Free Jewel of the Thames (A Portia Adams Adventure) by Angela Misri Page B

that perhaps did not want her name in the paper, I would bring her in the rear doors. I would also avoid attention by sending two higher-ranking officers out to wait for her, because it would seem far below their station to be on lookout duty. I would position those officers on the west side of the staircase, perhaps feigning enjoying a cigarette since you do not smoke, Professor, so that a hackney could quickly pull up, dislodge the patron and turn around without waiting for traffic, as there is so little on this side.”
    The sergeant looked incredulously from his still-smoking cigarette to my professor and back at me.
    “Also, when I first approached, you tensed on the balls of your feet, as if my appearance excited you,” I continued. “Since we had never met, I surmised that you were waiting for a woman of my age and description, and until the chief inspector identified me, you remained ‘at the ready’.”
    My professor was by now grinning broadly and patted his stunned peer on the back. “She has some skills, our Miss Adams does. Granddaughter of the estimable Dr. Watson, did you know?”
    “The late Dr. Watson of the detective offices of Sherlock Holmes?” the sergeant asked as I blushed.
    “ None other!” my professor boasted, and then turning to me, asked, “Though are you entirely sure of your parentage, Miss Adams? I knew Dr. Watson well, and as amiable and intelligent a man he was, your instincts are positively Holmesian!”
    I preened under his compliment even as the sergeant seemed to be annoyed by it. “Harrumph. Holmes was brilliant, truly, but impossible to work with from what I hear. Not someone to emulate, young lady, if that is your plan.”
    I had opened my mouth to respond when the lady they had been waiting for pulled up in a cab. I stepped out of the way as they rushed down to escort the woman into the building. As she passed, I noted her expensive navy blue wool dress with its fashionable cap sleeves and her wide-set eyes under a remarkable bonnet with a familiar triangle-shaped clasp. I pegged her at about twenty-five years old and nodded at her as she was escorted past me and into the building.
     
     

     
     
     
    Chapter Nine
     
    T wo days later, while we were helping his mother set the table, Brian admitted that the woman had been unable to make a positive ID of the suspect they had brought in, and that the man, a Mr. Ben Fawkes, had been released despite the police’s continued belief in his guilt.
    I took to walking home over that same bridge every day, noting that on Tuesdays and Sundays it was almost abandoned, as opposed to Fridays when traffic was at its highest as food and liquor made their way back and forth over its bricked surface. Traffic under the bridge seemed to be regular as well, with fishing boats and skiffs gliding under it with regularity, except on Sundays when the water was almost still with inactivity.
    I tried to stay positive during those weeks, filling my time as best I could, but if I had any close friends, which I did not, I would have admitted to them that I felt very small in that huge city. Insignificant, an outsider and just … small. Except when I was pursuing a clue or immersed in my grandfather’s diaries — that was when I felt connected and part of a bigger legacy, and it was an addictive feeling. Brian and I were becoming closer, but I felt like he couldn’t possibly understand my loneliness, living with both his parents, able to visit his grandparents in Surrey whenever he wanted to, and having a full social life with the friends he had made at Scotland Yard. A few times I had to swallow past my jealous feelings — like when watching his mother give him a kiss on the top of his head as she walked by his chair at the dinner table. How could I tell anyone, even Brian, just how alone I was? I might have told Mrs. Jones, since she was the closest thing I had to family these days, but she was showing up less and less at Baker Street — a