Adelia was tired of Lady Agnes’s high-handed manner and sudden mood changes. “I am accusing you of harbouring secrets. The content of those secrets might be entirely harmless. The act of concealment itself, however, leads to suspicions and rumours and it is those which are causing harm.”
“There is absolutely nothing–” Lady Agnes began to spit out, but The Countess put her withered hand on her daughter’s arm.
“Enough. Hush.”
Adelia waited as calmly as she could while The Countess appeared to order her thoughts. Eventually the older lady said, “Your husband has been in the ice house many times, has he not? He is a clever man, with his books and his scientific instruments. Has he seen that it’s all fake yet?”
Adelia nodded carefully. She hadn’t expected this particular revelation but she tried not to look surprised. “Yes, he has. There is not a scrap of real lapis lazuli in there. But what we can’t work out is why it’s still there, and why it’s a secret, and what’s the significance of it all? Surely there is something else in the ice house, or there has been, even if it’s gone now. Knight might have been hiding something illicit there which led to his death.”
The Countess said, “I can tell you the truth. There has not been anything else in that ice house. No secret stores, no hidden hoard of something precious. Only fake rocks, fake pigments, fake gems.”
“I don’t understand. Did Hartley Knight know that?”
“Know that it was all fake? Yes, he did. He knew some things, at least. He knew that.”
Adelia felt now as if she were trapped in a game. The Countess was unlikely to give her any information – Adelia would have to ask the right questions. Two people were dead, and this ancient matriarch was enjoying the show. Adelia realised that she did not like The Countess very much at all, and she felt bad about that, as one was supposed to honour one’s elders. No wonder Lady Agnes had flashes of bad temper, and some unpleasant traits – it was a wonder she had turned out as well as she had done. Adelia said, “Did anyone else know it was all fake? Did – does – Percy know?”
The Countess puffed out her cheeks slightly. “I doubt it.” She looked at Lady Agnes. “What do you think?”
“I don’t think that anyone else knew, no. Knight and you. It was always your secret.”
“Our secret.”
“Mostly yours,” Lady Agnes said, and a note of bitterness in her voice made Adelia feel yet another flash of sympathy for the woman. She was glad she was arranging a match for her. Lady Agnes needed to escape this place and this influence. Adelia hoped that it was not too late for her to find happiness in her life – and she hoped that there was nothing more to these secrets than what she was hearing. If, after all this, Lady Agnes was somehow involved in the murder or murders, it would be impossible to bear.
Adelia would willingly drive The Countess to the gallows herself, however.
“I don’t see why this secret was so important,” Adelia said.
The Countess smiled very thinly. She was definitely enjoying having the power in the conversation. It was probably the only power she really got to wield. “The market collapsed, back in the thirties. We lost all our money. We lost everything. The Seeley-Wood family, the Earls of Buckshaw, were ruined.”
“But it’s not lost – you’re not ruined,” Adelia said. Her confusion was mounting. What on earth was she missing?
“Oh, we worked very hard and made some clever marriages,” The Countess said. She sighed and looked away, her shoulders beginning to sag. She was tired, and trying to hide it. “In spite of the curse, we regained what we had lost.”
“In the space of three generations?”
“Yes. Agnes, my chest is tight...”
“Mother...” Lady Agnes sprang up and shot a look towards Adelia, warning her to stop her line of questioning.
It was a highly convenient attack, if it were true, Adelia thought. “I still don’t see why it all had to be a secret. Is that the curse? The curse is that you lost all the money? I don’t understand.”
“The world is full of things we don’t see.” Her breath really was coming in rasps. She began to cough. Adelia watched but she was ignored now, a mere piece of furniture, useless as the daughter fussed around her elderly mother in long-practised movements. Adelia eventually slipped out of the room, leaving unseen and unacknowledged.
She was burning with questions.
What was the point of keeping a secret that no one cared about?
Eighteen
The police spoke to each of them in turn and Theodore could see their annoyance grow. Every time he encountered Inspector Wilbred, the man looked angrier and angrier. At least he was no longer smug. Clearly, they were getting nowhere with their investigation. Whatever Wilbred had thought he could do, or what he thought he knew, he was being thwarted in the execution of it. Theodore waited, expecting them at any moment to ask him to assist them.
To his own irritation, they did not. They made copious notes, the body was carried off in a closed carriage, and the servants were allowed into the room to clean the blood up. No one wanted to do it, until Percy lost his temper completely and roared at them in a way that made even Theodore’s heart quicken. It was a thoroughly unpleasant task. As Percy stormed away in a fury, Theodore sidled up to the tearful maids with their mops and buckets.
“I shall personally see you all recompensed for this task,” he said. “Here is a coin for each of you now – and you
