“And that is?”
He gave a little cough to cover a smile. “A favor. We know the police have asked you to prepare an inventory of the Villiers Collection. Their interest is naturally related to any potential criminal activity. We have a different interest in the collection. The art and antiques form a not-insignificant portion of the Villiers’s estate. Unfortunately, we were never provided an evaluation—or indeed even a listing. Mr. Villiers did not expect to die—nor did Mrs. Villiers, I’m sure. We’d be obliged if you would provide that inventory to us—in our format, of course. There would be a small stipend.”
Another stipend? This was getting ridiculous. “What information do you need?”
“A listing. Descriptions, date of purchase, purchase price, current valuation.”
“Providing valuations will take time and research. In some cases, I’d have to consult with others.”
“Understood. Whatever you need.” He opened his briefcase and removed a packet of papers. “I’ll leave these with you, Mrs. Hamilton. Please contact us at your earliest convenience. I’ll … erm … see what I can do about Mr. Tweedy.” He clicked his briefcase shut. “Any further questions?”
“Just one. Mrs. Villiers hired a housekeeper and a gardener. Were you aware of other employees?”
“We were not.” He gave an embarrassed little cough. “It was her habit to pay her employees in cash, which, as you might imagine, created a certain, ah, tax problem.” His eyes flicked to PC Weldon. “Since she kept no records, we were obliged to … erm … recreate them.” His pale cheeks had colored slightly.
Another dead end. If Evelyn Villiers had been paying the man in the dark van, her solicitors hadn’t known about it.
By the time Simon Crewe left, it was nearly ten thirty. I packed up everything, and Anne and I headed back to Long Barston.
Later, after sharing a quick lunch with Vivian, I walked over to The Cabinet of Curiosities. As I was entering the security code, my cell phone rang.
It was Ivor.
“The Little Domesday translation will be delivered to the shop by courier between two and four this afternoon.” he said. “Can you be there?”
“I’m in the shop now.”
“The buyer, Professor Markham, is writing a scholarly volume on the history of East Anglia before the Norman Invasion. He’s very eager. Could you possibly deliver the package to him tomorrow? His village isn’t far over the Essex border. Forty-minute drive, tops.”
“Yes, of course. Is he retired?”
“In a manner of speaking. He taught for years at the University of Essex. Forced out during his course on the Boer War when his lecture on the relief of Mafeking turned into a polemic on the King Arthur deniers.”
“Can’t wait to meet him.”
“Yes, hmm. It’s a shame we can’t hold onto the translation for a few days. I’d quite like to see it.”
Precisely my own thought.
That night, back in my room at Rose Cottage, I forced myself not to tear open the brown-paper-wrapped Domesday translation at once. Instead, I texted my mother, attaching the grainy magazine photograph of Wallace Villiers with the missing Mockery of Age Meissen figural group.
Was this sold somewhere recently? If you don’t have time to check, no problem.
Then I opened the package delivered late that afternoon by the courier. The bound document had been preserved in an archival bag and nested in an acid-free, drop-side box. I pulled on a pair of white cotton gloves I’d brought home from the shop.
Since 1977, the original Domesday books have been kept in The National Archives at Kew. This English translation of the Little Domesday book by an anonymous scholar in the late eighteenth century was unknown until it turned up in the archives of a Norfolk country house whose original interior paneling and library shelves were being sold to an architectural salvage dealer.
I lifted the book out of its protective box and peeled back the archival bag with care. My affliction kicked in, of course, but this time the effect was pleasurable rather than alarming.
The book was a quarto, approximately eight inches by ten, meaning each page was one fourth of a standard printer’s sheet. The linen-laid paper had been bound with faded blue cloth-backed boards. For a book more than two centuries old, the condition was surprisingly good.
I opened to the index, which was arranged according to county—Essex, Norfolk, Suffolk—then (unhelpfully) by the “Holders of Lands,” beginning with King William himself. I remembered from my graduate school days that the landholders recorded in the Great Domesday Book were almost exclusively Norman. Few Anglo-Saxons who owned land at the time of the Norman Invasion were allowed to keep it.
The Little Domesday Book was a different story—perhaps because Essex, Norfolk, and Suffolk were the heart of Anglo-Saxon culture. Thumbing through, I noticed that landholders in Essex included both Norman names—Hugh de Monfort, Geofrey de Mandeville, Roger d’Auberville—and Anglo-Saxon names—Ranulf, Wulfgifu, Thorkil, and someone delightfully named Roger God-save-the-ladies, who owned property in Witham and Hinckford, with a manor house, twenty pigs, ten acres of meadows, and two ploughs. Both towns still existed.
Only in England.
At the end of the Little Domesday Book, I found an index of place names.
Long Barston hadn’t existed in 1086, but there had been a Little Gosling in Suffolk and a Dunmow Parva in Essex. Yes! My primary interest was in surnames, Grenfel in particular. The closest I found was Grenewic, a lost village in Suffolk with twelve households and no mention of green people.
I closed the book, rewrapped it in the archival bag, and placed it carefully in the box. I’d been wasting my time. All this was ancient history—literally. Fascinating, but having no relevance to my current problem, the murder of Evelyn Villiers.
Unless … I almost heard an audible click as two pieces of the puzzle locked together.
Ivor had said the professor in Essex was writing a book about Suffolk before the Norman Invasion—the exact time frame when the old yeoman farmer was said to have discovered the girl from another world.
The green maiden had
