Dorothy Cannell - She Shoots to Conquer

“When did you learn you supposedly had taken the family jewels with you?”

“Within a few days of my escape. My friends had chosen to break with the circle in which they and I moved, but they still had sufficient access to the latest scuttlebutt. When they told me what was being said, I knew that Celia had taken the only revenge left to her. She would know that Giles would not go after the insurance money and thereby set up a criminal investigation. In his own way, I believe he did love me.”

I didn’t offer my view on this. There were some things I did recognize were none of my business. “What finally brought you back?”

“Two things coincided. One of those friends who had helped me start over told me about seeing Celia’s advert in The Times for a companion cum secretary, and that same week I read an article in another newspaper about Aubrey’s reality show and the practical reasons for it. It came to me that if Celia had held on to the jewels, which according to the grapevine had never come on the market, then perhaps she had hidden them either at Mucklesfeld or more likely here at Witch Haven. In the article about Aubrey, it said he’d been married and divorced twice, and now he was being forced into what seemed likely to be a third mistake. And I, who have come to think of myself as the least romantic of people, found myself wondering if he wasn’t in need of someone galloping to his rescue at the twelfth hour. Recovering those jewels should enable him to raise enough to get going on repairs and otherwise putting Mucklesfeld back together.”

I liked the sound of that. “No luck so far? Not so much as the shimmer of a diamond or the glow of a ruby through a crack in the floorboards?”

She shook her head. “This house has its share of secret spaces behind the paneling and beneath hidden trap doors; not as many as Mucklesfeld, but enough to have kept me searching at night and every other spare minute I have. I’m beginning to think wherever the jewels are, it’s not here. Or at Mucklesfeld. I’ve made a few predawn flits over there…”

“That explains Lord Belfrey’s household staff claiming to have seen Eleanor Belfrey’s ghost leaving the premises by way of an exterior door. Were you minus the disguising glasses on those occasions?”

“I believe so.”

“With your hair down and a dark cloak flowing from your shoulders.”

She actually laughed. “Yes, to the first, and wearing my old nurse’s cape.”

“They were all familiar with your portrait.”

“Celia needed to be able look at it day in and day out and gloat. I was sure it would be the same with the jewels-that they had to be where she could feast her eyes and her malice upon them whenever the urge seized her. But I’m beginning to think she may have been afraid to risk their discovery, however cunning the hiding place.”

“Whether they’re here or not,” I leaned urgently forward, “you’re taking a terrible risk. If she is as crazed as she sounds and she figures out that Nora Burton is Eleanor Belfrey, she may make sure you don’t escape her a second time.”

“I have to keep looking… at least a little while longer.”

“In the hope of saving Lord Belfrey from a potentially disastrous marriage? Eleanor, he would be appalled if he got wind of the risk you’re taking.”

“You won’t tell him?”

I hesitated. “If you were doing this to reestablish your reputation and reclaim your old life, that would be one thing, but to walk into the lion’s den out of a quixotic notion of female gallantry is an unnecessary sacrifice.”

“What difference does my motive make?”

Unanswerable. Especially as I was pretty certain that in her situation I might well have felt compelled to pursue the same course of action. “No, I won’t tell him. But forget the jewels and leave here now.”

“Soon.”

“Promise you’ll be careful!”

Ten minutes later, walking back to Mucklesfeld, I mulled over Eleanor’s assessment that Celia Belfrey’s venom was so focused on the portrait that she couldn’t see that the living woman was often in the same room where it was displayed. That might be so; hatred can shift and shape to its own design, blocking out what might otherwise be apparent. Celia might never guess that her enemy was looking at her with living eyes. Then again, something might at any moment bring the truth home to her. And then what? Eleanor might have exaggerated the threat the other woman had posed years ago. Most people, however nasty, will shrink from committing murder. But Celia? I remembered her cruel face and cringed. If only I had not made that promise not to tell Lord Belfrey that Eleanor had come back.

The ideal person with whom to discuss this predicament would of course have been Mrs. Malloy. An impossibility. The reason I had not wanted her to come to Witch Haven with me-knowing I was going to confront Nora Burton-was that as a contestant she could not be party to information that could well and truly disrupt the production of Here Comes the Bride . I would not only be dropping a turnip in her applecart but also putting her in the position of knowing something her fellow hopefuls didn’t. The same would be true for Ben, who might feel under sufficient obligation to Georges LeBois to lay the facts before him. When it came down to it, I thought sadly, the only one I could have confided in with complete ease of mind was Thumper. He would have listened, assured me with his adoring gaze that he fully sympathized with my conflict, and felt no obligation to bark out the story to anyone.

In the hall at Mucklesfeld I met Lucy, the dingy blond female member of the crew with the dragon tatoos on her arms. She wasn’t carrying any equipment, and said she had grabbed at a free moment to go to the loo, from which she was now returning.

“How’s it going?” I asked.

She leaned against one of the larger pieces of furniture. “Hell if I know! We got the contestants’ organizational meeting without too many retakes, which is something, I suppose. No idea if Georges was happy or not, he’s just as snarly if he’s satisfied or isn’t.”

“I’m not clear about the structure.”

“As in?” Sticking a hand into her ragged jeans pocket, Lucy drew out a silver-wrapped stick of gum.

“The competition. I mean… what’s the game plan?”

“Sure. I get you. As you’ll know, Lord Belfrey had a formal meeting with each of the contestants yesterday-not much editing of those. Georges wanted all the throat-clearing and twitchy stares kept in. Today and for the duration the women will be assigned individual fifteen-minute interviews. Those will be well weeded, to bring each personality into the sharpest possible focus. I,” she tucked the gum in her mouth and tossed away the wrapper, “will be doing the questioning off camera. Georges decided a female voice would be more effective in getting them to reveal more than intended. Keeping the viewers coming back for more means playing into the mentality of the kinds of people who used to pack up a picnic and look for a nice grassy spot to watch the beheading. The more blood and tears the merrier, then and now.” Lucy stood chewing her gum. “More often than not, the most revealing stuff comes from trailing around after a subject when they think they’re not doing anything worth recording-and most of the time they’re right. Eventually, they stop noticing the camera and even the person holding it becomes invisible. At least that’s the hope. We also aim for those candid moments between his lordship and one or other of the contestants-walking in the garden, taking a look at one of the rooms, conversing over a cup of tea.”

“And he will come to his decision how?”

Lucy shrugged. “From watching the interviews and other film. That’s the system as explained at the start of the first episode, but in reality,” curling her tongue around the word, “it’s bound to come down to the one he can best see himself stuck with for life… or at least as long as it takes to get a divorce.”