Katherine inwardly cringed as she crept inside the townhouse she currently shared with her father, stepmother, and two younger sisters. Her stepmother, ten years older than Katherine, was often occupied in keeping her sisters, more than ten years younger, in line. Although the oldest, Connie, was nearing fourteen and developing an interest in investigation, Katherine still very much felt like she should be out on her own.
She had felt that way ever since her two older sisters had married and left the stately house in order to start families of their own. It was one of many reasons why she sought out independent living arrangements. The married adults left in Dorchester House hadn’t diminished their eagerness to continue their family, either. Since it was past midnight, Katherine couldn’t predict what she might find her parents doing.
And she had to seek them out. Lady Rochford was a friend of Susanna’s. Katherine didn’t want her stepmother to learn of the death of her friend from the morning news rag. She had to deliver the terrible news herself.
She mustered her courage and stepped into the dark house. A footman had remained awake to accept her outerwear and store it away for the night. She thanked him and asked after her parents and learned they were in the upstairs parlor.
She wiped her clammy palms on her cold skirt as she neared the open door. Papa’s voice spilled into the corridor, content. “What do you think of Arthur? There’s some strong mythology behind the name.”
“I don’t want to consider it just—”
When Katherine knocked on the door, pushing it farther open, Susanna abruptly stopped and turned to look at her. A wide smile overtook her face. “Katherine, you’re home! How was the ice ball?” It was that smile, betrayed by her twinkling brown eyes, that had swayed Katherine into trusting her when she was young and grieving the loss of her mother. Susanna had a way of making the people around her feel welcome and loved. It was no mystery why the marriage, which had started as one of convenience, had deepened to love. Susanna was impossible not to fall in love with.
Which was what made the news Katherine had to deliver all the more devastating.
Papa, seated next to his wife on the loveseat with his arm around her shoulders and an open book on his lap, studied Katherine with the ease of an expert investigator. He noticed the gravity in her expression immediately and shut the book.
“Katherine, is something amiss?”
Susanna’s lips parted, and she unfolded her lithe legs to place both feet firmly on the floor. She fiddled with a strand of her black hair, a nervous habit.
Papa squeezed her shoulders, looking suddenly older than his sixty-one years. His blue-gray eyes narrowed as he waited.
Katherine swallowed hard. Her knees trembled, but she forced herself to remain standing. “I’m terribly sorry,” she confessed, her voice hoarse. “Lady Rochford… I’m afraid Lady Rochford fell from a balcony this evening. She didn’t survive.”
Susanna gasped, and her hands flew to her mouth, her face turning white. “No. No, you must be mistaken. At the ice ball?”
Katherine opened her mouth, but her stepmother didn’t appear to be paying her any mind. Katherine hadn’t realized they were such close friends, but given the way her stepmother was reacting, this was hitting her very hard.
“I saw her earlier today. It cannot be. William?” She turned her gaze toward her husband, beseeching.
Papa’s expression was hard. He held his wife closer as he looked at Katherine. “Are you certain it was her?”
“Yes.”
Susanna wailed. She buried her face in Papa’s collar, her shoulders shaking with her sobs. “It can’t be. Not Celia, not now…” Fisting her hand in his waistcoat, she raised her head. “William, you must investigate this. Find out who did this to her!”
“My dear, this may not be a murder…” He looked at Katherine as if for confirmation.
She swallowed hard before she admitted, “The family is accepting it as a terrible accident. There were no witnesses.” But I think it was murder.
“Simply because no one admitted to seeing anything doesn’t mean it didn’t happen! Celia wouldn’t jump to her death—”
Papa rubbed his hand along his wife’s slim shoulders. “No one is suggesting she has, my dear. But I wasn’t there. I cannot tell you the truth. Perhaps Katherine…”
Susanna sobbed again as Papa held her tight. His eyes hard, he said, “Perhaps you’d best leave us.”
Katherine nodded and backed out of the room in turmoil. Should she have said nothing? Should she not investigate? What if she did a bad job? Perhaps this one was best left to her father. She’d never investigated anything that affected a member of her family before.
Shakily, she sought out her own room. Because she had told her maid not to wait for her, the only creature to greet her when she opened the door was her pug, Emma. Katherine dropped to her knees and hugged her tight as the weight of the responsibility of discovering what had really happened to Lady Rochford settled on her shoulders.
“I’ve never seen a woman killed in front of me before,” Katherine confessed to her maid and confidante, Harriet.
The maid’s dark, curly hair fell into her face as she wrestled to tie a new ribbon around Emma’s collar. The pug wiggled happily, wagging her tightly coiled tail.
Katherine continued, “I’ve seen corpses before, but never one so…fresh. It was—”
“Horrifying?” Harriet suggested, looking up. Her eyebrows pulled together in sympathy.
Katherine sighed, leaning back against the pillows on her bed. Although morning had dawned, she wasn’t the earliest of risers by choice and had yet to muster the desire to leave the warm bed. The reheated bed warmer, stuffed with hot coal from the kitchen and tucked beneath the mattress at Katherine’s feet, provided little incentive to rise when the floorboards would still be cold. In half an hour, perhaps the warmth of the kitchen below would chase away the chill.
“Confound it, hold still a moment more. I almost had it.”
Smiling to herself, Katherine sat up again and held out her arms. “Give her here. I’ll hold her steady.”
Scowling, Harriet was more than willing to comply. As she deposited the dog into Katherine’s arms, she asked, “Are you certain it was murder? This is the season when only fools venture out onto the balcony.”
“Pru and I checked the balcony straight away. There was no ice or snow, nothing that indicated Lady Rochford had slipped and fallen.”
“There.”
The moment Harriet stepped back and Katherine loosened her hold, Emma jumped up to happily lick the underside of Katherine’s chin. She bounded out the door to roam the house. Harriet and Katherine let her be. The servants in the Dorchester household knew to watch for Emma before opening any doors leading outside—or to their personal belongings. Emma had a penchant for taking things that weren’t hers.
“Now you,” Harriet said, shooing Katherine out of bed. “Let’s get you dressed and ready for the day.”
With a sigh, Katherine slid her legs from beneath the coverlet as Harriet crossed the room to shut the door. The dressing screen was on the far side of the room, near the wardrobe. A writing desk, scattered with Katherine’s notes on various investigations, stood on the other side of the room. The room itself was painfully neat, a product of Harriet’s attentions.
As the door clicked shut, Harriet asked in a soft voice, “Have you told Lady Dorchester?”
Wearily, Katherine nodded. She rubbed her face, her fingers tangling in the loose brown hair that fell forward as she rested her elbows on her knees. “I did last night. Susanna was inconsolable.”
Her stomach shrank as she realized that she would have to find and speak with her stepmother this morning. Susanna might have insight into Lady Rochford’s life, and if Katherine still meant to investigate the death, she would need that insight.
Harriet patted Katherine’s knee. “That’s to be expected. She was a good friend of Lady Rochford’s. It isn’t your fault.”
If her maid was remarking upon it, Katherine wasn’t making a valiant effort to hide her feelings. “I know. It’s a terrible situation.” She stood, her knees a little weak but better than they’d felt the night before. “I’d best dress to face the cold this morning. I’ll be going out, no doubt.”
Harriet led the way to the wardrobe, where she extracted the day’s garments while Katherine washed from a now-lukewarm basin of water.
The maid said, “If you’re looking to gain entry to Dalhousie Manor, I might be able to help. I’m friends with the housekeeper. I’m certain I could persuade her to let you question her staff in case someone saw something.”
Katherine glanced up as she dried her face with a hand towel. “How did you know that was exactly what I was thinking?”
Harriet smirked. “You always want to speak with everyone. Now, come. Let’s get you dressed so you can go down to breakfast.”
As Katherine tentatively stepped out of her bedchamber, afraid to disturb the household, Emma trotted up to her. Her jaunty yellow ribbon bounced with every step. Pleased with herself, she spat something onto the floor at Katherine’s feet and sat on her rump.
Katherine groaned. “You didn’t.” With a sigh, she bent to retrieve the item. Upon closer inspection, it proved to be a pearl stud earring, the white center encircled by braided gold, a distinctive piece. It belonged to Katherine’s stepmother. One way or another, Katherine had to face Susanna.
The back of the earring bit into her palm as she closed her hand around it. First, she needed to fortify herself with breakfast.
She paused in the doorway to the breakfast room. The sideboard was laden with covered dishes overseen by a footman in the Dorchester livery. He added more tea to the cup in front of Katherine’s stepmother. Susanna’s hair was tucked into a neat bun at the back of her head, and her appearance was tidy, but she appeared haggard all the same. Her fingers trembled as she raised the replenished teacup to her lips. Her eyes were red rimmed and bloodshot as she glanced toward the door.
“Katherine.” Tea sloshed over the rim of the cup as Susanna carelessly replaced it on its saucer. “Please, come in.”
As she sat, Katherine held out her hand, palm up. “Emma brought this to me.”
“My earring.” Susanna raised her hands to caress her bare earlobes. “The fasteners on these are always loose. I was afraid I’d lost it. Thank you.”
“My pleasure.” Katherine held still as the footman placed a plate in front of her. Eggs, kippers, bacon, toast. She wasn’t hungry for any of it. “I’m terribly sorry to have to break the news about your friend. I didn’t want you to learn of it from someone else.”
“I still can’t fathom it.” Susanna’s voice broke. When Katherine raised her gaze, she found tears in her stepmother’s eyes. “She’s been my closest friend ever since I was pregnant with Maggie.”
Katherine’s youngest sister was now seven years old.
Susanna swallowed audibly. “We were of an age, you know. Both young, both married to older men and trying to conceive an heir. She had as much trouble as I did, and I was terrified that I would suffer another miscarriage.” She dipped her hand beneath the table as though queasy at the thought.
“Celia finally conceived.”
For a moment, Katherine couldn’t breathe as she pondered the implications. “Lady Rochford was with child when she…?”
Susanna nodded. “She confided in me last week. And I…” She fought for breath as she pressed her palm against her mouth. “We were going to announce this later this week, when your sisters come over for dinner, but… I’m with child too. That is, if I don’t…”
Miscarry. The dreaded word hung in the air between them. Great shocks were known to cause miscarriages, and Katherine and her father had been trying for so long…
She reached out to squeeze her stepmother’s hand. “You won’t. You and the baby both will survive this. I’m terribly sorry. If I’d known—”
With a weak smile, Susanna shook her head. “No, I had to find out sometime, didn’t I?” With a sigh, she stared down at her full plate. “I don’t know if I can eat after all this.”
Katherine’s father darkened the doorway. Although years had given him a bit of a paunch, he still stood tall and proud, his shoulders not yet bowed from the weight of time. This morning, he seemed to have more white than gray in his receding hairline.
“You must,” he said firmly, stepping into the room. “Darling, you must keep up your strength.”
His wife mustered a trembling smile and speared a kipper with her fork. “You’re right, of course.” She nibbled at the tail end.
When she set it down again, only half eaten, he paused next to her to press a kiss to the top of her head, then her forehead, the tip of her nose, her mouth. Katherine made a face and set her fork down again. If her parents were expecting a child, why were they acting as if they still hoped to conceive? She needed to find a house of her own, the sooner, the better.
The affection had a clear effect on Susanna. The moment Papa lifted his head, the color washed through his wife’s cheeks again and her eyes softened. She seemed in better spirits.
Papa confessed, “I’m happy I was home from my consultation early last night. And even more relieved that you decided not to join Katherine at the ball. The very last thing you need is to see something like that.” He looked over at Katherine.
A haunted look overcame Susanna again as she looked down. Papa took her hand and kissed her fingers. “Katherine? Can I speak with you a moment?”
Since she had no appetite anyway, Katherine nodded. She followed her father into the corridor, where they could speak privately. His gaze was serious as he met hers.
“Be honest with me, kitten. Do you think Lady Rochford was murdered?”
“I do.” She braced herself, expecting to be relieved of the investigation at any moment. Papa was, after all, the one who had taught her everything she knew. He was a better investigator, and finding out what really happened was important.
Papa softly swore. “Tarnation. I’d hoped it was only an accident.”
“I could be mistaken. I won’t know for certain until I’m able to speak with Lyle and get his opinion…”
“I trust your instincts,” Papa said, his voice firm. “I have a case I’m working with Sir John, a consultation. Do you think you’ll have trouble solving Lady Rochford’s murder?”
Katherine frowned. “You want me to—”
“Yes. Susanna does too. We both have every confidence in your abilities. After all, you did solve the Pink Ribbon Murders where I could not.” He raised his eyebrows.
Yes. She had. Firming her chin, Katherine squared her shoulders and announced, “You don’t have to worry, Papa. I’ll discover who killed Lady Rochford. I promise.”