She already had the staunchest allies in Charlotte, Mrs. Watson, and Lord Ingram. Had Charlotte foreseen something? Did she believe that soon Livia would not have these allies anymore?
* * *
For most of its life, the Garden of Hermopolis had been a private dwelling, a remote, ramshackle edifice that bore the grand appellation of Cador Manor, but was more of an enlarged farmhouse than anything resembling a stately home.
The last local occupant died in the 1840s. His descendants sold the place to a Plymouth shipbuilder, who, like so many in the Age of Steam, wished to have a place in the country, far away from the coal and soot that had been the foundation of his prosperity.
His family having predeceased him, upon the shipbuilder’s death, the property went to a reform-minded widow intent on creating a sanctuary for young women in trouble. The widow shed her mortal coil before she could turn her vision into reality. Her son renovated the main house and added on a collection of smaller cottages with the goal of establishing a holiday destination that was readily accessible by railway, but as of yet unspoiled by hordes of unrefined tourists.
Alas, his commercial paradise failed to attract tourists, refined or otherwise. The resort was sold to a noted eccentric who aimed to construct his own castle on the spot. But as the eccentric dismissed one architect after another, only the castle’s walls were ever built.
After his death, the property proved difficult to sell. No one else wanted the trouble of constructing a castle and those who would have been tempted by the promise of a resort stayed away because its views had become obstructed by the walls. Which was how Miss Fairchild, the founder of the Garden of Hermopolis, managed to acquire the compound for very little outlay.
Miss Fairchild, born to the owner of a mercantile fleet, was independently wealthy. As a younger woman, she had sailed the seven seas and written a dozen travelogues set in Russia, Australia, and the Yoruba country, among other far-flung destinations. According to her own writings, it was during her travels that she encountered the teachings of Hermes Trismegistus and was sufficiently enamored to decide, when she settled down again in Britain, to form a community of like-minded thinkers.
This summary was given in Moriarty’s dossier. But Charlotte wished to consult someone who had personal experience with the Garden of Hermopolis. When she and Lord Ingram arrived at the location of the rendezvous, a house near Portman Square that had been used for more than its share of clandestine discussions, the officer of the law was already nursing a glass of whisky, seated in a spectacularly gaudy drawing room. Golden fringes and tassels bedecked every perimeter, tiger skins proved as abundant as antimacassars in an ordinary parlor, and the most garish hues of every color strove mightily for the gaze of the overpowered beholder.
Charlotte once again regretted that she had on only the same very staid jacket-and-skirt set and could not add to the splendid chaos.
In an earlier era, such a gathering might have been trickier to accomplish without alerting Moriarty to the fact that immediately after meeting him, Charlotte wanted to see Inspector Treadles. But with Mrs. Watson and the Treadleses having both recently installed residential telephones, and with certain code words they’d agreed to ahead of time, in anticipation of just such a moment of need, Lord Ingram had been able to ring Inspector Treadles from Mrs. Watson’s house before supper and arrange a meeting for the same evening.
The men greeted each other warmly, then Inspector Treadles bowed to Charlotte.
She inclined her head.
There was a time when Inspector Treadles had regarded her with both mistrust and distaste. Even now, in his otherwise respectful gaze, there was still a hint of wariness, but it was the wariness of a traveler on the savanna coming across, say, a rhinoceros, rather than that of one facing a pack of hyenas.
They’d barely sat down when Inspector Treadles said, “I was almost certain I’d misheard Lord Ingram on the apparatus. Did you really say Glasgow? What happened?”
Glasgow was the term they’d designated as the level of highest alarm, with regard to Moriarty.
At Charlotte’s indication, Lord Ingram gave a brief account of Moriarty’s visit. He was seated in a red velvet chair with a thick beard of fringes and a tiger skin draped over the back, but his inner gravitas was such that the chair, by being in his vicinity, appeared close to majestic. Briefly she imagined him fainting into such a chair, her slightly indecent story crumpled in his hands—and cursed Moriarty for not giving her more time to enjoy her dear Ash’s glorious letter.
Inspector Treadles listened, his hands clenched around the armrests of his chair, with an attention that was no doubt much less questionable than her own. He sucked in a breath when Lord Ingram explained that they’d wished to see him right away because Miss Baxter’s commune appeared to be none other than the Cornwall compound he’d attempted to reconnoiter in December.
He looked from Lord Ingram to Charlotte. “You are sure?”
Charlotte again indicated for Lord Ingram to answer the question—if she did the answering, she would need look at Inspector Treadles. And she preferred to ogle him instead.
He gave her an odd look, but complied. “Yes, we are sure, unless in that specific area of Cornwall there are two sizable walled compounds.”
“No, there aren’t.” Inspector Treadles shook his head. He stilled abruptly. “Does this mean that the place was not under Moriarty’s control at the time of my visit?”
Lord Ingram raised a hand and slid the back of it along the tiger skin above his shoulder in what appeared to be an absentminded gesture. “That was certainly the gist of Moriarty’s narrative.”
Inspector Treadles’s brows shot up. “The occupants have nothing to do with Moriarty, except for hosting his daughter in their midst?”
“So it would seem,” said Lord Ingram. He dropped his hand, removed a blue-and-orange cushion from his chair, and placed it on an occasion table to his left.
“And one such peaceable occupant chased me all the way to London and wounded me with a knife?”
“If you believe Moriarty.”
“Do you?”
“Not I, but Miss Holmes does to a certain extent.”
Now Charlotte had no choice but to clarify her position. “It’s true that I do not believe Moriarty to be altogether lying. However, I feel that I have been put in a lightless room, only able to see out through a peephole with smeared lenses. Am I looking at a festively decorated village, with hausfraus hurrying to and fro—or merely the façade of an elaborate clock?”
“You fear that it is a trap?”
“I don’t fear so; I know it is one. What I cannot fathom is the purpose of this trap.”
Inspector Treadles exhaled unsteadily. “Is there anything I can do? Any assistance I can render?”
“Yes,” said Charlotte. “Inspector, when you called on Mrs. Watson and myself in January, I asked you about what you saw in Cornwall. At the time you said you didn’t have much to share, and I don’t doubt that. But today we are in need of any and all details you can recall.”
“I’ll try,” said the inspector. He took a sip of whisky and held on to the glass. “I do remember how high the walls were. There are old castles in the areas and they have high walls. But in a fortified structure, the castle itself is more prominent. In this compound, however, the walls dominated. Even standing on the highest point in the surrounding area, I could not see inside.”