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“I do look quite the tart, don’t I?” I said, admiring myself in the mirror.
“Yes, m’lady,” Maddie said dryly. “Very tarty, if I do say so myself.”
“It’s all thanks to you,” I applauded.
“And Lady Butty,” she reminded me.
After tea, Aunt Butty and Louise had gone off to sort through Aunt Butty’s attic. They’d returned an hour later with a pile of gowns—decades out of date as I’d suspected—and instructions for Maddie. Somehow, my maid had managed to whip up something suitable for the evening’s undercover adventures.
The dress, such as it was, had been repurposed from one of Aunt Butty’s red velvet gowns. It hugged my curves to the point of indecency, revealed a rather generous amount of cleavage—which Maddie had helped along with the use of a great deal of padding despite my not needing any assistance in that department—and showed rather more leg than I was strictly comfortable with. She’d also put on my makeup with a heavy hand. The end result was that instead of a lady, I looked like, well, a tart.
“Bravo,” Chaz said when he saw me. “Darling, you look a treat.”
“A rather cheap one,” I said in a snide tone. “You think he’ll fall for it?”
“If he doesn’t, believe me, he doesn’t bat for your team.”
I snorted. “Shall we get on with it?”
We took his car, which was only slightly less flashy than mine, and parked a couple blocks away from the club. We were supposed to be ordinary folk, and ordinary folk did not drive around in expensive motorcars.
The club was located at the edge of the East End, tucked among dozens of restaurants, shops, and other clubs. It was loud, flashy, and very obvious. Inside, big band music played while women in costumes even tartier than mine strolled around serving drinks and selling cigarettes. A familiar dastar in the far corner caught my eye.
“Is that—?”
“Mr. Singh,” Chaz confirmed. “Aunt Butty thought we could use some backup.”
Mr. Singh was Aunt Butty’s Sikh butler. She’d picked him up somewhere along her travels, just as she had her dreadful maid, Flora, and her new driver, Simon Vale. Mr. Singh knew things that no proper butler should know and had skills no proper butler should have. He was very mysterious, our Mr. Singh, and I liked him immensely.
He sat quietly, nursing what appeared to be a whiskey, neat, watching the crowd with what I was sure was feigned boredom. Boredom was not an expression Mr. Singh ever bore. His gaze swept over us, completely blank, as if he’d never seen us before.
“Let’s mingle,” Chaz said, pulling me into the crowd.
We’d formed a plan on the drive over. He and I would drink and dance and behave just as two people on a night out should behave. Once we spotted Derby Jones, I would arrange an “accidental” meeting during which I would work my feminine wiles. Once he was under my spell, so to speak, I would proceed to extract information about Dottie Lancaster Davis. Meanwhile, Chaz would work the crowd, trying to get whatever he could out of the patrons and employees. And, apparently, Mr. Singh would be watching our backs the entire time. His presence made me feel much better about the whole thing, I must say.
We found a table not far from Mr. Singh where we could keep a good eye out. Chaz got us a couple of drinks, very cheap liquor, very watered down. Then we danced a bit to the subpar band, before chatting up the people around us. No one seemed to know Dottie, and Derby Jones was nowhere in sight.
At last I visited the rather dodgy cloakroom. It smelled dreadfully of mold and unmentionable things. As I checked my makeup, a young woman came in. I recognized her as one of the cigarette girls.
“Hey, you work here?” I asked, reverting to the country accent of my youth. It was easier than trying to fake an East End one, and no one would catch me out because of it.
“Sure, doll,” she said, chomping on a wad of gum. “Ya need somethin’?”
“Actually, I’m looking for a friend of mine used to hang out here. Haven’t seen her in a while. Dottie?”
Her eyes, thickly rimmed in kohl, widened. “You mean Dottie Davis? Didn’t you hear? Someone done her in.”
I gasped in feigned shock. “No! What happened?”
“They found her in Hyde Park a couple mornings ago. Somebody stabbed her through the heart with a sword!”
Well, she was half right. “Oh, no! That’s dreadful! Why would someone do that?”
“Probably messed with the wrong husband, you know what I mean?” She gave me a once over. “Don’t tell me she didn’t try it on with your fella. He’s a looker.”
I realized she meant Chaz. “She’s not his type. Wasn’t, I mean.”
The girl snorted. “Dottie was everyone’s type. At least for a good roll in the sack.”
“Did you hear who killed her?”
“That husband of hers. They arrested him, but they let him go. Then they arrested some uppity lady. She got out, too. Rich always do.”
“Don’t they just?” I murmured.
“Don’t know who they suspect now.”
“What about...” I leaned close enough I caught a cloying whiff of her cheap perfume. “What about your boss?”
“Mr. Jones? I doubt it were him. He didn’t care much for her.” She swiped a finger under her eyes to smarten up her makeup. “Mind you, he’s a dangerous man, Mr. Jones, but long as you don’t cross him everything’s fine. And Dottie was smart enough not to cross him.” She frowned. “At least I think she was.”
As I exited the ladies’ room, I was eager to get back to Chaz and tell him what I’d found out, but my way was blocked by a gorilla of a man. His cheap suit jacket strained against a thick chest and shoulders wide enough to block the hall.
“Pardon me,” I said, trying to move around him, but he stepped over to block me. I glanced up to find cold, dead eyes staring at me from an emotionless face. My stomach turned.
“Mr. Jones would like to see you.”
––––––––
I ADMIT TO SOME TREPIDATION as the beefy gentleman in the too-tight suit led me through the maze-like warren of narrow hallways that made up the back of the Apollyon. Chaz had no idea where I was, and I had no idea how to find my way out of this mess. What if Derby Jones discovered who I really was and decided to do away with me? Or worse. What if he thought I really was a tart?
Frankly, I was beginning to think this had been a terrible idea. Who’d thought this caper up, anyway?
Oh, yes. Me.
With an inward sigh, I straightened my shoulders, steeled my spine, and marched on. To the gallows, as it were.
At last I was ushered into what I could only assume was the inner sanctum. It looked like any number of studies I’d seen in any number of upper-class houses. Dark wood paneling. Plush armchairs in dark wine velvet to match the drapes. Carpeting thick enough to break an ankle. And a massive rosewood desk behind which sat one Derby Jones.
Aunt Butty had shown me a picture of him in the paper before we left the house. He’d been accused of one crime or another though it hadn’t seemed to stick. He was handsome in a brutal sort of way with a strong jaw, a nose that had been broken once or twice, a scar across his upper lip, and surprisingly thick eyelashes. He eyed me, his eyes the icy blue-green of the ocean. It made me shiver in trepidation, though I was fairly certain I didn’t show it.
“Mr. Jones, I presume?” I said saucily in my broad country accent.
He stared at me a beat longer, then inclined his head. He didn’t get up, as a gentleman should when a lady entered the room, but sat, fingers steepled, eyeing me up and down. “I am. And to whom do I have the pleasure?”
I propped a hand on one hip and eyed him back measure for measure. If he thought he could stare at me like a side of beef, well, I could do the same. He wasn’t exactly hard on the eyes, either, though he was no Hale.
“Maddie,” I said, giving him my maid’s name. She’d no doubt throw a teacup at my head if she found out.
One eyebrow went up. “Just Maddie? No last name?” He didn’t look at me like a man who was thinking of getting my clothes off.
I shrugged and took a seat in one of the velvet chairs. They actually weren’t as comfortable as they looked. “What’s the point? You’re not interested.”
“You’re right.”
I was surprised he admitted it.
“What I am interested in is why you’re questioning my people.”
My people. As if he owned them. Maybe in a way he did. Men like him bought and sold people all the time in one way or another.
“I’m trying to find out about my friend, Dottie. I know she used to spend time here.” Only a partial lie. Lies are always better when they carry a grain of truth.
“And?” Those cold, appraising eyes never left my face. Not since that first perusal of my body. I almost wished he’d look somewhere else. Anywhere else. It was unnerving.
“Well, she’s dead. Somebody killed her.”
His expression remained impassive. No hint of surprise. “And you think someone at my club killed her.” It wasn’t a question.
“Honestly? I don’t know. It could have been her husband or her boyfriend or that awful Kitty person,” I said, ticking off random suspects. Hale might be innocent, but Derby Jones maybe didn’t know that. “I was hoping maybe I could find something out here. Something that would point me in the right direction.”
“Why don’t you leave it to the police?”
I snorted in a very unladylike fashion. “Please. How many times have the police arrested you?”
“Fair point.” He actually cracked a smile and went from brutally handsome, to downright charming.
No wonder women swooned over him. I’d never understood why women liked bad men until that moment.
Clearing my throat, I crossed my legs, something Lady Rample would never do, but something that Maddie the Tart probably would. “I know she was cheating on her husband.” I knew no such thing, but I figured a person like Dottie must have been. She’d stolen her best friend’s boyfriend, after all. “I’m trying to find out who it was and thought someone might have seen her here with him.”
“And why do you want to find this man, if he exists?” Jones asked.
“Because maybe he knows something. Or maybe he killed her.”
“He didn’t.” His tone was very sure.
“How do you know that?” I demanded.
“Because I was Dottie’s lover.”