“You don’t like coming back here,” he said, breaking the silence that had held them.
Leda pressed her gloved fingertips together. “Not really.”
He turned to look out the window. Light fell fully on his face, burning ethereal icy fire. “I need you,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
She didn’t want him to apologize. She rather wanted to be needed by him.
He pulled the check strap. As the growler slowed to a halt, there seemed to be a challenge and a question in his expression; Leda glanced aside and realized that they were stopping in front of the police station. She caught the edge of the seat as the vehicle swayed to a standstill.
“Ready?” he asked.
Her fingers curled hard into the cushion. “What must I do?”
“Keep breathing,” he said with a half-smile, “and do what seems best.”
“You’ve no plan?”
“How could I?” The question was soft. “I don’t know what’s going to happen.”
“But surely—” She spread her hands and clenched them again nervously.
“Think of us as two cats,” he said. “Maybe we’ll be tigers. Maybe we’ll just be house cats. It doesn’t matter. When the time comes, we’ll know.”
“Mr. Gerard,” she whispered, “you are as mad as a hatter.”
She wished he had chosen some other location to leave the cab. But it was obvious that in this neighborhood, the safest place to let it stand was directly opposite the station. Mr. Gerard made no explanations or excuses as the cabbie held the door open, only giving directions to wait with the simple certainty of the ruling class—if he chose to linger in such a locale, it was of no interest to him what the driver thought.
She was horrified, however, when he slipped the cab man a bill and sent him into the station with instructions to bring back an officer. She’d cherished some small hope that she might slip out the opposite side of the clarence cab without being seen—but Mr. Gerard was leaning forward, holding open the door and motioning her out. She stepped down to the street just in time to look up into Sergeant MacDonald’s astonished face.
“Miss!” He reached to help her onto the curb. “Oh, miss, I’m that glad to see you! We were afraid you—” He broke off, the surprised relief transforming to an instant of blankness. He let go of her arm as if it scalded him.
“Good afternoon, Sergeant,” Mr. Gerard said, using his good leg on the step and swinging himself neatly down on crutches. The cab man stepped forward as if to steady him, but it was a pointless gesture; he already stood firm on the pavement and held out his hand to the policeman.
“This is my new employer,” Leda said quickly.
“Samuel Gerard,” he said, ignoring the dark flush on Sergeant MacDonald’s face. He gave the reluctant officer’s hand a firm shake. “Of Honolulu. Sandwich Islands. I’m settled in Park Lane for now.”
“I am Mr. Gerard’s secretary,” Leda added, anxious that the sergeant might not misunderstand.
He appeared to misunderstand anyway. She could see him change color, his freckles growing more prominent against his skin. “Secretary,” he repeated in a chilly tone, never looking away from Mr. Gerard. “That’s doing well for yourself.”
The words might have been pleasant—the manner in which he said them was unpleasant in the extreme. Leda drew a breath of distress, but before she could speak, Mr. Gerard laid a firm hand on her elbow.
“Miss Etoile must retrieve some of her belongings from her boardinghouse. She anticipates that there might be a little dispute with the landlady and her bully over some of the valuables. I’d not trouble you, but as you can see—I’m not in a condition to safeguard her as I’d like. I wonder if you might spare a moment and go with us?”
Leda felt his touch like a brand. The proprietary manner obviously confirmed Sergeant MacDonald in his assumptions. She almost thought he might be so indignant as to physically assault Mr. Gerard.
But the policeman’s big hands only moved up and gripped his belt. “I don’t know, sir. I’ll have to speak to the inspector.”
“Thank you,” Mr. Gerard said, as if the matter were settled.
The sergeant didn’t look at Leda as he turned away. He didn’t even speak to her.
“He thinks I’m lying!” she said in mortified despair.
“He doesn’t know you very well, does he?” Mr. Gerard didn’t let go of her.
“But he thinks—”
“It’s better this way. Let him think it.”
“Oh!” Leda said in horror, as she saw Inspector Ruby coming out the station gate. “Oh, please—”
Mr. Gerard instantly released her arm. He” shifted back, putting a decent distance between them.
“Miss Etoile!” The inspector’s welcome was much warmer; he shook hands with Mr. Gerard and congratulated her on her new position, just as if it were all the most commonplace visit, clucking his tongue over Mr. Gerard’s injury and assuring them that he’d be pleased to send MacDonald along to avoid any trouble with Mrs. Dawkins; it was on his regular beat. The inspector couldn’t leave the station himself—but he held Leda back a moment and squeezed her hand as the other two started off.
“Miss, you know this don’t look very respectable,” he said in her ear. “Are you certain what you’re doing?”
“I am acting as secretary to Mr. Gerard,” she said defensively. “He has been all that’s kind.”
The inspector looked after them. “Surely is a pretty fellow.” He shook his head. “Poor old MacDonald—daresay he deserves it, the way he sat there like a lump and let his witch of a sister ride roughshod over you, and so I told him. He’s been beside himself since you disappeared.”
“I’m sure that Sergeant MacDonald need not concern himself with my welfare,” she said, goaded into stiffness by the mention of Miss MacDonald.
“Well, you made him sorry that he didn’t. Just take care now, miss. I know you’re Quality. Don’t do nothing foolish. What sort of man hires a lady for a secretary and rides around alone with her in a closed cab?”
“A very good sort of man.” She was becoming rather vexed with these suspicions. “A hansom cab would have been impossible for him to get in and out of, that’s why it’s a clarence. Mr. Gerard might have just let me come here and try to get my things from Mrs. Dawkins by myself, mightn’t he? I doubt that many employers would trouble themselves so!”
“Aye,” he said, as if that proved his point. “Aye, not many. Pardon my plain speech, miss, I wouldn’t never speak so but I didn’t think it was important—but don’t be surprised if he tries to make up sweet to you. If he hasn’t done it already, I can’t think of anything more likely.”
Leda was incensed. “Well, I can think of nothing more unlikely!” she hissed. “Indeed, Inspector—I don’t know how you can say such a vile thing! I may tell you that he is a most superior person, devoted to an heiress of excellent breeding who has known him all his life. He is on the point of offering for her. I very much doubt he has any such low thoughts as everyone in this neighborhood seems to be obsessed with!” She started to walk away, and then turned and snapped, “Besides, his limb is broken!”
“Small bother to a determined man,” Inspector Ruby said knowingly.
“Good afternoon,” she said firmly, and turned to cross the street, lifting her skirts to run after her employer.
Two cats. Leda had no idea what she was expected to do. She could not believe that Mr. Gerard was so brazen as to ask the police to accompany them to the scene of his crimes. She really thought perhaps he was not quite right in his head, which made her even more frightened, because she was hopelessly entangled in his schemes now. She would be fortunate indeed not to end upon a gallows.
This was what came, she supposed, of having to do with gentlemen. They were entirely too adventurous, and taken to imagining themselves as tigers, or alley cats or such, when they would be far better off sitting at home with their broken limbs propped upon ottomans, resting quietly while being rea
d to. Leda had a very fine reading voice and would have been happy to lend it to this endeavor.
Instead, she heard it quavering a little as she said good afternoon to Mrs. Dawkins.
“Come back, have you?” The landlady wobbled out of her parlor at the sound of the front door. “I thought you might, Miss Hoity-Toity…and brought your gentleman back with you. Afternoon, good sir—” Her amiability came to an abrupt halt as she saw Sergeant MacDonald pushing open the door. “Now, now—what’s this, then?”
The policeman looked more sullen yet, glancing from the side of his eye at Leda in an accusatory manner. She ignored him. He was no better than his sister, ready to leap to any despicable conclusion on the smallest evidence. Leda told herself that she was fortunate to see him in his true light.
It was humiliating, nonetheless. Mrs. Dawkins didn’t precisely say that Mr. Gerard had visited Leda in her room, but Leda feared that it must be glaringly obvious.
“Miss Etoile has come to collect her things.” Mr. Gerard made the landlady’s familiarity seem an unwarranted encroachment. To be perfectly candid, as he handed her his hat, he looked as if she were something offensive he’d found on the sidewalk, which put Leda in a slightly better humor.
“Her things!” Mrs. Dawkins laid her hand on her bosom. “Why, I’m very sorry, but Miss Etoile left here lock, stock, and barrel, without a word to me about her things. She took them all with her.”
“I did not!” Leda exclaimed. “I haven’t removed anything!”
“Then why’s the room as bare as a widow’s cupboard, and me without my rent? I’m sure I didn’t remove them.”
“I paid the rent,” Leda cried. “I was paid up to Friday.”
“Do you have a receipt?” Mrs. Dawkins asked.
“You never gave me one!”
“Of course not. Because you never did pay, Miss Fancy Pants. I should have known you as a bunter from the start. If there was something left, I guess I have the right to recover my losses by selling any little trash you might have forgotten when you slunk away offhand. Ain’t that the law, Sergeant?”
The policeman shrugged. “Depends.”
“But have you sold the mirror and brush?” Leda asked anxiously. “Just Miss Myrtle’s dressing set—if I could have that…”
“I told Jem Smollett to take it all away and get what he could for it, and nothing in the lot worth two bob,” Mrs. Dawkins grumbled. “I don’t know anything about no silver dressing set.”
“You know it was silver,” Mr. Gerard said.
“A dressing set—what else would it be?” the landlady demanded in a huffy tone.
“Tortoiseshell. Ivory. Wood. Any number of substances,” he said reasonably. “When did he steal it?”
Mrs. Dawkins waved her hand. “Steal it! Let’s have no talk of that! All I know is the gel left me no rent.”
“Did it cover what she owed you?” He leaned on one crutch and pulled a money wallet from beneath his coat. “I’ll pay you whatever’s in arrears. How much?”
Mrs. Dawkins bobbed closer. “Twenty shillings the week, for a lady what entertains followers.”
“I have never entertained followers!”
“Why, miss, with my own eyes—”
Mr. Gerard interrupted the landlady. “Since you’ve already sold the dressing set, how much should I subtract?”
Mrs. Dawkins’ double chin bounced as she started to speak and then hesitated. Anyone could see that she wanted the whole twenty, with nothing at all deducted. She seemed to lose a little of her boldness as she met his look.
“Can’t you remember?” he asked, with a soft, controlled edge in his voice.
“N’more than two bob, like I said,” she mumbled.
“Are you very poor at numbers, Mrs. Dawkins?” His tone was indeed like a tiger’s, a large and sleepy one, still purring politely, but switching its tail.
“Tinsel stuff, it was,” she said, watching him slip the money wallet away as if she were mesmerized. “Not real silver.”
He looked at Leda. “I doubt that anything’s been moved yet. Go up and see.”
“Oh, no, you don’t.” The landlady roused herself abruptly. “You’ve not paid; you’ve no right to set one foot on me stairs, miss.”
“I did pay! You had the money off my washstand yourself!”
Mr. Gerard took no part in this dispute; he simply lifted his crutches onto the first step and started up. Mrs. Dawkins grabbed at his arm, but somehow as he faltered under her hold, she stumbled and fell back, bending over with a yelp.
“Oh, me knee! Me knee’s gone out!”
Mr. Gerard looked back. “Pardon me. Did I hurt you?”
“Oh, law! Help me sit down!” She clutched at Leda and Sergeant MacDonald. Between them, they supported her to a chair in the parlor. She collapsed into it with a moan and wobble of her rouged cheeks.
Mr. Gerard followed them to the door on his crutches. “Perhaps some hot water,” he suggested. “That’s what the doctor recommended to me.”
“Never mind hot water,” Sergeant MacDonald said roughly. “She’ll come out of it. Come along, miss—I can’t hang about here all the day long. No use for you to go up, with your splint ’n all, mister.”
Leda looked at Mr. Gerard helplessly, but he only stood back, allowing the policeman past. He didn’t say thank you, but then, Sergeant MacDonald’s offer had not been particularly politely phrased.
“Miss,” Sergeant MacDonald said curtly, holding back for her at the staircase, while Leda picked up her skirt and climbed.
She looked back down once, through the rails at the first landing. Mr. Gerard appeared to be mostly interested in a piece of lint on his trousers, while the sergeant clumped up the stairs behind her.
She reached the attic floor. Sergeant MacDonald stood very close to her shoulder as she fumbled in the dim light to find her key in her purse and fit it to the latch, close enough that she could feel his breath on her nape.
With a creak and rattle, the door came open. Leda stepped into the room, which was just as bare as Mrs. Dawkins had claimed, only the bed and table and chair remaining.
Now what? Her cloak gone, her washbasin, her sewing basket—not that any of that mattered, but to lose Miss Myrtle’s mirror and brush…
And what on earth did Mr. Gerard expect her to do? What was she doing here? She’d assumed that he had some reason to want to get into her room himself, but he hadn’t made much effort to do it. Perhaps, having so neatly incapacitated Mrs. Dawkins, he wanted Leda to occupy the sergeant while he pursued his mysterious objective from some other location.
“I can’t believe this, miss,” Sergeant MacDonald said in a strained sort of way.
She swung around to face him. “I can’t either. All my things!”
“I don’t give a da—” He grabbed her arm. “I don’t give a fiddle for your things! I can’t believe m’sister was right about you.”
“Your sister,” Leda echoed, stepping back in his hold.
“I thought you were fine; I thought you were an honest girl.” His face was flushed, his voice passionate. “I waited. I treated you respectable. I wanted to marry you!”
She wrenched her arm free. “I am perfectly honest, Sergeant. And I wish you will not speak of this to me!”
He took her by both arms; his hands were so tight that it hurt. “Is this the first time? Have you gone off with men before?”
“Unhand me!” Blood throbbed in her fingertips from the hold. She tried to twist free and could not.
“Mary warned me. She warned me that you were no better than you should be. But till I saw it with my own two eyes—!” He made a bitter sound and pulled her right up against his chest.
“You forget yourself!” Leda cried. She pushed at him, but he only seemed to grip harder. He put his face close to hers, and Leda strained back, panicking. She might have screamed; she felt she must, but mostly she pushed and pushed and tried to free herself, while he just pulled her tighter and closer.
/> “Sergeant!” She was panting, straining back as far as possible from him. “Let me go!”
“Let you go! So’s you can go off with him because he’s handsome as sin, and just as wicked. I know his kind. And yours! A plain man’s feelings don’t matter to your sort, do they?” He shook her hard. “Nothing but what you can get for yourself—just the way Mary said.”
“Sergeant MacDonald!” Leda twisted, breaking free. She saw Mr. Gerard in the doorway and gave a low cry of relief and mortification.
He didn’t say anything—he merely looked at the policeman with a level gaze. He paired his crutches and rested them against the wall, bracing his hand on the door frame.
“Oh, is it a fight you want?” Sergeant MacDonald demanded wildly. He took a step toward Mr. Gerard, his fists closing. “I’ll give you that, Fancy Man, limping or no. Is that what you want?”
“Not really,” Mr. Gerard murmured. Leda saw the tiger very clearly in his easy, ready stance, crippled but still with lethal claws.
She had a spurt of apprehension for Sergeant MacDonald, who didn’t know—who puffed and swung and never saw the danger. She drew in a sharp breath as he threw himself into the punch.
Mr. Gerard just seemed to move past him. For an instant they were together in the doorway, and then Sergeant MacDonald was lurching past onto the landing, grabbing at the stair rail to save himself from falling, while Mr. Gerard turned in front of Leda and stood there, planted between her and the policeman.
She heard Sergeant MacDonald come back, a clump of boots and furious breathing. She rubbed her palms up and down her aching arms and peered around Mr. Gerard. The sergeant stood in the doorway. “I’d have married you,” he muttered. “Against Mary and everything! Ask him what he’s offering!”
Leda felt her mouth pucker, chagrin and tears and nerves all tangled up together. “You wouldn’t have,” she said in a small voice. “You wouldn’t even speak for me to your sister. I wish you would go away!”