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No one is actually invisible, she says, if the right people are looking.
Best,
Olivia Mackenzie
Dear Olivia,
Thank you.
Thank you for the wisdom of Jess, the measure of character, and the state of your heart. Still missing are the feelings my voice inspired and any mention of cake, but I recognize my own impatience to know more and will bide my time.
I have no attachments, so my relative kindness must stand on its own merits. Perhaps you’ll allow me to walk you to the market tomorrow morning so you can judge for yourself? And if Jess should happen to come along and spots an old woman in a window or an urchin on the street, perhaps I’d have better luck in my search for Ajay.
I am worried. It has been three days with no sign of the boy, and my visit to the club was fruitless. Although the three-legged cross is an old symbol of the East India Company, my button was from some other institution that numbered among its holdings. But they’re all closed now that the company shuttered. My colleagues at Scotland Yard have no interest in helping me locate one small, brown-skinned boy, and I feel as though I’m adrift in the sea without a compass or a paddle.
May I pick you up at ten o’clock tomorrow morning?
Your,
Dhruv
Dear Dhruv,
Yes.
Olivia M.
Breakfast had long since been cleared, and I’d taken the time to brush out and re-braid my hair before I went to find Jess in the library, where she was doing lessons. Charlotte Devereux, or Charlie as her family called her, looked up at me from the open books in front of her ward.
“Jess has told me about the inspector and his investigation. I know how difficult it is for her not to go out and search for the boy herself, and I want you to know how deeply I appreciate your involvement in this whole matter, Mrs. Mac.”
“Thank you for your trust,” I said simply. The words masked my surprise, though I wouldn’t have really expected anything else from the gracious young lady.
Mrs. Devereux squeezed Jess’s hand. “I have not been to Covent Garden in some weeks. Any details you can bring me will make excellent fodder for Hannah’s drawing lessons.”
“You should come with us,” Jess said as she rose to her feet.
Mrs. Devereux shook her head with a smile at the leader of the children she now considered her family. “Not this time,” she said with a quiet glance at Hannah, who was lying on her stomach in front of the fireplace trying to capture the way the flames moved on the logs. So deep was her concentration that it was no wonder she hadn’t felt our gaze on her.
Hannah didn’t speak, though according to little Oliver, the youngest of the children, she could if she wanted to. With Mr. Devereux away, Hannah’s withdrawal had become more pronounced, and Mrs. Devereux was loathe to leave her until he returned.
“Right,” I said to Jess. “The Inspector is quite punctual by habit, so shall we?”
“I’d like to meet him, if I may?” Mrs. Devereux said to me, as if asking my permission.
“Of course, Ma’am,” I said automatically.
She and Jess both gave me a sharp look, but Mrs. Devereux was the one to speak. Her voice was gentle and quiet, much like herself. “I am not Ma’am to you, Mrs. Mac. We use our formal names for the sake of the children’s education, but I do not outrank you. In my mind, you are Olivia, and I hope that in yours, I am Charlie.”
I nodded because words suddenly caught on the lump in my throat. “Of course,” I murmured. “He’ll be waiting outside in the back garden.”
“Then I shall grab my wrap,” Charlotte said. Once, in a fit of reciprocal revelations, she’d admitted to me that she’d once worn trousers and had masqueraded as a boy to survive, to me she was Charlotte, a name which suited her grace much better than the nickname Charlie ever could.
As I walked down the hall in front of them, I heard Jess murmur to Charlotte, “She’s just ‘avin’ trouble showin’ she cares.”
And that, I realized, was at the heart of my reaction. I was beginning to care for Dhruv Lestrade, and some small, insecure part of me wondered how I’d fare, in his eyes, if I stood next to a woman like Charlotte Devereux.
The inspector sat on a stone bench, his face upturned to catch the sun’s morning rays. I had barely taken two steps into the garden when he opened his eyes, and the smile that lit them up at the sight of me would have quelled every insecurity if I’d allowed myself to bask in his gaze.
