Page 10 of A Single Thread of Moonlight

The man looked at me and interest flashed in his eyes, but his countenance remained professionally aloof. “I certainly will if I can,” he said.

“This is Devonshire House, isn’t it?”

He nodded. “That’s right.”

“Only,” I carried on breathlessly, “I’m supposed to be working here for the ball tomorrow night, and I can’t find the instructions that I wrote down. The agency sent me, you see, and it’s my first job for them. I’ll be in such trouble if I’m not where I’m supposed to be.”

I had found that if I pinched the back of my hand hard enough, I could make my eyes well convincingly with tears. This trick had got me out of several scrapes in the past, and its effect here was unsurprising.

“Now, now, miss,” the footman said, his expression softening, “you don’t need to worry.”

“Thank you,” I sniffled, trying to hide how pleased I was with myself. Unfortunately, his next words rather dispelled my triumph.

“There’s no chance of you missing anything because this agency’s sent you on a wild goose chase,” he said. “I don’t know what they were thinking, but all the staff are here already. The duke and duchess have so many, and the rest are hired by Mr Jones the butler directly. He’d never hear of using an agency.”

“Oh,” I murmured weakly. “I wonder how such a mistake can have been made.”

The young man scratched his head. “Which agency was it?” he asked. “I can have a word with Mr Jones. That’s no way to be treating such honest employees as yourself, miss.”

I cast about for an employment agency name. “It was … Sphinx and … Blackbird.”

He frowned. “Never heard of them.”

“They’re … new.”

“Not going to stay in business long if this is the way they conduct themselves,” the footman said.

“Thank you for your help,” I said, giving him one of my best smiles. “It must be a misunderstanding. I’ll go and speak with Mr, er … Sphinx.”

The footman nodded, looking dazed. “Yes, miss.” He treated me to smile of his own. “And if you happen to be in the neighbourhood again—”

“Goodbye!” I sang out, and then I turned and hurried off as quickly as I could.

As soon as I rounded the corner I slowed to a ponderous trudge, falling in with the stream of other pedestrians.

Well, that had not gone to plan at all. It seemed that sneaking in was going to be a lot more difficult than I had anticipated. I would have to think of something else. The most important thing was going to be keeping Agatha and the prince apart, and to do that I really needed to get inside.

The short walk back to Madame Solange’s did nothing to inspire me. I made my way around to the back of the shop, kicking my feet across the cobbled yard in frustration. There had to be a way. How could I let Helena’s plans fall neatly into place, when I had been given such a clear opportunity to thwart her? It had been years and I was no closer to making her pay for what she had done.

It was then that I noticed a large white box, leaning against the back door to the shop.

It had the words MISS IRIS GREY written across the front in black ink.

I frowned, approaching the parcel slowly as if it were a wild animal, likely to snap if I got too close.

Why would someone leave a parcel for me at the shop? For that matter, who would leave a parcel for me at all?

I picked the box up gingerly. It did not hiss or burst into flames or behave in any way that a large cardboard box should not behave.

I struggled with the latch on the door and made my way inside, through to the workroom, where Annie was sitting at a sewing machine, turning up hems on the dresses I had altered for Agatha.

“Oh, you’re back,” Annie said, in a tone of voice that was meant to convey I hadn’t been missed. Sometimes I thought that Annie’s utter determination to show how little she cared about me was the most obvious way of letting me know that she did.

“Do you know who left this parcel for me out the back?” I asked, dropping it on to my workbench.

Annie glanced up, indifferent. “No idea. I’ve got better things to do than to act as your personal post mistress. Madame wants the bodice on that purple silk finished by this afternoon.”

“Of course she does,” I sighed. I shoved the box into a corner.