“The next day she kept askin’ about the mornin’ paper, then took herself off late in the day,” Cavendish added. “I wanted her to take the hound with her and he jumped straight away into the cab.” He shook his head.
“Then he comes trottin’ up the Strand after she obviously sent him back, and went on alone. And now …” He shook his head.
“I should never have asked her to try to find me friend’s daughter.”
Brodie laid a hand on the man’s shoulder.
“The blame is not yers. As for her takin’ the inquiry case on her own? That’s on me.”
“Where do ye want to begin?” Munro asked as Brodie turned to the stairs that led to the office.
“Find Mr. Brown. His people have an ear to everything that goes on around London. Someone may have heard something. A lady disappearin’ on the streets is not a common thing,” he added.
“And yerself?” Munro asked.
“I need to know if there is anything in the office that might tell me where she went that last day,” he replied.
Munro nodded. “We will find her.”
“Aye.”
Not unexpected, when he reached it, the office door was locked.
That too was something that had changed over the past two years.
Before, he had always left the office unlocked. There was nothing of value there. But when she first stayed over, he had the lock installed.
He unlocked it now and stepped inside.
More than the lock on the door had changed. It was there in the orderliness of the place, the light that poured in through the window beside his desk, washed clean of the usual grime that he’d paid no attention to before.
It was there at her typing machine that he’d purchased for her to work on the next Emma Fortescue novel and type reports at her desk.
And there was the pot that sat atop the cast-iron stove that held coffee in the morning that they shared.
A cloud of chalk dust covered the wood floor beside the rubbish bin where she cleaned the felt eraser after using it on the chalkboard.
There was the furniture that had been added—her desk, a side table, and chairs for those they met with. Things that now filled the office, that anyone might not give a thought to, that filled up an empty place … the way she had filled up empty places inside him.
And the bloody chalkboard that she insisted upon.
It was covered with notes—lists, details, questions, and things she’d learned while he was away that included the names of three young women who had disappeared, including the daughter of Mr. Cavendish’s friend.
There were other names of those she’d met with—Elizabeth Davies, the mother of Charlotte Davies, and another woman at Covent Garden who knew Lizzie Smith, along with the name of a young man she’d met there.
Burke’s name was there as well, more than once, as she learned some bit of information that raised another question.
But what did it mean? Had she learned something important from him?
He looked about the office, then went to her desk and searched the drawers, not that he expected to find what he sought. She always kept the notebook with her.
Did it contain more information that she hadn’t an opportunity to add to the board?
Where to begin—it was like the cases he took when he was with the MET.
A missing woman, the murder of another, clues that revealed little, and time perhaps running out. Only this time, it was personal.
He placed a telephone call to the New Scotland Yard and left a message for Mr. Dooley.
“One of the patrols found the girl’s body,” Dooley explained after receiving the message Brodie had sent him. He shook his head.
“In all my time with the MET, I’ve never seen such a thing. Not even with those poor women over in Whitechapel.”
Brodie had worked with Dooley when he was with the MET, and many times since. He was a good man and he trusted him.
“Did she say anything when ye left the mortuary?”
“She only asked who would do such a thing? Then she thanked me and said not another word about what she saw at Kew. Not even when we went to the Bond Street Station for her to make a statement about what she knew about the poor girl.
“I escorted her to Mayfair afterward. Now, tell me. What has happened?”
“She has disappeared. It seems that she might have gone somewhere as part of her inquiries, and she’s not been back in almost three days.”
Mr. Dooley’s expression was grim. He nodded. “How can I help?”
“Follow any lead ye might have, and let me know what you find. If I’m not here, leave word with Mr. Cavendish.”
Mr. Dooley nodded. “We have the information on the other two young women that disappeared. I’ll put the word out with the lads. And contact me as well if you learn something important.”
When he left, Brodie went back to the chalkboard.
The last entry she had made was on 18 June. It obviously meant something important, and according to what Mr. Cavendish had told him, that was the last time he saw her when she had him call for a cab, and had then sent the hound back.
Three days ago.
How was it all connected?
He read through everything on the board again and came back to an entry for The Times newspaper with a question mark added with each entry.
What had she learned when she went see Mr. Burke at The Times?
There was nothing to indicate what it might have been. Perhaps nothing. Or possibly something she hadn’t taken the time to add to the board ...
Then that entry that seemed to verify what Mr. Cavendish had told him, that she had asked to see the latest edition of the newspaper, and had then taken herself off the afternoon of 18 June.
What was in the newspaper that had sent her off hours later?
It was late in the day when he left the office, the Strand crowded with end-of-day traffic and congestion, as a driver finally arrived and Brodie gave him the location of the newspaper office on Fleet Street.
The ground floor office and attendant’s desk were still well lit when he arrived, in spite of the late hour.
“Mr. Burke,” he told the young clerk at the desk.
“He left some time ago, sir. Is there something I can help with?”
“Where would he go?” Brodie demanded.
“I don’t know exactly …” the young man stammered.
“Perhaps some place when he leaves early of the day?” Brodie replied, rapidly losing patience.
“Possibly the Punch Tavern. He goes there sometimes to meet others who work at the other papers …”
The Punch Tavern was on the corner of Fleet Street, a typical London pub, filled with workers at the end of the day, and Theodolphus Burke.
They’d had previous encounters when Brodie was at the MET and then on a well-known inquiry case that involved the royal family. His opinion of the man was much the same as Mikaela’s.
There was a round of laughter where Burke stood at the long bar, a gin glass in his hand. By the laughter, it obviously was not his first of the night as he told his companions a story.
“Mr. Burke, a word,” Brodie told him, as he joined the man at the bar.
Burke turned with a frown, his story interrupted, and looked at him with a narrowed gaze. Recognition made its way through the gin haze.
“Are the police about to raid the place?” he asked with a smirk. “Should we all flee for our lives? Oh, yes, I have forgotten. You are no longer part of that distinguished brotherhood.
“I remember now,” he continued. “You now make private inquiries and with a woman, I might add, Lady ‘something or other.’ Though hardly a lady the way she goes about the city.”
It was the drink, Brodie told himself. He’d seen it a thousand times on the street and for now, chose to ignore the insult.
“You met with her just days ago. I need to know the reason. It’s important.”
“A man who cannot keep his position with the MET, and now cannot keep a woman in her place?” Burke raised his gin glass as if making a toast. “I will admit, aggravating as the woman is, she is a handsome piece.”
The glass sailed out of his hand as Brodie seized him by the collar of his coat, picked him up off the floor, and slammed him against the bar.
The tavern had suddenly gone quiet.
“We have business, Mr. Burke. We can discuss it here, or back at your office,” Brodie told him. “But you will tell me wot I want to know.”
There was a quick nod in response.
“I thought so.” He dragged Theodolphus Burke from the tavern, and then ‘escorted’ him back to The Times newspaper building.
“What information was she after?” Brodie asked a slightly bruised Burke who sat uneasily on the chair at his desk as if he was uncertain what might happen next.
“What information was she looking for?” Brodie repeated. “I'll not ask it again.”
Except for their somewhat one-sided conversation, the office was quiet save for a night clerk on the ground floor and a young reporter who had been working after the usual business hours and had decided that could be done elsewhere.
“It was regarding an advertisement that ran in the paper,” Burke replied somewhat shakily. “Something she found and wanted to know who had put it in the paper.”
“Tell me, all of it, or I will stay here until you do.”
There was no need to threaten the man further.
It was an advertisement on the front page of the newspaper—on the Personals Page for companionship of various natures—matrimony, affairs, the connection to a woman who offered her services, and companionship.
The advertisement Mikaela wanted information on was regarding the last one—‘companionship for travel,’ that she had apparently come by with the inquiries that she was making.
“I explained to her that I did not have any knowledge of the advertisements for the Personals Page.”
“Who has the information?” Brodie snapped.
“Mr. Charles on the third floor.”
“Did she go to the third floor to see the man?”
Burke nodded.
“And where is this man now?”
“He works quite late preparing the ads for the morning edition. He may still be there.”
Brodie hauled him out of the chair. “Then we will pay a visit to the third floor.”
Howard Charles was there, bent over a large sheet of paper, making marks as he scanned it, thick glasses on his face.
He looked up at the intrusion, startled at the sight of Theodolphus Burke being dragged along like a reluctant hound.
“What the devil …?” he exclaimed.
“I have need of information,” Brodie told the poor man whose hair—what there was of it—stood up about his head and gave the appearance of one of those ‘fright’ drawings the paper printed from time to time to stir up their customers.
He explained about the series of advertisements identified by that box number 41984, the first placed months before. Over that time there had been responses.
“Everything is confidential, as I told the lady,” Mr. Charles added after Brodie explained the information he was after.
The responses to that box number were then picked up weekly by a representative or servant of the person who placed the advertisement.
Also part of that confidentiality, no names were ever exchanged due to the nature of some of the ads.
“I want to know about the advertisement that ran the last several weeks and the responses that were received and then passed on to the owner of the ad.”
“As I explained …”
Again there was that hesitance, on behalf of confidentiality. Brodie took out the revolver and pressed it against Burke’s head.
“And I thank ye kindly,” he told both men when he finally had the tear-sheets from those past issues that, at a glance, told him what Mikaela might have been after.
He paused briefly at the door to that third-floor department.
“Mr. Burke,” he directed what he said next to the reporter.
“You are apparently somewhat educated. So you will understand what I say and my meanin’.
She is very much a lady, and if I ever learn that you have insulted her in any way, I will see that you never speak again. Make of that what you will.”
Outside The Times offices, he found a driver and returned to the office on the Strand.
The original advertisement that had been the same each time was not unusual. It was unusual in that Mikaela had taken it with her for her meeting with Burke:
Seeking female companion for same, for travel and adventure.
Age 18-25. All expenses paid.
No whores or prostitutes need reply.
Respond #41984.
And the response she’d made just after that visit to the that same box number:
#41984
I am a respectable girl of the age required.
I am a hard worker and wish to travel.
Awaiting your reply.
Brodie knew how she thought and the language of the response was articulate—‘Awaiting your reply.’
They were not the words of a flower seller at Covent Garden or a young woman who worked in her father’s shop.
It made sense that she had placed an answer to that ad. It’s what he would have done in order to find the person responsible for them. And she had received a response:
‘Respectable Girl. We must meet.
3:00
18 Jun.
#4 Princes Gate, Knightsbridge’
He had an address and was certain that was where she had gone.