The Custom House Murders (Captain Lacey Mysteries #15) - Ashley Gardner Page 0,45

“Not that I can imagine why a sickly clerk would kill Warrilow, or if he’d have the strength to do so. But it’s a link, of sorts. I will interview the man.”

“As ye like. You are leaving at the end of the week, though, mind.”

“Of course. I have said I would.”

Brewster sent me a narrow gaze and resumed staring at the floor.

We sat thus as a silver gilt clock on the table chimed out the half hour. After it had gone three rounds of this, I heard a door open in the hall, and then Gibbons entered our room. Without speaking, he gestured us to follow.

Denis had come in but not through the front door. He walked from the back of the house, in his greatcoat, divesting himself of hat and gloves and handing them to a beefy footman.

The butler put himself between us and Denis as he passed us without a word and walked upstairs. As soon as Denis had vanished on the upper floor, Gibbons led us in his wake to his study.

Denis had moved his desk. It no longer sat against the front wall between the windows, but before the fireplace, facing the door. The shutters on the front windows were closed, and blinds had been drawn over the back ones. In this gloom, the butler lit candles, their light joining that of the fire.

A chair was brought to me so I could sit, but Brewster remained standing.

“What did he want?” Denis had seated himself at his desk and now drew a letter from a stack that had been placed there. He broke its seal and scanned the contents while he waited for my answer.

I did not ask how he knew I’d been to see Creasey. Brewster hadn’t said a word to any but me since we’d entered the house, but as Creasey had acknowledged, Denis would have sent men to watch my every move.

“To offer me a post,” I answered. “At least, so he said. In truth, I imagine he was trying to pry information from me.”

“I doubt that.” Denis laid the letter aside. “He would have more information from his spies. He summoned you to discover what sort of man you are. To learn what it would take to make you betray me.”

“I am not in the habit of betraying people,” I said stiffly.

Denis spread his fingers. “He will poke at you until he understands your exact price. Every man has one.”

“So you said to me when we first met.”

“I stand by my assessment.” Denis gave me a slight nod and placed his hands, palm down, on the desk. “I would like to know all he said to you.”

I saw no reason not to repeat the conversation and told him all I could remember. “He painted you in the wrong, which did not surprise me. That he’d agreed to a truce he’d suggested and abided by it until you sent him the queen.”

Brewster huffed and began to speak, but Denis quelled him with a glance. “The truce was forced upon him,” Denis said. “He never liked it. I knew about Creasey long before he was aware of me. I told you once how I grew up on the streets. He was a force then, one I avoided. If anything, I owe my success to him, as I found avenues of business he had neglected. Nothing I did overlapped with what he had—I was very careful about that. But he saw me as a threat, wisely, I think. I offered the truce when it became clear we would soon clash. I promised to keep to my pursuits and leave his alone if he did the same for me. If either of us failed in the bargain we were to send the chess piece to signal that all restraints were off.” He shrugged. “Creasey is an old man now, and he has not groomed any lieutenant to take his place on the day he dies. He trusts no one. I could wait.”

He finished with the air of one who assumes they have far more time on this earth than those of their grandfather’s generation.

“But that is no longer the case?” I asked.

Denis slid his hands together in one abrupt movement. “A ship came in from China. It contained antiquities, very rare and difficult to find. One agent of mine nearly lost his life acquiring them and another actually did. The buyer had already paid a high price up front for the expedition and was to pay me