“Oh, but . . .” Her shoulders sagged as she apparently perceived the logic in my argument. “Very well. But please do not disturb Mrs. Goelet or disrupt the servants’ duties.”
I assured her we would do neither, and, velvet bag in hand, rode the elevator with Camille up to the second floor. I didn’t relish the ride any more than the first one I’d taken. As the conveyance lurched upward, I felt as though my stomach dropped to my feet.
Outside Ilsa’s door I knocked softly, but received no answer. I knocked again. From behind me, Camille reached to open the door. I almost stopped her, but she was, after all, still Ilsa’s lady’s maid. She pushed the door open to reveal an empty room.
It was then voices drifted to us from down the corridor and around the corner, from the main gallery that overlooked the Great Hall below. We followed the sound, our footsteps muffled by the woven runner with its rich colors, and entered the open square gallery supported by columns and arches fashioned from deeply carved teak. A rainbow of light from the massive stained glass windows at the half landing of the Grand Staircase bathed that end of the gallery. We proceed in the opposite direction until we reached a sitting room. The door stood open.
I was surprised to see Ilsa not only smiling but giggling softly, but perhaps I should not have been. Beside her sat handsome Patrick Floyd, and unlike his somber demeanor at the ball, or his authoritative air when he visited Dale at the hospital, today he seemed relaxed; he seemed to be enjoying himself in his present company.
“Ah, so we meet again, Miss Cross,” he said in his pleasingly deep voice.
“Thank you again for what you offered to do for Dale. He’s a good man.” As when I saw him at the hospital, however, I found myself assaulted by conflicting emotions. He had stood by Ilsa at the ball, even refused to dance with someone else when she suggested he do so. He had appeared at the hospital in his guise of guardian angel to offer Dale the legal help he might need, but would be unable to afford on his own.
Yet Mr. Floyd had also encouraged Ilsa while still married to another woman, and this raised in me a wariness of even his most altruistic acts. A whisper inside me, no greater than the stirring of a breeze, suggested that perhaps Patrick had something to do with his wife’s death—something rather more direct than straying from his marriage vows. No official suspicion had fallen upon him, however, for he had been away at the time. I tried to reassure myself that, if he had arranged for the gas duct to be left open, the police would have discovered his guilt.
Camille remained behind me in the doorway. Ilsa smiled up at us, her happiness evident. “Miss Cross, have you discovered something about my sister’s death?” Her gaze shifted over my shoulder. “Camille, thank you for bringing Miss Cross up. That will be all for now.”
I felt rather than saw Camille’s hesitancy. “We need Camille to remain,” I said. “But if Mr. Floyd would excuse us, there is a matter we need to discuss.”
“Oh, I . . .” I had clearly taken Ilsa aback. “Patrick, would you mind terribly? I can’t imagine what this could be about, but I’m sure it won’t take very long.”
“I’ll be right downstairs.” As he stood, he held on to Ilsa’s hand, and bent to kiss it. He relinquished his grasp in a lingering sort of way and left the room.
Ilsa looked up at me in question. “Come in, Miss Cross, and tell me what this is all about.”
I sat beside her on the silk-upholstered sofa and opened the velvet bag. “Do you recognize this?” With a gentle shake of the bag, I deposited the diamond necklace in Ilsa’s lap.
“This was my mother’s. Of course I recognize it. How did you come to possess it?” Her expression gradually changed from one of puzzlement to one of misgiving. Her gaze shifted. “Oh, Camille, you didn’t.”
Camille made a disgusted noise in her throat, but I held up a hand to forestall her protests. “Is the necklace yours?” I asked Ilsa.
“Yes, it’s mine. I inherited it when my mother passed away.”
“I told you so,” Camille murmured.
“Did you know it was broken?” I pulled out the second piece and showed her. Her face registered dismay.
“Oh, no! Mama’s beautiful necklace. Camille, how could you?”
A wave of scarlet engulfed Camille from neck to hairline. I spoke up again to forestall her explosion of temper. “I don’t know that Camille did anything wrong. You see, I found the smaller broken section in . . . well . . . in your sister’s room.” Camille and I had agreed not to mention my suspicion that Cleo meant to sell some of the diamonds. “Is it possible your sister borrowed the necklace and accidentally broke it? Camille says Cleo asked her to take it to a jeweler in town to have it fixed.”
As I spoke, Ilsa stared straight ahead, her expression unreadable. She reached with one hand to the end table beside her, graced by a vase of white flowers surrounding one red rosebud, reminding me of Cleo’s posy during the tableau vivant. Her fingertips brushed the petals absently.
When I’d finished my tale, she shook her head and whispered, “She did it again.”
“Did what again?”
“Borrowed—as you politely called it—my necklace.”
“You mean she had done it before?”
She nodded and with what I perceived to be fragile calm, turned her attention to Camille. “Did she tell you why she stole it?”
“She said she planned to wear it to the ball, miss.”
“And how did it break?”
“That I don’t know, Miss Ilsa. Miss Cleo asked me to put it on her, and when I tried, it fell apart in my hands.”
Ilsa let out a long-suffering breath. “She knew I’d never say anything at the ball, not in front of so many people. She’d have hidden it from me until it was too late, and I’d have stood by and pretended nothing was wrong. Why didn’t she just ask me? I’d have let her wear it.”
“Yes, why didn’t she?” I pretended to agree, but this again helped confirm my suspicion that Cleo had been less intent on wearing the necklace than selling part of it. “So you believe Camille’s account of what happened?”
She nodded, obviously deep in thought. Then she gave herself a shake. “Yes, I believe Camille’s story. I know my sister, Miss Cross. I loved her very much, but she was not without her faults.” She ended on a dismal note that tugged at my heartstrings. Camille had wished to spare her mistress this last revelation of her sister’s duplicity. I wished now that I had allowed Ilsa to continue in ignorance; I almost wished I had never come upon the necklace at all. But at least it had found its way back to its rightful owner.
Leaving Ilsa and Camille to make their apologies to each other—Ilsa for believing Camille had stolen from her, and Camille for not informing Ilsa of the theft immediately—I once again braved the elevator down to the kitchen level. Upon exiting, I found a slender figure dressed in a maid’s uniform waiting for me.
“Nora, you startled me,” I said after a gasp.
“Is that Camille in trouble?” she asked bluntly.
“If she were, it really wouldn’t be your concern, Nora. But no, she isn’t.”
Her expression fell, her disappointment evident. “Well, perhaps she should be. I don’t trust her, Miss Cross. She’s had visitors—at night. Male visitors. Or maybe just the one, but certainly a man and that’s not allowed. She meets him in the service yard.”
“This sounds like a matter for Mrs. Hendricks. Have you mentioned it to her?”
“No, not yet.”
“Then why tell me?” I asked, genuinely puzzled.
“I just thought you should know, Miss Cross, since you’ve been helping the police.”
I scrutinized her features, really very lovely despite the severe lines of her coif and linen cap. “You think this could have something to do with Miss Cooper-Smith’s death?”
Her vivid green eyes became large. Uncertainty mingled with her suspicions. “I don’t know. Maybe not. But there’s something strange about that Camille. She’s not like other girls in service. Sh
e’s too full of herself, thinks she’s better than the rest of us. She doesn’t know her place.”
Yes, I didn’t doubt Camille gave that impression to the other servants, and they resented her for it. Katie had reached the same conclusion, that Camille didn’t know her place. Did Nora, who knew Camille personally, have good reason to mistrust the lady’s maid, or was she, like Katie, merely upholding the servants’ strict code of conduct?
“Why do you say that, Nora? What has she done? I mean besides meeting a gentleman caller outside at night.”
“Isn’t that enough?”
“No, I’m afraid it isn’t, at least not where I’m concerned.”
She fidgeted with her cap. “It’s just a feelin’ I get when I look at her. It’s not a good feelin’. There’s something in her eyes, especially after she meets with that man. I think she’s schemin’ something with him. My gran could always know a person just by lookin’ at ’em, and so can I.”
“I’m sorry, Nora, but that isn’t enough to accuse a person of wrongdoing. Perhaps Camille isn’t suited to service, but we shouldn’t hold that against her.”
Was it a crime to think of oneself as better than one’s circumstances, to feel frustrations at the limits life had arbitrarily placed on one? I didn’t think so. I had seen Camille’s brand of determination before, in women like my aunt Alva, who chafed against the role of mere society hostess. Alva’s ambitions and, yes, her intelligence, prompted her to lash out at society in the form of fierce competition to rule over the Four Hundred as the wealthiest, grandest matron of all. I believed that was why she coerced her daughter, Consuelo, to marry the Duke of Marlborough. Poor Consuelo might abhor “Sunny,” but Alva could now boast being the mother of a duchess.
If Aunt Alva were free to choose the course of her life, what might she achieve?
Camille would never be a duchess, but if she stayed her course, she might just become the wife of a Knickerbocker. Her gentleman caller could be none other than Dorian Norris; hence the reason for the nighttime secrecy. Still, Nora had been correct about overhearing the argument coming from Cleo’s bedroom. Cleo had been accusing Camille of breaking the necklace, and Camille had been defending herself. Nora had been right to tell me about that argument. I shouldn’t disregard what she was telling me now.
She smoothed the front of her apron. “I’m sorry for wastin’ your time, Miss Cross.”
“You haven’t, Nora,” I hastened to assure her. “Please continue to keep watch, and if something specific does happen, please let me know. You remember I live at Gull Manor?”
“Yes, miss.” She bobbed a curtsy, looking slightly mollified.
* * *
I had no sooner arrived back home, dozens of thoughts and theories swimming in my brain, when the telephone summoned me to the alcove beneath the staircase.
“Emma, it’s Grace. Darling, you promised to dine with Neily and I, and I fear if I don’t pin you down we’ll never see you.”
I laughed softly at Grace’s typical tendency to exaggerate. “You do understand I’ve been busy?”
“I do, and that is precisely the problem. You are always busy, always taking on the problems of the world.”
Another exaggeration. “Hardly that. But where I see I might be useful, I do tend to step in.”
“Yes, well, you have earned a reward, haven’t you.” A statement, not a question. “Dinner with your favorite cousin and your dearest friend. I am your dearest friend, aren’t I?”
She was certainly one of them, despite the significant differences in our personalities and circumstances. “I would love to come for dinner. You have merely to tell me when.”
“Good. We’ll expect you at eight.”
“Tonight?” I glanced at the locket watch pinned to my bodice. “Grace, I’ve been running about town all day, and there is hardly time for me to—”
“Ah, here come your excuses. I’m not having it, Emma, I am truly not. We’ll be as frightfully casual as you please. My mother-in-law would shudder to see it. And it will just be us. Rest up a bit, smooth your hair, and toss on a fresh frock. I’ll send our carriage ’round to your place by seven forty-five. Will that suit?”
I couldn’t help laughing again. “I see you’re determined to bully me into coming.”
“I am indeed.”
It had been a long day, and I longed to put my feet up and sink into the oblivion of a good book. I suppressed a sigh. “You needn’t send your carriage. I can—”
“My dear, do stop arguing. I’m sending the carriage. Be ready when it arrives.” With that, she ended the connection.
That evening, Neily and Grace’s brougham brought me to Beaulieu House, built in the solid, monumental style that had become popular a decade or so before the War Between the States. Upon first glance it always rather reminded me of Chateau sur Mer, with a steep, almost mansard French roof that crowned a stucco facade, dominated by a square turret with wings to either side.
As the carriage approached the house, I couldn’t help craning my neck to catch a glimpse of Marble House next door. Only the darkness of an empty hull met my gaze. Aunt Alva no longer used the house. Since her marriage to Oliver Belmont three years ago, they had summered in his cottage, Belcourt, a short distance along Bellevue to the south. I thought it a great waste and held out the hope she would have a change of heart, or lease the property. Aunt Alva had had Marble House built as a statement confirming her perch at the top of society’s heap. The result had been a jewel of a house, not extensively large, but a showcase of exquisite workmanship. And now it went unused, unappreciated. Such was the wanton excess of the Four Hundred.
The carriage stopped and a footman came down the steps of the wide veranda that wrapped three sides of the house. After he helped me down, I entered a long great hall tiled in black and white marble, and found Neily and Grace there to greet me. Grace, in a pale pink gown embroidered with roses and vines, hugged me and told me I looked beautiful. Her pledge to be casual hadn’t fooled me a bit, and I’d worn champagne-colored silk with a tiered lace skirt, a hand-me-down from Neily’s sister, Gertrude.
“I’m glad you could come, Emmaline.” Neily embraced me warmly. “We haven’t had a proper visit in too long a time, and with everything that’s happened, Grace and I thought you could use a respite.”
“I’m grateful for it, thank you.”
There was a light in his eyes I hadn’t seen in some time—since he and Grace had married, actually. Theirs had been a troubled courtship, for his parents had objected so strongly he and his father had nearly come to blows over it. His mother, my aunt Alice, even blamed Neily for her husband’s stroke of apoplexy. Through it all, he and Grace had persisted in their plans to marry.
Yet soon after they had, I’d noticed a difference in Neily. A pensiveness, almost a sadness. He had seemed older, floundering, his confidence shaken. I wanted to believe his disinheritance had caused the change, that being cast out of the family and the family business had upended his world. But in my heart, I knew Neily was stronger than that. His response had been to continue his studies at Yale with an eye on obtaining his master’s degree in engineering. He returned to the family business, not as the owner’s son and heir, but as a mechanical engineer on an ordinary salary. If he couldn’t inherit, then he would earn.
I feared that, just as Grace and I were two very different people, so too were Grace and Neily, and that marriage had driven that point bluntly, perhaps painfully, home. Where Grace was vivacious and derived her energy from being around people and exciting events, Neily preferred his studies and quiet evenings at home. She kept him on a rigorous schedule of travels and social occasions that can only have left him drained. But tonight, oh, tonight, Neily’s smiles reminded me of the old days, when my cousins and I were young and responsibilities hadn’t yet set themselves upon our shoulders. Was it fatherhood restoring his youth, or perhaps merely being here in calm, comfortable surroundings, that made the difference?
“It’s
such a beautiful night, we thought we’d enjoy aperitifs on the veranda before dinner.” Grace linked her arm through mine. Her smile seemed cunning to me, and raised my curiosity, even a wariness. We walked through a charming octagonal parlor and out through the open doors onto the spacious rear veranda. Before us, beyond the glowing lanterns above our heads, spread the expanse of lawn and gardens, bordered by the sharp edge of the Cliff Walk and an endless, heaving blackness studded with glinting light.
The freshness of the ocean breeze made me grin as I raised my face to it. But an instant later a voice startled me.
“Good evening, Emma.”
My grin became a gasp of surprise. “Derrick.”
He moved from shadow into lantern light, the smile of apology on his lips telling me he had been in on Grace’s little secret. I had been bamboozled, kept in the dark in case I’d decided to decline the invitation. Though why Grace would think I might, eluded me. I had no aversion to spending time in Derrick’s company. I did, however, object to unasked for matchmaking. In this, Grace was no better than my aunt Alice, forever on the hunt for a suitable husband for me.
Still, I couldn’t find it within myself to be angry or even annoyed with her, and certainly not with Derrick. I smiled and placed my hand in his offered one. He raised it to his lips for a warm kiss. For all he had worn only a dark suit of clothes, he might have donned his best formalwear, so well did they fit him to his best advantage. His appearance made me glad I’d chosen Gertrude’s champagne gown rather than something plainer. Then I wondered what, if anything, it meant that I wished to look my best for Derrick. Perhaps only that this would be an enjoyable evening.
A footman offered each of us a cordial glass from a silver tray. They contained rich, nutty-flavored sherry, intended to stimulate the appetite. With a tiny sip I welcomed the warmth, the richness, and allowed it to spread a sense of well-being through me. Derrick watched me closely, and at the first opportunity, while Grace turned toward the garden to point something out to Neily, he drew me a short distance along the veranda.
Murder at Ochre Court Page 21
