Small cloth-bound notebooks were scattered here and there; several were quite dusty with neglect. There were also bits of scrap paper and even what looked to be some kind of ledger.

“Your previous cook was literate, sir?”

“I warned you she was peculiar.”

Alexia took another look around and then, thinking rapidly, maneuvered toward the small bed. “Oh, dear, perhaps those stairs were a tad much given my present condition. I seem to be feeling rather overstimulated.” She collapsed onto the bed, leaning back dramatically and almost overbalancing. It was a paltry performance.

Nevertheless, the butler seemed convinced. “Oh, I say, Mrs. Floote. This simply isn’t on. Really, we can’t consider anyone who—”

Alexia cut him off by groaning and clutching at her stomach significantly.

The man blanched.

“Perhaps if I could have a little moment to recover, sir?”

The butler looked like he would prefer to be anywhere else but there. “I shall fetch you a glass of water, shall I? Perhaps some, er, jelly?”

“Oh, yes, capital idea. Do take your time.”

At which he hurried out.

Immediately, Alexia lurched upright, an exercise that made up in efficiency what it lacked in dignity, and began searching the room. She found very little memorabilia with regards to the occupant’s personality, but there were even more notebooks and mysterious bottles tucked away in the bedside drawer and the wardrobe. She tucked anything that looked to be secret or significant into the stealth pockets of her parasol. Then, knowing she must limit herself, she took what seemed to be the most recent notebook and one that looked to be the oldest and most dusty, along with a neatly printed ledger and bundled them up in Felicity’s shawl. The parasol was clanking slightly and drooping from its excess load, and she thought the knitwear bundle must look very suspicious, but when the butler returned, he was so overjoyed to find her recovered he didn’t notice either.

Alexia decided to make good her escape. Saying she felt weak and had best hurry home before nightfall, she moved toward the door. The butler led her downstairs, declining to offer her the position, despite her calf’s-foot jelly, but suggesting she call round in several months when she had recovered from her inconvenience, jelly apparently being quite the alluring prospect.

He was just letting her out when a voice stopped them both in their tracks. “Well, gracious me. Miss Tarabotti?”

Alexia clutched her loot closer to her breast, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. Then she looked upward.

The gentleman walking slowly down the staircase toward her was an iconic example of the scientific species. His gray muttonchops were untended, his eyes bespectacled, and his attire too far into tweed for midsummer and midtown. Unfortunately, Alexia was all too familiar with that face.

“Why, Dr. Neebs! I thought you were dead.”

“Ah, not quite. Although Lord Maccon did do his level best.” The man continued down the steps, moving with a pronounced limp probably sustained during that last battle in the Hypocras Club’s exsanguination chamber. As he closed in upon her, Alexia noted his eyes were very hard behind those spectacles.