“Are you all right?” she asked sharply.
“I am feeling very well indeed.”
“You’re not drunk? Oh, God, Marsh, you can’t be drinking today! Iris, can’t you—”
“I am not drinking, I have not drunk, I will not drink.”
“Look, Marsh, I know you must be concerned about tonight, but really, there won’t be anything to it. Sidney will stand up after dinner and introduce you, you’ll say thank you for coming, and then everyone will get back to the dancing. Just a brief moment so as to introduce formally the seventh Duke. I know how you hate a crowd, but you can do that, Marsh, can’t you?”
“Alistair will make the introduction.”
“No, no; Sidney’s got his speech all ready.”
“Phillida.” That was all Marsh said, but the unaccustomed note of complete authority in his voice got her attention. She blinked, and took another step inside the room as if to see him more clearly. Her antennae were quivering; she knew something was up here, just not what it was, or how it would affect her.
“But Sidney—”
“No. I want Ali.”
“I don’t have the time for this,” she fretted. “Oh, very well, Alistair it is. Just tell him that all he has to do is introduce the seventh Duke of Beauville. Surely he can handle that.”
“Don’t worry,” Marsh told her. “The seventh Duke will have his introduction.”
Now she was certain that he was hiding something from her, and it worried her deeply. “Marsh, what do you have planned? You’re hiding something. I swear, Marsh, if you do anything to spoil this evening, I’ll—”
“Phillida, I will not spoil your evening. Your guests will go away happy.”
She might have pursued the matter—not that it would have done her much good, since her brother clearly had no intention of explaining further—but shouts and a crash from somewhere back in the house caught her attention. “Oh, Lord, what’s happened now? I have to go. Iris, Mary, keep an eye on him,” she pleaded, an attempt to enlist the sensible minds in the room onto her side—a futile attempt, as our faces told her. She threw up her hands, left the library, and then stuck her head back inside. “If you see the children, tell them to go to Miss Paul instantly, or I shall be quite angry.”
The door banged shut, and I made to go as well, but stopped when Marsh said, “Angry with me, do you suppose, or angry with the children?”
“Both, I should think,” Iris told him.
“In that case, perhaps I should have mentioned to her that they’re in the conservatory.”
Iris and I turned sharply in our chairs, to look through the billiards room to the glass house beyond. Indeed, after a few seconds, the anaemic vine jerked as if its roots were under attack.
“I merely told her that I hadn’t seen them,” Marsh explained placidly. “Which I hadn’t.”
“Marsh, you’re terrible,” Iris scolded.
The liberated duke just shrugged. He looked so pleased with himself, I could have hugged him.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Taking pity on Lady Phillida, Iris and I went out through the conservatory. A rattle of half-dead shrubbery followed our opening of the door, followed by an exaggerated stillness.
Iris spoke into the damp, mildewed air. “Your mother wants you to go back to your nurse.”
“She’s our governess,” protested a voice from the dead palm.
“I don’t care if she’s your headmistress, your absence is troubling your mother, who has quite enough on her mind without you two adding to it.”
After a minute of whispered consultation, the bushes disgorged two very untidy children, leaves in their hair, soil to their knees, and rebellion on their grubby faces.
“They’ve taken over all our hiding places,” Lenore complained.
“Even the cabinet in the drawing room,” Walter added.
“Can’t you play somewhere else?” Iris asked.
“We’re forbidden to go in the stables wing, and Mrs Butter told us that if she sees us again near the kitchen, we won’t eat for a week.”
“That leaves a lot of the Hall to hide in. This whole wing.”
“It’s all bedrooms upstairs, except the old nursery, and all the rooms on the ground floor we’ve been told to keep away from, too.”
“I see your problem,” Iris said solemnly. “Shall I ask your uncle if you might be permitted, just this once, to make use of the billiards room, when no-one else is using it, and the Armoury, if you promise not to touch any of the weapons?”
“Oh, yes, please!”
“But first you report to your governess and let her know you’re all right. Then ask if she would mind if you just kept to yourselves, but reported in to her once an hour. That may be an acceptable compromise. If you keep your side of the bargain. And brush yourselves clean before she sees you!” Iris called after their rapidly disappearing figures.
A first-rate shot and a woman with negotiating skills—I was amazed that Mycroft had not kept her as one of his own. When the children had left us, Iris lingered, clearly wanting to talk, but not sure how to begin.
“It should go all right,” I said, more to provide an opening than from any enthusiasm for Holmes’ proposed trap.
“Do you honestly think so?”
“Well,” I said, “the whole thing sounds uncertain, but it has been my experience that the more solidly constructed a plan looks to be, the more vulnerable it is. This one has the virtue of simplicity: Whoever is behind this, he will want that evidence of marriage, whether it’s Gabriel’s certificate that he has locked away in a bank vault somewhere, or the actual church register in France. And we do have sufficient man-power to go after him. Both those factors work in our favour.”
“And if he’s already destroyed both the certificate and the register?”
“Then in a few days we let it be known that Helen has a copy, and where, and lay the trap that way. It’s not perfect, Iris; such things rarely are. But if any group can lay hands on this particular culprit, it’s this one.” There was no point in letting her see my uneasiness; if the plan blew up, we should have to deal with it then. As a reassurance, however, it was inadequate, and Iris went off not much satisfied.
I spent the rest of the morning doing a certain amount of hide-and-seek myself, exploring the crannies and crevices of Justice Hall that I had not seen before. In this search I was aided by the librarian Mr Greene, to whom I had brought another sprig of winter-tough rosemary and who in return had lent me the original plans for the house. The volume was bound in green leather with gilt embossing, and was too cumbersome to be of any use while moving about the rooms and corridors, but I borrowed the big desk in Marsh’s rooms, and in that relative privacy made copious notes. What the servants thought of this friend of their duke’s creeping up the servants’ stairways and through the corridors on the wrong side of the baize doors, I hated to think, but most of them were far too busy to enquire, or even take notice.
I saw the Darling children once or twice, and was cautious about opening passages, lest they follow me inside, but they seemed happy enough with the Armoury and later constructed a fortress beneath the billiards table.
By the afternoon I was satisfied that I knew the ground as well as anyone could who had not been born and raised in Justice Hall. I even knew where the secret passages had to be, the concealed doors and the remainder of the spiral staircase, although lacking keys I could not investigate other than on paper. I returned the bound drawings to the library and went downstairs to take my leave of Marsh. To my surprise, he stood up from his conversation with the head butler.
“If you could wait a minute, Mary, I’ll join you. Are we finished, Ogilby?”
“Thank you, Your Grace.”
Poor man, I thought; what confusion would reign here on the morrow, when “Your Grace” would be a waist-high child with a Canadian accent. “I’m happy to wait.”
“Have one of the cars sent around, if you would, Ogilby. I’ll be at my c
ousin’s house for tea. If Lady Phillida starts to worry, tell her I promised to be back here in good time.”
“Very good, Your Grace.”
“Come, Mary. Let us escape before we find ourselves pressed into service as Ra and Hathor.”
Mrs Algernon provided us with a plentiful tea, on the theory that food would not be had for hours (no doubt true) and that we should at any rate be having too good a time that night to bother eating (which, having spent the afternoon teased by the rich odours from the Justice kitchens, I truly doubted). Afterwards, Marsh, Helen, and the child bundled up in their thickest coats and went for a long walk; when they came back, Marsh was carrying the tired boy and Helen was joking with the older man as if she’d known him all her life. There were snowflakes on their hats, and Algernon appeared before they had completely divested themselves of garments to say that he didn’t think the snow would last for long, the sky looking none too determined about the matter, but that maybe we’d want to move ourselves over to the Hall sooner rather than later, just in case. Mrs Algernon insisted we take another cup of tea, which involved our third meal of the afternoon. As we were sitting down in the solar before the fire with our cups, Holmes blew in, looking remarkably disreputable, a number of large parcels in his arms.
“Have you brought my costume?” I demanded. His mouth was already filled by one of Mrs Algernon’s sustaining little meat tarts, but he waved me towards the pile of things he had deposited just inside the door of the solar. I went over, and determined which was mine by the method of holding up each one and waiting for a shake or finally, a nod. The brown paper wrapping and crude twine gave me no great hope, but to my astonishment, what I pulled out was a more elegant version of the boy’s costume I had worn all through Palestine those years before: loose head-cover, baggy trousers, and long overshirt, even a heavy sheepskin coat to go over it all. All that was lacking were a curved knife for my belt and the torturous sandals Ali had inflicted on me in the beginning—which had in any case soon been replaced by the very boots residing in Alistair’s guest-bedroom wardrobe. In these clothes, I would be “Amir”—with rather more embroidery and a lot less dirt.
“This costume is anachronistic to a theme of ancient Egypt, Holmes,” I commented, but he did not take it seriously as a protest, as indeed had not been intended. Besides which, no doubt the nomads of the desert had dressed in much the same manner for the whole of their existence. I eyed the other packages. “Is yours . . . ?”
“The same,” he answered. Which explained why my constitutionally tidy partner had neglected to shave this morning, that he might present a more ferocious visage.
Perhaps, I decided, this fancy-dress ball wouldn’t be too bad after all.
Donning our costumes was a quick matter, with the arrangement of my hair beneath the turban taking the longest, as it was a skill I had forgotten. When Holmes and I met in Badger’s Hall, I laughed aloud in sheer pleasure. Helen seemed to find our costumes somewhat disappointing, given the ornate possibilities opened up by the Tut theme, but Mahmoud and Ali merely exchanged a glance of amusement.
We piled into the car, Holmes, Marsh, and I, to be driven by Algernon to Justice Hall. Algernon would bring Alistair and the Canadian contingent later, so as to keep them under wraps until the last minute. I had to feel a moment’s pity for the unsuspecting Phillida, whose elaborate party was going to be completely eclipsed by her brother’s announcement.
The special train had obviously arrived at Arley Holt: We passed a steady stream of motorcars coming away from the Hall empty, returning to the village for the next load. This time Algernon circled around to the delivery entrance of the kitchen wing, so that we might enter Justice without having to push through a hundred excited guests. Marsh took himself off upstairs to consult with Iris concerning the arrangements for Gabe’s care during the evening, Holmes disappeared in the other direction with my notes of Justice Hall’s hidden passages, and I stood alone in the corridor of the western wing, torn between the tumult of voices spilling out of the Great Hall to my left and the peace of the library above me.
First, I decided, I should like to remedy the one lack in my costume. I was, in fact, armed with a slim throwing knife that rode in the top of my left boot, but a true Bedouin male would not be caught dead without an impressive blade at his belt. Not that I had any intention of using the thing here—I would actually be happy with just a decorative hilt in an empty scabbard—but the costume cried out for it.
The Armoury was the obvious place for decorative knives. Also for pikestaffs, crossbows, claymores, and broadswords, but those weapons fit neither in the theme nor in a press of merrymakers. I walked to the Armoury door, let myself inside, closed the door behind me, and then froze.
One thing about old stone buildings: The sound of rats is generally confined to the wooden rafters, yet I could have sworn that I heard the characteristic quick scuffle of movement from against the wall. From the enormous waist-high chest, in fact, which on closer inspection seemed to have its lid slightly lifted. I fought a smile, frowned at the walls as if choosing my weapon, then went over to the chest and clambered up to reach a foot-long jewelled scabbard hanging above it. I jumped down to the floor and arranged the knife in my belt (where it proved remarkably uncomfortable), stamped noisily across the room to the door, opened it, shut it, then crept back to the chest and waited.
The heavy lid rose up, an inch, then two; I stuck my hands in my belt to face the growing gap. An inch more, then a startled gasp and it banged shut. I stepped forward, wrestled the massive lid open, and glared down at the two figures inside.
“It’s all right, sir,” Lenore Darling gabbled. “We have permission to be here, really we do, and we weren’t hurting anything, and never touched the weapons, honest.”
“Honest,” the boy echoed.
“Come on out of there, you two,” I said, and held the top for them. “How on earth did you get this lid open in the first place? It weighs a young ton.”
“We had to sort of prise at it—I think it scratched it a little, but it has a lot of scratches anyway. Are you one of the guests?” she asked, trying to distract me from my examination of the great gouge along the side where they had levered it open, which was, indeed, only the latest gash among the many time-honoured wounds of its long career. A bit of shoe polish or lamp-black and no-one would be the wiser, I thought.
“I am a guest,” I told the girl, “but we’ve met before. Mary Russell.”
They gaped at me, frankly admiring. “Zingers!” said Walter, and “Is that really you?” said his more skeptical sister. I pulled off my head-covering to give them the benefit of my hair, and both agreed it was their uncle’s guest.
I was not, however, finished with the chest. They had agreed with Iris not to touch any of the weapons in the Armoury, and although I had no wish to turn them in to the authorities, I thought it best to be sure that they had kept their part of the bargain. Every object I could see capable of prising open that lid had some kind of blade attached to it; I lifted the lid up enough to let light inside, and saw what they had been using.
It was an old tyre-lever, which was now transferring rust to a collection of moth-chewed wall hangings someone had stored in the chest and forgotten. Marsh’s mother, or grandmother even; certainly they’d been in the chest so long, I thought, that rusty metal or children’s shoes could not do them much damage. Which was more than I could say for the children’s clothes—one of Miss Paul’s chief duties was undoubtedly overseeing the changing of their clothes several times daily. I stretched to prop the heavy lid against the wall and then hitched my upper body over the side to retrieve the tyre-lever (realising that I probably ought not enquire where they had found the object, seeing that they were forbidden the stables wing as well). As my fingers touched the pitted metal, my sleeve brushed against something that was neither ancient wood nor moth-eaten wool. I handed the lever to Lenore, then went back on my toes to see what the foreign object had been.
Papers, it looked like: a packet of letters bound in a tired blue ribbon, a folded piece of heavy paper, and a single letter in its opened envelope, with a crumpled oil-cloth wrap that they had been in. I pulled them out, eased the lid down again, and glanced at the solitary envelope. It had been sealed, then opened with a sharp blade; the envelope had neither the black Post Office stamp nor the red mark of the censor. One glimpse of the handwriting, and I nearly ripped the letter out of its envelope. Dearest Pater, it began.
I was holding in my hands Gabriel Hughenfort’s final letter to his father, the letter written the night before his execution. A letter, I saw, containing no word of the young officer’s true fate, but which held instructions on thanks to be extended to various individuals, including the batman Jamie McFarlane and the Reverend Mr Hastings. Most important, however, and the reason it had never reached Gabriel’s parents, was the startling news of his battlefield wife, Helen, his love for her, his apologies for the haste of the marriage, and his knowledge that they would love her as their own. Gabriel’s other “final” letter, that time-stained sheet with the gentle and uplifting words intended for his mother’s eyes, had gone through; this one, from the heir to his duke and meant for the father alone, had been given to a trusted family confidant to deliver personally. I sorted quickly through the bound packet of envelopes, all of which were in a woman’s hand (Helen’s, I thought), then unfolded the heavy paper of the other loose document: a Certificate of Marriage, between Gabriel Adrian Thomas Hughenfort and Philippa Helen O’Meary. To my relief, it did not look as if Lenore and Walter had got as far as reading them.
“Did you find these in here?” I asked them, keeping my voice casual.
“They were under the corner of those dirty cloths,” Lenore informed me, anxious that I should accept the inevitability of their find. “We just climbed in to hide—or rather, I did, and when Walter couldn’t find me he started to blub—”
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