“Are you going to listen to the carol singers tonight?” Gertie asked, as she carried a pile of dirty plates to the kitchen sink.
Mrs. Chubb finished counting the silverware before answering. “Of course I am! Wouldn’t miss it.”
Gertie dumped the plates into the soapy water. “I wonder if all the guests will be there.”
“You mean you wonder if Jeremy Westhaven will be there, don’t you?”
Gertie twisted her face into a wry grimace. “Why does everyone think I’ve got any interest in a toff? Fat lot of bloody good that’d do me. I might as well have romantic feelings for the king.” She giggled. “Come to think of it, I might have better luck with him.”
“We don’t speak that way about members of the royal family, Gertie, so mind your tongue.”
Gertie grinned, and headed back to the door. “I remember when King Edward were here. Right bleeding Casanova he were. I bet his wife never knew how many ladies he entertained in his boudoir, or how many maid’s arses he pinched.”
“That’s enough, young lady!”
Mrs. Chubb’s sharp reprimand followed Gertie out into the hallway. Still chuckling, she hurried to the dining room. Her smile faded as she threaded her way through the tables.
Several people had already left the room, but Jeremy Westhaven still sat at his table, his chin resting on his hands. She’d been happy to see him come down for the evening meal, but he’d barely summoned a smile when she’d spoken to him, and seemed disinclined to speak.
He needed cheering up, that’s what he needed. And she was just the person to do it. Squaring her shoulders, she marched right up to his table. “Is there anything else I can get for you, sir?”
His glance skimmed her face. “What? Oh, no. Nothing. Thank you.”
She tried again. “There’s going to be carol singing in the ballroom in a few minutes. They’re rather good. I heard them last year. I think you’d like that, if you don’t mind me saying.”
He blinked at her. “I’m not in a very good frame of mind to enjoy Christmas carols.”
“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that.” She leaned closer. “Not poorly, are you? I could ask Mrs. Chubb for a powder if you need to settle your tummy.”
“Thank you, no. I’m quite well.” He seemed to make an effort to smile. “In fact, I think I might listen to the carol singers after all.” He rose from his chair and pulled a watch from his waistcoat pocket. “In the ballroom, you say?”
“Yes, sir.” Gertie nodded and smiled. “They should be starting any minute now.”
“Then I’d better dash along. Thank you for your kind concern.”
He hurried off, and she stared after him. Something was wrong with him. She could feel it in her bones. Something really bad. She hoped, with all her heart, he wasn’t really, really ill, like dying or something. That would break her heart right in two.
Despondent now, she helped the maids finish clearing the tables, then made her way to the ballroom. Now she needed cheering up, and listening to Christmas carols seemed a good way to do it.
The lilting music rang in her ears as she slipped through the doors and took up a position behind one of the pillars. Servants weren’t allowed to have a seat in the audience, but Madam let them stand in the back and watch.
A group of singers stood on the stage, their red cloaks making a splash of bright color against the gray background. Madeline had suspended huge white snowflakes above the performers’ heads, and a Christmas tree stood in the corner of the stage, its candles unlit.
Gertie shivered at the memory of the fire in the library last year. The smell had hung around for weeks, reminding them all how close they had come to losing the Pennyfoot. To most of the staff, the hotel was home, the place where they lived and worked.
Except for the two twerps Madam had hired for Christmas. Gertie gazed around but couldn’t see Reggie or Lawrence anywhere. What she did see, however, raised her eyebrows clear into her forehead.
Baxter stood behind a pillar across the room, hidden from the people seated in front of the stage. Elise Boulanger stood next to him, and judging by the way she gazed up at him, the two of them were a lot more cozy than was proper.
Gertie scanned the audience and spotted Madam seated in the front row, an empty chair next to her. Gertie got a sick feeling in her stomach. There weren’t nobody what loved each other like Madam and Mr. Baxter did.
If Madam knew he was skulking about behind the pillars with Elise Boulanger, there’d be bloody hell to pay. She could only hope and pray that whatever Mr. Baxter was whispering in that painted tart’s ear wouldn’t offend Madam.
Cecily watched the group of carol singers without paying attention to the words they sang. Baxter had promised to join her, yet she’d waited for him through three of the carols and he still hadn’t appeared.
The nasty niggling worry in her chest seemed to spread throughout her body. She couldn’t deny that her husband had behaved quite strangely lately, and with no real explanation for his actions. He had been secretive, evasive, and had far too many conversations with Elise Boulanger.
She could no longer accept his excuse of surprising her. She didn’t want to be surprised. She wanted her husband back where he belonged, at her side, with a full accounting of his behavior.
Perhaps she should look for him and demand he tell her what she wanted to know. She sent a furtive glance left and right to make sure she hadn’t missed him waiting in the aisle for an opportunity to slip into his seat.
Having convinced herself he hadn’t arrived, she made a movement to stand, then paused as a lithe figure slipped into the seat beside her. She stared at Samuel, taken aback by the uncharacteristic display of bad manners.
“Begging your pardon, m’m, but I need to have a word with you.” Samuel jerked his head in the direction of the doors. “Outside, if you don’t mind.”
With a stab of concern, she gave him a brief nod. Just at that moment the carol came to a flourishing finish. Cecily politely applauded, then bent double and slipped out of her seat to make her way into the aisle.
Just as she did so, she saw Baxter step out from behind a pillar and head her way. She was about to lift a hand in greeting when she saw another figure slip out from the same pillar and disappear into the darkness on the other side of the room. She recognized her at once. That red hair was identifiable anywhere. Elise Boulanger.
A knife turned in her heart. Staring straight ahead, she walked right past her husband and marched toward the door. She heard him speak her name, urgently under his breath. She chose to ignore it, and as the opening strains of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” rang out, she pushed open the doors and stepped through them.
Samuel must have darted ahead, since he waited for her at the end of the hallway. “I have to show you something,” he said, as she joined him. “It’s in the stables.”
In spite of the ache under her ribs, she felt a stir of anticipation. “You found something?”
“Yes, m’m.”
Since people were milling about the lobby, she held back her questions. “Wait here until I fetch my cloak,” she told Samuel, then hurried up the stairs to her suite.
It took her but a moment to wrap the warm cloak about her shoulders, and then she rejoined Samuel in the lobby. Beckoning him to follow, she stepped outside into the cold night air.
The salty sea mist clung to her face and hair as she did her best to keep up with Samuel’s quick steps while they crossed the courtyard.
Rounding the end of the stables, Samuel paused. “It’s in here, m’m,” he said, in a low voice. He stepped inside the first stable and she followed, picking up her skirts to avoid sweeping straw along with her.
Cecily waited until Samuel lit a lamp and held it aloft. “Oh, my.” She stopped short at the sight of what appeared to be a dead body. “Please don’t tell me we have another murder on our hands.”
“No, m’m.” Samuel walked up to the body and gave it a hefty kick. “It’s the scarecrow clown, m’m.”
She hurried forward, and stared down at the heap of clothes and straw. “My goodness. Not a very good one, is it.”
“No, m’m.”
The clown’s head had been badly shaped with straw stuffed inside a flour sack. A garish red mouth covered half the lower face, and a painted red nose sat above it, below two black eyes. A tangled mop head, soaked in what appeared to be red ink, stuck out the top. The rest of the body had been tied to the mop handle.
Up close it looked ridiculous, though Cecily could well imagine how frightening the scarecrow must have seemed suspended in the air above the balcony seats. “Well, that at least clears up the matter of the ghost,” she said. “Be sure to tell the maids about this. It will help settle their minds.”
“Yes, m’m.” Samuel hesitated, then added, “But I don’t think a straw clown could have killed Mr. Porter.”
“No, Samuel. I think we can safely rule out this bundle of rags as a suspect.”
“Then Roland must have killed him after all.”
Cecily frowned. “I don’t think so. I believe we are dealing with two clowns. One of them this monstrosity.” She poked the straw dummy with her foot. “The other, I’m afraid, quite real.”
Samuel’s eyes widened. “Two clowns?”
“Yes. I think this one was made to throw us off the scent. I found a clown nose on the top floor in the broom cupboard. It certainly didn’t belong to this one, so I must assume there is another clown prowling around the hotel.”
“I think it might be better if I didn’t mention that to the maids, m’m.”
“Quite right. Just tell them you found the scarecrow, and leave it at that. With any luck, we shall find the other clown before he makes any more ghostly appearances.”
“Or bumps off someone else.”
“That, too.” Picking up her skirts she turned toward the door. “Please get rid of that thing, Samuel. I suggest you burn it.”
“Yes, m’m. I’ll be sure and see to it first thing in the morning.”
She left him to pick up the ragged dummy and made her way back to the hotel. She had barely stepped inside the front doors when Baxter stormed across the lobby, his face a mask of resentment.
“Where in blazes have you been?” he said, his voice low with suppressed anger.
“To the stables.” She slipped past him and headed for the stairs. “Samuel had something he needed to show me.”
“In the middle of the night?”
“It is hardly the middle of the night. It is barely time for bed.”
She began mounting the stairs, behind a couple of elderly guests, who were taking their time with each careful step. She could feel Baxter’s body close behind her, and hear his furious breathing, but fortunately he had the good sense to hold his tongue until they were alone in their suite.
Pulling off her gloves, Cecily marched into the boudoir.
Baxter followed her, pausing in the doorway to glare at her. “What was so damnably important you had to leave me sitting in that blasted ballroom without so much as a word as to where you were going?”
“You weren’t exactly pining for my company,” Cecily retorted.
“What the hell does that mean?”
Ignoring him, she threw her gloves onto the bed and sank down on the edge of it. Her shoes had picked up a fair amount of mud and bits of straw still stuck to the soles, despite the fact she’d wiped her feet upon entering the hotel.
Sighing, she got up and walked over to her dressing table.
“I insist you explain that cryptic remark.” Baxter took a few steps toward her.
Cecily picked up her button hook and carried it to her favorite Queen Anne chair. Seating herself, she began undoing the buttons of her shoes.
“Cecily, I will not tolerate—”
Her temper finally unleashed; she jerked up her chin. “You will not tolerate what? It is I who will not tolerate your behavior any longer. It is bad enough that you find it necessary to sneak around in the shadows to talk to your dear Elise, but when you display your indiscretions in full view of the guests and staff of this hotel, then I must put my foot down. There will be no more clandestine conversations with that woman in this hotel. I hope I make myself quite clear.”
Heart thumping, she watched her husband thin his lips, his face white with temper. “Quite clear.” He stuck two fingers in his waistcoat pocket and withdrew something small, square, and white. Marching over to her, he threw it down on the bed beside her. “Here. This is what Elise and I have been discussing. She went to a great deal of trouble to get these for you, at my request.”
Her fingers trembling, Cecily picked up the envelope. “What’s this?”
“It’s part of your Christmas present. Open it.”
She did so, and withdrew two cards. Tickets, she saw, to a concert at the Whitney Theater in London. A concert featuring her favorite singer, Colin Masterson. With an invitation to visit him backstage.
A shocked gasp left her lips, and she looked up at her husband. “I had no idea!”
“Of course you didn’t. You assumed the worst, and I am sorely disappointed in you. I was under the impression you trusted me.”
Stung by the injustice of his accusation, she struck back. “Exactly what was I to think, I ask you? Everywhere I looked, there you were with your heads together, whispering like two guilty lovers. I’m quite sure I was not alone in my suspicions, either. Heaven knows what the staff must think.”
“I couldn’t care less what the staff might think!”
His roar made her jump, but she faced him with her own righteous indignation. “Surely you could have managed this transaction without all that skulking around? After all, Elise Boulanger is an attractive woman, and associated with the stage. And, as such, her reputation is not exactly one of notable respect.”
“It is not my fault if people have evil minds.”
“People will gossip, Hugh, no matter how innocent the situation might be. With that in mind, you should have taken pains to spare me the embarrassment.”
“Embarrassment of what, may I ask?”
“The embarrassment of giving people the false impression you had a personal interest in Miss Boulanger.” She paused, then allowed her own resentment to get the better of her by adding, “That’s if it is a false impression.”
For a moment he stood staring at her, his jaw twitching in anger. Then he spun on his heel, muttering over his shoulder, “Elise Boulanger is not you, Cecily. You would do well to remember that in the future.”
“Where are you going?”
He didn’t answer her, and a few moments later the door slammed behind him.
Left alone, Cecily stared down at the tickets in her hand. True, she had jumped to the wrong conclusion. But, he had given her just cause.
She tugged at the buttons of her shoe with renewed vigor. Then again, Baxter had gone out of his way to obtain the tickets for her. He had no interest in the baritone himself, and he hated to ask anyone for a favor.
With a grunt of frustration, Cecily threw the button hook across the room. Although she felt a certain amount of justification, she could understand Baxter’s outrage. His feelings had been hurt because she had doubted him.
Men. Piffle. Why did they have to be so infuriating with their logic and their rationalized behavior? It was enough to turn her hair gray. And she hadn’t even had the chance to tell Baxter about the scarecrow Samuel found.
Well, it would just have to wait until the morning now. Knowing her husband, he would return far too late and in no mood for conversation.
She could only hope that by the morning he would have recovered his temper. After all, it would be Christmas Eve. She couldn’t bear the thought of being at odds with him at such a wonderful time of the year.
Sighing heavily, she prepared herself for bed and lay aching for a long time before she finally fell asleep with an empty space beside her.
She awoke the next morning, relief flooding through her when she saw Baxter sleeping at her side. Debating whether or not to wake him up, she deliberately tossed herself around on the bed until he stirred.
“Bax—” she began, but he interrupted her.
“I’m sorry, Cecily. I was unduly harsh last night. After thinking things through I can see where you might have formed the wrong impression. Thoughtless of me, but I wanted to surprise you and I was afraid you’d guess that I’d asked Elise if she could procure the tickets.”
“I’m sorry, too.” She smiled at him, and smoothed back his tousled hair with a loving hand. “I should have known you would not conduct yourself in that manner for the wrong reasons.”
He raised his head to kiss her, which banished the ache in her heart. Resting her head on his shoulder, she said carefully, “What I didn’t understand is how you could be on such friendly terms with Elise, without telling me that you were even acquainted with her.”
“I didn’t make her acquaintance until a few nights ago. I left the office early, intending to buy the tickets at the theater. I arrived there just as Doris and Elise were leaving, after their rehearsals. Doris introduced us, and when I mentioned the tickets Elise explained she was a good friend of Colin Masterson’s and could possibly arrange for us to visit him backstage. I thought it would make a wonderful surprise for Christmas.”
“And it was, darling. Thank you.” Cecily sighed happily. All was explained; her husband still loved her and she had an exciting event to look forward to after Christmas.
Now all she needed was to find out who killed Sid Porter and caused the death of her footman. Then, perhaps, she could put all this upheaval behind her and enjoy the celebrations.
That, she reflected, with a stab of anxiety, would not be quite so easily resolved.