Sara Craven - Devil At Archangel

‘No—someone phoned me, but they won’t answer.’ Christina felt foolish.

‘May I?’ Eulalie held out her hand and Christina with a feeling of faint helplessness handed her the receiver.

Eulalie listened for a moment, then turned to Christina. ‘There is no one there now, mademoiselle. This is the house telephone. It is easy if one hurries to dial a wrong number.’

‘But why didn’t they say so?’ Christina felt that she had been put subtly in the wrong. ‘They just wouldn’t speak at all. It was horrid.’

‘Mademoiselle must have imagined it,’ Eulalie said coolly. ‘There is no one in the house who would do such a thing.’

She turned and walked to the door, obviously expecting that Christina would follow her. Christina snatched up a pair of low-heeled sandals in natural leather and thrust them awkwardly on to her feet. She felt gauche and confused. She knew she had not imagined the malice she had sensed at the other end of the phone, but she was at a loss to know what could possibly have inspired it.

As she followed Eulalie’s studiedly graceful figure along the corridor towards the main staircase, she searched in vain for some topic of conversation. Her position in the household was ambiguous. At the moment, she supposed she was a guest, but no doubt the staff were perfectly aware that she had come here ultimately to work. Perhaps someone had recognised the difference in the way she was being received, compared with the rest of the staff, and resented it. But who? So far, she had only met Louis and Madame Christophe—and now Eulalie. She could not imagine either of the first two indulging in spiteful tricks, while it was physically impossible for Eulalie to have telephoned her. It was disturbing to realise that she had recognised almost at once that the other girl would be quite capable of the action. And yet Christina could think of no possible motive—for her or for anyone else.

As they descended the stairs, the tall figure of St Michael, the gilded wings gleaming in the sunlight, loomed up in front of them. Christina paused for a closer look at the statue. Somewhat to her surprise, she saw that the winged creature at the angel’s feet was not a dragon as she had supposed at first glance, but seemed to have some human characteristics. It was quite repulsively ugly, she decided, wrinkling her nose.

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