ladies and gentlemen, is concluded.'
Mutters rose like flies on a hot day from the small group, from disappointed distant relatives and modestly rewarded servants, from hopeful acquaintances, and from somber-faced business associates. Some had received more than they'd hoped for, others considerably less. None had fared nearly so well as the late-Hiram Hanford's 'secretary,' the delectable Mayell.
Of the servants, none seemed as satisfied as the gardener, Willis. None had his reason to. For while Hanford had left him only a slight sum, Willis was heir to much more than was indicated in the formal will. He had inherited Mayell.
As she rose and turned to exit the lawyer's chambers, their eyes met in silent mutual congratulation. They had each other. In six months they would have the money and Trenton House. Soon they could live the life they'd endured in secret these past miserable five years.
'Nice kitty, kitty. Sweet Saugen-mine.' Mayell knelt in the foyer of Trenton and cooed to the yellow tomcat. It slid supplely around her ankles, meowing affectionately.
Willis's gaze was appreciative, but it was not wasted on the cat. Instead, he was luxuriating in the landscape provided by Mayell's provocative posture: kneeling, inclined slightly forward. It highlighted her burnished blond hair, the regular curve of delicate shoulders and hips, the cleavage better described in terms geologic than physiological, resembling as it did other remarkable natural clefts such as the East African Rift.
She stood, cradling the sleek feline in her arms. It purred like a tiny stove set on simmer. 'See, he likes me. Saugen-sweet always did like me.'
Willis noticed the cat staring at him. It possessed the penetrating, hypnotic gaze of all cats, magnified in this particular instance by overlarge yellow eyes. The black slits in their centers glinted like cuts. He shook himself. All cats stared like that.
'Good thing he does, too. That parasite of a lawyer will be around in May some time to check on the house and his furry nibs there. Keepin' the house and roses lookin' good is going to be my job. Keepin' the cat the same'll be up to you.'
Mayell hugged the tom close to the warm shelf of her bosom. 'That won't be any trouble, Willis. He doesn't seem to miss Hiram much.' She gently let the cat drop to the floor. It made a moving, fuzzy bracelet of itself around her left ankle.
'That's something we have in common.' Her perfect face twisted into an unflattering grimace. For an instant Willis had a glimpse of something less attractive hiding behind the beauty-queen mask. 'Five years of my life, gone.' She nestled into the gardener's arms. 'Five years!' She clung tightly to his rangy, sunburned form. 'Only you made it bearable, darling.'
'We're gettin' fair pay back. One hundred and ten thousand for each year of hell.' He glanced around the massive old house, at the garish neo-Victorian-decor and the wealth of antiques. 'Plus what this mausoleum will fetch. And no one suspects.'
'No.' She showed cream-white teeth in an oddly predatory smile. 'I didn't think anyone would, not as slowly as I altered his medicine. Ten months, a fraction at a time. Otherwise the old relic might've gone on for another twenty years.' She shuddered from a distant cold memory. 'I couldn't have stood it, Willis.' Her voice and expression were hard. 'I earned that half million.'
'Six months and we'll leave this place forever. We'll go somewhere sunny and warm, as far from Vermont as we can get.'
'Rio,' she murmured languorously, savoring the single soft syllable, 'or Cannes, or the Aegean.'
'Anywhere you want, Mayell. '
They embraced tightly enough to keep a burglar's pick from slipping between them while Saugen slid sensuously around the perfect ankle of his new mistress.
'Willis?'
'Yes, Mayell?'
They were sipping coffee on the heated, enclosed veranda of Trenton, watching bees busy themselves among the spring flowers of the garden. It was Saturday, and the remaining servants were off. They could indulge in each other without gossipy eyes prying.
'Do you think I look any different?'
'Different? Different from what, darling?'
She looked uncomfortable. 'I don't know . . . different from usual, I guess.'
'More beautiful than ever.' Seeing she was serious, he studied her critically for a moment. 'You might've lost a little weight.'
She half smiled. 'Seven pounds, to be exact.'
'And it troubles you?' He shook his head in disbelief. 'Most women would find that a bit weird, Mayell.'
She ran slim fingers through the tawny yellow-brown coat of Saugen, a puffball of fur asleep in her lap. 'I haven't changed my eating habits.'
He smirked, leaned back in the lounge. 'Could be you've been taking more exercise lately.'
She laughed with him, seemed relieved. 'Of course. I hadn't thought of that.'
He looked at her in mock outrage. 'Hadn't thought of it?' They both laughed now. 'I guess we'll have to work at making it stick in your memory.'
A concerned Willis led the scarecrow called Oakley up the curved stairway.
'If she's as ill as you think, man, why didn't you call me sooner!' Grit and Yankee stone, the elderly doctor mounted the steps without panting.
'She didn't call me. I told you, Doc, I've been in New York all week, making arrangements for the sale of the house and land. I didn't know she was this bad until I got back yesterday, and I called you right away.'
'Kind of unusual for a gardener to negotiate the sale of an estate, isn't it?' Oakley had a naturally dry tone. 'Down this hall?'
Sharp old birds, these country professionals, Willis thought. 'Yeah, She trusts me, and she's suspicious of lawyers.'
That struck a sympathetic nerve. 'Got good reason to be. Sound thinking.'
'This is her room.' He knocked. A faint voice responded.
'Willis?'
They entered. The expression that formed on Oakley's features when he caught sight of the figure in the old plateau of a bed was instructive. It took something to shake an experienced general practitioner like Oakley, and from his looks now he was badly shaken.
'Good God,' he muttered, moving rapidly to the bedside and opening his archaic black bag. 'How long has she been like this?'
'It's been going on for several weeks now, at least.' Willis looked away from the doctor's accusing stare. How could they explain that they wanted no strangers prowling the house, generating unwelcome publicity and maybe some dangerous second-guessing questions? 'It's gotten a lot worse since I've been away. '
He took the chair on the other side of the bed. The hand that moved to grip his was wrinkled and shaky. Mayell's once satin-taut skin was dull and parchmentlike, her eyes bulging in sunken sockets. Even her lips were pale and crepe-crinkled though neither dry nor chapped. She looked ghastly.
Oakley was doing things with the tools of the physician. He was working quickly, like a man without enough time, and his expression was grim, a dangerous difference from its normal dourness.
A fluffy fat shape landed in Willis's lap. 'Hello, cat,' he said, absently stroking Saugen's ruddy coat. 'What's wrong with your mistress, eh?' The tom gazed up at him, bottomless cat eyes piercing him deeply. With a querulous meow, he hopped onto the bed.
'Is he in your way, Doc?' Willis made ready to move the animal if the doctor said yes. Mayell put a hand down to stroke the tom's rump. It meowed delightedly, semaphoring with its striped maroon tail.
'No.' Oakley hadn't paid any attention to the cat, was intent on taking the sphygmomanometer reading.
'Good Saugen, sweet Saugen,' Mayell whispered. Willis was shocked, frightened to see how broomstick-thin her arm had become. She looked over at him, and he forced himself to meet her hideously protruding eyes. 'He's
