A Disappearance in Drury Lane

  I had a thought. I went downstairs after I’d closed and locked the doors and sought Mrs. Beltan below. Her bakeshop was doing brisk business, as it did every morning, with plenty of housewives, maids, and errand boys queuing at her door for the day’s freshly baked bread.

  Though Mrs. Beltan and her assistants were busy shoveling bread into and out of ovens, Mrs. Beltan did pause for me while I asked my question.

  She looked startled but pleased. “Well, if you want to continue paying on the rooms, I’ll not object, Captain. You’re a good tenant, for all your gruff ways. But I’d thought you’d be glad to be quit of this place, now that you’re moved into fancier digs.”

  “The rooms would be handy for consulting in,” I explained, “without bothering her ladyship. And I might now have the means to make some improvements to them.”

  Mrs. Beltan liked that, I could see. She was a fair woman, but frugal, never spending a penny when a farthing—or nothing at all—would do.

  “Well, if you can provide a bit of paint and polish, so much the better. I’m choosy about my tenants, you know.”

  I did know. She’d let Marianne take rooms even with Mrs. Carfax’s disapproval, but Marianne, for all her faults, had never brought gentlemen or unsavory guests back to her flat—she’d disappear with a gentleman who fancied her for a time instead.

  I thanked Mrs. Beltan, bought a bun, and left the bakeshop.

  Instead of returning with the cart to South Audley Street, I hobbled through the cold to begin my errands. Since Drury Lane theatre was nearby, I started there.

  Covent Garden was open for the day, and a crush of humanity surged there to buy the freshest produce and other foodstuffs and household necessities the markets had to offer. I was kept safe from the danger of pickpockets and Mr. Perry by Denis’s man Brewster, who followed me, not discreetly. I imagine Denis had chastised him thoroughly for letting Perry grab me.

  I finished chewing the warm bun by the time I walked into the theatre’s back passage. I knocked at the stage door, the sound echoing in the relative quiet. Silence met my vigilance, and I knocked again. As I was about to turn away, the door was yanked open then closed to a crack. “What?”

  “Mr. Coleman,” I said. “It’s Captain Lacey. I came here a few days ago with Miss Simmons to speak about Mrs. Collins, remember?”

  He gave me a nod. “You found her yet?”

  Coleman’s look told me he wondered why I’d return without doing so first. “No. That is why I would like to speak to Mrs. Wolff again.”

  Coleman peered past me in some suspicion. “Where’s Miss Simmons?”

  “I saw no reason to drag her out on a frosty morning. Is Mrs. Wolff about?”

  “No, she ain’t here. Mrs. Wolff don’t come ’til it’s warmer.”

  “Will you let me in, regardless? It’s brisk.”

  Coleman looked me up and down as though thinking I should be able to stand a little winter breeze. But wind blew through the passage with Arctic chill, the temperature below freezing this morning. Coleman finally gave me another nod, jerked the door wider, and admitted me to the dark theatre.

  The hall inside was not much better for warmth, but at least it was out of the wind. Coleman led me down the passage to the room with all the costumes, which was warmed by a stove, and stood still, waiting for me to speak.

  “Do you know a Mr. Perry?” I asked him. “John Perry?”

  The change in Coleman was instant. He stopped being impatient and effused a river of rage. “Why’d you want to know about him?”

  “He gave me these bruises you are so curiously examining.” I gestured to my face. “Or, at least, his friends did.”

  “Why?”

  “I never did discover,” I said. “He was interested in my visit here, but I did not remain with him long enough to find out what he wanted to know. Who is he?”

  Coleman’s angry gaze moved from my face with its healing bruises to my boots, polished by Bartholomew this morning but muddy from the streets. He took in my suit, well made but one of my older ones, and the new hat under my arm.

  He wasn’t certain of me, but most people were not. I was a landed gentleman but not wealthy, from an old family that was not sought after for its connections. Finally Coleman gave another nod and answered. “Mr. Perry is Mrs. Wolff’s husband.”

  My eyes widened. “Husband?” I thought about Perry and his thick face and wiry hair, and Mrs. Wolff, small, frail, blind, aged. “How can he be her husband?”

  “The usual way,” Coleman said without humor. “Banns, church, written in the parish register. She never did say why she did it, but some years ago, she did. They live apart now, and she won’t go by his name. She’s terrified of him, she is. I thought he’d gone north and stayed there.”

  “He was here three days ago and had me abducted and confined. Why? Is it he who’s been frightening Mrs. Collins?”

  Coleman shrugged his big shoulders. “He was likely wondering why you came here when none’s here but Mrs. Wolff and me.”

  “Is Mrs. Wolff safe now? Where does she live? Not alone, I hope. If Perry is still about . . .”

  “She lives with her sister and sister’s husband, in a big old house off the Strand. She’s safe enough there. Sister and her husband look after her. He’s a clerk or some such in the City. I walk Mrs. Wolff home every night and drop ’round to walk her here every day. I’ll keep Mr. Perry away from her.”

  “You might want to take more precautions than that. Perry had hired men pound me to the ground, and he won’t hesitate to do it to you either. Blasted man lost me a walking stick.”

  Coleman listened to me without blinking. “Thank you for the warning. I’ll find more to help me protect Mrs. Wolff while you find Mrs. Collins. Now, I must be getting on.”

  He seemed in a hurry for me to go away. He’d been much more cordial during our last meeting, but Marianne had been with me, and Mrs. Wolff had been there for him to worry about. I saw in him that he would protect Mrs. Wolff and resented any implication he would not.

  I decided it best to leave for now. I thanked him and departed the room alone, Coleman having no intention of accompanying me.

  The revelation of Perry as Mrs. Wolff’s husband stunned me—I would not have guessed that. If Perry had coerced her into marrying him, it would be for a sinister reason. I wondered very much why she’d agreed.

  Because Coleman had left me on my own, I took a wrong turn in the corridors behind the stage and ended up nearly walking onto the stage itself. I stopped when I realized my mistake, and looked out from the wings.

  The theatre appeared very different from this angle. The stage was deep and wide, with plenty of room for elaborate sets, though today the boards were bare. Beyond the proscenium, the seating rose in a semicircle of stalls and boxes, stretching upward to a domed ceiling, which was decorated with pilasters and hung with chandeliers. It was lovely, like a most lavish ballroom.

  Only one player was on the stage just now. A smallish man was walking about, back and forth, muttering to himself. As I watched, he turned to the nonexistent audience, rose to his full height, and bellowed out, “O cursed, cursed slave . . . Whip me, ye devils, from the possession of this heavenly sight!”

  I realized I was watching none other than Edmund Kean, the great tragedian. I hadn’t recognized him until he’d changed from the bent, muttering man to the lamenting Othello in one step. He’d become Othello in the space of that moment, war-weary, believing the woman he loved was betraying him.

  Kean turned and saw me. Abruptly, Othello faded, and Kean, now only an irritated gentleman, limped toward me. “You there. What are you doing?”

  I made the best bow I could. “I beg your pardon, sir; I did not mean to intrude. My name is Captain Lacey. I was asked here by Mrs. Wolff and Miss Simmons to look into the disappearance of Abigail Collins.”

  As Mr. Kean did me the courtesy of listening, his intense, dramatic gestures disappeared, and he looked at me in ordinary worry. “It w
as a bad business, that.” He shook his head. “I was not here the day the package came, but I heard the entire story from Coleman. Poor Mrs. Collins. The gunpowder could have marred her for life, killed her even. I do not blame her for fleeing, even if it is playing merry hell with the schedule. If you’re off to find her, do persuade her we will do everything to protect her when she returns. We need her.”

  “You believe she is staying away of her own accord?”

  Kean shrugged. “What else? She is a strong woman and a brilliant actress, but badly frightened. I have no idea who is tormenting her. No doubt a rival, who took it too far.”

  “I’d say the package shows much more evil than simple rivalry. The gunpowder might have killed not only Mrs. Collins, but perhaps Coleman, or Mrs. Wolff—or you—if it had been opened without thought.”

  Kean shuddered, a flash of his dramatic self escalating the shiver, before he shook his head again and returned to being a mere mortal. “It is obvious you know nothing of the world of the theatre . . . Captain, is it? I’ve elbowed my way into plenty of theatre companies and roles, although it never would occur to me to kill or maim for them. Humiliation of a rival, however, I am not above.” He gave me a brilliant smile, and this man two-thirds my height again looked taller and more robust.

  I could see his talent in these flashes, when he became a different person entirely. I’d watched him play Richard III in this very theatre and would have sworn he was in truth a pathetic hunchback consumed with the desperation to hold on to his crown.

  “Who are Mrs. Collins’ rivals in particular?” I asked him.

  “My dear Captain, I could name a hundred. Begin with the other actresses in this company, then move to those of Covent Garden, Haymarket, and others. Dramatic actresses only, I would think. When Mrs. Collins speaks as Portia or Cleopatra, she is them, her voice rich and beguiling. I’ve seen her render the entire theatre into a mass of weeping. But she has no talent in song—cannot carry a tune, poor woman. Thus, I would eliminate sopranos and any women in musical productions.”

  I saw his concern behind his words, which I sensed weren’t spoken in humor. He was outlining to me what he considered the greatest possibilities.

  “What about male rivals?” I asked. “Or spurned lovers, that sort of thing?”

  “Mrs. Collins has no spurned lovers. She’s had lovers, of course, but she always manages to part with them without fuss. Her husband, an actor of not much consequence, died of fever long ago. That is why I believe in this rival. Sift through them, find the prankster, and bring Mrs. Collins back to us. Tell her to hurry it up, there’s a good fellow.”

  Kean spoke as though I could rush away, lay hands on Mrs. Collins, and be finished by nightfall. I suppose that was what he wanted me to do.

  Finished with me, Mr. Kean gave me a vague, “Nice to have met you,” and turned away, walking back across the stage. He returned to muttering under his breath, ignoring me completely.

  I left him to it. I had to make my way back to the corridor and search for the door again, but I eventually found the passage that led me out to the tiny lane behind the theatre.

  As I walked to Russel Street, I had the feeling of leaving one world behind for another. Inside the walls of the theatre, the magic of the stage and actors like Kean existed in a sort of soap bubble, the rivalries, jealousies, threats, and little joys pushed together and distorting the world outside. Outside the walls, we went about our lives, tending to our needs, taking care of business, and looking forward to the few hours we could spend in the magical world of the theatre.

  I put aside my whimsical fancies once I joined the swarming populace of London in Russel Street, and continued with my errands.

  I wanted to visit the delivery company who’d sent the package and then to speak with Marianne, but I faced the fact that first, I needed a new walking stick. Nothing for it. My leg was hurting in the cold, and if I were to rush about London, I would need the prop.

  Shops in the Strand would sell walking sticks. Grenville might chide me for not patronizing the most fashionable haberdashery in Bond Street, but at the moment I simply needed something to help me stand.

  I hired a hackney to take me the few streets south where I began to roam the shops. I wondered if I were anywhere near where Hannah Wolff lived with her sister, but I had no way of knowing in which of the many lanes around the Strand she dwelled. Coleman had shoved me away before I could ask, and I doubt he’d have told me, in any case. Another detail I would have to pry from Marianne.

  I had to look into a few shops before I found a stick that suited me. It didn’t have the excellent sword my other had hidden inside it, but I hadn’t much choice at the moment. The one I purchased was of stout oak, well polished, its brass handle formed into the bill of a goose, similar to the head of the one I’d lost.

  After my purchase, I made my way to Fuller and Hamilton Deliveries, also on the Strand. The firm had rooms in a respectable-enough looking building opposite Somerset House, near St. Mary’s le Strand. When the head clerk understood that I was not, in fact, hiring them to deliver a package, he dropped his polite manner and wanted nothing to do with me. Bow Street, he said, had upset them enough, trying to blame them for the package, wanting to go through and open every parcel in their offices. What customers would trust them, once galumphing Bow Street Runners had torn open all the goods?

  I had to talk quickly before I could convince him I had nothing to do with Bow Street, and was in fact the friend of a friend of Mrs. Collins. The man was inclined to toss me out, but at the last moment, he agreed I could speak to the clerk who’d taken the delivery order. He wanted my promise I’d go away after that, and not to Bow Street.

  I gave my word I would keep whatever they told me in confidence and use it only to help Mrs. Collins, which was the truth. I had no intention of assisting Spendlove.

  The clerk who appeared was a younger man, in his twenties, I surmised, his face still a little spotty with youth. He had very dark hair and a pale complexion, his smallish eyes darting about nervously. He had not been the same since the incident with the package, he told me, and had asked to work in the back of the shop, and not with the customers.

  “I wouldn’t say the chap was spindly exactly,” the clerk said when I asked him about the man who’d dropped off the package. “Thin, yes, I think. Difficult to say. But his suit was fine. A respectable gent. Except he kept laughing. Big teeth. Quite an admirer of Mrs. Collins, he said, which was why he wanted to send her a gift. Too timid to take it to her in person. Best way, he said. His hands weren’t small, I noticed, but rather big. Unusual, I thought, because chaps with big hands are usually tall.”

  “But he was not tall?”

  “Oh, no. Not like you, sir. About my height, I’d say. I could look across right into his eyes.”

  The clerk stood about halfway between five and six feet. I’d met many men in London of similar height, Grenville included. The description did not advance me much, but it took away the possibility of Coleman. Coleman was unmistakably huge.

  The young clerk still looked shaken by the incident. “Not your fault,” I said. “You weren’t to know.”

  “I wasn’t, was I? The package looked all right, didn’t weigh much, didn’t rattle.” The clerk’s forehead shone with sweat. “Good thing I didn’t open it up to look inside, wasn’t it?”

  “No one was hurt by it,” I said. “That is what you must remind yourself. The man at the theatre realized the danger in time and knew what to do.”

  “Thank God for that, is all I can say. Gave me a turn when I heard, and then the Runners came and asked me all sorts of questions, as though I’d made the thing myself.”

  “It is their way,” I said, thinking of Pomeroy and his zeal. “But you are not to blame. They know that.”

  The clerk did not look reassured. Likely it would be a long while before he felt calm again.

  The head clerk wanted me out, that was obvious. I gave each man a half crown for his trou
ble, which made the head clerk a trifle more polite, and I took my leave.

  I found another hackney and traveled west, ending up rolling along Piccadilly. I debated who to visit first, Marianne or Denis. The early hour decided for me. Marianne these days kept the same hours of rising as Donata.

  I directed the coach to take me to Curzon Street. I had no appointment with Denis, but I’d long since decided that if he were to use me to carry out tasks for him, he’d have to put up with me coming and going when I pleased.

  When I arrived at the house I was taken upstairs right away, to my surprise, and ushered into Denis’s sparse but tastefully decorated study.

  Chapter Eight

  Denis’s desk was bare as it often was, the usual pugilists standing near the door and window to guard him. No, not the usual. The man, Cooper, who’d been a fixture in this room, was gone.

  Denis saw my gaze drift to where Cooper used to stand, and the look he gave me was hard. I returned it with a neutral one of my own and sat in the offered chair.

  “The incendiary device,” I began, both of us forgoing polite greetings. “Would you have any idea who could make this sort of thing? I’d like to ask him who hired him to construct it.”

  Denis steepled his long fingers before he answered in his cool, careful manner. “I have already put together a list of possibilities. When I find the man I will let you know. Or the woman.”

  I blinked. “You cannot think a woman made that terrible thing, can you?”

  Denis gave me a thin smile. “You are a romantic, Captain. I assure you, the female sex is capable of committing ruthless and violent acts. You wish to believe all women are mild and kind, but you see only the veil of manners society creates for them to hide behind. Your own wife is anything but mild.”