A Kiss Across Time (Time Into Time) - Page 37

‘In fact the only person even remotely connected with all this who has an alibi is Miss Reece,’ I said, staring at the incident boards. In the interests of keeping Luc awake we’d shifted them into his bed chamber. ‘She was at the dancing class with us.’

‘It doesn’t have to be someone named on there.’ Luc was propped up now as he seemed more likely to keep still if he could see what was going on. ‘If I was behind this I’d employ someone, dress them up to look respectable and have them follow me looking for an opportunity to use that cosh. They must have had strong nerves to follow me into Albany and do it on my doorstep, which argues a professional.’

‘Or someone desperate,’ I said. ‘Did you get to see your enquiry agent?’

‘Yes.’ He frowned with the effort of getting his, presumably badly aching, brain to recall the detail. ‘Essentially Dettmer is exactly what he says he is. Came over here with letters of recommendation, works hard, exchanges information about Continental practice in return for insights into pianoforte-making over here, always in on time. Mrs Kentish reports no visitors. If he’s up to something then it doesn’t involve odd hours, secretive behaviour or mysterious visitors.’

He broke off to drink from the mug of broth Garrick had made. ‘This is good. What is next?’

‘That’s it,’ I told him. ‘Good nourishing beef broth with veggies. You can have steak tomorrow. What about your solicitors and the Count?’

‘He came over in late ’93 at the height of the Terror. He was absorbed into the French émigré community, got intermittent work teaching French then fell in with someone who had influence at the Home Office and secured the translating post. Nothing known against him, all the established French aristocrats who’ve encountered him say he’s the real Count – spitting image of his father and so forth. Another dead end.’

I still wasn’t so sure. Some instinct was telling me that Gaston de Saint Clément might be just who he said he was, but that he was up to something. ‘I’ll move Herr Dettmer to the bottom of the board and mark him Probably Innocent, but I’m still not convinced about dear Gaston.’

The others looked unimpressed by my instincts. We took it in turns to eat dinner away from Luc so as not to drive him to rebellion. James and Garrick read the day’s papers to him and I tabulated the names from the ledgers that Garrick had finished.

‘Talbot doesn’t seem to have used any codes to mark problem patients, more’s the pity. If he noted jealous husbands and flirtatious ladies putting their hand on his stethoscope it would have helped,’ I grumbled. I didn’t feel any wiser by the time I had finished, only amazed at the status of Talbot’s patients.

By midnight we had talked ourselves to a standstill and Luc looked exhausted. But his eyes were still normal, there was no bleeding anywhere and I agreed it was safe to let him sleep.

‘Stay,’ he said. James had gone to bed down in the drawing room having promised that he wouldn’t try walking home alone at that time of night with the cosh-wielder at large and Garrick was heating water for Luc to wash.

‘Very well,’ I said. I had been determined to do so in any case, so I could sit up and keep an eye o

n him, but I sneakily thought it would be best if he thought it was his idea.

‘And sleep,’ he said and I realised I wasn’t fooling him at all.

We spent Saturday studiously avoiding anything that might stop Luc resting. He slept, ate like a horse and slept some more and by Sunday he was behaving as though nothing had happened. I couldn’t work out whether he was in agony but Georgian male pride simply wouldn’t allow him to admit it, or whether the tolerance of pain was higher in those days. I recalled reading about someone at Waterloo who was wounded, unhorsed, ridden over by two cavalry charges, used as a shooting platform by French troops, stuck by a lancer and who still survived and was very laid-back about the entire experience.

Garrick was full of admiration for the way the wound was healing cleanly and was a complete convert to the sterile theory, so at least I had some confidence that if any of them got hurt while I was back in my own time they would take the right precautions.

There was swelling of course, and a nasty line of stitches, but when Garrick cautiously washed Luc’s hair we found we could comb it to almost cover the damage. ‘That will do under a hat, provided we can pad the rim so it doesn’t chafe, but you can’t go to the ball in a hat,’ he said.

‘Egg white,’ I suggested. ‘Whip it up stiffly, then comb it in, position the hair and it will dry in place.’ They looked dubious, but I thought it would work.

Garrick and I spent an hour on Sunday morning sorting out my gowns for the garden party and for the ball in the evening, then I sat down with the Annual Kalendar and cross-referenced the employees of the Home Office against the names Garrick had extracted from the porters.

‘There are names that match,’ I said. ‘The porters recognised a Mr Potter and a Mr Albright who came in together and there are two clerks listed – Mr J. Potter and Mr A. Albright. And they saw a Mr Reece – could that be Sir Thomas’s nephew Elliott?’

‘Damn, I should have noticed the name,’ Garrick said. ‘I’m sorry, Miss Lawrence, my language – ’

‘No problem. And you had a lot on your mind at the time.’

‘I will go and find out now before they have the chance to forget any more than they probably have already. I should have thought to check those names yesterday.’

James looked up from where he was trying his hand at the coded ledgers. From the muttering and scattered paper he was having no luck with them either. ‘Did you say Albright?’

‘The porters saw a Mr Albright and an A. Albright is a Home Office Clerk.’

‘Augustus Albright. I saw him with George Coates once or twice in gaming clubs. Keen card player.’

‘And not the marrying kind?’ Luc asked.

‘No, definitely not. He was never seriously involved with George that I know of, simply as a partner at cards.’

‘But he was here around the time I was attacked, he knew Coates socially and at the Home Office, he was equally vulnerable to blackmail and he might have gambling debts. What does he look like?’

Tags: Louise Allen Science Fiction
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