Nooks & Crannies (8 page)

“Yes,” said Edward, “except now we have to tour the house before we even find out what this business is about. Parlor this, drawing room that, here's money, there's money. It's like being invited to Buckingham Palace and then first having to tour the extra-special toilet facilities with perfumed—”

“Edward, stop.” Viola's hand wiggled a little, her fingers brushing Tabitha's dangling ones. “Are you all right?”

“Oh, well, um, yes.”
Stupid Tabitha, just take her hand!
Though her inner voice had been rather rude, Tabitha took its advice and lay her palm in Viola's.

Viola squeezed and leaned in to whisper, her breath a warm wisp of air against Tabitha's cheek. “Boring tour or not, I'm dying to meet the Countess, aren't you?”

“Dying,” Tabitha repeated, thinking about Edward's words and an Inspector Pensive novel where a body was found in a water closet during a manor tour.

Pemberley rumbled about in her pocket, and she used her empty hand to free a piece of chocolate biscuit she'd hidden under her collar. She was just poking the morsel into her apron when she bumped into a very solid wall.

The number and quality of rooms touted in mansion tours is rarely as impressive and extensive as the wealth of secrets nestled within its walls.

—Inspector Percival Pensive,

The Case of the Enigmatic Encumbrancer

T
he wall Tabitha had just run into, as it turned out, was the butler. Black uniform fabric pressed against Tabitha's face, and she noticed that Phillips's clothes felt strangely cold in a manor that was such a furnace of wealth. He stood at the base of the grand staircase, staging himself three steps up so that he looked down on the parents, who were leaning collectively forward.

“Pardon
me
,” Phillips said, gently pushing her into the parent clump with a slight bow of apology.

Tabitha let herself be squeezed into the cluster and was gradually pushed out of its backside. Viola had been right. There was an electricity to the air—a sense of anticipation and building pressure that had followed them from the hotel lobby and escalated. Even Pemberley was restless, scratching at Tabitha's sweater until his nose found the small hole.

They're all desperate to know why we're here, Sir Pemby. And I can hardly blame them. This whole manor feels like a powder keg, just waiting for a flame.

Inclining his head a very butlerish fifteen degrees to one side, Phillips inhaled and exhaled deeply, then nodded at the gathering. “Hollingsworth Hall was built in the fifteenth century. Many a wealthy man has owned the estate, but never has such a
charitable
woman come into its possession until Camilla Lenore DeMoss's purchase of the property in 1880.”

“Are those two gentlemen the previous owners?” asked Mrs. Crum. She pointed to the portraits in the foyer.

Phillips sighed and wove his hands behind his back. “I really couldn't say, madam. The portraits were here when I arrived two years ago. Now follow me to the library.” He strode directly down the middle of the group, parting them and turning to walk gracefully backward as he spoke. “In addition to private rooms, the Hall contains—”

Barnaby's mother nudged herself to the front of the group. “A library, study, drawing room, double parlors, a dining hall, a vault, and guest and servants' quarters,” she recited. She eyed the two nearest rooms with a hungry expression.

Streaks of red crept up Barnaby's neck as he stared at his mother, but he remained silent.

At Mrs. Trundle's summation, Phillips merely lifted the non-twitchy side of his mouth and gave a stiff nod. “And a gallery that includes England's largest private collection of historical crime paintings, from the assassination of Julius Caesar to the Whitechapel murders of Jack the Ripper.”

Oh my,
thought Tabitha, her hand drifting down to cover Pemberley's ears so he wouldn't hear more if Phillips went into further detail.
What an unusual choice for a collection.

“How
horrid
,” Barnaby's mother said.

“Odd,” said Mr. Wellington, the art collector. “Though if they're of significant quality, they might bring a very large sum at market.”

“Is that right, sir?” asked Phillips, looking at Mr. Wellington with curiosity.

“Certainly,” Mrs. Wellington replied. “There are all kinds of collectors looking to own unique pieces. There's absolutely nothing a person can cherish more than the right piece of art. Art is the most precious, important thing that a person could ever give birth to or nurture. Isn't that right, Frances?”

Frances stiffened and pursed her lips. “Yes, Mother.”

“Edward,” Viola whispered, gripping her friend's shoulder. “The Countess gives nearly three thousand pounds a year to art-based organizations, and I daresay I should be interested, but
do
say we won't go see those paintings.”

Edward shrugged her off. “Not in charge, am I? I'd like to have a look at the Caesar one, myself. According to a riveting read on Roman medicine, the first recorded autopsy was done on him. Something like twenty-three dagger wounds. Physician named Antistius got to do it, lucky chap.”

They passed through another door and into a wide room with three windows along one wall and scores of bookshelves along the rest. A neatly laid blaze crackled and popped in an enormous fireplace, lending extra warmth to what Tabitha had already decided was the best room in the manor. The fireplace's mantel was made of dark wood, finely carved and extended to the ceiling, glittering here and there with golden leaf adornments. To one side of it hung a small painting of a boy seated beneath a tree.

Viola's nose wiggled, and she sneezed three times. “Oh dear, I do hope I'm not getting sick.”

“Allergic to the rug fibers, maybe?” Edward guessed.

Shaking her head, Viola sneezed once more. “No, it's probably a dreadful cold. Some of the people at the poorhouse we visited were ill, and I must have picked something up.”

“Or perhaps you're allergic to anything with a smattering of class,” Frances suggested.

Phillips cleared his throat until he had everyone's attention once again. “As you can see, the library contains the most ornate of the manor's seven working fireplaces. And the Countess owns more than two thousand volumes covering a variety of subjects.”

Only seven fireplaces, Tabitha thought. But there were ten chimneys total. She'd counted.

“Nobody gives a fig about fireplaces or books,” Mr. Crum murmured.

“I'm so sorry to be boring your unrivaled intellect, sir,” Phillips said with an attentive lip twitch. “Is there anything at all related to the manor that you
would
give a fig about?”

“What about the ghosts?” Viola asked. “Will we be needing to say prayers against seeing ghosts this weekend?” She tugged on her mother's sleeve.

“Shh,” said Mrs. Dale, smoothing Viola's hair and placing a kiss on her velvet bow. “Don't be silly, sweetheart. Please continue, Mr. Phillips.”

While Tabitha tucked away the fantasy of having her own hair smoothed in a similar manner, she remembered to watch Phillips for his reaction to the word
ghost
.

To her surprise, the butler did not smile. Not a whit. Instead his lips turned inward and pressed together in what was either a grimace in regard to the question or a grimace in regard to the ghosts themselves. “I regret to inform you that rumors of ghostly occurrences in the Hall are not an approved tour subject. Nor is the reason that you've been invited.
That
you'll have to wait for.”

While Phillips summarized the library's contents and the parents listened with thinly disguised impatience, Tabitha's eyes drifted to the view outside, which had taken a turn toward the ominous. An outdoor gas lamp must have been secured close to the windows, because Tabitha could see sleet pouring down. Bare, twisted branches of wisteria whipped back and forth in the wind, tapping against the glass with insistence. The center window was marked by three panes of diamond-shaped colored glass, reminding Tabitha of the three small windows she'd seen at the manor's highest point. That gable also had a chimney atop it.

Never hold back when the opportunity arises to address an oddity, Tibbs,
Pensive had said in the very book Tabitha had brought in her carpetbag.
Unless it's concerning a woman's choice of hat, of course. By God, never address that sort of oddity.

“What about the other chimneys?” she heard herself blurt out. “You said there were seven fireplaces, but there are ten chimney stacks.”

Phillips stood on his tiptoes to locate the speaker. “Observant, aren't you?” he said, not phrasing it as a compliment. “Three of the fireplaces are in the locked rooms.”

“
Locked
rooms,” Edward said, elbowing Viola.

“Locked rooms!” Frances repeated, stepping closer to Oliver.

“
Locked rooms
,” Tabitha murmured, nudging Pemberley to make sure he had heard.

“Locked rooms,” Phillips affirmed.

“What locked rooms?” Barnaby asked.

“The ones that have just been mentioned,” Phillips said. “There are several rooms in the manor that the Countess keeps locked. They are not needed and are no longer in use and are not meant to be disturbed.”

Mrs. Crum licked her lips and tapped Phillips. “And what exactly is in these locked rooms?”

Phillips wrinkled his nose at the touch and straightened his posture once again. “I wouldn't know, madam. They're
locked
, you see, which indicates that one cannot get inside. Her Ladyship has mentioned that one of the doors leads to the third floor, which is her son's former nursery, but that's the extent of my knowledge, I assure you.”

Tabitha raised her hand, only to have it yanked down again by her father.

“Stop speaking, you twit,” Mr. Crum quietly ordered.

But Tabitha couldn't halt questions from forming in her mind.
Were the rooms all of sentimental value? Did servants enter them to clean off the dust now and then?

“And now for the gallery . . .”

Phillips's voice faded with the group while Tabitha dawdled in the library, her eyes petting the beautifully stained shelves. “See, Pemberley,” she whispered, tucking a finger into her pocket. “That's two solid mysteries. What is in the locked rooms and what is the truth behind the ghost rumors mentioned by a maid and
not
refuted by Phillips. Oh, and why have we been invited, bringing us to a trio of mysteries.”

Squeak!

“Yes, quite right, duly noted: And we still need a crime.”

Squeakity-squeak.

Tabitha smiled. “Yes,
other
than Frances Wellington swiping hotel pens.”

Footsteps clipped across the marble floor. Agnes, the maid who'd taken their coats, bowed her head and curtsied. “The Countess wishes you to sit for dinner. Oh! Where is everyone, miss?”

“The gallery. I was just heading there. Sorry. I was mesmerized by the books, you see.” Tabitha gestured around the room. “I love to read, mysteries mostly, but I could spend hours exploring in here.”

“Yes, well, you needn't look in the library to find mysteries at Hollingsworth Hall,” Agnes said, her shoulders shuddering with some invisible chill. “Let's find the others, miss. The tour will have to be cut short. The Countess is still in her room, but she requested that you be seated for dinner.”

The dining room was dominated by a long, dark table with an autumn centerpiece of silken leaves and golden acorns, nineteen places set with gold-and-maroon settings, and more cutlery than Tabitha had ever seen. Dainty place cards marked the seating, with parents placed next to their child. Everything would have been quite lovely if it weren't for the rather shell-shocked elderly woman slumped in an armchair that was scooted up to the far end of the table.