Stolen Remains Read Online Free PDF

burst into flame before disintegrating into swirling, throat-choking ashes.
    She could only pray Bertie was not somehow involved.
     
    After he escaped the queen’s presence, Gladstone motioned to a servant. “I need to send a message to Scotland Yard,” he said.
    The servant nodded and went to fetch writing materials.
    Let Her Majesty dillydally about with her undertaker here in London. It would keep her occupied while he worked with Henderson to discover what had really happened. If he solved it, perhaps then the queen might admire him more.
    Why was Lord Raybourn dead? Why had he returned early from Egypt, against very specific orders?
    What real mischief was being conducted in the Suez?

5
    Preston Village, outside Brighton, Sussex
     
    “H ow was it, Mother?” Violet asked, taking away the bowl of warm broth.
    “Very good, dear. I feel much more settled today.” Mrs. Sinclair arranged her coverlet for the tenth time and retied the bow on her nightgown once again. “If only I didn’t have to lie here, rotting like a bag of potatoes before they are thrown to the pigs.”
    Violet laughed. “Now I know you are well on the way to good health if you are making jokes again.”
    “But I’m not joking. I’m not sure how much longer I can endure this inactivity. What I wouldn’t give for a stroll on the pier.”
    “The doctor says it won’t be much longer. He just wants to make sure you’re strong enough for walks on Brighton Pier.”
    Eliza pointed to the open window, where a breeze gently sailed in, causing the curtains to flutter in welcome. “It is a perfectly lovely day outside and the smart set have gone to London for the Season, leaving the pier alone and just aching for me to visit.”
    “Yes, Mother, the pier is in visible pain without you to tread its boards.”
    Eliza crossed her arms. “You’re mocking me.”
    Violet sighed. The dead were so much easier to manage than the living. “I suppose I am. My apologies. How about if I promise to fetch Dr. Humphries tomorrow and together we’ll try to convince him that you’re well enough to be up and about. If he agrees, we’ll go for a walk on the pier in the afternoon.”
    “I suppose that would be fine. Not that Dr. Humphries knows anything. I think he enjoys keeping me trapped here like an animal.”
    “You mean like a bag of rotting potatoes.”
    “That, too.”
    Violet carried the empty soup bowl back to her parents’ small kitchen. She and her husband, Samuel, had been staying here for a couple of months during her mother’s convalescence. When they’d first received word in America that Eliza was gravely ill, Violet had left her undertaking business in the hands of her daughter, Susanna, while Sam turned over his law practice to his assistant, and the two of them had skittered from Colorado to the coast via stagecoach and train, then across the Atlantic in a steamer ship. Their travel had been dangerous and exhausting, but they’d reached Eliza’s bedside at the very moment it seemed her mother would not make it another day.
    The sight of her daughter must have revived her, for Eliza had been making progress ever since. Her undiagnosed intestinal ailment had left the woman weak and thin, but she was finally eating and drinking.
    For the past week, she’d been grumpy at her situation, an attitude most unlike her mother’s usual state of contentment.
    Violet washed the bowl and spoon and put them away in the dish cupboard, then looked around for what she might prepare for dinner, always her most challenging task of the day. An array of vegetables lay on the worktable. Perhaps she should cut them up and—and—do something with them.
    The Sinclairs’ day help usually prepared a meal and left it on the table, but Maisie was away visiting family this week. Leaving the household management in Violet’s hands was tantamount to disaster. Although she knew exactly what to do with a body overcome by rigor mortis, a pork loin left her