Justice Hall - Laurie R. King [101]
It held photographs of the family, in groups and alone. My eyes were drawn to one that showed most of the major players in our family saga, arranged on the steps before Justice Hall: Marsh as a man in his early twenties, standing between an undergraduate Alistair and a vibrant young Iris, the three friends looking as if they were repressing laughter at a shared joke; a taller, older version of the Hughenfort line had his arm dutifully around a thin, tense woman a few years his junior—the fifth Duke, Gerald, I knew from a portrait in the Hall—and between them a child of four or five who had the black curls and proud chin of Phillida. Then Iris pointed to the last figure in the group.
“That’s Lionel, aged sixteen.” He resembled a washed-out Marsh. His eyes were too dark to be blue.
She sorted through the snapshots and studio portraits to show us a clearer picture of the man, slightly older and showing ominous signs of world-weary dissipation.
He looked nothing like the child we’d spent the last two days watching.
The other photos, of a grown Phillida at her wedding; of Marsh and Alistair at that same wedding, wearing English formal dress but with the beards of their Arab personas, neatly trimmed; of Marsh, Alistair, Iris, and two other young women seated at the base of the pelican fountain with champagne glasses in their hands; of Phillida and Sidney on a beach somewhere in France.
We were looking through the photographs when the telephone rang. I happened to be sitting closest the instrument, but on hearing that it was the trunk call come through, I held the receiver out in a direction halfway between Iris and Alistair.
“It’s Justice,” I said.
Alistair allowed Iris to take it, which I thought showed remarkable restraint: He looked more likely to curse and rage than to listen to whatever servant or nurse had been dispatched to give news of the duke’s state. Nonetheless, he hunched over Iris, their faces so close he must have heard every word that came over the line. I could tell by his darkening face that the news was not happy.
Iris hung the earpiece onto its rest, and gave us a small shake of the head. “He’s roaring at the nurses and throwing objects at the doctor. Ogilby asks when we are coming back. We’d best take the earlier train.”
Holmes, thoughtful, replaced the photographs in the envelope.
“Lady Phillida seems as eager as her husband that you all accept the boy,” he said. “I believe we ought to know why. Or rather,” he corrected himself, “what lies behind the ‘why.’ The ‘why’ itself is fairly obvious: The Darlings being by English law unable to assert claim or control over Justice Hall, they see Thomas as their, shall we say, proxy duke. They know that Marsh longs to leave; they long for him to leave as well, to allow them to carry on as the de facto masters of Justice. Thomas is the means by which that goal might be attained, an heir, conveniently under-aged, thus requiring regents to care properly for the house and farms. To say nothing of German industrial investments. What we do not know is if there is any criminal intent or deed behind the Darling sponsorship of Thomas. What was that you said, Russell?”
“Nothing, Holmes. It’s just that I don’t know that my simply continuing to change my hat-bands and overcoat is going to keep the woman from noticing that the same woman has been following her from Paris to London and back again. It’s all very well for a man—you all dress alike—but I can hear from your voice that we’re headed back to France, and so I think I ought to replenish my wardrobe first.”
“You’re right.”
“I should be back in a couple of hours,” I began, but he overrode me.
“I have a bolt-hole not far from this hotel,” he said. “We’ll find what we need there.”
I gave in. For one thing, he would have more makeup in one of his secret apartments than at my own London pied-à-terre, and with the right makeup, one person can be several.
We arranged with Iris and Alistair to stay behind in case Terèse and