Page 27

TWENTY

T he following morning Ursula got out of a cab, paid the driver and walked briskly through the fog.

From time to time she glanced down at the address she had transcribed from Anne’s stenography notes.

The cab driver had been very helpful but she was starting to wonder if he had made a mistake.

Stiggs Lane appeared to be fronted by largely abandoned, boarded-up buildings.

The livery stable one street away was the only active business in the vicinity.

The shop was hardly inviting. In spite of the shadows and the damp fog, there was no welcoming light behind the dark, grimy windows.

The adjacent buildings were empty. The unmistakable scents of the livery stable in the next street drifted on the damp air.

All in all, it was an odd location for a perfume and soap business, Ursula thought.

She stopped in front of the door and checked the address she had deciphered in Anne’s notebook.

There was no mistake. She took a closer look at the handful of items on display in the front window.

There was a small scattering of porcelain and glass perfume bottles, each one decorated with roses.

The design was identical to the one on the empty perfume bottle that she had found in Anne’s house.

Everything in the window was shrouded with a thick film of dust.

Tentatively she tried the doorknob and was somewhat surprised when it turned in her hand.

A bell shivered and chimed when she entered the shop.

She was assaulted by an unpleasant mix of chemical fumes strong enough to make her breath catch in her throat.

Hastily she covered her nose and mouth with one gloved hand and looked around.

There was no one behind the sales counter.

“Who’s there?”

The voice—thin, high, and tight with anxiety—emanated from behind a partially closed door. The speaker could have been either male or female.

“I’ve come to inquire about your perfumes,” Ursula said, intuitively trying to reassure the person behind the door. “A friend of mine has some that she said she obtained from this shop. I am interested in purchasing a bottle for myself.”

There was a great deal of nervous dithering on the other side of the door before a man edged nervously out of the back room.

He was as thin as his voice, small and jittery.

A few wisps of graying brown hair were plastered across the top of his head.

A pair of spectacles framed his pale eyes.

He wore a stained leather apron and leather gloves.

He regarded Ursula with a mix of suspicion and anxiety.

“Mr. Rosemont?” She employed the calm, confident, you-can-trust-me voice she usually reserved for clients who wished to hire a secretary for the purpose of taking down confidential information.

“I’m Rosemont,” he said. He removed his gloves and shoved them into one of the pockets of his apron. “You say a friend sent you?”

“That is correct.” Ursula crossed the room to the counter. “Miss Clifton.”

For the moment she wanted Rosemont to think that Anne was still alive. There was no reason that he would be aware that was not true. There had been no notice in the press. Women who lacked family or connections died every day in London, leaving behind very little evidence of their existence.

“I don’t remember a customer by that name,” Rosemont said quickly—too quickly, perhaps.

“Are you quite certain?” Ursula pressed.

“Positive.” Rosemont started to retreat behind the door. “If you don’t mind, I’m rather busy.”

Ursula opened her satchel and took out the perfume bottle that had belonged to Anne. She placed it on the counter.

Rosemont stared at the bottle. He looked horrified.

“Where did you get that?” he demanded.

“In my friend’s house. Miss Clifton has disappeared. I am trying to find her.”

“Disappeared? Disappeared? ” Rosemont’s voice rose to a squeak. “See here, that’s no business of mine. I can’t possibly help you.”

“I am trying to reconstruct her comings and goings in the days just before she vanished. According to her appointment calendar she called in at this shop on a number of occasions during the past year—including last week.”

“I told you, I don’t remember a Miss Clifton.”

This was not going well, Ursula thought. She had come here for information but it was starting to look as if she would leave no wiser than when she had entered the shop.

She could not afford a significant bribe and something told her that Rosemont would not be persuaded by a small offering—assuming he could be convinced to talk in the first place.

“How odd that you would not remember such a loyal customer,” she said.

Rosemont stiffened. “I beg your pardon.”

“Allow me to refresh your memory.”

Ursula reached back into her satchel and took out the paper on which she had transcribed several brief passages from Anne’s notebook. Rosemont watched in mounting panic as she unfolded the paper and smoothed it flat on the counter with one gloved hand.

“What is that?” he yelped.

“A record of some of her recent visits to your shop. They began about eight months ago and continued on a twice-monthly basis right up until last Wednesday. Oh, wait, I do believe that if we examine the dates more closely we see that in recent months she began stopping in more frequently.” Ursula shook her head, seemingly mystified. “It’s very odd, isn’t it?”

Rosemont glared at her. “I see nothing odd about it.”

“I do. You see, I happen to know that Anne earned a respectable living from her secretarial work. Nevertheless, I cannot imagine that she was able to purchase so much expensive perfume. And such a great quantity of it. I wonder what she did with all that fragrance. She certainly did not give any to me or her colleagues at the agency.”

Rosemont stared at the damning sheet of paper. Then he collected himself.

“Let me check my journal of receipts and transactions,” he said brusquely. “Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

She had won. Rosemont was backing down.

Cheered by the success, she gave him a cool, benign smile. “I’ll come with you, if you don’t mind. I wouldn’t want you slipping out the back door before you tell me what you and Anne were about with all those perfume sales.”

Rosemont drew himself up, momentarily projecting an air of defiance. Then his shoulders collapsed and he gave a heavy sigh.

“Very well, come with me if you must,” he said. “I will show you my records. But I must tell you that I have absolutely no idea why Miss Clifton purchased such a great quantity of perfume.”

He turned and disappeared into the back room.

Ursula whisked up her skirts. Satchel in hand, she hurried around the end of the counter.

“Did she come to your shop so frequently because she was in the habit of meeting someone here, Mr. Rosemont?” she asked.

“If that is the case it is very important that you tell me the name of the individual. Perhaps you were bribed to remain silent or perhaps you simply feel you owe her some loyalty. But as her employer and her friend, I can assure you that there is no longer any reason to protect Anne.”

She stopped short just inside the doorway. The front of the shop was steeped in gloom but the back room was drenched in even deeper shadows. The chemical odors were stronger in that room.

There were none of the things one expected to see in the back of a perfume shop. No bundles of dried herbs and flowers dangling from the ceiling. No jars of fragrant oils. No containers of orange peels or bottles of cinnamon and vanilla beans.

Instead, there was a shipping crate.

The lid was open, revealing a number of neatly packaged bags inside. Beneath the thick chemical fumes she detected a dark, slightly acrid, strongly herbal note. The odor was coming from the wooden crate.

When her eyes adjusted to the low light she noticed two bookcases against one wall. They were crammed with leather-bound volumes. Herbals and other books of botanical lore, she concluded.

She looked around, searching for Rosemont. He had vanished through a door set between the bookcases. Alarmed that he was trying to escape, she hurried to follow him.

“Mr. Rosemont?”

“In here,” he called from the next room. “Come along, I’ve got my journal ready for you to examine. Kindly be quick about it. The sooner you vacate the premises, the better, as far as I’m concerned.”

She went to the doorway between the bookcases and found herself looking into a shuttered room lit by gas lamps.

The windows were covered with thick boards that had been nailed to the walls.

She could see two workbenches littered with chemistry apparatus—glass beakers, flasks, scales and a burner.

An exceptionally well-equipped stillroom, she thought.

Rosemont evidently took a very modern, very scientific approach to the ancient art of perfume making.

“Welcome to my laboratory, madam,” Rosemont said.

He stood near a small writing desk where a large notebook was open.

He still sounded nervous but his voice was steadier now—the tone of a man who has made a decision and is determined to see it through.

“This journal contains a record of the transactions that interest you.”

She walked across the room and looked down at the book. The pages were covered with dates, amounts and quantities. She leaned over a little, trying to decipher the cramped handwriting.

“Can you please point out the entry that shows Miss Clifton’s most recent visit to your shop?” she asked. “I don’t have time to read through all of your notes.”

“You’re wrong, madam. I don’t know who you are but rest assured you have all the time in the world to read that journal.”

She straightened and turned quickly, intending to bolt toward the door. She stopped when she saw the gun in Rosemont’s hand.

“What on earth do you think you’re doing?” she said. “Have you gone mad?”

“Stay where you are.” Rosemont edged back toward the door. “Don’t move. I swear I will kill you where you stand. You very likely noticed that I do not have many neighbors, certainly none that will pay any attention to a gunshot. A guarantee of privacy was the reason I established my business here.”

The gun was shaking in his hand. That was probably not a good sign. Rosemont was a desperate, unnerved man. He was so jittery now that it was possible he would pull the trigger accidentally.

“Very well,” she said, trying for a calm tone. “I will do as you say.” The only practical strategy that came to mind was to keep Rosemont talking. “Are you aware that Anne Clifton is dead?”

“I assumed that was quite likely when you said you wanted to know about her visits to this shop.”

“Did you kill her?”

“ What? No. Why would I murder her? Things were going quite well. But I feared the arrangement would not last forever. Bargains with devils and all that. That is why I made plans for an eventuality such as this.”

“What plans would those be, Mr. Rosemont?” she asked.

He ignored the question. “Who are you?”

“My name is Mrs. Kern. I was Anne’s employer.”

“I see. Well, you were a fool to get involved in this affair, madam.”

“What affair? What is going on, Mr. Rosemont? I think you owe me some explanation.”

“I owe you nothing but I will tell you this much—I rue the day I agreed to make that damned ambrosia drug. The money was excellent but it did not compensate me for the risks I have taken.”

Rosemont stepped quickly back into the adjoining room and slammed the door shut. She heard the clank of a heavy, old-fashioned iron key in the lock.

“Scream for help if you like,” Rosemont called through the door. His muffled voice was barely audible. “No one will hear you. Not that you’ll be screaming for long. This will all be over quite soon, I assure you.”