Page 22 of An Artful Dodge
Pat’s usually cheerful face was sober and slack, as if a heavy weight pulled upon it. My nerves tightening, I watched the woman’s short-trained dress vanish up the stairs and heard the goods room door squeak open and closed. The newspapers forgotten, I sopped the last of the gravy with my bread and brought the bowl to the bar.
“Who was that?” I asked Pat.
He looked up from wiping the bottle. Before he could say he didn’t know or joke my question away, I added, “I saw how you looked at her. And you let her go upstairs.”
“She’s an old ’quaintance of Amelia’s.”
“You don’t like her,” I said.
He frowned and kept his eyes on the bottle, which was already plenty clean.
I set my palms on the bar.
“Don’t bother me about it,” he snapped. “I expect you’ll find out soon enough.”
I drew back in surprise and returned to my corner table to wait until I could see Amelia myself, for Pat’s manner made me want to know sooner than soon enough.
Well over an hour later, the woman descended the stairs, her face placid. She left quietly out the door, using her good left hand to turn the knob. Amelia did not appear.
The room was busier now, the bar two men deep, the tables filling. Avoiding Pat’s eye, I went upstairs to find the door to the goods room ajar, the way it never was. I entered and closed it behind me. Amelia stood at the window, her back to me, her tall figure straight and still as an iron lamppost, her dark hair tidy in its usual net.
“Amelia?” I crossed the room.
Her gaze remained on the street outside. “Hullo, Kit.”
“What’s happened with Josie?”
The skin around her eyes tightened. “Half a year, down from four.”
I studied her profile. “How?”
Amelia continued to study the street below. “The judge has a mistress, a French actress.” She drew a long breath and huffed it out. “Josie’ll be all right.”
I nodded. Six months would be awful but survivable, and Amelia could make sure Josie got decent food and a cell in one of the better blocks. “Who was that woman?”
Amelia gave a sidelong glance and a snort. “Might’ve known you’d be the one to come asking, faster than a railway minute.” Her mouth pressed into a wry line. “Well, you’ve a right to know, more than most.”
Opening the secret panel, she removed the whiskey rather than wine and poured herself an inch of the amber liquid without offering me any. I pulled out a chair from the desk and sat, though she returned to the window, her left hand holding the glass. Her gaze tracked something down on the street, perhaps the woman who had just left.
“Her name is Maggie Wirth O’Connell,” she answered. When I didn’t reply, she added, “Her mother was Patty Wirth.”
Astonished, I asked, “Where’s she been all this time?”
“A penal colony in Australia,” she replied. “Twenty years ago, there were ten men for every woman. The coppers were snatching up and transporting any woman they could, no matter how small the crime, so men would have something to do in the evenings other than trouble the bloody sheep.” Whatever she was watching had vanished, for she turned toward me. “She wrote letters the first year, but then there were two bouts of cholera in Swan River. We all assumed she died in one of them.”
“And you’re certain it’s her?” I asked.
One dark eyebrow rose. “You’ve seen her face. How likely is it I’d mistake her for somebody else?”
“True,” I admitted. Her beauty was memorable. “What does she want?”
“The ring, o’ course.” Her forefinger came away from the whiskey glass, as if to halt my protests. “Her ma gave it to me on her deathbed, but only because she thought Maggie was never coming back.”
Her tone of practical acceptance made me stare. “My God, Amelia. You’d turn it over to her? Without a fight?” I hated the idea of the ring changing. And instinctively I didn’t trust this woman.
“It’s hers, by birthright, Kit. There’s no question ofthat. And o’ course I’d quit someday.” She raised her glass toward me. “Only I thought I’d be leaving it to you, in a year or two.”
I blinked in surprise. I’d suspected, but this was the first time she’d said it straight-out. “Not Nell?” She was the only other one of Patty’s thieves still in the ring.
