by Jen Turano
“I told you I make her nervous, but I don’t think she needs to be on your list of suspects. I find it difficult to believe a shy and demure young lady like Finetta would want to murder me.”
“You should never underestimate young ladies, nor should you—not that it’s really my place to mention this—subject young ladies to your company when they obviously aren’t keen to spend time with you.”
Herman gave a very un-Herman-like roll of his eyes. “I’m well aware of that, and I don’t normally foist my attention on ladies who aren’t interested in it. However, Ann told me it would soothe my grandmother’s nerves to see me speaking with Finetta, which is actually why I continued conversing with her.”
“Perhaps it’s time for you to discontinue being so solicitous of your grandmother’s tender sensibilities, especially when it doesn’t seem to me as if her nerves are nearly as troublesome as you made them out to be.”
“She repairs to her room at the slightest provocation.”
“She didn’t repair to her room today after I almost took her head off.”
“True,” Herman admitted. “Odder still is that I saw her wave off the attention Dr. James Gibbons was attempting to give her after the croquet disaster. It’s quite unlike my grandmother to ignore her physician, which I believe speaks to the state of her temper after she realized you were the one behind the unfortunate incident.”
“Does your grandmother’s physician frequently attend events your grandmother hosts?”
“Dr. Gibbons is often in my grandmother’s company and has been so since my parents perished almost twenty years ago.”
Daphne flipped to a blank page and added Dr. Gibbons’s name to it.
“Surely you don’t believe Dr. Gibbons has anything to do with the attempts on my life?”
“He can’t be ruled out until I learn more about him, especially if he has more than a professional interest in your grandmother. If that is the case, he could benefit from your demise if he were to, say, become more than Mildred’s physician.”
“The thought of my grandmother being romantically involved with anyone is not one I want to contemplate.”
It took a great deal of effort for Daphne to refrain from rolling her eyes. “Your grandmother is a very attractive lady. I’m sure Dr. Gibbons has taken note of that over the years. And while I understand it’s difficult for a grandson to think about his grandmother being romantically involved with anyone, there is the possibility that Mildred keeps Dr. Gibbons readily available for reasons other than his medical assistance.”
“I don’t believe I’m enjoying the direction this conversation is traveling.”
“Which is why it’s fortunate you’ve hired me to look into matters you’re uncomfortable with, and I can assure you I’ll be looking into Dr. Gibbons. I’ll also be looking into whether or not his solicitous behavior toward your grandmother has actually benefited the state of her nerves or harmed them.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Daphne added a note beside Dr. Gibbons’s name and looked up. “You said Mildred often repairs to her bed when she’s anxious. Her physician could very well have ulterior motives for encouraging her to retreat from the world when her nerves come into play.” She frowned. “Out of curiosity, has your grandmother always suffered from nerves?”
“Her bouts of anxiety began after the loss of my grandfather, father, and mother. Before their deaths, she didn’t suffer from nervous bouts.”
Daphne wrote that down. “Interesting. That supports the conclusion I’ve been coming to that anxiety is usually a direct result of a traumatic event—a trigger, if you will, that then turns into a chronic condition.”
“Is a traumatic event responsible for the state of your nerves?”
Daphne tilted her head. “I can’t say with any certainty because I don’t quite remember when I began suffering anxiety attacks, although I believe they started when I was about thirteen.” She pressed a hand to a stomach that had begun to churn, a frequent occurrence whenever she turned her thoughts to the origin of her anxiety. She forced a smile. “But we’re getting woefully off topic again and our time is limited, so returning to Finetta.”
“I can’t imagine there’s much left to discuss about Finetta. She’s one of the shyest ladies I’ve ever met, and I highly doubt she has what it takes to murder me.”
“She didn’t hesitate to stand up to your grandmother earlier when she didn’t want Ann to continue on with the Montague Moreland book.”
“Her voice was shaking when she voiced her concern,” Herman countered. “That implies that Finetta Shoenburger is about as likely to want me dead as Perkins does.”
“Your butler has not been ruled out as a suspect.”
“You yourself made a fairly sound argument about why the butler is rarely the villain, as did Perkins.”
“Just because he vehemently denied having murderous intentions toward you does not mean he wasn’t lying about the matter. Murderers, I’m sure you’ll agree, are very proficient with lying.”
“I’ve never actually met a murderer.”
“Something you should remedy at some point to benefit your writing career, and—” Daphne suddenly stopped talking when, from out of the corner of her eye, she saw something moving through the trees. For the briefest of seconds, she thought it might be a deer, but then she realized it was a man, and one who seemed to be holding what appeared to be a lethal-looking axe in his hand.
“We have to go,” she said, grabbing hold of Herman’s arm. She tugged him forward and broke into a trot.
“What’s wrong?” Herman demanded.
“Don’t panic, but there’s an armed man in the forest.”
“Armed with a pistol?”
“No, an axe.” Daphne slowed her pace when Cooper suddenly burst into view, dashing past them a second later, his pistol drawn.
“Keep moving,” she said when Herman began to drag his feet.
“I can’t let Cooper deal with this on his own.”
“He’s a Pinkerton. It’s what you’ve hired him to do, so let him do it,” she said, ignoring what was clearly a stitch in her side as she tugged Herman onward, gritting her teeth when he stopped moving, causing her to stop as well.
Giving his arm a yank, not that it budged him a single inch, which suggested she’d not garnered as much strength as she’d thought from Cooper’s exertion lessons, she abandoned the effort of prodding Herman forward when another man burst on the scene, running at them from a different direction.
Realizing time was of the essence, she dropped her bag to the ground, fumbling around in it until she found her derringer. With a hand that had begun shaking more than slightly, she turned the pistol on the rapidly approaching man right as Cooper dove through the air and brought the axe-wielding man to the ground.
CHAPTER
Ten
If someone had told Herman a month ago that he’d find himself being protected from his best friend, Mr. Andrew Ware, by a small wisp of a woman holding a tiny derringer, he would have told that someone they’d taken leave of their senses.
Nevertheless, here he was, in the midst of a most unusual situation, one that held a touch of melodrama, and one that was certainly going to provide him with fodder for a future story at some point.
“I could use a little assistance, Herman. If you’ve neglected to notice, there’s a man sitting on top of me.”
Shaking aside all thoughts of potential story lines, Herman turned and found his cousin, Mr. Sheldon Clarendon, lying flat on his back, Cooper sprawled on top of him.
He glanced at the abandoned axe lying three feet away from Sheldon and frowned. “I’m sure Cooper will be happy to let you up after you explain what you were trying to do with that axe.”
“I would think that needs no explanation,” Sheldon returned, peering up at Herman through brown hair that was decidedly rumpled and almost obscuring his view.
“He was trying to murder you,” Daphne said with a definit
ive nod as she kept her pistol directed at poor Andrew, whose forehead was now beaded with sweat, probably because he’d noticed that Daphne’s hand was shaking.
Andrew dashed a hand over his brow. “Sheldon wasn’t trying to murder Herman.”
“So says the man who was obviously Sheldon’s co-conspirator.”
Taking pity on poor Andrew, who was white as a ghost and seemed about ready to take a page out of Daphne’s book and suffer a fit of the vapors, Herman stepped closer to Daphne and relieved her of the pistol.
“Daphne, this is Andrew Ware, my best friend,” he began, lowering his voice. “He was the man who was acting as my coachman before Cooper took over, and I’ve told him about hiring your agency. Since he knows I have professionals on my case, it’s highly unlikely that he’s here right now with murderous intentions on his mind.”
Daphne shot a look to Sheldon, who was now in the process of arguing with Cooper about letting him up, and gestured to Herman and Andrew to follow her, moving a good twenty feet away from Sheldon before stopping. She arched a brow Herman’s way when he joined her. “Have you considered that Andrew might have volunteered as your coachman to confuse the issue of who wants you dead?”
Andrew pulled out a handkerchief and began dabbing it across his forehead. “Am I to understand that I’m now a potential suspect?”
“Given what I just witnessed, you’re now a prime suspect,” Daphne said.
Andrew stopped dabbing. “I don’t want Herman dead. I certainly wasn’t trying to attack him a few minutes ago, and I definitely didn’t try to run him over with a carriage. If you’ve forgotten, I began driving his carriage after the first two incidents. It would have been impossible for me to do that driving while trying to run him over with a different carriage the last two times his life was threatened.”
“True, but there’s no saying you’re not in cahoots with Sheldon.”
“I’m not in cahoots with anyone, but is it normal for an inquiry agent to let a suspect know they’re under investigation?” Andrew asked.
“Shh, keep your voice down,” Daphne whispered. “The last thing we need is for Sheldon to become aware that an inquiry agent is on the scene.” She blew out a breath. “As for your question, no, it’s not normal, but this is an unusual situation because Herman told you he’d hired my agency to investigate his case. With that said, don’t think for a minute, if you are behind the attempts on his life, that you’ll be getting away with it because I intend to keep a very close eye on you.”
As Andrew immediately began sputtering protests, Herman realized the situation was only going to go downhill from there, unless, of course, Sheldon had a reasonable explanation about the axe. Leaving Daphne’s side, he strode back to Sheldon, who was red in the face as he tried to wrestle his way from underneath Cooper. “I don’t think Cooper will release you until you explain the axe.”
Sheldon stilled before he sent Herman a scowl. “I’m sure if you actually stop and think about the situation, you’ll realize exactly what I was attempting to do. But since you’ve yet to do that and this Cooper gent is remarkably heavy, allow me to set the matter straight. I noticed you walking into the forest a while ago and thought I’d take the opportunity of your being away from your guests to prove to you that you’re completely wrong about that scene you’re trying to include in your latest draft. It’s not working, and the reason it’s not is because you’ve given your villain a ridiculous axe to use against the hero. And even though trying to sneak up on a person with an axe is not something I make a point of doing, I knew drastic measures were needed to get you to rethink that scene.”
“It’s not ridiculous. I’ve never used an axe as a weapon before, which means it’s a fresh twist for my latest book.”
“It would only be fresh if the axe scene worked, which it doesn’t,” Sheldon argued. “I had quite the time of it trying to steal up on you because an axe is unwieldy, as well as cumbersome. Your hero would have to be completely oblivious to his surroundings to miss an assailant trying to take him down with an axe attack. I don’t believe oblivious is a characteristic you want for your hero.”
“I didn’t hear you stealing up on me, which suggests it is possible.”
“I imagine the only reason you didn’t hear me was because you were preoccupied with that lady I saw you speaking with, which I don’t blame you for in the least considering she is”—Sheldon glanced Daphne’s way—“lovely.”
Sheldon’s gaze shifted from Daphne a second later, a scowl settling on his face as his attention sharpened on Andrew. “What are you doing here, Andrew?” he called. “When we parted ways at the house after sharing a carriage back from town, you mentioned you were off to clean up for dinner.”
Andrew stopped speaking midsentence with Daphne and immediately strode over to join them, seemingly not upset in the least to discontinue what had obviously been a bit of an argument with Daphne.
“I’m here because I thought it might be prudent to warn Herman what you were planning.”
Sheldon blinked. “Why would you want to warn him? It’s not as if it was likely I was going to take him by surprise, although I wasn’t counting on him being preoccupied with a lady, which might explain how my little experiment has now turned into a complete fiasco.”
“It could have very well turned into an even larger fiasco if you had taken him by surprise,” Andrew shot back. “Usually when a person is confronted from out of the blue with an axe, there’s every reason to believe that person is going to react. Someone could have ended up losing a limb, and wouldn’t that have put a damper on the house party?”
“He does make a good point,” Herman said. “Grandmother would be beside herself if one of us was permanently maimed. She’d probably take to her bed for a month.”
“Which is why you should have a talk with . . .” Andrew nodded at Daphne, who was strolling up to join them. “Clearly, I was intent on a noble mission, one that has now spared your grandmother’s nerves because I took it upon myself to intervene. Because of that, I definitely don’t belong on any list.”
“I’m not taking you off the list, nor should you even be talking about the list because . . .” Daphne shot a look to Sheldon, who was now looking beyond bewildered.
Andrew threw his hands up. “Fine, I won’t talk about it.” He nodded to Herman. “I’ll leave you to sort all of this out. I’m going to head back to the house because your grandmother might also feel compelled to take to her bed if all of us show up late for dinner.” With that, Andrew sent a glare to Daphne before he stalked away.
Refusing a sigh over the unexpected state of his afternoon, Herman turned back to Sheldon, who, unfortunately, was still lying on the ground, Cooper apparently less than willing to let the man loose just yet.
“You can get off him, Cooper. He wasn’t trying to harm me.”
Cooper tilted his head. “You’re really trying to write a scene where the villain is going to attack someone with an axe?”
“Why do I detect a trace of skepticism in your voice?”
“Because an axe is an unlikely weapon if there ever was one,” Cooper said as he pushed himself off Sheldon, earning a grunt from Sheldon in return. “However, I suppose the story your cousin told is genuine, which is unfortunate because—” Cooper abruptly stopped talking, winced, then strode over to the axe and picked it up.
“Why would it be unfortunate that my story is believable?” Sheldon asked. “Or better yet, who are these people?”
“Ah . . .” Herman began.
“I’m Miss Daphne Beekman, Herman’s new secretary,” Daphne said, stepping forward when Herman continued to struggle for a reply. “The man who was recently sitting on you is Cooper, the new coachman.”
Sheldon pushed himself off the ground and settled a frown not on Daphne but on Herman. “Did she just say she’s your new secretary? Given the way I saw you speaking with her before, I was under the impression that she was a guest.”
The unexpected thought su
ddenly came to mind that springing Daphne on everyone with no warning was probably not one of his brightest decisions.
Herman cleared his throat. “Daphne is my new secretary and is not a guest, although she’s certainly included in all of the events we’ve planned for the guests this week.”
“And the reason behind hiring a secretary?”
“Ah . . .” was all Herman had readily available to reply to that, his mind unusually devoid of words or reasonable explanations at the moment.
“I can type,” Daphne said, evidently realizing he was floundering. “And since Herman told me you’ve been complaining about how long your usual typing service takes, I’m sure you’ll appreciate my joining Herman’s team.”
Sheldon didn’t bother responding to that, instead cocking a brow Herman’s way. “Why didn’t you discuss it with me before hiring her?”
Unfortunately, instead of his mind providing him with a quick and logical response, all he had at his disposal was a “Hmm.”
Daphne tipped her spectacles, sent him a look that clearly stated she thought he was being less than helpful, and then returned her spectacles to their proper position and settled a smile on Sheldon. “Herman didn’t have time to discuss it with you because it was a spur of the moment decision on his part, done so because I’m in high demand and had numerous offers of employment I was considering when I made Herman’s acquaintance.”
Sheldon’s brow furrowed. “You keep addressing Herman by his given name.”
“You’re right.” She turned to Herman. “I believe it might be best if I give you a moment alone with Sheldon to explain the particulars of my employment. I’m getting the distinct impression your cousin isn’t going to be amiable to anything I may have to say about the matter. If you need me, I’ll be over on that tree stump, writing down a few notes.”