helped herself to toast and jam and sat down opposite him. “Horace, where would the police take someone they had arrested for murder?”
His eyebrows flew up, dragging his gaze off the paper to her face. “Headquarters at Whitehall Place and Great Scotland Yard, probably. Why?”
“Are you in charge of the policemen there?” she asked, ignoring his question.
His frown deepened. “Not as such…”
“Then your name carries no weight with them?”
“I wouldn’t go as far as that,” Horace said with dignity. “My influence is broad.”
She smiled. “I thought so.”
In fact, Horace had come into his own during the panic of 1848, when revolution had swept through Europe and London had been shaken by the Chartist riots. Of course, unrest in Britain had been a pale echo of what had happened abroad, but with hunger and unemployment high, people were nervous. Now, Horace “kept an eye” not on crime as such but on threats to the government and to order. His authority appeared to be vague, yet everyone, including her politically active father and eldest brother, took it seriously.
Horace returned to his paper, only to look up a moment later. “Griz, are you up to something?”
“Lord, no. Just preparing for an argument.” She took a gulp of coffee. “I must dash. Vicky needs her walk. Have a pleasant day at the office!”
***
Although he had never been accused of murder, there was nothing else new to Dragan’s situation. He had been arrested before and questioned by the police. He had even spent a night in the cells once, in Pest. And another night locked up with his men in Transylvania when they had been captured by Austrian forces. On the first occasion, without evidence, they had let him go with dire warnings. On the second, he had taken matters into his own hands and escaped with his men.
This morning, he didn’t hold out much hope of either eventuality. Unless he could somehow get a message to a lawyer friend. He supposed he would go to court this morning, but the chances of him being granted leave to await trial out of prison were remote unless someone would vouch for him.
At the sound of rattling keys, he looked up from his hard, wooden bench. As did everyone else.
“Tizsa!” a policeman called, turning the key. “Inspector’s got some more questions for you.”
Dragan stood and wrestled himself into his coat, then snatched up his cloak as if quite confident of leaving.
“Bloody gentlemen,” someone growled. “Always get special treatment.”
“He ain’t a gentleman,” scoffed the man beside him. “He’s foreign!”
Which entertained Dragan all the way back to the bare room he had left only a few hours ago. This time, a pale beam of sunshine shone in through the small window, but it did little to alleviate the dreariness.
Inspector Harris laid a dagger on the table and glanced up at him. “Recognize this?”
“No.” He frowned. “Perhaps. Is that the dagger that was found beside Nancy last night?”
“It’s the one you handed to Police Constable Porter,” Harris said dryly.
“I didn’t really look at it. But yes, it could be.” He grimaced. “Pretty thing for such a grizzly purpose.”
“Valuable thing for such a grizzly purpose,” Harris corrected. “I’m told these jewels are real.”
“If you say so.” Dragan sat opposite the inspector, without being invited. “A simple inquiry should acquit me of any possibility of owning such a thing.”
“But you own a sword and a pistol.”
Before he could answer, some growing commotion in the corridor suddenly exploded into the room in the shape of a speeding dog, no more than a streak whizzing past Dragan’s eyes as it ran twice around the room and jumped on the table, sniffing the dagger.
Harris leapt to his feet, reaching out to rescue the weapon. The dog snarled, and Harris snatched back his hand.
Dragan laughed.
Another, bigger whirlwind in a wide-skirted blue gown flew into the room, closely followed by two bewildered-looking policemen.
“My lady, you can’t go in there!” one expostulated, much too late.
“What is the meaning of this?” Harris thundered.
The bespectacled young lady, resplendent in a fine Paisley shawl and wide-brimmed bonnet of precisely the same shade of blue as her gown, lifted the dog off the table and held it in her arms. It appeared to be a small, Italian greyhound, with fur of a rare, deep grey that was almost blue. It gazed up at her adoringly, as though saying, Would I growl at a policeman?
Over its head, she met Dragan’s gaze and smiled. Oh, yes, she was the same girl as he had