She Shoots to Conquer

now he doesn’t have her face to look at, he’ll get back to himself right as rain. That’s right, said Boris, don’t you go on worrying, Mrs. Foot. Always so thoughtful of me, those two. I got my hopes up that his lordship was over the lady when he decided on this plan to get married. But then… there was you… brought in by the fog. And it came to me that if you could be got rid of fast, before it all got stirred up again for him, there mightn’t be too much harm done.”

“You panicked on discovering that Monsieur LeBois had asked my husband to stay on beyond this morning.”

“That’s the nutshell, dearie.”

“Frankly,” it had to be said, “I’m surprised your primary concern isn’t that if Lord Belfrey does select a bride at the end of the week, she might be the new broom sort and decide to replace you, Mr. Plunket, and Boris with her own choice of employees.”

“Won’t happen, dearie.” The gummy smile was back full force and Mrs. Foot went so far as to rub her hands. “His lordship wouldn’t stand for us being booted out. He’s give us his word we’re to stay as long as we wants-which is forever-and with him that’s as sacred an oath as you’d get out of a bishop.”

“I’m sure.” And naively or not, I was. What puzzled me was why Mrs. Foot had confessed to the hot-water bottle and the open window. My mind primed to suspicion by my imaginings, I remembered Mrs. Malloy’s throwing in my face our previous forays into sleuthing. I couldn’t recall if she had closed the door after bringing in the tray. But if she had left it ajar, might not Mrs. Foot-having followed her up for the express purpose of having a listen to our conversation-be probing the reasons why Suzanne’s death might be murder most foul?

“I do hope you’re not ever so cross with me, dearie.” Vast shake of the hoary locks. “Oh, Mrs. Foot,” said both Mr. Plunket and Boris. “What if the lady he thinks ofas a rare rose goes telling his lordship about her bad night and he gets his dear self in a state worrying about her catching pneumonia? We can’t have him upset-not anytime, but specially now when he needs to be thinking clear to make his choice of a bride.”

So much for my silly ideas. Why doubt this explanation for her coming clean? “Of course I won’t say anything,” I reassured her.

“That’s a weight off my mind. I’ll go tell Mr. Plunket and Boris. I should have thought about them along with his lordship when pulling my stunt.” Giant sigh. No further mention of my feelings. “And now with all this drink your husband has brought into the house,” her voice became edged with the anger she had displayed that morning at the raising of a foreign flag over the kitchen, “I’m scared out of my wits Mr. Plunket will succumb to a glass of oh-be- joyful.”

“Ben acted upon Monsieur LeBois’s instructions and surely” (perhaps wishful thinking) “he wouldn’t have issued them without Lord Belfrey’s approval.”

“Pressured into it.” Mrs. Foot’s scowl deepened. “Not a drop of alcohol in the place from the day poor Mr. Plunket told his lordship about his battle fought and won with the bottle. An employer in a million, we’ve got. He’ll have insisted that what’s been brought into the house in the past twenty-four hours be kept under lock and key. But where there’s a will, there’s always a way to get to the booze. No stopping Mr. Plunket if the urge comes on too strong.”

“I can understand your worrying.”

Mrs. Foot knuckled a teary eye. “Just like there wasn’t any stopping Boris from letting that lion loose from his trailer in the middle of some high street after there was talk of him being sent to a zoo if he kept balking at jumping through the ring of fire, the poor old puss! Such a lot of running and screaming when all he wanted to do was play. But of course no one thought to toss him a toy mouse! And Boris given the boot after being with the same circus since he was a boy. Talk about feeling betrayed!”

“Yes,” I managed.

“What is this sad old world coming to?” Mrs. Foot wiped the other eye with her sleeve. “It’s a good thing those two men have me to mother them. Like Mr. Plunket said to Boris just this morning, their world would fall apart if I was took.” She appeared to size up my reaction. “I’m not as strong as I look-hacking coughs every winter and a nasty boil on my neck just a few months back.”

“Oh, dear!” I was really thinking of the time. If I rushed, I’d be five minutes late for afternoon tea. I explained the situation, to which she responded by picking up the tray with a wincing heave.

“Like I say to Mr. Plunket and Boris when they hover round, Ma-that’s what the dears call me in private-isn’t made of spun glass, but there’s never any getting them to see I’m not about to break like a precious ornament…”

“But lovely they feel that way about you.” I opened the door more fully. “Can I take the tray down for you? Going to the kitchen would give me the chance to remind Ben about the need to keep the alcohol under lock and key.”

“And make it look that I’ve been telling tales out of school about Mr. Plunket?” The eyes flashed green-yellow fire. If a woman of her looming presence could have been said to flounce, she did so out into the hallway. The thudding footsteps continued to echo like doom on the march as I raced along to the twilit bathroom, splashed water on my face, raked a comb through my hair, decided against lipstick, let alone a change of clothes, and sped down the main staircase into the hall without bothering to wonder if Georges had set up a trip wire in the guise of adding thrills and spills to Here Comes the Bride. Fortunately, this must not have occurred to him-yet. However, as I paused in my headlong rush to ponder the location of the library, a ghastly apparition emerged out of the crepuscular gloom.

A startled sidestep into the sharp edge of a piece of furniture, a suppressed scream, and I recognized the white face and lanky figure of Boris. My request for directions met with a hollow-eyed stare, as if I were a zombie or the ghost of Eleanor Belfrey. Luckily, before I was forced to go it alone-opening up door after door until hitting the jackpot-another shadow cast itself alongside him and Mr. Plunket’s voice asked if he could be of assistance. He sounded so much like a normal butler that I forgot my rush and took the opportunity to ask him if someone had been able to find a torch for Ben to use in trying to figure out what was wrong with the cooker.

Those blank looks of Boris had to be contagious because now Mr. Plunket had one.

“Monsieur LeBois said he’d seen one in his lordship’s desk. A red one,” the thickening silence had me babbling, “but there must be others, although in a house this size it must be hard to keep track of every little thing.”

“Green,” said Mr. Plunket.

“There’s one that’s-”

“Green the one in his nibs’s study.”

“Red, Mr. Plunket, dearie,” said the voice of Mrs. Foot. “That one is red. There was a yellow torch once in the pantry, but that got broke when Whitey knocked it off the shelf.”

“Color-blind,” gloomed Boris. “That’s what Mr. Plunket is, Mrs. Foot. Isn’t that right, Mr. Plunket? Remember,” his vocal cords sounded rasped to the limit, “you told us it came on you sudden, late in life, so it’s not surprising you forget sometimes.”

“That’s right.” Mr. Plunket nodded with such vigor I was afraid his head would fly off. “The result of the drink, that would be it, wouldn’t it, Mrs. Foot?”

“Now don’t you go blaming yourself, Mr. Plunket,” came the tender response; “we’ve all had our vices.”

“Not you, Mrs. Foot!” Staunch conviction.

“Not you, Mrs. Foot!” Sepulcher echo from Boris.

This was pointless. By now Ben had probably sent out for a torch or gone to purchase one himself. Mumbling something to this effect, I skirted the obstacle course of furniture and entered Mucklesfeld’s library.

As in the drawing room, the lackluster lighting made it impossible to immediately grasp the size of the space other than that it wasn’t poky. Bookcases lined with leather volumes that appeared to have been purchased in matching height and width rose on all sides to a railed portrait gallery beneath the vaulted ceiling that had the drift of an overcast sky. I was able to make out a short stairway immediately across from the doorway, providing access to closer perusal of presumably dead (and hopefully gone) Belfreys.

The living were scattered into two groups. Georges LeBois in his wheelchair watched with pouting lips as his crew carted tripods, telescopic-looking cameras, and goodness knows what other necessary equipment first one way, then another, as if searching for the perfect campsite on which to pitch a tent. All six of the contestants were assembled on sofas and chairs arranged roughly in a circle beneath an unlighted chandelier that would have flattened an entire city if it fell. Here there was not the excess of furniture that encumbered the hall and drawing