Page 82 of A Conspiracy in Belgravia

“I sought him on behalf of a client, an old friend of Mr. Finch’s with whom he had a standing appointment.”

Mr. Marbleton raised a brow. “Who’s the client?”

“I’m not at liberty to disclose that information.”

“And the client doesn’t know you are related to him?”

“That I can’t be one hundred percent sure. Did Mrs. Marbleton know that Sherlock Holmes was related to Myron Finch when she came to see me?”

“She called on you for a completely different matter.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“No, we didn’t know. But afterward, when we learned of the connection, we were certain you weren’t harboring him, at least not here, as we’d checked the place top to bottom. And it would be demented to hide him at Mrs. Watson’s, when you have an empty house here.”

Charlotte nodded, checked on the tea that had been steeping inside the teapot, and poured him a cup. “You have one more question, don’t you?”

He looked at her a minute. “I suppose I do. Is your sister well?”

“How many times did you meet with her?”

He added sugar to his tea. “Thrice.”

“More than necessary.”

Did he color a little? “Perhaps. Is she well?”

“Life is not easy for Livia—it has never been. She is an intelligent, discerning woman who believes her intelligence and discernment to be of no value.”

“You must have felt the pressure to believe the same.”

“Not at all. It took me a great deal of effort to understand that such pressure exists—I am not sensitive to the opinions of others, individually or as a collective. But Livia is. She is excruciatingly aware of what she is expected to be and how different that is from who she is. Not for a moment does she not feel her shortcomings.”

Stephen Marbleton took a sip of his tea—he held the cup with both hands, as if he were feeling cold. “Why are you telling me this?”

“So that you understand she is fragile, if you do not already realize that. She will not perish from a little flirtation, but she will suffer.”

“Are you warning me away from her?”

“No, but it behooves me to point out the likely consequences, so that should you choose to proceed, you do so in full awareness of them.”

She rose. “You must be weary. I will see myself out.”

Eighteen

SATURDAY

Charlotte rose early, took a basket of foodstuff from the kitchen, and called on 18 Upper Baker Street. She wasn’t surprised to see her uninvited guests gone, but she was rather impressed at how neat and untouched the place looked.

A note had been tucked under Sherlock’s pillow.

Thank you for your hospitality. We hope to meet again under more auspicious circumstances.

The day Charlotte learned that the woman who had watched Mrs. Watson’s front door had cabled a biblical verse to be advertised in the paper, she had sent in a request to consult the archives of theTimes. The permission had at last been granted.

She had expected the place to be thunderously loud. But the printing presses weren’t in use at the moment and the offices of the paper, while bustling, were far quieter than a drawing room on the night of a dinner party.

A large, well-lit editorial room anchored the entire operation, with a sizable oak table at the center and smaller desks arranged along the walls, furnished with every tool and implement to facilitate the act of writing. Next to the editorial room, according to the clerk who led the way, was the editors’ dining room.