Rolling along the famous cliffs, I could see a thin blue strip across the Channel that was France. It was a cloudless day with crystalline clarity and the horizon seemed but an arm’s length away, rather than the twenty miles or so to Calais. Though I jumped every time a guard or passenger passed our compartment, I admitted it was better to be here than scurrying about London watching the victims pile up.
We passed through Rye and Romney Marsh and eventually arrived in Hastings, a collection of houses and buildings, all topped with red roofs, and a haven, I understand, for artists and poets. I didn’t see any as we disembarked and changed trains yet again, but neither did I see any of the five men I’d scrutinized in Dover. Perhaps it had all been my imagination. Even better, we changed to the Brighton line, which meant we could travel in a carriage with no corridors.
We passed the old ruins of Pevensey Castle and skirted Eastbourne before crossing the Cuckmere River and coming to a halt in the small coastal village of Seaford where Juno had been sent earlier. As we disembarked, we faced a small esplanade and a shingle beach with the white chalk cliffs known as the Seven Sisters to our left. There were small boats pulled onto the shore, a few scattered net houses, and a stone redoubt built years before to keep Napoleon from landing on our flanks. I doubted there was a cheerier spot in all England that morning, and not a Sicilian in sight.
A dogcart was waiting for us at the station, with a driver that appeared to be acquainted with my employer. We climbed in, with Harm between us, facing backward as the dogcart allowed, and were soon rolling through the quaint streets of the seaside village. Seaford sits at the delta where the Cuckmere pours into the Channel. From there, the land rises north continually, though the bay pulling our vehicle seemed accustomed to the effort. In ten minutes we were in open countryside, with the chalk cliffs to our right and the channel breeze forcing us to clap our hats to our heads.
We finally came up to a gate flanked by a pair of young men resting their arms upon an old stout-timbered fence, reeds sticking out from between their teeth, looking content enough to stand there all day long. I couldn’t tell if they were guards or gardeners taking a break from their labors. They plucked at their caps as we passed through, then went back to ruminating on the rise of the South Downs and the chewing of their cuds. Meanwhile, we rolled along a meandering path before finally reaching the house.
It was obvious that part of the building was very old and that it was once a farmhouse. A building of equal size and age stood beside it, and must have been a barn at one time, but further enlargements and extensions had connected the two, and a new barn with stables and other outbuildings had been added over the centuries. It was a wide manor now, of two stories, with plaster sandwiched between old vertical beams and a many-angled roof bristling with chimneys. It was quaint and comfortable, and well tended, with gardens and a pebbled drive. Lucky is the man, I thought to myself, who owns such a comfortable home, wondering who he might be.
“Here we are,” Barker said, hopping down. That was it-no explanation, no hint of why we were there. After releasing Harm from his basket prison, Barker walked to the front door, seized the brass knocker, and gave it two good taps, which I could hear echo inside. Soon a solemn-looking butler opened the door, his countenance brightening when he saw the Guv’s weathered features.
“Welcome, sir. It’s a pleasure to see you again. Madame is in the conservatory, awaiting your arrival.”
My employer stepped past him and led me into the hall, which I thought a very telling action. The butler did not announce us but instead stepped outside to see that our luggage was unloaded. Light finally dawned in the old Llewelyn cranium. This was her home, the Widow’s home, Barker’s mystery woman, whom he disappeared off to see on odd evenings and Sundays when he wasn’t involved with a case. I had wondered about her often, questioned the Guv as obliquely as possible, and queried anyone who knew him well, and yet had always found a brick wall before me. Now I found myself about to be ushered into her presence, without a chance to see whether my hair and tie were straight and how much road chalk had managed to end up on my suit.
With Harm at his heels, Barker led me from one chamber to the next, each filled with ornate furniture or paintings the size of a wall in my room in Newington. This was not a farm but an estate, and the Widow must be quite wealthy to own such a large holding. Was it my imagination, or did my employer saunter from chamber to chamber as if the whole pile was his and he lord of the manor?
We finally passed through a pair of glass doors into a conservatory. I had barely enough time to take in the plethora of foliage on all sides, from small pots to grown trees hanging with pineapples, when the owner of all these wonders abruptly rose from a wicker basket chair and came toward us. This was she, the Widow!
“Cyrus, you’re late,” she scolded, and stepping up, planted a kiss on my employer’s cheek. Yes, on Cyrus Barker’s cheek. It was astounding. I wanted to pinch myself to be certain I wasn’t asleep in my room at home.
“Couldn’t be helped, my dear,” Barker rumbled. No, no, he didn’t rumble. He purred, I’d swear he did. One could hear the affection in it. It took all my training not to stand there dumbfounded, with my jaw hanging open.
Barker cleared his throat. “Philippa, allow me to present my assistant, Thomas Llewelyn. Thomas, this is our hostess for the next day or two, Mrs. Philippa Ashleigh.”
Before concentrating on our hostess, I spared a final glance at my employer. While appearing casual, every line of his body was warning me to be on my best behavior. I noted he hadn’t explained his relationship with her in any way. Were they friends or, dare I say it, courting? I realized I would have to deduce it for myself. The Guv wasn’t going to tell me. If they were in fact involved in a courtship, I would have to add it to the long mental list of contradictions which made up Cyrus Barker. I could no more imagine him as someone’s swain than as a grammar school teacher.
“Cyrus has told me so much about you,” Mrs. Ashleigh said. She smiled, but her eyes were appraising me from head to toe like a fortune-teller at a fair. If I was hoping for a kiss myself, I’d have been disappointed. I received a cool hand instead.
Three responses entered my head at once and muddled it. The first was, “He’s told me absolutely nothing about you,” the second, “Where did the two of you meet?” and the third was, “You have the most beautiful blue-green eyes I have ever seen.” What came out instead, after my brain ceased to function, was a sort of strangled, “Ahh!”
She was a woman in her late thirties, quite handsome if not in fact beautiful. She certainly seemed beautiful when her face was animated by those luminous eyes. Her hair was a pale red, almost blond where the sun struck it, and was pulled back and pinned in an artfully casual manner. She wore a white day dress with a high collar. She was tall, taller than I, but not nearly as tall as Barker, who was at least six feet. She appeared to have no trouble ordering him about.