A Study in Silks by Emma Jane Holloway Read Free Book Online Page A

her some dignity. She tried to remember some detail about the girl, but knew woefully little about the servant who slept under the same roof.
    She arranged Grace’s skirts, smoothing them over the edge of her petticoats.
I’ll do what I can for you
. It would be little enough. As she’d said to Tobias, she was no detective.
    There was the stomp and shuffle of men’s boots, and Tobias left Evelina to greet the newcomers at the door. A glimpse of tall, distinguished Lord Bancroft told her that time was running out. Even in a dressing gown, he had the look of a man ready to slap an unruly colony back into obedient servitude.
    But he was a man with secrets. She knew that now.
Dark magic, Your Lordship? Now there’s a tale you’ll keep close at all costs
.
    Evelina slipped her fingers under Grace’s jacket, questing for anything the servant might have hidden. Too many assumed a woman always used her bodice as a hiding place, but there were other options. Sure enough, there was an envelope tucked in the waistband at the small of Grace’s back, still moist with sweat. Evelina retrieved it and checked for the address. It was blank. Something hard was inside.
    An unpleasant sensation swept up her arm.
Magic
. It had a strange, double-layered flavor, as if the envelope’scontents had come into recent contact with not one, but two spells. Some substances, occasionally stone but more often metal, could absorb magical residue.
Where were you, Grace?
These were dark spells, unlike anything her Gran Cooper would have spun. Evelina squeezed the envelope, trying to guess what it held.
    She was suddenly all too aware of the constables standing with Lord Bancroft. Her pulse began to speed.
There is evidence of murder and dark magic on your cloakroom floor, my lord
. With a little careful management, the death of a servant might not arouse undue interest, but a scandal involving magic would be ruinous. There would be jail, or worse, and the courts were swift to find a culprit whenever and wherever magic was found. Every year, the penalties grew harsher, and a lordship was no guarantee of safety.
    And if Lord Bancroft were destroyed, his family would be, too.
    The thought made Evelina stiffen. Faces flashed through her mind: Tobias, Poppy, gentle Lady Bancroft, and even Lord B himself. They had been good to her. And Imogen was her only real friend. She slipped the envelope into her pocket and out of sight. Guilt flushed her cheeks, but she wasn’t handing it over until she understood what was going on—or, more precisely, until she was sure Imogen and her family would be proven innocent.
    “What is Miss Cooper doing here? And not properly dressed?” Lord Bancroft asked in a brusque tone. A slight sibilance betrayed the fact he had been enjoying a late-night tête-à-tête with the whisky decanter. “Do I need to point out the obvious and say this is not a suitable scene for a young woman?”
    “I invited her,” Tobias lied coolly. “You know she has an excellent head for details.”
    “I fancied I heard something earlier,” Evelina interjected, thinking about the voices she had heard while in the tree. The clock had struck eleven, drowning them out. And then there had been the figure in the hallway. “I thought I might prove helpful.”
    “Is that so, Miss Cooper?” Lord Bancroft lowered hisbrow. “It has nothing to do with your taste for sensational novels? Perhaps you should return to your bedchamber.”
    She was about to protest, to say he had to listen, or at least the police did. But, with a lift of his chin, he effectively dismissed her.
    Anger fired along her nerves, bright and sharp as lightning. She barely stopped herself from making a gesture unbecoming a lady—or shouting that he should be quiet and let her help him, because she might be the only one who saw the full danger his family was in. Instead, she turned back to the body, continuing with her inspection despite her seething.
    Uncle Sherlock very rarely