Page 22 of A Most Inconvenient Murder

The terrace, emptied of its principal, seemed instantly colder.

Mr. Darcy let out a slow breath, then turned to Elizabeth with a look of appraisal.

“Well?” he said.

“He is hiding something,” Elizabeth said, without hesitation.

Mr. Darcy allowed a small, approving smile. “I agree. The question is whether it is a secret worth killing for, or merely the ordinary sort of family embarrassment.”

“I do not think he is the type to kill for embarrassment,” Elizabeth said. “But he is certainly the type to conceal it to avoid a scandal.”

“Who among us would not?” Charlotte said. “It is my opinion that he is afraid for his sister. It was in every word he uttered. Whatever troubles them, it is not Mrs. Blackstone’s death, but what may come after.”

Elizabeth nodded, seeing it now as clearly as if it had been said aloud. “You believe he wishes to protect her and believes she is not strong enough to withstand a scandal. Or an inquest.” She looked again towards the door Mr. Haldridge passed through. “I am inclined to agree, but I am also not certain it was only that.”

Mr. Darcy looked at them both, then said, “I will inquire about this cousin. It may be nothing, but it is the only concrete lead.”

Elizabeth watched him and found herself struck anew by the way he deferred to the logic of the case. He was, in his own way, almost admirable.

Charlotte, as if reading the direction of Elizabeth’s thoughts, gave her a subtle nudge.

A moment later, a footman opened the door which Mr. Haldridge had just gone through. They followed him up a set of stairs at the rear of the house, then he left them at Mrs. Blackstone’s bedchamber door.

Pushing the door open, Elizabeth paused and looked in. There is always a particular sorrow that fills a room belonging to those who had abruptly expired. An item of clothing folded atop a sewing basket with the obvious assumption that the person would be available to mend it later. A letter half-written and carelessly covered with another sheet of paper. A bottleof powder crookedly corked. This is exactly how Elizabeth, Charlotte, and Mr. Darcy found Mrs. Blackstone’s chamber, a second-floor room at Willow Grange.

Upon entering, with the curtains drawn and the washstand untouched, one had the impression that, even in life, the room would reveal little of the woman who slept there.

Elizabeth paused at the threshold. Charlotte stood beside her, Mr. Darcy just behind, and for a moment none of them spoke. It somehow seemed wrong to enter a bed chamber whose occupant would never return. Yet there was no help for it.

She moved into the chamber, taking each step carefully. Charlotte and Mr. Darcy followed with equal care, as though all three felt the same unspoken obligation to disturb as little as possible.

Charlotte’s hesitation lasted only a moment. She glanced slowly about the room before making her way to the small writing desk. Resting her fingertips lightly on its edge, she frowned.

“It is exactly as he described it,” she said softly. “Nothing appears to have been touched.”

Mr. Darcy crossed to the window and drew back the curtain only an inch or two, then studied the prospect beyond. Elizabeth suspected he was considering not the view, but what Mrs. Blackstone might have seen, and what anyone approaching the house might have observed in return.

She left him to it and began a slow circuit of the chamber.

The bed had been neatly made, though the coverlet still bore the faint impression of someone having sat upon its edge. One wardrobe door stood partly open. Inside hung only two gowns, one gray and one blue, both plainly made and carefully brushed. A pair of walking shoes rested beneath them, placed so neatlytogether that Elizabeth wondered whether Mrs. Blackstone had always been so orderly, and on the upper shelf sat a spare bonnet with a ribbon worn thin at the ends.

Nothing seemed neglected. Nothing seemed hurried.

And yet its owner had left the room for what was meant to be an ordinary morning and had never returned.

The dressing table was more revealing of her habits. A regiment of small glass bottles and tins, their labels hand-lettered—a brush set with a few dark strands of hair between the bristles. A square of muslin stained faintly with rouge.

Elizabeth picked up one of the tins and removed the top. It contained an oily substance that was tinted pink. She gave it a sniff. “Almonds,” she said aloud.

“For the lips,” Charlotte pointed to the side of the tin. “The most common concoction is white wax mixed with almond oil and a bit of alkanet root to give it color.” She nodded. “I recall that Mrs. Blackstone was always precise about her appearance, though as a companion, she could not dress in the latest fashion. I had once heard it said that a woman’s only defense in a world determined to overlook her was to become incapable of being ignored. I was under the impression that Mrs. Blackstone would have abided by that slogan.”

Charlotte opened a drawer and extracted a sheaf of correspondence tied with a blue silk ribbon.

She was moving to replace it when Elizabeth set down the tin, fastened the top, then moved to her friend’s side. “May I?” Elizabeth asked, gesturing at the bundle.

“Of course,” said Charlotte, relinquishing it at once.

Elizabeth untied the ribbon and sifted through the pages. The letters were stacked with fanatical neatness. Most were fromMrs. Blackstone’s brother in Hampshire. Several were from a Mrs. Lingard of Bath.