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I shrug. “Perhaps more of a contact. One who’d know other purveyors of herbal and chemical remedies.”
I expect her to deny it, but she says, “Describe the other two women.”
I glance over at Gray, who describes Mrs. Young and Mrs. Burns—information I didn’t think to get.
“Anything usual about them?” she presses. “Memorable?”
“Not that I am aware of.”
“Then they are very like many of my customers, and I cannot say whether I have served them or not.”
“All right,” I say. “One final question.”
“You wish to know whether Lady Leslie is a customer of mine.”
“No, she is. You asked us to describe the other two women only, which means you know Lady Leslie, likely as a customer. My question is about thallium.”
She frowns. “Who?”
“Thallium. It’s a heavy metal.”
“A poison?”
“It can be used as such. What do you know of it?”
“I have never heard of it. Is there another name I might know?”
“It’s a recently discovered heavy metal element.”
She shakes her head. “It is new to me. When I say that I don’t carry arsenic or strychnine, that is not a hardship. I am not a chemist in the way Mrs. Ballantyne is. I am a herbalist, with some knowledge of chemical elements. Treatments such as mercury have their uses, but I do not deal in them.”
With that, I have nothing more to ask, except that she let me know if she thinks of anything that could help solve the case… especially as that would also help exonerate her as a suspect. When she tries to give Gray a package, he refuses to take it, so I do.
Once we’re outside, I give him the package.
“I do not need—” he begins.
“I need them even less, having zero intention of adding that to my Victorian experience.”
I shove the package into his pocket and ignore his protests.
“What did you observe?” I say. “I presume that’s why you let me lead. So you could observe.”
“No, I let you lead because you are the professional in such matters. But, yes, also I prefer to observe. I noted that her claim to carry only herbal medicines seems to be correct, though she may have chemical ones hidden elsewhere. Also, one should not confuse herbal for nonpoisonous, which is a common misunderstanding.”
“And one we’re still fighting in my time, when people think herbal remedies are always safer than medicine.”
“Yes, most medicines can be dangerous if taken incorrectly, and even sometimes if taken correctly. Therefore, I would not expect her shelves to be devoid of any dangerous substances and she did not claim such. I can only say that I did not see anything that might have been thallium, as Isla described it.”
I nod, and we turn a corner, taking us back toward the New Town.
He continues, “Also, her story about using the basement of an unwitting elderly couple is false, as you doubtless suspected.”
“I’m sure thereisan elderly couple living upstairs, but there’s no way they wouldn’t realize Queen Mab was there. They’re camouflage. Whether she lives there herself is another matter.”
“I believe she does. Or, at the very least, she has lodgings there. She was wearing silk slippers, and I did not see any sign of boots nor an outdoor jacket—not in her laboratory nor the library nor at the door, where there was not a closet.”
“Anything else?”
