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and Tom had decamped to his family’s country estate, which meant only Trevor, Rayley, Emma, and
Geraldine would sit around the evening table. Although he was fond of the two younger men, Trevor
had to admit that it was a pleasant variation to have a party of four. The room was so quiet that he
could hear the sound of Emma humming something pleasant. A scrap of a holiday carol, no doubt.
“You see, gentlemen,” she said, having attached the final candle to the top of the tree and daintily
descending the ladder. “When the candles are lit, it is meant to bring to mind the image of stars
twinkling through the tree branches. That sight was the inspiration for the carol Silent Night.”
“I don’t know the tune,” Rayley admitted, sinking down beside Trevor on the settee and reaching for
his pipe. “Is that what you were humming?”
But before she could answer, there was a knock at the door. Not the leisurely knock of a social
visitor, but a rapping that was persistent, almost frantic, and Trevor instinctively tensed, his hand
gripping the base of his brandy glass. Gage abandoned the ladder and went to the door and a moment
later Geraldine’s friend Tess Arborton dashed into the room, clearly in agitation. She had not
relinquished her wrap to Gage, but rather stood dripping and trembling before them, peering out from
beneath the brim of her feathered hat.
“Tess, dear, what a pleasant surprise,” Geraldine said, with a quizzical frown. “Will you join us for
dinner? We were just about to go in.”
“I cannot have dinner,” Tess said, her eyes darting wildly around the room as if it were a
preposterous suggestion. As if, in fact, she might never eat again. “I am sorry to come upon you
without notice and in such a ridiculous state, but I didn’t know where else to turn. My daughter is
missing.”
“Missing?” Geraldine echoed, as Emma turned to pour their sudden guest a glass of sherry.
“Well, not missing entirely, for I know where she is,” Tess said, pulling off her hat and wiping drops
of water from her cheeks. It was unclear if they were the result of tears or melting snowflakes. “But
she shouldn’t be there, not at all, and if a young girl is somewhere she has no business being, isn’t that
the same as being missing entirely?”
It was a bewildering question, but fortunately Emma was quick with the sherry, so they all had a
moment to compose themselves while Tess gulped it.
“Are her children gone with her?” Trevor inquired, for he knew Tess’s daughter had given birth to
twins a year earlier. The event had played an accidental but pivotal role into the Yard’s investigation
of the infamous case of Jack the Ripper.
“Children?” Tess said in bewilderment, but she allowed Emma to take her wrap from her and
Geraldine to escort her gently but firmly to a seat by the fire. “Oh no,” she said finally, once she
realized what he was asking. “You are speaking of my elder daughter, my Marjorie. She’s exactly
where one would expect her to be, at home with her husband and her boys. It’s my younger girl,
Anne, who has fled. I shouldn’t have come,” she repeated, looking around the room as tears began
rising again, perhaps triggered by the mere act of saying Anne’s name aloud. “But Gerry, I knew you
had friends of the sort who might…”