Page 52 of The Trick of the Treasure
On the other hand, she denied knowing anyone called Samuels.
“I believe he lodges here,” Solomon said.
“Does he?” The girl looked surprised and called, “Alf! You got a new lodger?”
The landlord himself loomed up to the counter. “Lord, no. Who you looking for, sir?”
“Arthur Samuels,” Solomon said patiently. “I was told he lodges here.”
“Not unless he’s changed his sex,” Alf said with a wheezy laugh. “It’s old Mrs. Simmonds what lodges with us. Has done for ten years.”
Constance laughed. “It’ll have been his little joke,” she said, in an accent much closer to those she had grown up with. She even nudged Solomon as she spoke. “I’ll bet he’s here so often he seems like your lodger. Seafaring cove, ship’s carpenter by trade. Not as young as your fine self.”
Inevitably, Alf responded, holding his sides and laughing. The maid smiled perfunctorily but still looked mystified.
“We don’t know anyone like that, do we, Alf? Unless it’s an occasional drinker. Here, what about that quiet cove what sits over there by the window when he comes in?”
“Haven’t seen him for months,” said the landlord. He grimaced. “Reckon he’s dead. Or moved house.”
“Gentle soul. Always polite, with a cheery word,” the maid mused. “Sad eyes, though. Hope he ain’t dead.”
“Actually, he might be a carpenter,” Alf reflected, raising Solomon’s hopes momentarily. “In fact, he is. Heard someone talking business in here with him once. Never heard of him going to sea, though.”
“I don’t suppose,” Solomon said, his buoyancy seeping away again, “that you know where he lives?”
Chapter Eleven
Alf’s directions tookthem via a route Solomon did not recognize to a house and a blue door that he definitely did.
When Constance would have stopped in front of it, he drew her on.
“Not yet. This is interesting. That’s where I saw Audrey Lloyd. Coming out of that particular door.”
Constance blinked at him. “So Alf saw a carpenter who might be Samuels go in there. And you saw Miss Lloyd come out? Since she doesn’t live there, perhapshedoesn’t either. I’ll tell you what, though, it doesn’t look like the house of someone particularly poor and deserving of charity. And if itisSamuels, we know he’s healthy enough to work a long and arduous voyage.”
“And why did he give the alehouse address rather than this one to Captain Tybalt?”
“Well, let’s go and see who is there now…”
Constance was right about the house. In daylight, the surroundings were much more salubrious that they had appeared last night in the dark. Rough sailors and the abject poor did not dwell here. Tradesmen, clerks, and merchant seamen, even of the officer class, might. There were similar areas in every port and close to every dock he had ever visited.
The building itself was a two-story cottage squashed between taller neighbors. There was a window on either side of the frontdoor, which opened straight off the street. The upper floor had three windows.
Solomon rapped the well-polished knocker.
“I wonder ifhe’sthe man who has already sailed,” Constance murmured.
But it seemed not. Solomon was just about to peer in the window when the door opened.
A fit, weather-beaten man stood there, looking curiously but not irritably from Solomon to Constance. It was hard to guess his age, for his white hair made him look older than his face. He could have been anywhere between forty and sixty.
“Yes?” he said.
“Mr. Samuels?” Solomon said, touching the brim of his hat.
The clear eyes never left his. If there was a shade of concern in the man’s expression, it did not appear to be personal. “No, I think you must have the wrong house. My name is Clarke. I don’t think I know a Samuels on this street.”
“The one we are seeking is a ship’s carpenter, recently aboard theQueen of the Sea, which docked at the beginning of the week.”
