Snow White Red-Handed (A Fairy Tale Fatal Mystery) (35 page)

They fell silent. Ophelia became aware that Penrose wore traveling clothes and that there was a leather bag near his feet.

He was leaving.

She pondered the wooden grain of the tabletop.

Penrose drew a watch out of his waistcoat pocket. His expression was veiled. “Well, Miss Flax, I must be going.” He stood. “I meant to ask you. . . .”

Her belly fluttered unaccountably. “Yes?”

“Would you accept the sum that you won in the gaming rooms last night? To assist you in your return to America, perhaps?”

“No! I couldn’t. It was your money to begin with.” Ophelia’s ears burned. Was she some kind of charity case to him?

Penrose was frowning. “Are you certain?”

“Yes.”

He paused. “I’ve a train to catch,” he said at last. “But I must say, it was a pleasure to—to meet you. And I . . .” His voice trailed away, yet his eyes glowed strangely.

“Professor,” Ophelia began. But she didn’t know what it was she wished to tell him. That he couldn’t go just yet, not till the indistinct, yet somehow urgent, thought welling in her throat came unstuck? That there was an awful twisting feeling where her heart was supposed to be?

“Ophelia!” Prue cried from the doorway. She was as pretty as ever, though a little worse for wear. She seemed to have some sort of bandage around her throat.

Penrose lifted his hat. “Good-bye, Miss Flax.”

“Good-bye, Professor,” Ophelia said. Then Prue was clinging around her neck, and he was gone.

Ophelia’s throat ached with that unspoken thought. The twisting feeling in her chest went cold and still.

“I’ve been having forty fits about you!” Prue said. “I don’t even hold it against you that you thought Hansel was a murderer and even went looking for, I don’t know, my dead body in the forest, and—” She stopped, noticing the tears in Ophelia’s eyes. “Oh, it doesn’t matter. I’m just awful glad to see you.”

“What has happened to your neck?”

Prue touched the bandage at her throat. “Just a scratch.”

Ophelia saw Hansel. “I’m sorry,” Ophelia said to him. “For—for suspecting you, and—”

“Please do not apologize, Miss Flax. You were only looking after Miss Bright.”

“I know,” Prue said to Ophelia, “you must be chomping at the bit to get back to New York, but I’ve had the most tip-top news.”

Ophelia looked at Hansel. He blushed.

Oh no.

“Not that, silly.” Prue laughed. “Hansel’s going back to Heidelberg to study medicine. No, the news is ever so much more exciting than you could ever think up. Mr. Hunt’s upstairs, calling on Mrs. Coop—my, what a bat she is—and I told him how my ma run off with someone, and you’ll never guess.”

“Mr. Hunt knows your mother?”

“Nope. But he knows where she is. Who’d have thought it? Ophelia, Ma married a baron or something, and she’s in France. In Paris! Mr. Hunt wrote down exactly where.”

“You’ve got your mother’s address?” Ophelia had gotten used to the idea of Henrietta Bright being gone forever.

“You bet I do.” Prue waved a piece of paper. “Say you’ll come with me to find her.”

Ophelia hesitated. She thought of misty green fields, a white barn, sweet-eyed dairy cows.

They would have to wait.

Ophelia squared her shoulders. “All right,” she said to Prue. “I’ll help you find your mother under one condition.”

“What’s that?”

Ophelia smiled. “No more hocus-pocus. No more fairy tales. And positively no more murders.”

Turn the page for a preview of Maia Chance’s next Fairy Tale Fatal Mystery . . .

Cinderella Six Feet Under

Coming soon from Berkley Prime Crime!

Shams and delusions are esteemed for soundest truths, while reality is fabulous. If men would steadily observe realities only, and not allow themselves to be deluded, life . . . would be like a fairy tale.

—Henry David Thoreau (1854)

November, 1867

Oxford, England

T
he murdered girl, grainy in black-and-gray newsprint, stared up at him. Her eyes were mournful and blank.

Gabriel placed the chipped Blue Willow teacup beside the picture. His hand shook, and tea sloshed onto the newspaper. Ink bled.

Gabriel Augustus Penrose, despite being a bespectacled professor, hadn’t—not yet, at least—developed round shoulders or a nearsighted scowl. Although, such shoulders and such a scowl
would
have suited the oaken desk, swaybacked sofa, towers of books, and swirling dust motes in his study at St. Remigius’s College, Oxford. And Gabriel, at four-and-thirty years of age, was certainly not given to fits of trembling.

But
this
.

He tore his eyes from the girl’s. Was it today’s newspaper? He glanced at the upper margin—yes. Perhaps there was still time.

Time for . . . what?

He didn’t customarily peruse the papers during his four o’clock cup of tea, but a student had come to see him, and he’d happened to leave
The
Times
behind. The morgue drawing was on the fourth page, tucked between a report about a Piccadilly thief and an advertisement for stereoscopic slides. A familiar, lovely, and—according to the report—dead face.

SENSATIONAL MURDER IN PARIS: In the Marais district, a young woman was found dead as the result of two gunshot wounds in the garden of the mansion of the Marquis de la Roque-Fabliau, 15 Rue Garenne. She is thought to be the daughter of American actress Henrietta Bright, who wed the Marquis in January. The family solicitor said that it is not known how the tragic affair arose and that the family was unaware of the daughter’s presence in Paris. The commissaire de police of that quarter has undertaken an assiduous search for her murderer.

Gabriel removed his spectacles, leaned forward on his knees, and laid his forehead in his palm. The murdered girl, Miss Prudence Bright, was a mere acquaintance. Perhaps the same might be said of Miss Ophelia Flax, the young American actress who had been traveling with Miss Bright when he’d encountered them in the Black Forest two months ago.

Mere acquaintance. The term could not account for the ripping sensation in his lungs. Fear for Miss Flax’s safety, Gabriel could admit. But the underpinning of desire that spread below each and every memory of Miss Flax, well, that was simply inadmissible.

Bother.

Gabriel replaced his spectacles, stood, and strode to the jumbled bookcase behind his desk. He drew an antique volume from the shelf:
Histoires ou contes du temps passé
(
Stories or Fairy Tales from Past Times
) by Charles Perrault. He flipped through the pages, making certain a loose sheet of paper was still wedged inside.

He stuffed the volume in his leather satchel, along with a few notebooks, yanked on his tweed jacket, clamped on his hat, and made for the door.

Two Days Earlier
Paris

The mansion’s door
knocker was shaped like a snarling mouse’s head. Its bared teeth glinted in the gloom. Raindrops dribbled off the tip of its nose. It
ought
to have been enough of a warning. But Miss Ophelia Flax was in no position to skedaddle. She’d come too far, she had too little money left in her purse, and chill rainwater was making inroads into her left boot.

“Ready?” she said to Prue, the nineteen-year-old girl dripping like an unwrung mop next to her.

“Can’t believe Ma would take up residence in a pit like this,” Prue said. Her tone was all bluster, but her china doll’s face was taut beneath her bonnet, and her yellow curls drooped. “You sure you got the address right?”

“Certain.” The inked address had long since run, and the paper was as soggy as bread pudding by now. However, Ophelia had committed the address—15 Rue Garenne—to memory, and she’d studied the
Baedeker’s
Paris map in the railway car all the way from Germany, where she and Prue had lately been employed as maids in the household of an American millionaire. “It’s hardly a pit, either. More like a palace.” The mansion’s stones, true, were streaked with soot, and the neighborhood was shabby. But Henrietta’s mansion would dwarf every building in Littleton, New Hampshire, where Ophelia had been born and raised. It was grander than most buildings in New York City, too. “It’s past its prime, that’s all.”

“I reckon Ma, of all people, wouldn’t marry a poor feller.”

“Likely not.”

“But what if she ain’t here? What if she went back to New York?”

“She’ll be here. And she’ll be ever so pleased to see you. It’s been how long? Near a twelvemonth since she. . . .” Ophelia’s voice trailed off. It was a chore to keep up the chipper song and dance.

“This is cork-brained,” Prue said.

“We’ve come all this way, and we’re not turning back now.” Ophelia didn’t mention that she had just enough maid’s wages saved up for one—and
only
one—railway ticket to Cherbourg, one passage back to New York.

Prue’s mother, Henrietta Bright, had been the star actress of Howard DeLuxe’s Varieties, back in Manhattan, up until she’d figured out that walking down the aisle with a French marquis was a sight easier than treading the boards. She’d abandoned Prue, since ambitious brides have scant use for blossoming daughters.

But Prue and Ophelia had recently discovered Henrietta’s whereabouts, so Ophelia fully intended to put her Continental misadventures behind her, just as soon as she installed Prue in the arms of her long-lost mother. If that installation was unsuccessful, well, they’d be in the suds all right. Again.

Before Ophelia could lose her nerve, she hefted the mouse-head door knocker and let it crash.

Prue eyed Ophelia’s disguise. “Think she’ll buy that getup?”

“Once we’re safe inside, I’ll take it off.”

The door squeaked open.

A grizzle-headed gent loomed. His spine was shaped like a question mark, and his eyelids were studded with flesh-colored bumps. A steward, judging by his drab togs and stately wattle.

“Good evening,” Ophelia said in her best matron’s warble. “I wish to speak to Madame la Marquise de la Roque-Fabliau.” What a mouthful. Like sucking on marbles.

“Regrettably, that shall not be possible,” the steward said.

He spoke English. Lucky.

His gaze drifted southward.

Ophelia was five-and-twenty years of age, tall, and beanstalk straight as far as figures went. However, at present she appeared to be a pillowy-hipped, deep-bosomed dame in a black bombazine gown and woolen cloak. Her light brown hair was concealed beneath a steel gray wig and a black taffeta traveling bonnet, and her oval face was crinkly with cosmetics. All for the sake of practicality. Beautiful flibbertigibbets like Prue needed chaperones when traveling, so Ophelia had dug into her theatrical case and transformed herself into the sort of daunting chaperone that made even the most shameless lotharios turn tail and pike off.

“Now see here!” Ophelia said. “We shan’t be turned out into the night like beggars. My charge and I have traveled hundreds of miles in order to visit the marquise, and we mean to see her. This young lady is her daughter.”

The steward took in Prue’s muddy skirts, her cheap cloak and crunched straw bonnet, the two large carpetbags slumped at their feet. He didn’t budge.

Stuffed shirt.

“Baldewyn,” a woman’s voice called behind him. “Baldewyn,
qui est cette personne la
?” There was a
tick-tick
of heels, and a young lady appeared beside the steward. She was perhaps twenty years of age, with a pointed snout of a face like a mongoose and beady little animal eyes to match. Her gown had more ruffles than a flustered goose. Her shiny dark hair was bedecked with a lace headdress, and gems sparkled at her throat.

“
Pardonnez-moi
Mademoiselle Eglantine,” Baldewyn said, “this young lady—an American, clearly—claims to be a kinswoman of the marquise.”

“Kinswoman?” Eglantine said. “How do you mean, kinswoman? Of my
belle-mère
? Oh. Well. She is . . . absent.”

Ophelia had picked up enough French from a fortune-teller, during her stint in P. Q. Putnam’s Traveling Circus a few years back, to know what
belle-mère
meant: stepmother.

“No matter,” Ophelia said. “Mademoiselle, may I present to you your stepsister, Miss Prudence Deliverance Bright?”

“I assure you,” Eglantine said, “I have but one sister, and she is inside. I do not know who you are, or what sort of little amusement you are playing at, but I have guests to attend to. Now,
s’il vous plaît
, go away!” She spun around and disappeared, the
tick-tick
of her heels receding.

Baldewyn’s dour mouth twitched upwards. Then he slammed the door in their noses.

“Well, I never!” Ophelia huffed. “They didn’t even ask for proof!”

“I
told
you Ma don’t want me.”

“For the thousandth time, humbug.” Ophelia hoisted her carpetbag and trotted down the steps, into the rain. “She doesn’t even know you’re on the European continent, let alone on her doorstep. That Miss Eglantine—”

“Fancies she’s the Queen of Sheba!” Prue came down the steps behind her, hauling her own bag.

“—said your Ma’s absent. So all we need to do is wait. The question is, where?” They stood on the sidewalk and looked up and down the street. It was lined with monumental old buildings and shivering black trees. A carriage splashed by, its driver bent into the slanting rain. “We can’t stay out of doors. May as well be standing under Niagara Falls. I’m afraid my greasepaint’s starting to run, and this padding is like a big sponge.” Ophelia shoved her soaked pillow-bosom into line. “Come on. Surely we’ll find someplace to huddle for an hour or so. Your sister—”

“Don’t
call
her that!”

“Very well, Miss Eglantine, said they’ve got guests. So I figure your ma will be home soon.”

The mansion’s foundation stones went right to the pavement. No front garden. But further along they found a carriageway arch. Its huge iron gates stood open.

“Now see?” Ophelia said. “Nice and dry under there.”

“Awful dark.”

“Not . . . terribly.”

More hoof clopping. Was it—Ophelia squinted—was it the same carriage that had passed by only a minute ago? Yes. It was. The same bent driver, the same splashing horses. And—

Her heart went lickety-split.

—and a pale smudge of a face peering out the window. Right at her.

Then it had gone.

On the other side of the carriageway arch was a big, dark courtyard. It was bordered on two sides by the wings of Henrietta’s mansion. The third side was an ivy-covered carriage house and stables, and the fourth side was a tall stone wall. The garden seemed neglected. Shrubs were shaggy. Flower beds were tangled with weeds. The air stank of decay.

“Look,” Prue said, pointing. “A party.”

Light shone from tall windows. Figures moved about inside a chamber, and piano music tinkled.

“Let’s have a look.” Ophelia abandoned her carpetbag under the arch and set off down a path. Wet twigs and leaves dragged at her skirts.

“You mean spy on them?”

“Miss Eglantine didn’t seem the most honest little fish.”

“And that Baldy-win feller was a troll.”

“So maybe your ma is really in there after all.”

Up close to the high windows, it was like peeping into a jewel box: cream paneled walls with gold leaf flowers and swags, and enough mirrors and crystal chandeliers to make your eyes sting. Ophelia counted five richly dressed ladies and gentlemen loitering about. A plump, dour woman in a gray bun—a servant—stood against a wall. A frail young lady in owlish spectacles crashed away at the piano.

“There’s Eggy,” Prue said. “Maybe that’s the sister she mentioned.” A young lady in a lavish green tent of a gown sat next to Eglantine.

“Same dark hair,” Ophelia said.

“Same mean little eyes.”

“A good deal taller, however, and somewhat . . . wider.”

“Spit it out. She looks like a prizefighter in a wig.”

“Prue! That might be your own sister you’re going on about.”

“
Step
sister. Look—they’re having words, I reckon. Eggy don’t seem too pleased.”

The young ladies’ heads were bent close together, and they appeared to be bickering. The larger lady in green had her eyes stuck on something across the room.

Ah. A gentleman. Fair-haired, flushed, and strapping, crammed into a white evening jacket with gold buttons, medals and ribbons, and epaulets on the shoulders. He conversed with a burly fellow in black evening clothes, with a lion’s mane of dark gold hair flowing to his shoulders.

“Ladies quarreling about a fellow,” Ophelia said. “How very tiresome.”

“
Some
fellers are worth talking of.”

“If you are hinting I care to discuss any gentleman, least of all Professor Penrose, then—well, I do not, I
sincerely
do not, feel a whit of sentiment for that man.” Well, maybe Ophelia felt a smidge of vexation and a trifle of fury. But nothing else.

“Oh, sure,” Prue said.

Ophelia longed for things, certainly. But not for
him
. She longed for a home. She longed, with that gritted-molars sort of longing, to be snug in a third-class berth in the guts of a steamship barging towards America. She’d throw over acting, head up north to New Hampshire or Vermont, get work on a farmstead. Merciful heavens! She knew how to scour pots, tend goats, hoe beans, darn socks, weave rush chair seats, and cure a rash with apple cider vinegar. So why was she gallivanting across Europe, penniless, half-starved, shivering, in this preposterous disguise?

Her eyes slid sideways.

Prue. She was doing it for Prue.

“
Duck
!” Prue whispered.

There was a clatter above, voices coming closer; someone was pushing a window open.

Ophelia and Prue stumbled off to the side until they were safely in shadow once more. They’d come to the second wing of the mansion. All of the windows were black except two on the main floor.