Home by Nightfall

CHAPTER TWENTY

That afternoon it began to rain, and when the employees of Lenox, Strickland, and Dallington gathered in the large central room of their offices, leaning aginst the various slanted clerks’ desks, or sitting in their chairs, their chatter was matched by the steady thrum of the drops on the window.

The three partners of the agency stood at the door, facing them.

Fourteen men in all. There were the four hired detectives, Atkinson, Davidson, Weld, and Mayhew; six clerks; Pointilleux, who occupied a position somewhere between clerk and detective; Anixter, the immense, dark-browed, and ominously mute ex-seaman who had accompanied Polly wherever she went as long as Lenox had known her, and presumably made it safe for a woman to be a detective in a city that could be unfriendly to both detectives and women; and two boys, Jukes and Chadwick, each around thirteen years of age. Both had been more or less urchins, well known in Chancery Lane for running errands for small change. With the regular pay of the agency, each had ascended to the highest sign of social acceptability he could imagine, the ownership of a hat — a gently used black bowler for Jukes, a wide-brimmed soft cloth cap for Chadwick. Neither had removed his in Lenox’s sight since obtaining it, indoors or out. Hats mattered a great deal, of course. Lenox had once seen a man being released from Newgate prison refuse to acknowledge his family, who were eagerly awaiting the reunion, for fifteen puzzling minutes, until a friend found and handed him a hat. Then he turned to them and embraced them all, as if he had just spied them and it was the most natural and spontaneous thing in the world to say hello

It was Lenox who cleared his throat, waited for the chatter to subside, and then spoke. Though the partnership was equal, he was the eldest of the three, and perhaps for that reason the employees paid him the greatest deference.

“It has come to our attention that someone may have passed proprietary information belonging to the agency to an outsider,” said Lenox.

Everyone looked at him blankly.

“More specifically, the identities of at least three of our clients have been passed to LeMaire and Monomark, we believe.”

That drew a stronger reaction. “How do you know this?” asked Pointilleux.

“All three clients have defected. Lower fees, LeMaire’s name constantly in the paper. It’s not surprising.”

Without staring at them too closely, Lenox was trying to keep an eye on Mayhew and Davidson, the two friends. Davidson stood upright, his bearing fastidious; Mayhew leaned against a desk, one hand in his pocket, occasionally drawing his other languorously to his mouth to have a puff of his small cigar. Neither had betrayed any surprise. Perhaps it was natural that they should just listen, however.

“Good Lord!” said Pointilleux, outraged, using one of the British expressions he often leaned on as he limped through the language.

In truth he ought to have been the first person they suspected — he was LeMaire’s nephew — but as the partners had walked back to Chancery Lane from the Cadogan a few hours earlier, all had agreed that it couldn’t be him. It seemed impossible, that was all.

“He’s too … too unimaginative,” Dallington had said.

“I think it’s more than that,” put in Polly. “I think he has honor. We’ve come to know him, haven’t we?”

Lenox had agreed with both of them. Now he went on, describing new security precautions to the employees, urging them to come forward if they had any idea about the crime, and finally promising whoever had done it that if he had the full list and returned it now, he could avoid criminal prosecution — a promise that would not hold should the partners discover the person’s guilt independently, which they believed they were within a day or two of doing.

After the meeting was over, a chattering buzz had broken across the room.

“One other thing,” Dallington said.

Everyone quieted down and stared at him, including Lenox, who wasn’t sure what his young protégé intended to say.

“This morning, the agency made a major breakthrough in the Muller case. The Yard has officially hired us to investigate it, at one and a half times our normal rate. All three partners will be dedicating at least some of their time to it in the coming days, so there may be a bit more work for everyone, later nights. I don’t expect to hear any grumbling about it, or I’ll have Anixter drag you under the keel of a ship.”

There was a laugh, and immediately a louder, more insistent conversation. What was the breakthrough? Had they found Muller? That had been smart of Dallington. Better to leave them on a note of optimism than doubt.

Dallington, Polly, and Lenox went to Polly’s office, where there was tea on the desk, and closed the door. Dallington poured three cups of tea, dashed some sugar into his, and then sat back heavily into an armchair, crossing his legs and stirring his tea moodily. “We’re in for it if someone has that full list,” he said. “No chance they’ll come forward.”

Polly, stirring milk and sugar into her own tea with the precision of a chemist, said, “We have to hope the person who stole it is a coward, and fears jail more than the loss of his job.” She sat down on the front edge of the seat behind her desk, thinking. Her hair was pulled back with a gray ribbon.

Lenox smiled at the two of them, so well mismatched. “We can only wait,” he said.

Dallington shook his head. “I hate waiting. I’ve never had any patience.”

“Do we find it odd that Mayhew and Davidson are so close?” asked Polly in a low voice.

“Yes,” said Lenox. “They’re very different.”

“They eat at the same slap-bang every day, down Cursitor Street.” Slap-bangs were popular among law clerks and other penurious professionals in this part of London for both their cheapness and speed — many only took fifteen or twenty minutes for lunch. They took their name from the sound that the busy waiters made dropping off the food. “I see them there every time I pass it on the way to the Beargarden for my own lunch.”

“Could they be conspiring then?” asked Polly.

“We simply can’t know yet,” said Lenox. “At any rate, our trap may work.”

Among the precautions for security that Lenox had enumerated before the employees was a new safe in Dallington’s office. It contained a sheet with the name of a lawyer and the password (“Chancery”) that would allow him to release their client list. In fact, it was Lenox’s own solicitor; anyone who approached him with that password would be held there by the bailiff under presumption of guilt.

“Leaving this aside,” said Dallington, “my question is, what do we do next on the Muller case? If we could only solve it, clients would line up to India for us.”

“We must be close now,” said Polly. “If only McKee and LeMaire weren’t working on it, too.”

“But Broadbridge must give us first whack, after this morning,” said Dallington.

Lenox shook his head. “I don’t think he cares who solves it.”

The three partners looked at each other in silence for a moment.

Lenox thought back to that morning. Theaters were odd places, full of lost rooms, winding backstage corridors, unexpected closets. Above the main dressing room, apparently, there was a small tunnellike space.

They had taken down the woman, as carefully as they could, Broadbridge’s nephew assuming the bulk of her weight, and laid her on the sofa.

Thurley, the theater manager, had gone pale. “That’s Margarethe,” he’d said immediately.

“Who?” asked Broadbridge.

“Margarethe. Mr. Muller’s sister.”

“What in damnation — did we even know she was missing?” said Broadbridge.

Thurley shook his head. “She was here on opening night — she traveled with Muller as his assistant. But after the first performance, she went on to Paris, his next destination, to book his rooms and make sure everything was in order there.”

“Christ alive, man, are you telling me that we may have a pair of dead Germans?” Broadbridge said, a look of despair on his face. He glanced over at McKee. “You’ve had this room for a week.”

“Yes, sir,” said McKee — and then, because blame runs downhill, he shot a sidelong glance at LeMaire.

Lenox was examining the body. “Nothing on her person, no money, no identification. No signs of violence either,” he added.

“Poison, perhaps,” said Dallington.

“Do you think Muller killed her?” asked McKee.

Lenox shrugged. “I couldn’t guess. But your constable ought to fetch the medical examiner — and then, gentlemen, I propose that we investigate this tunnel that passes above Mr. Muller’s dressing room.”