Accomplished In Murder (4 page)

Drucilla had to admit it was a relief to
freshen up while Rosie chattered on about inconsequential things
and unpacked her bags.

“Please lay out my dark merino, Rosie,”
Drucilla requested. In the absence of proper mourning clothes, the
simple, deep blue dress would have to do. It was the most subdued
costume she had brought.

When she had finished washing, she felt
almost normal again; the gravity of circumstances, if not eased,
was at least temporarily set aside. There would come a time for
mourning later. For now, she must get through the days ahead.

“I will undress myself. Thank you, Rosie,”
she said, dismissing the maid.

But the girl seemed to hesitate.

“Yes, Rosie? Was there something you
wanted?”

The maid’s face was openly curious. “I reckon
it must’ve come as a terrible shock to you, miss, learning of Lady
Celeste’s awful death so sudden like.”

So she was
that
sort of servant. Well,
that was all right. It occurred to Drucilla she might be able to
ask a gossipy maid questions it would not be tactful to ask Lord
Absalom. She did need to learn more about Celeste’s death. Only
when she knew the full of it could she accept the tragedy and move
forward.

“You say the death was very awful?” she asked
casually. “Lord Absalom neglected to tell us the details.” It
wasn’t subtle but it was all the prodding the maid needed.

She said, “I reckon anybody’s death be awful,
leastways for them that love them. But Lady Celeste, her end
weren’t like other peoples’. It weren’t
normal
the way it
happened.”

“What do you mean, not normal?”

“Well, they say it was a ghost that killed
the lady. That’s the word from below-stairs anyway.”

“What nonsense. Why would a ghost wish to
kill Lady Celeste?”

“Pardon my asking, miss, but why does a ghost
do anything at all? Because it’s evil. And this particular ghost,
she’s an especially wicked one. They say she was the mistress of
the house in ages past, who died by foul means at the hand of her
own lord. And it’s said she returned to Blackridge House to do away
with the new mistress when Lady Celeste arrived.”

Drucilla frowned but played along. “Has
anyone actually seen this terrible ghost of yours, Rosie?”

“Yes indeed, miss. Lots of the servants has
seen her flitting down the halls in the night and hovering around
the family cemetery in the moonlight. Even Lady Celeste herself
seen the ghost. She used to ask me about it.”

Drucilla was suddenly alert. “Lady Celeste
saw this ghost? You’re certain of that?”

“Aye, miss, sure as I can be. She was as
afraid of it as anybody, too.”

Drucilla was silent. Celeste had been a very
sensible girl and not at all given to flights of fancy. If she
professed to have seen a ghost, to fear it even, that was a claim
Drucilla was prepared to take seriously. Of course, Rosie may have
got it wrong. She did not seem the most reliable of sources.

And yet, portions of Celeste’s letters came
back to her. Hadn’t Drucilla sensed an underlying fear there? The
problem was never directly stated, but it was clear something had
troubled Celeste in her last days, something important enough to
make her write Drucilla, urging her to come. Had she foreseen her
own demise?

“Rosie.” Drucilla returned to her previous
question. “Precisely how did Lady Celeste die?”

“Why, I thought you knew, miss. She fell from
the topmost roof of the house. Fell or was pushed, folk say. And
who else would do the pushing but a vengeful ghost? Plunged clean
down to the jagged rocks at the bottom of the cliff, she did. They
found her in the wee hours of the morning but she must’ve lain
there all night. If the tide had come up any higher, the sea
would’ve carried her body away and we might never have known what
became of her.”

Drucilla felt faint. Knowing of Celeste’s
death was entirely different from imagining it in all its gruesome
detail. No wonder Lord Absalom had not given a very thorough
description.

Rosie seemed not to notice her reaction. The
servant was clearly enjoying the tale. It couldn’t be often she had
such an interested listener.

“See here,” she said now. “Come to the window
and you can look down to the cliffs and the shoreline. If we had a
brighter moon, you’d be able to see the spot where they found her.
She probably streaked past this very window on her way down.”

Drucilla had heard enough.

“I’m ready to sleep,” she said, bringing the
conversation to an abrupt end. “You may return to your other
duties, Rosie.”

After the servant had gone, Drucilla moved to
the window and looked down into the darkness. The moon had scuttled
behind a veil of clouds, but when she pressed open the casement she
could hear the crash of the sea waves against the cliffs far
below.

“Oh Celeste,” she whispered. “What really
happened to you?”

Chapter Seven

Drucilla spent a restless night haunted by
nightmares. In her dreams, she stood on a stormy rooftop, feeling
the wind tug at her and the sea waves crashing in the distance. A
figure stood before her.

“Celeste!” she called out to her friend, but
the other woman appeared not to hear or see her.

A second figure appeared, the shadowy form of
a man whose features were obscured in shadow. Drucilla watched as
the man approached Celeste and the two spoke briefly, their words
lost beneath the howl of the wind.

The man suddenly took Celeste in his arms
and, as Drucilla watched in horror, began to lift her over the
railing lining the roof of the house. There was a brief struggle,
during which Drucilla tried to run, to cry out, to do anything that
might save her friend. But her feet wouldn’t obey her commands and
her screams died in her throat. It was too late anyway.

Drucilla could do nothing but look on, a
helpless spectator, as Celeste was dropped over the roof’s edge to
fall to her death on the craggy rocks below.

“No!” This time her scream found voice as
Drucilla bolted upright in bed. Her heart thundered, and her hair
clung to her face and neck in sweaty tendrils.

It took her a moment to shake off the
remnants of the dream and remember where she was and what she was
doing in an unfamiliar bed in a strange house.

Golden sunlight slanted through the window to
lend the room a cheery glow but Drucilla felt scarce comfort as she
performed her morning ablutions in the cold wash water left from
last night. It seemed somehow inappropriate to ring for Rosie to
wait upon her on such an unhappy morning as this. Doubtless the
servants had other tasks to attend, in preparation for the funeral
guests who would surely be arriving soon.

Dressing herself in the blue merino she had
chosen earlier, Drucilla swept her hair into a loose knot and
decided she was as dark and drab looking as it was possible to
appear on short notice.

As she peered at her refection in the mirror
over her dressing table, her stomach gave a dissatisfied grumble,
reminding her how long it had been since her last meal.

Rosie had explained it was the custom of the
family to rise and filter down to the dining hall at whatever hour
they pleased, where they would help themselves from the
sideboard.

On her way out of her room, Drucilla gave
brief thought to asking Aunt Bridget if she would like to go down
together. But no, the old lady would probably not be awake for
hours yet and Drucilla was too famished to wait. Besides, she’d had
all of her aunt’s company she could abide for the present.

Descending the same sweeping staircase she
had climbed the night before, Drucilla was now in a better state of
mind to examine her surroundings. She found the place aroused her
curiosity to such an extent she could almost forget, just for a
moment, the gloomy circumstances surrounding her visit. How she
should have liked to have seen Blackridge House under happier
conditions, to have Celeste showing her around the house and its
gardens and outbuildings.

On entering the great hall that morning, she
found it to be exactly as she had imagined it from Celeste’s
descriptions. The beamed ceiling soared high overhead and the dark
paneled walls were covered with tapestries that gave the room a
distinctly medieval feel. Drucilla could almost imagine herself in
an old-fashioned court instead of a present day house in
Cornwall.

The atmosphere was enhanced by an enormous
fireplace which took up half of one wall and was surrounded by
heavy, unadorned furnishings which gave the appearance of relics
left over from another century.

Curious whether parts of the house more
utilized by the family had been modernized, she peered into a
smaller room, opening into the great hall. The door had been left
slightly ajar and Drucilla’s probing gaze quickly discovered the
room was not empty.

Two gentlemen inhabited the room and she
recognized one of them as Lord Absalom. The other faced away from
the door so that she was presented with nothing more than the view
of a broad back and a dark head of hair, lightly streaked with
grey.

“I do not know how long I can keep up this
pretense, Father,” Lord Absalom was saying, his tone muted but his
expression perturbed. “It would be so much simpler had Celeste’s
friend and her old aunt not shown up at our door.”

Neither man seemed aware they were the
objects of watching eyes.

Mortified, Drucilla moved into the shadows.
She could no longer see the men but could still hear their
voices.

“I should not think keeping up the pretense
of grieving widower would be too difficult for you,” the man Lord
Absalom had named as his father said dismissively. “We both know
you’re capable of much deeper deceptions than that. Besides, I do
not require you to make a show of mourning for a lifetime. Once the
funeral is over and its attendees sent packing, you and that woman
of yours can dance on your wife’s grave for all I care. But while
there are prying eyes in the house and loose tongues to wag, you
will be discreet.”

“Why are you so concerned with discretion?”
Absalom asked. “What is it you’re so afraid of? You are the
magistrate in these parts. Surely that must be worth something. If
you explain the accidental manner of Celeste’s death, then who
would combat your word? Anyway, I’m done following your orders.
You’ve pulled my strings quite long enough and it’s time you
learned Evita and I aren’t you’re puppets.”

“If you’re referring to my intrigues behind
your marriage to your departed wife—”

“Celeste had a name, in case you never
noticed.”

“Interesting you should accuse me of that. I
was under the impression it was
you
who failed to notice
her.”

Absalom made an angry noise but his father
didn’t pause.

“As I was saying, you ought to be thanking me
for my marital maneuverings on your behalf. It was a convenient
marriage, followed by what you must admit to be an even more
convenient death, and look at you now. A much wealthier man for it.
Confess! You know that foreign trollop you’re so enamored with
could never have brought you the money your wife did.”

“I wish you wouldn’t speak of what happened
to Celeste so coldly. It’s true I didn’t marry her for love but
that doesn’t mean I was waiting for her to die.”

“Of course you were. Do not confuse me with
those silly London women upstairs. I know what really goes on
behind that polished veneer of yours. Anyway, I’m not chiding you
for it. There’s no shame in marrying one woman for her money while
loving another. It’s what any man of sense would do. Particularly a
man whose family is of dwindling means.”

“I don’t think you care anything about my
means. You only want to sink all Celeste’s money into keeping up
this house. You and Southorn, you’re obsessed with this place.”

“You’d do well to imitate your brother in
that respect. He gives his all for the estate. I only wish you
would take as much interest.”

“I’ve done quite enough for the family. All I
want now is to put this whole business behind me and move on. With
Evita.”

“That, I can promise you, will never happen.
I’ve told you, I don’t care if you want to keep your mistress
around but never think of her as anything more than that. Such a
marriage would be unacceptable, both socially and—”

“I know, I know. The money again.”

“Just think on what I’ve said. This is a
dangerous period for us and not the time to court scandal, not with
your wife’s corpse barely cold.”

His words appeared to sober the mood of the
room and silence descended.

The sound of footsteps approaching the door
was the only warning Drucilla had the men were about to exit the
room.

Scurrying away, she ducked into the next open
doorway, which happened to lead into the dining hall.

The conversation she had just overheard left
her with such a knot in her stomach food was now the last thing she
wanted. Nevertheless, she could hardly leave the dining hall right
away, lest she collide with the men outside and they guess her
trespass. Best to busy herself, to appear as if nothing out of the
ordinary had occurred.

She filled a plate with eggs and ham from the
sideboard and sat down alone at the long table.

It was an immense relief when neither Lord
Absalom nor Lord Litchfield joined her in the dining room. Instead,
it was someone more unexpected who shortly joined her.

“So. What do you think of the old man now
that you’ve had a peek at him?”

Drucilla jumped, for the newcomer had slipped
into the room as quietly as any ghost. She looked up to meet the
mischievous eyes of the young man she had met in the hall the night
before. His riding cloak was gone now and he seemed in less of a
hurry.