The Truth About Verity Sparks Read online

  “Yes and no,” said the Professor. “Naturally, I want Lady Throttle to withdraw her threats to your former employer. But, my dear young friend, I think you could be of inestimable value to us in our investigatory endeavours.”

  I must have looked blank again (it happened dozens of times a day at the start, until I got myself a vocabulary) and SP rephrased his father’s words so I could understand.

  “We need you, Verity. We’ve got a new case, and we think you can help us solve it. Won’t you please stay with us a little while longer?”

  “Your amazing memory, not to mention your, ah, itchy fingers, would make you a most valuable assistant. And we really do need a female operative. A sharp-eyed young girl would make all the difference to some of our inquiries,” said the Professor. “We would provide you with accommodation and a wage of … let me see … how does twenty pounds a year sound? With a dress allowance. Would that suit? Unless, of course, you wish to return to Madame Louisette’s. Do you?”

  I thought about the cold early mornings. The omnibus drivers who wouldn’t stop and the snooty clients and the stuffy workroom. The pricked fingers and the eyestrain.

  “No,” I said. “I’ll stay.”

  At Madame Louisette’s we used to line bonnets with a material called shot silk. Depending on how you looked at it, it was purple or green, and if you held it just right you’d see the two colours together. I felt just like that – first one thing, then another, and sometimes all of a mixture – and although that night after supper I went to my bedroom feeling excited and happy, before I knew it I was crying. I wasn’t much of a one for crying, as a rule. Living with Uncle Bill and Auntie Sarah had knocked it out of me, for you were just as likely to get a hiding as a hug in that household. Tears never fixed anything, anyway. But I couldn’t help it.

  “You stop that, Verity Sparks,” I scolded myself. “You are a very lucky girl.”

  I had kind friends, and a job, and a home.But Mulberry Hill wasn’t home. Then, neither was Madame Louisette’s. Or – I shuddered – Uncle Bill and Auntie Sarah’s stinking rats’ nest in Racketty Lane. My real home was with Ma and Pa, and it was lost to me forever when they died. Tonight I missed them so much it hurt. I didn’t care if they weren’t my real mother and father; they were the only parents I’d ever known, and you could never hope to meet a kinder, more loving couple. My eyes filled up with tears again.

  All of a sudden I remembered Ma’s things. I kneeled on the floor, felt around in my carpetbag and brought out a patched old petticoat. I’d bundled them up inside it, in case of prying fingers at Madame Louisette’s. I took them out one by one.

  First, the ring. It was made of three intertwined bands, each of a different metal. I knew it wasn’t Ma’s wedding ring – that got sold when Uncle Bill and Auntie Sarah took me in – and I couldn’t recall ever seeing Ma wear it. Still, she’d saved it and kept it for me, and that made it precious. It was a bit too big, but I slipped it on my finger just the same.

  I held up the quilt next. It was the size of a baby blanket, made of triangles pieced together to form stars. The sewing of it was perfection, every tiny stitch even and neat. Where did Ma get such fancy material? I knew from Madame’s what fine French silks like these could cost. Another mystery.

  Last, the coin; the lucky piece, Ma called it. It was thin and battered, with a hole drilled in the top, hung on a length of red silk cord. It must be foreign money, I thought, turning it over. Or maybe not even money at all. Perhaps it was a medal of some kind. One side had the letter “V” on it, very faint, as if half rubbed off, and the other had seven little stars making a lop sided cross set inside a circle.

  I put the quilt on the bed, tucked the ring under my pillow and slipped the lucky piece on its cord over my head. The ring, the lucky piece and the quilt – my three gifts from Ma. I closed my eyes and pictured her face, not flushed with the fever as I last saw her, but smiling, like she used to. I knew Ma would be glad I was here, with a job and with friends. Feeling comforted at last, I snuggled down in the bed and fell asleep.

  6

  THE CASE OF THE CHINA HORSE

  I slept like a log and woke up feeling cheerful, even excited. Today I’d begin my very first investigation.

  “Now, my dears,” said the Professor over breakfast. “Let me give you some background information.”

  “The case concerns a Chinese horse, doesn’t it?” asked Judith.

  “Indeed. A very valuable horse.”

  “A racehorse?” I asked.

  “No, a figurine. That’s like a little statue,” said the Professor. He didn’t laugh at me for my ignorance, and neither did Judith. “It’s an antiquity.” He went on to explain that an antiquity is something very, very old. This one was a figure of a horse made in China over a thousand years ago.

  “Our client, Mrs Honeychurch, contacted the Confidential Inquiry Agency in great distress,” said the Professor. “She is a widow, about sixty, childless, quite rich, and living quietly with a couple of maids and a housekeeper. Her pride and joy is a collection of oriental antiquities, acquired with her late husband when they lived in Canton.”

  “Does she know for certain sure that this little horse has been nicked?” I asked. “It could just have been broken by one of the maids while she was dusting.”

  “We are almost certain it has been taken. It is a very delicate matter,” the Professor told us. “The lady suspects an old friend. His name is Major Wilton. He too collects Chinese antiquities. Now, it seems that a month ago, Mrs Honeychurch observed the Major slipping a valuable decorated bowl into his pocket. She didn’t know what to do or say, she told me, but the bowl was back in its place the next day. She is quite wretched now, for she wonders whether temptation has got the better of him.”

  “How terrible,” said Judith.

  “She has invited him to visit her today. And Verity, you and Judith and I are to be guests as well. For afternoon tea.”

  Afternoon tea? I looked down at my shabby dress, and Judith caught my eye. Read my mind too.

  “If you come upstairs with me later,” she whispered, “I will find one of my old dresses that will fit you. Mrs Cannister can help us take up the hem.”

  I blushed and thanked her. Maybe a smart dress wouldn’t help to find whoever nobbled the antiquities, but it’d make me feel a lot better at this tea party.

  Mrs Honeychurch lived in Gordon Square, in a terrace set behind a quiet tree-shaded park. As the Professor helped Judith and then me out of the carriage, a child darted out from the servant’s entrance and up to the horses. It was a little boy of about five, with wide-apart blue eyes, an elfin face and a shock of white-blond hair.

  “Jimmy! Jimmy!” A lady came running out of the house. “I’m sorry,” she said, taking his hand. “He’s mad on horses, and I can’t keep him away from them. Why, only last week he followed a delivery cart all the way up the Euston Road.”

  “It’s no bother to me,” said John, the Plushes’ coachman. “You can pat ’em, sonny. Go on.”

  “All right then, Jimmy,” the lady said and she turned to us, still a bit a flustered over her runaway. I thought it was Mrs Honeychurch herself, for she was dressed very nicely, but it turned out it was only the housekeeper. Mrs Chalmers was her name, and she led us into the hall and down a corridor to the drawing room.

  “Mrs Honeychurch is expecting you,” she said, ushering us in.

  Light filtered in through the narrow curtained windows, and it was all dim and solemn, like a church. The walls were lined with shelves and glass cases full of china bowls and plates. Some were painted with flowers and insects and strange winged creatures; some were patterned with blue and white; some were quite plain, and one – deep red and shiny and shaped like an upturned tulip – was so beautiful it took my breath away.

  “I see you are looking at the sang-de-boeuf,” said a woman’s voice.

  “Oh,” I said, startled. A little lady, old but still lovely in a thistledown sort of way, was sittin
g on the sofa.

  “Sang-de-boeuf means oxblood,” she went on. “It’s from the Ming Dynasty.”

  It was still gobbledegook to me, but the Professor was impressed.

  “Amazing,” he said. “We must beg your pardon, Mrs Honeychurch. I can speak for all of us. Your collection has deprived us, momentarily, of speech.”

  “Thank you,” said Mrs Honeychurch, holding out her hand.

  The Professor, with another of his old-fashioned bows, kissed it, and then did the introductions. “Our young friend, Miss Sparks” was the way he put it when he came to me, and he never said a thing about the millinery trade.

  “It is certainly a wonderful collection, Mrs Honeychurch,” said the Professor. “The work of many years, I can tell. Could you perhaps show me the bowl that Major Wilton …”

  The Professor trailed off tactfully, but I could see the lady was upset. She dabbed her eyes with her hankie, and sighed, and then sighed again, more deeply, and pointed to a small pink bowl decorated with fruit, vines and flowers.

  “My favourite. Qing Dynasty. Pretty, isn’t it? And my husband’s favourite was the Tang horse. It is very valuable, but Mr Honeychurch loved it because the conformation of the rump and the hocks reminded him of his old hunter Mazeppa.” A tiny tear trickled down her cheek.

  There was a knock on the door.

  “The Major,” announced Mrs Chalmers.

  Major Wilton was short and round and red in the face, a tubby whirlwind of waving hands, wobbling chins, nods and beaming smiles.

  “Dear Lydia!” he boomed. “How charming you look. Are you well? A little low? Let’s see if I can’t cheer you up.” Only then did he notice the Professor, Judith and me. “And visitors? What a treat. Young ladies too.” He bowed over our hands, beaming all the while. “How delightful.”

  A maid came in with the tea tray, and the Major jumped up and down like a jack-in-the-box: passing the cups, offering milk or sugar or lemon, handing around the cucumber sandwiches, urging Mrs Honeychurch, Judith and me to have one of the pretty iced cakes.

  “I know how partial you ladies are to sweets,” he said. He gazed adoringly at our hostess. “Sweets to the sweet, eh?”

  I felt like laughing. The Major steal the horse? He’d have given Mrs Honeychurch the shirt off his back. It was plain as the nose on your face that he simply worshipped her. Besides, I already knew where the horse was. My fingers had started to itch.

  I wasn’t sure what to do next.

  “Professor,” I whispered, plucking at his coat sleeve, but he wasn’t paying attention, for Major Wilton had bobbed to his feet.

  “I nearly forgot,” he cried. “I have something for you, dear Lydia. A surprise. I left it with Mrs Chalmers. I’ll just go and fetch it.”

  “You see?” said Mrs Honeychurch after he had left the room. “I’m sure he has something on his conscience.”

  “Professor …” I tried again, but the Major bounced back into the room carrying a large brown-paper parcel. He placed it gently on Mrs Honeychurch’s lap.

  “Won’t you unwrap it, Lydia? Here, let me help you.”

  He cut the string with his pocketknife. Inside the brown paper was tissue paper, and inside the tissue was something pink. He shook it out and held it up for her. It was a shawl, embroidered all over with wandering vines, leaves and fruits, flowers and butterflies.

  “Oh, Robert. It is the exact pattern of my Qing bowl.”

  “It is!” crowed the Major. “I had it made for you, Lydia. Do you like it?”

  “It’s perfect.” She stood up and took the Major’s hand in hers. “Robert, so that is why you took the Qing bowl.”

  He looked self-conscious. “Caught me out, did you? Well, I confess I did, Lydia, but only so the embroideress could draw out the design. I put it back the next day.”

  “You have not also borrowed the Tang horse, Major?” asked the Professor.

  “Goodness no. Whatever gave you that idea? Lydia?” He turned to her. “What is this all about?”

  “I thought … your collection … the horse … the temptation …”

  The Major sat down heavily. “So this is what you think of me. My dear, I began my collection so that you and I would have something in common. I’d have collected live snakes if you’d liked them.” He mopped his face with his handkerchief. “My dear,” he said, taking her hand. “I would not make you unhappy for all the tea in China.”

  This was my chance. “I think I know where it is,” I said.

  All the eyes in the room were on me, and suddenly I felt shy.

  “Mrs Honeychurch, may I try to find it?”

  “Of course, dear. Go wherever you like,” said Mrs Honeychurch, but really, she didn’t give two hoots for the china horse now. She was gazing at Major Wilton with stars in her eyes.

  I slipped out of the room, with the Professor behind me, and nearly ran smack-bang into Mrs Chalmers.

  “Mrs Chalmers,” I said. “May we see Jimmy’s room?”

  “Well …” She stopped, looking worried. “I suppose so.”

  I was off before she’d finished, up one flight of stairs and then the next. On the top landing I paused. My fingers were itching and I could see that little horse clear as day. A beautiful horse he was, already saddled, standing poised and graceful with one hoof raised, waiting for his rider.

  “Wait, Miss Sparks!” It was Mrs Chalmers, puffing, followed by the Professor. “That one is Jimmy’s room.” Her face was white. “I’ve already searched,” she whispered. “Even in the bed.”

  “Is James your grandson, Mrs Chalmers?” asked the Professor. He spoke very gently.

  “Yes, sir. My daughter’s boy. She died of the cholera last summer.”

  I rubbed my hands together, wincing a bit, for by now my fingers felt just like I had chilblains. I couldn’t see the little horse any more; I could see bars. Perhaps Jimmy’s room had once been meant for a nursery and there were bars on the windows.

  Mrs Chalmers opened the door. “Have a look, if you want.”

  The bars weren’t on the windows but on the cot. My fingers stopped itching. I kneeled at the end of James’s cot, lifted a loose floorboard and there was the Tang horse in a bed of straw. I held it up into the light. He had been well stabled. There was not a chip or a crack on him.

  “Oh, dear,” said Mrs Chalmers. “I asked him and he said no. He’s never told me lies before.” Tears welled in her eyes, but she brushed them away and said in a business-like tone, “Well, thank goodness it’s found. But Miss, how did you know?”

  “I saw how mad on horses he was. And I used to hide my treasures,” I said. “There was a loose floorboard under my bed too.” Even though it wasn’t the whole story, it was quite true.

  I handed the horse over to the Professor, for now that my hands weren’t itching, they felt so weak that I was scared I’d drop the blessed thing. We trooped down the stairs and into the drawing room, and Mrs Chalmers went outside to get Jimmy. He came in, clinging to his grandmother’s skirts, but when Mrs Honeychurch asked him if he knew where the missing Tang horse might be, he shook his head.

  “Don’t know no Tang,” he whispered.

  “Then what’s this?” asked Mrs Chalmers, pointing to the china horse in the Professor’s hands. She was close to either tears or temper, I could tell, but her face changed when the little boy spoke.

  “That’s Mazeppa,” he said, surprised. “No one asked me ’bout Mazeppa.”

  “Jimmy,” she said sorrowfully, but Mrs Honeychurch began to laugh.

  “You know that it was very wrong of you, don’t you, James, to put Mazeppa in your stable without asking?” said Mrs Honeychurch. “Everyone was so worried about him. Please put him back.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” whispered James. He took the horse from the Professor and placed it carefully on the shelf. “Lovely, he is.” He stroked its shiny brown back. “Lovely.”

  Mrs Honeychurch sat a few seconds, thinking. “James,” she said. “You may have him.”


  Jimmy stared at her.

  “He’s yours.”

  “What do you say, Jimmy?” prompted Mrs Chalmers.

  Jimmy stammered out his thanks, but Mrs Honeychurch wasn’t listening. The Major had hold of her hand, and she was staring into his eyes like he was Romeo and Prince Charming all in one. We tiptoed away.

  “It just goes to show,” said the Professor to Judith and me when we were back in the carriage.

  “What, Father?”

  “There is such a thing as a happy ending.” He dabbed at his eyes with his handkerchief, and then blew his nose very hard. “Touch of hay fever,” he explained, then turned to me. “Well done, Verity. Perhaps we should add matchmaking to our prospectus.”

  7

  A MEETING OF THE SIPP

  When I look back to all the things I learned in those first few months as an Assistant Confidential Inquiry Agent, it’s a wonder my brain didn’t burst.

  First, there was Surveillance. That meant following people and watching what they did.

  “Remember, any small detail might be the vital clue we need to crack the case,” said SP.

  And then I had to learn Reporting.

  “Father says you have remarkable powers of observation – that means noticing things, Verity – and at times you must take notes about what you’ve seen.” SP hesitated, as if he was embarrassed. “Do you … er … can you read and write?”

  I wasn’t too offended. Lots of girls like me couldn’t, but I was lucky; Ma had taught me my letters when I was small. Even so, I was a bit rusty, and SP took on the job of bringing me up to scratch. We started with the London Illustrated Journal and soon I was picking and choosing from the Professor’s library. Who would have thought of a milliner’s apprentice reading Mr William Shakespeare and Miss Jane Austen?

  Judith’s job was Manners and Deportment. I had to be able to go with her to a concert or a tea party or a smart shop without giving the game away that I was in fact a Female Operative. I was nearly over saying “ain’t” and dropping my aitches, and Judith was pleased. I was easy to teach, she said, for my voice was sweet and low, and I was naturally quite refined.