Fall From Grace

name of Oliver Garvie.

For Jean the last was like a kick in the stomach.

Made worse when McLevy more or less accused her of being part, if not author, of this conspiracy.

Thus the rammy began.

‘What do I know of Oliver Garvie?’ she lashed out.

‘Ye were his fancy woman,’ was the brusque response.

‘Who says?’

‘I do.’

‘How so?’

McLevy had no wish to bring Humpty Dumpty astride a damp wall into the equation.

‘Garvie was put under observation after the warehouse fire; a woman of your description was seen entering his lodgings out of a carriage also identified.’

‘From the horses no doubt?’

‘From the coachman, Angus Dalrymple.’

‘A social visit,’ was the response.

‘That’s a bare-faced lie.’ McLevy was hot and bothered; this was getting near the knuckle.

‘Says who?’

‘Ye were seen from the back window in flagrante!’ he bawled, a flush creeping up the back of his neck.

‘Flagrante?’

‘On the verge of it!’

‘Who did all this seeing?’ she bawled back, equally embarrassed.

Humpty Dumpty was unavoidably revealed.

‘I did,’ said Inspector James McLevy.

Jean’s mouth fell open and, for a moment she resembled a virgin nymph disturbed at her morning ablutions.

‘Ye – ye – dirty old beggar,’ she finally gasped.

‘I performed my duty,’ was the stern rejoinder.

McLevy was certain that he had nothing more than observation and incipient piles on his mind the night in question, pure as a newborn lamb.

However, they were both deeply discomfited as if coming upon each other naked in a biblical situation.

Adam and Eve.

The side room, into which Jean had ushered McLevy, to spare the comatose Hannah from his intrusive presence, had a small dressing table with a three-sided mirror, below which on a smooth white marble surface lay a dainty confection of colognes, sprays and various unguents.

There was another door which no doubt led to a room where other feminine mysteries were lurking but upon being tugged into this adjoining one, McLevy, after a swift glance round, thanked his lucky stars there was not a commode in sight.

You never can tell.

The inspector was squeamish about matters feminine latrinal; the only regular woman in his life, Bathsheba the cat, did her business on the slates, which suited him fine.

But now he had other things on his mind.

‘Never mind all that,’ he accused. ‘Were you in cahoots with Oliver Garvie, partners in all things?’

‘Go to hell, I was not!’

‘But you would confirm that Robert Forbes was a client of the Just Land?’

‘He had his requirements.’

‘And his chosen magpie was Rachel Bryden?’

Jean sniffed and made no answer. McLevy probed further.

‘Whit about this Rachel Bryden? She worked here, you must have known the goings on, eh?’

‘That bloody girl, I’ll wring her neck.’

‘How so?’

‘She stole from me!’

Jean had been hugging this bitter grievance to her bosom since she made discovery, not able to confide in anyone save Hannah who was unable to respond and Mistress Brash could not now restrain her anger any longer. Bad enough to lose her property without being roped into a blackmailing ring.

‘All my jewels, the skinnymalinkie whoor!’

This childlike but heartfelt insult caused McLevy to jerk his head back a little.

‘How does that occur?’

Jean caught sight of herself in the dressing table mirror. She had waited up all night by Hannah’s bedside, and at least managed to change her clothes and underthings, but the plain grey gown she had thrown on made her appear to be a mortuary attendant.

She had also scrubbed her face, put nothing back on and my God, to her unblinking eyes, she looked her years and many more this November morning.

‘It must have been her,’ she muttered. ‘Rachel. Before she left. All my jewels, my beautiful pearls. Robbed.’

One thing a woman will rarely lie about is the state of her missing jewellery.

McLevy came to the conclusion that Jean might well be innocent of the conspiracy, though it was still possible that she had taken a part and then been double dealt when the plan fell to pieces.

So he fished further in deep waters.

‘All this took place under your nose, eh?’

‘Right under the very nostril,’ was her grim reply.

‘How was that possible?’

Was there cruel pleasure in this pursuit? Jealousy getting its own back for a scene in a lighted window?

‘That’s not like you Jean, the mistress of the Just Land twisted and turned like a fool.’

‘I was in love.’

This flat statement silenced the inspector for a moment and Jean, who had spoken to herself as much as to him, chewed a bitter cud, her thoughts lining up to torture their creator.

All this under her nose right enough, betrayed by her own paramour, the two of them laughing at her, ardent lovers themselves no doubt, sporting in the bed, laughing at her.

The older woman.

Twisted and turned. Humiliated.

She became aware of other laughter, the source of which was James McLevy.

‘Oh dear,’ he spluttered. ‘Oh dearie me. Oh dearie, dearie me.’

Now truth to tell, though there may have been an element of malicious enjoyment in this reaction, it was also the product of contradictory emotions. Something had been stirred by these four simple words.

I was in love.

All his life McLevy had defended himself against madness and was not the passion of love a version of that?

Or madness an offshoot of love?

Whatever. In common with most men when faced with feelings that conflict like two boxers in the ring, he took refuge in laughter.

The splutter became a guffaw.

‘But you’re a bawdy-hoose keeper, love is what you buy and sell. That’s your stock in trade!’

‘Lust is my stock in trade,’ she answered, angered and rubbed raw by his apparent hilarity.

‘What’s the difference?’

‘Nothing you could recognise,’ she replied scathingly. ‘The only love you possess is for yourself and justice.’

McLevy’s eyes glistened with merriment; it was an aggravating sight.

‘Aye, you might well be correct there. Oh, dearie me.’