A Most Novel Revenge (27 page)

“You can go, Parks,” Milo said, removing his tie. “Mrs. Ames can help me undress. It's much more interesting when she does it.”

I frowned at Milo, but couldn't quite stifle a smile.

“Very good, sir,” Parks said coolly, gliding silently from the room.

“You shouldn't say such things to him,” I said when he had gone.

“I don't know who is more easily shocked, Parks or Winnelda,” Milo replied. “It's simply too easy.”

I took a seat on Milo's bed as he continued to change from his dinner clothes.

“I've just finished the book,” I said.

“Oh? Any surprises?”

“Not really. It was all pretty much as we've heard. There's just one thing that doesn't make sense to me. I can't help but wonder why she chose to make Bradford Glenn look guilty.”

“Perhaps he was.”

I sighed. “It can't be that easy. It's possible, of course, that she thought that he might be guilty. There was, after all, an altercation between Bradford Glenn and Edwin Green that night, presumably over the affections of Beatrice. Everyone I've talked to has admitted as much.”

“Does she say in the book how she came to suspect him?”

I shook my head. “She only says that Bradford awoke to find himself alone with Edwin and dragged him out into the snow to die. She does mention the brightly lit windows of the house. Perhaps someone saw something out the window. Her other scenes were accurate, from what I've been able to determine. I don't know why this one in particular should have been any different.”

“Suppose she did witness something. Why go on to write the book?” he asked. “Out of a quest for justice? It seems unlikely.”

“Everything seems unlikely,” I said tiredly. “Why did she do it? Why did she come back? None of it seems to make sense. And yet…”

There had been something in her manner at breakfast that morning. “She asked me if I thought people must always pay for their sins. Do you think that she had come back to set the record straight?”

“Does she seem the type to travel halfway around the world to make amends for a past wrong?”

What I had seen of her did not seem to indicate that justice might have been what she was striving for. What had it been, then? Some revenge of her own? Had she known something that was worth killing her to keep secret?

“There are, it seems to me, two possibilities,” I said. “One is that Isobel was murdered because of something she was about to reveal. Perhaps she had some new information that led her to believe that Bradford Glenn was not the killer and that someone else was. Or perhaps there was some other secret someone did not want to come to light.”

“And the other?”

“The other is that she was killed in an act of revenge for the havoc wreaked by
The Dead of Winter
. The crime itself speaks of passion. She was killed quite brutally.”

“That's discounting the poison, of course,” Milo pointed out.

I sighed. He was right. Someone had deliberately poisoned her before she was stabbed. Why could things never be simple?

“Let's collect our thoughts, shall we?” I suggested. I had always found that an orderly list was a good way in which to gather one's thoughts. I got up from the bed and went to the desk in the corner. I sat, took a sheet of Milo's stationery out of the drawer, and picked up a pen.

“Now. Where shall we begin?” I asked.

“It's difficult to decide, as she was something of a universal bête noire. You may as well begin with the Lyons family, I suppose.”

He was right. They had lost the most and had, perhaps, the most to lose if Isobel wrote another novel. Reggie Lyons had already suffered greatly as a result of Isobel Van Allen's first book. His family's reputation had been publically destroyed, and he had been forced to leave his home for many years.

“It could have been Reggie,” I said, “but he abhors the sight of blood.”

“Men have been known to overcome greater obstacles.”

“Yes, you're right. He has been very distraught since it happened. Perhaps he's suffering from the guilt of what he's done.”

“He might just have easily tried to poison her.”

“And when that didn't work, he flew at her in a rage.”

Milo nodded for me to continue. “Beatrice seems like a more likely suspect than Reggie,” I said. Beatrice Lyons Kline had, as far as I could see, two reasons that she might have killed Isobel. “She might have wanted to silence her, but she might also have wanted revenge. She seems very cool and calculating. Perhaps she has been waiting all this time to repay Isobel for what she did to the Lyons family.”

“She's capable of it,” Milo said. “Whether or not she actually did it is another matter.”

“What about Lucinda?” I was tempted to discount the younger Lyons sister, but knew that I could not rule her out. She had not been at the scene of Edwin Green's murder, and, as a girl of sixteen, would not have had the physical strength necessary to move Edwin out into the snow. That did not, however, clear her of Isobel's death.

Milo shrugged. “It's possible. She is a bit conniving.”

I was skeptical. Feigning a runaway horse was one thing. Murder was quite another.

“She was sent to a different boarding school abroad after what happened and seldom had the opportunity to see her siblings. Perhaps she has been harboring bitterness against Isobel for the way her family fell apart.”

“From what I understand, they weren't much of a family to begin with,” Milo said.

“Yes, that's true. Speaking of which, how was she tonight?”

“Much the same as usual. That is to say, a bit tiresome.” This was another reason I had not wanted Milo to encourage her. I had known that it would only be a matter of time before his amusement with her waned, and her feelings were bound to be hurt. He was sometimes very careless about such things.

“Well, do try to be nice to her, Milo. She's very unsure of herself. It can't have been easy to grow up the way she did. After all, she is much younger than Reggie and Beatrice, and was sent away immediately after the scandal. Her life has been very lonely.”

“We were all sent away to school,” Milo said. “It didn't do us any lasting harm.”

“You are much more confident in yourself than Lucinda Lyons,” I said.

“I don't know about that,” he replied. “She seems confident enough to me.”

“Confident enough to commit a murder?” I challenged.

“Perhaps.”

“Well, in any event, while the Lyons family has its motives, it could just as easily be Mr. Roberts who perpetrated a crime of passion.”

“Very possibly. She wasn't at all kind to him.”

I had seen the way that Isobel treated Desmond Roberts, heard the harsh way in which she spoke to him. She might have pushed him too far. A stabbing spoke of rage. That wouldn't explain, of course, who had poisoned her. Mr. Roberts had possessed a vial of poison and a rather dubious reason for possessing it. He might have tried one and then resorted to the other.

“I don't like to think that Freida might have done it, of course,” I said.

“Of course,” Milo replied. He always liked to say that I picked out the people I liked best and excluded them from the crime. That was simply not the case. I just felt I knew who was likely to be guilty and who was not. I was surprised he had not yet offered up Laurel as a potential suspect.

“I don't like to think it,” I went on, “but it
is
possible Freida might have done it. She was devastated by the publication of the book. She had still been suffering for years after the loss of her fiancé and had just married Mr. Collins. The fragile stability of her life had been torn apart by the scandal, but I don't think that revenge would motivate her. I find it difficult to believe that she would risk such a thing, given her love for her children, but…” My voice trailed off.

“The desire to protect them might prove worth the risk to her,” Milo said, and I nodded. If she was willing to do anything to keep them safe, it was possible that she had thought there were secrets worth killing Isobel to protect.

“The same might be said for Phillip Collins.” It was not hard for me to believe that he might be a killer, but what had his motive been? Were there secrets in his rather murky past that he did not want revealed? He cared for Freida. I had seen it in his eyes. Was there some secret in her past that he was guarding?

“That Collins fellow is a rotter,” Milo said without any great emotion.

“You've noticed that, have you?”

“He doesn't make any great effort to hide it, does he? I had the dubious pleasure of a long conversation with him this afternoon, and it's not an experience I would care to repeat.”

My interest was piqued. “Oh? What did he say?”

“Nothing of consequence. He spoke extensively of his land holdings in South Africa. It wasn't so much what he said. It's his manner that's repugnant.”

“Yes, I don't think he's a nice man at all.”

“That doesn't, of course, make him a killer.”

“It would be so much easier if it did.” I sighed.

Milo smiled. “No one said detective work was easy, darling.”

“No, I suppose not. Well, that leaves Mr. Winters,” I said. “What might his motive be?”

“Why don't you answer that? You are much more intimately acquainted with him than I am.”

“I will have you know that Mr. Winters behaved like a gentleman all afternoon.”

“Well, it's a wonder he could keep his hands off of you. He waxed rhapsodic about your beauty to me for a full ten minutes in the drawing room tonight. I shall be surprised if he fails to paint you with a halo and wings.”

I laughed. “You're quite ridiculous.”

“Not that I can blame him, of course. You're simply breathtaking. I sometimes wonder why I sit discussing murders with you when there are so many other amusing possibilities.”

“Milo, do try to concentrate,” I said with mock severity.

“If you're wondering if I think Gareth Winters has it in him to repeatedly stab someone with a knife, I would have to say no.”

I nodded. I felt much the same way. However, it was difficult to tell about Mr. Winters. I had wondered more than once if his show of airy detachment was not entirely authentic. It was possible that he had fabricated the persona to keep from revealing too much of himself. Perhaps he had bared some part of himself to Isobel that he was afraid she would include in a second book.

“He told me that he loved Isobel. Do you suppose it was possible that he…”

“Loved her enough to kill her?” Milo supplied. “It wouldn't be the first time such a thing has happened.”

“Murder is such a complex business.” I said. “It could conceivably be any of them.”

It seemed likely that everyone had secrets they wanted to protect. Now I had only to discover what they were.

Unfortunately, there was no way of knowing what had happened that night, not really. Even the people who had been there didn't really know what had occurred. If Edwin Green's death had not been murder, what other secrets could Isobel have known?

I remembered suddenly that Reggie had mentioned that Isobel would sometimes use the summerhouse for writing. I wondered if any of her manuscripts had been left there. It was just possible that they would provide the information necessary to tie everything together.

I could think of no conceivable way to visit the summerhouse without appearing morbidly curious.

Milo said something, but I was too preoccupied to hear it. I looked up. “Hmm?”

“Do you plan to sleep here tonight, or shall we retire to your room?”

“My room, I suppose,” I said, rising from the little desk chair. “I think it may be slightly warmer. Unless…”

He looked at me expectantly.

“You want to steal away to the summerhouse with me.”

“Absolutely not,” he answered without hesitation.

I frowned at him, but he shook his head, unmoved.

“It's not very far,” I pressed. “We could take a moonlight stroll and if it led us there…”

“Are you going to your bed,” he interrupted, “or shall I carry you there?”

Milo was seldom adamant about anything, so I had the distinct feeling he was not going to give in. Perhaps I would find a way to investigate the summerhouse tomorrow.

I capitulated, but he carried me to bed anyway.

 

25

I REACHED THE
breakfast room early the next morning and found that Mr. Roberts was the only one who had arrived. Though I had pestered the maids for frequent updates on his condition, this morning was the first time I had seen him since his collapse.

“Oh, good morning, Mr. Roberts,” I said.

“Mrs. Ames.”

He started to rise, but I held up my hand. “Don't get up,” I said sternly. “I don't want you to trouble yourself. How you are feeling?”

“I'm all right,” he said, though he didn't look it. He was very pale, and he looked as though he had lost weight. I glanced at his plate and saw that he had only a piece of toast with marmalade and a cup of tea. He certainly needed something more than that if he was going to regain his strength.

“You're up early,” I commented, going to fill my own plate.

“Yes, I couldn't bear to lie alone in that room any longer.”

“I imagine that it was fairly lonely. I'm glad you're feeling well enough to come downstairs.”

“Yes,” he said. “I've had a bit to eat, and it seems to have gone down all right.”

“I'm glad to hear it.”

I poured myself a cup of coffee and went to sit down at the table across from him.

“What will you do when all of this is done?” I asked, hoping to speak of pleasanter things. “Do you plan to go back to Africa?”