Page 60 of A Study in Scarlet Women

“Did you see him?”

“He wasn’t at home. And your mother was not receiving visitors.”

Meaning she had taken to her bed—after another hefty dose of laudanum, no doubt.

“But Miss Livia did ask me to tell you, should I run into you, that she is grateful for what you have done. She emphasized that you couldn’t possibly have foreseen that—”

“That by connecting the deaths of Lady Amelia, Lady Shrewsbury, and Mr. Sackville, I would double the number of Holmeses suspected of homicide?”

“Inspector Treadles will find something tomorrow.”

She almost dropped the madeleine in her surprise. He was consoling her—and he’d never consoled her in all the years they’d known each other. “You don’t believe it.”

“I often question your actions, but rarely your reasoning. And this isn’t one of those rare instances.”

She took a deep breath: She had fallen so far that he of all people felt the need to comfort her. “Thank you. Very kind of you.”

Mrs. Watson stuck her head out from the bedroom. “Beg your pardon, miss, but Mr. Holmes, he’s fast asleep. Do you still need me to keep an eye on him?”

“That won’t be necessary, Mrs. Hudson. Thank you.”

Mrs. Watson bobbed a curtsy and left, galumphing down the stairs. When the house was quiet again, Lord Ingram asked, “Is that the actress who took you in?”

His voice was carefully neutral, but nothing could disguise disapproval of this magnitude, so she pretended not to have heard it. “She’s very convincing, isn’t she? And she’s the one who identified the inspector’s origin by his accent. I must have her train me to better hear the differences in regional accents.”

“I don’t like this arrangement. You know nothing about her.”

At least now he was sounding more himself. “I happen to think I know a great deal about her.”

“That you can deduce someone’s circumstances doesn’t mean you can read all their thoughts and intentions. Ask yourself, if this had happened to someone else, to Miss Livia, for example, wouldn’t you point out that she is enjoying an unlikely amount of luck?”

“Sometimes luck is just luck.”

“And most of the time, what seems too good to be true generally is.”

Disagreement, their usual state of affairs. A bittersweet sensation, this familiarity. Sometimes it was more sweet than bitter, but not tonight.

She rose and walked to the desk at the back of the parlor. “What would you have me do? Leave my benefactress?”

“Yes.”

“And then what?”

“Let me help you,” commanded her old friend who had become so proper and decorous, every inch the future pillar of Society. “Youalways said you wished to be the headmistress at a girls’ school. You can still achieve that.”

“How?”

He joined her at the side of the desk. “Move to America. You can invent a new identity and start a new life there, with nothing to prevent you from going to school, receiving training, and ultimately finding a good position.”

“With you bearing all the expenditures in the meanwhile?”

“Pay me back once you are self-supporting. With interest, if you’d prefer.”

“But there will be no consequences whatsoever if I do not or cannot pay you back. Am I correct?”

He did not answer.

The direction of his gaze: somewhere over her right shoulder. The placement of his hand: braced at the edge of the desk. The rise and fall of his chest with every breath—beneath his dark grey coat, his waistcoat was silk jacquard, silver tracery upon the blue of deepest twilight.