The Werewolf of Whitechapel by Suzannah Rowntree

Author:Suzannah Rowntree
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bocfodder Press
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter XVI.

The clocks were striking two by the time I arrived at Marlborough House after a quick detour to the hotel in Piccadilly, where I was luckily able to retrieve my revolver without being noticed. This time I would have been happy to seek my bed wherever one had been set aside for me, presumably in the upper storey above the kitchen and stewards’ rooms in the east wing, but this was not to be. As I crept into the colonnaded entrance to the east wing, the door to the main part of the house creaked open and a whisper pierced the darkness. “Sharp! Is that you? Come here a moment; I want you.”

It was May, beckoning with a candle. Mystified, and somewhat dreading the result of such a midnight interview, I crept over and followed her into the entrance hall. Her hair was down, and she was wearing slippers and dressing-gown. “You took such an age,” she began, closing the door behind me; but then she saw my costume, and speech failed her. “Why, Sharp! what a remarkable frock!”

In addition to which, after the evening I had had, I must look like the wreck of the Hesperus. “It’s not mine,” I said wearily. “I’ll tell you about it in the morning, if I may.”

“Of course. I’m sorry to keep you up, but the most extraordinary thing has happened.”

I realised that she was truly agitated, and fear struck at my bones. “You didn’t have any more trouble with George, did you?”

“With the Duke of York,” she corrected me automatically, “not in the least; but I’ve had a very unorthodox visitor, and I thought I would ask you to step into the library and hear her story.”

I sighed, and told her that of course I was at her disposal. May took me at once into the library, where I was intrigued to behold a young woman in a shabby coat sitting beside a solitary lamp.

“Sharp,” May said stiffly, “this is Ivy Bates. She announced herself half an hour ago by throwing pebbles at my shutters.”

I stared, first at May, and then at the nervous-looking girl. “Why the dickens did you let her in, ma’am? She might have been an anarchist!”

“She isn’t an anarchist. Tell Miss Sharp what you just told me, Ivy.”

Ivy was holding a scrap of handkerchief in her hands, and at my question she looked down at it mournfully and twisted it. “I came looking for my sister, miss.”

By now I was tolerably knowledgeable about London accents, but I couldn’t place this one. It was soft and musical compared to either the sharp cockney of the East End, or the toffy dialect of the West. “From where?” I asked.

“From Yorkshire, miss. Her name was Olive, and she was a parlourmaid here.”

“In London, do you mean?”

“In Marlborough House.”

Curiouser and curiouser, to quote Alice! “So, you came looking for your sister, and you couldn’t find her?”

Ivy Bates’ rosebud mouth seemed to melt and spread all over her face. “No, miss. She’s vanished these two months.

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