“Why, I’d never cheat a lady, miss!”
The cabbie flicked his reins and they set out at a jolting trot.
“What’s Mogg’s?” Skeeter asked, hanging onto his seat and struggling with his stubborn umbrella.
“Mogg’s maps.” She pulled a little booklet from her handbag and passed it over. “Study it carefully. It lists the fares for every conceivable route through the city. Otherwise, cabbies will cheat you blind.”
“I’ll remember that,” Skeeter said as the horse jolted around a corner and swung smartly into heavy traffic, nearly colliding with two carriages and a drayman’s wagon and eliciting rude commentaries from cabbies they narrowly avoided while rounding a traffic circus Skeeter didn’t recognize. “If we survive so long. Man, not even New York traffic is this nuts!”
Margo just grimaced and held on.
True to Margo’s prediction, nobody else had found a trace of counterfeit banknotes, nor had anyone located a witness who could identify Armstrong, Catlin, or Marcus. Skeeter was feeling massively discouraged when he eased his aching, blistered feet into a basin of hot water in his bedroom. Maybe they hadn’t bought their clothes in SoHo? Or maybe they’d lucked out and used genuine banknotes when making the purchase? What else would they have to buy, which could be paid for with Goldie’s counterfeit banknotes? Food, of course, and coal for the cookstove and fireplace. But they weren’t likely to pay for any of that with five- and ten-pound banknotes.
“Well,” he mused aloud, “they have to live somewhere, don’t they?” Had they brought enough cash between them to buy a house or were they reduced to renting? Probably the latter, unless Armstrong had found lucrative employment somewhere. According to Goldie’s records, she hadn’t changed enough currency for “Benny Catlin” to buy a London house, not even a really ratty one. But if they were renting, they might well use larger denominations to make the payments. “I wonder how somebody goes about renting a house in London?”