Hers was a large corner room, with a comfortable sitting area and four chairs around a small round table, a tall wardrobe, and a huge canopied bed. The big, square, purple area rug on the floor complemented the lilac canopy and bedding. The light, canary-yellow walls had been papered with cloth in a paisley design. She touched the wall nearest her and pulled her fingers away a moment later, afraid she might damage it. Velvet paisley on top of silk.
Walking across the room to the window facing the front lawn, she realized she was in the room where she’d seen the woman—from this very window, in fact. The perspective matched completely. But where was the woman? Further, how had she gained access to a locked room unless she had a key? Ruth had told her a couple of staff members would be in and out of the house to tidy up and bring supplies, so that must have been whom she’d seen.
“Hello?” Emily called out. She walked out of her room onto the balcony. “Hello? Is anyone here? I’m Dr. Murray.” She felt stupid using her title. She walked farther, back toward the stairs. “But you can call me Emily.”
She was at the top of the stairs now and paused, listening. Had she heard footsteps, or were they her own?
Nothing.
“Hello?” she called, louder this time. The house wasn’t so big that whoever it had been couldn’t hear her—Emily was certain of this. Still, no one replied. Maybe she wasn’t supposed to be in my room, Emily thought. Maybe she’s afraid she’ll get into trouble. From the little she’d seen of her, she’d been fairly young, so maybe this was a new job for her, too.
Emily turned around and tried opening all the other doors along the balcony. The first two were locked, but the third, the one next to hers, opened easily, and she found a small, old-fashioned bathroom, likely the only one on her side of the house. Unlike her bedroom, it had clearly not been renovated, or possibly it had been kept in its original condition for the sake of preservation. A small, stained tub—no shower—and a green porcelain toilet and sink hunched together. An overhead light consisting of a harsh, uncovered bulb hung from a bare wire in the windowless room, its peeling paint a pale, sickly gray.
Considering how nicely the rest of the house had been refurbished—at least what Emily had seen so far—this room seemed out of place, strange. She hoped there was another bathroom somewhere nearby, as she couldn’t picture herself using this one except in an emergency. The thought of bathing in this creepy room—naked in that hideous little tub—made her shudder, and she closed the door behind her when she left.
Back downstairs, she decided to explore the rooms to the right of the main stairway first. She found only two doors: one a double set, the second a single close to the back of the house. The doubles led into a nicely decorated sitting room that featured a small upright piano in one corner and a sofa and chairs arranged in various configurations for group gatherings and smaller, more-intimate conversations. Two chairs near the windows faced each other across a little green card table. A well-stocked bar cart stood in a nearby corner. She saw no TV, the only type of media an old record player on a tiny wooden cabinet. The walls were covered in paintings in heavy frames, some portraits and some land and seascapes, all of which looked older, pre-Impressionist. Everything had been done in maroon and gold, with silk wallpaper behind all the paintings.
A small door connected to the only other room on this side of the stairway, and rather than go back through the foyer, Emily walked through it and into the library. It was much darker in here, the windows tiny and high. Bookshelves covered every wall and stretched from floor to ceiling. A wheeled ladder could be pushed around the room to reach the books above.
A surprisingly large, rolltop writing desk sat in the center of the room, but when Emily reached the front of it, she found it closed. She tried to open it and then pulled out her key ring again and slid the last of her keys, the small one, into the lock. It opened easily, and she rolled up the top of the desk to reveal a miracle.
Ruth had prepared her for the Lewis papers, but it was one thing to picture them and another thing entirely to see them firsthand. She found stacks of green file folders stuffed with paper covered in tight, small handwriting. There were also stacks of notebooks, the kind used in schools in the forties and fifties, and flipping one open, Emily saw that these too were filled with handwriting, covering every inch of blank paper inside. This hoard was a treasure trove—so priceless to Lewis scholarship that studies of her work would be forever changed.
She sat down on the old desk chair heavily, exhilaration making her, for a moment, feel almost faint. This project would be a huge undertaking. Despite her misgivings about Jim Peters, the other English professor that would be here this summer, she was suddenly glad he was on his way. She couldn’t possibly do this project on her own, not unless she had years to work on it.
The door swung open with such swiftness and silence, Emily wasn’t aware it was happening until it did. She had to bite her lip to stop from crying out, and she tensed, digging her fingers into the arms of the chair.
The woman who stood in the doorway was older than Emily by some twenty years, her dark hair striped with gray and piled onto her head in a loose bun. She was wearing a long skirt and a dark blouse, both fine and well-made. Emily knew instantly this wasn’t the woman she’d seen in her window. This woman was much older, her hair markedly different. The woman seemed unsurprised to see her here, and it took Emily a moment to realize she was waiting for her to say something.
“Hi?” Emily finally managed, her heart still pounding.
“Hello, Dr. Murray,” the woman said. “My apologies for being late. I didn’t anticipate that you would be here so early.”
“No problem at all.” Emily rose and held out her hand. “Please, call me Emily.”
The woman shook her hand. “I’m Mrs. Wright, the general housekeeper. Mr. Wright is the gardener. We come on Mondays and Fridays, normally, but Mrs. Bigsby asked me to be here today to greet you and show you around. I take it you’ve found your bedroom?”
“Yes. It’s lovely.”
Mrs. Wright turned without comment, and with a small gesture of her hand, she suggested that Emily follow her. Emily got up, but Mrs. Wright paused in the doorway and looked back behind them.
“You might want to lock that,” she said, pointing at the desk.
“Of course!” Emily returned to the desk and did as suggested. “Thanks.”
The woman continued without further comment, and Emily trailed her silently out of the room and back into the foyer.
“Does your assistant normally come today? On Tuesdays, I mean?” Emily asked.
Mrs. Wright paused and turned her head toward Emily, her eyebrows lowered in apparent confusion. “My assistant? You mean Mr. Wright?”
“No—the younger woman I saw earlier. In my room. Is she normally here on Tuesdays?”
Mrs. Wright turned more fully around to face Emily. “I don’t have an assistant, Dr. Murray. No one else works here.”
Chapter Four
“But you must be mistaken,” Emily said, then felt foolish. “I’m sorry. I mean it’s just that I saw her. In my room.”
“In your room? But how on earth could anyone she be in there? You’re the only one with the key besides myself and Mrs. Bigsby.”
“Well, the front door was unlocked. Maybe she has her own keys?”
Mrs. Wright’s eyebrows lowered even further. “The front door was unlocked? But that’s impossible! I locked it myself yesterday.”
Emily shrugged. “It was unlocked.”
“Was your room locked?”
“Yes.”
“What did this woman say? Did she explain why she was in your room?”
Emily hesitated. “I didn’t speak to her. I saw her from the front lawn. I waved and then she left.” She didn’t use the word “disappeared,” though that was more or less what the woman had done.
Mrs. Wright’s face cleared a little, her expression now a little knowing and skeptical. “I see. Well, perhaps y
ou were mistaken, Dr. Murray.”
“How do you mean?”
“Maybe no one was there at all. The light on those windows makes it fairly hard to see inside the house this time of day.”
Emily laughed, incredulous. “I know what I saw. And how do you explain the front door?”
Mrs. Wright sighed and shook her head. “That I have no explanation for. I’ll have to ask Mr. Wright. Maybe he came inside and forgot to lock up after himself when he left.”
“But I saw her!” Her chest felt tight—panic warring with something like anger. Her excitement was obviously making her seem ridiculous, but she was desperate to be believed.
Mrs. Wright seemed impatient now. “And what did this woman look like?”
Emily paused again. She’d seen the woman from a distance, and at an angle, but she’d had a fairly good glimpse of her head and shoulders. “She’s pale, maybe in her twenties or early thirties, with dark, long hair. She was wearing a gray shirt, I think. I couldn’t see her outfit very clearly, but it was dark and plain.”
Mrs. Wright shook her head decisively. “There’s no one like that around here, Dr. Murray. It must have been a trick of the light.” She turned again and started walking toward the set of double doors on the left side of the stairs. “Please follow me. I’ll show you around the dining room, the pantry, and the kitchen.”
Emily stood unmoving for a moment until she realized Mrs. Wright had effectively ended the conversation. Either she genuinely believed that Emily had imagined the woman in the window, or she simply didn’t want to deal with the repercussions of having, perhaps, left the door unlocked. Either way, for Mrs. Wright, the discussion was over.
“I’m sorry to hurry you, Dr. Murray,” Mrs. Wright broke in, “but as I said, this is not my usual day here, and I’m anxious to go home.”
Emily let it go for now and followed her into the dining room. The older woman closed the doors behind them, but, like the sitting room and library, the dining room wasn’t locked.
The room had a large, twelve-place table made of heavy dark wood that had long since become unfashionable. An enormous, electric chandelier hung above the center of the table, a small serving table was set up on the side, a towering grandfather clock stood in one corner of the room, and a full-length portrait topped the fireplace. Smaller paintings dotted the walls between the windows, very much like in the sitting room.
“The table’s a bit grand for regular use,” Mrs. Wright explained, “but this room hasn’t yet been fully restored. Mrs. Bigsby plans on replacing this table at a later date. As far as I understand, most people in the past, when this house was built, would have eaten their breakfast in their rooms. This room would have been used only for supper.”
“Do you know much about that time period? For the house, I mean? What the family was like back then?”
Mrs. Wright shook her head. “I’m not aware of the history, I’m afraid. I’m not from around here. My husband and I were hired long after the writer lady died.”
“And no one in town talks about the house?”
Mrs. Wright’s eyes darted away from hers. “No one says anything about this place, Dr. Murray. They wouldn’t know.” She looked strangely guilty.
Emily opened her mouth with a follow-up question, but Mrs. Wright had already turned and was walking toward a door to the right.
“The dining room connects through the pantry into the kitchen. Mr. Wright and I will keep you stocked with basic foods here and in the icebox in the kitchen. If you require anything else, simply let one of us know, and we’ll bring it when we return. Of course, you can always pick things up in town yourself if you prefer. I don’t do any cooking, and all of you will have to keep the kitchen somewhat tidy. I can do only so much, coming twice a week.”
The pantry lay off to the left of the little connecting hallway between the kitchen and dining room. Given the tall ceilings in the house, it too required a ladder to access its various baking, boxed, canned goods, and bread. They walked farther, into the kitchen, which, while clearly updated in the last century, was still old and dark—the kind of room the people who actually lived here would likely have never frequented. The dark-slate floor sloped slightly toward a drain in the center of the room. She noticed a large butcher-block table, an old fridge, an even older gas oven, and no microwave. Two new appliances sat on the counter: a coffeemaker and a toaster.
“Dishes are in those cupboards there,” Mrs. Wright pointed, “silverware in the drawers below.” She walked toward a small back door that led outside and waited until Emily approached. “Your key to the front door also unlocks this one. You’ll find the garage in the back of the house, where you can put your car.”
About fifty feet away from the back door, Emily saw an old carriage house with three doors that had been converted to allow entry for cars. With six visitors planned this summer, Emily couldn’t imagine how they would all fit.
Mrs. Wright turned around. “Past the gardens, you’ll see the path to the greenhouse and the pool. The main house key also opens those locks. I can take you out there if you like.” She said this last part with a clear note of reluctance, and Emily had to bite her tongue to keep from laughing. This woman didn’t hide how she felt about things.
“That’s fine, Mrs. Wright. I’m sure I can find it on my own. It all seems very straightforward. Thanks for the tour.”
Mrs. Wright indicated the third doorway in the kitchen before she walked through it. It led back into the main foyer, and they walked together to the foot of the stairs. Mrs. Wright pointed at the third, middle door to the left of the stairs. “You’ll find a small powder room there.”
Remembering the grim bathroom by her bedroom, Emily asked, “Where are the other bathrooms?”
“Two are on your floor, one on each side of the stairs. There is also one in the attic, but it’s not in very good shape.”
“There’s an attic?”
“Yes. You can access it on the men’s side of the house. But I wouldn’t recommend going up there, especially alone.”
“Is it unsafe?”
Mrs. Wright seemed momentarily confused and shook her head. “No—I wouldn’t say that. Dirty, but not unsafe. It hasn’t been renovated yet, and it’s full of a lot of the old furniture and fixtures from the rest of the house from over the years. No one goes up there.”
“I see.”
Mrs. Wright paused and then moved toward the front door. “Well, I’ll be off then. I trust that you can give the others the same tour should anyone arrive before Friday, when I’m back. I collect laundry on Fridays and return it on Monday. You’ll find a laundry bag in your wardrobe.”
Mrs. Wright’s hand was on the front doorknob when Emily said, “Wait.” The woman turned toward her with a look of wariness. “I did see someone in my window, Mrs. Wright. In my bedroom. I didn’t imagine her.”
Mrs. Wright shook her head, her face pinched with impatience. “It’s impossible, Dr. Murray. No one else is here.”
“She was here.”
Mrs. Wright shook her head again and left, closing the door behind her with more force than necessary. Emily assumed she was angry with the implications of this mystery woman. It meant that she’d been neglectful and left the door unlocked. But Emily could give a damn about that. Someone had been here and left. Or, worse, someone was still here. Hiding.
She shuddered and rubbed her arms to dismiss the goose bumps on them. She was not a superstitious person, had never believed in anything like ghosts or spirits, but she did have an acute phobia of being watched or listened to without her knowledge. And, now that she was alone, she couldn’t stop that feeling from creeping over her, a tingling suggestion that someone stood just behind her, staring at her back.
“Get it together, Murray,” she told herself. Whomever she’d seen would eventually appear and explain herself.
All of these closed doors didn’t help matters. Anything—or anyone—could be behind them. And they blocked the light. She opened
the two sets of double doors—those into the dining and sitting rooms, and the effect was immediate. The feeling of being watched disappeared, and the light was much better. Both rooms had seemed a little stuffy, as well, so this would help air them out.
“That’s better,” she told the rooms.
She decided to get her luggage and then park her car in the garage. She at least had the benefit of not worrying about parking since she was here first. She grabbed her small suitcase and laptop from her trunk, put them inside the main door, and then drove over to the garage. The door rose from the ground and was difficult to hoist it on her own, but she managed. Her car barely fit inside the tiny stall, and she had to turn sideways to scoot around it and back outside. Anyone with a larger car would be out of luck, anyway. She closed the garage door and walked around to the front of the house again to get her bags.
She was halfway up the stairs, luggage in either hand, when she stopped, her heart seizing. For a moment, she stood there, frozen. An icy sweat broke out on her arms and neck, and she hunched over as if to protect herself. Slowly, moving a fraction of an inch at a time, she turned her head and peered back down into the foyer below her, afraid to see what her brain had registered a few seconds late.
The doors to the sitting and dining rooms were closed.
Chapter Five
Juniper Friend made a mean G&T, just the way Emily liked it. The flavor of the tonic was there, but not overwhelming, the strength of the drink relying entirely on gin and lime. She’d also added the right amount of ice, neither too much nor too little. Normally, when Emily ordered this cocktail in a bar, she prepared herself to be disappointed, but this one was better than any she could have made herself.
Juniper raised her eyebrows. “Is it good?”
Emily almost made a joke linking Juniper with gin, but she stopped herself. “Mmmm. Perfect.”
Juniper responded with a wide smile, dazzling on her pretty features. This type of woman usually intimidated Emily—classically pretty, effortlessly graceful, tall and athletic. She had high cheekbones, creamy café-au-lait skin, dark eyes, and thick, enviable eyebrows and lashes. She dressed well, looking every bit like a woman cast as an art historian in film. But instead of making her nervous, Juniper had managed to put Emily immediately at ease. In the hour she’d been here, she already seemed like an old friend. She was intimate without being probing, nice without seeming phony. In a word, like her name, friendly. This smile, however, was disarming, and Emily’s face heated. She looked away.
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