“I’ll be outside,” the big man whispered, glaring at the inspector.
Madam laid a black gloved hand on the bully’s arm. “I am sure I will be perfectly safe with the inspector. If one cannot trust the police, then who can be trusted?”
Katherine Lundy perched on the edge of a high back Chippendale. “Please sit, Inspector. Or would you prefer ‘Mister’?”
“Either. Miss . . . Misses . . . Madam. What do I call you?” The young man returned to his chair and sank back into it, then pulled himself forward when he discovered that the woman was looking down on him.
“Madam Kitten will suffice.” Katherine folded her hands in her lap, resting them lightly atop a black clutch bag. It held a silver-plated, pearl-handled Derringer, and the back of the bag was slit to allow her to pull the gun free without opening the purse. “How may I help you, Inspector?”
Dermot opened his mouth to reply, but Katherine held up her right hand.
“And is this an official or an unofficial call?”
He hesitated just a fraction too long.
“Unofficial then,” she said evenly. “I gathered as much since you did not arrive in a police wagon, or even by public cab. That suggested you did not wish to leave a record of this visit. And since I can see dried red mud on your shoes, and the eternal road works on Marlborough Street are of that distinctive color, then I must conclude that you walked.”
Dermot glanced down at his highly polished shoes; there was a rim of hard red dirt on the soles. “You are very perceptive.”
“It comes with my unusual profession. My sex are naturally observant, but women in my business need to be even more so. It keeps us alive.”
“I take it you’ve had me checked out in the hour I was waiting?”
Katherine nodded, silk whispering across her face. “Of course. We would not be meeting if you had not passed muster.”
“Then you will know that I take no bribes and am not in the pocket of any of the madams on this street. I am a good police officer, with a tolerable arrest record.”
“You specialize in smuggling and contraband. And yet you have come about the theft of the Crown Jewels.” She saw his blink of surprise. “Come, come, Inspector: what else could bring you here this afternoon? It is the talk of the city. But surely, jewelry thefts are outside your remit?”
“Yes . . . and no,” he said.
Katherine cocked her head to one side. “Which is it?”
“It is a little outside my specialty, but every available officer has been tasked with finding the jewels. The king is sailing into Kingstown in a few weeks. He is due to wear the jewels when he invests some Irish knights. They must be found before then . . . and I want to find those jewels,” he added vehemently.
“You must be desperate indeed to come to me. Why is that, I wonder?” she asked, and then, beneath the veil, she smiled. “You are a brilliant police officer—you must be to have reached the rank of inspector while still not yet thirty. Your accent is Dublin and is neither refined nor overeducated, so you do not come from money or have a sponsor within the force.”
The inspector blinked in surprise and then nodded. “I have made my own way.”
“And you are a Catholic in a predominantly Protestant and Masonic organization.”
The inspector straightened. “Your researchers have been busy.”
“Not so. I saw the impression of a silver crucifix beneath your shirt when you sat forward. You are not yet engaged but there is a young woman in your life. And before you can ask for her hand, you need to advance in your career.”
Corcoran sat back, startled. “No one in the force knows that I am seeing a young lady; that cannot be in my file.”
“The skin on your upper lip is a lighter shade than the rest of your flesh, suggesting that you had worn a mustache for a very long time. The only reason a gentleman shaves off his mustache is if a lady requests it. And only a man in love would do so.”
Color flooded the inspector’s cheeks and he raised his thumb and index finger to smooth down the nonexistent mustaches. “You are correct. There was a mustache and there is a lady. She thought the mustache made me look old . . . and it reminded her of her father.”
“It might also have left a rash upon her skin,” Katherine added gently.
The inspector blinked in surprise. “I did not think of that.”
“Your lady friend did. You might think about asking her how she knew that a beard could cause a rash. That sort of knowledge only comes with experience.”