The Reckoning. James McGee

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      The manservant’s jaw flexed. “Name?” he enquired, stepping aside to allow Hawkwood entry.

      Hawkwood resisted the urge to wipe the supercilious expression from the manservant’s face, gave his name and fixed the man with a look. “Yours?”

      The manservant hesitated and then squared his shoulders. “Flagg.” Adding, somewhat reluctantly, “Thomas.”

      Through what sounded like teeth being gritted, the manservant instructed Hawkwood to wait. Then, turning, he strode across the hall to a closed door, knocked and entered the room beyond, leaving Hawkwood to mull over a noticeable bulge in the back of the manservant’s jacket. A small cudgel stuck handily in the waistband, Hawkwood guessed; definitely not a pistol, which would have been harder to conceal.

      Ellie Pearce – or Lady Eleanor, as she was choosing to call herself these days – clearly took the matter of personal security very seriously. Hardly surprising; most establishments of this sort – regardless of their status – employed protection in one form or another, some more covertly than others. Even girls working the street tended to have a pimp hovering nearby, though their presence had more to do with ensuring the safety of their investment than guaranteeing the girls’ welfare.

      The manservant’s absence provided an opportunity to take in the interior of the house, which was as tasteful as the exterior had suggested it might be.

      Given the greyness of the day, the lobby should have been cast in a sepulchral gloom, but by the strategic use of candles set in mirrored alcoves, the entrance hall was cast in a warm and welcoming glow. It was a far cry from the cheaper East End houses, which were apt to equal Smithfield on market day for both noise and activity. The main cause for the rowdiness was alcohol. In the rougher parts of the city, the only businesses that outnumbered the brothels were the gin shops.

      Such was the ambience created here that a casual entrant could well have missed the more intimate items of décor that suggested the Salon might be something other than a comfortable family residence. These were in the form of porcelain statuettes set in niches around the walls depicting nude male and female figures entwined in a variety of sexual acts. The theme continued up the main staircase, which rose in a graceful sweep towards the first-floor landing, with each tread accompanied by a rising gallery of pencil-drawn images that were so graphic they made the cavorting figurines on the ground floor look positively chaste.

      Somewhere above him, a door opened and closed softly, while from the ground floor, behind a door adjacent to the one through which the manservant had disappeared, there came the sound of a pianoforte, accompanied by a short and equally melodic burst of female laughter.

      As if the laughter had been a signal, the door across the hallway opened and the manservant reappeared. He looked no happier than he had before as he caught Hawkwood’s eye, signalling that despite his own reservations and the state of the visitor’s wardrobe, the man from Bow Street had been granted an audience.

      “Not your day, is it, Thomas?” Hawkwood murmured as he pushed past and entered the room. He didn’t wait for a reaction but felt the manservant’s eyes burning into the back of his neck as the door closed behind him.

      By their ages, the two women could have been taken for mother and daughter, though it was the older one who was closest to the description given by Connie Fletcher. Connie had intimated that she and the Salon’s proprietress were around the same age. Connie, Hawkwood knew, was still on the good side of forty, though only by a year or two. What struck Hawkwood, as the former Ellie Pearce turned to greet his entrance, was that it wouldn’t have mattered whether she’d been a park-walker touting her wares behind the wall in the Privy Gardens or a costermonger’s wife; like Connie, she would still have turned heads. The thought occurred that maybe he should have cleaned his boots, after all.

      It was her eyes as much as her profile and her smooth, near-porcelain skin that drew the attention. Deep indigo, framed by prominent cheekbones and what looked to be shoulder-length black hair drawn up and secured at the nape of her neck by a silver clasp, they regarded Hawkwood in frank appraisal, suggesting she was not best pleased by having her afternoon interrupted at the behest of an unknown and, more germanely, uninvited public servant.

      In contrast, her younger companion, who was also slender but with blonde ringlets and clearly less reserve, greeted Hawkwood’s entrance with an openly suggestive grin.

      “Officer … Hawkwood, was it? You must forgive Thomas his manners. He tends to be over protective when it comes to gentlemen visitors he does not know. Even now, I suspect he is listening without, ready to spring to my aid.”

      There was not the slightest trace of Half Moon Alley in her voice. The refined, almost seductive tones could have belonged to any London society hostess.

      “Thank you. I’ll bear that in mind.”

      Surprised by Hawkwood’s dry riposte, Eleanor Rain frowned, while the younger woman clapped her hands and beamed as if she had just been gifted with a new puppy. “Oh, I like the look of this one. Can we keep him?”

      The older woman held Hawkwood’s gaze for several seconds before turning and addressing her more forward companion. “Thank you, Charlotte. You may leave us.”

      Pouting prettily but without protest, the young woman made for the door, taking time to mime Hawkwood a kiss as she wafted past, while allowing her thigh to brush the back of his left hand and the faint scent of jasmine to linger enticingly in her wake.

      Eleanor Rain waited for the door to close before moving to a low, loose-cushioned sofa against which rested a small table, upon which was a tray bearing a China-blue tea service. Taking her seat, she brushed an imaginary speck of lint from her sleeve and regarded Hawkwood with cool detachment.

      “How curious; I’m trying to recall the last time a representative of the constabulary came to call, but I declare it’s quite slipped my mind. Though, of course, members of the judiciary are always dropping by.”

      The emphasis placed on the word “members” had been deliberate. It was her way of telling him that she regarded his visit as no more than a distraction and that, as a person of little consequence who could not possibly understand innuendo, his presence would be tolerated only for as long as it took him to state his business.

      Hawkwood nodded. “After a hard day on the bench, no doubt.”

      In the ensuing pause, the ticking from the clock on the mantelpiece sounded unnaturally loud.

      Until that moment, Hawkwood had been having difficulty equating the woman seated before him with the Ellie Pearce who’d earned her living servicing a parade of men in the back room of a Smithfield public house, but as her expression changed in the face of his rejoinder he saw caution in her eyes and a growing realization that it was not just her own appearance that might be proving deceptive.

      Her swift recovery also told him that this was a woman who was unashamedly aware of the effect her looks had on the opposite sex. If she’d been in the trade for as long as Connie had hinted, the half-smile she now offered in acknowledgement of his response would be as much a part of her repertoire as the way she held herself and her penetrating and provocative gaze.

      Similarly, the dress she wore, while appearing simple in cut, served to add to her allure. Cream, with an ivory sheen and inset with fine blue stripes that matched the colour of her eyes, the high waist and hint of décolletage artfully accentuated her shape, with the clear intention of making life a little more interesting for aficionados of the female form.

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