“I hadn’t noticed the sound.”
“It drove Miss Vera crazy. Earlier in the year, she asked for it to be turned off but Mr. Nightingale said no. He wanted it on all the time.”
“It’s never been turned off?”
“Never. For as long as I’ve been here, Alfred feeds the boiler with coal.” She was dreamy for a moment. “A real shame,” she added. “Nobody else gets to visit Alexandra Hall to admire it. There’s really no point to it at all.”
“Perhaps Mr. Nightingale ordered this fountain as a gift to his wife,” dismissed Maurice.
“Not that I remember. It was Mr. Nightingale who was awfully pleased with it. Like I said, he wanted it on at all times.”
Maurice reflected on those words, then shifted the conversation back to his case. “Is there anything else you think I should know, Miss O’Sullivan? About the murders in this house.”
Shannon glanced back nervously at the study door. “I’m not sure I should tell you this… I wouldn’t want, you know, Mrs. Cleary to hear,” she whispered.
“I’m certain that no one will hear. The door is shut. Please go on.”
“Well to be perfectly frank, Mr. Leroux, I’ve had a bad feeling in this house long before anything happened to Sophie Murphy or Miss Vera Nightingale. Take Mrs. Nightingale for instance…” She lowered her voice. “She was mostly quietly spoken and a demure sort of lady. But around two years before she passed away, she changed an awful lot. I’d never seen her like that.”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, mostly temper. Like I couldn’t do nothing right. She never complained about me to Mrs. Cleary, thank goodness, but she was bitter and unhappy with everything.”
“What exactly did she die of?” asked Maurice, wanting to hear it from Shannon’s lips.
“Didn’t they tell you? She had a fever. And…” she bit her lip. “Months before, I’d seen her brooding at Mr. Nightingale at dinner and I’m not deaf, I knew there was something off between them. She used to smile a lot when they first got married. She gave us kindly encouragements and often we’d hop on the carriage with her and she’d buy us ribbons and girlie things in Reading Town. But in the last year or so, I noticed that she’d become cold with everyone.”
“How would you know this?”
“Well… She no longer went out to the boutiques in town. She’d lock herself up in her room and see no one for days. And I caught her many times at dinner avoiding Mr. Nightingale’s eyes, like…I don’t know… I suppose, almost like she was afraid of him, or something.”
“Married couples argue and fall at odds with each other at times. Perhaps the Nightingales had a disagreement.”
“Well yes, and no,” cut in Shannon, raising her voice. “If they had a disagreement, it would have ended. But no, it’s not quite the same. She was, I’m quite sure, afraid of him. I don’t see why. He was so nice.”
A long shadow passed underneath the study door. Maurice paused. Was Mrs. Cleary listening in? He waited until the shadow faded away.
Maurice cleared his throat. “Afraid of her husband? Well, that’s a hasty judgment, mademoiselle. Perhaps she was upset at him. It happens.”
Miss O’Sullivan scowled and shook her head.
“But they worked together, didn’t they?” insisted Maurice, conscious of the impatience on Shannon’s face. For an instant, he wondered if the maid’s temper could have led her to commit murder. “Husband and wife,” he continued. “Quite an unusual pairing. They were working on some project. So surely they must have remained on cordial terms. That’s what Mrs. Cleary told me. An important project of some kind…”
“Oh, yes. That they did. Disappear into the cellar almost every day… Such a long day. When she’d come out she was always tired. I don’t think she fancied working very much. Come to think of it, maybe that’s what did it.” Her voice had trailed off and she fell silent.
Maurice caught her distant gaze.
“What’s that you were saying, Miss O’Sullivan?”
“Well I can’t be sure,” she shrugged. “But my honest feeling is she dreaded going down there…you know, into the cellar.”
Maurice leaned forward in his chair. He tried to suppress the excitement in his voice. “What’s in the cellar?”
Shannon’s eyes widened in alarm. “I’ve never been there myself. Mr. Nightingale was very strict that none of us should go down there.”
Maurice nodded. “Then I shall ask Mrs. Cleary to take me there,” he said. He jotted down a few notes. He had to ascertain the nature of Aaron Nightingale’s work. “Was there anything else you wanted to share, Miss O’Sullivan? Something you think will add to my investigation.” He had just noted a jagged scar on her right hand. It was recent, perhaps only a few years old.
She looked suddenly uncomfortable and concealed her hands. She stared at him. “I’m surprised you’ve not noticed the haunting in Alexandra Hall,” she confided. Her voice was thick with warning.
Maurice suspected that Miss O’Sullivan belonged to that class of impressionable unmarried women who derived a certain mystical pride from her intimacy with supernatural happenings.
“No, nothing of the kind. The idea that in some shape or form, Calista Nightingale haunts this house, is to me highly implausible.”
Shannon had grown quite pale. She shook her head violently. “I’ve seen it, Mr. Leroux. You should ask Ellen. Like me, she will not forget what she saw.”
“Thank you, Miss O’Sullivan. I will call on you if I need anything else. You may go, now. Please call in Ellen.”
Ellen
ELLEN was a short brunette with equally brown eyes and a quiet manner. Hanging round her neck was a tiny Christian cross which she often clutched nervously.
