Peter Lovesey - Mad Hatter

‘What kind of sleeping draught is it?’

Her eyes opened wide, like a child’s. ‘That’s what bothers me, my dear. I don’t know. Prothero doesn’t tell me, and I don’t like to enquire. I believe he prepares it from white crystals that he keeps in a jar, but I’ve never enquired too closely what they are. I shouldn’t want him to think I don’t trust him.’

‘Perhaps someone else could help.’

‘Darling, I’d quite forgotten that you were a medical man. But how charming! It will so relieve my mind.’

What had he volunteered for? ‘Medicine isn’t quite my field, Ma’am. Optics, you understand.’

‘But of course you know about these things! How marvellous of you to go to so much trouble.’

‘I dare say that if you could obtain a small sample of the solution I could get it analysed somewhere in the town,’ he conceded. ‘Though I’m sure your husband can be depended upon.’

‘So am I, Mr. Moscrop, so am I. But if your chemist found that the medicine were a trifle strong, perhaps I could prepare a weaker solution without offending Prothero. It’s just a little unnerving being insensible for thirteen hours at a time, you understand.’

‘Quite so, Ma’am. When would you be able to obtain this sample for me? It would have to be done unobtrusively, would it not?’

‘Darling, you’re so perspicacious! If you came to the croquet lawn at the Albemarle at two this afternoon, I could leave Bridget dressing Jason. Prothero will be in the billiards-room with Guy. How droll-we shall feel like two conspirators!’

The heroes of Tel-el-kebir marched down the Grand Parade in ranks of eight to the tune of Slap Bang, Here We Are Again and all Brighton lined the pavements to welcome them. The war in Egypt had been a daily topic of conversation for months past, quite as compelling as the scares about the town’s drainage system. The local newspapers carried long dispatches from Cairo, and in the aquarium entrance hall a huge canvas map of the seat of war was mounted among the weighing-machines, with flags to indicate the latest positions of the English and Egyptian armies. When the return of the Royal Irish was announced, a full civic reception was arranged at once, but the spontaneous tribute of almost the entire population quite stole the Corporation’s thunder. Flags appeared everywhere, even draped over the lichen on the walls of the poorest houses. Humble cab-horses trotted through the town with trimmings of red, white and blue; children appeared in miniature tropical helmets, brandishing tin swords; the minstrel bands played little else but See the Conquering Hero Comes and When Johnny Comes Marching Home.

As soon as Moscrop reached the Old Steine he saw that there was small chance of picking out the Protheros, even if Zena had managed to persuade her husband that this was the best vantage-point. It was like The Mall on Coronation Day. Crowds nine or ten deep lined the route from the Pavilion to St. Peter’s. Latecomers were improvising periscopes with hand mirrors, or resorting to the trees. The police, massively reinforced, had linked arms to preserve a passage for the regiment.

‘Was you wishing you had your spy-glass?’

He turned in surprise, stung by the pertinence of the question. It was exactly what he had been wishing. Bridget stood there, smiling mysteriously. ‘You wouldn’t spot the doctor and his wife in this mob, sir. Neither of ’em’s over-tall, and they started out late, long after the crowds began to collect.’

‘You! How strange! I had no idea-‘

‘Not so strange as you think, sir.’ She tilted her hat so that two of its imitation cherries lolled coquettishly over the brim. ‘I’ve been following you for ten minutes or more.’

‘ Following me?’ Whatever was the girl saying?

‘You ain’t the only one that plays follow my leader. I waited for you at the top of North Street, near the Penitents’ Home. I knew you’d come that way because your diggings are in Montpelier Parade. That’s given you food for thought, hasn’t it?’

‘I don’t understand.’ For the first time he looked at Bridget without regard to status. Her manner verged on impertinence and he would certainly have silenced the girl if she had not caught him unprepared. In the most presumptuous way she was demanding a conversation on equal terms. There was a positive hint of archness in the set of her mouth, as if she had caught him prowling below stairs. A neat little face, too, for all its pertness. Until now he had not noticed. ‘What possible reason do you have for following me?’

She stepped closer and, as if it were the most natural thing to do, tucked her hand behind his right arm. ‘If you was to buy me a glass of white satin you might find out.’

He stiffened. Into a public house to drink gin with a domestic? The very idea!

He treated the suggestion with contemptuous silence. But he did not remove the offending hand from his arm.

‘You won’t see much of the military from here,’ she persisted. ‘Just the tops of their hats. We could have a much more profitable half-hour together. The Seven Stars is just around the corner.’

And this was to have been the year when he made his debut in the Brighton season!

‘There won’t be a soul in the bar. They’ve all come on the streets for the march-past. Don’t let’s lose time. You want to find out some more about Mrs. P., don’t you?’

Put like that, it sounded appallingly crude, but he had to admit that the girl had the native gift of shrewdness one sometimes found among females of the lower orders. She was right. If there was anything to be learned of Zena, then he was enslaved. Feeling much as he had when he abandoned Bernhardt for his night at the Canterbury, he permitted Bridget to guide him towards Ship Street by way of Bartholomews. The salute was going to be taken from the Town Hall steps, so the pavement opposite bristled with people determined not to budge from hard-won positions. She steered him determinedly through the crush, at times surprising him with pressures he could not recall having experienced among the crowds in Oxford Street or at Waterloo Station.

A pink awning had been erected in front of the Town Hall, and the civic dignitaries and some of the senior officers of the regiment and their ladies were ranged under it in tiers. They made a brave show, a suitable focus of attention, medallions, civic regalia, ermine, gold braid, bright red Eton jackets. But the limelight was stolen by the milliners; you could hardly see a face for the hats, and you could hardly see the hats for the trimmings, ostrich feathers, swansdown, fruit, flowers and humming birds.

‘Gorgeous, don’t you think?’ demanded Bridget, cherries bobbing aggressively.

‘Unparalleled.’

‘ She’s there, of course.’

‘She is? Where?’

‘In the second row, third from the right, wearing white lilac and convulvulus. They’re artificial.’

He stared between shifting parasols, expecting to be rewarded with a glimpse of Zena’s haunting features. ‘The second row, you say. I don’t see her. That isn’t your mistress, Bridget. She doesn’t have copper hair. Good Lord!’

‘Not my mistress,’ said Bridget, with emphasis. They were looking at the young woman from Lewes Crescent, Dr. Prothero’s riding-companion.

‘What is she doing up there?’

‘Don’t you know who she is? That’s Miss Samantha Floyd-Whittingham, the daughter of the Colonel. She’s very well known in Brighton. Her father has set her up in a big house on the front. They say it’s because he won’t trust her in the officer’s quarters with so many men about. Instead she has the run of Brighton, and the Colonel thinks she sits indoors counting seagulls from her window.’