With a ding, the elevator halted, and Margaret’s stomach plummeted, gravity yanking her musings from the heights of nostalgia to the heaviness of reality.
The doors whooshed open. Squaring her power shoulders, she rolled onto the second-story balcony overlooking the vast factory. A single office occupied the floor, and she stopped before its door, marked with a brass plaque reading,Mr. Noble—Event Coordinator. No doubt the man was a stodgy old clerk with spectacles and no-nonsense jowls. Thankfully, she shouldn’t have to converse with him for long.Just give him the credentials Jane acquired from theLondon Dispatchand ask to be directed to the records room.
Simple and straightforward.
Once blissfully alone, Margaret could make quick work of locating the Invention Factory’s copy of the Chatsome Catherine design. According to Papa’s recollections of the company’s mode of operation, blueprints of inventions created on park grounds were filed in the corporation’s confidential records. That paper alone bore the name of the device’s true inventor while the patent application filed on public record with the patent office attributed the design to AlvanT. Harrison, Incorporated. Having accessed that confidential blueprint, she’d photograph it for evidence and add another name alongside Harrison’s on her suspect list. She could then investigate both suspects, determine whether they were working together, and how the thief—or thieves—had come into possession of the noblewoman’s original patent application.
Simple and straightforward. Barring any unforeseen complications.
Suppressing a wave of overwhelm, Margaret rapped upon the door. There was a shuffling of papers, the scraping of chair legs across a hardwood floor, footsteps growing steadily louder, and then the door opened. Her jaw dropped. Well, one of her speculations had proven correct.
Mr. Noble wore spectacles.
The round, wire-rimmed spectacles framed a pair of brown eyes much younger than anticipated. Eyes that seemed rather ... familiar. Not in their appearance, but in their function. For though the man was quite tall, his eyes did not lookdownupon her in the manner she’d come to expect from the average able-bodied person. Rather, his eyes met and held her own. Directly. Tenderly. Eagerly. Brown irises agleam with the warmth of a crackling hearth. As though to meet her gaze were a pleasure rather than an inconvenience.
In the whole of Margaret’s thirty years, she could recall only one other instance when a man had looked at her in such a way. At the patent office, just last month, in fact. The fellow with the awkward stammer and reddened cheeks whom she’d directed to Mr. Morning’s office. He was Mr. Noble—Event Coordinator?
Perhaps she should take the introductions in hand, so as to put the shy fellow at ease. That seemed like something her alias would do in this situation. Margaret spoke with crisp enunciation. “You are the event coordinator for AlvanT. Harrison, Incorporated, are you not?”
The man said not a word, only gawked at her with those brown eyes.
Did she have the wrong man? Perhaps this wasn’t Mr. Noble after all, but an assistant of sorts, at a loss after being mistaken for his superior. “I said, you are the event coordinator for AlvanT. Harrison, Incorporated, are you not? TheMr. Noble I was instructed to meet at precisely a quarter to one?”
“Well, I ... y-yes. Yes, of course.” Cheeks flushing a deeper shade of crimson, as though the room were overheated, the man blinked and then clumsily snatched the glasses from the end of his nose and slipped them in a waistcoat pocket. “Noble. That’s me. My name ... that is. My occupation being the very eventful coordinator for Mr. Harrison.”
Now it was Margaret’s turn to gape. She tilted her head. “I beg your pardon, are you ill?”
“I dearly hope not.” Mr. Noble laughed nervously, raking fingers through neatly trimmed dark hair. His throat bobbed. “I begyourpardon, miss. May we ... may I ... consider this exchange a terribly out-of-tune rehearsal and start the piece over?”
Mr. Harrison’s stammering employee had a background in music. An interesting development, that. Margaret’s mouth tugged to the right as the accompanying eyebrow raised. “From the top?”
Mr. Noble’s lips quirked, mirroring her expression. “Just so.” Taking a step back, he proceeded to shut the door in her face.
Once again, Margaret found her jaw hanging from its hinges. Of all the oddities!
A few moments of silence passed, and then a throat cleared on the other side of the door. “On your count, Miss Knight.”
Margaret suppressed a giggle, recalling in the very nick of time that her alias wasn’t the sort of woman to indulge in giggles. Especially not with a gentleman, and most especially not with a gentleman with whom she wished to engage on a matter of business. Margaret Knight the journalist wished to be taken seriously by her male peers, after all. Her giggle thusly contained and face schooled into an expression of nonchalance, she knocked.
The door swung open so promptly, it was a touch startling. Mr. Noble tucked a thumb under the collar of his jacket. “Ah, Miss Knight, of theLondon Dispatch, I assume?”
“You assume correctly, good sir. May I assume, in kind, that you are Mr. Harrison’s very eventful coordinator Mr. Noble?” She winked. Good gracious, why had she winked? That was much too forward. She mustn’t embrace the confidence of her alias too liberally.
“I am, indeed, Miss Knight. Do come in.” With a gallant wave of an arm, Mr. Noble retreated a step and tossed her a wink back.
Seizing the wheels of her chair, Margaret rolled herself into the office with all due haste. Why had this exchange of winkery increased her desire to giggle? It was most disconcerting how comfortable she felt with Mr. Noble upon such a short acquaintance. Why, they’d barely made it beyond introductions! Had assuming another identity somehow done away with her typical discomfiture around the masculine set?
“May I offer you a cup of tea, Miss Knight?”
Margaret parked her chair in front of Mr. Noble’s desk. “If it’s all the same to you, I’d prefer to skip such formalities and get on with the business at hand.” From an inner jacket pocket, she withdrew the letter from her fictional editor at theDispatchand handed it to Mr. Noble. “Once you’ve ascertained that my credentials are satisfactory, you may simply direct me to the records room and I’ll leave you to your work.”
Mr. Noble put on his spectacles, which must be reserved for reading, and perused the letter. “Ah, but are you certain I can be trusted to give directions, Miss Knight? Since, as you may recall, I’ve a habit of getting lost.” His brown eyes lifted from the page, meeting her gaze over the rim of his spectacles, and—did they just twinkle or was that a trick of the electric lights?
Quite unaccountably, her heart rate escalated. Twinkle ortrick, it seemed rather clear that Mr. Noble recalled their meeting at the patent office as well. Though she’d recognized him from the abnormality of his actions, it never occurred to Margaret that the man might recognize her after such a brief exchange, especially outfitted as she was in her New Woman attire. Had she blown her cover so soon?
No, to her recollection, there’d been no exchange of names, and there was no reason Margaret Knight’s presence at the patent office should raise any red flags, so her alias should still be intact. What would the intrepid journalist say in response? “You’re better acquainted with your own place of employment, surely, Mr. Noble?”
“One would hope, Miss Knight. Then again, I’ve only held this position for a month, so with any luck, I might yet need you to come to my rescue a second time.”
