“Who made use of the cottage, Mrs. Frost?”
“It weren’t Mr. Kent, I can tell ye that.” She gave a snort. “I dunno who I was cookin’ and cleanin’ for, but they were gentry.” Her eyes gleamed with sly amusement. “Or at least the man was. Dunno about the woman.”
“How’d you know that they were gentry, if you never saw them?”
“They left things about, fripperies and the like. And I can’t complain about me wages. He weren’t clutch-fisted.”
“How’d you get your wages?”
“Mr. Kent sometimes would come ’round, or he’d send a boy with me wages and instructions. Every fortnight.” She paused when the barmaid circled back to deliver the whiskeys.
“Where can I find Mr. Kent?” Sam asked once the maid had left.
“I told ye, he came ter me.”
“How long did you take care of the cottage?”
“Five or six months, or thereabouts. It was a tidy business.” She took a swallow of the whiskey, then let out a deep sigh. “I’m gonna miss it.”
“I was in St. Margaret’s. Your neighbors said you’d cleared off.”
Again, she touched the spot between her breasts. “Aye. No point in stickin’ around, is there?”
“Not when you were told ter go.”
She gave him a belligerent stare. “Who says I was told ter go? Me brothers live around these parts. No law against me visitin’ them.”
“Don’t lie, Mrs. Frost.” He matched her stare with one of his own. “You have no cause ter protect anyone. You did your duty, and are well out of it. Did Mr. Kent send you packing?”
She considered his words, then shrugged. “Aye. He paid me a nice sum and told me ter leave for a while. I got the feelin’ he didn’t want trouble for his master or mistress, whoever owned the cottage.”
“You don’t know the owner’s identity?”
“Old Man Fenn used ter own it, but he sold it around the time I was hired. Probably ter Mr. Kent, or his master. I suppose they’ll either sell it or rent it out. Plenty of London coves wantin’ their privacy, if ye take me meaning.”
“Are you sure you can’t give me Mr. Kent’s address?” Sam stared hard at the woman, but she moved her plump shoulders again.
“Nay. I’m telling ye the truth, God’s witness. Mr. Kent’s a wily one, ain’t he?”
Sam tried a different tack. “Did you ever hear the name Lord Weston mentioned?”
She frowned, apparently thinking back. “Nay,” she said finally.
“You said the couple left things about. Like what?”
She blinked several times, then her gaze slid away. “Oh, I dunno. Things.”
Sam’s gut tightened. Deliberately, he moved the baton he’d laid on the table. Her eyes flicked toward the gold tip apprehensively.
“When was the last time you were in the cottage, Mrs. Frost?”
“I cleaned it after Mr. Kent told me I should visit me brothers. Seemed like the Christian thing ter do. Couldn’t very well leave it fer the next tenants, could I?”
Sam gave her a skeptical look. He doubted she’d been a good Christian woman when she’d performed her housekeeping duties for the last time. More like a mudlark, the folks who descended on the banks of the Thames during low tide to search for anything of value left behind that they could sell later.
“What’d you take, Mrs. Frost?”
Her chin rounded in a defensive manner. “Who says I took anythin’?”
Again Sam twisted the baton so that the gold tip glinted in the tavern’s candlelight. “You were done with your housekeeping duties and given money ter go away for a bit. I wouldn’t blame you for pilfering anything that had been left behind in the cottage. Not like the cove was gonna come back for it, right?”
“Aye.” Mrs. Frost’s gaze suddenly turned suspicious. “What’s all these questions fer, anyways? Why’d ye wanna know who used the cottage?”
Sam had wondered how long it would take the housekeeper to ask him that. There was no reason she’d know that one of the people she’d set a table for and cleaned up after had turned up dead. And he doubted if anyone living in St. Margaret’s would’ve connected the temporary occupant in the cottage to a murder of a Lady in Grosvenor Square.
“The woman who used ter come ter the cottage was murdered, real vicious-like,” he said, hoping to shock her. It might loosen her tongue.
She looked surprised. “Truly? How? Who did it?”
“That’s what I’m tryin’ ter figure out. I need ter know what you took.”
She gave him an uncertain look. “If I did pinch somethin’—and I’m not sayin’ I did—how’s that gonna help ye find the murderer?”
Sam thought of Kendra Donovan’s insistence that every detail, no matter how small, mattered during an investigation. “You never know. Tell me what you found.”
Mrs. Frost hesitated and seemed to weigh all the angles. Then she heaved a sigh. “Ack, very well. Not like I can make use of it meself since I’ve never taken up the habit, but I thought it would’ve been a nice little trinket for Mr. Hobbs . . .”
She lifted a tattered looking reticule off her lap and placed it on the table. Her hand dipped inside and she brought out a diminutive silver tabatière, the lid inlaid with ivory, which had a bucolic landscape hand-painted on it.
Sam seriously doubted Mrs. Frost had planned to give it to Mr. Hobbs, unless he could fence it for her. But he didn’t press the matter. Instead, he took the box from Mrs. Frost’s palm and used his thumbnail to flick open the lid. He inhaled the scent of vanilla and orange from the remaining finely ground snuff inside. He found himself smiling. He’d never been one to take snuff himself, but he knew that he would be able to trace the owner of this particular brand. The tobacco shop owners prided themselves on their proprietary blends for their clients.
Still, he said, “Maybe it’s Mr. Kent’s.”
“That one! Ha! Not bloody likely. I found it on the floor in the bedroom, next ter the bed.” The gaze she leveled at him was filled with bawdy amusement. “Mr. Kent didn’t look like the sort ter have even a bit of fun. Very stiff sort of gent.”
Sam gave a grunt and closed the lid.
“Do ye think this will help ye find yer murderer?” Mrs. Frost wondered.
“At the very least, it should make one particular lord very uncomfortable.” Sam grinned suddenly, and shoved the box deep into his pocket. His gaze fell on his untouched whiskey glass. He picked up the glass, gave the widow sitting across from him a silent toast, tossed back the spirits in one gulp—and nearly died. The back of his throat burned as though it had caught on fire. His chest seized as the fireball descended, evaporating all air. His eyes watered. He choked and gasped.
“Me brother supplies the Blind Duck with its whiskey. He makes it himself, ye know,” Mrs. Frost told him with a smile.
“Holy . . . hell . . .” Sam finally managed to say, sucking in air. “Now I know how that damn duck went blind.”
21