Home by Nightfall by Charles Finch

says!”
    â€œVery well,” said Lenox. “Mr. Hadley, I will take the case.”

 
    CHAPTER EIGHT
    Mrs. Watson, the charwoman, lived with a family of six in two rooms on Drury Street. This was one of the small lanes toward the western end of town, near Markethouse’s only factory, which manufactured tallow. It was the poorest part of the village—there was an unpleasant smell from the factory at most hours, much worse in the summer—but it was still nothing like the poverty of London. Penned in front of most houses were a few chickens or a pig, and more often than not a small vegetable garden grew alongside them.
    The charwoman was not at work in Hadley’s more middle-class street, closer to the square, because one of her children was ill; Hadley had given her permission to take the day.
    â€œIt’s only the second time it’s happened these two years,” he’d told them in Edmund’s breakfast room, speaking in a forgiving tone, and Lenox’s ears had pricked up at that. Anything out of the ordinary was worth noting.
    â€œHas she been behaving peculiarly at all, your Mrs. Watson?”
    Hadley had furrowed his brow. “Mrs. Watson! Not at all. As reliable as the church bells, she is.”
    Now they arrived at the house where she lived. The young boy who answered the door didn’t look sick. “Do you want to buy a toad?” he asked.
    â€œNo,” said Edmund.
    â€œWhat about two toads?”
    â€œCan they do anything interesting?”
    â€œThey’ll leap something tremendous,” he said, with fervent sincerity. “I can give you both for sixpence.”
    â€œGeorge!” cried a voice behind the boy, before they had the time to answer. It was Mrs. Watson, hurrying forward. “Gracious me, Mr. Hadley, how sorry I am—George, get out of the house this instant—with your brother ill, no less—go!”
    The little boy ran off without looking back at them, and Mrs. Watson, though flummoxed by the appearance of her employer and two strangers who were obviously gentlemen, made a fair show of guiding them into her small, extremely warm kitchen. Another boy was lying in some straw in the corner, a long string bean of fifteen or so, his face waxy, his eyes fluttering. Mrs. Watson put a kettle on for them without being asked.
    â€œIs he all right?” asked Edmund, frowning.
    Mrs. Watson glanced down at the boy. “Him? He’ll be well enough soon, I hope.”
    â€œShould he see a doctor?” asked Edmund.
    The charwoman looked at him for a moment, and then realized that her face must have betrayed how stupid the question was, because she said, “It’s a very gracious thought, sir, but not just yet, I think.”
    Only if the boy was actually dying, of course, Lenox realized, maybe not even then. “I know that Dr. Stallings would come visit if we asked him,” he said. “Edmund, why don’t we send a note and ask him? It’s not ten minutes’ walk.”
    â€œI call that a capital idea.”
    So the note was written, and the boy next door enlisted to take it to Stallings, and they sat in the boiling hot kitchen, sipping flavorless boiling hot tea—and waited. Mrs. Watson, a rough, raw-faced, but kindly woman, was too polite to inquire why they had come, and the three men didn’t wish to disturb the boy. At last, Lenox suggested they remove themselves to the next room for a moment.
    Here they were able to interview the charwoman.
    She offered an account that mirrored her master’s: She had worked for him for two years, six days a week, Sundays to herself, cooking, cleaning, mending, sewing, shopping, no, the duties was not onerous, sir, yes, she was quite happy in her position. With these initials out of the way, Lenox was able to pose a few more probing questions.
    â€œCan you cast your mind back to last Wednesday?”
    â€œCertainly, sir.”
    â€œWhat time did