Moriarty Protection |

Lady Charmain looked none the worse for her awful experience, though her friend Miss Turner hovered over her as if she might collapse at any moment. Eleanor, the Duchess of Winshire, was acquainted with the two of them. Lady Charmain she knew very well. Eleanor had been friends with her mother. Miss Turner was more of an unknown. She had not impressed at first meeting several years ago, but had remained with her step-brother after her mother and sister were exiled for crimes against him and his wife. From all accounts, Miss Turner had not put a foot wrong since. Eleanor believed in second chances and would give the woman the benefit of the doubt.

She knew about the other woman in the room, too, though they had not met. Miss Trent was a personal guard, hired from Moriarty Protection to defend Lady Charmain after several attacks on her betrothed. Unusual to have a woman in that role, but how clever. Miss Trent could follow Lady Charmain into places no man could or should go.

“The men have gone downstairs to interview the scoundrel who slandered Lady Charmain,” reported Sophia, wife to Winshire’s eldest son and therefore Eleanor’s daughter-in-law. “They will join us in time to share a pot of tea, Aunt Eleanor. Jamie will have coffee, of course.”

Eleanor was not going to discuss the nasty scene in the ballroom that had led to the incarceration of the man Sophia rightly called ‘the scoundrel’. She knew just the topic to introduce to lighten the mood. “How are plans for the wedding, Margaret, my dear? Have you chosen your gown? I am so looking forward to witnessing the occasion.”

(This scene wasn’t in Snowy and the Seven Doves, out on August 10th. Instead, we follow Snowy down into the cellars. “First, they visited the Duke of Winshire, where Margaret and Pauline were scooped up by Lady Sutton and taken upstairs to visit with the duchess. Miss Trent followed behind the ladies, as silent and inconspicuous as a shadow.” After the scene in the cellars, “Snowy and the duke joined the ladies. They were discussing the wedding; apparently, the duke and duchess would be in attendance. Snowy wondered if the invitation had originated with the duchess, but since Margaret seemed happy, he said nothing. They then went for their drive in the Park. It was almost anticlimactic that nothing happened.” Not that this was the end. Indeed, 20% of the book and the worst attack of all remained to be told.)

Mrs Moriarty, Prue Wakefield’s guest, was not Irish, as her name suggested. Mediterranean, if Eleanor, Duchess of Winshire, had to make a guess. Perhaps Greek, with that classical nose and heavy eyebrows.

They had enjoyed a cup of tea each and some of Fournier’s lovely little cakes, but Eleanor still did not know why Prudence had asked for the meeting, though the conversation had been pleasant. Mrs Moriarty was not only a beautiful woman, but a very intelligent one, able to hold her own in a wide-ranging conversation.

She also had the same alert way of moving through her surroundings that Eleanor had seen before, in those who worked in the shadows. It came as no surprise when Prue said, “Mrs Moriarty’s husband was one of Lord Ruthford’s exploratory officers, and Mrs Moriarty also worked with him from time to time.”

“I was an assassin,” Mrs Moriarty said, the words all the more startling in her soft voice. Perfect English diction. She had learned the language well, and probably as a child. “Was. I do not like taking life, your grace,” she added.

Eleanor was seldom lost for words, but what did one say to such a statement? I am so glad? That is nice, dear?

“Lord Ruthford and the Moriartys have set up a new agency. Mrs Moriarty will head it, as the gentlemen are both occupied, Ruthford as an earl and Moriarty as a Senior Supervisor with the Thames River Police.”

This, Eleanor assumed, was the business end of the meeting. “Does the agency need something from me?” she asked. “I will need to know its purpose.”

Mrs Moriarty gave a pleased nod. “Prue told me that your grace is an unusual woman. You are correct. Moriarty Protection would like your endorsement. We seek to offer, as the name implies, discreet guard services for those in need of protection. Our guards will be experts in all kinds of weapons and in unarmed combat, and will have the highest level of screening to ensure they cannot be bought. Our women guards, as well as the men. They will be well enough spoken and educated to join a household in any guise, as servants, guests, friends, even family members.”

“Women guards?” Eleanor asked, intrigued by that one fact. She could see the benefit! “Unexpected, and able to follow a woman they are protecting into places a man cannot go,” she said.

That fetched another approving nod from Mrs Moriarty. “Precisely,” she said.