Ripley and Mallory searched high and low in the Windsor Marketplace, but didn't find the elusive Mr. Malloy that should've stuck out like a sore thumb. Along the way, the two got hungry and split lunch together, Ripley might not like Mallory, she couldn't do it on an empty stomach.
Afterwards, they continued their search, but he never turned up, and the women looked at each other. "Well, where did he go?" Ripley gestured towards Mallory. "Did you marry Houdini's descendent?"
They haven't found him and as far as they knew, nobody in the marketplace saw him. Mallory rubbed her chin as she thought about where her husband went.
"He wanted to go and see the sights, that much I know," Mallory shrugged.
Ripley crossed her arms. "Well, he's not here, he's definitely not at the Churchill Memorial, he's not on Main Street, he's not at the museum, maybe he's at the theme park riding some rides?" she suggested to Mallory.
Why would a grown man want to run towards the theme park, Ripley hadn't a clue, but if he's as eccentric as Mallory made him out to be, then surely, he'd go ride New London's Eye.
"Hm, he has mentioned wanting to go," Mallory scratched her chin with her painted nails. "Though he wanted to go with me."
Checking her phone, Ripley looked at the time, Karen' and Arthur's concert will end in a few hours. Matt and Diana wouldn't come back until well after tomorrow.
"Look, I'm not much of a guide, I doubt my knowledge about this place is anything to go by, are you positive your husband wanted to come here?" Ripley lowered her phone as she looked across the table to Mallory.
Mallory insisted that her husband wanted to come here. He had some memories attached and wanted to relieve them. Which Ripley asked, "Did your husband specifically come to these parts to relieve memories?"
It set off alarms in Ripley's head, someone having memories of this London, made it seem like someone ran afoul and caused issues. Mallory shook her head and assured her that, no, he didn't want to come to this London initially. He wanted to go to another version of London.
"He said he wanted to see the Big Ben and the Buckingham Palace," Mallory shrugged. "When we came here, he was just perplexed. I guess he wanted to go looking anyway. I don't know why he didn't take us back and try it again."
Ripley looked at her funny when she mentioned those two iconic landmarks. She blinked several times and shook her head. She then asked Mallory, "I don't suppose he has a name I can call him by, you know, make it easier to find him, right?"
Mallory had that smile on her face as she dreamingly looked up to the sky, she uttered his name, "He's my little Billy."
"Billy?" Ripley tilted her head at this. Mallory chuckled and told her, it was his nickname, he got it from an incident when he first met Mallory and it stuck every since.
"Okay, Billy Mallory, where are you?" Ripley murmured as she rubbed her eyes. An idea popped up and she asked, "Listen, your husband, he collect stuff?"
Mallory thoughtfully pondered and nodded. He lived on thrift stores and stalls selling old stuff, that's why he dressed eccentrically.
"Look, there's a possibility that he might've gone to some thrift stores and auction houses, I know them, maybe we can find him there?" Ripley suggested and Mallory nodded.
They stood up from their chairs and headed out of the Windsor Marketplace. Ripley hailed a cab and the two entered. She told the cabby, "Hawthorne's Knickknacks."
The cab pulled from the curb and interlinked traffic, the women looked out their windows, looking for Billy Mallory. With his eccentric outfit, he should stand out like a sore thumb, so Ripley hoped.
"You realize you're costing me money keeping my shop closed, right?" Ripley turned to Mallory. "I'm not doing this for charity, Malloy."
Mallory waved her hand and assured Ripley, the cost for finding her husband outweighed the ROI of her shop. Ripley sharply told her, "Finding a missing husband doesn't keep the lights on!"
However, Mallory insisted, and she even promised to pay Ripley back. Something Ripley didn't believe.
They arrived to Hawthorne's Knickknacks and Ripley entered the store first while Mallory followed closely behind.
"Innit you, Ripley, whatcha want now?" Hawthorne looked up from his magazine, he pushed up his square glasses and noticed Mallory behind her. "Who's she?"
Ripley sighed and responded, "Just someone looking for her husband, maybe he came through here?"
She let Mallory tell Hawthorne and Hawthorne scratched the bald spot on his head. "No, I'd remember an odd fellow like that, maybe he went to Jeffy's, if he's into that fashion, maybe he'd know."
Jeffrey's Emporium of Vintage Fashion, sounded like a place a person like Billy Malloy went to to find eccentric fashion.
Ripley thanked him and followed Mallory out the door and they hailed another cab.
The emporium, decorated oddly, stood out from its neighboring stores, with its colorful bricks that come in different colours: blue, red, and white. Two wide display windows contained mannequins of different period clothing, with Jeffrey switching them out every season. This season, late Victorian, with wide skirts and puffy hats on display on the vaguely female mannequins on the left and their male counterparts with their respected clothing on the right.
Ripley paid the fare and the two got out. She and Jeffrey knew each other through Matt, Matt sold Jeffrey the much-despised purple clothing to him when they don't get sold, so Ripley wouldn't destroy them.
If anyone knew eccentric clothing, it would be Jeffrey.
Entering the emporium, the two passed different mannequins fitted with different period clothing. It's something that Jeffrey did to showcase his wares, his emporium wasn't big enough for fitting rooms.
Sitting on his high chair, stitching a waistcoat from the late 1800s, Jeffrey whistled a tune, he hardly noticed Ripley and Mallory coming up the counter. Only when he heard Ripley, he stopped stitching the waistcoat and looked up.
"Well, well, Ms. Hates Purple, whatcha doing in mah shop?" Jeffrey asked her.
Ripley responded, "We're looking for a man, maybe you seen him?"
Jeffrey mistook her response and laughed haughtily. "You, looking for a man, has hell frozen over?" he chuckled.
Mallory raised her voice and told him they were looking for her husband and that they thought he might've come through here. Mallory told him that he stood out from the others, because of his eccentric clothing.
Jeffrey's eyes twinkled as he heard Mallory's description. He took off his magnifying glasses and nodded. He replied, "Yes, I saw a man that looked like that, my, I wished he sold me his coat, I've never seen anything like it in my 40 years of service!"
Mallory's eyes lit up in excitement as Jeffrey told them that Billy came through his store. Jeffrey practically begged for him to sell his coat. "White, well pressed, red trims, but the thread count, it's superb!" Jeffrey gushed about the coat. "He came in looking for something to wear for his upcoming trip. I've met customers who needed help, but this chap knew what he wanted because he went straight to my hat rack and picked out a hat before picking out a cane from my cane rack. Oh yes, I was impressed with his thorough history on them."
Billy bought two items, one shabby dark brown with an even darker wrap faux suede fedora and a cane with a curved hilt painted red.
"I must say, he does have an astounding sense of fashion," Jeffrey mused about Billy.
Mallory asked him, "Did he tell you where he's going?"
Jeffrey rubbed his eyes and pondered. "He mentioned wanting to buy a gift, he asked if I'd known any place that sold vintage jewelry. I suppose it's a gift for you. If there's anyone who'd known anything about vintage jewelry, it's that crone, Helga!" Jeffrey spat at the mentioned of her name, the two didn't like each other very much. Ripley never talked to Helga, she usually sold the jewelry she gets in her shop without issue, no need to bring them to Helga.
"So, your husband's going for a romantic route, then?" Ripley looked at Mallory. Mallory gushed, "My idiot, he does that."
The two thanked Jeffrey and hurried out of the shop. Mallory called for another cab and the two entered the first cab that pulled up the corner.
"I never asked, how the hell you two meet?" Ripley looked over to Mallory.
Mallory smiled dreamingly, she met her husband on one eventful adventure. It took place in a casino, on Juno, Mallory wanted to topple the house and claim the fortune stowed away in the multi trillion dollar vaults underneath. Billy wanted to topple the evils that the casino hid behind close doors, turning countless people into emotionally dead puppets that only served to play the house, unable to leave until they've died on the floors from exhaustion.
The two met and while initially they wanted to go their own ways in dealing with the house, the two reached an agreement. Mallory used her skills to destroy the labs the casino kept on premises and free the imprisoned people. Complications arose from this, causing all but one vault to flood from sewage. Mallory broke into the remaining vault, but found, it contained Billy's means of escape. He'd already gotten into the vault from the inside. The amazing thing, he'd only taken fourteen bars of iridium and sixteen gold bars for his machine, nothing else.
Not about to look a gift horse in the mouth, Mallory joined him and escaped from the casino. She didn't get her fortune that she wanted, but she got a husband out of it.
Sounding like a plot from a B-movie, Ripley wanted to cast doubt on the story, but Mallory's dreamingly smile made her change her mind. It sounded like something up Mallory's alley.
"How long have you been married?" Ripley inquired.
Amazingly, Mallory's been married for about ten years, now, but with their travels, it was hard for her to recall the years they've spent together, only that she loved every minute of it.
It was sickeningly sweet and Ripley found it too much for her taste.
The cab pulled up to Helga Augustine's Jewelry Store, decorated with finely detailed diamonds in the glass of the windows. The bricks white and pristine compared to neighboring business with cracks in the bricks and spots with broken bits.
Entering the store, the duo found Helga helping a customer pick out a necklace. She had the customer try on several types, clasps, loose, silver, gold, centerpiece, or no centerpiece, and the customer looked in the tall mirror at every one.
"Try this one," Helga encouraged the customer to try on another necklace.
Her green eyes moved to the side to catch Ripley and Mallory coming towards her.
Taking off the necklace and collecting all the necklaces, Helga told the customer that if she had any questions, she'll be at the front desk.
"You're not the type to wear jewelry," Helga points at Ripley.
Helga had a penchant of reading customers and she could tell by the outfit, mismatched dark clothing that's loose in places, that Ripley didn't give thought about some earrings, rings, or necklaces. Or have the capital to invest in one, judging from the scuffed up lacquered cane.
"But you are," Helga moved towards Mallory. She put thought in her choice of clothing and she took into consideration of her makeup. She'd be a customer without a doubt.
"Look, we're looking for someone. Oddball, wears a white coat with red trims, wearing a hat and has a cane with a red curved handle, maybe buying something for the lady?" Ripley pointed to Mallory.
Helga looked at Mallory and raised a finger. "Oh him, yes, he bought a beautiful 1896 42k gold chain with a beautifully cut topaz centerpiece surrounded by diamonds," she recalled the item he bought. "Asked if I could engrave it for him. So, I did."
Mallory seemed touch that her husband bought the necklace for her. She would've stolen something like it, but the fact he bought it for her and her only, even engraved it, was enough for her.
"Oh, I offered him a box for it, but he wanted it to use the one he brought with him," Helga recalled her offering a box for the necklace, black with cream lining, but he wanted to use a shabby box with green lining instead. He told her it was something of a… tradition, as he called it.
"A shabby box?" Ripley looked at her. Helga nodded and admitted she found it ugly, but he seemed happy about "following tradition".
"You're the expert, what tradition is that?" Ripley turned to Mallory. Mallory shrugged and said he'd always given her gifts in that box of his, something about a tradition, but he never talked much about it. She didn't mind it, though, because she liked the effort, he put into it.
"A sentimental idiot," Ripley commented.
Mallory asked Helga if he told her where he's going after this. Helga commented that he wanted to go to "the special place". She didn't know what he meant but he left before then. Ripley asked Mallory and Mallory didn't know for sure what he'd mean.
"Great, more walking," Ripley rubbed her eyes.