Garden of Lies(75)

She shook her head, smiled to herself and started to go into her own room. The door on the other side of the hall opened.

“Oh, there you are, dear,” Lilly said. She sounded much too cheerful. “I thought I heard someone up and about. Everything all right?”

“Everything is fine.” Ursula moved through the doorway of her bedroom and turned to look at Lilly. “You can go back to sleep.”

Lilly smiled a very satisfied smile. “You’re good for him, you know.”

“Am I?”

“Yes, indeed. He is a changed man these days and it’s all because of you.”

“I am, of course, delighted to know that I am useful.”

Lilly blinked, taken aback. “Now, dear, I never meant—”

“The question I must ask myself is whether or not Mr. Roxton is good for me.”

She closed the door before Lilly could say another word. Halfway back to her bed she turned around and went back to the door. Very deliberately she turned the key in the lock.

If Slater needed any more inspiration before morning he would have to find it elsewhere.

She snuggled into bed, pleasantly exhausted. Her last thought before drifting off to sleep was that one question about Slater Roxton had certainly been answered. He did, indeed, practice exotic sexual rituals on unsuspecting females in his basement.

—

SHORTLY BEFORE DAWN she thought she heard the faint sound of someone trying the doorknob. She waited to see if Slater would knock when he discovered that the door was locked. But there was only silence out in the hall.

She lay awake for a time, telling herself that she had done the right thing by locking the door. If she was to continue in the affair with Slater, it was important for him to realize that she was not merely a convenience or an aid to creative thinking.

Unfortunately, the small victory was somewhat obscured by the weight of regret.





FORTY-TWO




I told you I believe that Cobb is intent on creating a monopoly to control the drug,” Slater said. “Furthermore, I’m sure he plans to operate his business from New York, not London. And he doesn’t want any competition on this side of the Atlantic.”

They were gathered at the breakfast table. Lilly reigned at one end, nibbling delicately on a piece of kippered salmon. Slater sat at the other end, plowing through an enormous mound of eggs and toast while he explained his conclusions. Ursula, seated in the middle, thought he looked remarkably vigorous for a man who could not have gotten more than a few hours of sleep. There was nothing wrong with his appetite, either.

He had said nothing about the locked door of her bedroom. If he had been disappointed, he certainly concealed the fact well. She found his enthusiasm and energy extremely irritating.

“You say you think Lady Fulbrook intends to take some specimens of the ambrosia plant when she runs off to New York with Cobb?” Lilly asked.

“Right.” Slater ate some more eggs. “Specimens or seeds, at least. Regardless, she will no doubt arrange to destroy the rest of the plants in the conservatory. Cobb will want to make certain that no one else can continue in the ambrosia business after he and Lady Fulbrook are gone.”

Ursula put down her fork quite suddenly. “Seeds.”

Lilly and Slater looked at her.

“What is it?” Slater asked.

“When I found Anne Clifton’s stenography notebook and jewelry I also found some packets of seeds,” Ursula said. “I think the odds are good that they were from the ambrosia plant.”

Lilly’s artfully drawn brows crinkled a little. “Perhaps she intended to cultivate the plant in her own garden.”

“Or sell the seeds to the highest bidder,” Slater said. “Someone like Mrs. Wyatt would have paid well for them.”

A cold chill feathered Ursula’s spine. “I think that Anne planned to use them to buy her way into Damian Cobb’s side of the business.”

Slater contemplated that possibility. “Huh.”

“It would have been a very bold thing for her to do,” Lilly said quietly. “Cobb is a dangerous man.”

“Anne was a very bold woman,” Ursula said. “And remember, she had been acting as a go-between for Lady Fulbrook and Cobb for months. She may have felt she knew Cobb in a sense—that she understood him. She was not particularly fond of men but she was confident of her ability to manipulate them. She was, after all, a very attractive woman. Lady Fulbrook may have been writing love letters to Cobb but I think Anne was trying to seduce him.”

Slater frowned. “What makes you say that?”

“I haven’t had a chance to read through all of the letters from Cobb. They are written under the pen name he used when corresponding with Lady Fulbrook, Mr. Paladin. But I can tell that there was some sort of delicate negotiation going on between the two of them. On the surface Paladin is showing an interest in her short stories but I’m quite sure that is not what they were actually discussing.”

“Anne spent a great deal of time in Lady Fulbrook’s company in the conservatory,” Slater said. “She might have learned how to cultivate the ambrosia plant.”

“That would certainly explain some of the oddities in the poems that she wrote down in her notebook,” Ursula said. “There are several references to quantities and times. I remember one line in particular, the flower is delicate and potent. Three parts in ten bring on visions that thrill. Seven will kill.”