pointed out.
“As I said, in theory, either explanation makes perfect sense.”
“However?”
“However, I think there is something more we have not yet discovered. And perhaps the answers lie between the covers of Alice’s notebook.”
I harkened back to something he had said at Bishop’s Folly. “Do you really believe there is a connection between Alice’s death and Gisela’s disappearance?”
“I cannot imagine what, but it is entirely possible the two events are unrelated.”
“They had Maximilian in common,” I mused. “What if he did not remove Alice from the picture, but Gisela herself did?”
“She had only to order Alice from the Alpenwald,” he reminded me. “She is the hereditary princess. If she wanted Alice banished, then Alice would go.”
“But Maximilian, if he was still in love with Alice, might make a good deal of trouble. Would you want to start a marriage on such a footing?”
“Better than killing my mistress, if that is what you mean.”
I lapsed into irritated silence. “Their motives are so oblique. I find these people vastly annoying.”
“Annoying, but interesting,” he said with a smile. “It is a tangled skein to be sure. Now let us set to raveling.”
* * *
• • •
Naturally there ensued a rather spirited discussion on which of us ought to break into the Curiosity Club. We stood on the pavement, tucked into the leafy shadows of the square across the street. The club had once been a private residence, deeded to the organization by one of the founding members. It stood in a quiet street not so very far from a royal palace. The houses that stood like sentinels around the square were tastefully embellished and uncompromisingly white—austere wedding cakes, I always thought of them. During the day, the square would hum with discreet activity, nannies pushing their charges in perambulators buffed to a perfect gloss, maidservants moving on silent feet, starched aprons and cap ribbons snapping behind them. There were a hundred such streets in London, each of them pristine and tidy and secure in their own respectable prosperity. It seemed nothing scandalous or criminal could ever happen in such a place. Except that we were currently bent upon thievery.
We argued in hushed tones as we surveyed the building that housed the Curiosity Club. Stoker pointed out his greater skills in the art of lockpicking—to say nothing of shinning up a drainpipe like a monkey, a product of years spent in circus tents and on naval ships. But I replied that his skills were entirely immaterial in this case.
“I have a key,” I told him, brandishing the article in question.
“Veronica, you cannot just bloody well walk inside and steal Alice’s notebook,” he protested.
“Of course I can. I am a member of the club and you are not even the proper gender to be allowed inside its hallowed walls. I shall enter and slip upstairs to the exhibition room. If I am detected, I will simply say that I have come at Lady C.’s behest to attend to a detail regarding the exhibition and that the hour may be unconventional but was the only time I could spare.”
“And what if Lady C. is the one who apprehends you?” he demanded.
“That is a river I will ford when I come to it,” I told him. I lifted up on tiptoe and kissed his cheek. “Stay in the shadows and try not to look quite so menacing or someone will report you to the police as a lurker.”
He grumbled something entirely unprintable in a polite memoir and I hurried off, drawing in great lungfuls of cold, crisp London air. The door of the Curiosity Club sat in a tiny pool of warm light from the gas lantern hung next to it. Around me were silent shadows. In this quiet and largely residential part of the city, there were only houses and private clubs barred to outsiders. Even the garden in the center of the square was locked and barred against those who did not belong. Stoker had moved backwards to conceal himself still further against the high iron gate of the garden in the square, and I could not see him as I moved on careful feet to the top of the stone steps and fitted my key to the lock.
I gave a soft call—the cry of the hoopoe and our arranged signal. One call for success and two for danger. I waited for Stoker’s answering call and slipped into the club, closing the door silently behind me and thanking providence for Hestia. As portress, she was a