Murder on Cold Street (Lady Sherlock #5) - Sherry Thomas Page 0,47

to open the gate for them when Holmes said, “Lord Ingram and I will first walk around the outside of the garden.”

At the moment, it was not raining in this part of London. The temperature had risen a few degrees, but along with that slight increase in warmth came fiercer winds. Lord Ingram had to press a hand on his hat to prevent it from flying away. “Yesterday I hoped the Serpentine would be frozen soon, but that seems less likely today.”

She scanned their surroundings. “Your children like skating, don’t they?”

He looked at her a moment, enjoying the sight of her on the hunt. He’d once considered it intolerable, to tell her that he loved her, and then wait for a verdict. Now that he’d actually taken that step, it felt oddly freeing. He’d laid all his cards on the table; he didn’t need to worry about how or whether to play them anymore.

“They adore skating. So does Miss Olivia, if I recall correctly.”

“Livia is a good skater. She tried to teach me to skate. Alas, I balanced about as well as a sack of flour would on skates.”

He chortled.

“Looking back,” she continued, “I marvel at her patience with me. I didn’t like anything she wanted me to try; and she wasn’t interested in cake.”

It’s because she was certain of your love. Because she knew she was safe with you.

I didn’t understand for the longest time that I, too, have always been safe with you.

They stopped at nearly the same moment, she looking toward the base of a small bush next to a house, and he to the edge of the curb. Buttons. Buttons that looked exactly like the remaining buttons on Inspector Treadles’s coat.

The enclosed garden’s length of approximately 700 feet far exceeded its width, at about 150 feet. Both 31 and 33 Cold Street were near the middle of its long western side. Lord Ingram and Holmes currently stood on the pavement along its shorter southern edge, just outside another garden gate. If this was where Inspector Treadles had been attacked, there would have been drops of blood on the street in the immediate aftermath. But it had rained enough since the night of the party to wash away all traces of blood, leaving only the buttons.

Holmes took out a pair of tweezers from her reticule, picked up the buttons, and packed them away in a handkerchief. They kept walking and finished the round, but did not encounter anything else of note.

Back at the spot between 31 and 33 Cold Street, Constable Lamb opened the gate and let them through. Inside they found an expansive stretch of smoothly clipped lawn, the grass still green, though a paler, yellower shade. Large plane trees were scattered throughout, their bare forms, though somewhat forlorn-looking, still shapely. Here and there clusters of smaller trees or larger bushes formed, almost like the parkland of a country estate, if one ignored the houses that delineated the edges of this parkland.

A pebbled path wound through the lawn. Holmes stepped on the path and walked some thirty feet toward the interior of the lawn before turning around to inspect the two houses in question.

“You can actually see into number 31 from number 33,” she said. “And vice versa.”

Because of the gap between the two houses—and because the architects for both had decided to take advantage of that and put in windows.

Constable Lamb, who had gone off to unlock number 33, now stood at its back door, beckoning them to come in.

“Constable Lamb, was the back door open, when the police got here?” asked Holmes.

“No, miss, it wasn’t. Only the front door.”

She examined the rear entrance. “This house is otherwise unoccupied, I understand?”

“No tenants now, miss,” confirmed the young constable. “None since summer.”

She raised a brow. “This doormat looks rather new though.”

When she wished to encourage someone to keep talking, Lord Ingram noticed, her expressions grew more animated. Conversely, when she wanted someone to stop lying, her face became more and more opaque.

After they’d left Scotland Yard, where there was a greater chance someone would recognize her, she’d taken off the makeup and devices that made her appear different and older. He enjoyed seeing her real face in a state of vivacity, a change rather akin to a dramatic haircut.

The eager-to-help Constable Lamb did not disappoint her. “That’s because Miss Longstead, from number 31, uses the house from time to time.”

“Did Mr. Longstead also own number 33?”

“Yes, miss.”

This was not a terribly unusual arrangement. Mrs. Watson, for