Page 83 of Corpse in the Canal

“What was that about?” Solomon asked as she came slowly back to the bed.

Constance bent and rummaged in the pocket of her coat, which she’d left on the footboard. She brought out the torn piece of cloth. Then she sat on the edge of the bed, close to Solomon, and spread the fragment on her lap.

“I found it in the woods, near where the shooter must have been. It’s from one of Adelaide’s dresses.”

“Not the one she is wearing today,” Solomon pointed out.

“No, not that one, but it is hers. And I’m pretty sure it wasn’t there when we passed that way this morning.”

Solomon gazed at the cloth, shaking his head. His eyes were troubled. “There is so much wrong with this. Mostly that you should not have gone there, not alone.”

“I was quite safe. I knew the shooter would not risk going back there so soon.”

“You knew no such thing, Constance. You took a chance.”

“We have always taken chances. If we don’t, we have to give up Silver and Grey. I—and the baby—were in far more danger standing beside you this morning.”

He closed his eyes. “Do you think I have not considered that? What are we doing, Constance?”

“We’re solving another mystery, and yes, maybe we need to consider stopping, but not yet. This torn piece of Adelaide’s gown is about the only physical clue we have in this whole case.”

Solomon shifted restlessly against his pillows. “True. But would Adelaide have changed her dress just to shoot me, then changed it back again?”

“I admit I can’t see why she would,” Constance said. “But it is possible. And David is too close to her.”

“You mean he didn’t believe that she had done it? Constance, I don’t believe she would shoot me, whatever she may or may not have done to Percy.”

“That’s the point,” Constance said. “What if she didn’t set out to shoot you? Just to warn us off so that we’d leave the matter alone? Wills is floundering. Unless they call in Scotland Yard, we are the best chance of finding Percy’s killer. So, perhaps she changed out of what she was wearing just so we wouldn’t recognize her if we glimpsed her through the trees, then shot wildly, aiming to miss, and by bad luck caught your head? You had just moved it after all.”

Solomon gazed at her. “And then dashed back here, changing again into her original dress before we returned? She must have seen me fall.”

“But she couldn’t give herself away by sending anyone to help you, let alone summoning the doctor. Perhaps she even saw David in the gig. I don’t know what yet, but this piece of gown means something.” She reached up to smooth his forehead with her fingers. “Now I’ve made your head hurt again. Don’t worry, Sol, it’s only a theory and I shan’t do anything foolish. It doesn’t feel quite right to me either, and I don’t think we have anything like all the facts. I could do with reading over all our notes…”

“Tomorrow will do,” Solomon said, catching her hand and kissing it.

She shuddered, chilled by the flood of horror at what tomorrow might have been, had that bullet hit him a mere inch to the right. She could not afford to let such fears paralyze her. For now, making sure Solomon’s condition did not worsen was her entire focus, but she could not shake the fringe of unease that remained.

Tomorrow will do. But would it?

Chapter Eighteen

Adelaide would have gladly taken a turn in watching over Solomon, but it was clear that his wife did not want her to. That may have been down to simple jealousy, but Adelaide suspected there was more to it. Constance was suspicious.

As the evening wore on, Adelaide knew she should go to bed, and yet she sat on, gazing into the parlor fire and wondering if she had said and done the right things, made the right choices.

She did not hear him approach until the door snicked shut, keeping the warmth in the room.

“Am I disturbing you?” David asked.

“If you are, it is a good thing. I should go to bed, but I don’t seem to be tired.”

“Perhaps a nightcap? May I pour you one?”

Adelaide was conscious of a flicker low down in her belly. She recognized the danger, for she had felt it all too often in the past around this man’s brother. They looked too alike. And yet she could not dismiss this as an echo. She was older, wiser, and David was very different from Solomon.

It was time to leave before she complicated her straightforward life. And yet she didn’t move.

“Thank you,” she said, scaring herself all over again.