In the Eye of the Storm (Storm and Silence 2)

‘No. That harpy took it.’

‘Miss Fotheringay?’

‘Yes. She said it was bad for me, checking my watch every five minutes. She thought it caused overanxiety.’

‘Don’t worry. I’ll get it back for you.’ Patting his hand, I rose and made my way towards the door. At the door I paused and looked back with a grin on my face. ‘Will you be all right while I’m gone? I mean, you’re going to have to waste at least two and a half minutes waiting for me.’

Mr Ambrose gave me a cool stare. ‘On the contrary. I shall not be wasting time.’ He picked up an issue of The Spectator that was lying on the bedside table. ‘I shall be finishing this. There are a few articles that I have not read yet. It is time to check up on what is ha

ppening in the metropolis.’

‘Have fun.’

He ruffled the pages. ‘Fun has nothing to do with it. This is information acquisition, Miss Linton.’

‘Of course it is, Sir. I’ll be back soon.’

Glancing back at him as I closed the door behind me, I caught a last look of him, lying in the bed, reading the magazine. It was a brief look, so I might have been mistaken, of course. But I could have sworn he was gazing after me with something almost akin to a smile on his granite face.

It didn’t take me nearly as long to retrieve the watch as I’d feared. Miss Fotheringay had entrusted it to her mother, and the kind old lady had not only wiped it meticulously clean, but even taken it to the local watchmaker to have the mechanism inside cleaned, too. She didn’t even mention money, for this or for the room Mr Ambrose had slept in. I would gladly have paid her out of my own purse - only, I had no purse, and certainly no money to put in one.

Letting the pocket watch snap open to check the time, I re-entered Mr Ambrose’s room. ‘Good news!’ I announced. ‘It’s only half an hour now until the coach leaves. We should get going if we want to be there in ti-’

That was when I lifted my head and caught sight of Mr Ambrose’s face. My voice abruptly cut off.

There wasn’t even the hint of a trace of a fraction of a smile on his face now. It was as hard and cold as I had ever seen it. No, actually, it was a lot harder. He was holding The Spectator clenched in his fists as if it were a pamphlet demanding a pay rise for his employees. His eyes were boring into the paper with deadly, ice-cold wrath.

At the sound of my voice, he lifted his head and focused this look on me.

‘You…’ The word was spoken with so icy a threat, so chilling a power, that it made a shiver run down my back. ‘You did this!’

‘D-did what?’

You’re stuttering! He’s just staring at you, and you’re stuttering! Get a grip, Lilly!

‘You did this.’ Seeming not to have heard me, he flung back the blanket over his legs and rose with a sinuous grace that you would never have suspected from so stiff a man. He stalked towards me - that was the only word for it, stalked - without paying the slightest attention to his injured leg. His eyes remained trained on his prey - sweet little me! ‘You did this! Oh… I’ll make you pay for this!’

‘Did what?’ Was it only my imagination, or did my voice sound suspiciously like a squeak? I took a step back. And another. I was a feminist, I was all for standing up to men - but not this man, and not while he was in this mood! I took another step back, and my derrière bumped into the doorframe. ‘What did I do?’

‘Read this!’ Giving me one more vengeful, dark glare, he shoved the magazine under my nose. I took it, and the heading jumped right out at me:

Scandal Around Financial Magnate

I tried to lift my hands, tried to take the magazine to read, but my arm wouldn’t move. I was frozen in place by the ice in his eyes.

‘Don’t want to read it, do you?’ he enquired, with an alarmingly soft voice. ‘Don’t feel like delving into the details? Don’t worry. I’ll read it for you.’

And he lifted the crumpled magazine to read, hiding his face. Part of me was glad I could no longer see him. But that just meant I had more attention to spare for the ice of his voice when he started to speak.

‘Scandalous events often shake the newspapers these days, but seldom has the press of London had to report such an outrage as the writer of this article has now to reveal. Not long ago, at Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park, London, at a meeting of the esteemed Anti-Suffragist League of London, numerous important personages and a crowd of supporters came together to fight against those unnatural creatures who call themselves suffragettes and feminists and deny the fact that a woman’s God-given place is in the home.’

The shiver that had run down my back earlier realized that its work wasn’t done yet. Taking a run-up, it raced up my back again, leaving goose bumps in its wake.

Oh no…

‘Among the gentlemen present,’ Mr Ambrose continued without mercy, ‘was Rikkard Ambrose, renowned financial magnate. However, Mr Ambrose’s performance at the meeting did not at all reflect the power and position of his social rank.’

Blast, no! A curse on all newspapers and magazines! Please, let this not be what I think it is!