“You don’t have to convince me,” said Catchpole. “I’ve been told that you’re who you say you are, but what about the other two? Who are they? No one seems to know.”
I kept my expression carefully neutral as I silently reviewed Catchpole’s comments. As far as I could tell, there was no one else in the cottage, and I seriously doubted that anyone who knew me had dropped in for a spot of tea and gossip in the midst of the blizzard. Was the old man hearing voices—the kind no one else could hear?
“Who told you about me?” I asked cautiously.
“Miss Gibbs’s personal assistant,” he replied. “Rang her on my mobile this morning. She vouched for you, but she’d never heard of the other two.”
“You have a mobile phone,” I said, with a sigh of relief.
“ ’Course I do. Have to report in to Miss Gibbs, don’t I? Tell her how the work is coming on, how the chars are doing, what supplies I need. Besides, Miss Gibbs didn’t think I should be out here on my own without one. Something to do with insurance.” He shrugged, as if dismissing the foolish concerns of the modern world, then leaned forward and returned to his original point. “It’s not you I’m worried about, Lori. It’s Mr. Macrae and Miss Walker.”
“Why?” I asked, wondering what had rekindled the old man’s paranoia.
“I told the three of you not to wander,” he reminded me. “So I was a bit put out when I saw a light moving around inside the abbey last night.”
“It was probably me and Jamie,” I said. “I’m sorry. I know you wanted us to stay in our rooms, but it was too early to go to bed, so we spent an hour or so in the library, sitting and talking. Or you may have seen Wendy’s light. She was roaming around for a while, looking for extra blankets, but she ended up in the library, too.”
“The light I saw wasn’t in the library,” Catchpole intoned. “It was in the attics.”
“The attics?” I repeated, frowning. “You saw a light moving in the attics?”
“The attics take up the whole of the top floor,” Catchpole said. “And someone was up there last night.”
I sat in silence while my mind went into overdrive. Neither Jamie nor I had wandered from our assigned floor the night before, but I couldn’t be sure about Wendy. She’d arrived at the library long after I’d found Jamie there. If she’d spent the intervening time looking for blankets in the attics, she hadn’t mentioned it to me.
“How do you get up to the top floor?” I asked.
“There’s a panel in the wall at the head of the main staircase,” said Catchpole. “Push on it and it pops open. You’ll find the attic stairs behind it.”
I nodded decisively. “Leave it with me. I’ll find out who went up those stairs and why. I’m sure there’s a perfectly innocent explanation.”
“Going to question those two? Those two we know nothing about? What if you find out that they aren’t so innocent?” Catchpole sat back in the rocker and regarded me shrewdly. “Have a care, Lori. You know how it is with cornered beasts. As often as not, they go for your throat.”
Eleven
My second crossing of Ladythorne’s arctic tundra wasn’t as onerous as the first had been. I’d already broken a path through the worst of the drifts, and I was energized by a vision of the dry trousers awaiting me in my wardrobe at journey’s end. Even so, I was extremely pleased to finally reach the courtyard door, brush snow from the big blue parka, and let myself into the warm kitchen.
I smiled when I saw Jamie. He was dozing in a Windsor chair he’d drawn close to the range, his chin on his chest, a book open in his lap. My overtired protector had evidently decided that his need for a comfortable bed was less pressing than his desire to witness my safe return. I was touched by his noble sacrifice and tried to cross the kitchen without waking him, but my attempt to tiptoe quietly in hiking boots proved to be an exercise in futility.
Jamie sat up, blinking, then rubbed his eyes and gave me a stern look.
“I was about to send out the dogs,” he informed me, and tapped his watch like a disapproving father. “It’s past noon. You’ve been gone for three hours.”
“You think it’s a stroll in the park out there?” I retorted. “It must’ve taken me the better part of forty-five minutes to get to the cottage, and coming back wasn’t a cakewalk, either.” I shook the snow from my cap and gloves, piled them atop my jacket, hung the parka on the back of a chair to dry, and crossed to stand before Jamie, adding contritely, “But I’m sorry if I worried you. Truly, I am. It was good of you to wait for me.”
“Yes, well . . .” Jamie grumbled. “Just don’t let it happen again.” He closed the book and ran a hand over his face, as if he were still trying to wake up. “Did you find Catchpole?”
“I found him, and he’s safe and sound, thank goodness.” I turned to hold my cold hands over the range. “I don’t know how he managed it. You could lose a small town in some of those drifts. He must be as tough as an old tree root.”
“Was he happy to see you?” Jamie asked.
“I think he was more surprised than anything,” I replied. “He gave me a cup of tea, though, and a chance to catch my breath.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” said Jamie. “I expected him to greet you with an angry shout and a waving fist. A cup of tea is much more civilized. What’s his place like?”
“Homey,” I said and left it at that. I felt I’d been given a privileged glimpse into Catchpole’s private domain; to discuss it with Jamie seemed uncomfortably close to betraying a confidence. “What are you reading?”
“It’s a book I found in the library.” Jamie held the calf-bound volume out for my inspection. “It’s about the Franklin Expedition.”
My eyebrows rose. “You’re reading about Sir John Franklin?” I said. “The arctic explorer?”
“The breadth of your knowledge leaves me speechless,” Jamie declared.
“I could say the same about your choice of reading matter,” I said. “You should be reading about sun-drenched beaches in Tahiti, not about an expedition that lost its way in the frozen wastes and was never seen again.” I clucked my tongue. “No wonder you were fretting about me.”
“Perhaps you’d help me chose a new title?” Jamie suggested. “I’m up for another visit to the lib—” He broke off midsyllable as Wendy came bustling in from the service corridor. “Hello, stranger,” he said brightly. “Have you finished laying out a new route for your hiking trip?”
“Not yet,” Wendy replied.
She was wearing a pair of loose black leggings and the pale-gray hand-knit sweater she’d worn the day before. She’d used a tortoiseshell clip to hold her long gray hair in place at the nape of her neck, and she’d swapped her heavy hiking boots for a pair of soft-soled slipper socks.
“You’ve been drudging away up there all morning,” Jamie teased. “What’s taking so long?”
“There are more options than I’d anticipated,” said Wendy. “It’d help if I had a master map, but I can’t find mine. I must have left it at home.”
“What a shame,” I said, though inside I was crowing. There was nothing more galling to a member of the map-and-compass crowd than the discovery that an essential map had gone astray. It forced them to contemplate the humiliating and terrifying prospect of getting lost.
Wendy must have detected an undertone of insincerity in my voice because she gave me a jaundiced look and subjected my snow-soaked jeans to a prolonged up-and-down stare.
“What have you been doing?” she asked. “Rolling around outside? Aren’t you a little old to be playing in the snow?”
I bristled and was on the verge of a snippy comeback when Jamie stepped in.
“Lori’s been on a mission of mercy, to confirm that Catchpole survived his journey home last night,” he said. “She’s been to his cottage and back, a feat the great Sir John Franklin himself would have lauded.”
“Better you than me.” Wendy dismissed me with a contemptuous glance and turned back to Jamie. “I’m hungry. A
re you ready for lunch?”
“I’m sure we all are,” Jamie said pointedly.
“I’ll see what I can find in the larder,” Wendy said, and went back into the service corridor.
I waited until she was out of earshot to murmur thoughtfully, “Do you think she’d be very upset if all of her maps went missing? It could be arranged.”
“Never mind,” said Jamie, laughing. “Go up and change out of those wet clothes. We’ll have a pot of soup simmering on the range when you come down.”
I smiled ruefully, collected my gear, and set out for my room. I heard Wendy rummaging in the larder as I passed, but didn’t pause to look in. The less contact I had with her, I told myself, the better.
I was certain that she was responsible for Catchpole’s mysterious light in the attics, and I didn’t have many doubts about what she’d been doing up there. It was a long way to go for extra blankets, I reasoned, but a great place to search for something valuable to steal. How often did anyone inventory the odds and ends stashed in an attic? Ladythorne’s were probably filled to the brim with priceless knickknacks. It would be ages before anyone noticed that some of them were missing.
They’d have to be small items, of course, small enough to be carried in a backpack, but I could think of dozens of portable treasures the DeClerke family might have accumulated over the years: snuff boxes, tankards, candlesticks, carriage clocks—the possibilities were endless.
I’d decided on the way back from Catchpole’s cottage to keep my thoughts to myself until I’d had a chance to explore the attics on my own. Jamie had pooh-poohed my earlier misgivings as an oversensitive response to Ladythorne’s eerie atmosphere. I wanted to have something concrete to show him this time—a recognizable boot print in the dust, perhaps, or a jimmied lock bearing the telltale scars of a short-handled pry bar. If I could prove to Jamie that Wendy had been sneaking around behind our backs, he’d have to take me seriously. He might even be willing to help me keep an eye on her.
I entered my bedroom, called a cheery hello to Reginald, and piled my jacket, hat, and gloves on the slipper chair. The room had grown chilly in my absence, so I dumped the rest of the coal on the fire and placed the empty scuttle near the door, making a mental note to take it downstairs for a refill.
The wardrobe yielded a lovely pair of charcoal-gray gabardine trousers as well as a pair of doeskin bedroom slippers I’d overlooked the night before. The slippers were a bit loose and the trousers a bit long, but an extra pair of socks solved the first problem, and rolled-up cuffs solved the second.
To avoid a third, and more distressing, problem, I opened the blue journal and said, “Dimity?”
The familiar copperplate unfurled steadily across the blank page. Good afternoon,Lori. I trust you slept well?
“Never better,” I said, perching on the edge of the bed. “And I’ve had a very eventful morning. I went out to the old caretaker’s cottage to check up on him, and guess what he told me.”
I can’t begin to imagine.
“He told me he saw a light in the attics last night,” I said. “It wasn’t me or Jamie—we were in the library. So it must have been Wendy’s light he saw.”
Ah, yes, the famous—or should I say infamous?—Wendy. I’ve been waiting to hear about her. There was a note of disapproval in your tone when you mentioned her last night. Am I to understand that she’s unlikely to become a close friend?
“She’s a smart-mouth,” I said bluntly. “She can’t resist the urge to needle me. And she’s one of those impossible, good-at-everything people who make me feel like I have six thumbs and half a brain, which I wouldn’t mind so much if she weren’t so smug about it.”
Smug, rude, and good at everything. How perfectly odious.
“It’s okay,” I said. “I’ve found a way to pay her back.”
Do tell.
“I’m going to prove that she pilfered something from the attics,” I said. “I’m going up there after lunch to look for evidence.”
How exciting! And if you find no evidence?
I made a wry face. “Then I’ll just have to short sheet her bed. Wish me luck?”
All the luck in the world, my dear. I’m glad you’re keeping busy.
“Never a dull moment,” I said. “Talk to you later.”
I look forward to it.
I returned the journal to the beside table, draped my wet jeans over the back of the chair at the writing table, and left the room, coal scuttle in hand.
As I descended the main staircase I realized that my stomach felt as empty as the scuttle, and was forced to admit that Wendy Walker had at least one redeeming trait—if breakfast was any indication, she was a dab hand at foraging for food.
Wendy exceeded my wildest expectations by producing a paella for lunch. It was a camper’s pared-down version of the dish, made with canned and packaged ingredients scrounged from the larder, but it was delicious nonetheless, flavorful and very filling. Jamie’s halfhearted offer to reheat the remains of Catchpole’s apricot compote brought forth groans and a suggestion that we save it for after dinner.
“I didn’t think you two cared for the compote,” I commented, as we cleared the table. “Neither of you ate more than a spoonful of it yesterday.”
“Do you always keep track of how much people eat?” Wendy asked.
“I was concerned for you.” I gave her a sly glance. “I thought you might have been upset by Catchpole’s story about Miss DeClerke’s bloodthirsty ghost. You looked startled when he mentioned it—afraid, almost.”
“I haven’t been afraid of ghosts since I was a child,” said Wendy. “And even then I kept a baseball bat under the bed to deal with them.”
“I liked the compote,” Jamie put in, “but by the time Catchpole served it, I’d filled up on the risotto.”
“You didn’t eat much of the risotto, either,” I pointed out.
“I’d already had more than my share of your picnic lunch,” Jamie reminded me. “The cranberry muffins were nearly as big as my head.” He rinsed the last dish, put it in the drying rack, and dried his hands on the tea towel. “What shall we do with the rest of the day? I believe you and I were going to the library, Lori, to find a book on sun-drenched beaches. Care to join us, Wendy?”
“No, thanks,” she said. “I’m going to have a bath, followed by a long nap.”
“A nap sounds good to me, too,” I chimed in, avoiding Jamie’s eyes. “Sorry, Jamie, but my polar expedition seems to be catching up with me.”
“Thank heavens.” Jamie drooped weakly against the sink. “I was hoping for a lie-down this afternoon, but I didn’t want to disappoint you.”
“I’m not disappointed,” I told him. “And you need the sleep. The silence kept him awake last night,” I explained to Wendy, “but instead of going back to bed this morning, he sat up in the kitchen, waiting for me to come back from Catchpole’s.”
“Like a baby-sitter,” Wendy said, and the accompanying snigger seemed to imply that I needed one. “I’ll probably skip dinner,” she added, heading for the service corridor, “so don’t bother to come and get me.”
“Won’t you be hungry again by then?” Jamie called after her.
“I’ve got plenty of snacks in my backpack,” she replied. “They’ll hold me until breakfast.”
“I hope she chokes on them,” I snapped the moment she disappeared. “A baby-sitter . . .” I huffed angrily. “She just can’t keep her snotty comments to herself.”
Jamie shrugged. “Not everyone has your sweet nature, Lori.”
“Sweet? Me? Hardly,” I said, blushing. “But at least I don’t fling insults into the air every chance I get. What’s up with her, anyway? She was nice enough to me when we first got here, but she’s been a brat ever since.” I fell silent, caught my lower lip between my teeth, and looked thoughtfully at Jamie’s soulful eyes and attractively tousled hair. “Maybe it’s you. Maybe she’s showing off in front of you—trying to make me look bad so she’ll look better. So
me women can turn awfully catty when a good-looking man’s thrown into the mix.”
“Nonsense,” said Jamie. “If you ask me, she’s simply frustrated because her trip was interrupted.”
“If you ask me, she’s a pain in the patoot,” I muttered heatedly.
“Don’t get yourself so worked up over her. You’ll ruin your nap.” Jamie pointed to my empty coal scuttle and took me by the hand. “Come on, Lori. We’ll find the coal hole, refill your scuttle, and go upstairs together, thinking happy thoughts.”
The image of Wendy Walker behind bars in a high-security prison brought a grim smile to my lips, but I said nothing of it to Jamie. It didn’t strike me as the sort of happy thought he’d had in mind.
Twelve
Jamie insisted on carrying the heavy scuttle up to my room for me. He told me to knock on his door when I’d finished my nap, so we could keep our library date, then went to his own room to catch up on the sleep he’d missed the night before. I was fairly sure he’d be out like a light in under five minutes, but I waited fifteen before putting my head into the corridor.
The sound of running water drifted to me from the bathroom. When it stopped, I waited another few minutes to give Wendy time to make herself comfortable in the tub, then switched on my small flashlight and retraced my steps to the head of the main staircase, confident that no one would hear the faint whisper of my doeskin slippers brushing against the thick maroon carpet.
When I reached the stairs, I stood with my back to them, walked straight toward the opposite wall, and pressed a palm against the linenfold paneling. I had to jump out of the way when a spring-loaded door swung silently outward, revealing the landing of a broad, gray-carpeted staircase with a plain wooden handrail and whitewashed walls. The stairs appeared to go down to the ground floor as well as up to the attics.
“Servants’ stairs,” I murmured, and remembered Catchpole telling me that he’d used the back way to show the others to their rooms. Wendy had probably taken note of the hidden door then and used it later to gain access to the staircase, hoping it would lead her to a burglar’s paradise.
Aunt Dimity: Snowbound Page 10