The Shadow and the Star by Laura Kinsale

whisper.
    "She was not married?"
    Leda gave a little speechless shake of her head. Miss Gernsheim lifted her eyes from the paper, regarding Leda with a frown, and then wrote. "What is your present direction?"
    "Mrs. Dawkins at Jacob's Island, ma'am. Bermondsey."
    "Jacob's Island!" She closed the notebook and laid down her pen. "You are something of a challenge, Miss

Etoile. It's most unusual for sensible girls to look above their background. When you return with your character, we shall see what we can do. Will Monday a week be convenient?"
    "I believe that I can bring the letter earlier than that," Leda offered.
    "You may bring it by as soon as possible, Miss Etoile, but it will be Monday at best before I have reviewed the openings to find what might be appropriate to your circumstances. Close the door gently behind you, if you please. My head quite tortures me today."
    Leda, too, had the headache. She left the office in a gloomy mood. She would have somehow to manage to find Lady Cove at home when her sister Miss Lovatt was not there, a formidable task in itself, and then coax the timid baroness to write a character which Miss Lovatt had plainly hinted was not to be written, including a line expressing clearly that Leda hadn't the temperament of a murderess… just the sort of thing that would excite a conversation on the topic of sanguinary servants, and end by putting Lady Cove into a tremble over the possibly evil designs of her butler, a quavery-voiced, stoop-shouldered man who had been employed in her home for thirty-five years.
    And to have to wait for more than a week just to hear of openings! Leda mentally totted up her accounts and trudged grimly onward.
    It was late dusk when she reached her neighborhood. The night-inspector was just stepping up to the station-house stairs. He stopped when he saw Leda on the walk behind him and held open the gate. "You're early again, miss! Heard you was by early yesterday."
    "How do you do, Inspector Ruby? Have they left everything properly in order for you?"
    "Certainly have, miss. Certainly have." This part of their exchange was a ritual. Leda asked after his wife and children and what his supper had been, and offered to pass along Miss Myrtle's receipt for ox tongue.
    "Thank you kindly, miss. Come up then and I'll put it into my memorandum book, if you're not in a hurry."
    Leda climbed the stairs and went through the iron wicket door that he held open for her. Inside the stuffy station room, the Inspector's podium stood alone in a pool of gaslight, like a pulpit in the gathering dusk. A woman lay full-length on the floor inside the single cell, a dark heap mumbling and moaning softly to herself in the shadow, while a policeman jumped to his feet off the outer bench and saluted his superior.
    Leda felt it would show a vulgarly prurient curiosity to examine the woman in the cell too closely, so she sat down on the bench and leaned against the whitewashed wall, taking the inspector's book into her lap to write. In spite of the sultry atmosphere, the reserve policeman began to stoke up the coal beneath a copper kettle on the hob grate, apologizing to the inspector for not having his tea at the ready.
    The inspector grimaced. " 'Tis no nevermind; you brew the bitterest cup o' stable muck I ever did drink, MacDonald."
    "Sorry, sir," MacDonald said. He straightened up, looking as if he couldn't think what to do with his big, freckled hands. He hooked them in the webbing of his white belt and popped the shiny buckle, giving Leda a shy glance. "Never have got the way of it. Me sis always does the honors at home."
    Leda put the book aside. "Let me make your tea for you, Inspector. I'm quite practiced."
    "Why, that's capital of you, miss." Inspector Ruby rubbed his mustache and smiled. "I'd be obliged to you, I would. Nothing like a lady's touch."
    Leda crossed the stark room and busied herself with the kettle and the fire. From the corner of her eye, she saw the female figure in the