The Lightkeeper's Ball

by Colleen Coble

  The older man huffed, then stepped away. “Very well. Convey my regards.” He jammed his bowler onto his head and stalked off the porch.

  “Who was that?” Lady Devonworth asked when he returned to the parlor.

  “My father. I must warn you that he will be most opposed to our marriage. He has his heart set on Olivia Stewart as my wife. I told him this was not the best time to make your acquaintance.”

  She paled and bit her lip. “Thank you. I should like to be at my best when I meet him.”

  “I suspect that will be at least a week.”

  She nodded and sat up straighter on the cushions. “Someone shot at us in the clearing,” she said. “I can’t help but wonder if the man could be the same one who threw me from the boat.”

  He frowned, realizing he hadn’t even thought of the attempt on her life the day they met. “We’ve never really talked about that incident. Do you have enemies?”

  “I didn’t think so. But after our escapade in the wilderness, I began to wonder. Do you know why the plane went down? Could it have been sabotaged?”

  “I never considered the possibility. I’ll make a trek out to the site and check it out.” He studied her downcast eyes and pale cheeks. “If what you say is true, perhaps the shooter meant to harm me.” He shrugged. “Or it might still have been just a hunter.”

  Her eyes widened. “I hadn’t thought it might be connected to you. Eleanor’s death. Might she have been killed by someone who hated you?”

  “Whoa, where did that come from? Eleanor has nothing to do with this.”

  “You must admit it was most strange. She feared the water. So why would she have gone swimming?”

  The information made him flinch. “Eleanor feared the water? Did anyone mention this to the constable?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You told me Eleanor’s mother asked you to look into the circumstances of her death. So is that the real reason you’re here?”

  She looked down and didn’t meet his gaze.

  His lips twisted. “So now you think I’m safe? Because I let you walk out of the forest alive?”

  “Yes.”

  “A more pressing matter is in front of you,” he said. “Or do you want to ignore what happened today?”

  “I can only tell the truth and say the plane went down.”

  There was still only one choice that he could see. “I believe you know better, Lady Devonworth. At least let us announce our engagement and explain why you accompanied me without a chaperone. We can break the engagement at a later date after everyone has forgotten this incident.”

  “I must speak with my mother. Perhaps the gossip hasn’t reached New York. If so, this will soon die down.”

  “Don’t wait too long. We don’t have long to salvage your reputation.” He found the thought of her reluctance quite unbearable.

  TWENTY-ONE

  PAPERS COVERED THE rosewood desk’s polished surface. Tiger sat in Olivia’s lap kneading her leg. The invitations to the Lightkeeper’s Ball had all been sent out before the aeroplane accident, but Olivia was beginning to wish she’d never offered to hold the ball. Would anyone even come now?

  She pulled a vellum sheet toward her, dipped her pen into ink, and began to list pieces of this strange puzzle that now preoccupied her.

  Father’s death

  Eleanor’s death

  Eleanor’s fearful letter to me

  The attack on the boat

  The mysterious voice in the speaking tube

  The letter from Father

  The shot in the forest

  The plane crash

  How did they all tie together? Was it possible these events were related to Harrison’s family and not her own? She didn’t see how it was likely. The kitten mewed when she quit petting him and jumped down. Olivia opened the drawer in the desk and lifted her father’s letter from it. The cheap paper’s creases were already becoming thin from the number of times she’d reread it. Her father’s warning against Mr. Bennett and Harrison couldn’t be plainer. If only Father would show himself and explain. She didn’t understand why he continued to allow the world to believe him dead.

  She heard the doorbell ring and lifted her head. Was that a man’s voice?

  Goldia appeared in the doorway. “Mr. Frederick Fosberg is here, miss. With his mother, Mrs. Martha Fosberg.”

  “Show them in.” She swept everything into the drawer, then shut and locked it. By the time she’d thrust the key into her pocket and maneuvered to the sofa on her crutches, Goldia was leading them into the room.

  Mrs. Fosberg rushed toward her. “My dear Lady Devonworth, I’m so sorry to hear of your misfortune.”

  Olivia smiled. “Thank you, Mrs. Fosberg. Have a seat. Goldia, will you tell the cook to prepare some refreshments?”

  No one else in town had called this morning. Well, hadn’t she expected the cold shoulders? “Thank you for coming.” These two were to be commended for braving the town’s censure.

  “I’d like to introduce you to my son, Frederick,” Mrs. Fosberg said.

  “I’m honored, Lady Devonworth,” he said.

  She studied the man who had seemingly mesmerized her sister. He had blond hair slicked back with pomade and a pencil-thin mustache. His sack coat was the height of fashion. It had narrow lapels and was fitted at the waist. The slight flare at the bottom gave him an athletic appearance. His trousers had an impeccable line. This was a man who took fashion very seriously. His blue eyes looked her over as well, and she didn’t know if she cared for the amused glint in his eyes.

  She inclined her head and repeated her planned story. “Mr. Fosberg, it’s good of you to come. I’m in need of some advice on a sum of money left to me by my father. I’d like to invest it.” He didn’t have to know it was a paltry amount.

  “I’m happy to assist you. My office is well known for guiding clients to good investments. May I ask how you heard of my services?”

  “From Eleanor Stewart,” she said, watching him closely. When wariness replaced the amusement in his eyes, she knew he was hiding something.

  “You knew Miss Stewart?” he asked.

  “Quite well. We grew up together. I heard she was quite taken with you.”

  The last of his smile evaporated. “I am happy to assist anyone in need of my services.”

  She would have to switch tactics. “I’m holding a ball to raise money for the lighthouse. I’ll make sure you get an invitation.”

  His smile came almost too quickly. “Thank you for that, Lady Devonworth. I’m most honored you would think of me.”

  His set might be the only ones who would attend her ball after her fall from grace. “I shall save you a spot on my dance card,” she said, putting on her best smile.

  His eyes crinkled at the corners as he smiled back. “I should like that very much,” he said, his voice soft.

  “Did you meet Eleanor before she came here? I found a dance card for an event and noticed you danced with her quite often.”

  He sat back in the chair. “Lady Devonworth, is there something you are trying to ask me?”

  What would he say if she told him the truth? “Her mother asked me to look into her death. When did you see her last?”

  “The day before she died.” He crossed his arms over his chest.

  She didn’t care if he didn’t like being questioned. “How did she seem to you? Distraught?”

  “She was fine. A little edgy. She kept looking out the windows.”

  His mother had been fidgeting. “Lady Devonworth, I don’t understand why your questions are so pointed. The poor girl drowned. Are you suggesting she had a liaison with Frederick?”

  Olivia’s ankle throbbed, her head hurt, and she desperately wanted to talk to a friendly face about her troubles. “I don’t know, Mrs. Fosberg. Eleanor’s family is not convinced the drowning was accidental. I am trying to bring some closure to the situation.”

  The older woman smiled. “I understand, my dear. But Fred
erick hardly knew the woman.”

  “That’s not exactly true, Mother,” he said. “I will admit to my own doubts about how she died. She feared water. I don’t understand how she came to be drowned in that manner.”

  Aware her mouth was open, Olivia snapped it shut. Goldia brought in refreshments and placed them on the table. She passed around blue-and-white teacups, then backed out of the room. When her maid was out of the room, Olivia took a sip of her tea and asked, “What can you tell me, Mr. Fosberg?”

  He stared into the teacup balanced on his pinstriped pants. “I loved her,” he said.

  His mother gasped. So did Olivia. “How did she feel about you?” she asked.

  “She was going to break her engagement to Bennett. I suspect he killed her when she did.”

  TWENTY-TWO

  HARRISON TOOK AN appreciative sniff of the cool forest air. Pine, decaying bark, and leaf mold hung in the air. He’d needed to stretch his legs this morning after fielding questions all evening from his parents, so he took Eugene with him to collect the dismembered plane parts. The blue bowl of sky played hide-and-seek with them behind the towering redwoods as they hiked back to the site of the crash. He inhaled again and exhaled his worries.

  Eugene paused to wipe perspiration from his brow. The normally immaculate valet had flecks of mud on his trousers and wide rings of moisture under his arms. “Are you sure this is wise, sir?”

  “I need to see those plane parts. I want to check for sabotage.”

  Eugene lifted a brow. “Sabotage? How would you ever know? And for what purpose?”

  Harrison couldn’t explain his obsession. Everything had changed when he discovered Lady Devonworth believed Eleanor had been murdered. There was too much to explain away: the attempt on her life, the crash, the man shooting at them. He had no idea how they all fit together, but he wanted to find out.

  “The clearing is just ahead,” he said, pointing to where the path veered to the right. Ferns the size of trees grew in the shadow of the redwoods. A glint caught his eye, and he paused to stare at a crushed patch of weeds.

  “What is it, sir?”

  “I’m not sure.” He knelt and picked away twigs and moss to reveal several shell casings. “I believe our shooter stood here.” The shells were cool and hard in his palm. He pocketed all four of them. “I shall show them to the constable.”

  The men continued on toward the sound of rushing water. Harrison’s spirits plunged when he saw the debris of his beloved aeroplane strewn around the open field. There was no putting it back together. He would have to start anew. At least he had some modifications in mind. There should have been plenty of gas in the tank, yet the plane had faltered as though it had no fuel.

  Eugene stood beside him with his hands in his pockets. “Do we seek anything in particular?”

  “The engine and fuel system,” Harrison said.

  “Righto, sir.” His valet wandered off in the direction of the stream.

  Harrison picked up pieces of plane and discarded them as he went. Finding what he sought would be difficult. Flies buzzed around his head, and his boots sank into the boggy ground. It was best not to dwell on his time here with Essie. Tossing and turning on his bed last night, he’d remembered the scent of her hair and the way she fit into his arms.

  He tore his attention from the evergreen boughs. There was one last patch of scattered debris to examine. He lifted a wing and found the prize. The fuel tank. The damp ground soaked the knees of his trousers as he knelt and uncapped the tank. The interior was too dark to make out the level of liquid inside. He grabbed a nearby stick and stuck it into the tank. When it clanged against the bottom, he withdrew it. The end of the stick was dry. Empty.

  “Did you find something?” Eugene’s voice came from behind him.

  “An empty tank.” Harrison rolled the container over and followed the lines out. “I’m looking for a leak. See what you can find.”

  Eugene knelt beside him and dug through parts as well. “There’s this, sir,” he said, holding out a long end of fuel line.

  Harrison almost didn’t want to see it. If he found clear evidence of tampering, then what? He ran his fingers over the length of line. His forefinger snagged on a rough edge on the side away from him. When he turned it over, he found a hole. The edges went inside. Sabotage.

  “It appears someone put a nail through this,” he said, showing it to Eugene.

  “Perhaps it happened when the plane crashed.”

  He shook his head. “There were no nails. This was deliberate.”

  His valet raised stricken eyes to his. “You think someone wanted you dead?”

  “It appears so. No one knew I was taking Lady Devonworth up in the machine. It was a spontaneous decision.”

  Had someone killed Eleanor to get to him? And how did the attack on Lady Devonworth play into the killer’s plan? Had someone gotten wind of her intention to investigate? Perhaps the attempt on her life was to deter her from being too nosy. He rubbed his head. None of this made sense. He needed to tell Lady Devonworth, though, warn her to be on guard.

  “Let’s go,” he told Eugene.

  “What about these parts?”

  “I’ll show the fuel line to the constable and ask him to investigate Eleanor’s death as well.”

  “Sir? Miss Eleanor drowned.”

  “I discovered she was afraid of the water, Eugene. Lady Devonworth is a friend of the Stewart family, and they believe she would never have gone swimming.”

  The men left the gurgling brook behind and tromped out of the forest.

  Olivia didn’t want to believe Frederick Fosberg, but his blue eyes were full of truth. If only she had spoken with Eleanor before her death. There were too many contradictions to know what to do. Whom to believe.

  Eleanor had been happy to marry Harrison. She liked nice things and pretty dresses, and Mr. Bennett’s promise that she would be the star of Mercy Falls had certainly had an impact on her. While Mr. Fosberg was attractive, Olivia doubted he had the money that Harrison had. Could Eleanor have actually fallen in love with Fosberg? Even if she had, that didn’t explain her death. It was clear to Olivia that Harrison hadn’t been consumed with a passion for Eleanor. He had merely been dutiful in a sensible arrangement. He would have bowed to her request to break the engagement, if in fact she’d made one.

  Olivia prided herself on her ability to see past appearances and discover truth, but her abilities had failed her ever since she came here. “Do you know if she broke her engagement?” she asked Fosberg.

  “When we last spoke, she was expecting him to call on her. She intended to tell him then that the two of us planned to wed.”

  Mrs. Fosberg sat wringing her hands. “You never breathed a word of this to me, Frederick!” She turned to Olivia. “My dear, I’m so sorry.”

  “I needed to know the truth.” Olivia barely managed to speak past the constriction in her throat.

  She didn’t want to believe Harrison had harmed Eleanor. Maybe there was another explanation. Pain throbbed behind her eyes. Only decorum kept her from asking the pair to leave. She needed time to think this through, to analyze all the ramifications of what this new information meant.

  Silence fell with the lengthening shadows. The Fosbergs drank their tea in a hurried manner as though they sensed Olivia’s desire for solitude.

  “Thank you for your candor,” she said as the mother and son took their leave. “Do call again.” When she heard the front door shut, she slumped onto the sofa and put her foot on the pillow.

  She had reached for her tea when the doorbell rang again. Who would be calling when she was an outcast?

  “Olivia!” a woman’s voice called out from the hall.

  Olivia bolted upright. “Mother?”

  The sound of running feet came down the hall, and her mother burst into the parlor. Olivia had never seen her mother rush or show any indecorum. The older woman’s cheeks were flushed, but her attire was impeccable, as though she had just left
her house on Fifth Avenue.

  “My dear girl,” she cried, holding out her arms. She rushed to the sofa and embraced Olivia.

  Olivia inhaled her mother’s delicate rosewater scent and relished the tight squeeze of the maternal embrace. “I didn’t expect you for another week,” she murmured against her silk dress.

  “I told you I would come at once.”

  Olivia pulled away and smiled up at her mother. “‘At once’ usually means after days of packing.”

  Her mother unpinned her hat and placed it on the table. “Not when you call with such momentous news. And when I arrived, I found you had been in an aeroplane accident! Really, Olivia, what were you thinking to go off with a man unchaperoned in such a hoydenish way?” She draped herself elegantly on the Queen Anne chair by the fireplace.

  Olivia sat up and smoothed her hair. Though her ankle throbbed, she didn’t raise it to the coffee table, an act her mother would find most uncomely. “I am trying to discover what happened to Eleanor,” she said. “I’ve been spending as much time with Harrison as possible so that I can question him.”

  “Well, this is going too far!” Her mother nodded to the teapot on the silver tray. “Is that fresh?” When Olivia shook her head, her mother rang for the maid. When the girl appeared in the doorway, she requested fresh tea and cake before turning to Olivia with more questions. “I saw the newspaper, Olivia. You were alone with that man for two nights.”

  “Nothing happened, Mother.”

  “Of course nothing happened. I’ve raised you to know better than that.” Her mother smoothed her dress.

  Olivia clutched her hands together. “I’m told the news was in the San Francisco papers.”

  Her mother gasped and put her hand to her mouth. “Olivia, no!” She moaned and put her hands on her cheeks. “You’re ruined.” She fanned herself. “And I shudder to think what my friends will say if word of this reaches New York.”