by Blythe Baker
An Uninvited Corpse
Blythe Baker
Copyright © 2021 by Blythe Baker
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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Contents
Description
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
About the Author
A portrait of death...
Anna has barely had time to settle in at the Montford town home in London, when she is drawn down a new path of danger. After she witnesses a stabbing in an alley, it’s up to Anna to find the killer – before the killer finds her.
When suspects abound, Anna must delve into the art world and the personal life of the victim, searching for the truth. Will the reintroduction of her employer’s attractive nephew, Jerome Townson, complicate matters? And will the stirring of old shadows from her past blind Anna to the dangers of the present?
1
Golden hour. Some say it is the most romantic time of day, when the world seems believably at peace, when the quiet worries of the mind seem to settle down and drift away.
I often imagined picnics and slow walks through a park, watching the clouds overhead as they passed lazily by…comfortable, peaceful ways to spend the only time of day that makes one feel as if the world itself is standing still.
But I could not spend every day staring out the window as the shadows elongated. What with the move to London and the settling in that it required, I had mostly found myself busy with unpacking, rearranging, and organizing the townhome that the late Colonel Montford and his wife had so rarely visited in the past few years.
Even as we readied the house under Mrs. Montford’s direction, I wondered how long she would be happy here in this place that seemed so much more cramped than the vast halls and rooms of the country estate we had left behind.
The sunroom, which Mrs. Montford said was her favorite part of the house, was half the size of the one she was used to back on the estate. The room’s theme was, aptly, the sunflower, with yellow velvet upholstery on the furniture and walnut wood finishes. It sat at the back corner of the house overlooking an expanse of green that the townhouse butted up against. That gave it the peak of the morning light and the very best of the glow of golden hour on those rare, sunshiny days.
We found ourselves there, as we often had, three weeks to the day from our arrival in town. After her afternoon tea, Mrs. Montford enjoyed returning to that spot to sit by the window, to stare out over the surrounding scenery. Today was different, however, as the mistress was having her portrait painted.
“You, over there.”
I looked up from my place near the windows. My eyes shifted to the man sitting on a stool near the door, as he peeked out around a canvas to glare at me.
Mr. Jonathan Hill was not at all what I would have considered handsome, with a drooping face, a large nose, and a pouting bottom lip. His eyebrows, thin and dark, very nearly met in the middle of his forehead like an angry, furry worm. The paintbrush behind his ear did him no favors, either.
“Yes, sir?” I said, stepping forward.
He waved his hand toward the wall. “Draw those curtains. The light is too harsh.”
I glanced over at Mrs. Montford, who sat in her favorite yellow armchair which had been brought from the estate in Maidstone, the sole piece of furniture that she had requested be brought with her to London.
Her blue eyes shifted to mine. “Go on, then, do as he says,” she said with a small wave of her hand.
I turned and started to pull the curtains closed. I could not imagine it would do a great deal of good, as the sun had spent the majority of the day behind cloud cover, only daring to peek out for mere moments at a time.
“Ah, ah!” Mr. Hill exclaimed, startling me so that my heart nearly leapt from my chest. I stopped, only partly having done as he asked.
“Too much!” he went on. He snapped his fingers. “I want just a hair’s width open, just a whisper of sunlight to trail in through those panes…” He gave a dramatic flick of his wrist as he withdrew the paintbrush from behind his ear and dropped it to the palette he held in his other hand.
I did as he asked, drawing the curtains slightly open until only a sliver of sunlight sliced the room clear in half, separating Mr. Hill from Mrs. Montford.
He glowered at me as I arranged the bottom of the curtains so that they draped in a pleasing fashion.
“Now, fetch that lamp.”
He pointed with the tip of his brush, flicking it toward the tall, standing lamp in the corner.
I moved it toward him, casting more light upon Mrs. Montford.
“Left,” Mr. Hill snapped. “No, right. Right! Good heavens, girl, are you listening to a thing I say?”
Biting my tongue, I shifted the lamp slightly further.
He groaned.
“This is ridiculous. Must I do everything myself?” he snapped, slamming his palette down.
He hopped down off his stool and grabbed the lamp, his eyes narrowing to slits as he glared at me and moved the lamp two or three inches from where I stood.
“There…” he said, lifting his hands wide, beaming at the lamp as if it were his firstborn. “Perfect.” He looked over at Mrs. Montford, who had been watching him with quiet bemusement, and nodded. “Yes, perfect.”
He made his way back to his easel and stool, plopped himself back down upon it, and let out an exaggerated sigh.
“Now…” he said. “We can begin.”
“You have not yet started?” Mrs. Montford asked, her brow furrowing.
“The muse, my dear lady, the muse,” Mr. Hill said. “It has to be just right for me to begin.”
Mrs. Montford’s brow arched but she said nothing further.
He picked up his palette and began to swirl the dollops of paint together, humming softly to himself.
I looked over at Mrs. Montford, who must have felt my gaze, for she returned it.
Her eyes seemed to say, This is the famous painter that everyone is talking about?
“Very good, Mrs. Montford. If you could tilt your head to the side, just a bit? To the left. Right. No, to the left. Yes, correct, just like that,” Mr. Hill said.
My mistress did as he asked but I noticed her jaw clenched as she did so.
“There, now…” he said. “Did my ears deceive me, or did I hear that you have only recently come to town?”
“Yes,” Mrs. Montford said. “Though my husband and I used to come to London for the Season every year.”
He nodded, his eyes focused on the canvas before him. His brush swept across its surface in a blur of yellow and grey and the blue of her dress. So far, I found myself unimpressed. “Yes, well, as all the best people do, of course,” he said with a chortle. “How are you finding this beautiful city? Is it living up to all your expectations?”
“I have not yet had the chance to get out and see a great deal,” she said. “And now that we are into the first weeks of December, I imagine the majority of my travels and social calls will be leading up to Christmas, yes?”
“Of course, of course,” he said and rubbed his brush into a rag he procured from the pocket of his apron, which showed a bit of every project he must have ever worked on, with smears and splatters of every color imaginable. “What brings you back to town now? You have moved your household here permanently, have you not?”
“Well…my husband passed away recently—”
“Oh, madam,” Mr. Hill said with a gasp, peering around the side of the easel. “Allow me to offer my most sincere condolences.”
Mrs. Montford smoothed her features quickly. “Thank you,” she said.
“Well, never you worry, madam,” he said, returning his brush to the canvas. “London will be the very best medicine for your broken heart. There are more sights here than you shall ever be able to see in the entirety of your life. Theatres, restaurants, art galleries.”
“I am quite familiar with London’s offerings,” Mrs. Montford said, spreading her hands out over her dress.
“No, no, Mrs. Montford,” he said, pointing his brush at her. “You must not move. Any movement could alter the perfection of the piece. You would not want that, would you?”
Mrs. Montford became as still as if she were a statue. Only her lips moved.
“What of you, Mr. Hill?” she asked. “As a means of occupying me, why don’t you share a bit about yourself? How did you become interested in painting?”
“Oh, well, we may not have time for my entire history,” Mr. Hill said with another chortle.
He tilted his head thoughtfully.
“I suppose it all began with my mother....”
He launched into the story of how he had come to discover his talent as an artist, including naming the other artists who had influenced him and the classes he had taken.
“You have earned quite the reputation,” Mrs. Montford said. “Otherwise, I imagine you would not have come so highly recommended by some of my friends.”
He brightened. “Ah, yes…Lady Caldwell, I presume? That is what the rumors tell me.”
Mrs. Montford pursed her lips. “Yes,” she said. “I commented on the portrait that you had done for her and her husband.”
He beamed. “I was quite proud of that one. The way I managed to capture the pure bliss on her face…”
“Yes, I thought such a portrait would make a nice addition to my home,” Mrs. Montford said.
“Though my most prized piece, perhaps the piece that I am best known for, is one that has recently been featured in the Grand Gallery,” he said.
As he passed his brush over the canvas, I thought I could just begin to make out Mrs. Montford’s basic shape. The yellow of the chair had appeared, as well as a featureless blob that might have been the beginnings of her face and hair.
“The Grand Gallery?” Mrs. Montford asked, lifting her eyebrows ever so slightly. She must have truly been surprised. “Well, congratulations,” she added.
“Thank you, my lady,” he said. “Yes, the piece I submitted was a silhouette of a young man standing at the edge of the river Thames, staring thoughtfully out into the grey skies, while he wears the proud hat of the British Army. The piece is aptly named…Humility.”
He could stand to take a bit of that himself, I thought with silent amusement as I straightened a throw pillow on the green, tufted fainting couch in the corner.
“It would be my honor if you were to visit the Grand Gallery while it is being featured there,” he said. “They assured me that all paintings are displayed for only weeks at a time, at least those of modern artists.”
I turned back around and studied him as he worked. I noticed a trickle of sweat along his hairline. Painting surely could not be quite so strenuous?
As he leaned down to the canvas, I saw a tension in his shoulders that had been absent just a few moments before. In the silence, he seemed uncomfortable. Nervous, even, though I could see no reason why he should be. Perhaps he had more on his mind than met the eye.
“Speaking of Lady Caldwell…” he said suddenly. A sly smile spread across his face, making me question if I had seen the anxiety at all, as his confidence returned in full. “Did you know, Mrs. Montford, that Lady Caldwell went to Mrs. Meyers to have her dress made for the Christmas ball being thrown by Sir Rolland?”
“Mrs. Meyers?” Mrs. Montford said. “The seamstress to the royal family?”
“Yes,” Mr. Hill said eagerly. “And Mrs. Meyers accepted her as a client. Can you believe it, after the way that Sir Caldwell treated the Duke’s cousin?”
“From what I understand, the Duke’s cousin was at fault,” Mrs. Montford said.
Mr. Hill gaped, wiping his forehead with his sleeve. “Oh, well…yes, of course, everyone knows that, but Sir Caldwell—”
“Was entirely in the right to confront him the way he did,” she said with a nod. “Unless the stories I received from Lady Caldwell herself were incorrect?”
Mr. Hill busied himself with the paint on his palette, seemingly having lost his appetite for gossip.
“Regardless, sir, it is quite impressive that your work has been featured in the Gallery,” Mrs. Montford continued graciously. “It is quite the accomplishment.”
His chest puffed up a bit. “Yes, that it is, my lady. Thank you for your kind words,” he said. “It may very well not have ended up there, if it were not for some people being so incredibly difficult to work with…”
The malice in his final comment surprised me. He seemed like a man whose feelings changed quickly from one moment to the next. Perhaps such an unpredictable temperament was natural in an artist?
I glanced at Mrs. Montford and hoped she knew that if he gossiped mercilessly about other clients of his, nothing would stop him from telling his next client everything that Mrs. Montford told him today, probably with additional dramatic flair.
I realized that Mrs. Montford was using the conversation to feel out the society which she had recently rejoined, but I hoped that she would remain a bit distant with this man.
“Surely, your whole life cannot be art, Mr. Hill,” Mrs. Montford said. “Do you have a family of your own?”
“No, ma’am,” he said. “I have yet to meet the woman of my dreams. She will have to love art more than she could ever love me…and I have yet to meet a woman who understands that art will forever be my mistress.”
Mrs. Montford tried to stifle a yawn, and I glanced up at the clock on the wall. It was very nearly six o’clock and her dinner would be ready within the next quarter of an hour.
“Mrs. Montford, you seem rather fatigued. Might I bring you some water?” I asked.
Mr. Hill let out a grunt of dislike. “Really, must you interrupt me?” he asked. “I am in the middle of—”
“Yes, Anna, that would be wonderful. I am quite parched,” Mrs. Montford said.
I poured a glass of water and offered it to her.
Mr. Hill huffed a sigh.
She took a few sips before taking a look at the clock herself. “Mr. Hill, I realize that this painting will not be finished in one day. While I appreciate that you were able to find the time to start the process today, I must tell you that I am expecting dinner shortly.”
“Dinner…” he said. “Yes, of course, my lady. I am at your disposal.”
“When might you be able to return to continue your work?” she asked, rising to her feet.
He rather begrudgingly set his palette down on the small table beside him. “I believe I have some time come…Wednesday, around noon?”
“Sooner than I expected,” she said. “Very well. I shall ensure that everything you need is here. Thank you again for coming to do this.”
“It is my honor, my lady,” he said. He seemed to brighten a bit. “Very well. I shall take my leave, then, once I gather my things.”
It took him but a few moments to do so and he departed with nothing more than a wave.
“Good gracious,” Mrs. Montford said when he was gone. “I had not expected him to have such…enthusiasm.”
“
Are you feeling all right? Still thirsty?” I asked, sweeping over to take the water glass from her. I had learned since the Colonel’s passing that she responded far better when I asked after physical ailments instead of anything directly emotional.
“Only a bit tired,” Mrs. Montford said. “I did not realize how weary sitting still could leave me.”
“You have great strength, ma’am,” I said. “You sat as still as a tree for nearly two hours.”
“Was it that long?” she asked. “I wonder how long he will need me to sit next time.”
“Well, all you need to worry about now is resting until he returns on Wednesday,” I said, gesturing toward the door.
She turned and looked at the canvas, which he had left on the easel.
“Well…” she said, folding her hands politely in front of herself. “It…is a work in progress, yes?”
“Precisely,” I said. “And you did say how impressed you were with the painting of Lady Caldwell.”
“Yes, I was,” she said. “I imagine my own portrait will be—”
She stopped, straightening.
“When did I agree to have him come?” she asked.
“Noon, ma’am,” I said. “Is there a problem with that?”
“Yes,” she said. “I have already made luncheon plans for Wednesday at noon. With Lady Caldwell. Anna, you must run and catch him. He cannot be further than the sidewalk. Tell him to telephone me later and we shall reschedule.”
I hurried from the sunroom.
On my way, I passed another servant, George, who gave me a perplexed look.
I skidded to a halt and rounded on him. “Did you see Mr. Hill come this way?” I asked.
His brow furrowed behind his spectacles. “Mr. Hill?”
“The painter?” I asked. “A pompous man, wearing an apron stained with colors?”