Page 66 of A Season for Scandal

“Precisely.” Izzy nodded. “However…”

“I do enjoy a goodhowever!” Mrs Finch sighed happily.

“After they left the doctor, Maud went below stairs and spoke to some of Dr Wright’s staff. It seems that your Mr Lavigne visited the doctor alone, without Helene or his wife.”

“So the doctor didn’t examine Helene at all?” I frowned.

“As far as we have been able to ascertain, after checking the passenger lists on the Channel crossings, Helene and Mrs Lavigne weren’t even in the country at the time.” Izzy said. “They arrived in England only days before they all came to Yorkshire.”

Oliver frowned. “They told me they had travelled over from France together – why lie about such a thing?”

“And why did the doctor write a letter for Mr Lavigne if he hadn’t actually seen Helene?” I asked.

“Thanks to a bit of help from Ash and Joe, we were able to discover that Dr Wright had some gambling debts that have now been settled.” Izzy smiled, pleased with herself. “The man who settled them fits the description of your Mr Lavigne.”

“So Lavigne paid off the doctor’s debts so that he would write the letter for a patient he hadn’t seen?” Oliver said slowly. “For God’s sake, why? Especially if the contents of the letter are only what any doctor would conclude anyway?”

“I assume because there was some reason Helene and Mrs Lavigne couldn’t come with him in the first instance, and Mr Lavigne was in a hurry?” Mrs Finch said serenely.

“You would be correct,” Izzy agreed. “Upon greasing several of the right palms, we were able to trace Mr Lavigne’s movements after he disembarked the boat. We were intrigued to find that, prior to his visit to the good doctor, Mr Lavigne had met privately with a rather senior assistant in the Home Office … in a pub in Whitechapel.”

Mrs Finch exhaled sharply. “Now that is interesting,” she said.

“It seems that the gentleman in question is known in certain, shall we say,less than legalcircles to be a dab hand at forging official documents, with the assistance of many of his influential friends.”

“Which is when Izzy brought this to me,” Max said, rubbing a hand over his face, which I noticed looked suddenly tired. “And our agency have begun work, uncovering a counterfeiting operation that we believe at this time may reach all the way up into the cabinet. It’s a damn mess.”

“Youragency,” Izzy scoffed.

“Acting on the exemplary work of the Aviary, of course,” Max added solemnly, though his eyes twinkled.

“And for which you no doubt took all the credit,” Oliver grumbled.

“We are asecretorganization, Oliver,” Izzy pointed out fairly. “Credit really isn’t our thing. And, believe me, Max is so foolishly honourable that it’s more of a curse than a gift that he has to take the credit for all our good ideas.”

Max scowled. “I’ll probably get another promotion at this rate,” he said dolefully. “That or a medal.”

“Wait, wait,” I said, bringing us back to the matter at hand. “So, Mr Lavigne had someone forge documents?” My mind flashed to the search of their room. “The travel documents!” I exclaimed. “And Helene’s adoption papers?”

Izzy nodded. “Yes. It seems that after the forged documents were delivered, your Mr Lavigne travelled back to France, and then he, Mrs Lavigne and Helene returned using the travel papers in question before heading here. If anyone – say, Ellen’s long-lost brother, for example – were to look at the crossing records, they would see only the three of them crossing all neat and tidy together.”

“You keep sayingyourMr Lavigne.” Oliver frowned. “And I don’t think it’s by accident.”

“No.” Izzy shook her head. “I’m sorry, Oliver. Because we had investigated the doctor’s appointment, we knew that Mr Lavigne must have been in the country earlier than records indicated. It took us a while to piece it together, but the man downstairs first travelled to England several weeks ago under the name David Brown. He visited the doctor and acquired forged documents, then returned to France. It was only the second time he entered the country that he arrived as Mr Lavigne, with his wife and daughter in tow.”

I sat on the side of the bed with a thump. “So what you’re saying is…”

Izzy’s face was grim. “Whoever those people are downstairs, they are not who they claim to be.”

CHAPTER THIRTY

It took several moments for the rest of us to absorb these words. Mrs Finch frowned into the distance, and I almost imagined I could see the cogs in her brain spinning wildly. Oliver’s face was set, and he too seemed lost in thought. Izzy watched him, her expression worried.

“What do we do now?” I asked quietly, breaking the silence.

“I don’t know,” Izzy admitted. “Technically, it is Sylla who should decide, but we have been having some trouble reaching her in France – communications are moving too slowly to keep up with the information we are uncovering.”

“So far we know very little about David Brown,” Max offered. “It is a common name and there are many who have travelled to and from France through Dover and Folkestone over the last dozen years or more.”