“I do,” Plumtree assured him.
“I enjoy découpage,” J. J. put in. “Fire screens, usually, although I made my aunt the cleverest little table for Christmas last year.”
Mornaday stared from one to the other. “Have I wandered into an assembly of lunatics? How are you all sitting there calmly discussing hobbies whilst there is a madwoman wandering loose out there?” He flung out his arms, very nearly upsetting the suit of armour again.
“It is merely a little polite conversation,” I scolded. “You needn’t act so aggrieved.”
“Act? I do not act, Veronica. Iamaggrieved. I have very nearly lost my job, and the lot of you promised me this case would be concluded,not just concluded but end in triumph. I confess, I do not see how a discussion of lace-tatting is going to accomplish that.”
“Lace-tatting! Now that is a quick way to lose your eyesight,” young Plumtree put in.
Mornaday closed his eyes. “Veronica, kindly bring this meeting back to the matter at hand, or I will do a violence to someone, and at the moment, I do not particularly care to whom.”
“Very well.” I sighed. “Mr. Plumtree, do forgive Mornaday. We promised to make certain he retains his employment with the Metropolitan Police, and to do so we require your assistance.”
Mornaday opened his eyes to give me a suspicious stare. “How?”
I grinned. “We shall feed two birds with one apple. Mr. Plumtree is the person who can set my plan into motion. It will also require a little effort on J. J.’s part and nothing whatsoever of you, Mornaday, except to be on hand to take the credit for what transpires.”
“And if it fails?” he demanded.
“Then you melt away into the night and the official story is that you were never there and had no part in it,” I said. “There is absolutely no risk to you whatsoever, but there is every possibility of saving your job.”
“I do like the sound of that,” he admitted grudgingly.
“Perhaps, Veronica,” Stoker put in, “now would be the time to explain your scheme in detail.”
I smiled. “Haven’t you guessed? We are going to set a trap for Eliza Elyot.”
***
The details were sorted with astonishing rapidity. In order to attract Eliza Elyot’s attention, we needed to place a story in the pages of theDaily Harbinger—the most crucial and difficult aspect of the entire enterprise.
“What ought J. J. to write?” Mornaday asked.
“There can be no mention of Elyot herself,” J. J. said swiftly. “It will only serve to alert her to our scheme.”
“Agreed,” Stoker said. “The story ought to be that the body of a young drowning victim, believed lost some fifteen years ago, has been recovered in a state of curious preservation. Make no suggestions as to how it may have been done,” he added firmly.
“Then say as she has never been identified, she is being laid to rest in an unmarked grave at Plumfield,” I instructed.
J. J. scribbled a few phrases into her notebook. “Then what? It will seem curious there is no word from the police.”
She gave Mornaday a meaningful look and he groaned. “Oh, for god’s sake. In for a penny, in for a pound, I suppose. Very well. You may say that exhaustive police efforts to identify the victim were made when her body was first recovered, but since they failed, the police have nothing further to say upon the matter.”
“And that is entirely true,” I pointed out. “They gave up on her after Elyot was commissioned to sculpt her death mask. She was already supposed to have been buried anonymously.”
“Quite right,” Plumtree confirmed. The tamarin, which had been blessedly absent for some days, reappeared atop the mount of the giraffe at that moment, yawning broadly and scratching its belly. It dropped to young Plumtree’s shoulder, eliciting a shriek of surprise.
“Never mind,” I told him kindly. “It is only a little monkey.Leontopithecus rosalia. Familiarly known as the golden lion tamarin. It is a clever creature and usually continent.”
“How singular,” he said in a faint voice. But he put a fingertip to the creature’s head and began to pet it in an absent fashion. “With that story appearing in the newspaper, it will appear that we are merely finishing what was begun fifteen years ago.”
“Include the planned time of the burial at Plumfield,” I told J. J.“It ought to be as specific as possible in order to anticipate her movements.”
J. J. wrote feverishly for a few minutes more, then looked up. “Tomorrow night, I presume?”
There was a chorus of dismayed reactions from the men, but J. J. and I exchanged patient looks. “It must be tomorrow night,” she told them. “We already know Eliza is desperate to recover the Beauty, based upon her murderous attack upon Lord Ambrose. If we suggest she is at Plumtree’s, Eliza may well break in and attack young Wilfred here.”