Read Online Justice Hall by Laurie R. King - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Laurie R. King
Tags: Fiction, Historical fiction, General, Historical, Mystery & Detective, Women Sleuths, Mystery Fiction, England, Women Detectives, Holmes; Sherlock (Fictitious Character), Traditional British, Country homes, Married Women, Women detectives - England, Russell; Mary (Fictitious character)
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recent war, whose eyes and chin declared him a Hughenfort, a slimmer, younger Marsh.
I became aware that the butler had materialised silently, in that manner of excellent manservants, waiting for his orders.
“Tea?” the scarred duke asked us. “Coffee? Something cold? No? That will be all, Ogilby.”
Ogilby faded away. The door was shut, and Marsh Hughenfort stood before the fire, concentrating on removing a cigarette from a silver case and lighting it with a spill taken from a Chinese bowl on the mantelpiece. When the cigarette was going, he flicked the half-burnt paper fan into the flames and walked over to splash whisky and a shot from a soda-siphon into a glass. He held it out as an offer—which Holmes accepted and Alistair and I refused—and then to my astonishment he made one for himself and took it back to the fire.
I glanced at Alistair, seated with his knees crossed and his hands clasped together on his lap. It struck me then, how unusual it was to see those hands empty and unoccupied. In Palestine, Ali always had some project to hand: patching the tent, mending a buckle, working oil into the mules’ leather traces, or—first, last, and at all moments in between—whittling. He had whittled endlessly, using the deadly blade he wore at his belt to carve unexpectedly delicate and whimsical figures of donkeys and lizards and long-haired goats. Whittling, it would seem, was not an occupation for the drawing room.
The man at the fireplace did not look at his cousin, but turned instead to us, and remarked, “You two are looking well.”
The sheer conventionality of the opening took my breath away: It had been astonishing enough to see the man hold a drink to his lips, but Mahmoud Hazr, making polite conversation? The changes in Ali ought to have warned me, but the Englishness of Alistair was nothing to that of his cousin.
There was no trace of Mahmoud’s heavy accent, no accent at all apart from that of his class and education. His movements evoked no swirl of ghostly robes; nothing in his demeanour indicated that this duke had ever held something as crass as a handgun, far less a killing blade; his eyes betrayed no hint of the watchful authority that had been the very essence of the man. His voice was lighter, his eyes seemed a lesser shade of brown, his stance was that of an amiable if distracted English nobleman. Had it not been for his scar, and for that brief flash of command when I was about to speak his Arab name, I should have thought him a different man. He even held his cigarette differently.
“And you, sir,” Holmes replied, always ready to turn conventionality to his own purposes. “You are looking somewhat… changed.”
“They say change is inevitable.” The duke raised his gaze to face Holmes squarely.
“I find folk wisdom to be a somewhat overrated commodity,” Holmes retorted. “It generally fails to take into account the workings of cause and effect.”
Rather than bristle, or retreat, at this confrontation, Marsh Hughenfort seemed to relax, just a fraction, and opened his mouth, but before he could respond some distant sound reached him. He paused in an attitude of listening; Alistair too cocked his head; then, as one, the two men slumped into gloom. Alistair even muttered a mild oath. Marsh retreated until his back was to the fireplace, and waited.
Children’s voices, of all things. Two high-pitched excited chatterers, growing and then fading as they turned into another part of the house, giving way to the sound of a woman in monologue. The library door opened; Holmes and Alistair rose automatically to their feet.
“—just pop my head in to see if he’s in here, p’raps you’d better inform Mrs Butter that we’ll be here for luncheon after all, just too terribly tiresome of them, truly it is. Oh, hello. I didn’t know you had company, Marsh. Good morning, Alistair.”
She was a small, elegant, expensive woman in her early thirties, plucked, pencilled, and pampered,
I became aware that the butler had materialised silently, in that manner of excellent manservants, waiting for his orders.
“Tea?” the scarred duke asked us. “Coffee? Something cold? No? That will be all, Ogilby.”
Ogilby faded away. The door was shut, and Marsh Hughenfort stood before the fire, concentrating on removing a cigarette from a silver case and lighting it with a spill taken from a Chinese bowl on the mantelpiece. When the cigarette was going, he flicked the half-burnt paper fan into the flames and walked over to splash whisky and a shot from a soda-siphon into a glass. He held it out as an offer—which Holmes accepted and Alistair and I refused—and then to my astonishment he made one for himself and took it back to the fire.
I glanced at Alistair, seated with his knees crossed and his hands clasped together on his lap. It struck me then, how unusual it was to see those hands empty and unoccupied. In Palestine, Ali always had some project to hand: patching the tent, mending a buckle, working oil into the mules’ leather traces, or—first, last, and at all moments in between—whittling. He had whittled endlessly, using the deadly blade he wore at his belt to carve unexpectedly delicate and whimsical figures of donkeys and lizards and long-haired goats. Whittling, it would seem, was not an occupation for the drawing room.
The man at the fireplace did not look at his cousin, but turned instead to us, and remarked, “You two are looking well.”
The sheer conventionality of the opening took my breath away: It had been astonishing enough to see the man hold a drink to his lips, but Mahmoud Hazr, making polite conversation? The changes in Ali ought to have warned me, but the Englishness of Alistair was nothing to that of his cousin.
There was no trace of Mahmoud’s heavy accent, no accent at all apart from that of his class and education. His movements evoked no swirl of ghostly robes; nothing in his demeanour indicated that this duke had ever held something as crass as a handgun, far less a killing blade; his eyes betrayed no hint of the watchful authority that had been the very essence of the man. His voice was lighter, his eyes seemed a lesser shade of brown, his stance was that of an amiable if distracted English nobleman. Had it not been for his scar, and for that brief flash of command when I was about to speak his Arab name, I should have thought him a different man. He even held his cigarette differently.
“And you, sir,” Holmes replied, always ready to turn conventionality to his own purposes. “You are looking somewhat… changed.”
“They say change is inevitable.” The duke raised his gaze to face Holmes squarely.
“I find folk wisdom to be a somewhat overrated commodity,” Holmes retorted. “It generally fails to take into account the workings of cause and effect.”
Rather than bristle, or retreat, at this confrontation, Marsh Hughenfort seemed to relax, just a fraction, and opened his mouth, but before he could respond some distant sound reached him. He paused in an attitude of listening; Alistair too cocked his head; then, as one, the two men slumped into gloom. Alistair even muttered a mild oath. Marsh retreated until his back was to the fireplace, and waited.
Children’s voices, of all things. Two high-pitched excited chatterers, growing and then fading as they turned into another part of the house, giving way to the sound of a woman in monologue. The library door opened; Holmes and Alistair rose automatically to their feet.
“—just pop my head in to see if he’s in here, p’raps you’d better inform Mrs Butter that we’ll be here for luncheon after all, just too terribly tiresome of them, truly it is. Oh, hello. I didn’t know you had company, Marsh. Good morning, Alistair.”
She was a small, elegant, expensive woman in her early thirties, plucked, pencilled, and pampered,
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