*
Ophelia breathlessly recounted to Penrose all she’d learned, as soon as they were outside and walking along Rue de la Paix. More people were out now, mostly fashionable ladies in complicated hats. Shop windows brimmed with perfume bottles, feathered fans, jewelry, furs, and bolts of gorgeous cloth. The street may as well have been a stage set, it all seemed so dreamlike.
“Hold your horses.” Ophelia stopped in front of a hatmaker’s window and frowned up at Penrose. “Your eyes have got that glow about them again.”
“I can’t think what you mean.” Penrose pushed his hands into his greatcoat pockets. “Oh, do look at that tilbury hat. I haven’t seen one of those in years.”
“You suspect it’s the stomacher in the parcel, don’t you?”
“Is that far-fetched? It was, according to you, at any rate, missing from Miss Pinet’s gown when you discovered her in the garden. The murderer perhaps removed the stomacher. It would be rather valuable, both as an antiquity and as an assemblage of precious metal and gems. Now, this mysterious customer who ordered the gown—the gown that incorporated the real diamond stomacher—wants the stomacher back.”
“But if Madame Fayette has the stomacher now, that means she shot Sybille.”
“Not necessarily. But it would seem that she is deeply involved.”
“Do you suppose Sybille was killed on account of the stomacher?”
“It is possible. As I said, it would be valuable in more than one respect.”
“Surely no one but you, Professor, cares about the stomacher’s fairy tale history.”
“No? Then why was the stomacher sewn onto a gown that matches, specifically, a Cinderella costume? Like it or not, Miss Flax, the fairy tale is a part of this.”
“Then Sybille knew a person, was murdered by a person, who is as nutty about fairy tales as you are.”
“You are assuming the gown was sewn expressly for Miss Pinet. That Miss Pinet did not, as the police claim, simply steal the gown from its true owner.”
“But Sybille doesn’t sound like a thief, and she wasn’t a strumpet.”
“How can you be certain on either point?”
Ophelia sighed. She couldn’t be certain. She only hoped that Sybille wasn’t a strumpet or a thief but the truth was, Sybille had likely been wearing the stomacher for some reason. “What I wish to know is, why didn’t Madame Fayette go to the police with the name of this customer?”
“She’s either covering up for someone else, or for herself,” Penrose said. “Shall we have a walk about the Louvre? It is nearby and dry inside, and at twelve o’clock we could return to spy on Maison Fayette and discover the identity of the gentleman customer.”
13
The ogre Hume showed up while Prue was working on the breakfast dishes. He burst into the kitchen, hauled her out, flipped her into a waiting carriage, and fastened the door from the outside.
After fifteen, maybe twenty minutes, the carriage stopped in front of a house with witch-hat towers and mean little slits for windows.
Hume dragged Prue inside, up some stairs, and into a stuffy, dim, parlor sort of room that stank of woodsmoke, cough medicine, and ancient folks’ morning breath.
“Ah, the beautiful little orphan who nobody wants.” Lady Cruthlach was all bundled up on a sofa. “Dear Lord Cruthlach is abed, I am afraid. Such a pity, for he did so enjoy seeing you last night.”
Hume shoved Prue down onto a chair. He retreated to a post against a wall.
“My name’s Prue. Prudence Bright. And somebody does so want me.”
“Oh, but your mother shan’t ever return.”
Why did Lady Cruthlach sound so certain? “She will,” Prue said. Tears prickled. “But anyway, I ain’t talking about Ma. I’m talking about my—my friend. Hansel. He’s to be a doctor, and maybe we’ll marry someday.”
“You? Marry a doctor? Oh, good gracious, no!”