Solomon being several inches taller than he was. “Are you a member, sir?”
“Yes,” Solomon said, meeting the glacial stare.
“Your name, if you please, sir.”
Solomon sighed and produced one of his cards. The porter made a fuss of checking through his membership book under the letter G. Quite clearly, he did not expect to find the name in front of him, but in fact, although he had never before set foot in the place, Solomon had been elected a member more than a year ago, having been proposed for membership by a gentleman he had once done lucrative business with, and seconded by Sir Nicholas Swan.
Flummoxed by this discovery, it took the porter some time to lift his gaze from the name written quite clearly on the page.
“You needn’t take my coat,” Solomon said pleasantly, already pushing open the inner door to the hallowed halls. “I shan’t be long.”
The club held few surprises for him. He discovered several men snoozing over newspapers in one room, a few more silently poring over worthy tomes in the library, and an enthusiastic group having a political argument in one of the meeting rooms. It was in the next door meeting room that he finally found Barnabas Lloyd.
Lloyd had clearly been holding court about his adventures to several interested gentlemen of all ages, a few of whom were studying the photographs on the table.
Lloyd, in the middle of answering a question, noticed Solomon immediately and broke off to exclaim, “Grey! Excuse me, gentlemen.” He strode straight toward him, hand held out. “What brings you here? Have you news? Have you found it?”
“I have not,” Solomon said, briefly shaking the man’s hand. “I do, however, have questions.”
Lloyd glanced around the room, clearly reluctant to leave. “Come, then, we can speak undisturbed for a few minutes…” He led Solomon to the far corner of the room, dragging a couple of chairs with him.
“What is on your mind?” he asked, as they sat.
“First of all, that if you actually expect us to have any chance of finding your treasure, you must be completely honest and clear in the information you give us.”
Lloyd sat up. His nostrils flared. “In what way have I ever been dishonest?”
Solomon met his haughty gaze without difficulty. “You led us to believe that you had shown your family the treasure on the night you came home. Instead, you allowed them to stare at a closed chest for several hours before you locked it away.”
Something like chagrin might have flickered in Lloyd’s eyes. But he remained outwardly offended. “Whatever you might have interpreted from my words does not make me a liar, sir.”
“Technically not, but frankly, if we cannot take your words at face value, it makes you damned difficult to do business with.”
Redness suffused Lloyd’s weather-beaten cheeks—temper, not shame. Interestingly, he wrestled it back. “I fail to see how this makes a blind bit of difference to your task of locating my property.”
Was he really so lacking in imagination? Or merely pointlessly defensive?
“Why did you not open the chest for them?” Solomon asked bluntly.
