The archive, just down the passage from the dining room, held every edition of theTimessince the paper’s inception. Charlotte was given brief instructions and then left to browse.
She had assumed the biblical verses would appear weekly. Instead it was three times a month, always on the same dates. She checked the papers from three years ago, but the verses weren’t there. When she looked carefully, however, she found a weekly cipher that decoded into a roman numeral, followed by a number.VIII, 260,XI, 81,XIV, 447, and so on.
They did not appear to be referring to the Bible. Charlotte got up and walked into the next room, where a dozen proofreaders were working, surrounded by hundreds of dictionaries and encyclopedias. She located theEncyclopedia Britannica, volume 8, page 260. The entry wasEngland.
The other ciphers also each yielded an entry—if that was what they signified.
But what was the point of all this?
She thought for some time, then took herself to the house on Portman Square and left Lord Bancroft a note.
When, exactly, was the Vigenère cipher you gave me sent as a telegram? The information will be much appreciated.
Mrs. Burns, true to her word, was back at the soup kitchen, peeling carrots. Mrs. Watson tied on an apron and attacked a pile of vegetable marrows.
“Sometimes we have other ladies coming in here to help. But they’re finicky. Don’t want to do anything too dirty, heavy, or hot. You’re all right, Mrs. Watson,” said Mrs. Burns, after almost an hour had passed.
Mrs. Watson laughed. “That’s probably because I’m no lady, Mrs. Burns. I was a musical theater performer. Even if I married a duke, actual ladies would turn their noses up at me.”
Mrs. Burns stopped what she was doing. “You aren’t making fun of me, are you?”
“If I wanted to make fun of you, Mrs. Burns, I’d be telling you how respectable I was, instead of the other way around.”
“So you were really on stage, singing and dancing?”
“As described.”
“And gentlemen on their knees at your stage door, begging for your favors?”
Mrs. Watson laughed again. “Not on their knees. But yes, there were a few gentlemen here and there who wanted introductions and whatnot.”
“Whatnot, eh?”
“Oh, you know it.”
Mrs. Burns raised a brow, but her expression was delighted, rather than scandalized. “I hope you had the pick of the litter.”
“I had my way of managing that aspect of the business,” Mrs. Watson said modestly.
Mrs. Burns shook her head and resumed peeling. “Never thought I’d meet an actress at the soup kitchen.”
“I’ve run into old acquaintances in bookshops, railway stations, and once while walking in the Pennine hills. We aren’t that rare—especially not in London.”
Mrs. Burns shook her head a little more. Then she looked at Mrs. Watson and said, “I was always interested in the theater. Not in appearing on stage, mind you—wouldn’t want all those strangersstaring at me. But it’d be... freeing, wouldn’t it, to be in a place where everybody is, well, I don’t know how to say it without giving offense, but—”
“Where nobody is, strictly speaking, all that respectable,” Mrs. Watson finished for her, smiling.
“And therefore respect has to be earned, because everyone starts on the same footing.”
“If you are looking for an egalitarian profession, I’m not sure the theater is your answer. And the amount of jostling for position is as fierce as anything you see in Society at the height of the Season. But I liked it. There’s a certain magic to performing and you can achieve great camaraderie, even if there’s plenty of ugly madness, too.”
Rather like life itself.
Mrs. Burns didn’t reply. In the kitchen, knives thudded on chopping boards and steam hissed from kettles.
Mrs. Watson thought Mrs. Burns’s curiosity had been exhausted until the latter said, “Part of the reason I keep thinking of the theater from time to time is because of someone I used to know. He’s, well, of a particular persuasion, as they say.”
“You mean, his romantic interest lies not with women.”
