CHAPTER 3
“Verity, we wondered where you’d gone,” my aunt exclaimed as she huffed forward. “You missed half the tour.”
“Yes, well, I saw Reg out here and thought he could use some company,” I replied.
“I see.” Her voice and her eyebrows raised with suspicion. “And just what have you two been conspiring about?” She wagged her finger between us. “They always were, you know,” she told Sidney in an undertone, as if we couldn’t hear her. “The lot of them. Verity and the boys. Her mother despaired of her ever learning to behave like a lady.”
I laughed. “I can’t help it that all my cousins are boys, and my only sister so many years younger. You didn’t expect me to be able to convince them to have tea and play with dolls, did you?”
“No, but a young lady might have balked at wading barefoot into the river to catch tadpoles or climbing trees and tearing her dress.”
Reg let out a crack of laughter. “I’d forgotten about that. Ripped it clear up the back. I thought your mother was going to have an apoplexy when she saw you running toward the house in nothing but your shift.”
Sidney, who had been observing us all in amusement, his hands tucked in the pockets of his trousers, chose that moment to disabuse my aunt that she had any ally in this argument. “I think I would have liked to see that.”
My aunt scowled while Reg nearly doubled over with merriment.
It was painful, yet also somehow comforting to talk about old times, like using a muscle that’s grown weak from disuse. “I do believe you witnessed me doing enough foolish things to try to impress you the first time you came home with Freddy from school,” I reminded Sidney. “And none of those were cherished memories to your sixteen-year-old self.”
“Darling, you underestimate your eleven-year-old charm,” he teased.
I screwed up my nose. “No, I do not. I was a perfect pest, as you’ve admitted.”
He chuckled. “True enough. Who knew how much I would find you changed in six years’ time?”
“Not so much changed as aware that men do not like apples thrown at their heads or secret admirer notes doused in pilfered perfume tucked under their doors.”
“Good Lord, Verity,” Reg cried, clutching his side in hilarity. “How have I never heard this before?”
“Reginald, don’t hurt yourself, dear,” his mother cautioned.
His brow creased in annoyance, and Sidney stepped forward to clasp his shoulder. “Good to see you, Popham.”
“Likewise, Kent. Hope you didn’t travel all this way just to pay us a visit.” That this comment had been calculated to irritate his mother, there was no doubt, for his jaw clenched, as if prepared for her answering rebuke. And she gave it to him.
“What an absurd thing to say, Reginald. It’s not as if we live in deepest Cornwall or, heaven forbid, Scotland. In any case, it’s a lovely day for a jaunt out to the country, and I’m very grateful to have their company.” Her gimlet stare fell on me. “Though I hope your cousin hasn’t been saying anything untoward to upset you.”
There was a topic she clearly hadn’t wanted me to broach with him, and I had a strong suspicion of what it was.
“Of course not. What an absurd thing to say,” he responded with biting mockery. “We were merely reminiscing and discussing my still-stunning good looks.” His head turned vaguely in the direction of where Sidney stood. “You understand, old chap. One can hardly trust one’s own mother for confirmation of this fact. She’d likely call me an Adonis even if I looked like a gargoyle.”
“What nonsense,” Aunt Ernestine huffed. “Come with me, Verity. There’s something I wish to show you.”
More likely she wished to scold me. But before I could object, she’d already turned to stride off, expecting me to follow.
“Now you’ve done it,” I teased, rising from my chair and turning with a swish of my blue skirt. “She’ll never let me come back out and play.”
“Fortunately, she retires early,” Reg called after me. “And we have a full sideboard stocked with gin.”
I laughed as I lifted my skirts to better hasten after my aunt, who could move with surprising swiftness when she was working herself into high dudgeon. I caught up with her just as she turned into the corridor, which led to the grand staircase, her chin arched upward imperiously.
“I hope you haven’t said anything to Reginald about my troubling discoveries,” she proclaimed in a sharp voice calculated so that it could not be heard beyond a few feet away above the echo of her footfalls. “His health is delicate, and I’ve no wish to upset him more than absolutely necessary.”
“His health doesn’t seem delicate,” I replied, matching her tone. “If anything, he seems frustrated and listless. And in any case, shouldn’t you be conferring with him on the matter of these forgeries and thefts? He is the baronet, after all. Perhaps he has some insight.”
She pulled up short to glare at me just as we reached the base of the staircase. “I forbid you to speak of them.”
I frowned at the vehemence in her tone.
Swiveling abruptly, she began to march up the stairs. “Just because I called you here for your help, does not mean I will brook any interference. I should think I know better than you what my son needs.”
“I meant no insult, Aunt Ernestine, but don’t you think . . .”
“You were not here when he came home from the hospital that first time,” she continued in a brittle voice. “You didn’t see the scars beneath his bandages, or hear his cries of terror when he couldn’t tell whether he’d woken from his nightmares or was still trapped inside them because he could no longer see.”
My steps faltered on the landing though she continued on. I’d forgotten Reg had been buried under a collapsed trench wall when they pulled him out after the shell explosion.
“You weren’t here begging him to return to the hospital out of fear he would put a pistol in his mouth if he did not.” She paused to glower down at me from halfway up the flight, her face pale and haggard in the light of the window at my back. “So don’t presume to tell me what I should or should not do in regards to my own son.”
I nodded and she turned to carry on. I hesitated before following her, realizing I’d clumsily trampled over a chasm of grief, dread, and insecurity. She was right. I hadn’t been here when my cousin had been at his lowest, and it was callous and presumptuous of me to think I understood all of what he had been through or what he was thinking simply from one short conversation. But that didn’t mean I was entirely wrong about Reg’s frustration or his capabilities either.
However, I would obey my aunt’s wishes for now. At least until I’d confirmed my suspicions about the forgeries via a different angle.
“I’ve placed you in the laurel-green chamber.” My aunt continued speaking, as if our confrontation had never occurred, and I hastened after her. “I know it was one of your mother’s favorites, and honestly it’s one of the least damaged. The officer who stayed in that room was more conscientious than his fellow airmen.” She opened a door a short distance from the landing and allowed me to proceed her into the chamber.
My eyes swept over the warm oak furniture and laurel-green walls, and I could well imagine why my mother had liked it. The gleaming furnishings were at least two hundred years old, and the color palette, while understated, was still pleasing to the eye. “Thank you. It’s lovely.” My gaze fell on the painting of a bay laurel tree hanging above the bed in an ornate swirling frame, and a thought occurred to me. “What a charming picture.” Then feigning sudden inspiration, I turned toward my aunt. “I seem to recall a portrait hanging in your bedchamber. One of you reading under a willow tree. Please tell me that isn’t one of the forgeries.”
She gave a soft laugh. “No, child. That wasn’t me. It was naught but a pretty picture I found at a shop in London and took a fancy to.”
This I well recalled, but I figured it would deflect some of the pointedness of my sudden interest.
“Then it’s still there? In your room?”
“Yes, above my writing desk, where it’s always been,” she said with a gentle smirk.
“May I see it?”
She didn’t respond, and I had difficulty interpreting the look on her face. It was pained in some way, though I couldn’t tell if that was because she suspected my subterfuge or for another reason entirely.
“Maybe that seems an odd request . . .” I continued, trying to gauge her reaction.
“Oh, no,” she replied. “It’s simply . . .” She broke off, shaking her head before she offered me a determined smile. “Come with me.”
I followed her down the corridor, its runner scuffed and worn beneath our feet, and around the corner toward the grand master bedchambers. A gold-haired maid who had been walking toward us down the main corridor turned to watch us with interest as we approached the suite of rooms, and then she hurried on.
“I should warn you, the door may not open.”
Relieved that she’d broached the matter Reg had wanted me to look into herself, I regarded her quizzically. “What do you mean?”
“We’ve had some issues with doors in this part of the house sticking and the locks jamming.” She spoke evenly, as if the matter was not of great concern, but I could hear the consternation beneath her words.
“That sounds unsettling.”
“Yes, well, apparently a leak was found on the roof in the upper story, and it’s seeped down into the walls along this corridor, causing the wood to swell. Or at least, that’s how our man-of-all-work explained it.”
My eyes trailed up the walls to the ceiling, searching for any evident signs of water damage. “Can the problem not be fixed?”
“Yes, but at some expense.” She reached for the door to the lady’s chamber and paused, as if bracing herself, before turning the handle to push it open. Contrary to what I’d expected after what she’d just told me, it swung open with ease. “Sometimes it’s like that,” she explained. “While other times it seems nothing will force it open save the hand of God Himself.”
“Is it safe for you to stay here, then?” I asked, following her inside. I wondered if she would confirm what Reg had already told me.
If the wood was truly that warped, that temperamental, then was this part of the house even structurally sound? And heaven forbid, if there was a fire and she needed to escape.
“I’ve moved to a room down the hall. Temporarily,” she stressed, anxious to make some point, though I wasn’t certain precisely the aim. If they were as strapped for funds as they seemed to be, then they hadn’t the money available to make such extensive repairs. But of course, maybe my aunt didn’t want me to know that. Though surely if my father knew, she must have anticipated he would tell me.
A quick perusal of the lavish rose and gold decorated chamber showed that much of the chamber’s contents were still present. From the ornate walnut furnishings to the thick Aubusson carpet to the paintings and artwork gracing the walls, it appeared more or less as I remembered it. I crossed toward the writing desk to gaze up at the painting I had asked to see, while all the while my mind was sifting through everything she’d just told me. “You said the locks on the doors sometimes jam?” I turned my head to look at her where she stood next to an ormolu table, fiddling with the items resting on top. “Isn’t that . . . peculiar?”
“Apparently not. I, of course, have no experience with such things, but Mr. Green says it happens more often than one would realize.”
I assumed she was speaking of the estate’s man-of-all-work, and I couldn’t help but wonder at his credentials. Was he qualified to make assessments of such matters? I had no more experience than my aunt, but while I had witnessed wood in houses swelling and doors sticking, I failed to comprehend how that could cause a lock to engage on its own and jam. The scenario seemed all too improbable, if not impossible.
I wondered if perhaps Sidney would have a better grasp of the mechanics of the matter than I did, and so I asked him later that evening when we had a moment to ourselves after dinner.
He paused in loosening his tie to cast me an incredulous look. “I would say that’s worse than improbable. It sounds suspicious.”
“I had the same misgiving,” I admitted as I removed the bracelets dangling from my wrists and stacked them in my jewelry case. “But I can’t comprehend the motive for impelling my aunt to leave her bedchamber. From what I could tell, nothing was missing except her more personal property, and she undoubtedly moved that to the bedroom she’s currently occupying.”
He shrugged out of his black evening coat and tossed it over the back of the chaise lounge. “Still, I think it would behoove us to find out more about this Mr. Green.”
“I’ll speak to Miles tomorrow,” I replied, pulling the bejeweled headband from my hair and raking my hands through my auburn castle-bobbed tresses to remove the indentation. “There are a few other things I’d also like to ask him.”
He lifted his head as he bent over to remove his shoes, casting me a knowing look. “The forgeries?”
“Among other things.” I sank down beside him on the chaise, removing my black T-strap pumps. “What did you and Reg discuss after Aunt Ernestine summoned me away?”
“Nothing of interest,” he remarked before flicking open the top two buttons of his crisp white shirt and draping his arm over the rounded back of the chaise behind my shoulders.
I arched my eyebrows, letting him know I was well aware that “nothing of interest” was man-code for “something of great interest,” but whatever it was, he wouldn’t share it. Whether that was because Reg had asked him not to, it was inappropriate for a lady’s ears, or more likely, that it had to do with the war and that curious realm of comradery shared only by fellow soldiers, I couldn’t tell. While I had witnessed more than most British citizens and endured my share of ghastly experiences during my time as an intelligence agent, I had not fought in the trenches. I had not slept in muddy dugouts knee-deep in water, or made tea in a bully beef tin, or singed lice hidden in the seams of my clothes with matches. I had not witnessed my friends being mowed down by a machine gun’s bullets, or torn apart by shrapnel, or choked by gas. I knew full well that there was a limit to what I could understand, and what any returning soldier would share beyond that. Even my husband. Especially him.
“Then he didn’t confide in you his frustration at his mother for involving you in the complaints about the damages to the estate?” I asked.
“No, but that much is obvious.” His voice was droll. “Otherwise, what reason would your aunt have had for deliberately excluding him from our conversations on the matter?”
So he had noticed that as well. Whatever the truth about Reg’s health, or his good and bad days, as baronet, he still should have been consulted.
I sank my head back against his arm. “One thing is certain. While the house is undoubtedly damaged, it is not crumbling down around them.” I rolled my head to the side. “Though I suppose one could argue that the roof over the master bedchambers is in danger of doing so. But I don’t think my aunt can lay the blame for that at the airmen’s feet. Not if the roof has been leaking for some time.”
“And that’s supposing that the information this Mr. Green gave your aunt is correct. Did you see any evidence of this water damage?”
“Well, no. But I didn’t precisely peer behind all the doors along the corridor looking for it.”
Sidney reached over to idly run his finger over the black seed pearls decorating the skirt of my gown. “Whatever the case, all your aunt can do for now about the damages done during the war is submit a claim to the government. Reg and I can do our best to exert pressure on them to take care of the matter swiftly, but that doesn’t mean we’ll be successful. This is the government we’re talking about, and there’s already a long line of petitioners for war reparations.”
“And even if they do pay for the damages, it doesn’t mean it will fix their dilemma. Not if they are as empty in the pockets as Father suggested. They’ll have to sell off part of the estate, if not the house. That is, if it’s not entailed.”
Sidney’s brow furrowed. “Bloody feudal regulations. I hope they change the laws or one of the men in my family finds a way to break the entailment before I stand to inherit. Otherwise we shall be strapped with the Treborough monstrosity of an estate. One I have never been fond of, and that will bleed us dry if we try to fix it.”
I was somewhat startled by this pronouncement. As the only surviving grandson of the fifth Marquess of Treborough, I knew Sidney eventually stood to inherit the title currently held by his oldest uncle, but I’d never visited Treborough Castle. “Is it truly as bad as all that?”
“Worse,” he stated glumly. “My grandfather may have been rather progressive in distributing his unentailed wealth among his three sons evenly. But in doing so, he failed to anticipate the changes in Britain’s economy, and so saddled Uncle Oswald with an estate he couldn’t hope to maintain on the income it generated alone.”
Sidney’s father, the youngest of the brothers, had compounded his inherited wealth through sound investments and by marrying an heiress, though not for purely mercenary reasons. They’d fallen in love, and from all indications were still as enamored with each other today as the day they’d wed, sometimes to the exclusion of everything else, including their own children. Given what I knew about his father’s wealth, and the more than generous annual stipend Sidney received, the notion of Treborough Castle and its estate being in such a state as to cause bankruptcy was shocking indeed.
“Well, let’s not think on that now. Not when it will be many years before it is your father’s or our problem.” I curled my stockinged feet up on the chaise and nestled in closer to Sidney’s side. “We have more pressing matters to consider.”
“Indeed.” He shifted his broad shoulders so he could gaze down at me more easily.
“I know there’s nothing we can do about the damages, but I would like to take a closer look into these forgeries and thefts, as well as the matter of my aunt’s mysterious locking door. I think I should ask the staff about the missing maid as well, just to be sure there genuinely is no cause for concern.” I frowned. “For all my aunt’s professed eagerness for our assistance, she’s not being very forthcoming.”
“Only when she thinks the information is relevant to her wishes,” he agreed, having noticed the same diversionary tactics I had.
“Moreover, it seems rather rude to rush off less than twenty-four hours after my arrival. I’m sure my father expected more from me.” I turned to gaze up into his deep blue expectant eyes. “However, there’s no need for us both to stay.”
“Are you suggesting we divide and conquer?”
“I don’t expect there’s much more to discover here, so there’s really no reason why you shouldn’t keep our appointment in Falmouth and then return to collect me on your way back to London.” I searched his face. “Unless you’d rather remain?”
But I already knew his answer. I could sense his desire to be off. Part of it was an eagerness to be back behind the wheel of his new Pierce-Arrow, but part of it was something else. A restlessness that stemmed from the war, particularly when he was confronted with a situation that dredged up fraught memories. There were plenty of potential sources for that here at Littlemote.
“No, I suspect you’re right. And such a tactic might work in our favor, for I’d wondered how comfortable the employees at Lord Rockham’s import-export business would feel speaking to a woman about the questions we intend to ask them.”
I understood what he meant. For all my annoyance at men who considered women incapable of understanding business matters or were shocked that they should even take an interest, in my intelligence work I’d learned the importance of accepting reality and adapting to work within others’ limitations and prejudices if I hoped to achieve results. The men at the shipping yards in Falmouth would share far more with Sidney than me, just as the employees at a London milliner might be more forthcoming with me than they would be with my husband.
“You should have said something to me sooner,” I told him, wondering if he would have if I hadn’t unwittingly introduced the subject myself. “We have to be smart about this. Lord Ardmore is almost certainly already aware of our gathering further information on him, as well as Rockham’s and Flossie’s murders. So we may only get one chance to ask our questions before he interferes.”
We’d tangled with the calculating and elusive Lord Ardmore several weeks earlier while trying to solve two seemingly unrelated murders. And while we’d unmasked the perpetrators responsible for pulling the triggers, both literally and figuratively, we were also convinced Ardmore had been the ultimate architect of the killings, as well as a number of related deaths. However, Ardmore was far too clever to be connected easily to the crimes. His ongoing role with Naval Intelligence was shadowy, the details unavailable even to my former chief, C, at the foreign division of Military Intelligence—the Secret Service. But one thing was certain, C didn’t trust him, so neither did I.
So we’d begun clandestinely collecting information about Ardmore, trying to piece together the components of the previous investigations we hadn’t possessed, hoping one of them would lead us to the proof we needed to convince Ardmore’s highly placed friends of his guilt. The trouble was, Ardmore was much too good at covering his tracks, or eliminating the people who could make those connections. Even the details we could confirm seemed to lead to a dead end, either by Ardmore’s design or because he’d destroyed the evidence.
“You’re thinking of that girl at the orthopedic foot appliance store,” he deduced.
“Of course, I am.” I crossed my arms over my chest, still struggling to control my temper days later. “She was perfectly friendly and talkative the first time I visited the shop, and happy to tell me all about her former coworker. How Flossie began stepping out with a customer she met there. A gentleman who claimed to be writing a book about some of the unresolved mysteries from the war. A man who claimed aloud he’d worked for the intelligence service and spoke about all the information he often uncovered from reading people’s mail.” I arched my eyebrows in emphasis. “How Flossie had seemed to devour his tales, even though the shop girl had maintained a healthy skepticism. Which might have simply been her effort to mask her jealousy that Flossie had snagged such a beau and not her, but either way, the connection seems obvious.”
“You said the description she gave you of the man didn’t match Ardmore.”
“No, but I imagine it matches one of his underlings. And I’m certain it was Ardmore who sent him to that store to scrape up an acquaintance with Flossie. To charm her, and somehow inveigle her into stealing her housemate Esther’s correspondence.” That Esther had then caught Flossie doing so, and Flossie had accidentally killed her trying to escape seemed pure chance, though one that had benefitted Ardmore. Until Sidney and I had stuck our noses into the matter.
I scowled ferociously, wrinkling my nose. “I’m also certain it was Ardmore, or another of his henchmen, who convinced that shop girl to refuse to speak with me when I tried to follow up with her a few days later.”
Sidney pulled me closer, tipping my chin upward so that he could look into my eyes. “Don’t let him vex you,” he reminded me. “You know that’s exactly what he wants. For you to stew in frustration.” His thumb brushed a wayward strand of hair away from my cheek. “It’s doubtful you would have gotten anything else useful from that shop girl anyway. And now at least you have a description of one of the men working for him.”
I exhaled a long breath, conceding he was right. “But you understand this means Ardmore must be aware we haven’t stopped investigating. And that means he’s anticipated our making a trek west to Falmouth.” My gaze trailed over the bronzed skin of his square jaw and high cheekbones before staring intently into his eyes. “Be careful. Watch your back in Falmouth.” My lips quirked upward at one corner. “And perhaps lay off the accelerator just a bit.”
He heaved a sigh of long suffering. “Because you asked, I will.”
The glitter in his eyes told me he was only teasing, but I emphasized the point anyway. “I mean it, Sidney.”
“I know, Ver,” he assured me, his face softening with sincerity, though the twinkle never left his eyes. “I’ll be back by Monday. I wouldn’t want to miss your birthday.” His voice lowered. “Not when I have a special present planned for you.”
“Do you?” I murmured back playfully, draping my arms over his shoulders.
He smiled secretively.
“What is it? Can you give me a hint?”
He tilted his head in consideration. “No.”
I pouted my lips and his gaze fastened on them.
“But I can offer you a preview of the other festivities,” he proposed as his mouth captured mine.
What exactly he had planned for my twenty-third birthday in three days’ time, I didn’t know, but the preview assured me it would be more than spectacular.