The Silver Ghost (9 page)

“She’s Lionel’s aunt, too, and he doesn’t have a baby at home. For God’s sake, Sarah! Maybe she got a headache and left quietly so as not to break up the party.”

“Lionel’s already gone to take his mother home. And Davy’s as much your child as mine, if you’re thinking what I know you’re thinking. Darling, I truly am concerned about Aunt Bodie. She’s much too healthy to get headaches, and she’s the last person on earth to sneak away without taking proper leave of her hostess, even if Abigail weren’t a particular friend. Besides, her car’s still in the parking lot.”

“Are you sure that’s her car?”

“Max, come on! How many beige and gray 1946 Daimlers are you likely to find on the road these days?”

“In this crowd, I wouldn’t dare guess.”

Melisande wasn’t one to stand by in silence. “You needn’t get uptight about who’s going to ride in the helicopter, Max, it’ll be Tick and the pilot. Tick wouldn’t give up his seat to anyone on earth. He absolutely adores getting up high and looking down. I can’t bear to, myself. And Sarah’s quite right about Bodie Kelling. This isn’t like her at all. We’ve asked all her friends, and nobody’s caught so much as a glimpse of her since about halfway through the banquet. We’ve searched the house and the gardens. We’ve just taken a quick scoot around the bee fields in the honeybug to see if she might have gone for a long walk and sprained her ankle or something. If Tick doesn’t spot her,” Melisande shrugged her impressive scarlet-clad shoulders, “I don’t know what to think.”

“No chance she drove herself off in the Silver Ghost?” Reggie Myre ventured.

“Aunt Bodie wouldn’t do that, not without getting permission from some member of the family,” Sarah protested. “Besides, how could she have got into the car shed? Unless—”

She caught her breath. “Aunt Bodie did want to see the Rollses, she said so during the morris dancing. She was coaxing Mrs. Gaheris to come with her when the heralds came out to announce the banquet, so they went into the pavilion instead.”

“But she wouldn’t get up and walk out in the middle of a meal,” Myre protested. He himself certainly wouldn’t, from the look of his beltline.

“Actually, that’s something Aunt Bodie would do,” Sarah replied. “She’s rather a health nut, and hates the idea of people gorging themselves. She herself didn’t intend to eat much, she said so, and she’d find it a bore to sit there watching a roomful of moving jaws. It would have been quite like her to get up and go for a walk, if only to set a good example to the rest of us. Don’t you think, Melly?”

“Oh yes, Bodie’s like that.”

“And she evidently didn’t know Bill wasn’t letting anyone into the car shed this year or she wouldn’t have suggested to Mrs. Gaheris that they go. Or else she’d have thought the rule didn’t apply to her, which would also be like Aunt Bodie. So if she happened to arrive here at just the wrong moment—”

Max put his arms around Sarah to stop the shivering. “Okay, kid, take it easy. We’d better search the remaining cars, don’t you think? There’s always the chance she might be tied up in one of them.” There were other chances, but Max didn’t go into those. “Are the trunks all unlocked, Melisande?”

“I’ll get the keys. Come on, Reggie.”

“Sure, Mel.”

Sarah took no part in the search. She’d never been particularly devoted to Boadicea Kelling, but an aunt was an aunt. If there was anything to be found here, she did not want to be the one who found it.

S
ARAH NEEDN’T HAVE HUNG
back, there was nothing to find. The cars were all empty. The shrubberies yielded no gruesome bundle. Tick Purbody and the helicopter pilot flew as low as they could, shining their searchlight on every inch of the bee fields, but drew a total blank. A telephone call to Boadicea’s house only served to throw her housekeeper into a tizzy.

It was long after dark by now. The frazzled remnant of the Renaissance Revel were gathered around the fire in what Abigail called the castle keep, drinking hot coffee and trying to bolster each other’s spirits.

“There’s only one logical explanation,” Bill was insisting. “Bodie must have got into the car shed somehow, discovered the secret exit, and driven away in the Silver Ghost. Chasing Rufe’s murderer, I suppose.”

“Never.” Abigail was holding up somewhat better than her husband. “Why should Bodie rush right over and discover that crazy trick of Wouter’s when the rest of us have been overlooking it for the past five years? Why would she waste time trying to start the Silver Ghost, which isn’t the easiest thing in the world, as you very well know, when she could have run down the hill and got her own car in half the time?”

She spread honey on a crumpet and handed it to Bill. “Here, for goodness’ sake eat something before you drop. But why should a middle-aged woman as commonsensical as Bodie go chasing a murderer in the first place? Bodie’s never taken a reckless chance in her life. She wouldn’t even join in the pillow fights at school. Would she, Drusilla? I’m not saying she didn’t leave the car shed in the Silver Ghost, dear. I’m only saying that if she did, it wasn’t of her own free will and we might as well face it. Max, what are we going to do?”

“I’ve phoned a description of Mrs. Kelling to the state police,” he reassured her. “They already had a bulletin out on the Silver Ghost. If she’s in it, they’ll find her.”

“But what if she’s been kidnapped by somebody else?”

“That’s hardly likely. In any case, we’d just have to wait until the kidnappers get in touch.”

“With whom?” Abigail fretted. “Bodie’s a widow and her only son lives in Hong Kong. They’d hardly call here, I shouldn’t think.”

“I should think they’d call some of the Kellings,” said Tick Purbody.

“Who in turn would call Max.” Sarah was inclined to be waspish in more ways then one about the way her family kept dumping their problems into her husband’s lap. “We’d get the word fast enough.”

“But what if she’s being held hostage?” Melisande suggested.

Max shook his head. “Why should she be? Look, let’s quit pussyfooting around the issue. It must have occurred to everybody here by now that Rufus’s murder and the theft of those two cars were almost certainly engineered by an employee, a close friend, or a member of the family.”

Drusilla Gaheris was first to break the thunderous silence that followed. “I’ve been wondering whether anybody would get up nerve enough to say that. It does look dreadfully obvious, one has to admit. I expect what Mr. Bittersohn’s getting at is that a person in any of those categories wouldn’t have to take a hostage. If he, or I suppose I have to say she, should have happened to bump into Bodie at an awkward moment, he simply could have pretended he was there on some innocent errand like herself, and postpone stealing the Silver Ghost until some more opportune time.”

“But suppose Bodie came along just as this person was in the act of killing Rufe?” Tick Purbody insisted.

“Then there’d have been two bodies in that tree instead of one, don’t you think? You know, everywhere we went in Europe, people were aghast at what a violent lot we Americans are. I’ve spent years trying to convince them we’re not all muggers and gunslingers, but—”

Mrs. Gaheris shrugged and set down her coffee cup. “No thanks, Abigail. I mustn’t have any more or I shan’t sleep a wink. Now that the conversation’s getting down to the touchy part, I believe the tactful thing for me to do is say good night and slide along to bed. I am rather exhausted, as a matter of fact.”

“By all means do what feels most comfortable to you, Drusilla.” Abigail Billingsgate sounded as if she’d have been glad to go, too. “I’m so terribly sorry your first visit to our house has to be marred by this dreadful business.”

“Please don’t feel that way, Abigail. I’m just thankful I’m here to lend a bit of moral support, if I can’t do anything else.”

“Maybe you can,” said Max. “Before you go up, Mrs. Gaheris, is there anything at all you can say that might be useful? My wife tells me you may have been among the last to talk with her aunt at the banquet.”

“Perhaps I was, though I honestly don’t know. Ironically enough, Bodie and I were all set to stroll off and look at the Rollses, or thought we were. I hadn’t understood the car shed was to be put off limits, which was pretty stupid of me considering that I’ve been right here in the house all this week.”

“It was a last-minute decision,” Bill told her.

“I’m sure it wasn’t, but thanks for helping me save face, Bill dear. Anyway, just as we were about to start, the heralds came out blowing their trumpets—that was a marvelous touch, Abigail—so naturally we went into the pavilion instead.”

Mrs. Gaheris smoothed down the heavy brown skirt she was still wearing. “I’d rather taken it for granted Bodie and I would sit together, but somehow that didn’t happen. My fault, I expect. I kept running into people I hadn’t seen for ages and stopping to chat a bit. You know how one does. By the time I was ready to sit down, Bodie was off somewhere and Dorothy Dork was asking me to sit with them. Dot’s my cousin, actually, though her children call me aunt. I think she’s just a wee bit miffed because I chose to stay with Appie and Bill instead of with her and Dork; so needless to say I wasn’t going to tread on her toes again. All of which is rather boring and totally unhelpful for you, Mr. Bittersohn.”

Max thought so, too. He got back to business. “How did Boadicea seem when you were with her? Not preoccupied or anything?”

“Bearing in mind that this was the first time we’d been together in many years, I’d say she acted perfectly normal. Bodie was always Bodie, and she hadn’t really changed a bit. I was disappointed not to have more time with her. I did look for her again, as soon as I decently could.”

“Where did you go?”

“Oh, just around the terrace and the pavilion. I wasn’t exactly searching, you know, merely keeping an eye out in hopes.”

“Did you leave the pavilion at any time during the banquet?” Max persisted.

“Yes, I did. I have some pills I’m supposed to take at mealtimes and I’d forgotten to bring them downstairs with me. Nothing serious, Abigail, just too much foreign cooking for too many years.”

Mrs. Gaheris’s digestive problems also failed to capture Max Bittersohn’s interest. “Were these pills in your bedroom? How long did it take you to get them?”

She seemed faintly amused at his persistence. “Yes, they were in my room. On the dressing table, to be precise, where I’d left them after breakfast when I went up to get into my costume. As to the time, it’s rather hard to say. I dawdled at the dressing table a minute or so, fussing with my wimple and dabbing on a little powder for whatever good that might do. I visited the usual offices while opportunity presented itself; one learns that in the diplomatic corps. And I stood at the window a little while, admiring the front terrace and the fields out back. Oh.”

“Oh what?”

“Oh nothing, I don’t suppose. I just happened to recall a tiny thing that can’t possibly matter a bit.”

“Why don’t you tell us anyway?” said Sarah.

“It’s just that one of the morris dancers came along.”

“Along where?” Max wanted to know. “Out of the copse?”

“No, into it. I thought he might be heading for the car shed, probably because Bodie and I had thought of going that way ourselves. There’s a pretty footpath and a wooden bridge. I’ve strolled that way a couple of times already.”

“Could you see who the dancer was?”

“No, he had his back to me and his hood up. All those red and yellow flutters did look picturesque against the masses of greenery. I was sorry to lose sight of him.”

“How long would you say you stood watching him?”

“Perhaps a minute or two. Not longer. He was walking fast, almost running.”

“Did you happen to notice the time?”

“No, I didn’t. I do have a traveling clock on the night-stand, but I didn’t bother to look at it. I was deliberately not noticing, if you want the truth, trying to imagine myself in an age where clocks didn’t much matter. When one’s been under a good deal of pressure for a long time and then has an opportunity to let go and drift, that’s all one wants to do, I find. I’m sorry if you think it matters, but it did seem so trivial at the time. Whenever that was.”

“Did you see whether the man turned toward the car shed?”

“No. There’s no way I could possibly have seen that far. My view is completely blocked by some big trees. I believe you said, Bill, that the landscaping had been planned with that factor in mind.”

“That’s right,” Billingsgate confirmed. “Security was much less an issue than privacy in my great-grandfather’s day. By now, some of the trees he planted are so big that they do pose certain problems for us, but they’re such magnificent specimens we can’t bear to have them taken down. Sorry, Max, I didn’t mean to maunder. Could you give us any inkling of who the morris dancer may have been, Drusilla? Was he tall or short, heavy or lean?”

“He was nimble on his feet, but then they all are. As to his build, that’s less easy than you might think. I was looking down on him from a fair height, you know, and one gets a sort of telescope effect. He definitely wasn’t fat or conspicuously broad in the shoulders, but neither was he skinny. ‘Well-muscled’ would be my best description.”

And would fit any one of them, Sarah thought, though she refrained from saying so. The same thing must have occurred to Mrs. Gaheris, however, because she added a couple of qualifications.

“It wasn’t Young Dork, I’m sure. He’s too short and burly. And I think we can eliminate you, Tick, because you’re so much taller than the rest.”

Sarah caught her breath but again she didn’t speak. Mrs. Gaheris still had the floor.

“Telling people from the back when they’re all dressed alike would be a tricky business even if I knew them well, which, needless to say, I don’t.”

“How about you, Tick?” asked Bill. “Can you cast any light on who it might have been?”

“Short of agreeing with Drusilla that it wasn’t myself, I’m afraid I can’t. After we stopped dancing, I made a beeline for the bathroom, if you want to know. Then I went straight to the pavilion.”

“How long were you in the bathroom, just for the record?” Max asked him.