City of Bells (41 page)

             
“But that was just another way I tried to help you,” Weaver blurted out, wiping sweat from his brow. “When Rose said she wanted an English nurse, I hired one from your stable, a girl who might have otherwise been a financial burden to you all your life.  If you recall, I sent a note -“

             
“I do recall the note,” Leigh Anne said.  “And we shall add your hiring of Adelaide to your long list of saintly acts.  But she was a special girl, an unusual one, and she had to be treated in a certain way.   So on the first day of her employment I escorted her to your house –  It was Sang who greeted us and something in his kindness…”

             
She shook her head, as if to erase the memory.  “I cannot say that seeing the house is what did it, or even seeing Sang again.  Something in the situation struck me, but I never would have put it all together without Adelaide.  Soon after she began attending your wife she came home one day telling me about a tile in one of the bedrooms.  Telling me it had an elephant with five legs… “ Miss Hoffman laughed,  not with bitterness for once, but in genuine delight.   “Adelaide has a child-like mind, Secretary-General.  She came to us from a brothel where her mother sold her virginity when she was but six years old.  It burns the heart even to think of it, that there are men with such urges in the world and women so willing to accommodate them.“ 

             
“The world is a horror,” Weaver said.  “Just when one thinks he has heard every possible sad tale, another arises.”

             
She shrugged.  “True enough.   But for purposes of my story, it would seem that Adelaide’s mind somehow froze at that point, the point of her cruel defloration, and it was never to grow further into adulthood.  She and I were delivered to the school the same year, can you imagine?  Both of us had managed to arrive at the age of six having already outlived our usefulness to the civilized world and thus were destined to be thrown away like yesterday’s garbage.  We were companions of a sort through the years until I grew up and she…did not.  I must confess she has always been a bit like a sister to me, both of our childhoods having been ripped in half by a singular event.  It was hard to imagine her future.   Hard to imagine any place she might find refuge beyond the school.  So when the note came asking for an English nurse, I sent her.”

             
“The task was not arduous,” Weaver said.  “You must have realized she would not actually have to perform any nursing duties.”

             
Leigh Anne nodded.  “But I knew nothing of the family making the request, other than the fact they were prepared to pay handsomely for her limited services.  It was only when Adelaide returned that day, telling tales of the elephant with five legs that the memories came flooding back.  I realized for the first time that the house where I had stayed after my rescue must be here in Bombay and I did some investigation…”

             
“You had her poison Rose.”

             
Another laugh, a bell-like sound.  “Actually, if you recall, I tried to have her poison you.  But unfortunately our dear Adelaide lacks focus and thus is not an ideal accomplice in the art of murder.  She told me you took your sips of the laudanum in the evening, sometimes before she left.  And so I had her bring residue from the pods of our own suicide tree, just like the one you so obligingly grew within your own garden.  Did you know the dark purpose of that particular flower?  No, I rather doubt you did.”

             
“I did not take the laudanum every night,” Weaver said.  “Only on those evenings when….”  He paused, mopped his brow.  The sun had burned the entire garden into a single white hot light.

             
“Only on those evenings when the memories rose up against your will?”  Leigh Anne asked gently.  “On those nights that you knew that without the draught, sleep would prove impossible?”  She sat back with an exhalation.  “We are much alike, as fate would have it, Secretary-General.   I struggle with insomnia myself.”

             
“If I had sipped a bit of the mixture that night,” Weaver said hollowly, “then your plan would have been perfection.  The morning would have found me sleeping an eternal sleep.  And in a man near unto seventy, there would have been no investigation at all.”

             
“Plans,” Leigh Anne said.  “We make them and fate unmakes them.  I am sorry beyond all measure that Pulkit Sang was taken, although if you are speaking the truth about Rose’s role in my banishment I cannot claim any particular sorrow on her behalf.”

             
“My wife,” Weaver said tonelessly.  “She was a cold and heartless monster.  I wanted her and then I had her…and our life was a hopeless hell.”

             
“Indeed?” said Miss Hoffman.  “Then perhaps the hand of God was working in the mistake.  His mysterious ways, and all that sort of rot. “

             
“People might say that you are a very unusual sort of missionary, Miss Hoffman.”

             
“And they might further add that you make a highly unlikely war hero, Secretary-General Weaver.”

             
Despite it all, he chuckled.  There was a certain pleasure to be found in her company.

             
“So here we sit,” he said.  “The only two survivors - save of course Michael who doesn’t know himself to be such - of the slaughter the world calls Cawnpore.  That is something, is it not?”

             
He raised his tumbler in a salute and, after a moment of hesitation, she followed suit. 
This rough scotch grows easier to swallow in time
, he thought. 
Like so many things.

             
“Where is Adelaide now?”

             
“Simon, or rather Michael, departed the school just minutes before you arrived.  You no doubt passed his carriage with your own.  He stood right here before me and announced he had come for his sister.  His dear sister Adelaide Sloane.  It was a rather strange moment, I assure you.”

             
Weaver shook his head, unsure whether to laugh or cry.  “That fool of a boy…”

             
“That well-funded fool of a boy. His expression was insolent, but his words were like honey to the soul.  He said he wished to benefit the school which had shielded Adelaide for so many years.”

             
“You took money in exchange for that poor wretch of a woman? So now you can add slavetrading to your list of accomplishments.”

             
Leigh Anne bobbed her head, the long strands of graying hair tumbling around her face. 
It makes her look like some mad Greek goddess
, Weaver thought,
or some mermaid of the sea.
 

             
“Yes, I handed her over,” Leigh Anne said.  “What would become of her if I didn’t?   And the money…it is enough to keep the school going for some time, no matter what.”

             
No matter what,
he thought, taking a longer swig of Scotch. 
She knows what is coming.

             
And when he sat down his glass and looked over at her, she indeed was observing him keenly.  “How much do the authorities have?”

             
“I am afraid they have your fingerprint on a glass that policeman was holding when he fell into the well. Or rather when you pushed him, I suppose. They seem to think that in itself is enough.”

             
She nodded slowly.  “Which means there isn’t much time.”

             
“The Scotland Yard detectives are boarding the afternoon ship, which is scheduled to depart at three.  And then the locals are free to move in and take all the credit.”

             
“So I have an hour?”

             
“Perhaps two.  The dockworkers are not efficient.”

             
She paused, looked out into the garden.  He did not have the impression that she was particularly upset by his words, and she was not at all surprised. 

              “Then we have come, you and I, at last to the end.”

             
“It would appear so.”  He sipped again and looked past her.  “Your garden is lovely.”

             
“Thank you.  My mother kept an English garden.  It is the only thing I remember of her.”

             
“Ah.  So did my wife.”

             
“There is nothing quite like an English garden, is there?”

             
“It is the very apex of civilization.”

             
And then they sat for a minute in silence. 
She might have been my daughter
, Weaver thought, the foolish notion bringing the hot sting of tears to his eyes. 
And it occurs to me now, far too late, that I would have very much liked to have had a daughter.

             
“I was about,” Leigh Anne said slowly, “to have a bowl of curry.  A late luncheon, one might say, or perhaps an early tea.  And what of you, Secretary-General?  Have you come to dine with me at last?”

             
“Yes,” he said, wiping a single unmanly tear from his sun-leathered creek.  “We shall eat from the same bowl, you and I.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

Bombay Harbor

3:30 PM

              “Well, that was a bloody jumble,” Rayley said irritably.  “The dockmaster’s office seems to be run with the same efficiency as everything else in Bombay. Thank God we had the Queen’s letter with which to threaten the man.  The royal seal seemed to speed things up from an ooze to a crawl.” 

             
“I do believe you drew the worst of the day’s tasks,” Trevor said with a chuckle.  “But no fear.  We shall have four days of absolute leisure on the ship and as far as I’m concerned, we should all spend them dead drunk.”

             
Rayley looked about. “Speaking of which, where’s Tom?”

             
“Shopping the little waterfront stalls with Emma.  And Davy is lurking about scouting allies and rivals for shuffleboard, and Gerry is standing in the one bit of shade on this whole damn dock.  Here, rest before you have a heat stroke, my man, and I shall round them up.” 

             
Rayley nodded and leaned against a fence.  The passengers traveling posh were allowed up the gangplank first, which gave one a bit of a preview of what the next four days at sea were going to be like.  He watched as the dour-faced men in tweed queued up with their preoccupied, nervously chattering wives trailing behind them. And further behind even yet, came the children and the nannies, and the dogs.

             
“They look precisely like the same group we came over with last week,” Emma said.  She and Tom had come up beside him with dozens of gaily wrapped parcels in their arms.

             
“Just so,” Rayley said.  “I suspect that’s rather the whole point.” 

             
“See here, darling,” Tom said.  “Give me your packages to carry so you can hold on to the gangplank railing.”

             
“Don’t call me ‘darling,’” she said, but she handed him the packages nonetheless.

             
“But I call everyone ‘darling.’”

             
“I know.  Which is precisely why I don’t want you to use the term with me.”

             
Trevor, Geraldine, and Davy now wandered up as well, apparently deep in conversation.

             
“What shall happen to the students at the school?” Gerry was asking.

             
“Ask Emma,” Trevor said.

             
“Mrs. Morrow and Amy have agreed to supervise the girls until a suitable headmistress can be found,” Emma said.  “Of course, Mrs. Morrow is too elderly and Amy is too young to be up to the task on a permanent basis, but I have no doubt they shall hold matters together for a while.”

             
“And the school received a sizable endowment today,” Trevor said, with a sidelong glance at Davy.  “Enough to attract a most excellent headmistress in due time.  At least that is the rumor.”

             
“Gerry…” Emma said.  “You are far too generous.”

             
“Geraldine’s pursestrings have remained tied for once,” Trevor said. “My understanding is that the monies came from Michael Everlee.”

             
“Just look at them,” Rayley said, and he inclined his pointed chin in the general direction of Adelaide and Michael, who were at the top of the gangplank and positioned to be the first on the ship. “It would appear that he truly is taking her back with him to London.”

             
“A family reunited,” Trevor said drily.  “At least in a manner of speaking.”

             
But Geraldine was nodding in approval, as Emma, Tom, and Davy moved ahead of the older members of the party, chattering among themselves as they approached the base of the gangplank.  

             
“Does it matter if they do not share the same blood?” Gerry said, moving toward the ship herself, but at a more measured pace.  “Just believing himself to be part of a genuine family might make Everlee a changed man.  Look there, just now.  Note how gently he is assisting her over the rough boards.”

             
“It is uncharacteristic, I agree” Trevor said.

             
“Oh dear, I know that tone of voice too well,” Geraldine said, with a wink at Rayley.  “It is the detective speaking, and not the man.  Are you about to tell me that it is essential these poor souls be confronted with the truth?  Or can we just declare that the white termites ate up every piece of documentation at the school and leave it at that?”

             
Trevor smiled.  “Seal is on his way to arrest Leigh Anne Hoffman in this very moment, so justice has been served in the murders of Rose Weaver, Pulkit Sang, and Hubert Morass.  And that, I assure you, is the only truth that matters to me.  Besides,” he added, smoothing his mustache, “I doubt that any of us shall see either of them ever again.”

             
“Quite so,” Rayley said.  “And they do seem rather – dare I say it?  He is smiling and so is she.  It would seem that we have our happy ending, at least in one regard.”

             
“And that’s all very well,” said Geraldine, as a whistle sounded, signaling the straggling members of first class to approach.  “At least while we’re in transit through neutral waters. But Michael runs with a very elite crowd back in London, and it’s difficult to imagine how a woman of Adelaide’s complex history shall fare among that level of society.”

             
“Difficult indeed,” Trevor said, with a small private smile.

             
“She will be an innocent among a pack of tigers.”

             
“Tigers, you say?  Dear me. How dreadful.  Abrams, have you noticed any tigers roaming the streets of Mayfair?”

             
“Frequently, Welles.  They lurk behind every dustbin.”

             
“You both can stop your foolishness, both of you, for I am deadly serious.  The drawing rooms of London are as barbarous as any jungle.”   Geraldine pulled herself up to her full height, the plumes of her hat bobbing in the waterfront  breeze.  “Perhaps I might take it upon myself to help her.”

             
Trevor offered Geraldine his arm as they turned toward the gangplank.  “But of course you shall.”