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Twenty-four hours still remained before the Garipoola docked in Madras and Isabella re-united with her husband. That excitement didn’t distract her from the current puzzle.
She determined that she would have to talk with her former cabinmate Caro Marten, maid to Lady Saunders. That meant she would miss tea.
Isabella had spent a few hours arguing with herself that the intruder to her cabin could not have been Lord Saunders, but that scent of bergamot, jasmine, and bay was too distinct of a cologne not to associate it with him. Most men cloaked themselves in sandalwood or bay or clove. If she hadn’t shared a table with the Saunders couple and Lady Bernhardt, she would never have come close enough to smell a cologne so lightly applied.
She didn’t know what she expected to learn from Caro. They may have shared a cabin for days, but they hadn’t really become friends, not the way she’d become friends with the secretary Nedda Cortland. Part of that was Caro’s position as maid, on call with her employer when Isabella was usually free. She also hadn’t become friends with Hettie Rufford, who’d been the fourth in their third-class cabin on the Nomadic.
As soon as Lady Saunders joined Lady Bernhardt in the Dining Room, Isabella headed for the staterooms behind the bridge and pilothouse. Lord Saunders would have joined the men in the forward-facing upper-deck Smoking Room. They usually had whisky with cigars while the women indulged in tiny sandwiches and creamy confections.
Caro was the only other blonde not at the hotel for luncheon when the man had searched for his supposed contact. Isabella hadn’t seen Caro at the market, but perhaps she’d gone earlier. The woman he looked for would have been a brunette or a red-head, as she’d speculated to Phoebe Drake, but suspicions said no, not when the scent in her lavatory pointed her to the Saunders.
The man had picked Isabella for his contact for a reason. The golden blonde Savina Fremont hadn’t visited the market, nor had the other blondes aboard ship, remaining with the tours to the temple, the palace and gardens, and the hotel for lunch. Isabella had skipped the hotel to explore the market. She’d done so alone.
Had that been one of the man’s criteria for his contact, a western woman alone?
All the potential threads snarled into a tangle, and she had no guidance to find the right thread to unpick the snarl and work everything loose.
Caro’s answer to a couple of questions would help.
A steward pointed her to the Saunders’ stateroom. Isabella knocked and waited, hoping Caro had maintained the schedule followed on the Nomadic.
The door opened, and Caro peeked around it. Seeing Isabella, the maid opened the door wider. “Mrs. Tarrant. The Saunders are at tea.”
“I’ve come to speak with you, Caro.”
“Me?”
“Are you busy?”
The maid glanced over her shoulder then stepped into the passageway, shutting the door behind her. “I have been pressing her ladyship’s wardrobe. We leave ship in Madras, you know. We’re bound inland.”
“We all have to leave ship. The Garipoola will steam back to Jeddah. I suppose your tomorrow will be taken up with packing.”
Caro scowled, either from the sun in her eyes or at Isabella’s interruption. “And unpacking then repacking. Lady Saunders always changes her mind. Did you have something particular to ask me?”
Her questions about the Saunders seemed too intrusive for an abrupt leap to them. “Just—we never talked much, did we, on the Nomadic? I’ve hardly seen you since Port Said.”
The maid shrugged. “I work for my living. You do not.”
“Have you been in a long employment with the Saunders?”
“What is this? You suddenly want to know about my life when we’ve less than a day remaining aboard? I doubt we’ll ever see each other again.”
“The old world’s a strange place. We could.”
She rolled her eyes. “I doubt it. You’re—what? Australia-bound after a few weeks in India? I’ll be here for months. In the interior.”
“Do the Saunders have a plantation?”
“Tea, I think.”
“You don’t know?”
Caro folded her arms and leaned against the stateroom door. “I’ve never been there.”
“So, you’re not a long-time employee?”
“I have been,” she countered. “We were in London and Kent, then Lord Saunders’ uncle decided he had to spend time at the family plantation.”
Isabella didn’t have to fake surprise. “I didn’t know that.”
“What reason would they have to tell you?”
“That seems a strange decree, to require someone who knows nothing about tea or India to uproot family and all to come here.”
Caro didn’t respond. Isabella flailed around for a next topic. Before she found it, the maid grimaced. “Look, just ask what you want to know. I cannot tell you their financial situation beyond the uncle who holds the purse strings. I don’t know their politics. I do know Lady Saunders has her good works society that meets in Charing Cross.”
“And Lord Saunders?”
Her shoulders hunched. “He has his club, of course, but I don’t have much to do with him.”
“He and his wife aren’t very ... devoted to each other. He gives more attention to Lady Bernhardt.”
“Noticed that, did you? He’s more comfortable around the old ladies. That’s his way. What else? I need to press Lady Saunders’ dress for this evening.”
“Where did the Saunders go when we were in Cape Cormorin?”
“The palace and the gardens and the hotel.”
“Were you with them?”
“Not me. That was my free time.”
“I saw you come out of the port office.”
“So, that’s it.” Caro’s blue eyes narrowed. “If you want to know what I did and report it back, you should just ask. I’ve no secrets.”
“I don’t report to anyone.”
“Don’t you? I thought you did, that he left ship in Bombay.”
“I don’t report to anyone,” Isabella insisted.
“Then I’m mistaken,” she acquiesced, doubt clear in her voice. “It explained the reason you poked your nose in everywhere.”
She opened her mouth to argue then shut it, realizing what Caro believed didn’t matter. After tomorrow, they would never again meet. She returned to the important question: Should Caro have received that note? “Where did you go when you were off-ship?” Then she recognized that Caro had had nothing to do with Emerson Werthy. Why would he have sent her a note? He wouldn’t have. I shouldn’t be here. What would this mistake cost her?
“The palace and gardens. The market.”
“I didn’t see you at the market.”
She gave a tittering laugh. “Are you checking on me? Do you think I’m a spy? I’m flattered. Most people ignore those of us in service.”
“But—.”
“I didn’t see you there, either. The rain caught me. I took shelter as soon as I reached the docks. Now, if that’s all—.” She opened the door behind her and backed into the stateroom. “Ta-ta, Mrs. Tarrant. I hope we never meet again.”
The encounter unsettled Isabella for the rest of the evening. She barely spoke at dinner, and her mind was certainly not on the bridge game. Mr. Fullerton called her to book several times.
As she climbed into bed, she placated her perturbation by reminding herself that Phoebe Drake had the important information. Phoebe would know what to do with it and who needed to know.
Isabella suspected this mystery would remain unsolved for her. Phoebe might discover the answer. By tomorrow night, Isabella would be with Madoc and no longer thinking about a note written in code.
