Bill Pronzini - The Bughouse Affair

Holmes bowed as he joined Sabina. There was a smudge of dirt on one of his cheeks, as if he had spent part of his time inside crawling around in dark corners or a dusty attic. “My dear Mrs. Carpenter. An unexpected pleasure. May I ask what brings you here?”

“I’ve come to extend my condolences to the widow.”

“Detective business as well, perchance?”

“Perhaps. Though not of the same sort you’ve been indulging in.”

“Ah, you overheard my conversation with Mrs. Costain.”

“Part of it. I’ll thank you to cease claiming to be what you’re not-an authorized employee of the Carpenter and Quincannon agency.”

“My apologies, dear lady, for the small deception. But it was in a good cause, I assure you.”

“Yes? Did you learn something my partner and I should know?”

Holmes’s smile was crafty. Instead of answering her question, he said, “It’s almost teatime. On my way here I noticed a tea shop around the corner on Federal Street. Would you do me the honor of joining me there after you’ve finished speaking to Mrs. Costain?”

“I have no time for social niceties, Mr. Holmes.”

“You might find it worthwhile nonetheless,” he said. He bowed again and sauntered off, the ferrule of his stick tapping rhythmically.

Sabina watched after him for a few seconds, then returned to her former place at the front door. She had to move the funeral wreath aside in order to lift the heavy brass knocker.

The door opened abruptly and there appeared a pale, wrathful face under a black hat with a drawn-up veil, her prominent chin outthrust. “Now what do you-? Oh. I thought you were someone else.” The woman’s expression modulated into a frown. “I don’t know you. What do you want?”

“A few minutes of your time. My name is Sabina Carpenter.”

“Carpenter? Of the detective agency?”

“Yes.”

Penelope Costain hesitated. “I shouldn’t be speaking to you at all. If your partner and that fool Holmes had done their jobs properly, my husband would still be alive.”

“Please don’t blame Mr. Quincannon for what happened to your husband. If it had been humanly possible for him to have prevented it, he would have done so.”

“So you say.”

“May I come in?”

“I’ve just returned from making funeral arrangements. I’m really quite tired.”

“I won’t keep you long.”

“… Oh, very well.”

The widow’s mourning attire was a rather inappropriate black taffeta dress that rustled and crackled from static electricity as she ushered Sabina into an underheated and overdecorated parlor. Flowers and ruffles, statues of shepherds and shepherdesses, a hideous ormolu clock on the mantel. Antimacassars, Faberge eggs, ornately painted plates on a wall rail. Life-size china dogs beside every chair, multicolored glass baskets holding mints and candies. An empty gilt canary cage. And over it all, a patina of dust as if the room hadn’t had a proper cleaning in some while. There was even a spiderweb between two of the ornate plates.

A gauche display of wealth that had been neglected-and plundered a bit, judging from the spaces where more of the ostentatious clutter had once been displayed. How could people live in such surroundings?

Mrs. Costain stood stiffly, her head cocked to one side in an oddly birdlike fashion, her short dark hair touching the high collar of her dress. Eyes like the points of arrowheads jabbed at Sabina as she said, “Well, Mrs. Carpenter? Why are you here?”

“First, to offer my condolences.”

“Thank you.”

“And I have something of your husband’s that I thought you might wish to have.”

“Of Andrew’s? What might that be?”

Sabina produced and handed over the silver money clip. Penelope Costain turned it over in her hand. As her fingers traced the intricate design, she winced slightly as if struck by a painful memory.

“Where did you get this?”

“From a pickpocket I was hired to apprehend.”

“A pickpocket. I see. And did you apprehend him?”

“Her.”

“A woman? Well, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.”

“She was killed yesterday by an unknown assailant.”

“Deservedly, I’m sure. You’ll pardon my callousness, but I have no sympathy for such creatures. I would not be unhappy to hear that the man who shot my husband has also been killed.”

“Understandably so. You did know that the money clip was stolen from your husband?”

“He mentioned the fact, yes.”

“When and where did it happen?”

“A few days ago, I believe. Near the Palace Hotel after Andrew left his office.”

Another of Clara Wilds’s random victims, then, on her prowls along the Cocktail Route?

“Did he say how much cash he carried in the clip?”

“A few banknotes, no more than thirty dollars. He was more upset at losing the clip than the money. That, and the fact that the pickpocket jabbed him with a sharp object just before she struck.”

Sabina saw no need to reveal what the object was. “Was anything else stolen besides the clip and banknotes?”

“No.”

“You’re sure?”

“Andrew would have mentioned it if there had been. Why are you asking all these questions, Mrs. Carpenter? The pocket-picking incident is no longer of any importance. My husband has been cruelly murdered. Finding the man responsible is all that matters now.”

“Of course. My partner is engaged in that very activity. In fact, he may already have accomplished it.”

“He knows the identity of the burglar?”

“He believes so.”

“But he’s not sure?”

“He won’t be until the man is in custody.”

“Have the police been informed?”

“They may have been by now. You needn’t worry, Mrs. Costain. Your husband’s murderer will not escape punishment, whether he’s the man Mr. Quincannon is pursuing or not.”

“That is of little comfort to me at the moment,” Penelope Costain said. Her head still cocked in that birdlike way, she made discomfited movements that caused the black taffeta to rustle and crackle again; her patience seemed to have worn thin. “Is there anything else?”

“Not at present, no.”

“Then I trust you will be good enough to leave me alone to grieve in private.”

“The history of teatime,” Sherlock Holmes said sententiously, “extends back to the seventeenth century, when Queen Elizabeth granted the East India Company the right to establish worldwide trade routes. Originally the routes were used for the transport of spices, but by the time Charles the Second claimed the throne, tea had become the beverage of choice for English society. Now the custom has spread to your country, although of course it is not yet either properly refined or highly regarded here.”

Sabina sipped her jasmine tea and wished the Englishman would cease pontificating and get to the point of this meeting. The tea shop on Federal Street was small and maintained a pretense of gentility despite the fact that the South Park neighborhood was no longer fashionable among the city’s gentry. She and Holmes were seated at a window table. She was not overly fond of tea, preferring coffee or John’s favorite beverage, warm clam juice, but she could appreciate a national tradition that supported eating well and often. Or she could if she weren’t being bombarded with far more details of British habits and tastes than she cared to hear about.

“Naturally there are several variations on the tea service: cream tea, with scones, jam, and clotted cream; light tea, with scones and sweets; and full tea, with savories, scones, sweets, and dessert.” Holmes motioned with mild distaste at the plate of scones and strawberry jam on the table between them. “This fare wouldn’t do in England, you know. No, not at all. The scones and elderberry preserves served in the London shop near my rooms on Baker Street are far superior.”