Night of a Thousand Stars

The garage man was wiping his hands on an oily rag when we appeared, looking a little out of place amongst the spanners and grease. I flicked Masterman a look indicating she should stay behind me. She obeyed, keeping a little distance as the garage man came forward.

“Can I help, miss?”

I put out my hand, then thought better of it when he apologetically showed a soiled palm.

“I hope so. Are you the proprietor, Mr. O’Loughlin?”

He grinned. “Naw, miss. I’m Wilson. Never has been an O’Loughlin here. I gave the place that name because the quality do like their Irish chauffeurs, don’t they?”

I returned the smile. “Clever of you, Mr. Wilson. I’ve come because I’m trying to find an acquaintance of mine, a gentleman who assisted me under some very trying circumstances. He gave me a ride when I rather desperately needed transportation. I’m afraid I didn’t have a chance to thank him properly and it’s rather got under my skin. It would have been about a week ago. He drives a pretty little Talbot tourer. Painted blue? Quite fast?”

The garage man’s face brightened. “Ah, yes, a right little beauty, isn’t she? And Mr. Fox is a good customer, he is. Always ready with a pleasant word and what matter if he forgets a bill now and then? He always pays it and a little more when he realises. A real gentleman.”

“Mr. Fox, you say? I’m afraid I didn’t catch his name when he gave me a ride.”

“Sebastian Fox,” the garage man said promptly. “He lodges in the next street with Mrs. Webb what keeps the big house on the corner.”

I thanked him and followed his directions to the corner house with Masterman trotting alongside.

“Honestly, I don’t see what all the fuss with being a detective is,” I told her. “It’s quite easy, really. But did you hear the garage man? The curate was right. Sebastian’s name isn’t Cantrip at all. It’s Fox. Why on earth would he lie?”

“Perhaps he’s a criminal,” Masterman said blandly.

“He’s nothing of the sort. I think he was hiding from someone,” I told her. “Perhaps he is in some sort of trouble.”

She snorted. “What sort of trouble would a man be in that he changes his name and lies about his identity rather than going to the police? He’s a criminal,” she repeated slyly as we reached the corner house.

I noted that the front steps were freshly scrubbed and the brass knocker had been polished to a blinding shine. I used it to rap briskly, and the door was opened almost immediately by a tall, imposing woman with a wealth of iron-grey hair bundled into an old-fashioned snood. She wore a black dress with a crisp white collar, and everything about her spoke of respectability.

“Have you come to inquire about the room?” she asked pleasantly.

I was caught off guard. “Oh, no, I—” I broke off, thinking wildly. I couldn’t very well explain who Masterman was. Ladies who could afford maids didn’t live in boarding houses. I felt a sudden jolt of inspiration and smiled winsomely at Mrs. Webb. “That is to say, not just a room. My, er, friend and I would need a pair of rooms.” I flicked a glance at Masterman, who must have been surprised but kept her expression perfectly impassive.

Mrs. Webb nodded. “Well, I’ve only the one, I’m afraid, but it is large enough for two. I could put in a second bed, no trouble at all. It’s only just come available, but I assure you it’s in very good condition. The gentleman who occupied it was not always tidy, but he was clean, if you take my meaning.”

“Show us,” I said, amending it hastily with a fervent, “please.”

Mrs. Webb escorted us up the stairs and unlocked a door from the ring of heavy keys at her belt. “There you are, miss?” She let the word dangle hopefully.

“Cantrip,” I said promptly. “And this is my friend, Miss Smith.”

Mrs. Webb nodded. “I’ll leave you both to look around. I have a sponge in the oven. If you will make your way down when you are finished, you’d be most welcome to a cup of tea.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Webb.”

The landlady withdrew and Masterman gave me a grudging nod, her expression speculative. “You’ve a talent for lying, miss.”

“I always have had,” I admitted. “Learnt in more boarding schools than I can count. Now, let’s have a good sniff around and see if we can discover anything about our mysterious Mr. Fox.”

Masterman busied herself with the wardrobe while I circled slowly, taking in the room. It was large with a bow window that gave onto the street. I flicked aside the crisp white curtains with a gloved finger. There was a perfect view of the comings and goings of the neighbourhood from this room, although something at the back overlooking the garden would certainly be quieter. Interesting.

I turned and inspected the rest of the room. There was a small sitting area by the fireplace, a deep armchair, and a little table just large enough to hold a cup of tea and a book. The fender was well-polished and the leather cushion on top showed a bit of wear. I could just imagine Sebastian there, slouched comfortably in his chair, stockinged feet propped on the fender as a fire crackled merrily away.

Masterman finished with the wardrobe and wandered to the bookshelf, touching the books idly. “Not so much as a pin in the wardrobe, miss. It’s been thoroughly cleaned.”

There was nothing else to search save the bed and bookshelf. The bed was stripped to the mattress, narrow and freshly turned, and the bookshelf was nearly empty. Only half a dozen volumes stood upon it, and I motioned for Masterman to move as I took each one down, riffling through hastily.

Most were classic novels of the sort anyone might have, Dickens and the ubiquitous Austen, but I was intrigued to find the last book was Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens. I held it up to Masterman. “See? Not a criminal. No criminal would have a copy of this. It’s a child’s adventure book.” I thumbed through to find my favourite picture, the Rackham illustration of Queen Mab, the queen of the fairies in Kensington Gardens.

And there it was, on the flyleaf in neat copperplate script. “Sebastian Fox,” I said, tracing the handwriting with a fingertip.

“Do you suppose it’s his real name?” she asked.

“I suspect so. It’s dated 1911, the year the book was published, and the handwriting is a boy’s. So, confirmation he lied to me but told the garage man the truth.”

I looked up at Masterman with fearful eyes. “This book is very nearly falling apart. It’s been read to pieces. Look where he’s mended it, here and here. And he’s underlined passages. This was no ordinary book to him, Masterman. It was a treasure. He would have had to have been in a very big hurry indeed to leave without it.”

She nodded. “I’m beginning to think you’re right, miss.”

I shoved the book back onto the bookshelf with reluctant fingers. “I think his leaving this behind is a sign that we are onto something here.”

Masterman said nothing as I prodded her downstairs to find the landlady. Mrs. Webb was in the kitchen finishing laying the tea things, and she gave us an apologetic look.

“I’ve nearly done here if you would go through to the sitting room, my dears.”

I hesitated. We had passed the sitting room on our way up the stairs. It was precisely the sort of room a proper landlady would keep—chilly and formal with an ancient Victorian horsehair suite of furniture and too many china ornaments. It was not a place for confidences. No, one wanted a kitchen for that. Many secrets could be exchanged in a warm and cosy room over a fat brown teapot and good bread and butter.

“That is so kind of you, Mrs. Webb, but I wonder if you would mind very much if we had our tea in here? It’s just that I seem to have twisted my ankle a little in these wretched shoes and I shouldn’t like to take my shoe off in your lovely sitting room.”

With that little confession, Mrs. Webb dropped her formal manner and began to fuss like a mother hen. She insisted on making up a basin of hot water liberally dosed with salts for soaking my ankle and settling me in front of the welcoming fire. She had cut generous slices of bread and butter and we ate these companionably as Mrs. Webb poured out from a fat brown teapot precisely as I had expected. There were slices of feather-light sponge to follow with homemade raspberry jam, and I had to resist the urge to lick my fingers.

“I promise you, Mrs. Webb, I haven’t had such a lovely tea since our last English nanny left,” I said. As soon as the words were out, I could have bitten my tongue. I hadn’t intended to reveal anything true about myself, much less that I came from a family of means.

Masterman darted me a quick glance, but I dropped my eyes and affected a little break in my voice. “I oughtn’t talk of better days,” I said softly. I gave Mrs. Webb a look from under my lashes. “The family has come down in the world,” I murmured. “Financial reversals.”

Mrs. Webb gave me a kindly smile. “I do understand, dear. And little wonder you enjoyed it then. I was a nanny for twenty years before I married. I missed all the little ones terribly when I left service. Mr. Webb did always say I fussed too much, but I do so like to look after my guests properly.”

I seized my chance. “And did you fuss over the gentleman whose room you showed us?”

“Well, bless you, my dear, I did. Such a thoughtful young man was Mr. Fox. Mind you, I didn’t much care for him coming in all hours as he used to do. Far too much coming and going, and that’s a fact. But he was never once late with his rent and never disturbed the others with noise or bad language. I shall miss him, and there’s no doubt about that.”

I waited until Mrs. Webb had poured out another cup of tea before picking up the thread of her inquiry. “Why did your nice Mr. Fox leave? I shouldn’t think any tenant would want to leave this house unless he had to.”

Mrs. Webb beamed at me. “Bless you, dear, but it’s a fact my tenants stay far longer than those next door at Mrs. Campbell’s.” She lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Tinned sauce on her puddings,” she murmured, shaking her head. “But you are quite right about Mr. Fox. He had to leave us, and it was a sad day for me when he did.”

I accepted another slice of sponge, thinking it was a wonder Sebastian hadn’t been fat as a tick with eating Mrs. Webb’s cooking. “Business, I suppose?” I asked casually.

“Indeed. Mr. Fox is a scholar, you see. Biblical texts and so forth. It was all quite over my head. I asked him once about his work, and I don’t mind to tell you, the explanation he gave was more than I needed to hear. Quite too much for me to understand! But he was a clever young gentleman, our Mr. Fox. His studies were naturally interrupted by the war, but now that peace has come, he has the chance to join an expedition in the Holy Land.”

“Indeed?” I asked faintly, my hopes beginning to fade. I had traced him to Hampstead only to find I now had the whole of the Holy Land to search instead.

Masterman asked quietly, “Whereabouts in the Holy Land?”

Mrs. Webb spread her hands, her lips thinning a little with distaste. “Oh, bless you, dear, I couldn’t say. I don’t believe I know one of those foreign places from another! Geography was never my strong suit.”

She folded her hands over her belly and gave me a piercing look. “Now, dear. About that room?”

* * *

Mrs. Webb was not at all pleased with our excuses for not taking the room. She expressed again her willingness to put in an extra bed and take something off the rent, but it wasn’t until I told her quite firmly that I could only live in an east-facing room on account of my morning devotionals to the Egyptian sun god Ra that we were hurried out onto the front steps and the door closed behind us with a bang.

“Rather quick on your feet, aren’t you, miss? I thought you’d given away the game when you mentioned a nanny, but you turned up trumps. You even got your chin to tremble,” she said in admiration.

“Contrived contrition,” I said with a brisk nod. “An entirely useful skill honed in far too many boarding schools.”

“Still,” she went on, “you rather burnt that bridge, didn’t you?” Masterman asked mildly. “What on earth possessed you to tell such a whopping lie? Sun god Ra indeed.”

I shrugged. “It got us out of there. Useful lies aren’t that great a sin.”

“Well, if we’re on the subject of sins, I ought to confess I took this.” She reached into her handbag and took out the copy of Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens.

“Masterman!”

Her expression was impassive. “I’m sorry, miss. I ought not to have done it, but when I nipped back up to...” She paused delicately to allude to bodily functions. “Anyway,” she hurried on, “when I came out of that room, I thought I would just have another look around while you were busy getting along with Mrs. Webb like a house afire. And I thought we ought to take it. It’s a connection to him, do you see? It’s the one piece of proof we have of his real name. We haven’t even an idea of where he is except the Holy Land, and that’s a mighty big haystack for a single needle, if you ask me.”

“Of course it is, but we can approach it logically,” I told her automatically.

She stood on the pavement, regarding me with something between suspicion and admiration.

“Are you always like this, miss?”

I blinked at her. “Like what?”

She sketched a gesture taking me in from head to toe. “This. You’re the original optimist, aren’t you?”

I shrugged. “I suppose. I always think things will turn out for the best, and somehow they usually do. Besides, what if we are able to find out where he went? Do you realise what it means, Masterman? It’s the Near East—Richard the Lionheart and Saladin in the Crusades, it’s Lady Jane Digby riding off on a camel, and djinns on flying carpets, and Scheherezade spinning her tales, and Ali Baba with his thieves, and Lady Hester Stanhope perched on a mountaintop.”

I had taken her arm in the course of my little speech, and she disengaged my fingers gently.

“I’m quite certain some of those aren’t real people,” she said darkly.

“Of course not. That isn’t the point. The point is that some of them were real. They lived there, and they were legends, larger than life because they gripped life with both hands and looked it right in the eye. That’s the sort of life I want.”

I squared my shoulders as I gripped the book, feeling a rush of savage, untrammelled certainty. “This is it, Masterman. This is the adventure I’ve been looking for. The chance I’ve wanted to make something more of myself. I owe Sebastian a debt. And I mean to repay it. I’m going to find him. And if he truly is in trouble of some sort, I’m going to help him, just as he helped me.”

Masterman stood toe to toe with me, and there was resolve in her eyes. “Not without me, miss. Not without me.”

Five

And somehow, through our mutual resolve, a partnership was born. I had made up my mind to find Sebastian, and Masterman had made up her mind to help. The first order of business was to make inquiries at the steamship offices, and since it was already past teatime, we arranged to spend the night in London at a small but respectable hotel. Masterman booked the room and I hurried in with my cloche pulled low to avoid being recognised. It wasn’t likely that any of Mother’s friends would frequent such a quiet place, but I was in no mood to take chances. We left early the next morning to divide and conquer. We separated with conspiratorial nods, and I took the offices of the five largest companies, smiling sweetly and asking to see the passenger lists for departures to Palestine, Syria, the Lebanon, the Transjordan, Turkey, and Egypt. I thought I had narrowed the search considerably, but there proved to be far more ships departing than I had expected. The tiny printed names blurred together as I reached for yet another list from yet another bored clerk.

I worked on, studying the endless lists and pushing through a headache and stiff shoulders. I stifled a yawn and just as I was about to put aside the last list, a name jumped out at me. Fox, Sebastian. I yelped, earning myself a dark look from the clerk, but I blew him a kiss and asked him for paper and pencil. He sweetly obliged, and I copied out every scrap of information, the name of the ship, the date of departure, the class of cabin he had booked.

Beckoning the clerk over, I showed him the list. “Can you tell me exactly where this ship stops?”

Bored once more, the clerk silently handed over a slim pamphlet with the ship’s itinerary shown on a small map as well as a list of amenities and attractions. I thanked him and left, mind whirling. It was time for lunch and Masterman and I were not supposed to rendezvous until teatime. It was the perfect opportunity to take her advice and brave one of society’s favourite hotspots. I made my way to the Savoy, forcing myself to think of the rather delectable Poulard de France Dorothy instead of the stares and glares I was bound to attract. I was just about to enter the restaurant when I heard a voice behind me.

“I don’t believe it—Penelope Hammond!”

I whirled around, wincing a little at the sound of my name echoing through the lobby, but as soon as I saw the source, I broke into a grin. “Cubby Ashley!”

Lord Edward Ashley, known to his friends by his childhood nickname of Cubby for his resemblance to an amiable bear, kissed me swiftly on the cheek. “It’s good to see you in person,” he told me. “The direst rumours are going round about you at the clubs.”

“I can imagine,” I said dryly. “Don’t tell me you’re listening to such nonsense.”

“Nonsense? My dear girl, I’ve got a fiver on you being covered in scales under all your clothes.”

I tweaked his arm. “Ass.” But I said it with affection. “It is good to see you, too, Cubby. I do feel rather awful about the wedding.”

“Yes, well, you didn’t just run out on Gerald, you know. There I was, all got up in my rig for standing up with him—and dashed splendid I looked, too. It isn’t every day I make the effort,” he added with a twinkling smile. Before I could speak, he darted a glance around. The lobby of the Savoy was a crowded place and we were already beginning to attract attention. “I say, Penelope, I would like to catch up. I don’t suppose you’d have lunch?”

“Of course,” I said promptly. “But not here. I’m afraid my nerve has rather deserted me. I’ve just seen Lady Knapely walk in, and she’s one of Mother’s chums. I couldn’t bear running into Mother just now.”

With the furtive hilarity of children on holiday we hurried out and down the street to a quiet little corner house, where we ordered quickly and settled down to the business of catching up.

“All right, Cubby. Out with it. I know why I didn’t want to stay at the Savoy, but why were you so eager to get out of there. What’s afoot?”

To my astonishment, the gentle giant actually blushed.

“Cubby! You’ve got a girl,” I deduced. “And you didn’t want to be seen in public with a scandal like me in case your girl heard about it. Confess all—I’m right, aren’t I?”

The blush deepened. “More than a girl. I’ve got a fiancée.”

“How wonderful!”

“Not really,” he said with a grin. “You see, Father had a bride all picked out for me.”

I held up a hand. “Don’t tell me. Some heiress to shore up that castle of his.”

Cubby nodded. “You know how it is. The Ashley title is five hundred years old but we haven’t a bean. The whole north tower actually collapsed last month.”

I winced. “Oh, dear. And I suppose your father found a nice girl with pots of nice money, did he? What was she—American? Railroad heiress?”

“South American with a squint and mouse-brown hair. And it’s not railroad money at all. Nitrate mining,” he told me between spoonfuls of soup.

“What is a nitrate and why does one want to mine it?”

He shrugged. “Something to do with arms. Her father made a bloody fortune in the war, which I think is quite low really.”

I smiled into my soup bowl. “Cubby, you’re one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. For you to say something is low, it must have been awfully vile.”

“Yes, well, you know how it was. I was over there in the trenches. I lost friends, more than I care to count. And to marry a girl whose father made his money that way—” He broke off, wincing. “I hadn’t the stomach for it. At least, not until you.”

I put down my spoon. “Until me?”

“When you had the courage to leave Gerald at the altar. Serves him right, the pompous prig.”

“Cubby, Gerald is your best friend and your cousin,” I reminded him. “And what I did wasn’t courageous. It was the rankest cowardice.”

“It was not,” he said stubbornly. “If you knew you had doubts, the right thing, the only thing, was to get out before it all became official. I call it good sense.”

“Good sense, bad form,” I murmured.

“Yes, well, society doesn’t know everything,” he said firmly.

I tipped my head thoughtfully. “Cubby, tell me about your new fiancée. Does society not approve?”

“It does not,” he told her. He put down his spoon and leaned forward, his eyes bright. “She’s the prettiest girl in the world. She’s kind and thoughtful, and well, I simply wouldn’t want to live if I couldn’t have her.”

“You’re quite the romantic, Cubby,” I said, smiling. “But if she’s so wonderful, why the objections to the match? Hasn’t she any money?”

“Not tuppence to rub together, I’m afraid. She’s the vicar’s daughter,” he said with a rueful face. “Mother is about to have an apoplexy, and Father’s threatened to cut me off without a shilling, but I don’t care. I love Gwen, and I’ll marry her or no one. It’s been the most terrible secret, utterly awful not to be able to talk about it, and you’ve always been so friendly. I feel somehow you understand that I mean to do this. I must do this.” Cubby’s chin had taken on a decidedly mulish cast, and I tried not to imagine the outrage of the Marchioness of Drumlanrig at having a daughter-in-law called Gwen.

“I’m sure they’ll come around,” I said, certain of no such thing. But it seemed the only polite remark to make under the circumstances, and Cubby brightened noticeably.

“But you see, Gwen is a bit uncertain of me just yet,” he went on. “She’s feeling out of sorts at how awful my family are being, and it’s made her doubt herself. If she were to find out I’d been lunching with someone as notorious as—”

He broke off, blushing again as I gave an indignant screech. “I’m not notorious! A moment ago, you said I was courageous.”

“And I meant it. But people do say things about you. I mean, what sort of girl leaves a viscount’s heir at the altar?”

“And what sort of man throws over a nitrate heiress for a village maiden?” I retorted.

But I could never stay mad at Cubby, and having at least one friend to talk to made me feel marginally less like a pariah. By the time we had tucked into large plates of apple tart with cream, we were perfectly friendly again—friendly enough that I ventured to give him an almost truthful response when he asked about my plans.

“I mean to travel,” I told him. “I’m thinking of someplace nice and sunny. Perhaps the Holy Land.”

He sat back, patting his rounded belly in satisfaction. “Rather a long way just for some sun.”

“Yes, well, I’ve always been mad about Biblical antiquities,” I said blithely. “Nineveh and Bethlehem and Sodom.” At least I hoped those were real places. Cubby blinked and I hurried on. “Anyway, now that the war’s over, I can see the region properly.”

“Ah, taking a Cook’s tour or something?”

I thought quickly. A Cook’s tour would cost the earth, and I doubted my funds would stretch to passage for me and Masterman, as well. I could have asked Reginald and he would have given the money happily, but something in me rebelled for the first time. If I asked Reginald, it meant involving Mother, who would ask endless questions and even, possibly, insist upon coming along. But if I found the means myself, I was answerable to no one. I could go as I please. I could be truly independent for once. The thought was as intoxicating as the finest champagne, and I blurted out before I could stop myself, “Actually, I mean to get a job.”