Carrie Bebris: Suspense & Sensibility

"That is immaterial."

"Mr. Darcy, I must concur with your wife." the professor said. "If you reveal yourself now, our whole scheme falls to pieces. We cannot risk failure over a scullery maid spying a mouse."

Darcy released an exasperated breath and cast his gaze about the hall. It came to rest on the dining room door, which stood open. "We will wait for you in there," he said. "If someone is screaming, I do not want to be three stories away from you. Tell us what you learn, and we will proceed from there."

But how will I report back to you without the servants noticing?"

Her husband looked at her confidently "If I know you, Mrs. Darcy, you will find a way"

It was not difficult to determine how to reach the lower hall; she simply followed the noise. Nor was it hard to overhear the cause of the excitement and return to the dining room undetected by the preoccupied staff.

We no longer have a need for subterfuge," she announced to Darcy and the professor "Sir Francis is dead."

"I just knew those ices would be the end of him." The cook shook her head sadly. "Only, I thought he'd eat himself to the hereafter. I never expected this."

"I doubt anyone did" Elizabeth tried to sound sympathetic, but her mind was only half engaged in the conversation. The other half wondered what they were going to do about Harry, now that Sir Francis had died. A glance at Darcy and Professor Randolph revealed that they didn't know, either.

"The master was in that larder every night, don't you know, dipping into the ices. Usually after all of us had gone to bed. Lemon was his favorite. I think his lady fnend preferred strawberry. Liked to sneak down there himself, instead of waking the servant — made it seem like more of a guilty pleasure, I think. I'd get up in the morning and find the empty pans." She

dabbed her eyes with her apron. "This morning I found him."

The cook had discovered Sir Francis in the sub-cellar larder, his body as cold as the ices of which he was so fond. It was her scream that Elizabeth had heard and that had summoned the whole staff. The servants were in such a state of shock over their employer's demise that when Elizabeth had returned to the scene with Darcy and the professor in tow, no one had looked askance at their sudden appearance. In fact, many of them recognized Darcy from previous visits and gratefully looked to him as a gentleman, as some sort of authority figure who could provide direction.

"How did you come upon him?" Darcy asked.

"After I started breakfast, I went down there to get ice cream for the master's strawberries—"

"Ice cream at breakfast?" Elizabeth could not help but interrupt.

"He used to simply have ordinary cream, but since he built that larder, now he wants ice cream. So I give him ice cream." She shrugged. "That was nothing. Gentlemen have all sorts of peculiar tastes — if you'll pardon my saying so, sir — but the master had more than anyone else I've ever worked for."

"Continue," Darcy said, "You went down to the larder?"

"Yes. When I opened the door, there he was on the floor. All huddled up, like he'd been trying to keep warm."

"Was the door locked?"

"Bolted, sir.'

"And that is normal?"

"Well, of course, sir. The door must stay shut to keep the cold in."

"Would Mr Dashwood have closed the door behind him

when he entered?"

"Oh. I doubt it, sir. Though he was well into his cups last night, and you never know what a man what's been drinking will do."

Elizabeth recalled Sir Francis's state when she'd seen him the previous afternoon. He'd still seemed in possession of his faculties, but if he'd continued to consume brimstone at the rate she had observed, he would have been pickled by midnight.

"The bolt can be operated only from the outside?"

"Yes, sir."

"Might someone have seen the open door and closed it, not realizing Mr. Dashwood was inside?"

"No one else was about. I'm always the last of the kitchen staff to retire. Last night I left a fresh pan of lemon ice in the larder before I went to bed. This morning, I was the first person with cause to go down there. The lemon ice was still there — along with the master."

Darcy raised his gaze to Elizabeth's, and she saw that they had both reached the same conclusion. Someone had murdered Sir Francis.

Further conversations with the staff confirmed as highly unlikely the chances that their master's death was accidental, sometime between midnight and five o'clock, when the cook retired and risen, an intoxicated Sir Francis had descended to the larder to indulge his sweet tooth. Someone had either followed him or happened upon him, bolted the door, and left him to die of cold. His mind muddled by drink, he quite possibly had not even heard his captor or realized his peril until it was too late. The room was so well insulated and so deep in the house that with the door sealed, no one would have been wakened by a shout.

When Darcy dismissed the last servant, who joined her fellow domestics in hovenng outside the drawing room waiting for instruction, he shut the door. Elizabeth was glad to finally have a chance to discuss the situation privately.

"Have you learned enough to identify a suspect?" she asked.

"All London"

"Splendid. I was afraid we would be unable to narrow the field."

"Apparently, Sir Francis had instructed the staff to leave the back entrance unlocked at night so that his paramour might come and go as she pleased in anonymity. Though no one can say with certainty whether she visited the house last night, neither can anyone say she did not. That unlocked door, meanwhile, offers easy ingress to anyone who might harbor less than amiable feelings toward the house's owner. The way Sir Francis

had been conducting himself, that list includes everyone from jealous husbands to government officials."

"There is plenty of motive within the house, as well," Elizabeth said. "From what I was able to learn, it sounds as if he seduced half the female staff."

Professor Randolph entered. He had gone downstairs to have a look at the corpse.

"The body is as they describe." Randolph said. "Very cold, very stiff, and from the smell of liquor, very well preserved. His hands are quite bruised — I expect from beating against the door, trying to escape."

"We should summon the authorities," Darcy said.

"Not yet." countered Professor Randolph. "Once they arrive we'll lose all opportunity to help Mr. Dashwood."

"I think he is beyond help."

"Imeant the one in the mirror."

"So did I," Darcy said. "Assuming Harry's soul is indeed trapped in the glass — an assumption about which you know I harbor doubt — with Sir Francis dead, we have no spirit to exchange for Harry's. His has left this earth, we certainly are not going to offer one of ours, and allowing anyone else to fall victim to the mirror is unconscionable."

Darcy had voiced the conundrum that had weighed on Elizabeth's mind since the moment Mr. Dashwood's lifeless body had been discovered. Without Sir Francis, what were they to do?The murder had left them with a horrible dilemma: They could not sacrifice an innocent party to release Harry, but neither could they abandon him to an eternity of imprisonment

in the glass. The whole situation had her stomach in knots.

"Professor, is there not some way we can yet rescue Mr. Dashwood?" she asked.

"I have been pondering that question. Sir Francis's death profoundly complicates matters. I must say, his murder occurred most inconveniently."

"Murder usually does." Darcy said. "At least to its victims."

"We are fortunate, however, in the manner of Mr Dashwood's death, as I believe the circumstances have left his body still viable. Between the cold and the liquor, it has not yet started to deteriorate. If we can release Harry's essence very soon, his body might yet sustain life."