Page 47 of Murder on Harley Street
He peered over the spectacles at her. “She was my wife.”
Miss Rowbottom sat back. “Yes, of course. I merely meant it must be difficult for you to go through her things and read her secret thoughts. You should let me do it, so it’s one less bother for you.”
He stopped turning pages when he reached October. “Here! Listen to this. A week before her death, she wrote: ‘Meet Will I. Tell him I know.’” Mr. Kempsey handed the diary to Harry. “’Will I’ is Dr. Iverson. I don’t know what she was going to tell him, but I believe the code in the pages leading up to it might give a clue. I can’t decipher the code, but perhaps you can.”
Harry lowered the diary so we could both read it and flipped back through the pages. Isabel Kempsey’s jottings consisted mostly of a series of times beside what I guessed to be locations. Several were C Royal—Café Royal. It seemed likely she’d discovered the doctor frequented the venue. Other locations appeared to be public spaces such as parks. They were probably all places where she’d seen the doctor meet someone. Given the Café Royal’s reputation, it was a reasonable assumption that she saw him meet men.
“There, you see,” Mr. Kempsey went on. “Isabelwasn’thaving an affair with the doctor. She was gathering information about him, perhaps to blackmail him. I don’t know why she would do that—she didn’t need the money—but what other reason could there be?”
Jealousy sprang to mind, but I kept my opinion to myself.
His sister-in-law wasn’t so kind, however. Miss Rowbottom reached across the gap and clasped his forearm. “My dear Ian, shewashaving an affair with him. She told me to my face that she loved him. It’s most likely that when he broke it off with her, she was angry and sad, so she followed him around the city like a puppy. She must have learned something about him while doing so, something he wouldn’t want made public.”
Mr. Kempsey snatched his arm away. The familiar blank mask descended over his face, and he was once again the indifferent husband. Except now I realized it wasn’t indifference. It was a way of protecting himself from not just the loss of his wife, but the truth of her infidelity.
“The entry in the week before her death states she was going to tell Dr. Iverson she knew whatever it was she’d found out about him,” Miss Rowbottom went on. “You’re right in that she probably wanted to blackmail him, but not for money. For his affections. Either way, it’s a very good motive to kill her.”
Mr. Kempsey indicated the diary in Harry’s hand. “You may keep that, Armitage. Take it to the police.”
Harry shook his head and held it out to him. “It must come from you, sir. But thank you for showing it to us. It’s enormously helpful.”
Mr. Kempsey accepted the diary. “You had some more questions for us, I presume?”
“Does the name Edith Hamlin mean anything to you?”
“No.”
Harry looked to Miss Rowbottom, but she also denied knowing Mrs. Hamlin. “Who is she?” she asked. “And how is she important to the investigation?”
“We can’t divulge that information.”
I watched Miss Rowbottom carefully. Out of the two of them, I suspected she knew Isabel the best. “Are you sure your sister never mentioned her? Could she be an old friend Isabel bumped into? Or a new acquaintance?”
Miss Rowbottom shook her head. “The name isn’t familiar to me, but I’ll go through Isabel’s secret diary to see if there’s any mention of an Edith Hamlin.” She reached for the small leather-bound book, but Mr. Kempsey kept it away from her.
“I’lllook through it,” he muttered.
Miss Rowbottom’s hand recoiled as if he’d slapped it.
We left the Kempsey residence and I presumed we’d make our way to Duncan Hamlin’s workshop next, but Harry suggested we take stock of the investigation in a tea shop first.
“I have an idea,” he said.
“Does it involve you flirting with Dr. Iverson in order to discover once and for all if he’s interested in men?”
“It does.”
“It’s a dreadful idea! You are not flirting with anyone, Harry, male or female.”
His dimples flashed with his grin. “Jealous?”
“Of course not. I’m objecting on the grounds that you’d be upset if the situation was reversed, and I was the one flirting with a suspect.”
“I’d be upset because I couldn’t stand seeing you flirt with another man, whether it was an act or not. In other words, I’d be jealous. Admit it, Cleo, you’ve got a jealous streak in you. It’s not a bad thing, by the way. In fact, I quite like it. It makes me feel as though I’m special to you.”
I slowed my pace and turned to him. “If you don’t realize you’re special to me yet, then clearly my kissing needs work.”
His lips twitched with his wicked smile. “Your kissing is perfect already, but I’m always available for more practice.”
