The Curious Case Of The Clockwork Menace (16 page)

She’d
been oblivious.

Perry had
always known he carried on affairs, but Garrett was discreet and
usually conducted them outside guild matters. Usually she only
realized what was going on when she smelt a hint of perfume on his
skin. She’d never been present during the start of the flirtation,
and it had rocked her to see him smiling and flirting with Miss
Radcliffe, whom he obviously found attractive.

And why
wouldn’t he? The young actress was beautiful, gracious, and brave.
Everything that a young lady should be, and everything that Perry
wasn’t. Perhaps that was the true problem? Miss Radcliffe was so
perfect - the kind of young woman that Perry had once wished she
could be, before realizing that no matter how hard she forced
herself, she would never fit that mold.

She’d accused
him of letting his emotions and flirtations interfere with their
work, when she’d compromised it far more severely.

This was all
her fault.

“
Perry, are you all right?” The floorboards creaked as he took
a step toward her. “I didn’t mean to say I didn’t wish to work with
you. I didn’t mean–”

“
I know you didn’t.” She’d made a right royal muck of things.
“I shouldn’t have made you feel like you’d compromised your
professionalism. You didn’t. It was only–”

“
No, you were right. I was attracted to Miss Radcliffe, and I
couldn’t see it, so don’t apologise for that.” Garrett stepped into
her vision, taking her by the upper arms. This time his grip was
firm, his expression more confident than it had been before.
“Apology accepted?”

“
Apology accepted,” she repeated. “Back to Nelly’s apartment
tomorrow?” she asked, forcing her voice to lighten, as though
nothing had ever occurred between them.

He nodded.
“I’ll try and track Millington down today with Byrnes, and see if
he has any answers. You just rest. Tomorrow we’ll see if we can
find anything at Nelly’s that we missed in the first sweep, now we
know what to look for.”

Determination
filled her. Cases could often be slow, but Perry needed to find
some answers now, with three people dead. Poor Lovecraft, he’d
never stood a chance...

I’ll find them,
she promised
Lovecraft silently.
And I’ll make them pay
for what they did to the pair of us, for what they did to Nelly and
Hobbs...

The darkness
of the hunger surfaced within her at the thought.

CHAPTER
THIRTEEN

MILLINGTON WAS
AT The Cap and Thistle, in Holborn, with several fellows who met
for darts each Sunday. The Cap and Thistle was an old pub, with
diamond-shaped windowpanes, and mahogany paneling inside. It stunk
of smoke and beer, and laughter rocked its small confines.

Garrett strode
in and located his target, throwing darts in the corner.

“
That him?” Byrnes asked, at his side.

“
Aye.”

Millington
swilled a mugful of beer, laughing at something someone had said.
It had taken three hours to track him down - both by rumor of his
habits on his day off, and his scent trail. Byrnes was almost as
good at tracking as Perry was.

Millington saw
them enter over the rim of his mug, and choked a little on his
beer. Garrett tipped his chin, indicating he wanted a word, and
Millington handed the pair of darts in his hand to someone
else.

“
Christ,” the man muttered. “Ain’t you fellows finished up,
yet? Thought we got him.”

Garrett’s
smile was tight. “We’re not entirely certain Lovecraft had anything
to do with Nelly Tate’s murder, but what I want to speak to you
about is what occurred when you shot him. Specifically, if there
was another individual in the area when you arrived on scene.”

Millington
grumbled under his breath as he dragged out a barstool, the whites
of his eyes flashing as he eyed the dartboard longingly. “I can’t
bloody remember. Were about a dozen of us, all told, and it all
happening at once...”

“
And the pistol you were carrying at the time?” Byrnes
asked.

“
A Colt 1862 Trapper. Why?”

A .36 caliber.
“No reason.”

Garrett
grilled him for the next half hour but the story didn’t change.
Millington seemed uninterested.

“
Bloody hell, we got him, didn’t he?” A sneer curled his lip.
“Took care o’ matters when you lot couldn’t. You ain’t got any
proof that clockwork menace did it? Hell, you only had to look at
him!”

“
In the Nighthawks, we prefer facts.”

“
Attacked Miss Radcliffe, he did!”

“
Did he?” Garrett murmured, then deliberately set out to fish
for information. “I was under the impression that she simply got in
his way.”

Millington’s
eyes narrowed. “Saw it with me own eyes. You ask Lord Rommell! He
were there, too.”

“
Yes, we’re aware that Rommell was standing there. Makes us
all kinds of curious.” Byrnes cut him an enigmatic smile that could
have meant anything.

“
Rommell’s a good man,” Millington blustered. “Took care of
matters when you lot didn’t.” He drained the dregs of his beer, and
slammed the mug down. “I’ve had enough of this. The monster’s dead.
Case is solved. You ought to move on.”

“
The problem is, that whoever the other person is that shot
Lovecraft, is also responsible for assaulting my partner, Perry.”
Garrett bared his teeth in a smile. “I’m afraid I’m not just going
to let that sit.”

Millington
paled at the threat. “The lass as dresses like a man?”

“
Yes.” Garrett stood, shrugging back into his leather coat.
“I’m fairly certain that when she wakes up, she’ll be able to point
us in the right direction. I was hoping you might have had an idea,
but I suppose we’ll just have to wait for Perry.”

“
Interesting tactic there,” Byrnes commented as they strode
along the footpath. “I thought Perry was awake.”

“
She is,” Garrett replied.

“
You suspect something?”

“
Millington?” His brows shot up. “I’m not certain. He was very
defensive.”

“
Covering for someone?”

“
Possibly. Either that, or he doesn’t like us very
much.”

“
If he does know who did it, then that somebody just received
fair warning,” Byrnes pointed out.

Garrett felt a
tight smile stretch over his face. “Good. I want them to be warned.
I want them on edge about what Perry might know. So far we’ve got
very little. Maybe this will push the murderer into revealing his
hand.”

Byrnes laughed
under his breath, an evil sound. “That sounds like something I
would have done.” He looked impressed and clapped a hand on
Garrett’s shoulder. “Perhaps you’re not such a hopeless case, after
all.”

CHAPTER
FOURTEEN

NELLY’S FLAT
was near Portman Square. It was a cosy little one-bedroom flat, and
far more ordinary than Perry had expected. Nelly’s dressing room at
the Veil was that of a theatre starlet; her home belonged to an
entirely different woman indeed. The quilt on the bed was handmade,
and much mended - as though it had been a treasured item - and
dozens of poetry books and plays lay scattered around the sofas
that sprawled through the main room.

Morning light
streamed through the lacy curtains. Perry ransacked the room,
taking less care this time to disturb matters. Poor Nelly was dead
- she wouldn’t care - and they needed to find information. Time was
ticking out on them. Rommell had withdrawn the private commission
that morning, considering the case to be solved.

Lynch had
given them two days to find something, or he was going to have to
pull them from the case, and put them on something else.

“
Over my dead body
,” Garrett had
muttered, as they left to search the flat. Tension rode his hard
frame, and it was clear he was still taking her assault
personally.

For the first
time in days, they were working as one, the way they always had. It
was both a relief and a frustration - like poking at a sore tooth.
The argument had fallen behind them, but she still felt as though
it chafed deep inside her. Her own raw feelings, threatening to
dislodge this tentative peace.

She
had
to
keep them hidden away.

“
Found anything?” Garrett asked, poking his head into the
bedroom.

“
Nothing.” She tossed aside a pair of pillows, running her
hands under the mattress. “Anything from the
neighbours?”

“
We’re in luck. Since our last visit, the lady next door asked
her granddaughter if she’d seen anyone calling. The granddaughter
was cleaning her grandmother’s windows one day when she said she
saw Nelly meet a young man across the street. She’d never seen him
before, but she noted that he handed Nelly a posy of
peonies
,” he emphasized
the word with a waggle of his eyebrows, “and that she laughed, and
tucked her arm in his, before they hopped on the omnibus. This was
about three weeks ago.”

“
I wonder why Nelly was so secretive?” Perry mused. “Why meet
him at the park? She’s an actress, so it’s not as though she has
any great reputation to protect - and I mean that with all due
respect.”

“
Interesting thought... You’re right. She’s acting as though
she has something to hide.”

“
But from whom?” Something else occurred. “The granddaughter
said he looked young? Hobbs was middle-aged. How old is the
granddaughter?”

“
Almost twenty, perhaps.”

“
She’s not going to think Hobbs was young. Any other
description?”

“
He was wearing a cap, so she couldn’t see his hair. Tall,
somewhat lanky, wearing a tweed suit. It was too far away to get a
good view, but she definitely recalls the incident. Remembers
thinking to herself how lovely it was that Nelly had a beau.
Nelly’s always been good to her grandmother, you see. Keeps an eye
out.”

And Miss Radcliffe had mentioned the card attached to the
flowers Nelly had received, from someone named Nick or Mick, or
something similar. What if they’d been wrong all along? What if
Nelly
had
been
seeing someone in secret? Someone they didn’t yet know about?
“Let’s keep searching then.”

Together, they
turned toward the living areas. Several long fruitless minutes
passed.

A typeset play
with dog-eared pages rested on the edge of the chair by the window,
as if Nelly had been going through it the day before she
disappeared. Little handwritten notes filled the margins. Perry had
glanced at it before, and dismissed it after a brief glimpse, but
now she flipped through it.

‘
Oh, Ned, I love this line. It’s brilliant! And so
naughty.’

She was about
to put the play down, when a name caught her eye.

‘
You wicked man! I know exactly who this
Edward Mayhue character
is based on.
It’s James to a T! All puffed up importance, and
I-know-what’s-best! I wonder if Clarissa is going to turn out to be
his secret sister, hmm?’

Perry paused,
her thumb ruffling the corners as she flicked through the pages.
Another little scrawl caught her eye.

‘
And now Clarissa meets the stable hand? I’m practically dying
of laughter here. It’s brilliant! I wonder if James will even
recognise it all when he sees it on stage? I wonder if Rommell
will? Please tell me his pompous lordship meets a bad end instead
of marrying poor Clarissa?’

Perry flipped
back to the start, and began reading. It seemed to be a comedy, in
which the heroine, Clarissa Donovan, was pursued by the odious Lord
Carthark, much to the disgust of her half-brother, Edward. Clarissa
meanwhile, was in love with her brother’s stable hand, right
beneath the noses of both Edward and Lord Carthark.

The humour was
considerably bawdy, and some of Clarissa’s antics made her eyebrows
lift. It was the type of play Garrett would have loved.

“
What have you got there?” he asked, noticing her
absorption.

“
I’m not entirely certain. I think it’s telling us something.
I think Nelly did have a beau - this Ned. Come look!” She flipped
back to the note about James. “I
don’t
think James was her beau, after all. I think he’s her
brother.”

It was the closest they’d come to finding any sort of
background on Nelly. The woman was a mystery.

“
Ned,” he muttered. “There’s a stagehand named Ned, isn’t
there?”

“
And two Edward’s. One’s an actor, the other works in
costuming, and as an usher.” And what was the bet that the flowers
Miss Radcliffe had seen that day, had been sent from a
‘Ned’?

Garrett graced her with a smile. “Excellent. Time to go
question some Ned’s then.”

The first Ned
was a handsome young usher who lifted his brows incredulously when
they asked him if there had been any sort of relationship between
he and Nelly.

“
Me and Nelly Tate?” He repeated, a flush of heat burning into
his cheeks. “Cor, if I ‘ad been seein’ ‘er, you’d ‘ave known it.
I’d be shoutin’ that from the rooftops. Blimey, to ‘ave ‘alf the
luck!” Then his delight faded. “Or mebbe not. Lord Rommell wouldn’t
‘ave cared much for that.”