At five o’clock Emily was back and in Veronica’s room, laying out clean linen, when Veronica came in. “I’m so sorry about your sister, Amelia,” she said immediately. “You’re very welcome to take Saturday afternoon off to go and visit her; if she should get any worse, please tell me.”
“Yes ma’am,” Emily said solemnly. “Thank you very much. I’m hoping she’ll get better, and there are people with worse troubles. I just took your black boots to the cobbler’s and I heard them say down there that that policeman who came here about the stolen silver and things has been charged with murdering a woman in a magenta pink dress, to do with some investigation he was on-” She stopped, staring at Veronica’s face, which was suddenly bleached of every vestige of color. It was exactly what she had hoped for, and although she was perfectly capable of pity, it did not make the slightest difference to her continuing.
“That must be the same man that upset you so much, ma’am. No wonder! I suppose we should all be grateful he didn’t lose control of himself with you, or heaven knows, you might be like that poor woman. Except of course I can’t imagine you wearing such an unflattering color. From the description it was wicked.”
“Stop it!” Veronica’s voice rose close to a scream. “Stop it! What does it matter what color she wore?” Her face was white as a sheet, her eyes glittering. “You are talking about a human being who’s been murdered! Life just- snatched …”
Emily’s hands flew to her face. “Oh, ma’am! Oh, ma’am, I’m terribly sorry! I clean forgot about Mr. York! Oh, I am so terribly sorry-please forgive me. I’ll do anything …” She stopped, as though she were too upset to speak, and simply gazed at Veronica through her spread fingers. Did her dreadful pallor reflect the memory of Robert’s death, or was it a sign of guilt? Surely there was panic in her expression; had Veronica known Cerise, and did she know now who had killed her?
For several seconds they stood staring at each other, Veronica in shocked silence, Emily studying her through wide eyes, affecting abject contrition. At last it was Veronica who spoke. She sat down on the side of the bed and Emily automatically began to undo her boots for her.
“I–I didn’t know anything about it,” Veronica said very quietly. “I don’t see the newspapers, and Papa-in-law didn’t mention it. Did they describe her, this woman”-she swallowed-“in pink?”
“Oh yes, ma’am.” Emily recalled everything she could of the descriptions of Cerise. “She was tall, rather on the thin side, not at all full-figured, especially for a-a woman of pleasure, but she had a very beautiful face.” She looked up from the boots, buttonhook in hand, and saw Veronica’s horrified eyes. Her protruding leg was rigid, and her knuckles on the side of the bed were white.
“And of course she was wearing that peculiar color of very violent magenta pink,” Emily finished. “I think ‘cerise’ is the right name for it.”
Veronica made a little sound as if she were about to cry out, but tension strangled the word in her throat.
“You look terrible shocked, ma’am,” Emily said ruthlessly. “They say she was a woman of the streets, so perhaps she’s no worse off. Quicker than disease.”
“Amelia! You sound as if-”
“Oh no, ma’am!” Emily protested. “Nobody deserves to die like that. I only meant her life was pretty wretched anyway. I know girls who have lost their places, been dismissed without a character, and had to go on the streets like that. They usually die young, either of working twenty hours a day or the pox, or someone kills them.” She kept on watching Veronica’s face and knew she had touched a deep pain, a wound that was still bleeding. She turned the probe. “That policeman said he was questioning her about a crime he was investigating. Perhaps she knew who broke in here and killed poor Mr. York.”
“No.” It was a whisper, little more than a sigh of breath forced between the lips.
Emily waited.
“No.” Veronica seemed to collect her strength. “Policemen must have more than one case at a time. What on earth would a woman like that know of this-of this house?”
“Maybe she knew the thief, ma’am,” Emily suggested. “Perhaps he was her lover.”
For some unfathomable reason Veronica smiled. It was ghastly, like a rictus, but there was the shadow of bitter humor in her eyes. “Perhaps,” she said softly.
Emily knew by some change in the air, a difference in the tensions of the body, that the immediate weakness was past. She would get no more from Veronica now. She finished with the boots, took them off, and stood up.
“Would you like me to draw you a bath before dinner, ma’am, or would you prefer to lie down, perhaps with a hot tisane?”
“I don’t want a bath.” Veronica stood up and went to the window. She spoke with growing decision. “Go and make me a tisane, and fetch a slice of bread and butter from the kitchen. In fact, two slices.”
Emily had a strong idea it was not so much the bread Veronica wanted as an excuse to be rid of her, but she had no choice but to obey.
She fairly ran along the passage and down the stairs, earning a sharp word of reproof from the housekeeper for her unseemly behavior.
“Yes, Mrs. Crawford. Sorry, Mrs. Crawford.” She slowed down to a more dignified walk until she was out of sight through the green baize door, then quickened into a scamper again. She asked Cook’s permission as a matter of policy, then put on a kettle and sliced the bread and butter so rapidly she made a mess of the first piece; it was too thin and fell to bits.
“ ’Ere!” Mary said helpfully. “You got ’ands like a navvy today! Let me do it for yer!” And she cut two wafer- thin slices, buttering each on the loaf first, a trick which Emily had not learned.
“Thank you; bless you!” Emily said with real gratitude, then hopped from one foot to the other waiting for the kettle to boil. But she had learned her lesson and she did not spill it.
“S’right,” Mary said approvingly. “More ’aste, less speed.”
Emily flashed her a smile, picked up the tray, and went back upstairs with it as quickly as her long skirts would allow, unable as she was with her hands full to hold them up. She stopped outside the bedroom door, hearing a murmur of voices, but even standing motionless, her cheek to the panel, she could hear no distinct words. To disturb whoever was within might cut short the very conversation she must overhear!
The dressing room!
She put the tray down and very softly tried the handle of the dressing room door, making sure the latch did not click. She swung it open, picked up the tray, and put it inside on the chest of drawers, closing the door soundlessly. The door to the bedroom was closed, she had done it herself out of habit. Now she needed to open it so fractionally the movement would not catch the eye of anyone in the bedroom, even if they were facing it. Of course, if they saw the handle move it would all be over: she would be caught eavesdropping without a shadow of an excuse.
She bent to the keyhole and put her eye to it, but she could see only the comer of the bed and a small edge of blue skirt over the chair. It was only the dress laid out for the evening. But she could hear the voices much more clearly. The answer was obvious: she must kneel with her ear to the keyhole. Carefully she took a pin out of her hair and put it on the floor as an excuse if she were caught; then she knelt to listen.
“But who was it?” Veronica’s voice was desperate, thick with something very close to panic.
Loretta’s answer came back, reassuringly gentle. “My dear, I cannot even guess! But it has nothing whatever to do with us. How could it?”
“But the dress!” Veronica cried. “That color!” The words seemed to cause her physical pain. “The dress was magenta! “
“Pull yourself together!” Loretta snarled. “You are behaving like a fool!”
For a moment there was silence and Emily wondered if Loretta had slapped her, as one does with hysterics; but there was no gasp, no indrawn breath, no sharp sound of flesh on flesh.
Veronica’s voice shuddered and the next words were forced through sobs. “Who. . was. . she?”
“A harlot,” Loretta replied with ice-cold contempt. “Exactly what she seemed to be, I should imagine. Although God knows why that idiot policeman should have broken her neck!”
Veronica’s question was so soft Emily strained to hear it, her shoulders hunched to keep her ear to the lock.
“Did he, Mother-in-law? Was it he?”
Emily did not even notice the cramp in her knees or the aching muscles in her neck. Nothing was further from
