THE SECRET STEALER
Somewhere in London
Friday, April 11, 1958
11:40 p.m.
Envelope encased, the carrier cylinder traveled through
miles of pneumatic pipes from its place of origin to the dark, deep dungeon of
the Filing Department—falling neatly from the end of the pipe and into the
corresponding receiver box, as if by some magical, invisible postman.
A bell chimed as the envelope landed in receiver box
fifty-five.
Michelle White’s eyes shot open as she lurched back from
the edge of sleep. She blinked at the flashing yellow light on the noticeboard
above her. It was her job to ensure all letters were sorted out the minute they
arrived: those that met agency requirements were to be organized by date and
slipped into the Inquirers’ in-box for later investigation. Those that did not
went straight into the rubbish bin, and those of which she was unsure what to
do with, into a looming pile on the desk. But crime and crookedness had been on
the decline the last few weeks in London and so, assuming the letter would be a
lead on something petty, Michelle White staggered across the Filing Department
in no particular hurry.
She lifted the lid on receiver box fifty-five, the
endpoint of a six-mile pneumatic tube that fed off from a letter case hidden in
Passing Alley in Farringdon.
Envelopes and letters pulled from the receiver boxes were
usually addressed to the agency in general: Dear people under the ground, or
similar.
But tonight was different.
To Miss M. White, Inquirer.
It was odd, yet she couldn’t help smile at the thought of
it. Michelle had once dreamed of becoming an Inquirer; she had come so close to
the reality, too. But she was just not good enough. Not clever enough, not
brave or talented enough. Not quite anything enough.
Ten years ago, at the age of twenty-two, she’d been
recruited from a textile factory where she’d toiled long hours as a quality
control assistant. But like everyone who came to work in the sunless labyrinth,
Michelle had swiftly and without much consideration renounced the liberties of
her previous, lackluster life in exchange for the opportunity to begin a new and
thrilling vocation as an Inquirer, where she’d hoped to finally make use of her
very particular set of skills.
But things had not quite turned out that way, which is
why—instead of scouring London’s streets for criminals and delinquents—Michelle
had ended up here, spending her evenings as the night-duty filing assistant in
the establishment’s dullest department. In fact, had it not been for her other,
far more satisfying role—that of Border Guard, protector of the secret—then
perhaps she would have quit years ago.
But now Michelle wondered, as she stared at the envelope
in her hand, how whoever had sent it knew where she worked or why they had
considered her the worthy counsel of their troubles. She ran her thumb over the
words—Miss M. White, Inquirer—as if they might be absorbed through her skin and
become true.
For a moment, she was reluctant to open the envelope,
concerned it might be a joke. One of the young apprentices playing a trick. She
clenched her jaw at the thought, breathed, then entered the letter’s details
into the register file: time and date received, receiver box number and her
initials. But when she opened the envelope and read the final detail—the nature
of the inquiry—her breath began to quicken.
The letter was short. A name, a time, a place and one
simple revelation. And yet it unleashed a torrent of angst.
Several weeks ago, something had gone missing from her
handbag—something invaluable, irreplaceable, something that might dredge up a
secret long since buried across the Border. At first she’d been so certain of
who had taken it, and for countless nights thereafter she’d turned in her
sleep, anxious the nasty thief would soon come looking for the paired device
she kept locked in her private office, and with that the secret would be uncovered.
But if the letter she’d just received was to be trusted,
Michelle’s anxieties had been misplaced—the secret had already been discovered.
She wasn’t sure how, or even why, but if she followed the letter’s directions,
she might soon find out.
Though sirens of warning blared in her head, Michelle had
already made up her mind. Of course she could take the letter to someone more
qualified than herself, but it had been addressed to her—whoever had sent it
had entrusted her with this, a most precious and urgent secret. And besides, as
the letter had said, if only for tonight, Miss White was an Inquirer.
As instructed, she lit a match and held the letter under
the flame. Once the paper had turned to ash, she packed up her things, grabbed
her handbag, locked the office and rushed up the staircase toward the library.
She stopped at the lock room gate, far on the other side of the grand hall of
glorious bookshelves. The gate was ajar, just as she’d expected.
She stepped inside, pausing immediately as a wave of something
cool and cutting passed in front of her, a curious thing. She rubbed her eyes
and looked around the dully lit room, at the hundreds of steel drawers, safes
in which were kept the agency’s most hallowed files and documents. The lock
room, with its thick walls and high ceiling, was always chilled, but tonight it
felt particularly so.
Crack.
Something split from the wall behind her. She turned to
the sound but saw only a shadow move across the room and something that looked
like a large black box being removed from inside the wall. She hesitated, then
moved a little closer. But it came again—a wave of cool air, dancing in front
of her. She dabbed her eyes with the cuff of her sleeve; they were now surely
playing tricks on her, for everything had turned to a strange blur of nothing.
Michelle started to panic, her thoughts as unfocused as her eyesight. Her head
began to spin. Her limbs to tingle. This might have been the moment she ran for
her life, out of the lock room and away from the evil she now knew had been
waiting for her there. But terror had immobilized her. There was nothing she
could do to get her legs to move, not even when she heard the rush of
footsteps, some behind her, some in front. Not even when she felt the brush of
air against her neck.
“What’s happening,” she asked in a staggered groan. “I
know you’re there…I know it was you…” She trailed off, the words in her head no
longer making sense.
She dropped her handbag. Something hard rolled out and
across the floor. She was too disorientated to realize what it was.
In a drawn-out moment that seemed to last forever,
Michelle’s senses grew dull and viscous. She could no longer trust her
eyesight, her ears. She might have seen an amorphous shape crouching in front
of her. She might have seen it lift something from the floor. Certainly,
however, she felt the sharp burn of a cold, ragged blade as it sunk quickly and
easily through the delicate skin across her throat.
Warmth, darkness and nothing more.
Excerpted from Marion Lane and the Midnight Murder @ 2020
by Tessa Gukelberger, used with permission by Park Row Books/HarperCollins.
