Page 52 of The Oxford Guide to Scandal and Lies

“Could you see what she was really doing?” Gin asked. “I know an evasive tone when I hear one. She was most certainly not ‘looking for something.’”

“She was, though. She took a book but didn’t want to be caught in here.” Sidney returned the step stool to where Watkins had stood and climbed, surveying where the don had been digging. The thickest layer of dust lay upon these books. He opened a few at random but could see nothing unique about them besides being very old. Inside each one, Neville’s name was written on the flyleaf.

Sidney stepped down to Ginevra’s side. “I don’t think Watkins was borrowing that book she left with. I think she might have stolen it.” He turned the book around and tapped the inked scribble. “I noticed a lot of books formerly owned by professors at Olenev’s and thought it an odd coincidence they would all do business with him. But what if she’s selling others’ books to him on the sly?”

“Some of these probably are worth quite a bit,” Gin mused. “I suppose if she’s careful, only taking books that won’t be missed, she could turn a small profit as a side business.”

“And Olenev’s not the type to care where she’s getting them.”

“Not an innocent reason, but not treason either. Neville on the other hand…” Gin tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, eyes wide with incredulity. “Planning a move to the Soviet Union only incriminates him further. We’ll have to tell the Rook.”

Sidney replaced the step stool. “Do you want to call him, or shall I?”

Ginevra grimaced. “This silly article for The Blue is due tomorrow, so I shall be burning the midnight oil. Do you mind?”

“No, I’ll handle it,” he said, herding her toward the door, “but we should be going. The playbill said there’s an intermission, and I don’t want Neville to catch us next.”

Gin peeked into the hall, signaling the coast was clear, and Sidney pulled the door shut behind them. He felt absurdly naked without the mop and bucket in hand, but the hallway had not seemed quite so long on their first trip. They turned the corner, and Sidney’s pulse finally eased at the sight of the exit to the main hall.

Only the door opened as they approached, and Lewis Hughes strode right toward them. He was half in costume, Caesar’s laurel leaf crown in hand, and stopped short at the sight of them.

Ginevra hesitated only a second and tugged Sidney onward. “You were grand, Mr. Hughes!” she cried. “Simply grand. You’re so talented with Shakespeare, I don’t know how you memorize it all.”

Sidney choked on a laugh at the awful imitation of a Cockney accent that Ginevra had thrown on like a tattered shawl, but a subtle pinch on his forearm helped him instantly quiet.

“Thank you.” Hughes glanced at Sidney, and his brow puckered: He knew he was out of place, and his lips parted, a question in his eyes.

“This lad got turned around trying to fetch a prop,” Ginevra interjected. “You’ve got to get back onstage, don’t you, Mr. Hughes? We’ll get everything put right again.” She pumped the man’s hand, and Hughes’s expression eased to bemusement. “It’s a real treat to have someone of your caliber acting for us. A real treat.”

With a grand twirl around Hughes, Gin tugged Sidney toward the exit.

Chapter Seventeen

The moon had nearly gone to bed when Gin finished drafting the article after the play. She had finally settled on the pen name Godiva but still had to live with the knowledge she’d written the horrid thing. Hopefully, Oliver Whitby’s expectations for “human interest” from the piece were modulated by his knowledge that this was her first time attempting such a feat. Gin rubbed her aching eyes and stretched, trotting briskly back and forth across the Persian rug. If she could work up the willpower to review it again, it would all be finished, and she could have a lovely lie-in. Perhaps Iris would even sneak her breakfast in bed and a whole pot of tea.

Gin perked at the thought of tea. One cup would set her up for success better than any attempts at exercise in her tiny domain. And the new kettle in the buttery heated water in record time, preferably before the housekeeper overheard her bumping around and came to investigate.

She threw on her robe and hastened out the door.

The stairs were cold in stocking feet, and Gin lightly tripped down to the common room. The passage to the buttery required slipping by the housekeeper’s room, but she had become quite adept at evading the squeaky floorboards during nocturnal raids for biscuits. Though the buttery was kept locked at night, upperclassmen had passed on their great and treasured knowledge: The spare key lived behind the hallway’s hideous painting of a fat dachshund. The key secured, Gin slipped inside and shut the door.

The buttery was a long, narrow room that overlooked the back garden, with a wide counter for producing a full tea during normal operational hours. Its best quality, however, was the large pantry stocked with a delectable array of biscuits and bread and marmalade, and the housekeeper was a kindly woman who only sighed when too many disappeared overnight.

While the water heated, Gin nibbled on a Lemon Wheel biscuit and admired the stars shining in the dark sky. Such an awful lot had happened within mere weeks, but she finally felt on the cusp of … something. Sidney was tolerating her overtures of friendship, and the Robert Crowne clue had boosted her confidence. They would find their informant—their murderer—and poor Mr. Tolliver would not have died in vain. Only there were still so many questions bothering Ginevra that she wished she could lay them out like puzzle pieces and sort them to complete the picture in a tidy manner—just like she used to with her mother.

A pang of strong emotion washed over Gin, and she closed her eyes. Grief didn’t overwhelm her as often as it used to, but it always snuck upon her when she was alone. It was why she’d thrown herself into her debutante season with such force, attended every party, and danced every dance. Her mother would have wanted her to enjoy herself, true; but Ginevra also knew she would have withered into a deep melancholy without the charade of gaiety to maintain. Her father was not the sort of person to help anyone.

But there was also too much at stake right now to let herself sink low with reminiscing. Gin dashed the moisture from her eyelashes and grabbed a teacup from the cupboard. Her fingers trailed across the metal tea tins lining the windowsill, searching for her favorite, when a flutter of movement beyond the window made her pause.

Someone slipped through the garden, hovering in the shadows, heading straight for the back door into the buttery.

Gin’s neck prickled. She too occasionally reentered the college after hours in a similarly furtive manner. But she was also quickly realizing that her guard needed to be higher—much higher—and the hour was shockingly late. Gin scooped up a rolling pin from the counter and stepped inside the pantry, closing the door just enough to watch whomever entered.

Minutes dragged by like hours. Finally, there was a soft rattle at the back door, and Gin’s fingers tightened around her makeshift weapon as a figure entered the room. They wore a soft cap pulled low over their face and shapeless, dark clothing.

The teakettle’s whistle made the figure leap back.

“Bloody hell,” a low voice grumbled. The intruder moved the kettle and turned off the stove, turning as though surveying the dark room. “It’s a bit late for a snack, isn’t it? Or early, I suppose…”