Murder at Marble House (A Gilded Newport Mystery)

by Alyssa Maxwell

  “Suit yourself.” Dobbs headed for the door.

  Jesse handed the murder weapon back to the policeman who had brought it in. “Bring this back to the station. I’ll be along later.”

  “How you gonna get back, sir?”

  Jesse glanced at me, and I nodded. “I’ll get back,” he told the officer. Then he nodded at Lady Amelia, bid Aunt Alva good day, glanced at me and gestured toward the door. “Emma, would you mind?”

  We walked back out to the pavilion together.

  “What do you hope to find?” I asked once we’d cleared the terrace steps. I felt eyes on our backs. Aunt Alva’s, no doubt, but I judged that we had gone beyond her hearing.

  “I’m not sure. Maybe nothing. But I want you there all the same.”

  I couldn’t help smiling and uttering a quiet, “Thank you.”

  “This doesn’t mean I want you getting involved. Not in any active way. But . . .” He sighed. “I can’t deny that you’ve got the instincts of a real detective, Emma.”

  “Not to mention the brains?” I couldn’t resist adding.

  He nodded. “Yes, the brains, too. Absolutely.”

  The pavilion came into view through the hedges and my steps began to drag. Jesse stopped a few feet ahead of me and looked back. He studied me a moment before saying, “I’m sorry, Emma. What was I thinking? You shouldn’t be out here.”

  “No . . . no, it’s all right.” I drew a deep breath and strode to where he waited for me. “I want to help. I have to, Jesse.”

  He smiled grimly. “Aunt Sadie?”

  “In a way. She taught me to care about them. About everyone who has no voice. Girls like Clara. Like Katie, who used to work for my uncle Cornelius and lives with me now.”

  “You really think Clara’s innocent?” We’d resumed walking again, side by side. Jesse offered me his arm, and I slipped my hand into the crook of his elbow. We continued in companionable silence until we reached the pavilion steps.

  At the top, I answered his question. “I don’t know for sure. It’s just a feeling I have. When I look at her, with that delicate frame and those huge eyes of hers, I just don’t see a murderer. Do you?”

  “Oh, Emma, murderers look like all kinds of people. If recent events have taught you anything, it should be that.”

  He referred to the case I’d helped solve, the murder my own brother had been accused of committing. In the end, the guilty party had been someone I’d never have suspected if I’d lived a thousand years. And yet, looking back, there had been signs....

  I turned away from him to glance around the pavilion. The card table still occupied the space at the center of the floor, and the crystal ball caught the rays of sunlight slanting beneath the roof and sent them dancing on the ceiling, floor, and columns. The coins had been scooped up, the cards removed. A light scent of incense, though long extinguished, still permeated the air. Better that than the scent of death, I thought morbidly.

  I walked farther in, then stopped and turned. “So, what are we looking for that we haven’t already noted?”

  Jesse strode past me, circled the card table, and went to the far railing. He turned and stared at the pavilion entrance, then shifted his gaze closer, to the table. “Madame Devereaux sat there, waiting for Mrs. Vanderbilt and her guests. Tell me exactly what you saw, and what you think might have happened, Emma.”

  “Well . . .” I studied the table for a moment, picturing the scene as it had been earlier. “Actually, Madame Devereaux might not have been sitting and waiting. It makes more sense that she was busy preparing. Lighting the candles, the incense, placing everything just so. The scene was set when we arrived.”

  Jesse nodded. “Go on.”

  “If she sat, my guess is it was because someone had come asking about their future.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because of the cards and the coins. It looked as if she’d been in the middle of reading a fortune. And because . . .” I fell silent, trying to put my finger on why Madame Devereaux hadn’t been surprised by her killer. Finally, it hit me. “The tablecloth. It wasn’t askew or rumpled. It was just as it is now, except that Madame Devereaux had fallen over facedown on it. As if someone had placed her gently down.”

  “Someone who’d been standing behind her, perhaps?”

  “Exactly.”

  “As you found Clara.” This was not a question, but a statement of fact.

  My shoulders slumped. “Yes, but . . .”

  “Let’s think this through.” Jesse moved to stand behind the chair, just where Clara had. “Now, supposing you’ve just strangled the woman, and you hear someone coming. What would you do?”

  His expression held knowledge of the answer, yet he waited for my hypothesis. I studied the artfully winding path leading from the gardens to the pavilion. I realized with a start that although the shadowy interior of the pavilion wouldn’t be visible from the upper gardens because of the foliage, it was possible from this raised vantage point to catch flashes of anyone on their way down the path. If Clara had come from the house, her white pinafore and cap would have stood out against the greenery, visible to the killer in a succession of glimpses at each break in the hedges.

  “He saw her coming,” I murmured. Then, louder, I said, “He—or she—saw Clara coming down the path and made his escape.”

  Jesse was nodding. “My guess is our culprit went over the railing directly behind Madame Devereaux’s chair, and then ran between the azalea hedges and through those trees.” He pointed to a stand of dogwoods and graceful willows. He beckoned me beside him. “My colleagues have already noted the broken branches in the hedge. See?”

  I went to the railing and peered out over the shady vista. The growth Jesse indicated stood twisted to awkward angles among the perfectly trimmed hedge, as if forcefully shoved aside and then allowed to fall haphazardly and brokenly back into place. “Did they find any torn fabric, or even threads, in the branches?”

  “Unfortunately not,” he replied. “Which in itself provides a clue. It tells us the person was wearing sturdy clothing.”

  “Not delicate silk or muslin,” I said. “The footsteps Clara heard . . . By the time she reached the pavilion, he was well away, and Clara was too distraught over what she found to give those footsteps another thought.”

  I turned back to Jesse, reaching back to clutch the railing behind me. “The question is why?”

  “Why was Madame Devereaux murdered?” Jesse sent me a warning glance. “Mind you, Emma, this is all speculation. We could be dead wrong, and Clara is guilty as sin.”

  “I doubt that very much. What reason could Clara Parker have to murder anyone? What would her motive be?”

  “Fortune-tellers make enemies all the time. Clara might simply have managed to make it to the front of a long line of people waiting to wring Ellen Deere’s neck.”

  “Ellen Deere! I heard that name spoken once before today. Mrs. Stanford said it when Madame Devereaux first arrived.” The earlier incident flashed in my mind. “For an instant she looked furious . . . and so did Madame Devereaux, for that matter. But it was quick, and at the time I thought maybe I’d imagined it. Now, however . . . well. It certainly makes one think.”

  “Mrs. Stanford, you say?” When I nodded, Jesse raised his eyebrows. “Looks like I’ll have to question Hope Stanford again, won’t I?”

  “Jesse . . .” I pushed away from the railing. “Did you know her?”

  “The medium?” He looked down at his feet, smiling slightly. “Yes, I knew her. All of us on the force did, like we know all of Newport’s more interesting entrepreneurs. She came down from Providence about two years ago—”

  “Mrs. Stanford is from Providence,” I said quickly.

  “Yes, I know, Emma. That doesn’t make her a murderer.”

  “Maybe not. But someone committed a murder here today, and I’d bet my best hatpin it wasn’t Clara Parker.”

  Chapter 5

  Jesse and I returned to the house,
where he instructed Aunt Alva’s guests not to leave Newport until further notice.

  “Good heavens, are we suspects?” Roberta Spooner reached for her sister’s hand and the two women drew together as though against a common enemy. Even Jesse’s reassurances didn’t smooth the alarm from their brows.

  “No, no, it’s merely a precaution, ladies. I might have more questions for you. But if you wish, the two of you may return to your own home.”

  “But you said not to leave Newport,” the shorter, frailer-looking Edwina said. “And Sister and I live in Portsmouth. Though I must admit, it would be ever so comfortable to be amongst our own things. Not that it hasn’t been splendid staying at Marble House, mind you,” she added hastily with a startled glance at Aunt Alva. “Then again, perhaps splendid isn’t quite the proper term under the circumstances.”

  “Oh, Edwina.” Roberta slipped an arm around her sister’s waist. “I’m sure Detective Whyte meant we’re not to leave the island. Since Portsmouth is on the island, our going home shouldn’t pose a problem. Isn’t that correct, Mr. Whyte?”

  Jesse seemed to be fighting a grin. “Quite right, ladies. We’ll know where to find you if we have further questions for you.”

  Hope Stanford brushed off the sisters’ concerns. “I for one have no intentions of running off. I’ve got important business in Newport and I’m not about to let a little thing like a murder deter me one bit.”

  A little thing like a murder? I bit my tongue to keep from retorting. Instead, I said, “I’ll drive you back to town now, if you like, Jesse.”

  Downstairs in the main hall, he drew me aside, out of the hearing of the footman attending the front door. The ladies had all retired to their guest rooms. I assumed Aunt Alva had likewise gone to her room, or perhaps she was with Consuelo. The house had grown quiet, and Jesse spoke just above a whisper. “Would you mind if I borrowed your carriage to get back to town? I can have it returned to you in an hour or two.”

  “Well, yes, but why go to the trouble of having someone return it when I can take you?”

  “Because I want you to stay here, Emma.” His voice dropped lower. The clinking of someone putting away china in the serving pantry drifted from across the large expanse of the dining room. The footman standing by the door looked straight ahead. We might have been invisible for all he registered our presence, but for a slight pricking of his ears.

  Jesse ran a hand through his bright auburn hair and flicked a glance to the top of the staircase. “I’d like you to talk to your cousin and ask her the questions I can’t. Would you do that, Emma?”

  I couldn’t help chuckling. “Do you really think I have more authority over my aunt than you do? After all, you have the law on your side.”

  “Challenging Alva Vanderbilt is not worth the trouble that would inevitably follow. But you’re Miss Vanderbilt’s friend as well as her cousin. Will you please talk to her for me, and let me know what she says?”

  The word friend pricked my conscience, but I said, “Of course I will. I’ll go up and see her now, and I’ll call you later from home if there’s anything you need to know.” I grinned. “That’s if I’m allowed to go home. I’m not under house arrest here, am I?”

  “As if you would stay put if you were.” He smiled ruefully, then took my hand. “Thank you, Emma.”

  “You’re welcome. I’ll talk to you later.”

  He nodded and continued holding my hand a moment too long, long enough to become more than a friendly gesture. This wasn’t the first time he’d made such an overture, albeit a subtle one, and now, as then, a sense of awkwardness flooded me. Gently I slid my hand free, careful to keep a smile on my face as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred. As if I hadn’t just glimpsed a bit of Jesse Whyte’s heart.

  Despite an age difference of some dozen years, he and I would surely have made sense—so much more sense than Derrick Andrews and I ever could. Not only were we both Newporters born and bred, we hailed from the same Point community, whose inhabitants were probably the saltiest and most straightforward of all Newporters. He and I understood each other....

  Jesse was my father’s friend as well as Brady’s, and to me he’d always been like an older brother. Could there be more between us? Suddenly his image faded in my mind’s eye while another formed, Jesse’s straight auburn hair darkening to wavy brown, his boyish features strengthening to a square jaw and chiseled profile.

  Derrick. Had it been only that morning I’d sent him packing, as they say? After all that had happened in the hours since, it seemed like years ago. Yet it was too soon—far too soon to even consider another. Jesse was my friend, and I was grateful for that friendship, but for now, at least, there could not be more.

  As if he read my thoughts, his smile turned wistful, then sad. He left and the footman closed the door behind him. The servant was new to the household and I didn’t know his name; but even if I had, my throat had closed and my tongue ran too dry to allow speech. I wandered into the Gold Room, where the events of this dreadful day had begun, and where I stood leaning with my back against the wall to regain my equilibrium.

  Good grief, that made two men in one day I’d sent away disappointed—on top of everything else. Feeling wretched and drained, I pushed away from the wall and made my way up the stairs.

  Outside Consuelo’s room I tapped my knuckles lightly on the door. No answer came, so I tried again. Finally, I turned the knob and poked my head inside. Consuelo’s bed lay empty, as did the bedside chaise. A quick glance around the room failed to reveal my cousin. Was she in the dressing room?

  “Consuelo? Are you here?” I ventured a few feet inside. “Darling, it’s me . . . Emma.”

  Silence.

  “Consuelo?” Unease churned inside me. Something felt utterly, entirely wrong about this empty room.

  Hurrying down the corridor, I pressed my ear to her mother’s door. The silence within sent me on to the next bedroom, this one draped in rich greens and burgundies—my uncle William’s former suite. Somehow I could picture my cousin seeking solace among her father’s things. The door was open and I came to an abrupt halt on the threshold. “Consuelo, are you in here?”

  When no answer came I strode through into the dressing room, but it, too, stood empty. I doubled back, following the zigzagging hallway past the large front bedroom currently occupied by Lady Amelia, reserved for her due to her rank as an aristocrat. Here the hall turned and led to a small sewing room. I barged in, panting, but found no one inside. My concerns spiraled, though I couldn’t quite say why. This was a large house and while my cousin might have been under house arrest of sorts, she was certainly allowed to wander where she wished. The library? But Jesse and I had been standing in the main hall and we never saw her come down the stairs.

  It was then I realized that in all the uproar of finding Madame Devereaux, of Clara appearing to be the guilty party, and the police arriving and questioning the rest of us, no one had spared a thought about Consuelo’s welfare. No one had questioned how badly the day’s events might have upset her. No one thought to check on her after we all returned to the house. We had simply assumed she’d seen little or nothing at the pavilion and had returned to find comfort in her dolls and books and the many luxuries to be found in her bedroom.

  But I, better than most, knew how little comfort Consuelo gleaned from that room, from this house, and how terribly sensitive she was, though she struggled always to conceal it.

  So then, if her room brought her neither cheer nor reassurance, where would she go?

  “Consuelo?” I called out, the inexplicable panic now rising in my throat.

  A door opened and Lady Amelia swept into the hallway. “Is something wrong, Miss Cross?”

  She looked annoyed; I had apparently disturbed her rest. I also noticed her accent had diminished once again. “Have you seen my cousin?”

  “Miss Consuelo?”

  “Yes,” I almost snapped in my impatience. “Since her brothers are away, there is on
ly one person in this house I’d refer to as my cousin.”

  She smoothed a hand down one side of her beautiful emerald gown, from ribs to hip. “I haven’t seen her since . . . you know.”

  I released a breath and rushed past her. As I reached the staircase landing, Aunt Alva came out of her room. “What is going on? Is that you I hear caterwauling through the house? Really, Emmaline, a lady—”

  “Where is Consuelo?” I asked over her admonishment. That cut her off short. She blinked. “In her room. Where else?”

  “No, she isn’t.”

  For a full moment Aunt Alva stared back at me, looking nonplussed. Then her face cleared. “Downstairs, then. She probably wanted a book.”

  “I think we had better see.” I hefted my hems and hurried down, hoping, yet doubting, we’d find Consuelo in the library. Aunt Alva’s footsteps followed heavily in my wake, making me remember what Clara had said earlier.

  It could have been a woman, if the woman were as stout as Mrs. Vanderbilt.

  I wiped the thought from my mind and concentrated on finding Consuelo. My own thudding footsteps echoed off the glass-fronted bookshelves in the library; there was no sign of Consuelo. Then Aunt Alva brushed past me on her way to the rear-facing windows; she braced her hands on the sill and peered out. “She’s not on the terrace either.”

  With a look of determination that bordered on anger, she fisted her hand around the bellpull in the corner and gave an aggressive tug, leaving the tasseled length of embroidered brocade to swing vigorously as she rounded on me.

  “How long has my daughter been missing, and when were you planning to inform me?”

  I raised my eyebrows in a show of wounded dignity. “I didn’t know she was missing—I still don’t. But I am concerned about her. I think we should search—”

  Grafton walked sedately into the room and tipped a bow. “Ma’am?”

  “Were you below stairs just now?”

  “I was, ma’am.”

  “Did you see my daughter down there?”

  I expected him to look mystified; instead, he appeared to try to hide a guilty look that admitted Consuelo did occasionally seek out the servants’ domains in order to escape the oppression of living in this echoing, shadowy house, always under her mother’s thumb. “No, ma’am. I haven’t seen Miss Consuelo since tea on the terrace.”