Winterset

by Candace Camp

  “Thank you. I think I am. I have had nightmares the last two nights. I suppose it is inevitable. But last night was better than the night before.” She looked at him, remembering how comforting it had been to lean on him, how strong and safe his arms had felt around her. She knew that if only she could go into his embrace now, she would feel better.

  Anna glanced away, hoping that her thoughts did not show in her face. “Have you heard anything further about the murders?”

  He shook his head. “No. Anna…I intend to find out who killed those people.” The tone of his voice made it a promise.

  Startled, Anna looked up at him. Reed’s face was set, his gray eyes determined. “But why?” she blurted out. “Is that not the constable’s job?”

  “Yes, no doubt. But the last time this was happening, the constable did not solve the matter. We cannot presume that he will this time. He is not accustomed to dealing with problems like this. A constable in a small village…” Reed frowned. “I just think he probably needs all the help that he can get.”

  Anna nodded. She knew the constable better than Reed, and she knew that he was a simple man, accustomed to dealing with simple problems. She had to admit that the murders of the past week would be overwhelming to him.

  “I have to make sure that no one else gets hurt,” Reed went on, and Anna realized suddenly that he was looking into the murders for her sake. He was afraid that his dream meant that she would be a target for the killer. He had said that he did not love her, but he must still care for her in some way. She told herself that it was terrible and selfish of her that this knowledge warmed her heart.

  “You think that these deaths are somehow connected to me,” she told him. “Don’t you? Because of your dream.”

  “I cannot help but wonder.”

  “Perhaps your dream—if it meant anything—was nothing more than an indication that I would stumble upon the body. I do not see how the murders threaten me more than anyone else who lives here.”

  “I don’t, either, at the moment. But we have no idea why he has killed those he did—or who else he might decide to kill. The only safe way to deal with the problem is to find out who has done these things.”

  After a long moment, Anna said, “Did you notice that the first murder was of a servant girl and the second victim was a farmer—just as in the murders fifty years ago?”

  “It occurred to me. One can only wonder why someone has decided to imitate what happened before. It seems that it must have some significance for the killer.”

  “Yes, but what? The style of killings would be enough to raise the fear of the Beast in everyone. Why make them so exactly alike?”

  “God only knows. I cannot think that we are dealing with a rational person. It may mean something to him that would never occur to a normal human being.”

  “There were only two deaths the other time. Perhaps he will stop now.”

  “We can hope, but I would not rely on it.”

  “What are you going to do?” Anna asked.

  “First, I want to look into the legend about the Beast, and also the earlier murders. There must be some reason why the killer wants us to think that the Beast is running amok again…why he has copied those other two deaths so closely. I plan to look through the Winterset library. I haven’t really had a chance to—it’s extensive. I thought there might be something there about the local legends. And I would like to look at those records the doctor spoke about. His father’s notes and the newspaper articles of the time. Perhaps something in the old murders will give me a clue as to what is happening now.”

  “I want to help you,” Anna told him.

  Reed looked at her, his eyebrows lifting. “But—”

  “Don’t tell me that it is unsafe,” Anna warned. “You are already afraid that I am somehow involved. I don’t see how poking about would endanger me any more.”

  “It is just that it is an unsavory subject,” he responded. “Are you sure you want to look at the doctor’s drawings and such?”

  “I’m not sure that ‘want’ is the correct word. But I have seen one of the victims, and I do not think that the drawings of two murders in the past could be any worse than that. I feel an obligation to Estelle and that poor young man. I want to do something.”

  “Of course. I will be glad for the help. You can escort me to the doctor’s. You know him far better than I.” He paused, then continued. “Tomorrow, perhaps. And we can look through the library at Winterset.”

  “All right.” Anna felt suddenly a little breathless. It occurred to her that she might be playing with fire, being alone with Reed in his library, but she pushed the thought aside.

  He arranged to come by the next day to take her to the doctor’s, and then he bowed over her hand and left. Anna stood for a moment, her hand pressed to her stomach, which was suddenly dancing with nerves.

  Several times that evening, she started to write a note to send to Winterset, telling Reed that she had changed her mind, that she was not going with him to look at the doctor’s notes. She even got so far as actually writing part of the note, but then she tore it up. However much she told herself that it could be dangerous, she could not bring herself to refrain from going.

  The next morning, she took extra care with her appearance, then grew angry at herself for doing so, and instead put on one of her plainest dresses and had Penny redo her hair in a bun at the nape of her neck. However, she did not realize that nothing could detract from the glow of her skin or the sparkle in her eyes, so that no matter how much she tried to look ordinary, her very anticipation at being with Reed enhanced her beauty.

  Dr. Felton was somewhat surprised at their arrival on his doorstep, but when Anna told him that they wished to look at his father’s notes on the fifty-year-old murders, he agreed amiably and led them into the office behind his surgery. Unlocking a cabinet, he pulled out a metal box and opened it. Inside were a series of bound journals, which looked identical. Dr. Felton searched through them and, after a time, took out one.

  “This is for the year of the murders,” he told them, handing the volume to them, and closing and replacing the box. “Would you like the newspaper accounts, too? Mrs. Ross, his old housekeeper, gave them to me several years ago. I don’t know, really, how helpful they are.”

  He closed the cabinet and relocked it, then moved to another, unlocked, cabinet and dug through it until he came up with a plain box. He turned toward them, holding out the box. “These are all the articles she clipped. I haven’t read all of them. One can only describe the tone of most of them as hysterical. I am not sure how accurate they are.” He gave a faint smile. “I discovered that our newspapers’ ancestors were almost as given to hyperbole as the present-day issues.”

  “This is perfect,” Anna assured him.

  “You can look at them in here, if you’d like,” Dr. Felton told them, gesturing vaguely around his small office, which was almost entirely filled by his large desk and several cabinets. “Or you may take them home if you would rather….”

  They agreed that it would be easier to look at them at Winterset, and Anna promised solemnly that they would return the materials as soon as possible. They went back to Winterset and sat down in the library with a pot of tea, then opened the journal between them on the table. They sat side by side at the table, leaning in to look at the book. Their arms touched—it was impossible not to—and even though Anna could feel only the material of his suit coat against her own skin, bared by her summer dress, the contact made her flesh tingle with awareness.

  In her mind, she imagined covering his hand with hers, feeling his warm skin beneath hers. He might open his fingers slightly, allowing hers to slip between his…. Her skin warmed, and she shifted a little in her chair, so that their arms were separated by a fraction of an inch. But she could not escape the other ways his nearness affected her. There was still the faint scent of his skin in her nostrils; she could still feel the warmth of his body; she could still glance at his profile an
d see the curve of his jaw, the straight line of his nose, the curl of his impossibly long eyelashes, the dark shadow of beard that was already beginning to lurk beneath his skin, even though he had doubtless shaved only hours earlier.

  Reed turned to glance at her, and their eyes caught and held. Anna’s breath was shallow in her throat; she could not turn from his silver gaze. Yearning for what she would never have pierced her. If she had married him, they would have sat often like this, but then she would have had the right to slide her hand through his, to lean her head against his shoulder. She would know every line and curve of his face, would have touched them many times, tracing a loving finger over his brows and nose and lips.

  Reed’s gaze darkened as he looked at her, and for an instant Anna thought that he was about to kiss her. She waited, her heart pounding ferociously, not knowing what she would do if he did lean toward her. But then he broke the contact of their gazes and turned back to the journal in front of them, flipping through the pages until he reached the first of the murders.

  “Here it is.”

  Anna leaned in, looking at the doctor’s notes. There was a detailed drawing of the servant girl’s body, with lines leading to the places where she had been stabbed. The stabbed areas were then drawn in insets, enlarged, with the marks detailed. It was a gruesome drawing, even with the doctor’s dry, clinical remarks attached. On the next page, the doctor had jotted down such information as where she was found and when.

  “Look. She was found on a farm, also,” Anna said. “Weller’s Point. That is on one of the Winterset tenant farms. Not the same one as where Estelle was found, but still…”

  “A definite similarity,” Reed agreed. “It seems clear our killer is imitating the first.”

  “Let’s look at the second drawing,” Anna suggested, reaching out to flip through a few more pages. She stopped, running her finger down the center of the book. “This—it feels as if a page has been torn out here.”

  Reed nodded. “I noticed that earlier on.” He flipped back toward the front of the journal. “Pages are missing here, as well. And here.”

  “Hmm. Why do you suppose that is?”

  Reed shrugged. “I suppose there could have been mistakes, a drawing done wrong and ripped out.”

  “Or something that he did not want anyone even to read,” Anna put in.

  “Yes.” He glanced at her. “Are you suspecting the doctor of the earlier murders?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t suppose he should be ruled out, though. What if the cuts were made with a scalpel, just spaced apart to look like claws?”

  “Then why write in here that he thought they were too even to be an animal’s claws? If you go to the trouble to do that, trying to fool everyone, you aren’t likely to write down the truth in your journal.”

  “I suppose that is true,” Anna conceded as she turned the page and found the drawing of the old farmer who had been killed next. She peered at the drawing. “I don’t think these marks look exactly like the ones on the Johnson boy. I mean, they aren’t in the same places.”

  Reed nodded. “You’re right. And this old man’s throat was not as damaged as Frank Johnson’s. So the killer imitated the killings, but not in every point. Perhaps he had only heard that they looked like an animal attacking but had never seen these drawings showing exactly where they were.”

  “Which would be almost anyone in the area,” Anna commented with a sigh.

  “Yes, I am afraid it’s not a terribly useful supposition.”

  “There must be some reason for the imitation, though. I mean, the killings are the same in so many particulars that he has to be copying the earlier murders.”

  “I think you’re right,” Reed agreed. “I mean, unless you subscribe to the eternal man-beast theory. Then it would be the same, er, person.”

  Anna grimaced at him. “I think we can safely discount that theory. Nor does it seem likely that it was the same person, even if he is not a supernatural being. He would be far too old now to be doing such things, wouldn’t you think?”

  That also, Anna thought with inward relief, tended to exonerate her uncle. He had been only a boy at the time of the killings, no more than seven or eight. Of course, she reminded herself reasonably, perhaps talk of the killings had been so significant to him that he had incorporated them into his madness.

  She flipped back and forth a few times between the drawings, studying them, then went back to the notes the doctor had written about the first victim. Suddenly, something toward the bottom of the page caught her eye.

  “Look. He says here that she was a servant at Winterset.”

  “What?” Reed leaned closer, his eyes going to the spot where her finger pointed. “‘Susan Emmett, a parlormaid at Winterset, was found beneath the large tree at Weller’s Point.’”

  He looked at Anna. “Well, I suppose it makes sense. If she was a servant girl, she would in all likelihood have served either here or at Holcomb Manor. You say Weller’s Point was a de Winter tenant farm. How far away was it?”

  “Not too far.”

  “It says here it happened on a Sunday evening. She might have been off that Sunday and had gone to see her family, then was walking back to Winterset when he attacked her.” Anna couldn’t suppress a little shudder at the thought.

  “Do you suppose there would be anyone here who might remember her?”

  “I should think it was all too long ago for any of them to still be working here, but if we could find out their names, some of them might still be alive.”

  Reed nodded, and they bent their heads to the pages once again. Finally he sat back, letting out a groan. “I think I have absorbed all I can for the moment.” He looked at Anna. “Care for a walk?”

  “That sounds very nice.”

  They went out the back, wandering through the garden, which had obviously been cleaned up quite a bit, weeds pulled, and overgrown bushes and trees cut back. There was some semblance of order now, although the roses still grew in wild profusion, casting their heady scent in the air.

  Anna’s hand was tucked into Reed’s arm. The sun was warm on her back, shielded from her eyes by the brim of her bonnet. It was a delightful day, she thought, seemingly far removed from the tales of murder they had been studying inside. And yet, murder had taken place not far from here only a few days earlier. It seemed impossible.

  She breathed in the roses with a sigh of enjoyment, and Reed, a smile touching his full lips, broke off a bloom, carefully stripping it of thorns, and handed it to her. Anna brought it to her nose and sniffed deeply, her eyes shining with thanks above it. Her heart welled with feeling. This, too, could have been hers, she thought—long summer days with Reed, walking in the garden, side by side. Perhaps they would have been holding hands, laughing as they talked about their lives. There might even have been children running about. She pictured them laughing and intelligent, full of questions, something like the twins—perhaps even with their black hair, but with Reed’s silver eyes.

  It was a picture so compelling that she almost let out a soft moan of longing. She had done the right thing, she knew. The honorable thing. It had been her only choice. But she knew with an ache just how much she had cut out from her life.

  They strolled through the arch, covered thickly with a flowering vine, and a figure popped up in front of them, startling them.

  “What the devil—oh, Grimsley. You gave us a turn.”

  It was the caretaker, Grimsley, small and dark, wearing a cap pulled low on his head to shield his eyes from the sun. He swept the cap off now to Reed, revealing his stringy mop of graying hair, and bobbed a bow.

  “My lord. Miss.” He nodded at them, grinning and twisting his cap in his hand. “Out for a stroll, eh? The old place is lookin’ better, innit? Now that I got some help. We’ll have it lookin’ tip-top in no time.”

  “Yes, it is much improved, “Reed agreed.

  “Sorry her ladyship and the young’ uns left,” Grimsley went on. “They was interes
ted in all the plants, them boys.”

  “Yes. They are generally interested in everything.”

  “Too bad about them folks being killed.” Grimsley shook his head. “Strange it happened again.”

  Reed shot Anna a look. They had not even thought about the gardener when they had been talking about the Winterset servants earlier.

  “You were here then?”

  “Oh, yes, I were just a lad then, twelve or so, I guess. But I helped me dad out sometimes. He was head gardener here before me.”

  “And did you know the girl who was murdered?”

  “Oh, no, sir, she worked at the Manor, now, didn’t she?”

  “No, I meant the murder that happened a long time ago.”

  “Oh. Aye, I think she did work here, now I think about it. But I didn’t know her, like. I only worked out here, you see.”

  “Yes. Of course.” Reed paused, then asked perfunctorily, “And the murders—do you think they were committed by the ‘Beast’?”

  “The Beast,” the old man repeated scornfully. “Nay, my lord, I don’t believe in any Beast. That’s just a tale, now, innit?”

  Reed looked at him in surprise. “Yes, that is what I think. But most of the servants I’ve talked to believe that it is indeed the Beast of Craydon Tor who has been doing the killings.”

  “Oh, them…” Grimsley made a dismissive gesture toward the house. “They’re new here, ain’t they? They don’t know nothin’.”

  “And do you have a theory as to who it is, then?” Reed asked, his interest piqued.

  “Sure,” Grimsley replied easily. “It’s clear as day. It’s the ghosts.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  There was a long silence as Reed and Anna stared at the gardener.

  “Ghosts?” Reed repeated.

  “Aye, sir. It’s ghosts right enough.”

  Anna cast a glance toward Reed, then said, “Why do you think that?”