Peril at Somner House

by Joanna Challis

  Half turning her head, I caught the haunted look behind her eyes. It vanished as soon as she smiled, offering the best bed to me, but I shook my head. The more time I spent here, even these passing minutes, confirmed the blooming premonition in the back of my mind. Angela needed me. Why, I didn’t know. But she needed me.

  The bedchamber, a capacious one by any standards, boasted full-length wooden shutter doors leading out onto our own private little balcony, the shutters being an option for privacy. Two wicker chairs and a table graced the balcony outside, a small bowl of fresh island flowers flapping precariously in the breeze.

  Rescuing the flowers before they flew away, I sprinkled the pink, yellow, and white concoction over our beds and unpacked for the night. Hanging two dresses, one for tonight, and one for tomorrow, I took out the essentials and proceeded to find the bathroom.

  Across a narrow tiled stretch, the long room consisted of a green bath, with a lion-shaped head as the water spout flanked by two antique golden handles and a modest mirror above a prehistoric washing bowl stand. Little blue and white tiles graced the walls, adding character to the room, and I made swift business of attiring myself, knowing Angela’s hourly ritual for adorning herself.

  Soon, Kate arrived to collect us for dinner.

  “Don’t you two look lovely! Pity your efforts are wasted, though Rod may still come. The storm will bring him.”

  “The storm, Lady Trevalyan?”

  Her mouth hardening, Kate slapped me over the wrist. “Just Kate, please. We’re on an island and even in London, I abhor all that kind of snobbery. Titles mean nothing.”

  “To some,” Angela reminded, leaning over for Kate to sniff her new perfume.

  Back down the same stairs, we turned right to enter the main living quarters of the house. Drawing us into the large open drawing room where a lively fire spluttered and bristled, the chill of the day disappeared and we faded gratefully onto the comfortable velvet reclining divans, each arrayed in a deep purple with long, rounded, cream-colored cushions.

  Sets of various African rugs warmed the cool floors beneath, the surrounding walls displaying works of art. “Are they all yours?” I asked Kate.

  “Yes,” she beamed. “Which is your favorite painting? Choose carefully now. It’s my first test for any newcomer to Somner.”

  Given the pleasant task, I meandered about the room to appreciate each painting while Angela and Kate giggled and whispered together on the far lounge.

  “Damnable impudence!”

  Sauntering to the fire, Max stoked it. Three aggressive jabs and three unmentionable curses. I recoiled in shock.

  “Darling, please.” Kate blushed. “Don’t swear. What has happened now?”

  Glaring toward the door, Max’s brood intensified. “Ask him. You won’t like it.”

  We all glanced at the tall, dark-haired, caped man paused on the landing.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Kate sighed, “do come in, Roderick. Whatever this kafuffle is, you are staying for dinner. There’s no point going back to the tower now with a storm raging, and besides,” she teased, gliding across to him to plant a sisterly kiss on his cheek, “you must meet Daphne and Angela, the writer sisters I was telling you about. Here, let me take your cape.”

  Angela and I rose for the introductions.

  Inclining his head to both of us, Roderick Trevalyan looked nothing like his brother. Though a year or two younger, he appeared twenty years older because of his dour expression. His dark eyes revealed little, a mild passing interest and a weariness, perhaps in regard to his brother. It was a very bleak face, not entirely unhandsome.

  “What’s the bad news?” Kate prompted, reverting to her usual infectious affability.

  “He says we’re to sublet the London flat,” Max snarled. “For a year. Sorry, Katie. Looks like we’re stuck here.”

  “Oh.” A slight frown marred Kate’s creamy forehead. “How horrid. But if we must, we must.”

  “Blast it! I don’t want to be trapped here!”

  “Let’s go to dinner, dear.” Kate skipped to the door. “We’ll talk about it later. We don’t want to ruin the first evening for Daph and Ange do we, my Maxie boy?”

  Under her placating look, the aggressiveness slowly dissipated and Max resumed his former attentiveness, leading us into the dining room.

  Glaring at his brother across the table, Max whipped out his napkin. “’Spose it’s the money again. A year, you say? Why can’t we sell off one of the farms?”

  “You know very well we cannot sell any of the land,” Roderick replied, his voice low and deceptively patient.

  “Damned hereditary clauses!” Raising his glass, Max grinned his apology at us ladies. “Ah, well, we’ll just have to keep you all here, won’t we, Katie?”

  He fluttered his eyelashes at Kate, who looked on him with weariness and extended her hand across the table. “Of course, my love. In time, we’ll let out the rooms properly and invite fascinating people who pay—”

  “Oh, do let us be the first,” Angela insisted, looking to me for support. “Our parents will love it.”

  “Er, yes,” I echoed. “You must accept, Mr. Trevalyan?”

  After a pithy silence, Roderick said: “I think it’s an appalling suggestion to impose upon one’s invited friends, Miss du Maurier.”

  “Humph!” Max rolled his eyes. “But Rod, this time I suppose you’re right. It’s rude, Katie. No, not our friends. The next lot. You do up the rooms and I’ll collect the cash. Six months and we’ll be back in London.”

  “Provided you don’t spend the funds you collect,” Roderick dared to caution.

  “Let Rod handle the money, darling,” Kate implored with an edge to her voice. “He’s saved us many times before, remember?”

  Forced to do so, Max swiftly relented to the wisdom of his younger brother with a perturbed lower lip.

  “Dearest Rod, we’d be lost without him.” Healing the breach between the brothers, Kate went on to relate how skillfully Roderick handled all of their affairs, farm, estate, and in town.

  Listening to her, I thought it remarkable how Kate handled her husband. But I felt sure some hidden tension lurked behind their display of affection.

  Chapter Two

  A queer sound woke me.

  Turning to the window, I opened a bleary eye to see a tiny bird pecking at the glass. The noise hadn’t roused Angela yet, and amused by its friendly curiosity, I watched it, afraid to move lest it fly away. Having never before seen a bird of its kind, I mentioned the incident to Kate over breakfast.

  She, Angela, and I breakfasted alone in the morning room downstairs. Further along the passage adjacent to the dining room, the enclosed terrace overlooked the open terrace outside where the rain and wind still howled.

  “It’ll pass,” an optimistic Kate said, looking more than a little pale this morning and I wondered whether it was due to the notable absence of her husband. She said nothing of Max and we did not ask.

  “There’re many exotic birds here,” she said, sipping her coffee and tugging the satin-and-fur morning wrap closer about her shoulders. “You’ll have to ask Roderick. He knows everything about the island and its species.”

  “Roderick,” Angela mused, the only one of us this morning who’d taken the time to dress properly for breakfast, even applying color to her cheeks and lips. “Where is he?”

  “Oh, he left early. But,” Kate teased, “I daresay he’ll be back. He’s positively enchanted by you two ladies.”

  “I wasn’t asking for that reason,” asserted Angela.

  “And how is your Captain Burke, darling?” the perceptive Kate inquired, and sensing the two friends needed time alone to share their confidences, I took my coffee cup and moved to a quiet corner of my own.

  The cane chair nestled off to the side was surprisingly comfortable and, curling my legs up under me, I observed the weather outside. Another hour or so and I could begin my excursion and decide whether or not to stay on the isl
and.

  Part of me wanted to stay in order to discover the reason behind Angela’s incongruity. Something plagued her and hearing the two whisper together, I felt a little hurt that she chose to confide in Kate and not in me, her sister, the one she’d dragged to this forsaken place.

  “Rod gone back?”

  The unexpected appearance of a shabbily robed Max sent the remains of my coffee spilling down my shirt.

  “Yes.” Rushing to her feet, Lady Kate gently corrected his askew hair as I mopped up my coffee spill. “Why don’t you get dressed, darling, and offer Daphne a tour of the estate?”

  His glum roll of two very shady eyes, remnants of last night’s private revelries, led me to rise and insist upon going on my own. I explained this gave me the greatest inspiration and Max swiftly agreed, checking the status of the weather outside. “Best take a raincoat. Got one?”

  I assured him I did and, leaving him to the devices of his wife and Angela, whom, I suspected, did not relish his sudden interruption into their private tête-à-tête, I escaped through the sliding terrace door.

  The day and its possibilities beckoned. Heading straight for the sea, I smiled at Hugo the hunchback. A person standing with him, the gardener I presumed, a man in his early forties, neatly dressed with a roughened face, clipped whitish beard, and alert eyes, tipped his hat as I passed. I felt intensely sorry for Hugo, having to do a great deal of the work about the place. He served our breakfast, carried our luggage, cooked our meals; did he clean, too? Despite the financial restraint, it seemed there must exist a maid somewhere, even if she worked only a few hours.

  Eager to catch sight of the tower where the mysterious Roderick lived, I followed the track down to the beach. The wet sand stuck to the underside of my boots and, shaking them free, I abandoned them for the barefooted approach.

  Nothing quite compares to walking along the beach with one’s feet bare, the radiance of the morning casting its glow over a sparkling sea.

  I located the tower easily, perched high on the cliff. It was a short stretch from Somner House, then a rocky upward climb of a somewhat perilous nature. Obviously, Roderick Trevalyan didn’t entertain many visitors at his home.

  Evidence of life existed beyond the crows circling above the crumbling jagged proportions. A ginger-haired cat lolling there under the ledge lazily observed my intrusion with its watchful green-yellow eyes. Lifting the wrought-iron handle to the old arched church door, I waited for a response to my call.

  There was no response.

  I tapped louder.

  Suddenly, he came bounding down what sounded like rickety stairs to answer the door. Swift annoyance passed his face before a polite, tepid smile emerged.

  “Sorry for startling you, Mr. Trevalyan,” I apologized. “Lady Trevalyan, oh, I mean, Kate, said you’d left early so I thought you wouldn’t mind if I…”

  I had already stepped inside, forcing him to let me through the door. Roderick Trevalyan guarded his privacy in a fierce fashion and I refused to allow him any chance to think of an excuse to send me away.

  “What a fascinating place! I love ruins.”

  And a ruin it was. Open to the sky, the last vestiges of stone staggered about the place in splendid disarray. The tunnel over the door preceded two meters and extended up the installed wooden stairs where part of the old stone had disintegrated. The shell of the tower, up the rickety stairs, seemed to enclose one livable space.

  I must have looked like a puppy hankering to go upstairs with large, hopeful eyes. “Can I have a quick look, Mr. Trevalyan? Ever since Max mentioned the old castle, I knew I had to see it and I might not have another opportunity.”

  A mild brow rose.

  “I may be returning to the mainland this evening.”

  I waited for him to ask why and during the flagging quietness, I began to move toward the stairs. Roderick’s lumbering feet reluctantly followed. He presented a bizarre image in his casual overalls and rolled-up shirt. He was the worker of the family, the diligent one. I smiled to think of him managing Max’s estate and visiting his tenants and farmers in his overalls.

  The tower room was as I imagined: small, circular, quaint, and compact; stone walls and floors, a lone square rug of tribal print, reminiscent of Kate’s decorating at Somner, one slim-line monkish bed, a tall wardrobe, dressing stand and bedside drawers with lamp, and a chair and bookcase by one of the four windows. Going to a window, the one near the bookcase, I inspected how the glass panes sat inside the iron casing of the old turret windows.

  Next, running a gaze across the line of book titles gracing his shelf, I noted the usuals: Shakespeare, Walter Scott, Dickens, no women authors amongst random fiction titles, fishing and books on Cornwall, and…“Boatbuilding?” It certainly went with the overalls.

  “Yes,” confirmed the stark presence looming at the door, preluding my exit.

  “Fishing boats? My family has a home in Fowey. Heard of it?”

  “No, I rarely leave the island.”

  Rarely leave the island? Inherently curious, I returned the boatbuilding book back to its place. “Thank you for letting me see your tower, Mr. Trevalyan.”

  He stared at me as I darted down the stairs and out the door.

  “You think he’s a boatbuilder?” Angela laughed later in our room, throwing a pillow at me. “Admit it, his austerity has intrigued you. You’ll stay.”

  I didn’t like her drawing conclusions about me. “Maybe not. Why am I here, Ange? What’s troubling you? I’m your sister. You can trust me.”

  “I know.” Nodding, she quickly turned away to view her face in her hand mirror. Frowning at certain parts, her right eye sent me a furtive glance. “You’re prettier than Jeanne and I now. I saw how Max looked at you.”

  “Ha!” I nearly choked though a fiery red stained my cheeks. “He who rolled his eyes at the suggestion of doing me a guestly duty? Are you mad?”

  “Poor Kate…” Sitting on the edge of her bed, Angela continued raiding her little makeup bag. “She suffers so much with his affairs and his drinking, among other things.”

  I had guessed as much. Max lived life to the extreme. Did those habits and lifestyle grate on Roderick, wishing he were the elder brother, resenting the fact Max held the title and estate when he least deserved it?

  “Did you find the tower?”

  “Yes. Is it possible Roderick and Max have different mothers, do you think?”

  Angela lifted a weary brow. “Oh, please, we’re not writing books here!”

  “Isn’t that why we came?”

  “Well, not at this moment, and not using our hosts as character studies. Though,” she paused on reflection, “I think an austere boatbuilder would feature nicely in your Cornish family saga.”

  I thought so, too, and skipping luncheon, as everyone seemed to arrange their own midday meals at Somner, I took out pen and paper and stopped by the kitchen to fetch an apple.

  A singing maid mopped the floor nearby. Admiring her graceful hips dancing to some tune, I was loath to interrupt her.

  “Ayeee!” A few more expletives flew out of her mouth as the mop flew out of her hands. Twirling wildly, she gaped at me in horror. “Oh, sorry, miss! Didn’t know it were you.”

  She had a very strong Cornish accent, her upturned beauty enhanced by straight, short chestnut hair and impish green eyes. “Have you worked here long, er…?”

  “Fayella. Just once in a while, miss. When they need me.” Her lips curled at some private joke.

  Retrieving an apple, I snuggled up in a chair on the outdoor terrace to write. One or two pages later, wishing I’d brought my typewriter, I recalled Fayella and her wanton smile. Arrogance existed on that stout upper lip. Was she a plaything of Max’s on the side? When they need me, she’d said.

  “Ah, so you’re a writer!”

  Plonking himself down opposite me, Max snatched the notebook from my hands and flicked through the pages, his lips twitching in amusement. “This one’s been on the boil for a w
hile? Do I feature in it now?”

  Chuckling to himself like an amused child, he scanned the lines before tossing the book back to me. I hoped he failed to notice my slight fluster, and wondered how he’d react if he knew my suspicions.

  Smirking, he asked, “Mind if I smoke?”

  I shook my head, looking out for Angela and Kate. Something about Max disturbed me. It was more than a wildness, I decided, and continued writing. Using my senses to guide me, to conceal the rapid flutter of my heart, I tried to ignore his presence.

  “See the old castle?”

  “Yes. Yes, I did.”

  “And my brother, Rod? What d’you make of him?”

  I hesitated. At length, I said, “Odd.”

  Max laughed, moving his chair closer to mine. “I like you, Daphne. I like you very much. Do you have a boyfriend?”

  I tensed. Is this how he intended to conduct himself with his wife’s guests?

  “Ah, your face went red! That means there is someone.”

  “There is someone,” I conceded. “But I’d rather not talk about it.”

  “Why not? I need a diversion.” Glaring at dried mud on his boots, he kicked the ground to get rid of it. “Not everyone loves me. Kate…she treats me like a child.”

  I didn’t know what to say.

  “And Rod’s just waiting to get his hands on the estate. He says he should have been the elder. Gosh, he even looks older!”

  I nodded my agreement and blushed when I felt his keen gaze upon me.

  “Pity you have a boyfriend…and pity he’s not here to protect you.” Chuckling, he left and I breathed an acute sigh of relief. He acted master of the house too well for my liking, taking liberties with everybody, from servants to guests.

  His wife, however, failed to show true unease at her husband’s imprudence, and despite Angela’s manifestation of her continual sufferings, I doubted any real love existed between the couple.

  Love replaced by convenience, I jotted down, with a question mark.

  I decided to stay.