Sonnet of the Sphinx Read online

  “Maybe there was no exhibit,” Cordelia said. “It was pretty racy stuff. Maybe it was all simply packed away. Kept under lock and key.” She wriggled her dark brows suggestively.

  “I would know if such articles existed.”

  “Perhaps the donation was made before you took charge,” Grace offered, remembering Miss Webb had told her that she was relatively new to Innisdale. “I think this was back in the sixties.”

  “The sixties.” Miss Webb frowned—possibly at the memory of frost white lipstick and go-go boots. “Well, I suppose it’s possible.” She brightened. “Attic is bung full of boxes and trunks. Suppose it could be up there. Haven’t had a chance to sort through everything.”

  “Would it be possible for us to have a look?” Grace asked eagerly.

  “Er…” Miss Webb looked uneasy again. “Not really practical. Place is a hazard zone. Spiders, mice, dust layers thick. Not in good repair. Not at all.”

  “That’s all right,” Cordelia said buoyantly. “We don’t mind a bit of dust.”

  “But it’s not all right. Not really. Not safe, you see.”

  “We’ll be very careful,” Grace said in her most responsible manner. “I realize there must be many items of historical and cultural value up there.”

  “Well, there are, you know, and I can’t really risk—” Miss Webb seemed to rethink that, saying more diplomatically, “You’re not authorized, my dear. If something were to happen, it could mean my position.”

  Grace sighed. “Whom do I need to talk to?”

  Miss Webb looked taken aback. “Don’t really know. Village Council, I suppose.”

  “All right. Thank you.” Grace glanced at Cordelia, who looked ready to argue. “Come on.”

  Reluctantly, Cordelia followed her out. “You gave up easily.”

  “I haven’t given up.” She was momentarily distracted as a bright blue sports car zipped past, winding through the narrow village streets with ruthless disregard for the tourists dawdling across the road.

  “What’s wrong?” Cordelia inquired

  “I thought I recognized the driver.”

  Cordelia did not seem to find anything amazing in this, and perhaps there wasn’t, but Grace was still surprised to see Professor Fenwick Archibald speeding through the village.

  “Perhaps he had a hot date.” Like Cordelia, Peter did not seem to see anything puzzling in her Archibald sighting.

  Grace made a face at this unlikelihood—the un-English phrase sounding more unlikely in Peter’s public school accent. “He doesn’t live locally, that’s all. There are bigger villages closer to Amberent Hall, and we’re not really on the way to anywhere.”

  “Perhaps he was visiting Matsukado-san.”

  That made sense, although she didn’t much like the idea. She was confident that she was miles ahead of Mr. Matsukado in the quest for the lost Shelley, but if Professor Archibald revealed the substance of their conversation, her rival could come up to speed in short order.

  “Or perhaps he was visiting Lady Vee,” Peter offered.

  “Perhaps Lady Vee was his hot date,” Grace retorted.

  “It’s possible. The Cumbrian Circle did seem to emulate the spicier elements in the lives of their Romantic idols.”

  Grace was back to considering the potential threat of Mr. Matsukado. “How do I get in contact with the Village Council?”

  “Tell them you’re building a monster in the laboratory, and they’ll be here shortly, torches in hand.”

  “Seriously.”

  Peter told her whom to contact without much interest. He had spent the last hour trying to evaluate a painting of Mount Scafell recently discovered in a local woman’s attic. The sooty clouds and jagged black peaks seemed to form one glum blob to Grace’s untrained eye.

  “The frame is nice,” she offered.

  Peter grunted acknowledgment.

  For a moment Grace watched him, chin propped on elbow. “One thing I want to do before I leave here is hike up one of the mountains.”

  “That sounds rather final.” He didn’t glance her way, continuing to thumb through a dog-eared copy of the currentHislop’s Art Sales Index.

  “You’re not getting rid of me that easily. I simply mean since I’ve booked my flight home, there are a few things I want to do, and I’ve been meaning to climb at least one mountain since I arrived here. You can’t really have a Lake District vacation and not climb a mountain.”

  “What does the local constabulary think about that? Your trip to the States, I mean.” Peter glanced her way, but there was nothing to read in his voice or expression. Was he so sure she was coming back? Would he miss her at all if she didn’t? “When’s your flight?”

  “Not till the nineteenth. Hopefully they’ll have—well, I mean, they can’t keep me prisoner here.”

  “Not yet.”

  She gave a weak laugh.

  In the end, it turned out that Grace did not need permission from the Village Council to investigate the attic at Landon House. That same evening Miss Webb called, sounding much more like her normal hearty self, and told Grace that after a jolly visit with Jack Monkton, she had decided to allow Grace access.

  No sooner had Grace got off the phone with Miss Webb than the phone rang again. It was Professor Archibald.

  “My dear,how is the adventure progressing? Have you discovered anything?”

  “I’ve got permission to view Eden Monkton’s private papers, which were donated to Landon House back in the sixties. I’m hoping to turn up a clue.” It sounded lame; she hoped the professor would not be disappointed with her lack of initiative.

  “But that’s why I’ve phoned, my dear.I have a clue. I don’t know what use it may be, if any, but last night I suddenly remembered when it was that Johnny Mallow retrieved the sonnet.”

  “Oh? When was it?”

  “The evening of the thirteenth. The night before the buzz bomb hit us.”

  Grace absorbed this slowly. “Do you know if he returned immediately to Innisdale or did he stay in Plymouth?”

  “I suppose he must have spent the night in Plymouth. I can’t recall now what his plans were. He was on leave, I do recall that. Looked very well in his uniform, I remember, but he always cut rather a dashing figure. Always popular with the ladies, eh?” He laughed heartily.

  27

  Rusted hinges shrieked as Grace raised the lid on the brass-bound trunk. The smell of mothballs and mildewed clothes walloped her.

  “Pew. Smells like old ladies,” Cordelia remarked from behind her.

  “Or maybe a mummy.”

  “Or maybe an old lady’s mummy.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised. There seems to be everything else in here.”

  Grace went to the attic window of Landon House and tried to push it open. The window was stiff with years of grime and disuse. With Cordelia’s help, and using all her strength, she at last managed to shove it open.

  As the window scraped open the last foot, hot air gusted in. The rotten clothes on the dressmaker’s dummy next to the wall moved with a semblance of life. Empty picture frames knocked back and forth.

  Grace stared out of the window. A black Audi was parked in the weed-choked drive below. Miss Web appeared to be entertaining.

  She returned to the trunk, found a relatively clean patch of floor, and began to sift cautiously through the contents. Linens edged with lace, now brown and stained, embroidered pillowcases, crocheted doilies and antimacassars. Miss Haversham’s hope chest, she thought.

  For some time they searched in companionable silence.

  Cordelia, going through a box marked “personal papers,” sneezed.

  “Bless you. It’s a shame these things have been left to rot,” Grace muttered.

  “These are the wrong date.”

  “Are you sure other dates haven’t been mixed in?” She replaced the linens carefully. “This has all been left in a terrible state.”

  “Maybe that’s what Miss Webb didn’t want us to disc
over.”

  Grace smiled absently and closed the lid on the trunk. Stepping onto a rickety stool, she lifted down another box marked “letters,” which she handed to Cordelia.

  Cordelia promptly screamed and dropped the box. “Spider!”

  “Oh, for—!” Grace jumped down and squashed the, in all fairness, science-fiction-sized spider that appeared to be pursuing Cordelia around the crowded attic.

  “I think it went mad with the heat,” Cordelia panted.

  Grace grinned. “It’s not the only one.”

  They both jumped as the attic door banged shut behind them, the sound as loud as a shot in the silence and heat.

  “The wind,” Grace said quickly in answer to Cordelia’s horrified look. She went to open the door, but it didn’t budge.

  “Is it locked?”

  Grace shook her head, testing the knob. “Jammed, I think.” She wiggled it and shouted, “Miss Webb!”

  They listened. The old house creaked. From down below, they could hear a radio playing.

  “Miss Webb, can you hear me?”

  “Why do people always ask that?” Cordelia inquired. “If she could hear us, she’d answer. If she can’t—”

  “Not right now, please.” Grace banged on the door. “Miss Webb!”

  “Maybe she’s gone.”

  “Gone where?”

  Cordelia had wandered over to the window. “Her car is gone.”

  Grace joined her at the window. The driveway below was empty. “What makes you think that was her car?”

  “I don’t know. It’s her garden, isn’t it?”

  Duh, as the young ladies of St. Anne’s were wont to say.

  “I don’t understand. Why would she leave without telling us?”

  Cordelia did not seem particularly troubled. “Maybe she forgot we were up here. She’s pretty old. Or maybe she plans on coming right back.” She wandered back to the scattered letters that had fallen from the box she dropped.

  “Maybe.” It couldn’t hurt to wait a few minutes, and they still had stacks of boxes to sort. Reluctantly Grace joined Cordelia on the floor and began dividing up the letters. The job was not made more pleasant by the quantity of dust and mouse droppings.

  When they had gone through the spilled contents without result, Grace lifted down another large hat box tied shut with string. It was unexpectedly heavy.

  Setting it on the floor, Grace worked the strings loose. Inside were neat stacks of yellowed letters bound in blue ribbon. Grace picked up the stack and her heart leaped at the address.Eden Monkton.

  “I think I’ve found something,” she said, and Cordelia came over and joined her.

  For another hour or so, they were lost in the world of a young woman long dead.

  Cordelia grew restless and began to circle the room. “How long are we supposed to wait?”

  Grace resurfaced from the near dream state she had been in. Rising, she tried the door once more, knowing it was a waste of time.

  “This doesn’t make sense,” she muttered. “Miss Webb should have been back before now.”

  “Maybe the car wasn’t hers. Maybe someone knocked her over the head and robbed her.”

  “What does she have that anyone would want?”

  “Information?”

  “Well, then—never mind.” Grace thought it over, frowning.

  “Maybe she fell down the stairs or had a stroke or something.”

  “You’re just full of cheery thoughts.”

  “Don’t you have a mobile phone?”

  “It was ruined when my car went off the road. Let’s think about this for a moment.”

  “I don’t have time to think. I have to use the loo.”

  Swell.

  Grace tried banging on the door a couple of times. She looked around to try and find something to take the hinges off the door but could find nothing.

  “The situation is becoming desperate,” Cordelia said plaintively.

  “I’m working on it.”

  “Perhaps you could try and climb down the drainpipe. You’ve done stuff like that before, haven’t you?”

  “Me?”

  Cordelia shrugged. “That’s what Auntie says. You’ve written a book all about it, haven’t you? All about your adventures.”

  “It wasn’t like this. It was…” Whatever it had been, it wasn’t as though she had courted death and danger.

  Grace studied the drop from the window over the alley. They were about twenty feet above the ground, so it was doable, inasmuch as the fall probably wouldn’t kill her. The drainpipe, conveniently positioned near the window, looked reasonably sturdy, and what, after all, was a broken leg or two in the grand scheme of things?

  “Whatever you’re going to do, you’d better do it fast,” Cordelia said ominously.

  “I must be out of my mind,” Grace said under her breath, but she sat down on the window ledge and swung her legs out over the driveway. It was a good thing she wasn’t afraid of heights, because all at once the cracked pavement and weeds looked a very long way away.

  Don’t look down.Grace tore her gaze away from the dizzy drop, and reached out for the drainpipe. It was exactly like grabbing onto a fireman’s pole, she assured herself. A really old and battered fireman’s pole.

  There were rungs on the pipe on every foot or so. Grace stretched her sneakered foot till her toe rested on the nearest rung; she let go of the window frame and wrapped both arms around the pipe.

  With a terrible groaning sound, the pipe broke away from the side of the house, and swung brokenly out over the drive.

  Grace squealed, half-sliding, half-falling, her arms and legs wrapped monkey style around the pipe.

  Above her, she could hear Cordelia giggling maniacally.

  “Don’t look down!” she shouted.

  Grace cast a quick look down. She was about nine feet about the pavement.

  Cordelia, still in stitches, called, “One day they’ll make a movie about you. Grace Hollister, Attic Raider!”

  That brought a reluctant laugh from Grace, which immediately turned into a strangled gasp as the drainpipe did another bend.

  She landed safely, if not gracefully, brushed her hands, and tried the side door. It opened soundlessly on well-oiled hinges.

  Calling for Miss Webb, Grace stepped inside.

  Her footsteps sounded hollowly down the corridor. A cursory glance into the museum showed that it was open to the public but empty.

  Grace ran upstairs, pausing only to peek inside Miss Webb’s living quarters. She glimpsed the oversize black cat on the table drinking out of a teacup. An old-fashioned table fan with deadly metal blades rotated back and forth, a ribbon trailing in the breeze. One of the table chairs was overturned.

  “Miss Webb?” she called in a hushed voice.

  The cat looked up and meowed at her.

  Grace continued up to the attic. The door was closed, the old-fashioned key sticking out of the lock. Funny that the wind hadn’t knocked the key out when the door slammed shut.

  She turned the key and pulled open the door.

  Cordelia hurtled past, flew down the staircase, barged into Miss Webb’s flat, and vanished. Following more cautiously down the narrow staircase, Grace went into the flat and looked around.

  Other than the overturned chair, there was no sign of violence. Then again, perhaps the thug of a cat had knocked the chair over. Perhaps the cat had done away with Miss Webb. It was as disreputable-looking an animal as Grace had ever seen.

  She checked quickly through the rest of the rooms. All seemed tidy and in order.

  Cordelia exited the bathroom. “No sign of her?”

  Grace shook her head.

  Not speaking, they went downstairs and looked through the museum. There was no sign of foul play, but there was no sign of Miss Webb, either.

  “I think we should call the police,” Grace said slowly.

  Cordelia, examining her face in the oval mirror, said, “In that case, I think you should put what
ever you want of that rubbish upstairs in your car.”

  Grace met her eyes in the mirror.

  Guiltily—but speedily—Grace and Cordelia loaded Eden’s journals and letters into her car. Then, a little out of breath, Grace phoned the police.

  DI Drummond showed up a few minutes later. He listened to Grace’s story—punctuated at intervals by Cordelia’s opinions and stray thoughts—skeptically.

  “She’s a grown woman, Ms. Hollister. And it is broad daylight. You don’t feel you’re overreacting?” He poked his head into Miss Webb’s bedroom and withdrew it hastily, apparently put off by the sight of her voluminous flowered nightdress.

  “No. I don’t. There have been two murders already. Miss Webb was very uneasy about letting us go through the attic, yet she suddenly takes off without a word, leaving us loose upstairs? You don’t find that odd?”

  “I do findthat odd,” Drummond said sourly. “But I find it odd that she let you in at all.”

  “Ha-ha,” said Grace. “What about the chair? Doesn’t that look suspicious to you?”

  “Perhaps she was in a hurry. Perhaps she remembered she was late for an appointment She’s only been missing for a matter of hours.”

  “You’re making a terrible mistake,” Grace said. “If something has happened to Miss Webb, every moment could mean the difference to her survival. I’m absolutely positive her disappearance is linked with the Kayaci and Sartyn murders.”

  “Of course you are, Ms. Hollister. But as you know, I already have a suspect in those crimes.”

  “Do you believe that Sartyn and Kayaci were killed by the same person?”

  He said noncommittally, “They appear to have been killed by the same weapon.”

  Exasperatedly, she said, “Well, doesn’t that mean anything? Or are you suggesting that a second murderer stole the first murderer’s still-unidentified weapon?”

  He gave her a long, unfriendly look. “That doesn’t let Fox off the hook.”

  But it did, although Drummond did not know it yet. If Sartyn had been killed by the man who killed Kayaci, then Peter was in the clear. He had not killed Sartyn, she was sure of that. The person who had attacked her was shorter, broader, and had moved quite differently. Had smelled quite different.