The Bet

by Rebecca King

  Estelle jerked and looked at him. When her gaze slid back to Eva’s, their gazes met. Rather than the kindly face she had spoken with before, Eva’s eyes were cold and hard.

  “Myles,” her murmured, her tone dark and full of warning.

  Myles frowned at the warning in Estelle’s voice. He knew immediately that something was wrong but had no idea what objection she could have to Eva, whom she was now staring back at quite avidly.

  “It’s her,” Estelle whispered. “It’s Eva. It’s her.”

  “Her, what?” Myles’ gaze flew to his aged relation. Suddenly, Eva looked at him. He immediately saw her to be the cold-hearted killer she was. He stood up.

  “Is it?” he asked quietly.

  Eva continued to sew for a few moments.

  Myles wondered if she was going to pretend to be deaf as always.

  “What are you going on about boy?” Barnabas demanded. “What’s Eva?”

  “Eva is the killer,” Estelle told him, her voice now full of conviction. “She has difficulty walking, doesn’t she?”

  “Of course she does,” Barnabas replied. He moved around the desk and stared at his relation.

  “Look at her dress. The weather is hardly fit for taking a stroll in, yet her dress has leaves stuck to the back of it. Not only that, but her boots have mud on the heels – look.”

  Everyone turned to look at Eva’s dress. Shockingly, Eva suddenly launched out of her chair without the hesitant motions of the infirm. Instead, she was swift and sure, and left nobody in any doubt of her duplicity.

  “Eva?” Barnabas gasped in shock. “Please don’t tell me you can hear us?”

  “Of course I can hear you, Barnabas,” Eva replied bluntly. “God, you are a fool.”

  “You lied to us,” Barnabas murmured, unable to take on the import of what was unravelling before him. “You are not deaf after all. Do you mean to tell me that you are not infirm either?”

  “Of course I am not bloody infirm, you buffoon,” she snapped. “Nor am I deaf. It has been so easy to fool you all, and take what is rightly mine.”

  The cold fury in her voice, when accompanied by the ruthless defiance she levelled on them all, assured them all of her guilt.

  “It was you who sent the letters demanding everyone return to the house, wasn’t it?” Myles demanded, unsurprised when Eva merely glared at him.

  “Of course, you have sat there listening in on our private conversations, remembering all relevant facts so you could use them against us at will. How convenient,” he snapped.

  “How vile,” Barnabas interrupted. “Do you mean to tell me that I took you under my roof, fed you, provided you with board and lodgings, gratis, thinking you were old and infirm, when you have been plotting to kill us all along?”

  Myles looked at the fury on his father’s face.

  “Father.” He didn’t want the situation worsening. Not when they had a killer in their midst.

  “What in the Devil did you think you were doing? Doesn’t this family mean anything to you?” Barnabas bellowed anyway.

  “No, you do not,” Eva snapped. “You are greedy, and selfish, and don’t deserve to have it all. Why should you get it all? What about my father? He was your relation, yet your father got it all, Barnabas. Rather than share the wealth between his two sons, your father had it all. My father was left with nothing and worked all of his life to make ends meet. When he passed on, there was very little left. I was sick of struggling while you wasted your money on this place, and lorded it over everybody. It’s disgusting.”

  “Good God, Eva, that happened years ago,” Barnabas snapped. “Besides, it is the way things are. The estate and title always goes to the first boy in the family, you know that. Besides, my family are a different branch to your family. Our wealth is really none of your business. Your father had his dues, I am sure of it.”

  “My father had nothing!” Eva shouted, her face puce with rage. “What pittance he was left could barely keep him alive let alone provide for a family. You refused to help him.”

  “He didn’t ask me,” Barnabas protested.

  “Yes, he did. On many occasions, he told you he was struggling. Did you help him like you did Gerald, or Beatrice? No. You didn’t. You left him to suffer. So, when he died and I was left the house I decided to take some of that money back.”

  “But you led me to believe you were deaf and could barely walk, Eva,” Barnabas retorted. “Surely you didn’t expect to get away with your duplicity forever?”

  Eva laughed cynically and threw her sewing onto the floor as she whirled to face him. “But I have gotten away with it, Barnabas. You wouldn’t have found out about it even now if it wasn’t for your son’s doxy. I have fooled you all, with your benevolence and snobbery.” She raked Barnabas with a scornful look. “Well, I have bided my time and waited while I have helped myself to the things that were rightfully mine.”

  “You have been helping yourself to the items in storage at the back of the house. As I lay on the floor in the room you locked me into, I can remember thinking that there doesn’t seem to be much dust on some of the boxes. I couldn’t quite work out why,” Isaac whispered. He glared at Eva. “Why did you have to hit me so hard? Why did you not just lock me in a room?”

  “You are always after money, aren’t you? It is the only reason you come here, and everyone knows it,” Eva accused.

  “That’s why you killed Gerald and Beatrice? It was the consensus of opinion of everyone the other night that Gerald only came to moan at Barnabas about his money problems, and Beatrice came to get her bills paid. After Gerald’s death you realised Isaac was likely to be graced with financial support from Barnabas and decided that he had to go too. What were you going to do, Eva, kill me next?” Myles demanded. He stared at the woman he had once thought of so dearly, and went cold when she narrowed her eyes on him. “Good God, you did, didn’t you?”

  A deathly silence fell over the room.

  “I told you there was a traitor in the house,” Vernon murmured, his voice calm and matter-of-fact.

  “Oh, shut up, Vernon,” Isaac snapped. “She is a killer. Be grateful you weren’t next on her list.”

  “But he won’t ever be, will you, Vernon?” Estelle whispered. “He is here gratis as well, aren’t you?”

  Everyone turned to look at Vernon who, for once, stared at each person in return.

  Myles studied him. It was difficult to be sure while Vernon was sitting down but suddenly, the image of the hooded figure Eva had been talking to in the woods only half an hour ago swam into his mind.

  “It was you in the woods,” Myles breathed.

  Estelle went cold. She looked at Vernon and shivered at the maliciousness in the man’s cruel smile.

  “We want you gone from this house,” Vernon declared coldly.

  “Who?” Barnabas snapped.

  “All of you. You, the other money hungry wastrels, your doxy, Myles. All of you.”

  “You are in our way, you see. The Dark Master wants us to have a better place to worship him. What better place for us to have than here? We just need to get rid of you first.”

  “So you two-” Barnabas looked in disbelief at Vernon and then Eva.

  Estelle shivered and stepped closer to Myles now that the dangers had doubled. She knew that the chances of this scenario ending without any further deaths were remote, but at least Myles had his gun.

  “You haven’t been in the tower room all this time, have you?” Barnabas asked of Vernon.

  “Of course I haven’t, you stupid man. What do you take me for? I have been worshiping the Great Master, plotting and planning for this day. You have taken my mutterings as a sign of madness. I have been seeking guidance from the Dark Master.”

  “You have been chanting,” Myles said quietly, feeling strangely sick that he hadn’t picked up on this before. “You were chanting when you whisper as you walk these halls in just the same way as you were chanting in the woods just now. I have no doubt that
when we have all believed you were in the tower room you have been meeting with your associates from the village in the woods, playing your ridiculous games.”

  Vernon suddenly rounded on Myles.

  Isaac struggled to stand, intent on helping Myles should Vernon pose any physical risk to them. Aware of his injuries, Barnabas stood before him to shield him. There was nothing he could do about Myles or Estelle, who were left to face Eva and Vernon alone together.

  “So you have both been making free of the family’s personal possessions while enjoying the benevolence of a relation you have been double-crossing and plotting to kill. Not only that, but you have been undertaking practices of Devil worship in the Whispering Woods with the intent of securing yourself a more permanent base in this house once we are all murdered. What about Estelle? How are you going to explain her death?” Myles challenged.

  “Our colleague is a doctor,” Vernon told them with a smirk. “He can put whatever he wants on the death certificates. My associates can pass it about the village that Myles ran her over but, rather than take her to the doctor, he brought her to the house to hide the fact that he had killed her. I doubt they will question it, nor will that old woman your doxy lives with.”

  Myles shook his head in disbelief that two people who had been a part of the family could be so devoid of humanity.

  “You won’t get away with this,” he warned, and lifted his hand holding his gun. “I am afraid that I can take you out with one shot, Vernon. Eva, you don’t stand a chance against me, Barnabas, Estelle, and Isaac, even wounded as he is.”

  Myles watched Vernon look at Eva, a little unnerved that neither seemed perplexed by the problem they faced. His gaze slid to Estelle. He needed to know that she was handling this situation, and was unsurprised to see stunned disbelief on her face. It was the way he felt, if he was honest; disbelieving, and incredibly angry.

  Before he could say anything else, all Hell broke loose.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  He barely had the time to think before Vernon launched himself across the room at him. Rather than head straight for him, Vernon lifted a vase off the small table at the end of the chaise and launched it at his head. Dodging out of the way, Myles leaned into Vernon’s tackle and went down with a heavy thud.

  Estelle screamed when Eva launched herself at her. Thankfully, Eva was not armed with a gun, but didn’t lack for strength and was difficult to fight off, especially when she produced a wicked looking knife out of her bodice and pointed it at Estelle’s throat.

  Estelle froze. She couldn’t move. She daren’t even breathe.

  “Now come toward me slowly. Any sudden moves and I will slice you from ear-to-ear,” Eva ordered coldly.

  Estelle felt the sharp bite of the blade dig painfully into the tender flesh of her throat.

  “It was you who tried to strangle me,” she whispered.

  Eva snorted. “I was a little busy at the time with Beatrice. Vernon did that, but couldn’t even get that right.”

  Estelle stared at the venom in the woman’s eyes and wondered if she was unhinged, or nonsensical because of the opiates she had undoubtedly inhaled in the woods. Either way, she was incredibly dangerous. Stepping carefully around the end of the chaise, Estelle did as instructed and backed all the way to the door.

  “Don’t do anything stupid, Eva. You cannot go anywhere with this,” Barnabas warned. “Unless you have the magistrate worshiping Satan as well, you are going to go to prison.”

  Eva ignored him.

  “I am not going down that tunnel,” Estelle warned bravely when they entered the hallway. She could hear the cursing and heavy grunts of the men battling over the gun.

  “Stay away,” Eva snarled, when Isaac stumbled toward them. “Stay away or I will cut her.”

  Estelle felt tears sting her eyes but she blinked them away. She couldn’t afford to stumble because she couldn’t see. A burning trail of pain was starting to form in her neck, but she daren’t think about why. All she could think about was that death was close to her again. With it came a now familiar determination to survive.

  “You will do as I tell you,” Eva ordered when Estelle hesitated.

  “The entrance is blocked. We blocked it when we entered the house. You won’t get the heavy piece of furniture blocking it moved, and neither will I,” Estelle explained, more calmly than she had expected to be.

  This threw Eva momentarily. The woman looked at her. Once out in the hallway, she paused as though contemplating what to do. Before Estelle could caution her any further, the tension was interrupted by the arrival of someone new.

  “You will not get away with this, Eva Frenchay,” the old woman warned from her position on the stairs.

  “You!” Estelle breathed as she studied the same old woman she had seen in the woods the other night. “I didn’t imagine you.”

  The old woman levelled a pair of brilliant blue eyes on her that could only be described as piercing. “No, you didn’t imagine me. I told you to get away from the area.”

  “But you didn’t show me which way to go,” Estelle protested weakly. “I didn’t know how.”

  “They showed you how,” the woman challenged.

  “They chased me,” she argued.

  “As you should be chased when you stray so close to people who try to summon the Devil. You are not a bad one, but you ventured too close,” the woman warned.

  Estelle didn’t doubt it. Given what had transpired today she now knew that Myles had been her saviour that night in more ways than one. Her gaze met the old woman’s for several moments. She tried to think of something to say but her mind wouldn’t work properly. Strangely, staring into those wise depths of azure brought Estelle calmness and clarity. She knew, somehow, that everything was going to be alright. Just as long as she stayed calm and didn’t make any rash movements, everything would be alright.

  “Get out of the house you old bag,” Eva snapped.

  Estelle glared at the scornful woman beside her, even though she was not really in any position to anger her.

  “She has as much right to be here as you do,” Estelle challenged.

  Without thinking about what she was doing she yanked Eva’s arm away from her, twisted around and took several steps into the centre of the hall, away from the ruthless tip of Eva’s blade.

  Eva’s gaze widened when she realised what she had done. She whirled on the old woman who began to move steadily toward her. Eva’s gaze fell to something the old woman carried. Her eyes widened. She looked at the woman in panic. Without a word, she whirled around and raced for the front door.

  “Don’t,” Estelle shouted.

  “Let her go,” the old woman ordered as she raced past her.

  “Estelle!” Myles cried from the doorway. He caught a brief glimpse of her skirts as she raced past the door, and redoubled his efforts to subdue Vernon. Estelle needed his help. With all of the strength he could muster he placed one hand on Vernon’s neck and pushed hard. Drawing his clenched fist high, he landed a punch on Vernon’s jaw, and watched the man fall instantly to the floor.

  He pushed to his feet, and threw his father a warning look. “Tie him up. I don’t want him getting free again.”

  Leaving his father and Isaac to deal with the killer, Myles raced out of the house after Estelle. Strangely, there was no sign of the old woman. That didn’t matter, though. It was more important to catch the woman now chasing after danger.

  When he got outside he paused and scoured the gardens at the front of the house. His gaze fell on Estelle, racing steadily toward the moat, and Eva, only a few feet in front of her. With a virulent curse, he set off after them.

  Eva slammed to a halt when her toes reached the raging water’s edge.

  Estelle slowed down, and walked the last few steps slowly until she came to a stop a few feet away from her.

  “There is nowhere you can go,” Estelle murmured. She had no idea what she was going to do now, but wasn’t prepared to allow Eva to go
anywhere except back inside for Myles and Barnabas to deal with. “Not even the Devil can help you now.”

  “Stay where you are, Eva,” Myles ordered, his gun levelled on the older woman. “Move away from the edge. There is no place for you to go now.”

  Estelle stepped closer to Myles. She looked at him standing so tall and proud with his pistol unwaveringly trained on the killer. She knew then that she was in love with him. It was the only term she could use to describe the warmth that settled deep within her, or the strength she gained from being in his presence. Just looking at him filled her with a quiet pride and joyous wonder that made her want to smile and hold him close. To not have him in her life was to not be complete.

  Whatever the future held for her, for him, for them both, she knew she had to keep him a part of her life – somehow. She just didn’t know how yet but everything would work out alright – she was sure of it.

  “I am not going to prison,” Eva scoffed. “You are insane.”

  “No, you are insane, for worshipping something dark and insidious as the Devil. It has turned your mind and stolen your life just as much as being imprisoned will. Nobody has the right to steal anybody’s life at will, or help themselves to someone’s benevolence whilst plotting dire things against them. It is not for you or anybody to decide who should live or die. This has to end. You are dabbling in the Dark Arts for God’s sake.” Myles made no attempt to hide just how ridiculously stupid he considered her behaviour to be, and wasn’t surprised when her eyes flashed angrily at him.

  “You can go to Satan.”

  Myles stared at the old woman who appeared several feet beside them. She didn’t even look at him or Estelle. Instead, she addressed Eva.

  “He is waiting for you,” the woman continued. “You have stolen too many souls to remain on this earth unhindered. I am afraid he has called you home.”

  Eva stared at the old woman blankly. The belligerence she had previously shown them all suddenly vanished. In its place was a terror unlike anything Estelle or Myles had ever seen. Myles stepped protectively closer to Estelle, and watched the old woman swing a small, black pouch from side to side as she moved toward Eva.