“Wouldn’t you agree he’s putting on weight, Aunt Em? Never mind about his feelings—tell me what you really think. Remember, honesty is the best policy.”
“I wish everybody thought that,” muttered Detective Sergeant Bob Ranger, while Miss Seeton, smiling, maintained a tactful silence. “Although, if they did, I’d be out of a job. Which isn’t likely, human nature being what it is—which is just as well for us, because the money comes in handy.” He opened the door of the little car, which had been Anne’s before they married, and which they still hoped to sell in part exchange for something larger—one day, when they could afford it. But setting up house seemed to cost a great deal more than they’d ever expected, so . . .
Bob bumped his knees, as he always did if he wasn’t careful, on the steering column, but Anne and Miss Seeton emerged from the car unscathed. Their steps crunched comfortably across the gravel towards the main door of the hotel, and they had plenty of time to look about them.
What they saw was delightful: rural England at its best. Windows sparkled in the sunshine, sparrows danced and darted about the lawn, pigeons cooed in the trees above. A lazy labrador retriever yawned hugely in the shade of a beech, golden fur dappled on dappled green grass. Miss Seeton’s fingers ached with a longing to capture the scene on paper, and she tried to remember whereabouts in her suitcase she had packed her sketching pad.
The reception area was large and luxurious. The floor was carpeted richly, the armchairs had plump cushions, and the desk itself gleamed with lavender and beeswax. Behind the desk was a young woman, so at her ease there that it was plain she never had to double, as did Plummergen’s Maureen and Doris, as waitress, washer-up, or barmaid. Those nails, thought Bob as he strode across the deep pile of the carpet, had never known a sink of dirty dishes; those eyelashes had never lost their mascara by a brush from the back of a weary hand. Their owner was paid to be glamorous and efficient at one particular post, and there and thus she would remain.
Her attractions were evident to others besides Bob. The reception desk was set at a discreet angle to the door, out of the direct line of any draught, and for added protection flanked by some impressive specimens of potted plant: ferns, bromeliads, and a cheeseplant Charley Mountfitchet would have offered to buy on the spot. Amongst all the foliage, neatly arranged, were more chairs-on the most comfortable looking of which lay curled a large Ginger cat and a low table. And with one foot carelessly on the table, his elbow resting on the leather inset of the desk, stood a young man, bending close to the attractive young woman, making her giggle and blush as he talked.
The feet of the Plummergen party made little sound on the deep-piled carpet, and the pair at Reception were deep in conversation. Bob, preceding Miss Seeton and Anne, was almost at the desk when the young woman looked up, uttered a little exclamation, switched on a professional smile, and said, in a hasty aside:
“For goodness’ sake, Eddie! I’m busy. I’m on till half nine tonight . . . Good afternoon,” she greeted Bob, directing the rest of her smile past him to his companions.
“Oh, gosh,” said the young man, straightening up and turning round in one smooth movement. His expression was rueful as he observed the three strangers. “Caught in the act, I’m afraid.” He smiled, and his eyes danced: it was, Miss Seeton thought, far more real than the smile of the young woman. He had something of dear Nigel Colveden about him, she thought, always so ready to admire a pretty girl, but not always a good judge of character—those nails, such black lashes that nature had never, surely, intended . . .
The smiling young man was still speaking as Miss Seeton tried to dismiss from her inward eye a vision of the young woman as a harpy, with rapacious claws, preying on innocent youth. “I’m so very sorry,” he said, as he prepared to move away. “Your need is greater than mine, of course. I shall take myself off, and leave you in Beverley’s expert hands.” He bowed gracefully, smiled again, and, with a little wave for Beverley, was gone.
Beverley did her best not to show her disappointment at his going, and, professional that she was, did it well. She seemed, almost at once, utterly delighted to see the visitors, and made just the right amount of fuss over them.
“Mr. and Mrs. Ranger, you’re in Room 24, overlooking the front, and we’ve put your aunt in 25, almost opposite—if that’s all right. The one next-door was already booked, I’m afraid—we’re rather busy at the moment.” She regarded Miss Seeton with an expert eye, and a look of relief showed clearly as she added, “There’s no lift, but if you’d like to leave your cases here we can see about someone helping you upstairs with them later . . .”
The formalities were done, the keys handed out, the car locked again after Bob’s trip for the cases. Miss Seeton had unpacked a few necessities, and was gazing now out of the window at the back lawn, listening to the babble of some small children romping in the play area. Overexcited, she thought sternly. One wondered at the parents, in this hot weather—surely it would be wiser to settle them under some shady tree . . .
She drifted back to her suitcase, and retrieved her pad, pencils, and eraser. The dog, the dappled sunlight, the lazy summer cooing of the doves—how it had made an impression on her, at the time! But could she remember it now?
She thought she could—she found she could not. Somehow, the difference between vision and reality had blurred: the yawning retriever was now a snarling wolf, above whose head swooped not doves, but dark, darting, sinister winged creatures with vicious teeth: not birds, but vampire bats. And beside the wolf was a figure part bird, part woman—a woman with Beverley’s face—a harpy. “Oh, dear,” breathed Miss Seeton in dismay. What had happened? Where had it all gone, that sunny summer afternoon? The trees, instead of being in full leaf, were stark and grasping against a sky heavy with an approaching storm; the hotel was a crumbling ruin, its vaulted ceilings and arched windows looking more medieval—a castle, perhaps, or a church—than the elegant Georgian pile her eyes had shown her.
But what her eyes showed her now, she decided sadly, was that nothing was quite as it seemed . . .
After a stroll around the grounds and an early dinner, the three of them wandered into the Residents’ lounge, where Anne and Miss Seeton settled happily to watch Casablanca on television, and Bob fell asleep. The spirited café rendering of “La Marseillaise” roused him from his slumbers; he stretched, yawned, and left the room.
When Rick and Louis had disappeared into the swirling Moroccan mists, Anne and Miss Seeton left everyone else sitting in front of the News, and, sniffing a little, emerged from the lounge to look for Bob. They found him at last, after a search through the crowded public rooms, in the bar, with a pint mug and a philosopher. He looked bored.
“Which,” Anne teased him, once they had extricated him from the conversation of the travelling salesman, “will be a lesson to you not to neglect your wife in favour of selfish pleasure. We’ll have a sherry each, please, to make up for it—and while we’re drinking it,” she added quietly, “you can tell us what you’ve found out.”
Bob grinned, bought the drinks, and admitted that everything had been pretty busy—holidaymakers, businessmen, a honeymoon couple—and all he’d managed to learn from the barman was that the Abbey opened for three days every week, but that there was talk it might be increased to four, after the sudden interest shown. Which, Bob pointed out, didn’t come as much of a surprise, in the circumstances. But they, or rather the Oracle, had certainly picked the right time to arrive, because tomorrow was one of the “open” days.
“Tomorrow,” said Anne, “is another day. I adored Gone With the Wind when I saw the re-release, but I’m sure Bob would have fallen asleep if he’d been with me—I sometimes wonder if he has a soul at all! And, talking of sleep . . .”
Miss Seeton smothered a ladylike yawn and smiled: such a long journey, and so many different sights to admire. One’s mind needed time to absorb it all—and then there were her exercises, too. This morning—so unexpected, such a rush—not that i
t did any harm to curtail the routine, but yoga was intended as a relaxation, and really . . .
Bob grinned. “I doubt if I’m going to be particularly relaxed after tonight, sleep or no sleep. That four-poster bed is obviously an original, and those were the days when people just didn’t come my size.”
“There’s always the floor,” said Anne brutally, as Miss Seeton’s eyes lit up with the romance of it all. “Gorgeous thick carpets, and you can take the bolster—we’ve even got a bolster, Aunt Em, just think. Real feathers, too.”
Miss Seeton was thinking. “A genuine four-poster bed? I have never even seen one, except in museums, of course. And stately homes. And in the cinema . . .”
“Let’s hope it isn’t haunted by some genuine ghosts,” said Bob, and chuckled. “And there’s only one way to find out—and it’s getting late. We’ll see you in the morning, Aunt Em—and then we’ll go and see whether Belton Abbey has a four-poster bed of its own.”
The little car waited for a moment behind a coach more than half-full of trippers, the driver of which evidently hadn’t been warned about the tightness of the turn into the Abbey gates. He managed it without too much difficulty, however, and the Plummergen party followed the coach in queueing to buy tickets from the man in the gatehouse booth.
Belton Abbey was a sight to make Miss Seeton catch her breath. Here before her were the very walls and windows she had found herself sketching last night: not a castle, but a church—or, rather, an abbey—and not ruined, of course. Any ghosts that walked would be those of monks, dispossessed by Henry VIII and with love of their ecclesiastical home lingering beyond the grave—a love which Miss Seeton, having seen the place, could now well understand.
“Pretty impressive,” said Bob, bringing the car round to a stop. “We’ll buy a guidebook. I wonder how old it is.”
“It doesn’t look real, does it?” said Anne. “I mean, of course it must, because it is—but it’s almost too real, in a way. Like a movie director’s idea for a film set.”
“One has the feeling,” said Miss Seeton slowly, “that it is, indeed familiar—which would be why, of course, as he will have allowed them to. The duke, I mean—to use it for a film, or a television play. It is certainly most beautiful—the setting, too, so peaceful—so very English. One wonders how they can ever bear to be away.”
“Yes,” mused Bob, remembering the words of the duke’s steward on the Bremeridges’ dislike of warm temperatures. “Those high ceilings and great thick stone walls must be jolly cool, even in summer . . .” And what it would be like in winter was anyone’s guess. Maybe there was something to be said for being middle class and mortgaged, after all: their house might be small, but at least they could afford central heating throughout.
Somehow, it was hardly a surprise, as the little party entered in the wake of the chattering coachload, to find Faulkbourne about his stewardly duty, hovering in the hall. On his face as he observed the throng was a practised look of lofty disdain, which impressed everyone very much. Here, they thought, was a regular aristocrat, worth every penny of the entrance fee, looking down his nose at them like that—not a bit like the young man with the charming smile who was stepping forward to greet them. But then Faulkbourne noticed Bob on the edge of the throng, and his expression of gracious distance changed at once to what might, in a being less stately, have been called a smile. Everyone looked round to see what could have caused such a metamorphosis: a metamorphosis which magnified into a broad grin, when Faulkbourne saw that accompanying the young man he’d last seen in Scotland Yard were two women. One of whom, an elderly little body in a light tweed suit and a distinctive hat, had an umbrella hooked over one arm . . .
Fortunately for the Plummergen party’s cover, it seemed nobody else knew who they were. There was a suggestion (as Faulkbourne was so plainly a member of the ducal family) that Miss Seeton might be an old retainer, perhaps a nanny (though the hat was possibly on the frivolous side) or, more likely, a governess. Bob and Anne, it was clear, were her nephew and niece; they’d probably all be invited to go along after for a nice cup of tea and a chat, a chance to catch up on old times.
And then, as the smiling young man began to address the whole group, everyone forgot about the newcomers, and settled down to enjoy their guided tour of His Grace the Duke of Belton’s family seat.
chapter
~13~
BOB AND HIS companions had already recognised him as the same young man who’d been paying so much attention to the charming Beverley when they arrived at the Belton Arms yesterday. Away from the confines of the reception area, his voice was firm and clear, every syllable reaching the farthest members of his party.
Tours always began, he informed his audience, in the hall where they were standing, and would take in most of the ground floor, including the famous cloisters, and about half the floor above. The remainder of the Abbey was kept closed to the public, because it was the family’s private home.
“But are we going to see the place the snuffboxes were stolen from? That’s upstairs, isn’t it?”
The young man’s smile widened as he replied. From the amusement in his tone and the laughter in his eyes, this was obviously something he’d been asked before.
“I assure you, there’s nothing of interest left to see. The ropes have all been removed by the police—clues, don’t you know—not,” he added with a chuckle, “that they seem to have any idea about catching the chap. He’s as far out of reach as he ever was.”
“I hope they were insured,” muttered a dried-up little man with spectacles, a bald head, and the air of someone who understood these matters.
“The collection was priceless,” he was told. “Insurance couldn’t replace the sentimental and historical associations even if it could replace the money. Besides, the case isn’t closed yet, remember. Not that I can say too much about it, of course, but you stop and think about it. There’s been no mention yet of . . . the Ransom, has there?” And his audience shuddered with the thrill of it all.
He was certainly an accomplished showman. Having first whetted their appetites, then dashed their hopes, he finally admitted that, yes, the tour would include the morning room from which the snuffboxes had been removed. “And if anyone feels brave enough to try walking along the windowsills,” he added, “there’ll be a refund of his entrance fee!”
Making them all chuckle and shiver by turns, never once losing their attention, the smiling young man led his party from room to room, giving what was clearly a well-rehearsed commentary as he did so. They visited the kitchens, and the wine cellar. They enjoyed the cool air of the cloister, and the stuffiness of the gun room, all leather and oil and, to everyone’s delight, dog. As they entered, a spaniel with beautiful eyes and a prodigious wag to her tail stirred from her basket, trotted across to greet the young man, then at a word of command went back to bed. Some members of the party asked whether flashbulbs would scare her, and, on being reminded that spaniels were gundogs, took photographs. Whoever had arranged the tour was clearly very good at it.
Upstairs, they found something which pleased them very much: a four-poster bed, of mammoth proportions, in what was described by the young man as the official main bedroom, although since the Abbey had been opened to the public the duke and his wife slept elsewhere. In this bed, generation after generation of Bremeridges had been born; one of the few exceptions to this tradition being Ivo, the current Lord Pelsall, heir to His Grace, whose birth had occurred in the local hospital three months earlier than expected, after his mother, ever adventurous, had suffered a fall while hunting.
“Pardon me,” broke in a tall, earnest American woman who had taken more photographs of the spaniel than anyone else. “If he’s to be Duke of Belton one day, why is his name—Pelsall, was it? And who are these Bremeridges we’ve heard so much about? Can they really be all the same family?”
“Oh, yes, indeed they can—though I do agree, it’s sometimes rather difficult to understand,” said the young man, his
smile kind. “You’re not the first person to ask that question, and I’m quite sure you won’t be the last. It’s all a matter of the difference between a name, you see, and a title. The family surname is Bremeridge, as yours may be Smith or Clutterbuck or Bloggs, and the present duke is Ivo Bremeridge, Duke of Belton. His elder son is another Ivo Bremeridge—it’s a family name—but because he is the elder son he takes his father’s second title, which is Lord Pelsall. We call that a courtesy title. Ivo was born in the degree of marquis, as the elder son of a duke. Now, if Ivo the Younger marries and has a son before the present duke dies, that son will take his grandfather’s third title—but you all look thoroughly bewildered. I’m so sorry. Perhaps we’ve had enough genealogy for one day! But for anyone who may still be interested, there’s a family tree in the next room, along with the portraits . . .”
The portraits were on display around the walls of a room with a high ceiling and, Miss Seeton was pleased to observe, a north light. The faces of Bremeridges from ages past hung in heavy gilded frames, neatly labelled, looking down on the faces looking up as the party studied them dutifully. The American woman posed several questions about which face went where on the family tree; but most people were more interested in the promised morning room, which they seemed to be taking a long time to reach.
Their guide, when asked, said that they would soon be there, which made everyone eager to leave the portraits and the family tree behind. Miss Seeton, with Anne and Bob, was the last to leave, looking back once more at the Bremeridge likenesses before, with a nod and a quiet smile, catching up with the others. The morning room, after all, was what they had mainly come to see . . .
“So nobody,” enquired the young man with a grin, “has any desire for the entrance fee to be refunded? Well, well. Then I believe we must conclude that Raffles has won this round, too.” He had shown them the cabinet (now filled with a hasty assemblage of porcelain) and occasional table where the snuffboxes had been displayed, and the window through which Raffles had made his entry. He had opened the window, and invited them to peer out along the line of sills to that one directly beneath the chimney, from which the rope had been suspended.
Miss Seeton by Moonlight (A Miss Seeton Mystery Book 12) Page 10
