HE HAD JUST TURNED the corner in time to watch them leave together, stepping over a uniformed body in the doorway, the dog following close behind. He wanted to stop them, but he knew that impulse had nothing to do with justice. It was an entirely jealous impulse. Portia led the way to the train, which had started its departure from the station, and he stepped forward, out of the shadows. Could he really let her leave like a thief in the night? She leapt onto the train and he saw something large fall out of her coat pocket. Multiple whistles signalled the arrival of constables at the ticket station, surrounding the body in the doorway, making his decision for him. She had made her bed. She would have to sleep in it without him.
THE RHYTHMIC MOVEMENT OF the train did nothing to alleviate the tension in my body. Lancaster looked just as bad, sitting on the opposite end of the train car, as far away from Nerissa and me as possible. My bloodhound kept trying to lick my hands, but I couldn’t bring myself to let her, so she settled for licking her own paws clean of the blood that had soaked that horrible scene.
I held my hands in front of me, palms up, the blood red drying to maroon that marked me up to my wrists. Almost against mywill, I looked down at my dress and satchel, finding with relief that the darkness of both hid the worst of the stains. This wasn’t my first murder scene — or my first bloody suicide — so I recognized the adrenaline that had carried me here, but the shock was fading to be replaced by cold calculation. I cast my eyes around the train car, pushing myself up to examine the barrel closest to me. I wrested the top off to find it filled with flour. I dismissed it, opening the next one. This one was filled with what smelled like beer. I scooped handfuls of the liquid, rubbing my hands and wrists to get rid of as much blood as I could. I then tipped over the barrel so no one would be subjected to the dirtied alcohol. Lancaster hadn’t moved at all, his arms wrapped around himself defensively. I squatted down beside him.
“What a cock up,” he said, turning his dark eyes my way. “SIS will never deal with me now.”
“We didn’t kill anyone, Lancaster,” I said, filing away that admission and speaking with more confidence than I actually felt. “Our mistake was not understanding the stakes. The bomber is feeling boxed in and is acting more and more desperately.”
“Bomber?” Lancaster repeated, affirming that at least one of my words had been the one I meant to say and looking down at his bloody hands. “Neither of them were the bomber. We’re back at square one and two people are dead.”
“If they’re not involved, why are they dead?” I challenged him. I pulled out the bullet cartridge I had picked up at the scene. “Do you recognize this? It’s not a company I’ve come across before.”
“If you’re asking if I’ve seen it before, sure. It’s German, from the war,” he replied dismissively. “Common enough amongst our enemies.”
Digby was married to a German woman who left him — Val, Ilsa’s mother — but he was carrying a British gun. The Digbys are involved, though perhaps not how I originally thought. I needed to write an ad for Annie right away. The death of the sergeant meant that we were on the run until we had the real bomber. I would not be meeting her at Charing Cross.
I sat down and opened my notepad, creating an ad for a nanny, as Annie and I had agreed, incorporating a message about the scene we had just left and encouraging her to write back with news about the queen’s lady-in-waiting and whether Parabellum ammunition was part of the weapons story she was writing. Annie and I favoured a modified skip code; the actual message was the first word and then every fourth word of a sentence. Wilans’ involvement seemed like even more of a long shot given the murder scene, but my leads were drying up faster than this blood on my dress. Surely Scotland Yard could pursue Éamon O’Duffy in my absence. I added a line about an Irish leader to the ad just in case. Lancaster leaned against me, snoring remarkably for a man who had seemed so troubled moments ago, and Nerissa curled up at my feet. I hesitated and then added a final line about Gavin returning to town, referring to him as Mr. Whitt and hoping Annie would understand whom I was referring to. Whitaker was the smartest person I knew (besides Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler) and as odd as it would be for him to look for a code in The Lady, I wouldn’t put it past him. His return couldn’t have anything to do with the bombings though. What possible agenda of his could it satisfy? Gavin was driven by power and money, two things that had evaded him growing up in the worst orphanages in London. Other than the power to terrorize, these bombings seemed to hold no power that he would be interested in. Thoughts of his criminal pursuits naturally brought up feelings about my grandmother. Irene Adler had spent five decades stealing from and blackmailing the rich and powerful, evading the law, including my grandfathers. The sooner she found me, the sooner she could help me. It was just a matter of time. Wasn’t it?