Escapade (29 page)

“Practice,” I said.

She cocked her head. “But in a way, you know, I was ... rather disappointed.” She moved her shoulders in a small, dismissive shrug. “I’d been hoping for something more, I suppose.”

“Real ghosts?”

“Something with a less obvious explanation. A more persuasive apparition, perhaps. Something surprising.”

“You seemed a bit surprised there, for a second or two.”

Her face was calm but those black, almond-shaped eyes were watchful. “Oh?”

“When your daughter was mentioned.”

“Yes,” she said.

“It caught you off guard,” I said.

“Yes.” She looked down, lightly ran the tip of her finger along the rim of the snifter. “Not everyone knows about my daughter.” She looked up at me. “But Alice does, which no doubt means that her servants know as well. Including Briggs, I imagine.”

I nodded.

“But why should they bother learning about my daughter?” she asked me. “Why choose me?”

“You have money.”

She blinked her long black lashes. Money was something that wasn’t discussed in polite conversation. Then she understood what I meant and her eyebrows lowered. “You’re saying that they found out about Esme, and they deliberately used the information to impress me, to bring me into . . . To . . .” She frowned impatiently. “What is the word I’m looking for?”

“Enlist?”

“To
enlist
me as one of their followers?”

“Probably.”

She stared at me for a moment, her wide red mouth open, her black eyes narrowed. Finally she said, “But that’s
filthy
.” She looked off, her mouth grim now. “That’s
vile
. ”

“Yeah.”

She drank some more brandy.

“How old was your daughter?” I asked her.

Still looking off, she said, “Five.”

“When did she die?”

“Six years ago.” She turned to me. “I’d prefer not to talk about her, if you don’t mind.”

“Fine.”

“Tell me something,” she said. I think she heard her own voice, heard how curt it sounded. She added, “Would you?”

“Sure.”

“Why were you asking Briggs all those questions?”

“That’s what I do for a living.”

“Yes, but why those questions, and why Briggs? The Earl committed suicide. It’s a tragedy, of course, a terrible tragedy, but it has nothing to do with this magician you're after, this Chin Soo.” 

“Probably not. I’m just basically nosy.”

“Tell me about this Chin Soo.”

I told her. It took a while but she listened well. When she asked a question, which wasn’t often, it was a good question. From time to time her glance dipped down toward my mouth and then slipped back up. It made me very conscious of my mouth. And very conscious of hers—I realized that my own glance was doing pretty much the same thing, sliding down along her cheekbones to flick against her wide red lips, then darting back up to her almondshaped eyes.

When I was finished, she said, “You no longer believe that it was Chin Soo who fired that rifle this afternoon.” She looked at the clock on the end table, looked back at me, smiled. “Yesterday afternoon.”

“No,” I said.

“You believe that it was one of us. One of the guests.”

I nodded. “Yeah. There were four guests who weren’t on the lawn. Four guests who could’ve fired the rifle. Lady Purleigh, Cecily Fitzwilliam, Dr. Auerbach, and Sir David. Can you think of any reason why one of them would want to shoot at anybody?

Shoot at you, for example?”

“
Me
?” She laughed. “You can’t really think that someone was shooting at
me
?”

“Someone was getting shot at. If it wasn’t Harry, it had to be one of you.”

“But it couldn’t possibly have been me. It couldn't have been
any
of us, but who on earth would shoot at
me
?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t really see Lady Purleigh or Cecily using a rifle. Dr. Auerbach has an alibi, or says he has. Besides, you never met him before this weekend. Or did you?”

“No. He’s a friend of a friend of Alice’s. He learned about the seance and asked Alice if he could attend.”

“That leaves Sir David.”

She laughed again. “David? Why would
David
want to shoot me?”

“I don’t know.”

“Really, Mr. Beaumont, the idea is ridiculous. I’ve known David for years. He can be unpleasant, he often is unpleasant, as you saw for yourself, but he’d never shoot anyone. And he certainly wouldn’t shoot me.”

She leaned slightly toward me and gave me a martini smile dry, with a twist of lemon in it. The scent of her perfume grew stronger. She said, “I think you’ve been letting your imagination get the better of you.”

“Maybe. That happens.”

She leaned away but her perfume hung there in the air between us like an invitation, or a promise. She said, “And why are you so concerned about the gunshot in any case? If, as you say, it wasn’t fired by Chin Soo?”

“Habit.”

“Ah,” she said. “You told me in the garden that smoking cigarettes wasn’t one of your bad habits. Is this one of them?” 

“Which?”

“Asking these questions.”

I shrugged. “Like I said. It’s what I do for a living.”

She eased herself comfortably back against the love seat and she looked over at me. “What are your bad habits?”

“Is that why you asked me here? To find out about my bad habits?”

“Among other things.” She raised the snifter to her mouth, sipped at it.

“Which other things?”

“I told you in the library. Alice is a friend of mine. If you’re asking questions about her household, I’d like to know why.” 

“And like I said then, do you feel better now?”

She smiled. “Not remarkably so. Not yet.” 

“Not yet?”

The black eyes were staring steadily into mine. She was holding the brandy snifter lightly in both hands, the index finger of her right hand pointed upward. The polish on her long nail was the same bright red as her lips.

She said, “Are you quite certain you don’t feel like resting?”

I could hear the ticking of the clock on the end table. I took in a breath. It seemed to me that all the air in the room had been replaced by the scent of her perfume. “Not yet,” I said.

“Then don’t you think,” she said, “that you’re a trifle overdressed?”

I smiled. I turned, set my brandy on the end table, turned back to her. I reached for her glass and she handed it to me. I set it beside my own. When I turned back again, her head was back and her black hair was fanned across the cushion of the love seat. The black eyes were staring up at me, the wide red lips were parted in another smile.

I leaned toward her.

Someone knocked at the door.

It had a tentative sound, two or three light raps, as though the knocker, whoever it was, didn’t really want to bother anyone this late at night.

I sat up.

Without moving her head from the cushion, Mrs. Corneille reached out and put her hand on my arm. “They’ll go away,” she said softly.

The knocking came again, harder.

“I don’t think so,” I said.

She sighed, lightly squeezed my arm, and stood up. “Don't move,” she said.

She waltzed around the coffee table and across the carpet to the door. She opened it a few inches, craned her head around its edge,

and suddenly she said, “Jane!”

She opened wide the door and stepped out into the hallway, then stepped back into the room with her arm around Miss Turner’s shoulders.

Miss Turner’s brown hair was loose, tumbling to her shoulders. She was wearing her gray robe. It was streaked with dust and spotted with clumps of what looked like fur. Her arms were hanging limply at her sides and in her right hand she held a shiny double-bladed dagger.

I STOOD UP.

Miss Turner saw me and she said, “Oh!” Her blue eyes flew open as she wheeled to face Mrs. Corneille. She put her hand to her chest, the hand that held the dagger, its bright blade aimed toward the floor. “I didn’t know, I didn’t realize you had a guest. I’m so sorry!”

“It’s quite all right, Jane,” said Mrs. Corneille, and led her to the love seat. “Mr. Beaumont and I were just talking. Here. Do sit down.”

A gentleman might have offered to leave the parlor right about then. I took a few steps sideways, to give Miss Turner room on the love seat. Still gripping the dagger between her breasts, her knuckles white, she sat down and she leaned forward, balancing herself on the edge of the cushion. She looked up at me and suddenly her face and her throat went red. It made the blue of her eyes seem deeper and brighter. She looked away and then looked back, her lashes fluttering. “I’m sorry,” she told me. “I truly am. I didn’t mean to disturb anyone.”

She looked up at Mrs. Corneille, who stood bending over her, her hand on Miss Turner’s shoulder. “I think it would be best if I left,” Miss Turner said.

“Jane, really, don’t be silly,” said Mrs. Corneille. She looked at me. “Please, Mr. Beaumont. Sit.”

I sat.

Miss Turner said, “I . . .” She looked down at the dagger. She held it out, away from her, and she stared at it as if she couldn't understand how it gotten there.

“Why don’t I just take that,” said Mrs. Corneille. I didn’t say anything—if there had been any other fingerprints on the knife, they were gone now, smeared by Miss Turner’s. Mrs. Corneille reached out and Miss Turner surrendered the weapon, then winced and wiped her hand on her thigh as if her palm were bloody.

Standing upright, Mrs. Corneille examined the knife. Both the blade and the ornately carved handle were silver. “It’s very pretty, Jane,” she said. “Wherever did you find it?”

Miss Turner’s hands clutched at each other on her lap. She looked up said, “It was in my bed. I think someone tried to kill me.” She turned to me. “Does that sound utterly insane?”

I said, “Not if they used that knife.”

“You were in bed,” said Mrs. Corneille, “and someone tried to kill you?”

Miss Turner shook her head. “No, no. I was in the Earl’s room when it happened.”

Mrs. Corneille looked at me, looked back at Miss Turner. She nodded. “This sounds as though it may take a while. Would you like a brandy, Jane?”

“Yes,” said Miss Turner. “Please. Very much.”

“You sit back,” said Mrs. Corneille. “Relax. No one will harm you here.”

“Yes,” said Miss Turner. She sat back, glanced quickly around the room again. She took a long deep shuddery breath. “Yes,” she said.

She peered down at herself and she sat forward. “Oh dear,” she said. Her voice was higher now, and it sounded as if it might crack. “What a
fright
I look.” She brushed at the front of her robe and then plucked away a tuft of what I’d thought was fur. It wasn’t fur. It was a flattened dustball, the kind that grows underneath sofas and beds if you don’t sweep often enough. Wincing again, her mouth twisted, she shook it from her hands, then quickly rubbed her fingers on the robe.

Those sapphire eyes were a bit wild and I thought she might leap up and run away. Out the door, maybe out the window.

She didn’t. The eyes closed and she took another deep breath. She set her mouth in a firm straight line. Then she opened her eyes and looked over at Mrs. Corneille, who was pouring brandy into another snifter. With only a thin ribbon of strain left in her voice, she said, “I feel as though I’ve been pestering people and making a fool of myself all weekend.”

She was a real surprise, Miss Turner. A stronger woman than she seemed.

“Not at all,” said Mrs. Corneille. She set down the botde and carried the snifter over to Miss Turner. She had left the dagger beside the brandy bottle on the sideboard. “Only a fool,” she said, “can actually make a fool of herself.”

Miss Turner smiled with a kind of tentative irony. “Perhaps that’s why I’ve succeeded so well.”

“Nonsense,” said Mrs. Corneille. “Here you are. Have a big swallow now.”

“Thank you,” said Miss Turner. Her right hand was unsteady and the brandy shivered against the curved walls of the glass. She put both hands around the snifter and raised it to her mouth and she took a swallow that would’ve done Lord Bob proud. She sat back and closed her eyes and screwed up her face.

Mrs. Corneille smiled. “You needn t swallow like that again. Unless you want to, of course. I’ll fetch a chair.

I stood, but she waved me back down. She stepped over to a spindly wooden desk, lifted the spindly wooden chair from beneath it, carried it over to us and placed it a few feet from Miss Turner.

She picked up the two brandy snifters from the end table, leaned around Miss Turner to hand me mine, and then she sat down, her back straight. “Now,” she said to Miss Turner. “Do you feel better?”

Her lower lip caught between her teeth, Miss Turner had been staring at the snifter on her lap as though there were a message floating across the surface of the brandy. She looked up at Mrs. Corneille. “Yes,” she said. Her voice was small. “I think I do. Thank you.”

“Not at all. Now. You must tell us all about it.”

Miss Turner moved her shoulders in a frail shrug. She smiled hopelessly. “I’m not at all sure where to begin, really.”

“Well,” said Mrs. Corneille. “We tried starting in the middle and that didn’t work terribly well. At the risk of sounding obvious,

why don’t we try starting at the beginning. Why did you go to the Earl’s room?”

Miss Turner took another swallow of brandy. “Because of something Madame Sosostris said. At the seance.” She looked at me.

I smiled and I nodded. That was supposed to encourage her. “Madame Sosostris?” said Mrs. Corneille.

“Yes. She was talking about the Earl—she was Running Bear then, do you remember?”

“Yes?”

“She was Running Bear—playing the part, I mean—and she was talking about the Earl. She said that the Earl felt guilty now, because he’d imposed his sick desires on an innocent young woman. He felt tortured about it, she said. Well, it occurred to me that I was the woman Madame Sosostris meant.”

Mrs. Corneille smiled as though she hadn’t really followed all that. “You?”

“Yes,” said Miss Turner. She leaned toward Mrs. Corneille. “Don’t you see? The ghost. Lord Reginald. The ghost that came to my room last night. That was no ghost. It was the Earl.” She looked at me. I remembered to smile and nod some more.