“I drive down to London for an afternoon, and you all start playing tennis without me?” Verity exclaimed as she and Kitty approached. “What treachery is this?”
The other girls stopped the match and turned to her. The blonde girl grinned from ear to ear, and the other two quickly copied her. In fact, all their movements were unnervingly coordinated. The hairs on the back of Kitty’s neck stood on end.
“There you are, Vera!” called the blonde. She spoke with a very posh voice, and her diction was so flawless it made Kitty shiver. “We looked everywhere for you this morning. You know we cannot play doubles without you!”
Verity sighed and pushed Kitty forward. “I told you last night I was going to pick up my cousin. You agreed she could stay for a few days before she leaves for India.”
“Oh, of course!” the blonde said. “Was that today? Silly of me, I quite forgot.” She approached Kitty and held out a hand. “Hello! You must be Kate.”
“Must I?” Kitty asked awkwardly. It was meant as a joke, but it just sounded stupid when she said it, and Kitty tried to hide her own embarrassment with a laugh.
The blonde didn’t seem to care. She grabbed Kitty’s hand and said, “Vera has told me all about you! I’m Diana Lowell.” She waved her hand at the house and grounds. “Welcome to the old homestead.”
“Very pleased to meet you,” Kitty said. “Vera’s letter said she was staying with some simply wonderful friends, and since I was stopping off in England anyway . . . I hope you don’t mind.”
“Not at all,” Diana promised. “The more, the merrier, as they say. Any friend of Vera’s is a friend of mine. Now then, meet the girls.” Diana’s friends had joined them, and she put a hand on each of their shoulders as she introduced them. “This is Phyllis and this is Ivy.” The brunette and the redhead respectively. “They’re making a summer of it.”
“Hello,” Kitty said, offering her hand to each of the other two girls.
“Well aren’t you simply darling?” said Phyllis. She shared a grin with Ivy and said, “Poor girl looks like we’re going to eat her.”
“Don’t be horrid,” Diana admonished. She took Kitty by the arm and led her to one of the chairs facing the tennis court. “You’re going to have a splendid time while you’re here, I promise. And you must tell me all about Canada.”
“Oh, certainly.” Kitty tried to summon up some of the incidental facts she had memorized for her cover. Suddenly nothing was coming to her. Instead, she tried deflection. “Have you ever been to Canada?” she asked.
Diana looked amazed at the question. She snickered. “Oh God, no!” She looked at the other girls. “Honestly, who goes to Canada? If I wanted to see a backwater, I’d simply visit Wales!”
Phyllis and Ivy started laughing, echoing Diana. Again, there was that timing. Diana did something, and the other two followed her. Kitty glanced at Verity, who gave her a momentary look of sympathy before joining the laughter. Not wanting to look out of place, Kitty chuckled nervously.
“You’re right,” she said. “It’s, um, very boring! I would never go if I wasn’t born there.”
Diana giggled and gave Kitty a shove. It wasn’t exactly hard nor exactly mean, but it didn’t feel genuinely playful either. “That’s the spirit!” she exclaimed. “Vera said you were a good sport. Now you sit down and watch as we play a proper game of doubles.” Diana snapped her fingers. “Vera, darling, grab a racquet. You’re with me.”
Verity looked down at her clothes. “I’m not dressed for it. Can I change?”
“Certainly not!” Diana replied. “I’ve been absolutely dying for a proper game of doubles all day, and you’re not getting off that easily. Play in what you’re wearing.”
Kitty saw frustration flash across Verity’s face, but Verity suppressed it. She smiled demurely, took of her shoes, and handed them to Kitty, before joining the other girls on the tennis court.
“You know, if I get grass stains on this dress . . .” she began.
“Oh, shut up. I’ll buy you a new dress,” Diana answered, like that was all that mattered.
Verity took her position on the court beside Diana. She gave her racquet a twirl around her fingers and swung it back and forth to test the weight. The movement immediately drew Kitty’s gaze to Verity’s fingers, which were lively and dexterous as they moved. It made Kitty think of her own fingers, and she looked down at her hands. Were they as agile as Verity’s hands? Was that important for spying, or just for playing tennis?
It took Kitty a moment to realize that she’d become distracted. The laughter and shouting of the other girls snapped her out of it, and she looked up at the match. She quickly folded her hands in her lap and hoped that no one had noticed her odd behavior. This was a new place full of new people and being in the field on a real mission was a very new experience. It was all starting to make her feel anxious, and that meant trouble.
Keep your head together, she reminded herself. You’re not Kitty Granger, you’re Kate Greenwood, and Kate Greenwood doesn’t get distracted.
She lay back in the chair and watched the other girls play. It was actually quite exciting. Kitty had never seen a proper tennis match before, and never one on grass. There was a lot of running back and forth, because the ball never bounced very high if it hit the ground, so everyone was sent racing to intercept each volley that came over the net. A few times the ball would hit the lawn and bounce, and someone would catch it with a daring dash and a flick of the wrist—but more often those attempts failed, and the ball rolled to a stop a couple of feet away, taunting the poor player who had missed the swing.
Kitty expected Verity to be the star of the game, since Verity seemed to be awfully good at a lot of things. Instead, she proved to be a capable player, but not noticeably better than anyone else—least of all Diana, who shone the most. Kitty wondered if that was by design. Diana seemed to fume and pout whenever a set went against her. Were the others letting her win to humor her?
After a little while, the girls stopped for a break. Diana walked to a nearby table, where there was a pitcher of lemonade and some glasses on a tray. She filled a glass for herself without waiting on the others, and took a drink. Her face immediately went sour.
“Oh, Lord, it’s warm! Ew, ew!” Diana exclaimed.
Verity tried some and made a face. “Well, yes. How long has it been out?”
“Well I don’t know! A few hours?” Diana frowned. “It won’t do. Someone will have to go and tell Cook to make some more.” She looked around with an angry expression. “Oh drat, where is the maid? Probably doing housework or something useless. The junior maid is on her day off, or else she’d be here to take care of it, the lazy twit . . .” She began calling toward the house, “Susan! Susan, get out here, you’re needed!”
Kitty glanced at the other girls. Verity was trying not to look annoyed, while Phyllis and Ivy gave each other nervous glances. Kitty felt very uncomfortable too, with all the anger rolling off of their hostess. It did seem like a very silly thing to get so upset about.
“Don’t be cross,” Verity said. “Look, I’ll just go to the kitchen and sort it all out.”
Diana pointed a stern finger at her. “You stay right where you are, Vera. We’re in the middle of a match, and I’m not losing my partner over some lemonade.” She turned to the house again and shouted, “SUSAN!”
An idea came to Kitty. It was a long shot, but any opportunity to explore the house on her own would be useful. She didn’t know where to start looking for Lowell’s hidden room, so if she could eliminate even part of the house now . . .
“I’ll do it,” she said, giving Diana a sweet smile. She had practiced doing that to prepare for the role. “I’m not playing, so I may as well make myself useful.”
Diana fixed her with an astonished stare, and for a moment, Kitty feared she had done something wrong. Then Diana’s expression changed dramatically, but Kitty couldn’t read whether she was angry or pleased.
“Well!” Diana exclaime
d. “That is the first good idea I’ve heard in ages. Your cousin can stay as long as she likes, Vera, if she’s willing to fetch and carry.”
“Good old Kate, always happy to help,” Verity said. She took Kitty aside and pointed toward the glass French doors nearest to them. “Look, the kitchen is easy to find. Go straight through those doors into the house, turn right at the first hallway and follow it past Lord Lowell’s study.” She emphasized those words just slightly. “The stairway to the kitchen is just beyond. No need to rush; we’ll be here for hours, if Diana has anything to say about it.”
“Right,” Kitty said.
She waited until the game had resumed before going to the French doors and slipping inside. She found herself in a little parlor looking out on the lawn. It was very elegant and filled with all sorts of expensive furniture and decorations, like a small ivory statue on an end table and several portraits that glowered down at her. They were probably long-dead members of the Lowell family, and Kitty felt like they were watching her and knew what she was up to.
Kitty did a quick circuit of the parlor just in case anything stood out to her, but she didn’t expect to find anything there. Verity would’ve covered this ground already, and a public room like the parlor wasn’t a good place for the entrance to a secret chamber. The floorboards all felt equally solid beneath her feet, though it was hard to be certain through the carpet. The wallpaper all matched, and none of the wood looked out of place. Short of tugging on every book and wall fixture in search of a trigger-point for a hidden door, that was about all that she could do.
Next Kitty hurried into the hallway and followed it toward the middle of the house. Her eyes darted all around, taking in as many small details as possible, until her head swam from the overabundance of information. Nothing stood out as suspicious. It was frustrating, but at least it meant she wouldn’t have to search this part of the house again later.
Lord Lowell’s office was farther down the hallway. Kitty tried the door and found it unlocked, so she crept inside. The room was dark and somber, and it looked very old. The parlor had been updated with modern furnishings to help drag the old manor house into the 20th century, but aside from a telephone on the desk, Lowell’s office looked like it hadn’t been changed in a hundred years.
The big desk, right in the middle of the room, was very tidy, and the papers on it were placed into neat stacks. A crystal vase of cut flowers sat on a nearby table, and the flowers tickled Kitty’s nose. She sniffled to keep from sneezing.
Kitty flipped through the papers: mostly accounts and other bits of bureaucracy that seemed to have no connection to the Orchestra’s investigation. After a quick search of the desk’s surface, Kitty adjusted everything back to exactly how it was, right down to the unpleasantly off-center placement of one of the pens. It made her cringe to look at, which was how she knew she had replaced it properly after her search.
The desk drawers were locked and there was no time to pick them. This was just a preliminary examination. She would have to do more searching later. Very conscious of the time, Kitty examined the walls, but nothing revealed itself to her. No inconsistencies in the wallpaper, no bumps or depressions in the paneling, no mysteriously uneven sections of the floor. The secret room wasn’t here either.
But there might be something else. Verity had talked about a safe, and that reminded Kitty of her discovery in Ivan’s hideout. Behind one of the paintings she found Lowell’s safe.
It was big and heavy and imposing to look at. It had a combination dial, as Verity had said, so there was no hope of picking it open.
Kitty pushed the painting back in place and frowned. There might be something useful inside, but how were they supposed to find the combination?
A floorboard creaked out in the hallway, barely audible from where Kitty stood. Her heart began pounding, and she froze in place. Was she about to be discovered?
She scurried to the wall on one side of the door, where she could be shielded from view when the door opened. She made herself as small and unassuming as possible, and waited.
Her eyes fell on the heavy curtains gathered at either side of the window. A thought started building itself in her head. She could hide behind those curtains. They were wide and thick enough to mask a human shape. Should she move over there now, or—
The door opened and a man walked in. It was Lord Lowell, looking almost the same as in his file photograph. Kitty’s breath caught in her throat and she pressed herself against the wall. Lowell had a newspaper tucked under one arm, and he went straight for his desk, giving the door a push to close it behind him.
You have to go, Kitty told herself. Get out of here or else he’ll see you!
As Lowell passed, Kitty stepped sideways and caught the door with her hand. Her fingers fumbled against the wood, and for a moment it felt like she was going to lose her grip. Her heartbeats thudded painfully, and she recognized the onset of panic.
Get out! Get out! Get out!
Kitty scrambled around the door and back into the hallway. She doubled over and gasped for air. Panic washed over her and it was all she could do to keep on her feet.
From inside the office, she heard Lowell call out, “Is someone there?”
Lord Lowell must have heard her. She was going to be discovered. She had bungled the mission and now everything was ruined!
Stupid, stupid, stupid Kitty!
No. Through the miasma of self-recrimination, Kitty’s better judgment forced its way into her mind.
He didn’t see you. Look innocent.
Kitty hastily backtracked toward the parlor and then started walking down the hallway again, trying to look like there was nothing suspicious about her. Just as she got back to the office, Lord Lowell flung the door open and stepped out in front of her. Kitty stopped short and looked startled, which was probably the sincerest emotion she had shown since arriving at the estate.
“Oh goodness!” she exclaimed.
Her voice quivered with fear, which was very real to her, but was understandable under the circumstances. She drew back from Lowell and gasped. That gave her a moment to steady her nerves and push away the fog of panic in her brain. As Lowell stared at her, Kitty exhaled dramatically and felt some small measure of tension leave her. She wanted to inhale and exhale over and over again for the better part of an hour to make it all go away, but that wasn’t an option.
“I do beg your pardon, sir, you gave me such a fright!” she said, as she did everything in her power to look like she was relaxing after an unexpected shock. She had no idea if it worked.
“Who the devil are you?” Lowell demanded. “What are you doing in my house?”
Kitty gasped. “Oh no! Diana didn’t tell you?”
To her relief, this had an immediate effect on Lowell. “Oh, you’re one of Diana’s friends, are you?”
Kitty put on her best sweet smile and said, “Yes, sir, I’m Kate. Vera’s cousin? Diana said I could stay for a few days.”
“Ah, yes.” Lowell glanced back into the office with a look of concern on his face, but then he turned his attention back to Kitty. “Diana mentioned something about it. I didn’t realize you were arriving today.”
“I’m so sorry, Lord Lowell. I hope it’s no trouble.”
“No, no, not at all.” Lowell sounded gruff and annoyed, but at least his suspicion was fading. “Canadian, are you?”
“Yes, that’s right. I’m from Ottawa.” Kitty gave him a big shrug. “I guess the accent gives it away.”
Lowell chuckled. “Not an easy thing to hide. Welcome to the old estate. Do forgive my . . . brusqueness.”
“Oh, not at all, sir!” Kitty replied. “I didn’t mean to startle you. Diana sent me to get some fresh lemonade from the kitchen, and I’m a little bit lost.”
Lowell pointed down the hallway. “Last door on the right. Take the stairs down.” He started to return to his office, then paused. “Diana will tell you, but dinner is at eight. Do not be late.”
“No,
sir. I’ll be prompt, I promise.”
Lowell nodded. “Good,” he said, and left Kitty in peace.
Chapter 17
After the close call in Lord Lowell’s office, Kitty kept a low profile for the rest of the evening. That was fine, because being in Diana’s company gave her access to most of the ground floor and upstairs rooms. The girls traipsed all over the house, partly because Diana seemed to enjoy showing it off to a new guest and partly because she was too restless to stay in one place for long.
Kitty kept her eyes peeled for clues. At first she’d wondered if there might simply be an unused room somewhere, a room everyone knew about but thought abandoned, which was really Lowell’s secret meeting place. But one of the girls would surely have mentioned a vacant room. Diana seemed to love telling stories about which famous people had slept in which bedrooms, which ancestor had added which design touches, and which poor souls had died in unexpected parts of the house.
So a completely hidden area seemed more likely. Kitty quickly drew up a mental blueprint, then tried to figure out if there were any conspicuous inconsistencies between one side of a wall and the other. As far as she could tell, there were no large unaccounted-for spaces between rooms. And she couldn’t go around knocking on the walls to hear if any of them were hollow. At least not while the other girls were around.
Dinner was served in an opulent dining room. Lord Lowell joined them and sat at the head of the table, but he spent most of the meal reading some papers and pretty much ignored his daughter and her friends. Occasionally he exchanged a few words with his wife, Lady Constance, but neither of them seemed too interested in conversing with the young people. It seemed like the family dinner was more a matter of tradition than an occasion for actual socializing. As soon as the meal was done, Lowell vanished into his office and wasn’t seen again for the rest of the evening.
The Secret Life of Kitty Granger Page 12
