Free The Silk Thief by Deborah Challinor

stood with their snouts pushed though the wrought iron pickets, strings of spit hanging from their jaws, growling like hellhounds. He wondered if there was another way in. Surely visitors didn’t have to run the gauntlet past these beasts every time they called? Or, given the rumours he’d heard about some of the unpleasant characters Bella did business with, perhaps that was the point? Still, he wasn’t standing out here shouting himself hoarse until someone came to let him in.
    He crunched across the gravel at the back of the house, which actually faced the street, past tidy garden beds and a statue of a naked cherub wielding a trumpet, until he came to a small door in the far end of the building, fortunately on this side of the fence. He knocked and waited. Eventually a shifty-eyed woman opened it.
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘Mrs Shand, please.’
    ‘Who’s asking?’
    ‘My name is Leonard Dundas.’
    ‘What’s your business?’
    Leo made a well-educated guess concerning the subject of Walter’s letter. ‘Amos Furniss.’
    The woman stared at him sourly for a moment. Then she said, ‘Hold on,’ and shut the door in his face.
    Leo had a horrible few minutes of wondering if she was letting the dogs out so they could race around the house and surprise him.
    She opened the door again. ‘Come in.’
    He followed her down a hallway, then past a staircase and into a light-filled reception room. French doors led to a verandah with a stunning view of Sydney Cove, though this morning the doors were closed against the briskly cool winter weather.
    Bella Shand sat at an expansive writing desk against the wall opposite the French doors. Leo, who had never met her, had expected her to be old and ill-favoured, perhaps even grotesque — physical traits that would be commensurate with her reputation — but she wasn’t. She was quite attractive in a sharp, hawkish sort of way, though extremely thin. She was possibly in her thirties, though her thick face paint made it difficult to judge her true age. Her coal-black, heavily ringletted hair gleamed (surely such shine and abundance signified a wig?) and she was certainly beautifully dressed, even Leo could see that. He could also see why Clarence chose to marry her: privately, Clarence might prefer men, but she would make a good foil.
    Inherently, however, there was something deeply unpleasant about her. She seemed … reptilian. Also, a very fierce intelligence burnt behind her eyes. Leo decided he would do very well not to cross her, and prayed he wasn’t about to do just that.
    ‘Mr Dundas,’ she said. She didn’t smile.
    She had an unusual voice, too. Low, but very rich and full. Alluring and quite mesmerising.
    ‘Mrs Shand.’ Leo offered his hand.
    She rose to meet him. ‘Amos Furniss,’ she said without preamble.
    ‘Aye. I’ve been asked to deliver to you a letter. I gather it concerns him. Or rather, his death.’ Leo retrieved Walter’s note from his jacket pocket, hoping like hell it did. He would look an absolute fool if it didn’t.
    Bella took the letter, returned to her chair, broke the seals and read it quickly. ‘Who wrote this?’ she demanded. ‘A half-trained monkey? Who’s this Walter Cobley?’
    ‘Writing isn’t his strong suit.’
    ‘Is this true, what he’s said?’ Bella held up the letter.
    ‘I don’t know. I haven’t read it.’
    Bella looked as though she didn’t believe him, but said, ‘He says he killed Furniss, not Friday Woolfe and her crew. Who is he? Why would he kill Amos Furniss?’
    Shocked, Leo thought, Friday? Why does she think Friday murdered Furniss? But, keeping his face neutral, he said, ‘Walter was a victim of Furniss’s thoroughly unpleasant habits. He had the great misfortune of sailing with Furniss on the Isla .’
    ‘That child ?’ Bella looked vaguely startled. ‘The ship’s boy ?’
    ‘Aye.’
    ‘But how do you know him?’
    ‘He jumped ship. I took him in. He’s been lodging with me ever since.’
    ‘Where