An Untimely Frost (21 page)

C
HAPTER
36

S
ick with disappointment, her limbs trembling with exhaustion, and her bloodied palms throbbing with every beat of her heart, Lilly shuffled her mud-encrusted feet to the ladder. She placed her boot on the bottom rung and put her weight on it. Simultaneously, a sharp crack of lightning split the sky and the step gave way, jarring her from the tips of her toes to the top of her head. From the front of the house she heard the terrified whinny of the rented horse. Peering over the edge of the grave, she saw the beast running hell-bent for leather down the lane toward the main road, the buggy bouncing along behind it.

Her hysterical laugh dissipated in the raging wind. What else could go wrong?
Don't worry about the horse, Lilly. What if you can't get out of this blasted hole? Won't that be a fine kettle of fish?
Then she recalled that Billy Bishop knew where she was. If the rented rig showed up at the livery by nightfall, surely he would send someone to look for her.

Gritting her teeth, she grabbed the sides of the ladder and lifted her foot to the next rung, praying that it would hold as she hoisted herself upward and onto the ground. It did. On firm ground at last, she rolled onto her back and flung her forearm over her eyes, aware finally of the absence of the sun, the thunder grumbling in the distance, and the sudden stiffness of the chilly wind. She lay still for several moments, trying to catch her breath, uncertain whether the wetness on her face was tears or raindrops.

Why hadn't she gone back to Chicago with the news that Purcell was dead and his widow had no intention of selling this godforsaken place? Why had she let her stubbornness and curiosity bring her to this?

Even as she questioned herself, she knew she'd done what she had because the innocence of three young women taken against their will insisted that the truth be revealed. Old hurts cried out for release of decades-old pain. Ruined lives demanded justice.

How could she do anything else?

Allan Pinkerton's words echoed in her mind, and with them, renewed determination. Harold had killed Rachel and left her body here, or he had left and assigned Prudence, an accessory to his crime, to do the dirty deed.

Again, Lilly felt as if she were missing some vital bit of information, some clue that would tell her all she needed to know about the heinous acts committed in this place. With a sob, she rolled to her stomach and lay there for a moment with her head on her forearms, struggling to gather the last remnants of her energy.

Without warning, the hair at the nape of her neck stood on end, as it had twice before. She raised her head, her frantic gaze sweeping the woods around her. As usual, she saw nothing but shadows. Before, her watcher had been an animal. She hoped that's all it was now. Her derringer was secure in the pocket of the skirt that lay next to her, and even if her physical reserves were low, she certainly had enough strength left to pull the trigger.

The fleeting moment of panic gave way to anger. She would do what she'd come to do. Uncovering the Purcells' crime was her goal, and she intended to do it, wild animals roaming about or not. Swiping at her eyes with the back of a filthy, rag-wrapped hand, she cursed whatever was out there watching her. Pushing herself to her feet, she slipped her blouse on to protect her against a sudden chill and, grabbing her muddy clothes, flung them over her arm and stumbled toward the rear door.

How many times had she searched this place? she wondered, draping her clothing over the back of a chair and weaving like a drunken sailor through the kitchen. No hiding places here. She paused in the wide foyer, wishing for the brightness of the sun as her frenzied gaze searched every shadowy inch from ceiling to floor, looking for places that might conceal hidden hinges, or that small
something
to indicate that a undisclosed doorway might be there.

She ran her aching palms over the vertical oak boards beneath the staircase, pushing here and there in hopes a secret door might pop open. Nothing. Raw fingertips grazed the square newel post with its intricate carvings, searching for camouflaged buttons and finding none. Her feverish gaze raked the floor, moved over the dark place at the bottom of the stairs. Then, with a gasp, returned.

Before, she'd assumed wine had been spilt on the floor, staining the heart pine planks. But was it wine, as she'd thought, or was it blood? With a little cry of excitement, she rushed back to the kitchen and groped for the benzidine in her skirt pocket.

Dropping to her knees, she struggled to unscrew the top of the bottle with her sore, shaking hands and tipped the container, splashing a small amount onto the discolored boards. She waited. The spot, at least a foot wide, was old, and either someone had made an attempt to clean it or the stain had degraded so much through the years that she feared the compound wouldn't work. She poured on more, and then, in the poor light seeping through the dirty windows, she began to see the chemical reaction as the substance that pooled in the cracks began to take on a bluish hue.

She smiled in triumph. Blood. Blood, not wine, had soaked these boards. But why would there be blood here? Had Rachel, wounded and panicked, somehow escaped Harold and fled into the hall? If so, where had she gone next?
Or where did he take her when he caught her?
Instinct told her the answer to either question was “up.” Getting to her feet, she started toward the second floor, her footsteps dragging with exhaustion. Halfway up, she stumbled and fell to her knees, rapping her shin against the carpeted runner.

With her throbbing palms pressed flat against one of the steps, she closed her eyes against tears of weakness and pain. Maybe Robert Pinkerton was right. Maybe women weren't suited to detecting. A man wouldn't be brought to tears by the things she'd gone through today. Maybe she should have stayed with the troupe and forgotten about the wrongs Tim had done to her. An image of Robert Pinkerton's mocking expression materialized behind her closed eyes. No doubt he would gloat if she failed this, her first assignment. She would not grant the odious man the satisfaction. She had come this far, and would not stop now.

“Please, God,” she sobbed. Not one given to prayer, she was unaware of the feverish, whispered words. Forcing her eyes open, she stared at the floral pattern of the carpet runner as she gathered the remnants of her waning resolve. Fat pink and burgundy roses and buds intertwined with yellow and white flowers she could not name against a cream background. A ribbon banner of gold swirled beneath, and a rosebud . . .

That is not a rosebud on the gold ribbon, Lilly. It's a stain.
And there were other splotches mingling with the floral pattern, she noted with growing exhilaration. She had little doubt that these droplets were blood. She hadn't noticed them before, because she wasn't really looking, and because their color blended so well with the busy pattern of the runner.

New energy suffused her, and she grabbed a spindle to pull herself to her feet. Rachel had gone up the stairs, away from Harold. Keeping her gaze trained on the carpet, Lilly followed the stains to the second floor, where she lost them for a moment, only to pick them up again at the steps leading to the attic.

As she pushed open the door, a sharp crack of lightning and a cannonball boom of thunder shook the entire house. Her gaze searched the room with far more care than on her first trip.

Filled with the detritus of a family's life and a twenty-year collection of cobwebs and dust, the gloom-shrouded room mocked her. The walls were rough boards. Dusty sheeting gave ghostly shapes to unused furniture, which had been placed willy-nilly throughout the area. Wooden crates and trunks abounded. Castoff landscapes and portraits leaned against the walls. The lifeless gazes of long-dead ancestors followed Lilly as she moved deeper into the space.

Ignoring their stares and wishing for a lantern to cast off some of the darkness, she scuffed her booted feet through the powdery grime, looking for more rusty droplets. Had Harold caught Rachel outside the door? Where would he have put her, if she managed to come this far before he finished doing her in? Lilly's gaze moved past a large steamer trunk. Returned.

The gruesome notion that crept into her mind set her stomach churning. He couldn't have . . . could he? Oh, yes. He could. She was fast learning that depravity knew no bounds.

Gritting her teeth in determination, she approached the first trunk and unhooked the latches. Then, she took a deep breath and lifted the top. To her profound relief, there was nothing but ladies' clothing inside. Moving from one trunk to another, she checked the contents and found nothing of importance. Some were even empty.

There must be a hidden room somewhere. She began a close examination of the walls, as she'd done downstairs. Against the third wall was yet another trunk topped with an assortment of crates and a large rococo mirror. She lifted the wooden boxes down one by one, and then, biting back a groan of pain, hefted the sizable mirror and leaned it next to the trunk.

As soon as she stepped aside, she saw what she'd been looking for—a narrow door. The things stacked in front of it hid a simple wood latch with a single nail that allowed the fastener to turn.

She paused, staring at the discovery. The boards that made up the door were flush to the wall and staggered in length so that the aperture became part of the partition. There was no doorframe and no hinges visible to the naked eye. Whatever lay behind the wall was meant to be a secret. This had to be the place Harold Purcell had hidden the body of the young girl he'd used in such a vile manner.

The trunk would have to be moved to open the door. The satisfaction of knowing her suspicions were right lent her new strength, and with a few tugs and pulls on the leather handles and pushing with her hips and legs, she soon shifted the trunk far enough from the wall to open the door.

She approached the narrow portal with caution, steeling herself for what she might find. Reaching out a trembling hand, she turned the makeshift latch and, taking hold of the strip of leather that served as a handle, gave the door a yank. The narrow aperture opened with a scream of unused hinges that grated on her ragged nerves.

Stepping through the door, she paused, allowing her eyes to adjust to the deeper shadows of the windowless room. After a moment, she saw thin, faint strips of illumination on the opposite wall. There was a window, but it must have been covered with an interior shutter of some sort. Fearful of tripping over something, Lilly shuffled her way toward the sliver of light and pushed the shutters back on their hinges. Then she turned to survey the room and gave a shriek loud enough to raise the dead.

But didn't.

C
HAPTER
37

L
illy pressed her fingertips against her lips, but the puny effort didn't stop her groan of shock as her mind registered the sight before her. Thunder rumbled toward the east, as the storm moved toward Vandalia. Watery sunlight fought its way through the sodden skies and the grime of the small window, its lackluster rays illuminating the skeletal remains of the woman sitting on a small cot. She sat on a feather tick with her back leaned against the wall, a blue quilt folded next to her. Her right hand rested inside the carpetbag sitting in her lap.

Shreds of what was once a fine lawn nightgown clung in tatters to skeletal shoulder bones. The sleeves closed at the wrists with tiny mother-of-pearl buttons. Straggles of cobweb-festooned hair hung in limp waves almost to her waist. Eyeless sockets stared out at Lilly, and small, even teeth smiled at her from a fleshless face.

Moving closer, Lilly noticed that the mattress beneath and around the woman's hips bore a large stain, which could be nothing but blood. Blood from a delivery that had gone on too long and been too hard for the young mother. Leaning nearer, she peered into the valise. There, wrapped in a tattered flannel blanket, lay the remains of a tiny infant on a bed of what looked like old letters. The bony fingertips of the female rested near a small, skeletal cheek. A dying mother trying to comfort her little one.

Comprehension and soul-deep grief washed over Lilly in cold, relentless waves. She began to tremble with horror and the certainty of her conviction. Rachel Townsend had given birth to her baby in the bed downstairs, and then, with her life's blood flowing from her, Harold Purcell had forced her up here to this secret room to hide his sin from the world. Rachel had died from loss of blood. The baby had starved to death, its mother long dead. Lilly imagined that its pitiful, mewling cries of hunger would have easily been mistaken as the howling of a ghost by two impressionable young boys playing in the woods.

Dear sweet heaven! How could anyone do such a thing to another human?

Her heart raced in sudden urgency to return to town and tell the sheriff what she'd discovered, but with her horse and buggy gone, it would take hours to walk back, and she wasn't certain she could get there before dark. Her only other option was to wait until someone came for her, and if they didn't, she would start out in the morning. A shudder ran through her at the thought of staying in the house overnight, and she rubbed her upper arms to drive it away.

“Death lies on her like an untimely frost . . .” The sadly appropriate line from
Romeo and Juliet
eased through Lilly's mind as she stared at the tiny skeleton in the valise. She found herself wondering if the baby her mother had been expecting would have been a sister or brother, and what the baby would have been like if Kate's life had not been snuffed out as prematurely as this young girl's had been.

Lilly's tear-glazed gaze shifted to the jumble of envelopes beneath the baby's remains. What was in the letters, she wondered, reaching out to retrieve one, careful not to disturb the child who slept there for all eternity. She was pulling an envelope free from the collection, when she heard a sound behind her. With a startled cry, she whirled to see a black-shrouded, rain-soaked presence standing in the doorway. The shaft of sunlight coming through the dirty window fell onto the face of the newcomer.

“Mrs. Purcell. What are you doing here?”