Chapter Seven #2
“Well, he was always very sure of himself. It must have been such a surprise to him when he died,” Lady Susan mused. “It was to me. I had been at the theatre all evening, you see. At any rate, I believe in life after death – what a life I have had since his death!”
“You have had several husbands,” Mr. Tilney said pointedly.
Miss Denham regarded her with fascination. “How many?”
“Three of my own, and a few belonging to other ladies,” Lady Susan said with a wink. “That merely proves me exceedingly unfortunate.”
“Nothing but riddles from her, as usual,” Sir Walter huffed.
“You need not announce that you have no understanding of women,” Lady Susan said with an evil smile.
“As entertaining as your theatrics are, madam,” Mr. Darcy interrupted, “Tilney had the right idea in gathering us all together to make a plan. There may be a killer amongst us, but they are surely outnumbered by those who can agree to work together. We are trapped in here, and we ought to do something about it.”
“I quite agree,” Mr. Bertram said. “I have something to report on that score. Rushworth and I took it upon ourselves this morning to have a look around. The captain had to have hidden the key somewhere in this old place, and to quote some old poet, there is nothing lost that cannot be found, if sought.”
“Mr. Crawford and I went exploring today, too,” Mrs. Rushworth said. “We found that room of newspapers and rubbish, and we returned to the library to look for the secret passage Lady Susan claims she discovered.”
Elizabeth attempted to conceal her panic; the other end of the library passage was the shared parlor where they had compiled their evidence.
Could the secret lovers have wandered in while she was being shown about the castle?
She glanced quizzically at the red-faced Sir Edward and Lady Allen. “Did you find the passage?”
“It was quite a discovery indeed,” Mrs. Rushworth said to Elizabeth, her lips curling into a slow smile as the two women locked eyes. The sky flashed white, the windowpanes rattled with ensuing thunder, and then came the sound of hail pelting the castle.
“I fear the royals will be delayed,” Elizabeth said, turning the subject and breaking her gaze with Mrs. Rushworth.
She glanced again at her uncle and his lost love.
They must have left the parlor at some point during the others’ absence, adjourned to the bedroom…
. Elizabeth wrinkled her nose at what that must portend.
Cathy leaned in to whisper, as if she had read Elizabeth’s mind. “It is fortunate they must have come in when we were taking our tour. We had not brought the dossiers yet, so we will not be caught in that lie!”
“But they will have seen the papers pinned to the wall!”
Cathy considered this. “The bookshelf where the passage opens is all the way across the parlor! Would they have snuck so fully into the room and snooped about, without fear of being caught?”
“They might be so bold if one of them is the killer,” Elizabeth whispered. “We must be on our guard.”
“Perhaps it is a blessing the royals will be delayed,” Mr. Tilney suggested.
“It will give us time to discover where Fred hid the key. He must have thought that it might have been enough to save him from meeting the same fate as Father, and it ought to have been. We should have the key when the royals arrive, if we are to be able to receive them.”
“And if we have not found it, and they actually do turn up?” Lady Susan crossed her arms in front of herself with a look of challenge.
“We shall have our servants keep watch of the road by which they will approach, just as we did for my father,” Mr. Tilney said.
“When they are waiting at the kemp for the drawbridge to be lowered, I will swim across, and ask them to summon a blacksmith to break the lock, and a rowboat to bear him across the moat. I shall require a hot bath that lasts the rest of my life afterward, but I fear the distance is too great to merely shout for help.”
“Until then, I believe that searching for the key must be our chief occupation. Let it be for the magistrate to solve the murder, and not us,” Mrs. Rushworth said.
“And what of the other keys in this castle?” Elizabeth looked questioningly at Mr. Tilney. “Usually a home has a housekeeper with a key ring; all the rooms I have seen have locks in the doors.”
Miss Denham looked askance at her. “You are clever, Miss… Bennet? Gardiner? I hardly know what to call you. But Mr. Tilney, are we quite safe here? I should like to know who has the key to my room.”
“I have the one that ought to be the housekeeper’s and Mrs. Younge has the one that ought to belong to the butler,” Mrs. Clay said.
“Well, that is just perfect,” Lady Susan hissed.
“What have we got to do to prove our innocence? Take it yourself,” Mrs. Clay hissed, tossing her the key ring. It smacked Lady Susan in the chest as she put her hands out to catch it, and she drew the keyring into her lap, grinning.
“Yes, let us all have a turn welcoming the Merry Widow to our bedchambers,” Sir Walter drawled. He extended a hand to Mrs. Younge, his fingers curling in a gesture meant to receive her own keys, but she did not oblige him. Instead, she gave them over to Mr. Tilney.
Mr. Crawford scoffed. “I see, and I suppose when one of us is murdered in our beds, you shall again say that you have been framed.”
“Then who shall have them?” Mr. Tilney gestured around the room.. “Let us all decide democratically!”
“Perhaps according to rank; this is England, after all,” Sir Walter huffed.
“I know,” Cathy cried, springing up from her chair.
“Mr. Tilney, I presume there is paper in the escritoire in the parlor? Excellent!” She dashed from the room, and returned with a clean sheet of paper and a pencil.
“Now, listen. We all know and trust at least one other person here, yes? We will vote, each giving up two names for key holders.”
Mrs. Rushworth sniffed haughtily. “What if we do not wish the others to know whom we have nominated? We will vote privately.”
Cathy thought for a moment, then wrote something down on the piece of paper, before holding it up for all to see.
She had written Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy side by side.
Then she creased the top of the page where she had written their names, folding the paper down just enough to conceal her writing. “There. We will pass it around.”
“And I should think it bad form to vote for oneself,” Mr. Tilney said with an approving nod.
“That is very well done, my dear,” Sir Edward said as Cathy passed the paper and pencil around the table.
Lady Allen nodded her agreement and whispered, “I am voting for you, my dear.”
When everybody had taken a turn marking their choices down and folding the page over, Mr. Tilney unfurled the paper and began to count the votes. Elizabeth, who had been last to vote, bit back a smile as she looked up at him; she had broken his rule, for she only fully trusted herself and Cathy.
He winked at her, and then said, “I strongly suspect several of you have nominated yourselves, but no matter. Most have one or two votes, some none at all; Miss Bennet has the most, with seven, and Miss Morland has five.”
“Well, how convenient that both sets of keys shall be kept by this little set, when it is obvious they are all in cahoots,” Mrs. Rushworth huffed.
A few of the others murmured their agreement, and Elizabeth strode across the room and thrust her set of keys at Mrs. Rushworth.
She did not entirely trust the woman, but since Mrs. Rushworth must already have seen their wall of evidence in the parlor, better for her to have the keys than anybody who had yet to make that discovery.
“Better that you should face the consequences of having these, and spare me the headache,” Elizabeth said with a smirk, then she stalked back to her seat.
The next matter settled was the division of their party into pairs or threes, so that they could commence their search for the one key that would secure their salvation.
With more accomplished than Elizabeth had expected of so many unreasonable people, they set about their business directly after their meal.
Elizabeth was to search with Mr. Darcy and Sir Edward.
Cathy would go with Mr. Tilney and Lady Allen, and Emma would be accompanied by Lady Susan and Harriet; the others were less decisive.
Mr. Tilney listed off the parts of the castle to be searched, assigned each group a designated area, and they set out as the storm raged on outside the walls.
But Elizabeth did not get far with her companions, who were to search the north and east wings of the fourth floor.
Before they had even made it to the stairs in the turret, Elizabeth was walking too close to a narrow passageway when an arm reached out and grabbed her, and a hand was placed over her mouth as her body was pressed against the cool stone wall.