by Rhys Bowen
“And they are hardly likely to have gassed her in her bed. Not the modus operandi of most criminal types. Bashed her head in or suffocated her.”
“Besides,” I said, “they couldn’t get into the house.”
We reached the end of the driveway just as the singers broke into a lusty rendition of:
In his master’s steps he trod, where the snow lay dinted.
Heat was in the very sod, where the saint had printed.
Darcy was frowning, staring up at the big square shape of the Ffrench-Finch house and its plain stone walls. “I don’t think there’s any way that three convicts could be hiding out in a village like this,” he said. “Village eyes are too sharp. They’d notice something. And even if someone was hiding them, the villagers would notice someone buying more food than usual.”
“Your aunt has certainly been buying more food than usual,” I pointed out. “I expect everybody has for Christmas.”
We crossed the deserted street to the Misses Ffrench-Finches’ front door and switched to “O Little Town of Bethlehem.”
A maid opened the door and was joined by two tiny ladies with neat gray buns. They were now dressed in black with fringed Spanish shawls around their shoulders. The first thought that struck me was that their name was so apt. They both listened with their heads to one side, bobbing like little birds.
“So good of you to come,” one of them said in her soft child’s voice. “Effie always loved the carol singing. We won’t invite you in, I’m sure you understand, but do have some of Cook’s delicious mince pies and try some of our homemade elderberry wine.”
Two trays were produced. The mince pies were wonderful—warm, flaky pastry and plenty of spicy filling. The elderberry wine was not unpleasant and I had a second glass. We drank a toast to their health and to their dear departed sister and went on our way.
Mr. Barclay welcomed us gushing and bowing and requested that we sing a couple of carols none of us knew, before settling on “Hark! the Herald Angels Sing.” I hope the herald angels sang a little better than we did, but he seemed to appreciate the effort. He offered hot cheese straws and mulled wine. From him we went to the vicar, who invited us into his well-worn but comfortable sitting room where we gave him a rousing rendition of “Oh, Come, All Ye Faithful.” He had more mince pies laid out for us and a traditional wassail bowl. I was beginning to feel the warmth of the food and alcohol as we left and made for Miss Prendergast’s cottage, singing “In the Bleak Midwinter.”
She met us at the door, looking flustered. I decided she was probably one of those spinsters who always looks flustered. “I’m so embarrassed,” she said. “I was doing a crossword puzzle and completely forgot the mince pies. I do so love my little puzzles and I was so engrossed that I only remembered the pies when I smelled something burning. And of course by then it was too late to go into town to buy more mincemeat. I feel like such a fool. My mince pies are usually so good too, aren’t they, Lady Hawse-Gorzley? So I’m afraid you’ll have to settle for biscuits and ginger wine.” She retrieved a tray she had put on a low table beside the front door. “Here we are. Ginger to keep out the cold. Nothing better,” she said, offering the tray around. “And I am so looking forward to joining you for the Christmas festivities, Lady Hawse-Gorzley,” she twittered. “So good of you to invite me. So generous. I can’t tell you how much one appreciates company when one is all alone in the world like me.”
The ginger wine was so powerful that it took my breath away and made my eyes water. I stumbled along, half blind, as we headed for my mother’s cottage. I was interested to see whether they would pretend to not be at home, but lights shone out between heavy curtains and the door was opened by my grandfather. I wondered whether he would be playing the role of jolly butler, but instead he said, “I won’t ask you in, because they’ve been working hard all day and consequently have retired with headaches. But we do have a hot rum punch ready and Mrs. Huggins has made some lovely sausage rolls. So if you could possibly manage a quiet carol, it would be appreciated.”
We obliged by singing “In the Bleak Midwinter” again and then Granddad ladled out the punch. He winked as he handed me my glass. “That will put hair on your chest,” he said. “Oh, and by the way, your mum and Mr. Coward have been invited to join you for Christmas dinner.”
“What about you?”
“Not me, my dear,” he said. “Me and Mrs. Huggins will be a lot happier here on our own than where we don’t belong. We ain’t posh and we never will be.”
“I’ll come down to visit on Christmas Day when I get a chance,” I said.
“That will be lovely. Anytime. We’ll be here.”
I took my glass of punch. It was hot and the fumes from the rum were strong enough to make me cough. But it slipped down deliciously and I was feeling that all was right with the world as we left the cottage and headed on our way. We’d only gone a few yards, however, when I had the strangest sensation. We were being watched. I decided that it was probably my mother and Noel Coward having a good chuckle at our expense upstairs in the cottage, but I also sensed something else. I sensed danger.
Chapter 15
SOMEWHERE IN THE DARKNESS, IN THE VILLAGE OF TIDDLETON-UNDER-LOVEY
DECEMBER 23
I had been in enough difficult situations to know what danger felt like and I was clearly sensing it now. A hostile presence was watching us. I turned to look around. The village green lay in perfect stillness and repose. Early moonlight glistened on crisp snow. Smoke curled up from chimneys. Lights peeped out of cottages. Some curtains were not fully drawn and I saw Christmas trees and paper chains and all kinds of greenery decorating cozy front rooms. Here was a picture postcard of the pretty and peaceful English village. And yet three people had died here in three days. I wondered if there was to be a fourth—if someone was stalking our column of singers, pantherlike, waiting to pounce.
We sang outside the rest of the cottages. Willum beamed in delight and did an ungainly dance when we sang “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen” outside the shop, while his mother looked on, smiling. I found myself looking around to see if we passed any empty cottages or anywhere else a dangerous presence might be hiding, but every front door seemed to be open to us. I noticed as Lady Hawse-Gorzley instructed villagers to come up to the hall for their Christmas box on Boxing Day and they bowed reverently, muttering, “God bless you, your ladyship.”
If one of the convicts was nearby, I was convinced that nobody in this village knew about him. And certainly none of these happy villagers, their children peeping shyly around their legs and skirts, was harboring him. And yet the feeling did not go away until we were walking back up the drive. Actually, it was overtaken by another feeling—one of unsteadiness. I’ve never been a great drinker and all of those various punches and drafts from wassail bowls were suddenly having an effect on me.
“That was fun, wasn’t it?” Darcy drew close to me again. “Like reliving one’s childhood.”
“Marvelous fun,” I said. “Absolutely marvelous fun.” At least that was what I wanted to say. It came out “Absholuly maavlus fun.”
Darcy eyed me critically. “You’ve been drinking.”
“Only the punches and the elderberry wine,” I said, trying to look haughty and dignified, which effect was lost as I tripped over an unseen rock in the snow and would have fallen on my face if Darcy hadn’t grabbed me.
“Whoopsie,” I said and started to giggle.
“The elderberry wine?” he said. “My dear girl. Don’t you know that homemade wines, especially those created by old spinsters, are always lethal?”
“Silly me. I had two glasses,” I said, as I staggered and giggled again.
Darcy took my arm firmly. “You’d better give me that lantern,” he said. “And hold on to my arm.”
“You are so kind.” I gazed at him adoringly. “You take such good care of me. But you always go away again. Why do you always go away?”
“A little thing called money,” he
said. “One needs to earn some occasionally.”
“What does money matter?” I went on. “Why don’t we run away and live in a little cottage on a desert island and we’ll be wonderfully happy.” I don’t know how much of this he understood. I was having trouble forming words by now. What’s more, the world was swinging around.
We reached the house and Darcy leaned his lantern against the portico. “I think I’d better get you up to bed before anyone else sees you like this,” he whispered. “Come on. Up the stairs with you.”
“I’m perfeckly all right,” I said at the same moment that my foot started to slide on the polished floor. “Who put in an ice rink while we were away? Wasn’t that clever of them?”
“Up the stairs. Now.” Darcy gripped my arm firmly and half carried me up the stairs and then down the hall to my room.
“Finally,” I said as he bundled me inside the door. “We’re alone together, just you and me and a bed. What’s taken you so long, Darcy? I’ve been waiting for this a long time.” I kept talking while he pulled off my various outer garments and then sat me down to take off my shoes. “Do you know how boring it is to be a virgin?” I went on. “Boring, boring, boring. Everybody thinks virgins are boring. And do you know what? They are.”
Darcy undid the leather strap that held my kilt in place and it dropped to the floor.
“Arms up,” he said and yanked my sweater over my head. “There. You’ll do until your maid can finish undressing you. I’ll bring you up a tray from supper. You should eat something if you can. And a cup of black coffee.”
“Where are you going?” I asked plaintively.
“Down to tell them that Lady Georgiana is not feeling well.”
“You’re not going to leave me alone, are you? Not when there’s this big and beautiful bed and I’m in it all by myself. And you are such a good kisser too.”
Darcy smiled and leaned to kiss my forehead. “As tempting as this offer is, my lady, I’m going to wait until you’ll remember what you’ve done. In spite of what your sister-in-law thinks, I happen to be a gentleman.”
“Oh, Fig. Don’t talk about Fig. If I am boring, then she is boring times ten. The most boring person on the whole Earth. I bet she never invited a young man to her bedroom. Never never.”
Darcy looked down at me with a mixture of amusement and concern. “Now, you’re to stay put and try to sleep. I’ll find your maid and have her come to keep an eye on you. And I’ll bring you something to eat later. All right?”
“I wish you weren’t going away,” I said in a small voice. “I’d rather fall asleep with your arms around me. So nice. So warm. So safe . . .” I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, he had gone.
I lay back, half dozing, half awake, until I heard the click of the door latch and a shaft of light came from the hallway outside. This was rapidly extinguished as the door closed again and I sensed someone coming toward the bed.
“Is it suppertime already?” I asked sleepily.
“Supper is over,” said a deep voice. “They’re all having coffee, so I thought I’d slip up and see how you were faring.”
And someone sat on my bed. I fumbled for my bedside light. In its rosy glow Johnnie Protheroe’s face loomed close to me.
“What are you doing in my room?” I demanded, fear giving me control of my tongue.
“Just came up to see how you were, old thing,” he said. “I heard you were feeling poorly. Thought you might need cheering up, what?” And to my horror he put a hand on my bare shoulder, caressed it, then started to slide it down my front.
I mustered all my energy and sat up. “Unhand me, churl,” I said, knocking at his hand as if it were an annoying insect. “Be gone, I say.”
For some reason he found this really funny. “You really are quite delightful,” he said. “I thought I’d be bored to tears this Christmas but now I can see it’s going to be rather jolly.”
He grabbed my hands as I lashed out at him, and pinned me back to the pillow. “A spirited little miss, eh?” he whispered as I tried to break free of him. “I do enjoy a good struggle. The prize is so much sweeter. All of the dried-up prunes around here are all too ready to leap into the sack at the slightest invitation.”
His face was close to mine and I smelled the unpleasant mixture of alcohol, tobacco and some kind of scented pomade or hair oil. That sobered me up more quickly than any black coffee would have done.
“Go away or I’ll scream,” I said.
This made him laugh even more. “My dear, bed hopping is a time-honored country sport. Everyone does it. It’s only a bit of fun, what?”
“Not for me,” I said. “And certainly not with you. Now get out of my room.”
“You ’eard the lady. Get out while the going’s good,” said a threatening voice behind us, and Queenie loomed up like an avenging angel. She had a water jug in her hand. “Now, do you want this broken over yer ’ead or what?”
“Well, I can tell when I’m not wanted,” Johnnie said and made a hasty exit.
“Queenie,” I said, sitting up again and brushing myself off, “sometimes you are worth your wages after all.”
“Who was that man? Bloody cheek, coming into your room like that,” she said. “Nasty slimy type. I’m going to bring my mattress and sleep on your floor in the future. And you tell your Mr. Darcy and he’ll punch the daylights out of him.”
“I don’t think we’d better do that,” I said.
“He was worried about you, you know. He says to me, ‘Queenie, go and sit with her. See if you can get her to eat something.’ So I brought you the tray. There’s a lovely soup and some game pie and black coffee.”
“I’ll try the black coffee anyway,” I said and then fell asleep with Queenie sitting on the end of my bed.
Chapter 16
GORZLEY HALL
DECEMBER 24, CHRISTMAS EVE
Awoke feeling rather confused and not too well. Reminder to self: Never touch alcohol again, especially not elderberry wine.
I opened my eyes and wondered why the daylight hurt me so much. Then vague recollections of the night before crept back. Not only of my drunkenness but of the danger I had felt. And I had been too drunk to be vigilant. I opened my bedroom door. The house was suspiciously quiet. I should have stayed awake and alert last night. I should have told Darcy my suspicions instead of . . . My cheeks turned flaming hot as I remembered some of the things I said to him. If someone had died during the night, it would be my fault.
Even the Wexlers had not leaped up at the crack of dawn after the previous night’s festivities. I suspected I wasn’t the only one taken by surprise at the strength and amount of the alcohol consumed. I washed, dressed and came downstairs to find the Rathbones breakfasting quietly on toast and black coffee. I decided that was all I could manage too and was just trying to swallow a morsel with marmalade on it when the door opened and Monty, Badger and Darcy came in, laughing as if they were in the middle of a good joke.
“So the bishop said, ‘Not during Lent,’” Monty finished and the other two laughed even louder. They went over to the sideboard and started helping themselves generously to everything that was there while I looked around to see if there was another way out of the room or I could disguise myself as a standard lamp. Before I could attempt either, Darcy came and sat beside me.
“Good morning, my lady,” he said. “I trust you slept well?”
I flushed bright red as I saw his eyes laughing at me. “Remind me never to drink elderberry wine again,” I said.
“Good God, you didn’t actually drink any of those old biddies’ wine, did you?” Monty said in a horrified voice. “They are notorious for it around here. Lethal. Positively lethal. And the elderberry is worse than the dandelion. Of course, the parsnip is the real killer.”
At the mention of the word “killer” I found that I was no longer laughing. I remembered the sense of danger I had felt as we walked from my mother’s cottage.
“Is everybody all right this
morning?” I asked.
Monty was still grinning. “I suspect the other guests feel rather the way you do,” he said. “If they all knocked back that wine they’ll have glorious headaches.”
Monty and Badger devoured their food as only young college men can and excused themselves to go outside and hurl around a rugby ball. I went to go too, but Darcy grabbed my wrist. “What did you mean by asking if everyone was all right?” he said softly. “Did you suspect that might not be the case?”
“It’s these unexplained deaths,” I said. “One each day since I arrived. The man shot in the orchard, the garage owner who fell off a bridge, the old lady found gassed—and yesterday there was also a horrible incident in Newton Abbott. A telephone operator was electrocuted when she tried to plug in her headphones.”
“That doesn’t sound right,” Darcy said. “There would be no way that electric wires would be anywhere near telephone wires.”
“That makes it four deaths in four days,” I said. “So I couldn’t help worrying that someone might have died this morning.”
“As far as I know we’re all hale and hearty here,” he said. “No corpses lying in the hallways.”
“It’s not funny, Darcy,” I snapped. “It’s horrible.”
He reached across and stroked my cheek. “Yes, I suppose it is. Especially when you’ve actually seen one of those corpses. But there’s nothing we can do about it, Georgie, and it doesn’t concern us. Maybe your telephone operator was deliberately killed because she eavesdropped on a conversation, but the others—well, as far as I can see they can’t be connected or even be murders. A cluster of sad accidents, that’s all.”
His hand slid from my cheek down to my chin and he pulled me toward him to give me a kiss.
“Darcy, not in public,” I said.
He grinned. “You weren’t so modest about it last night, I seem to remember. Inviting me into your bedchamber, suggesting that we run off to a desert island together in full hearing of everyone else. In fact, I had no idea that you were such a hot little piece.”