The Masked City

The housekeeper answered it. She was a middle-aged woman of unflappable disposition, her greying hair pinned up in a rock-hard bun. ‘Can I help you, ma’am - oh, it’s you, Miss Winters. Mr Vale said: would you mind waiting, if you arrived while he was out.’

Irene’s stomach sank. Something had gone wrong. She didn’t know what yet, but she just had that feeling. ‘Do you know where he is?’ she asked, stepping inside and closing the door behind her.

‘He went out early, on a summons from Scotland Yard, Miss Winters,’ the housekeeper said, taking Irene’s hat and helping her off with her coat. ‘Then your friend Mr Strongrock came by, just an hour ago—’

So Kai must have come straight here from their discussion with Silver, Irene calculated.

‘- and someone met him at the door. I did catch a few words, and it was a message from Mr Vale to meet him in the East End. And off he went. And then, when Mr Vale was back, I told him all this, and he’s off to the East End himself, quick as you like. He told me most particularly that if you were to turn up, Miss Winters, I should ask you to wait for him to come back. Or, and he said it very severely, he couldn’t answer for the consequences.’

Irene had been nodding along as the woman rattled on, but her throat had gone dry. Kai lured away. Vale gone after him. She wanted to be out of here, right this minute, and hailing a cab to take her to the East End too.

Except, common sense pointed out, the East End was a big place. And Vale had specifically asked her to wait for him. Her hands tightened into fists, but she composed her face to calmness. ‘Of course I’ll wait for Mr Vale to return. Did he say where in the East End he was going?’

The housekeeper shook her head. ‘You know how he is, miss. Can I get you a cup of tea while you’re waiting?’

The door slammed open. ‘That will not be necessary,’ Vale said from behind her.

Irene turned to see Vale standing there, looking down at her from his superior six feet of height. His clothing was, as always, austere, but appropriate for a gentleman, and of the most expensive fabrics. (It was no wonder he’d bonded so well with Kai. They both refused to wear anything but the best.) His dark hair was swept back from his face, and his profile seemed even more hawklike than usual. ‘Where have you been, Miss Winters?’ he demanded.

‘To a library, sir,’ Irene said. She didn’t quite let her tone slip into sharpness, but it was a near thing. ‘I sent Kai to you. Where is he now?’

‘Abducted, Miss Winters - while you were out at your library.’ Vale managed to put an astonishing amount of accusation and simple anger into the words. ‘And I would like to know what you propose to do about it.’

The worm of guilt in her gut - I leave him alone for five minutes and he gets himself kidnapped - collided with a sudden burn of anger at Vale’s words. ‘Why, get him back, of course! How dare you—’

The housekeeper coughed loudly, and both Irene and Vale turned to look at her. ‘I’ll bring your tea upstairs, Mr Vale,’ she said firmly. ‘And some for the lady too. I can see that you’ve got matters to discuss.’

‘Oh, very well,’ Vale said, with no grace whatsoever, and stamped up the stairs to his rooms, with Irene a pace behind him.

I was wrong, ran through her head. It wasn’t a threat to us. It wasn’t a threat to me. It was a threat to Kai, and I left him alone, and they caught him.

CHAPTER FIVE

Vale walked across to the bow window, looking down at the street below. His rooms were as cluttered as ever, though a dust-free zone demonstrated where the housekeeper had been making headway before Irene’s arrival. He didn’t look round at Irene as he said, ‘I should apologize for that, Winters. My words were unjust.’ He’d thankfully dropped back to his usual style of address, rather than the more formal Miss Winters.

Irene flicked on the light switch and shut the door. She folded her arms. ‘I accept your apology,’ she snapped. ‘Now maybe we should discuss how to retrieve him.’

‘You show very little emotion of the softer kind,’ Vale said. He turned, regarding her thoughtfully in a way that was more disconcerting than his earlier angry glare.

‘How would that help the current situation?’ Irene asked. Her anger and self-blame manifested as a slow roil in her stomach. But she was going to use it, not let it control her. ‘Can we please not waste time? Kai might be in great danger right now.’

‘Probably,’ Vale agreed. His anger seemed to have ebbed, just as hers had risen. He gestured her to a chair. ‘But to take action on the spur of emotion, without full information, would be as unwise as I was a few moments ago. Please, Winters. Sit down. Tell me what you know. It’s quite obvious that you know something.’

Irene sat, folding her hands in her lap. ‘Does the name Guantes mean anything to you?’ she asked. ‘Probably in connection with the Fae, possibly in connection with Silver.’

‘Hmm.’ Vale strode briskly over to one of his big scrapbooks that bulged with newspaper clippings and filed notes, flipping through it. ‘Grant: the Covent Garden riot and flood. Guernier: the perfume murderess. Guantes … Guantes: no, nothing in here. The name is familiar, as a new arrival to London from Liechtenstein, both he and his wife, but I don’t have anything definite on them as yet.’ He slammed the book shut and dropped into the chair opposite Irene, folding his long body forward to focus on her. ‘Tell me more, Winters.’