normal things to someone outside the family.”
“Why? Whatever has happened?” Hester could see without asking that something had occurred. Edith looked even more tense than on their previous meeting. Her body was stiff and her movements jerky, with a greater awkwardness than usual, and she was not a graceful woman at the best of times. But more telling was the weariness in her and the total absence of her usual humor.
Edith closed her eyes and then opened them wide.
“Thaddeus's death is immeasurably worse than we first supposed,” she said quietly.
“Oh?” Hester was confused. How could it be worse than death?
“You don't understand.” Edith was very still. “Of course you don't. I was not explaining myself at all.” She took a sudden sharp breath. “They are saying it was not an accident.”
“They?” Hester was stunned. “Who is saying it?”
“The police, of course.” Edith blinked, her face white. “They say Thaddeus was murdered!”
Hester felt momentarily a little dizzy, as though the room with its gentle comfort had receded very far away and her vision was foggy at the edges, Edith's face sharp in the center and indelible in her mind.
“Oh my dear-r-how terrible! Have they any idea who it was?”
“That is the worst part,” Edith confessed, for the first time moving away and sitting down on the fat pink settee.
Hester sat opposite her in the armchair.
“There were only a very few people there, and no one broke in,” Edith explained. “It had to have been one of them. Apart from Mr. and Mrs. Furnival, who gave the party, the only ones there who were not my family were Dr. Hargrave and his wife.” She swallowed hard and attempted to smile. It was ghastly. “Otherwise it was Thaddeus and Alexandra; their daughter Sabella and her husband, Fenton Pole; and my sister, Damaris, and my brother-in- law, Peverell Erskine. There was no one else mere.”
“What about the servants?” Hester said desperately. “I suppose there is no chance it could have been one of them.”
“What for? Why on earth would one of the servants kill Thaddeus?”
Hester's mind raced. “Perhaps he caught them stealing?”
“Stealing what-on the first landing? He fell off the balcony of the first landing. The servants would all be downstairs at that time in the evening, except maybe a ladies' maid.”
“Jewelry?”
“How would he know they had been stealing? If they were in a bedroom he wouldn't know it. And if he saw them coming out, he would only presume they were about their duties.”
That was totally logical. Hester had no argument. She searched her mind and could think of nothing comforting to say.
“What about the doctor?” she tried.
Edith flashed a weak smile at her, appreciating what she was attempting.
“Dr. Hargrave? I don't know if it's possible. Damaris did tell me what happened that evening, but she didn't seem very clear. In feet she was pretty devastated, and hardly coherent at all.”
“Well, where were they?” Hester had already been involved in two murders, the first because of the deaths of her own parents, the second through her acquaintance with the policeman William Monk, who was now working privately for anyone who required relatives traced, thefts solved discreetly, and other such matters dealt with in a private capacity, where they preferred not to engage the law or where no crime had been committed. Surely if she used her intelligence and a little logic she ought to be of some assistance.
“Since they assumed at first that it was an accident,” she said aloud, “surely he must have been alone. Where was everyone else? At a dinner party people are not wandering around the house individually.”
“That's just it,” Edith said with increasing unhappiness. “Damaris made hardly any sense. I've never seen her so… so completely… out of control. Even Peverell couldn't calm or comfort her-she would scarcely speak to him.”
“Perhaps they had a…” Hester sought for some polite way of phrasing it. “Some difference of opinion? A misunderstanding?”
Edith's mouth twitched with amusement. “How euphemistic of you. You mean a quarrel? I doubt it. Peverell really isn't that kind of person. He is rather sweet, and very fond of her.” She swallowed, and smiled with a sudden edge of sadness, as of other things briefly remembered, perhaps other people. ”He isn't weak at all,” she went on. ”I used to think he was. But he just has a way of dealing with her, and she usually comes 'round-in the end. Really much more satisfactory than ordering people. I admit he may not be an instant great passion, but I like him. In fact, the longer I know him the more I like him. And I rather think she feels the same.” She shook her head minutely. “No, I remember the way she was when she came home that evening. I don't think Peverell had anything to do with it.”
“What did she say about where people were? Thaddeus-I beg your pardon, General Carlyon-fell, or was pushed, over the banister from the first landing. Where was everyone else at the time?”
“Coming and going,” Edith said hopelessly. “I haven't managed to make any sense of it. Perhaps you can. I asked Damaris to come and join us, if she remembers. But she doesn't seem to know what she's doing since that evening.”
Hester had not met Edith's sister, but she had heard frequent reference to her, and it seemed that either she was emotionally volatile and somewhat undisciplined or she had been judged unkindly.
At that moment, as if to prove her a bar, the door opened and one of the most striking women Hester had ever seen stood framed by the lintel. For that first moment she seemed heroically beautiful, tall, even taller than Hester or Edith, and very lean. Her hair was dark and soft with natural curl, unlike the present severe style in which a woman's hair was worn scraped back from the face with ringlets over the ears, and she seemed to have no regard for fashion. Indeed her skirt was serviceable, designed for work, without the crinoline hoops, and yet her blouse was gorgeously embroidered and woven with white ribbon. She had a boyish air about her, neither coquettish nor demure, simply blazingly candid. Her face was long, her features so mobile and sensitive they reflected her every thought.
She came in and closed the door, leaning against it for a moment with both hands behind her and regarding Hester with a frankly interested stare.
“You are Hester Latterly?” she asked, although the question was obviously rhetorical. “Edith said you were coming this afternoon. I'm so glad. Ever since she told me you went to the Crimea with Miss Nightingale, I have been longing to meet you. You must come again, when we are more ourselves, and tell us about it.” She flashed a sudden illuminating smile. “Or tell me, anyway. I'm not at all sure Papa would approve, and I'm quite certain Mama would not. Far too independent. Rocks the foundations of society when women don't know their proper place-which, of course, is at home, keeping civilization safe for the rest of us.”
She walked over to a neo-rococo love seat and threw herself on it utterly casually. “Seeing we learn to clean our teeth every day,” she went on. “Eat our rice pudding, speak correctly, never split infinitives, wear our gloves at all the appropriate times, keep a stiff upper lip whatever vicissitudes we may find ourselves placed in, and generally set a good example to the lower classes-who depend upon us for precisely this.” She was sitting sideways over the seat. For anyone else it would have been awkward, but for her it had a kind of grace because it was so wholehearted. She did not care greatly what others thought of her. Yet even in this careless attitude there was an ill-concealed tension in her, and Hester could easily imagine the frenzied distress Edith had spoken of.
Now Damaris's face darkened again as she looked at Hester.
“I suppose Edith has told you about our tragedy- Thaddeus's death-and that they are now saying it was murder?” Her brow furrowed even more deeply. “Although I can't imagine why anyone should want to kill Thaddeus.” She turned to Edith. “Can you? I mean, he was a terrible bore at times, but most men are. They think all the wrong things are important. Oh-I'm sorry-I do mean most men, not all!” Suddenly she had realized she might have offended Hester and her contrition was real.
“That is quite all right.” Hester smiled. “I agree with you. And I daresay they feel the same about us.”
Damaris winced. “Touched Did Edith tell you about it?”
“The dinner party? No-she said it would be better if you did, since you were there.” She hoped she sounded concerned and not unbecomingly inquisitive.
Damaris closed her eyes and slid a little farther down on her unorthodox seat.
