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When The Devil Drives

A Liberty Lane Mystery

Severn House Publishers Limited

'Dora will be totally lost in London,' the young man said.

He was leaning forward in his seat from desire to convince me, long fingers clasping the edge of my table, fair hair flopping over his forehead. 'She's only nineteen. She'll be an abandoned fawn on a prairie of prowling lions.'

The sound that came from the girl on the other side of the table might have been a suppressed sneeze. Since the poetical young man didn't react to it, I hoped that was what he took it for, but I knew better. I glared at Tabby, to remind her of strict orders to keep quiet. From childhood, Tabby had survived by her own resources on the prairie of prowling lions, so had precious little sympathy for the fawns of the world. This interview was her first official appearance as my assistant and the start of what would probably prove to be an apprenticeship that tried the patience of both of us. At least she looked reasonably tidy in her grey dress, with hair clean and tied back. I picked up my pencil.

'You say you last saw Dora Tilbury at church on the Sunday before last. That's eleven days ago.'

He nodded.

'And that was at Boreham, in Essex?'

Another nod. It was, he'd told me, a village on the far side of Chelmsford, which made it about five hours from London by mail coach.

'And Miss Tilbury was living with her guardian?'

'Yes. Her parents died some time ago.'

'Shouldn't it be the guardian's role to start investigations rather than yours – since she's no relation to you?' 'She's everything in the world to me,' the young man said.

In his note, asking permission to call, he'd introduced himself as Jeremy James. He looked to be around twenty, some four years younger than I was, but there was still a schoolboy air about him. His lips quivered after speaking. Perhaps he was nervous of me and hadn't expected a businesslike air.

'Are you suggesting that her guardian cares for her less than you do?' I said.

'Not that, precisely. I'm sure he is concerned for her. He's her uncle, quite elderly, a clergyman who had to resign his living because of ill health. He's very conscious of people's opinion. And in a small village ... you know.'

'You believe he might be too ashamed that his ward's run away to London to do anything about it?' 'She hasn't run away, I told you. She wouldn't do anything like that.'

'And yet she's disappeared from her home. Are you telling me that she's been kidnapped?'

'No.'

'So she went willingly?'

'She must have had a reason. She wouldn't just go. She's hardly been ten miles from the village since she was a child.'

I heard stubbornness as well as strain in his voice. He wouldn't be an easy client.

'Tell me what happened from Sunday onwards,' I said. 'You saw Miss Tilbury in church. Did you speak to her?'

'A few words. I asked her how she was and whether she was enjoying a book I'd sent her. Then Mrs Meek came up and hurried her away. Mrs Meek keeps house for Dora's guardian.'

'Why should she hurry her away? Does the guardian disapprove of you?'

'No, I think not. As I said, he is very conscious of propriety.'

'Are you engaged to Miss Tilbury?'

'In our hearts, yes. As the world sees it, no. My father says I should qualify for the bar first, then look for a wife.'

'Do you live in the same village as Miss Tilbury?'

'We have a small estate just outside it.'

'That Sunday, did she say anything to suggest she was thinking of going away?'

'Of course not.'

'So what did she say?'

He blinked. 'I've told you.'

'No, you've told me what you said to her. What did she say to you?'

He seemed at a loss. 'The usual things, I suppose. She was well. She thanked me for the book.'

I was tempted to say that was hardly the language of passion, but perhaps it had been one of those occasions when eyes did the talking.

'When did you find out she was missing?'

'The Thursday morning. Her guardian came round in his pony cart, demanding to know where she was. My father was furious.'

'With him or you?'

'With him. The old man was accusing me of eloping with Miss Tilbury. My father knew I wouldn't do anything so dishonourable, and in any case there I was, at home.'

'She'd said nothing to her guardian, left no note?'

'No. She went up to her room as usual, at about ten o'clock on Wednesday night. She didn't come down to breakfast. Mrs Meek went up to her room. Her bed hadn't been slept in.'

'Had anybody seen her leave?'

'Not leaving the house, no. But the landlord of the Cock saw a young lady getting into the coach for London at about six o'clock in the morning. I've spoken to the driver of the coach and there seems no doubt about it. His description matches Dora exactly, even down to her blue cloak and hood. He remembers her getting out in the yard of the Three Nuns at Aldersgate in the City when they arrived at about midday. After that, she seems to have vanished from the face of the earth.'

'Did he notice if she had any luggage with her?'

'A small bag, he thought.'

'Did she have money?'

'I believe about two hundred a year, from her parents.'

'Money in her pocket, I mean.'

'Her guardian allowed her pin money, for gloves and church collections and so on, but even if she'd saved it, she couldn't have had more than a sovereign or two.'

I put down my pencil. 'Miss Tilbury's been missing for six days now, so the trail's already cold. But I shall do my best. My terms are two guineas payable now, a further three guineas when the person is found, plus expenses whether we find her or not.'

'Expenses?'

'Omnibus or coach fares, payments to people who may have information. I try to keep them as low as possible. The initial two guineas covers two weeks of investigation.'

I'd been in business as a paid investigator for less than a year, but one thing I'd already learned was to establish the fee from the start. Clients who were prepared to promise the world when they wanted something would haggle over shillings once they'd been given it.

'And if you haven't found the person in two weeks?' he said.

'In my experience, if a person isn't found in two weeks, he or she is not likely to be found at all.'

So far my experience of looking for missing persons had amounted to three cases, two of them successful. Mr James looked doubtful, then slowly felt in his pocket and put two sovereigns and two shilling pieces on the table. I signed to Tabby to push pen and inkwell towards me and wrote him out a receipt.

'Now our work starts,' I said. 'I need a list from you of any friends or acquaintances Miss Tilbury has in London.'

'None.'

'None at all? Most people have an old schoolfellow or two.'

'Miss Tilbury was educated at home.'

'An aunt or cousin?'

'Apart from her guardian, the only relations I ever heard her mention were an aunt and some cousins in Scotland.'

'Had she any particular friends?'

'There are few young ladies in the area. Her guardian doesn't pay social calls because of his health.'

'Did you and she ever talk about London?'

'Not that I can recall. I may have mentioned a play or an opera I'd read about.'

'What were her interests?'

He thought for a while. 'She was very fond of her pet linnet and talented in embroidery.'

'Did she have any dreams involving London life?'

'Dreams?'

'Going on the stage, being the belle of the ball and so on.'

'Good heavens, no. Miss Tilbury is a modest and retiring young lady.'

I caught the expression on Tabby's face and had to look away quickly.

'Let's have a description, as detailed as you can make it.'

He seemed more at ease here, and rattled it off. 'Her hair is fair, complexion pale, eyes blue. Chin rounded, white and even teeth, a well proportioned nose, neither too long nor snub, height around average or a little below it, small and delicate hands and feet.'

I waited, pencil poised. He looked at me. 'Go on,' I said.

'I've just described her.'

'There are probably ten thousand young women in London who match that description. I need something that's particular to Miss Tilbury.'

'She's beautiful.'

'And I dare say for every one of those ten thousand women there's a young man who thinks she's beautiful.'

He tried to look fierce. 'I don't think I've done anything to merit your sarcasm, Miss Lane. When I heard about you, I hoped that a woman's heart would be touched to learn of one of her own sex in danger.'

'How did you hear about me, as a matter of interest?'

He mentioned a name of one of my clients and said he'd heard about his case from an old school friend, now a law student. Since I didn't advertise and could hardly put up a brass plate, all my clients came to me by word of mouth.

'I hope I'm not unsympathetic,' I said. 'But if I have any chance of finding her, it's my head and eyes I need more than my heart. You love Miss Tilbury?'

'Yes.'

'If you love a person, you notice everything about him or her. Not the things the whole world notices, like fair hair or blue eyes. A mole on the cheek, say, a particular way of walking or an expression.' (I thought of a man's face and his look when something amused him – a drawing together of the eyebrows, then the outbreak of laughter, revealing a tooth on the top right side slightly askew, from falling out of a tree when he was ten.) My client was telling me something and I had to drag my mind back to him.

'Dora has a pale brown birthmark on the inside of her left wrist, about the size of a farthing piece. Her glove usually covers it.'

We could hardly go round London asking blonde young women to take off their left gloves.

'Anything else? Her voice for instance.'

'Soft and low.'

It would be. 'I shall report to you as soon as there's anything to tell you, and in any case at the end of a week, even if there's nothing,' I said. 'Are you going home to Boreham?'

'No. How could I stay there, knowing she's in London? I'm lodging with my law student friend, out at Islington. Any message from you will find me there.'

He borrowed the pen and wrote down an address. I stood up. He hesitated, as if hoping for something more, then stood too and picked up his hat and gloves. He'd kept his overcoat on through our interview. I only used my little box of an office when clients called, preferring to work in my own room next door, so the fire wasn't kept up and the temperature was scarcely warmer than the grey October day outside. I followed him downstairs, onto the cobbles of Abel Yard. Straw had blown into the spaces between the cobbles from the cowshed at the far end of the yard. Inside the carriage mender's workshop by the gateway onto Adam's Mews, the forge was roaring and the damp air carried the sound of hammering and the smell of hot metal. My client trod cautiously in his well-polished boots and gave me a puzzled glance as if wondering why I lived in such an artisan place. I could have told him: small fees and large problems.

After a reasonably successful summer, autumn had brought a falling-off in my business, along with the yellowing of the leaves and the first frost in Hyde Park. I told myself that was due to the rhythms of the rich. From May to August, the social season brought its crop of scandals, thefts, elopements and suspicious absences, with some of their consequences providing work for me. With the start of the shooting season, the wealthy and aristocratic carted themselves and their problems back to country estates. In the past fortnight, our only income had come from our reliable standby, Lady Tandy's marmoset. The lady was an elderly widow who lived in some luxury in Grosvenor Square. Instead of the more usual lapdog, she cherished a bright-eyed marmoset. Every now and then the animal would tire of a lifetime of sitting on velvet cushions, being fed peeled hothouse grapes, and make for the open spaces of the park. When that happened, a footman in gold and red livery would make his appearance at the bottom of our staircase.

'The monkey's gone missing again, ma'am.'

By now, Tabby and I had established a routine. She would inform the leader of the gang of urchins who hung about the mews, he would recruit his best climbers and off they'd go across the road to the park, where a group of bystanders looking upwards would instantly tell them what tree to target. The urchins would propel one of their climbers into a fork of the tree and he'd balance there holding out a palmful of raisins, which we'd discovered that the marmoset loved more than liberty. Once he was recaptured, Tabby would bring him to me and I'd present him at Lady Tandy's front door, where I'd be awarded a fee of half a guinea. That was broken down as follows: five shillings to the leading urchin, for distribution among the gang; two shillings to Tabby; three shillings to me for organizational costs and the embarrassment of walking through Mayfair with a marmoset in my arms; sixpence to replace the raisins borrowed from Mrs Martley's jar. So far, it was an arrangement that had worked to everybody's advantage. The marmoset had the exercise, our team earned the money and Lady Tandy appeared to enjoy the drama. The only drawback was my suspicion that Tabby and the leading urchin were conspiring to set free the animal in the first place, possibly with the assistance of some servant in the lady's household. If the escapes happened too frequently, I'd have to drop a hint to Tabby.

Back upstairs, I found her sitting at the table staring at the notes I'd made. No point, because she couldn't read. Over the past few weeks I'd made an attempt to teach her. She was so naturally intelligent and quick-minded that I'd expected it to come easily, but had reckoned without her core of stubbornness. Simply, she saw no place for reading and writing in her life and that was that. I put the notes in the table drawer and led the way onto the landing and through a doorway so low that even Tabby had to stoop. My two rooms had their own staircase down to the courtyard, but this was a quicker way to the living space next door that I shared with my more-or-less-housekeeper, Mrs Martley. The landlord didn't know that I'd had the old door unblocked. An alternative way of coming and going was sometimes useful. Tabby hesitated at the doorway to our parlour.

'I'm not allowed in here, am I?'

'It's all right. Mrs Martley won't be back from Bloomsbury for another hour.'

Mrs Martley wouldn't tolerate Tabby in the house. Since I paid the rent, I could have insisted, but compromised for the sake of domestic peace. I told Tabby to lay two places at the table, carried a saucepan of Mrs Martley's good mutton broth to the fire and roused the sullen and cindery coals. Tabby sat and watched while I knelt on the hearthrug and stirred the broth. It should have been the other way round, but she was about as easy to domesticate as a March hare and it was less trouble to do it myself.

'Well, what did you make of Mr James?' I said, carrying the saucepan to the table. I thought she might have been impressed by his sad story and his callow good looks. She made a face.

'Thinks the sun revolves round him, don't he?'

'Ah, so that struck you as well. Why?'

She chewed a nugget of mutton and thought about it. 'I reckon it was him talking to her all the time, not noticing what she said. You picked him up on that, not seeing or hearing her.'

More to the point, Tabby had picked up my picking him up.

'He says he loves her.'

'Oh, that.' She tore off a hunk of the loaf.

'Tabby, please use the bread knife. You don't think he means it?'

She shrugged, as if to say that was nothing to the point.

'I think he means it,' I said. 'I daresay he goes for long gloomy walks and writes bad poetry to her.'

'What's poetry?'

I stared at her. She wasn't joking. 'It's words going together and rhyming,' I said. 'Like "Where Alph, the sacred river ran Through caverns measureless to man".'

'Oh, you mean what people sing when they're drunk. Kitty's titties and things like that.'

'Well ... but coming back to our client, how do you suggest we set about looking for Miss Dora Tilbury?'

As far as the case offered any profit at all, it would make a prentice piece for educating Tabby in our business. Tracing missing persons is nine-tenths tedium, asking the same question time after time without result.

'She must have gone somewhere after she got off the coach,' Tabby said.

'Exactly. We start from the last thing we know about her. She gets off the coach at the Three Nuns in Aldersgate. Either she gets straight onto another coach, in which case the driver or the clerk who books the places will have noticed, or she walks out of the yard.'

I thought of a wise saying of my friend Amos Legge, the most fashionable groom in Hyde Park: Anyone who goes anywhere has to do it on two feet or four. When it came to inquiries in the world that went on four feet I could call on his help if necessary.

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Excerpted from When The Devil Drives by Gillian Linscott, Caro Peacock. Copyright © 2011 Caro Peacock. Excerpted by permission of Severn House Publishers Limited.
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