Page 57 of An Artful Dodge
“What’s enough?” His voice was practical. “A hundred? Two hundred?”
“I don’t know.” I was trying to be honest. “It’s been years since my mother died, leaving us with nothing, and I still have dreams that I’m running from door to door, hammering to get in because I need food for Sarah, and none of the doors open.”
He studied me. “But that’s not the truth now, is it?”
“No,” I admitted. “I’ve enough put by to take care of us, if something happens, if Sarah gets sick or I can’t work for a while.”
He opened his mouth as if to correct me but closed it again, as if he thought better of it. “Well, for the next two weeks, until this dodge is done, let me worry for you, if it must be done.”
“Will you worry over Sarah for me, too?” I asked wryly. “Shedespiseswhen I do it, but she likes you, so she’d probably take it with better grace.”
He laughed and bent to kiss me again, his mouth warm and tender and full of longing, like he had years to make up for.
We might have remained there for hours, but I drew back shakily. “I should go.”
“Yeah?” he whispered, his forehead touching mine.
“Yeah,” I echoed. “It’s getting late. I need to tell Maggie I’ve figured out how I’ll get that bloody necklace for her.”
Chapter 18
James had offered to take me home, but I wanted time between the north bank and the south, time to think and feel before I had to keep my happiness off my face. I wasn’t ready to share it.
Nothing could keep my heart in its proper place.
He put me in a cab back to Elephant and Castle. I found myself smiling.
Upon entering the inn, I approached Pat to ask where I might find Maggie only to find she’d left for Birmingham on the early train, back the day after next.
Deflated, I spent the next day with the uneasy, restless feeling of urgently wanting to act but being stalled.
On Monday morning, I went to the inn to ask for Maggie again, but still she hadn’t arrived. I went for a walk, occupying myself as I could, and returned early in the afternoon. This time Pat’s eyes flicked toward the stairs.
I found Maggie in the goods room with Silas Pike, going over ledgers. Remembering that Amelia told me Silas had been Maggie’s lover before being Amelia’s fence, I backed out and said I’d wait. Nearly an hour later, when he left, I entered.
She stood behind the desk, her fingertips on the edge. “Well?”
“I want to propose a different dodge,” I said. “I’ve found a way to get your necklace. Safer and easier than taking it from the jeweler’s.”
“Oh?”
“I went to the shop, twice—in different costumes—and considered every angle. But Maggie, there’s a clerk and the son of the jeweler present, mirrors everywhere, a safe behind a locked door, and locks on every cabinet, the back door, and the alley, not to mention a high gate. The entire family lives upstairs, so there’s no way of coming in over the roof from above, as they’d hear the noise.”
Her eyebrows rose. “The entire family lives upstairs?”
“Yes, including a son who returned from Crimea with terrible injuries. He’s bedridden. Besides, the Fairleigh murders mean the constables at the end of every street are more vigilant. So I truly don’t think it’s possible to take the necklace off the premises, even at night, without being caught.” I dropped my hands onto the top rail of the chair. “But there’s a ball in a few weeks. That’s why the marquess is having it cleaned and repaired at the jeweler’s. I can retrieve it at the party.”
To my surprise, there was no light of approval or even curiosity in her eyes.
“Sit down,” she said and as I drew out the chair, she took a bottle of whiskey from the cupboard, pouring some into a glass. The smoky tang of it made me miss Amelia. Maggie put the bottle away without offering me any, not that I’d have taken it. There was something unpleasant coming, and I’d need my wits about me. She sat behind the desk across from me, but at an angle, her right forearm on the desk, her warped fingers around the glass with its amber liquid, her eyes on it as she said, “I want to tell you the story of the day I was caught. Would you like to hear it?”
Cold spiked down my spine. Was she finally going to tell me about the role my mother played? “Yes.”
She tapped the glass soundlessly with her thumb. “I was once a girl much like you.” Her eyes met mine. “You might not think so now, but I was very pretty. Twenty years in the blazing sun of Swan River ruined my looks, but I once had thick dark hair and a complexion as fair as yours.”
I recalled the photograph. “I’m sure,” I replied. That much was honest.
“Your mother was my jenny that day.” She paused and gave an appraising look. “So you knew that.”
