A Conspiracy in Belgravia (Lady Sherlock #2)

This morning’s post at Upper Baker Street, however, did not please Mrs. Watson as much. It took some self-restraint not to slam it down on the breakfast table when she reached home.


Miss Holmes, already dressed for going out, took a look at the typed address on the envelope and sighed. She finished the poached egg on her plate, wiped her fingers with her napkin, and reached for the letter.

Mrs. Watson knew what it said:

Dear Miss Holmes,

I cede you the moral high ground. I accept your admonishment that seeking the whereabouts of a man who has demonstrated his lack of interest in me is both an insult to my intelligence and a black mark upon my conduct as a married woman.

Nevertheless, I do not care anymore about either my own opinion of myself or anyone else’s. I need to speak to Mr. Finch and that is that.

Please, I beg you, give me his address.

Yours,

Mrs. Finch

Miss Holmes rose. “I would have liked to have another muffin before leaving this table, but then again, I always feel the same no matter how many muffins I eat.”

They removed to the drawing room, where Mrs. Watson wrote down the contents of a brief note, as dictated by Miss Holmes.

Dear Mrs. Finch,

Mr. Finch is away from London for a fortnight. When he returns, I will make inquiries on your behalf.

Yours,

Holmes

Mrs. Watson sealed the letter. “Do we know for certain that he will be gone that long?”

“Mrs. Woods told me yesterday that he has paid two weeks’ rent in advance, so I am perfectly comfortable claiming he will be out for the duration.” Miss Holmes checked her watch. “Shall we start our day?”



At least now the corpse had a name. Richard Hayward of London.

Unfortunately, the dead man’s friend was a font of non-knowledge. Mr. Ainsley couldn’t remember exactly when Mr. Hayward became his neighbor. “Four months ago. Six? It was some time this year.” He was at sea as to where Hayward had lived before. “Norfolk, maybe. Or was it Suffolk?” And to Treadles’s question on what the deceased had done for a living, his reply was a semihorrified, “I would never ask such a thing. Why, that would presume he needed to toil for his own support in the first place.”

Given Treadles’s dedication to work, it was easy enough to forget that for a certain segment of the population, having to earn one’s keep was considered a badge of dishonor. One could have serious interests, even callings. But to exchange honest labor for remuneration, well, that was for the lower classes.

“Don’t think he mentioned work—never heard him complain about having to get up early. But if I were to be perfectly honest, I can’t be entirely sure that he was a gentleman. A gentleman by birth, that is, not that he wasn’t perfectly trustworthy and all that.”

Treadles understood. Mr. Ainsley meant to say that Hayward had not been a man from the same class as himself.

He went back to the dead man’s former lodging, to check on the references Hayward had furnished to his landlady. Only to discover that Mrs. Hammer didn’t require references for those tenants who could pay three months’ rent up front.

He asked to speak with Temple, the valet, instead. Temple was in the small room where he performed most of his work. Between polishing Mr. Ainsley’s boots and ironing the man’s shirts, he answered Treadles’s inquiries.

According to him—and this agreed with Mrs. Hammer’s records—Mr. Hayward moved in the first week of April. Temple remembered because he had learned about it from Mrs. Hammer when he returned from picking up Mr. Ainsley’s new summer coats from his tailor, which he always did the first week of April.

Three weeks later, Mr. Ainsley had invited Mr. Hayward to his place for dinner—Temple was sure of the date because he had written down the purchases in his diary, which he gladly showed Treadles. Bottle of claret, bottle of champagne, three bottles of mineral water, veal cutlets, a saddle of mutton, and a strawberry tart and a Swiss roll from Harrod’s.

“I do all right with plain baking,” Temple said apologetically. “But fancy cakes we buy.”

“I’m saving up for one of those meringue cakes for my sister’s birthday,” said MacDonald. “She’s wanted one for ages.”

“Oh, those are almost too pretty to eat, they are.”

Treadles cleared his throat. “Mr. Temple, do you know where Mr. Hayward lived before he became Mrs. Hammer’s tenant?”

“I didn’t ask him—he was Mr. Ainsley’s friend, not mine.”

“Mr. Ainsley didn’t think he was born a gentleman. Do you agree with that assessment?”

“I do. I think he went to a proper school—he didn’t have a regional accent, if you know what I mean, sir. But I don’t think there are enough quarterings in the family. Or any, for that matter.”

“How do you know?”

Temple half winced. “Hard to say. I just do. For example, the day of the dinner, he came, brought Mr. Ainsley a marvelous bottle of cognac, and it all went off very well. But when he was on his way out, he tipped me.”

The way Temple shook his head, one would have thought Mr. Hayward had performed a handstand in the vestibule.

“Mind you, I appreciated the generosity, but it was only dinner. If he’d stayed with us for a few days and I’d done for him, then, yes, it would have been the right thing. But it was only dinner. And he gave me far too much. So that told me that his money was awfully recent. Not even nouveau riche; that would have implied his father had it. And if his father had it, he should have known what to do with a valet. If you ask me, I think he probably came into some unexpected inheritance within the past few years.”

It never failed to surprise Treadles—and dismay him in some way—that a person’s origin was so easy to pin down. Here was someone who had exchanged scarcely three sentences with the dead man, yet could offer such trenchant insight on when he had obtained his fortune.

On the other hand, had Temple been able to tell Treadles a great deal of Hayward’s inner life, but nothing of his pedigree or lack thereof, it would have been of far less use to the case. He thanked Temple and asked to have the key to look through Hayward’s rooms again.

On his way out, he asked, rather casually, “You wouldn’t happen to know, would you, Mr. Temple, who might have wanted to harm Mr. Hayward?”

Temple thought for a moment. “I can’t say I do. But come to think of it, Mr. Hayward himself might have known.”

“What do you mean?”