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“Thank you.”
The box is small. A snuffbox? I have no idea what a snuffbox looks like, only that it’s a historical object—maybe from this time period, maybe not—and when I see this, that’s what springs to mind. It’s ornamental enough that I’d presume it’s a woman’s piece, but I’ve learned that Victorian men are just as likely to have pretty things. This box is indeed pretty, made of tortoiseshell with an inlaid painting of a Greek ruin. There’s a clasp with a tiny lock for a tiny key.
I turn the box over. On the bottom are the initials JTF.
“A very nice piece for someone in Fischer’s circumstances,” I say.
“The plate has been added later,” Gray says. “Likely there was another one, with other initials.”
“Ah. Buy it secondhand, remove the initials and add your own. Now let’s see if I can get it open.”
I take out a hairpin, but it’s too large. Before I can say a word, Gray passes over a stickpin. I hesitate to use it. Like the box, the pin is very pretty—gold with royal-blue enamel around a pearl.
“I wouldn’t want to break your pin,” I say.
“It is old. Use it.”
It takes a bit of poking and prodding, but then the lid snaps open. Inside are two vials. One contains a chunk of gray metal that looks like lead. The other holds pale powder.
“Is that arsenic?” Jack says, pointing to the powder.
“Something like that,” I say.
Gray catches my eye, and I nod. This certainly looks like thallium—the metal—and thallium sulfate—the powder.
“Then he did it,” Jack says. “He murdered those people.”
Gray takes the box and starts to pick up the vials. Then he murmurs “Fingerprints” and leaves them where they are, nestled in velvet in the small box. He sets the box aside and takes a pair of gloves out of his pocket.
Footsteps clatter on the stairs.
“Down!” I say, waving for everyone to duck.
Jack hides behind an upturned table, while Gray and I zip behind the wardrobe.
“Is it a problem that we found the poison?” I whisper.
His brows knit. “You are concerned that we will be blamed?”
My concern was the chain of evidence, but now that he says this, I see anew problem. Gray is brother to the prime suspect in Lord Leslie’s death. He’s also brother to the chemist who may have supplied the poison. What happens if he’s found in the new suspect’s apartment with the evidence?
It shouldn’t be a problem unless someone is hell-bent on blaming Annis. That’s exactly what Fischer’s lawyer might do, but we have a valid reason for being here, even for breaking in. We followed Jack’s note, which Elspeth and others have seen, and we found Jack held captive.
A key scrapes in the lock. Fischer doesn’t realize it’s already open. He’s distracted and, I suspect, running on autopilot.
“He’ll bolt,” I whisper.
“I’ll catch him,” Gray says.
I shake my head as I picture those three flights of rickety stairs. “Slip over behind him, and cut off his escape.”
Gray nods. The door is opening, but Fischer is on the other side of it, giving Gray time to duck and dart past a few piles of furniture. By the time Fischer is closing the door, Gray is by the wall, crouched and hidden.
I watch in a broken mirror as Fischer steps inside. He throws down his key by the stack of mail.
“I am returned,” he says, as if calling a weary greeting to his wife. He continues inside and unbuttons his jacket. “I did not find what I needed. My partner had a place where he kept his business papers, and the police have discovered it.”
He walks farther into the apartment. “I had hoped I could burn the papers. I ought to have done so after Andy’s death, but I feared I would be caught sneaking in and they seemed safe where they were. Now I am…” He rubs his mouth. “I will not say I am undone. I still hope to fix this, and when I do, I can release you. I only hope it is soon. If it is not…”
