Silver Bells & Murder: A Violet Carlyle Historical Mystery

by Beth Byers

  Violet was giggling as she chased after Kate, who seemed like she was feeling better. Under the trees, snow from the branches overhead dropped down occasionally in wet splodges.

  They were both choking back laughter and then Vi hissed, “Do you think if it is a poacher that we’ll be shot for deer?”

  Violet wasn’t even wearing a coat, so she was darting through the snow in a navy blue dress. She could only hope that her dress was clearly not some sort of animal. They checked their progress against the side of the house and then darted deeper into the trees when they were able to see Nanny in the window holding baby Lionel.

  They hurried straight back, counting trees as they went. They saw the mess in the snow first. Then they saw the marks on the tree. Looking up, there was a figure in the branches.

  “Hullo there,” Kate called with that voice that had shifted from bright young thing to mother. It was quite the same tone as the one she used for little Agatha or Vivi when they tried to climb up on furniture. “Are you quite all right?”

  The person nodded rather quickly but didn’t reply.

  “Whatever are you doing here?” Violet asked. “In the snow? Aren’t you freezing?”

  Not a sound escaped the figure, and they just shook their head.

  “Do come down,” Kate tried ordering firmly, but the figure just shook their head again.

  “Do you need help?” Vi tried.

  A head shake.

  “Do you have somewhere to stay?” Kate asked.

  A nod.

  “Why are you here?” Vi asked. “Whatever reason could you have to be in the middle of nowhere in the trees?”

  Not a single answer.

  Violet sighed and then said, “We’ve been ill at the house. It’s better to stay away.”

  Vi and Kate backed up and went towards the house, but about five trees away, they paused and waited. It took a few minutes for the sound of something large dropping into the snow. Kate nodded and they hurried forward again.

  It took only seconds to dash through the snow to where they’d been, but they slid as they tried to stop and clanked into the person. Three high-pitched gasps.

  Vi met Kate’s eyes and her sister-in-law demanded, “Are you a lady?”

  “Hardly that,” the woman’s voice snapped. “Leave me be.”

  “We aren’t the ones trespassing,” Vi snapped, finally irritated. “Or lurking in the trees. Or poaching. Or whatever it is that this madness is. We’d help you if you needed it.”

  “But I don’t need it,” she said.

  “Then stop lurking in the trees here,” Violet told her. “You’re lucky we came out to look instead of coming out armed.”

  Kate pulled Violet to her feet and the two women stared at the other one. Her thick man’s coat reached her feet and the heavy boots kept her feet at least dry. Her head was covered in a knit cap as well as another hat over the top. The gloves and the scarf hid her face from them, but the crash had knocked her braids free. The braids were red and thick and looked to hold back riotous curls.

  “What madness is this?” Kate demanded.

  “No business of yours,” the woman snapped and then started backing away. “Don’t follow me.”

  “Of course we aren’t going to follow you,” Violet told her. “We’d rather just ask you to stop coming here.”

  The woman said nothing, and just spun and darted through the trees.

  “You think she has an auto on the road?”

  “I don’t know,” Kate replied. “It seemed like we were quite in the middle of nowhere when we arrived and the snow is rather deep. I don’t see how she could have an auto. Perhaps there’s some woodcutter’s cottage or some such nonsense.”

  “Or a sleigh,” Vi suggested with a laugh. “Complete with sleigh bells. Perhaps she’s one of Santa’s lurking elves, spying on us.”

  “Oh!” Kate said all of the sudden. “I fear I’m quite out of energy.”

  “Lean on me, darling,” Vi said, hooking their arms together. “I am full of vim.”

  “Vim?” Kate laughed and then glanced at Vi with pure affection. “I am so glad you’re my sister.”

  Vi grinned and then found herself tearing up. “Family wasn’t so great for Victor and I as children. The holidays were so often…” Vi shook her head. Bittersweet. Missing the idea of a mother. Missing Great Aunt Agatha if they were with their father. Missing their siblings if they were with Aunt Agatha. Always wishing that they felt as though they fully belonged somewhere. Somehow, magically, those days were gone, and Vi and Victor had found their family. Denny and Lila first. Later Jack and Beatrice. Then Ham. Kate. Rita thereafter, and finally even Smith.

  There were others they loved over the years and of course actual family had come to matter. Gerald, Isolde, and Geoffrey. Victor and Violet’s ward, Ginny. There was so much love in their lives now after so much loneliness and the feeling of drifting.

  “Not now, though?” Kate said. “Victor doesn't feel unanchored anymore. I think the girls help with that.”

  The house was in sight, and they didn’t bother to plow through the snow on the side of the building. Instead, they headed towards the unsuspecting front doors.

  Violet ignored the pointed comment from Kate and then giggled when Kate elbowed Vi in the side.

  “What?” Vi asked innocently, fluttering her lashes and then muttering, “Oh, it is cold, isn’t it?”

  They started to open the front doors and then realized the gents had locked them. Those overprotective louts, Vi thought and rang the door vigorously. The lack of coat and hat had transcended chilly to bone deep cold, and Vi crossed her fingers that Rita or Lila would open the door. The others would tell on her, and Jack would get that stressed look in his eyes that probably matched the one Violet had been carrying around while Kate and Victor had been ill.

  The door swung back slowly and Vi saw Smith. He lifted a brow and Vi wasn’t surprised to see his gaze turn calculating.

  “No,” Kate told him.

  “No?” he asked as he let them into the house. His eyes were unreadable by Vi, but Kate seemed to be without trouble.

  “No,” she repeated. “Family doesn’t torment each other. Being here means you’re family now.”

  Violet bit down on her bottom lip. In her head, that wasn’t quite true. In fact, if anything, family meant that you were the one who got to do all of the harmless tormenting. Vi tried to keep her face expressionless, but she could see that Smith had read her better than she’d have wanted.

  Their gazes met and Vi lifted her brow. Would they start a battle? She rather thought that they might be headed there. “It is Christmas,” she reminded him. That wasn’t a plea to not begin but a reminder.

  “Boxing day, then?”

  “Even New Year’s,” she suggested. “Once we’re out of this…prison.”

  “Oh Vi, you are spoilt,” Smith mocked. “This is no prison.”

  “You would know,” Kate told him. “New Year’s.” It was a command. The fighting and teasing would be placed on pause.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Smith and Vi said in unison and then laughed.

  Chapter 6

  One of them needed to make the dinner, and Vi was rather afraid they’d be eating something liked tinned beans and sardines. She sighed and ran up to her room, drawing a quick bath with lukewarm water. That didn’t heat her up, so she fed the fire in her room and then curled up in front of it, wrapped in her kimono and a blanket.

  Once she could feel her toes and her nose stopped running, she dressed quickly into thick cotton tights and her thickest dress with a cardigan over the top. She popped a turban on her hair and then ignored her rouge and lipstick to go down and help with the dinner. On her way to the stairs, she found Smith dressed and smirking. He had a look of utter satisfaction on his face. Perhaps because any sneaking he had to do with Beatrice was over now that they were married.

  “You’re getting coal for Christmas, my friend. That look declares you were certainly n
aughty.”

  “Darling, Vi,” Smith laughed and then turned and headed down the stairs. Vi glanced back and then saw Beatrice quietly exiting their bedroom.

  “Beatrice!” Vi scolded just to see if Beatrice would blush and got just that, which made Vi break into wicked laughter.

  “Am I let go for morals?”

  Vi shook her head and winked. “Do you know how to cook?”

  Beatrice’s expression turned long-suffering as she hissed, “I do not.”

  “Want to help me anyway?”

  Beatrice nodded and they made their way down to the kitchens only to stop as they found Ham and Jack at the stove. Vi pressed her fingers over her lips and watched as Ham cursed the beast of a cast iron oven.

  She had to adjust her whole hand to hold back her laughter as Jack joined the cursing and tossed the box of matches behind him. There was a tray of steaks on the counter and Vi could see that someone had scraped the peels off the potatoes.

  “What’s all this, then?” she asked and then laughed as Jack jumped.

  Ham growled, “Out!”

  “We could help,” Vi suggested carefully.

  “Smith knows how to light the oven,” Beatrice tried, but she started laughing when both of the gents shot them dark looks.

  Jack roared, “Smith!”

  “Out!” Ham repeated.

  When Vi and Beatrice burst into laughter and escaped, Violet said, “You know, we should see about an automobile. If the snow lets up, we should be able to get to the station, stay away from everyone, and then leave.”

  “Tomorrow is Christmas Eve,” Beatrice reminded Vi. “Do you think we should just wait?”

  “I don’t know,” Vi admitted. “This won’t be the holiday we were imagining.”

  Beatrice shrugged. “With all those years in service in my family, we found that celebrating the holidays when you can didn’t ruin a thing if you chose not to let it.”

  “How awful am I that I never really thought about that?” Violet asked, feeling a hard wince.

  Beatrice laughed, unbothered. “You remembered the Christmas bonus, Vi. You remembered it generously.”

  “Was that all that mattered?”

  Beatrice nodded and then grinned evilly as she added, “I did know you were spoiled.”

  Vi’s laughter brightened her moment and then she tucked her arm through Beatrice’s and admitted, “I want for nothing more than coffee. For Christmas, I want a steaming—not cup—pot. All to myself, of deep, dark, bitter coffee.”

  “Yes, well, when you have everything you want,” Beatrice mocked.

  “Having a dangerous man like Smith obsessed with you—” Vi shrugged and then said suggestively, “a lot of women would be jealous of you.”

  “And others would be uncomfortable.” Beatrice’s head cocked and she asked, “What were you and Kate doing out in the snow?”

  “Chasing our mystery woman. She was up a tree!”

  “Whatever for?”

  “I have no idea. She barely spoke. Why would anyone climb a tree in the middle of a wood in the middle of nowhere next to this beast of a house? It’s the oddest mystery.”

  “Did you tell Jack or Ham?” Beatrice asked. “You didn’t say anything to Smith. Whyever not?”

  “I was cold,” Vi admitted. “And I knew Jack would be upset. No coat when people are getting sick. Running after someone possibly dangerous. All these deaths, Beatrice. They affect us all. Jack tries to hold back the desire to wrap me in cotton wool, and I him. But—” Vi shook her head and laughed.

  She tried to make the humor sound genuine, but she didn’t pull it off. Beatrice wrapped her up in a hug.

  “I know— I know—” Beatrice rubbed Vi’s back as she fought back the horror of all the things they’d been through.

  “I didn’t want to go home for Christmas, so this is my fault, isn’t it?”

  “No,” Beatrice said, shaking her head immediately.

  But Vi shook off the comfort. “That last murder over the holidays. I didn’t want Ginny with us. Cursed as we are. I hope she’s off, traveling with her friends, having an adventure and never thinking of the madness that follows us everywhere.”

  Beatrice sighed and then they started opening doors looking for the telephone.

  “It’ll be fine here,” Beatrice said. “After all. No one is even around us except for the madwoman in the trees.”

  Vi laughed at that and then nodded. “I suppose you’re right. Here we are: no servants, surrounded by illness, snowed in, in an unfamiliar house.”

  “It’s an adventure,” Beatrice said. “We’ll be laughing over this in the years to come.”

  “Will we?” Vi shook her head and rolled her eyes. Thankfully her tone wasn’t quite as self-hating as she sounded. She admitted, “If this had been the country house, it would have been fine. Our pipes are good, we’d have all our things, we’d feel quite comfortable with the rogue in the woods because we’d be able to figure out who it was.”

  “Rather than our mystery woman? So some oddball is chasing round the wood. Perhaps the woman is a mad bird watcher.”

  Vi scoffed. “Why wouldn’t she just say so?”

  “I don’t know,” Beatrice said and then groaned, muttering low, “Where is that telephone?”

  “Not finding it is making me feel even more trapped.”

  “This house is huge,” Beatrice said, surprised at the idea of feeling imprisoned in a place so large.

  “What perturbs me is that we can’t leave. Doesn’t that bother you?”

  Beatrice shook her head with a mocking laugh. “I work from the London house and don’t travel nearly so much as you, Vi. You and the others flit about England—and the world really. I spend much of my days in the same few rooms.”

  Violet paused, considering. “I suppose it’s a little easier for you to be trapped somewhere then.”

  “I’m used to my cage,” Beatrice laughed. “Smith likes that.”

  “That you’re caged?” Vi gasped.

  “No, that I like to be home. He likes the feel of a home.”

  “Does he?” Vi demanded. “Really? That doesn’t seem—”

  “Smith-like?”

  Vi nodded.

  “He’s more complicated than his persona.” Beatrice then crowed when the telephone cord was discovered. “Here it goes.”

  Since they’d wed, Smith and Beatrice were living in an apartment in Vi and Jack’s London home, as it was quite a bit larger than Vi and Jack needed alone. Beatrice also had an office there to help manage Vi’s business interests.

  The two of them followed the cord to a small cabinet and then tried to open it.

  “Ah!” Vi exclaimed. “Why is it locked?”

  Beatrice shook off her frustration and pulled a hairpin from her hair. A moment later and an impossible to follow, nimble twist of her fingers, and the cabinet was opened.

  “Smith!” Vi whispered. “That devil is rubbing off on you.”

  “Handy, though,” Beatrice muttered back and then lifted the receiver from the telephone. She shook her head and muttered, “It’s out.”

  Vi groaned as she slumped into a nearby chair. “Where are we?”

  She glanced about only then and realized they must be in the office of the house. There weren’t sheets over the furniture in this room. Vi started to assume that whoever looked after the house must use this room, but then she noticed a pile of folded linen in the corner.

  She slowly rose and crossed to the corner, picking up a piece of the linen. “What the devil?”

  Beatrice frowned and said, “But Smith and I arrived with Ham and Rita. We haven’t used this room. Victor and Kate have been mostly sleeping since they got here.”

  They glanced at each other as they considered Denny and Lila.

  “Why would you?” Vi asked, taking it in again. It was a very business-like office. No window. A serviceable but not particularly nice desk. Overall, this house had the feel of being done over fresh in the late 188
0s, but this wasn’t even the owner’s house, so it must be a butler’s or assistant’s office. If Violet were a little meaner—or perhaps a little poorer—something like this would have been what she’d given to Beatrice when she’d shifted from maid to secretary.

  Beatrice, however, had never been just a maid or a secretary. She’d been the woman who’d helped Vi out of a tight spot, and Vi’s loyalty and love had been forever captured in that moment. Vi sighed and then said, “It feels like someone has been in here. But I can’t see it being one of us.”

  “We had better find out.”

  Vi frowned at the telephone closet and then rose and followed Beatrice from the room. They made their way back to the kitchens, but Ham and Jack were cursing at Smith who was easily cooking up the steaks on the stovetop. There was also the scent of roasting vegetables.

  “Smith can cook,” Vi whispered to Beatrice. “If this were a true survival situation, you two would be the winners.”

  Jack and Ham looked up and Vi guessed, “You two always ate out?”

  “A few sandwiches,” Ham agreed. “Bread and cheese at home.”

  “A dinner with my father,” Jack answered. “I have cooked over the fire a few times.”

  “We heated up beans during the war,” Ham added. “Those weren’t so bad.”

  “They were,” Jack told Ham. “They were horrible. The stuff of nightmares. We used to moan for a sandwich.”

  Ham shook his head as though Jack were making things up. “The beans were fine. Excellent. Sometimes I wake, dreaming of them.”

  Vi tried for an easy tone as she asked, “Has anyone spent some time in the house’s office?”

  All three gents looked at Vi and shook their heads.

  Vi nodded casually and then in explanation said, “Telephone seems to be out. Perhaps the lines are down.”

  None of them seemed bothered, so Vi’s casual tone must have been sufficient to keep them distracted. Really, Vi thought, they were some of the best investigators in the country, and none of them had been bothered by her odd question.

  Regardless, they’d be having a serious discussion about what was happening in the house after dinner. She glanced at Beatrice, whose solemn expression told Vi that her friend felt the mystery in the air as well. They’d had too many mysteries for the feeling to do anything other than make her stomach hurt.