She expressed gratitude for my help, then took the pair without looking them over for signs of doggy mauling and put them directly into the pocket of the Windbreaker I had lent her. I took this as a positive sign that, despite the news of Suzanne Varney’s tragic death and the emotional distress that had preceded that news, she might be coming around to the idea of making a more conventional entrance into the lion’s den that was Mucklesfeld Manor. To test the waters, I suggested that we walk down to the gates outside where she had left her car, with the keys still inside, along with her own jacket, handbag, and suitcase.
I was disappointed to see her waver. “You’re right… I’m almost sure you are, that Daddy would tell me to stay, that I should think of this coming week as a holiday with the chance to meet some new and possibly interesting people. But,” she looked up at the vast rear of the house with its multitude of windows, almost indistinguishable in their heavily grimed state from the gray stone, “it does look grim-the sort of place where you could imagine terrible things having happened over the centuries. Murders that went undetected because the victims got locked away in secret rooms or walled up behind the paneling.”
A woman with more in common with me and Mrs. Malloy than I would have thought. I shivered even though I was wearing a thick sweater over a long-sleeved linen shirt and woolen slacks.
“Any place of antiquity might look this way after years of abysmal neglect,” I said more stoutly than I felt. “It will be interesting to learn why the former Lord Belfrey failed in his stewardship. Was his inheritance already seriously reduced when he took over at Mucklesfeld or did he squander the resources that could have sustained the property?”
A glimmer of interest showed in Livonia’s blue eyes, and a pale glow of sunlight breaking through the gauzy veil of early morning brought out the sheen in the firmly set waves of her dark hair. “I wonder how much Lord Belfrey will tell us about the history of Mucklesfeld?”
“Not me,” I reminded her.
“I still wish you weren’t leaving.”
“Even if I were staying, you wouldn’t see much of me. You’ll be caught up in activities from which I’d be excluded, especially when Lord Belfrey spends time with you and the other five contestants.”
“There’ll be your friend.” She brightened marginally. “Is she easy to get to know?”
“Her name’s Roxie Malloy. I’ll tell her to take you under her wing.” If she didn’t without huffing and puffing, I thought grimly, I’d hide her makeup bag. Actually, it was more of a suitcase.
“Do you think we’ll be divided into teams?” Unease trembled on her lips.
“I haven’t thought about the format.” Staring around the wilderness with its suggestion of having once been formal gardens, I found myself wondering about Georges LeBois’s vision for
I took another glance round the grounds-as much as I could see of them from that vantage point-and felt a pang for the lopsided statues, moss-covered birdbaths, and capsizing garden benches scattered around what must once have been geometrically precise grassy terraces leading down to a scythed lawn with a central fountain-now reduced to a broken crock. All that stood in visible testament to a patrician past were groupings of lordly trees, their lofty branches spread in benediction over what might once have been an Eden. Sinful the number that likely would need removing due to lack of pruning and neglected root systems. What chance was there that the proceeds from
The dog woofed as if suggesting a penny for my thoughts and Livonia asked if I knew a lot about old houses.
“I’m an interior decorator-part time now that I have a family-and I did take a few courses on the architectural periods during my training. I can tell that Mucklesfeld’s stone facade postdates the interior by a couple of hundred years. And I think the grounds were probably re-landscaped at around the same time.” My imagination warmed to the images invoked. “An eighteenth-century Lord Belfrey must have decided the place needed a face-lift, or perhaps the family coffers were overflowing at that time and he did the manly thing-went on an out-of-control spending spree to make him feel good about himself.”
“Harold thinks going mad on shopping is buying two loaves of bread at once.”
Silently, much as I detested the man unseen, I conceded that in general this was more in line with the male psyche than my version. “Shall we go down to your car?” I suggested.
She accompanied me meekly toward the drive, which ended with the gapped and crumbling wall, while the dog trotted soberly ahead as if demonstrating that he was not the sort to run away from home. I was now convinced that he did belong at Mucklesfeld or had accompanied Georges LeBois. Regrettably, if the latter were the case, he didn’t take his duties of canine assistance to a man in a wheelchair with an excess of dedication-unless he belonged to a labor union that required his being given designated time off.
“Perhaps he married an heiress, Ellie.”
Momentarily I couldn’t think who Livonia was talking about, but I was pleased by her comfortable use of my name. She had seemed so self-deprecating that I had imagined it would take months or even years for her to drop the Miss, Ms., or Mrs. with a new acquaintance. However, before flattering myself unduly, I recognized she now found herself in unknown territory.
“Oh,” I said, “my eighteenth-century Lord Belfrey! The pragmatic marriage would have been the order of his day, wouldn’t it? And now here is his current lordship engaging in a highly modern interpretation of selecting a bride with the most to bring to Mucklesfeld.”
“It sounds cold-blooded,” replied Livonia, as we skirted a sundial lurking in a tangle of tall weeds. “Still, I suppose it’s understandable he would feel morally obliged to honorably fulfill his stewardship. With his not having children, in particular a son, who will inherit the title and estate at his death?”
“He has a cousin,” I said, pleased that she was showing an increasing trickle of interest in Mucklesfeld and Lord Belfrey. “His name’s Tommy Rowley and he’s the local doctor. I met him last night.” No need to go into details, although I would have to warn her at some point about the maniacal suit of armor.
She eyed me in puzzlement. We were now walking down the badly rutted drive that sloped fairly precipitously on our left into scrub woodland. “I’d have thought that if he’s in line, his name would also be Belfrey.”
“Rowley was his mother’s maiden name. His father made the switch because of some family feud. I got the impression that he hadn’t taken kindly to being the third son. Probably got his nose out of joint from being stuck wearing hand-me-downs and told his share of the ancestral inheritance would be a predisposition to severe acne and early balding.”
“Did Dr. Rowley display any hostility toward his lordship?”
“They seemed friendly.”
“I suppose he was at Mucklesfeld because of the car accident that took Suzanne Varney’s life,” Livonia continued before I could reply. “I still can’t take it in. Did anyone say if she died instantly, or was she able to talk… if only to give them some idea what happened?”
“Tommy’s belief was that she was killed on impact.”
“It’s simply too awful.” Livonia swayed against me, stepping in a pothole. “I’ve always had a fear of getting into a bad accident. Harold says it’s because I know nothing about how cars work, so can never be in complete control of a vehicle. He’s right. I’m not the least bit mechanical, but I suppose I could take a course and hope the instructor wouldn’t lose patience with me if I got the battery and the engine mixed up. In this day and age, a woman on her own should know how to fend for herself in a crisis…” She choked up.
There hadn’t been much fending that Suzanne Varney could have done in her moment of ultimate crisis, I was thinking when we reached the tall iron gates that heralded the end of the drive. Parked against the roadside curb was a pale blue Volkswagen Beetle. Livonia opened the driver’s side door with a timidity that suggested she was expecting an arm to reach out from the back-seat to grab her round the throat. I wasn’t all that surprised, therefore, when she screamed: “There’s someone crouched down on the other side of the car. I saw the top of a head.”
