Jewel of the Thames (A Portia Adams Adventure) Read Online Free PDF

one. He was a bit of a bounder, as men of his looks are apt to be.”
    I grinned at this, adding to my mental picture.
    “He married as often as…” she blinked, laughed, “well, as often as I did, I suppose, though my reasons were infinitely better.”
    She glanced keenly at me. “Your grandmother was the first and best of his wives, and he would have been a far happier man had he come to this side of the pond with her rather than returning to England and marrying Mary.”
    That was all I could persuade her to say that night, and indeed I despaired of gaining any further insights into my grandparents until almost four days later. I was mournfully ill, bent at the waist over my basin, weak and sweaty from seasickness. The voyage to this point had been relatively calm, but as of this morning the skies had darkened, and the seas all around had become choppy and violent. I had missed two meals that I would have normally enjoyed above deck, but was too ill to even pass word to Mrs. Jones excusing myself.
    She arrived as I had just managed to regain my bunk, dragging the basin with me onto my stomach as I lay back.
    “Oh, my dear, you should have sent for me,” she said as she took in the pathetic scene.
    I mumbled something barely intelligible about being too weak, but she ignored me, sweeping in, soaking a wet cloth and pressing it over my closed eyes.
    I sighed at the relief that brought and took her ministrations with gratitude. So much was I relaxing that I nearly missed her whisper, “Both your grandparents suffered the same seasickness, I remember.”
    My eyes flew open as I tried to sit up. “They did?”
    “Lie back down, you silly girl,” she commanded, easily pressing me back into a prone position because of my weakened state.
    “ But—” I protested.
    “ If you lie still and try and regain your spirit, I promise I will answer your questions,” she said.
    I nodded a little too eagerly, bringing on a new wave of nausea. I shut my eyes, willing the sea to cooperate. Meanwhile, she re-soaked the cloth and applied it to my brow.
    “As I recall, your grandfather never traveled by sea without a tincture of ground mint to add to cool water,” she explained.
    “ Mint?” I said, taking care not to move.
    “ A self-prescribed antidote. Do you want me to ring for some from the galley?”
    I did, and said so, my reason being as much to relieve my present state as to feel just a little closer to my mysterious grandfather. We sat in rocking silence until the attendant arrived with some fresh mint leaves. I watched Mrs. Jones crush a few leaves into the jug of water, the pungent smell filling the cabin, and then she soaked the cloth before applying it to my forehead. Whether it was actually a cure or just a placebo of faith in a lost relative, I do not know. I know only that I awoke the next day feeling better than I had in two weeks.
     
     

     
     
     
    Chapter Three
     
    I expected that we would go straight to Mrs. Jones’s home in London (I had learned that she had residences all over the world), but instead she directed the cabbie at the train station to my inherited property. I peppered her with questions about every landmark we passed: the gothic look of Tower Bridge, the imposing structure of Big Ben, the crimson-dressed guards in front of Buckingham Palace, Lord Nelson’s statue in the middle of Trafalgar Square. Everything fascinated me, and she had a story to tell about each.
    “ Those bronze lions were remarkable when they were put in place under Nelson,” she whispered, pointing at the regal feline statues as we passed. “It is one of my fondest memories as a child, when my father brought me to their installation. Though by then Sir Edwin was quite mad, at least according to the gossip at the time.”
    The traffic in Whitehall took my breath away with the mix of horse carriages, trucks, cars, bicycles and pedestrians all vying for the lane that would allow for the quickest route through the heart