Chapter 7 #2
Isabel tried to turn her key again. It would not, and the door remained locked.
What could be wrong with her key? She grabbed the knob and tried again.
The knob was smooth. Isabel bent to inspect it.
The little dent on the left side wasn’t there.
This knob was new or switched with another from the house.
Susanna. Who else would lock her out of her painting room?
When had she had the lock changed? Isabel had been up here only yesterday morning working on the oil painting of Leadon Hill for Mamma’s birthday.
Perhaps the housekeeper would have the key among all the others she was in charge of.
Isabel found Mrs. Murry in the still room supervising the preparations for a batch of raspberry preserves. “Good morning.”
Mrs. Murray paled. “I am sorry, Miss, I can’t give you the key.”
“I had not even asked, yet.”
“I assume the key is why you searched me out? And not your fondness for preserves.” Mrs. Murry knew as well as anyone that Isabel preferred currant jelly and marmalade to raspberry.
“Yes. I am locked out of my painting room. I assume Susanna gave you that order.”
“It was Lady Godderidge who ordered the lock changed.” Mrs. Murry reminded Isabel of her sister-in-law’s title. The housekeeper’s pained expression gave Isabel hope that Mrs. Murry was as perplexed as Isabel was by the order.
“Thank you, Mrs. Murry, I will not bother you more on the matter.” Isabel held back her sigh.
It would not do for the staff to know her frustrations with her sister-in-law, especially after Monday’s argument.
Though she had not attempted to pick a lock in years, Isabel determined she would if she could not get into her painting room by other means.
Isabel left the kitchen and headed for her brother’s study.
Confronting Susanna would not go well, and she needed David on her side.
His study door stood open, and the room was vacant.
Odd. A footman directed her to the nursery where she found David talking with the nurse, who was wringing her hands.
“Is something wrong?” asked Isabel.
David turned. “Susanna took Oliver this morning, and I can’t find her. It is past Oliver’s feeding time.”
Isabel struggled to process the words. Susanna always visited the nursery several times a day.
Sometimes had him brought down to show callers, but Isabel could not remember Susanna taking her son out of his domain previously.
The windows beyond David gave a view of heavy dark clouds.
If she had taken the baby… Her nephew was much more important to her than her painting room.
“Where have you looked? Are the servants helping?”
“I have only just learned of what happened. The nurse said two of the maids have been searching the adjoining rooms.”
“Susanna installed a new lock on my painting room. Are there other rooms with new locks?” It stood to reason—or actually to not reason—that Susanna must be hiding if she was not easily found. But to what end?
“She changed the locks?” David shook his head. “I am sure the maids could not have looked in locked rooms.”
Isabel addressed the nurse. “Go fetch Mrs. Murry, she was in the stillroom a few minutes ago. David, you stay here, and I will get Mamma.”
Mamma would know what to do. She always knew what to do.
The Blue Parlor was locked. Perhaps Susanna meant to keep both Mamma and Isabel from their favorite spots.
A tap on the door proved the room to be empty.
She found Mamma in her bedroom by the window.
Questions floated through Isabel’s mind.
However, only Oliver and Susanna mattered.
“Have you seen Oliver or Susanna this morning?”
“Susanna left the breakfast room as I came in, but I have not seen her since then.”
“David can’t find either of them. The nurse is beside herself as it is Oliver’s feeding time.”
Mamma stood, her brow furrowed. “They could be in the Blue Parlor, it is locked.”
“No one answered when I knocked and I did not hear a thing.” If the baby was hungry, he should have been crying, right? Isabel knew he cried often enough. “I have sent for Mrs. Murry and the keys. She should be with David in the nursery.”
Mrs. Murry arrived at the nursery at the same time as Isabel and Mamma. The housekeeper unhooked her keyring from her chatelaine. “The keys, my lord. Nurse explained all as we came up the stairs. I set the maids and footmen we passed to looking. No one has seen my lady since breakfast.”
David held up a hand. “Keep the keys. Izz go with Mrs. Murry. Check all locked rooms. Including in the attic.”
Isabel turned to leave. David called her back. “Do you have your pins? You have my permission to use your skills on any door you wish.”
Surprised that her brother remembered that she was successful in picking locks, Isabel nodded. “I have not used them for years. They are in my painting room.”
“Get them.”
“Your attic room first, miss?” Mrs. Murry held up a shiny new key.
Her painting room was the least likely place to take a baby.
But since they could not hear crying, the furthest corner of the house made sense.
They rushed up the servant stairs to the attic.
Mrs. Murry stopped at a storage room on their way, it was void of people so she locked it back up.
The newest key on Mrs. Murry’s chatelaine turned in the lock with a click.
Nothing had been disturbed in the room, which was a relief, as Isabel had suppressed visions of paints and canvases strewn across the room.
Isabel retrieved the hairpins she had spent hours straightening and bending just so as a ten-year-old, keen to learn how to open locked doors like a character in one of Edward’s adventure books.
Mrs. Murry relocked the room with an apologetic smile. They looked in cupboards and corners as they continued throughout the attic, leaving the unlocked servants’ quarters for others to search.
To Isabel’s surprise, the large bedrooms in the west wing, reserved for visitors, were locked.
She could not recall them being locked before, other than when she and her brothers used the rooms to test their lock picking skills.
Mamma claimed that shuttered rooms invited mice.
A fact that proved to be true in the second room where squeaks of baby mice called from a well-chewed pillow.
When had Susanna locked away so many rooms?
And why? There had never been many rooms or cupboards locked at Leadon Hill.
Mrs. Murry muttered something about warning her ladyship and calling a footman to take care of the rodents.
The keyhole on the Blue Parlor door caused Mrs. Murry’s key some difficulty. None of the keys fit properly.
Isabel pounded on the door. “Susanna!”
A muffled cry answered. Oliver?
Isabel stuck her pins in the lock only to have them meet an obstruction, likely the key to the room.
Though the hero of the book from long ago could move a key out of the way, Isabel had never mastered that skill.
All her attempts resulted in bent and twisted pins.
“It is locked from the other side. I cannot pick it.”
Mrs. Murry turned to leave.
Isabel laid a hand on her arm. “I can run faster.”
She found David in the corridor near the ballroom searching with a footman. They rushed with her to the Blue Parlor. Oliver’s muffled cries grew in intensity. Each cry tore at Isabel’s heart.
David called through the door.
When no answer came, he turned to the footman. “Break it down.”
The second ram with a shoulder popped the door open. David rushed in with Isabel on his heels.
Susanna huddled on the settee, shaking violently, tears running down her face. Oliver lay on the floor wrapped in a blanket, as if he were a bundle of laundry, not a precious child.
“Izz—” David pointed at his son as he rushed to his wife.
Isabel scooped up her nephew, momentarily stopping his cries. “I’ll take him to the nursery.”
“No! She cannot have my boy.” Susanna lunged off the settee.
David held her back. “Go Izz! And call for the doctor.”
Isabel fled, clutching Oliver to her chest, his small body warm against hers.
She couldn’t look back at Susanna’s wild eyes or David’s stricken face.
She had to get Oliver to safety. Halfway down the corridor, Isabel met the nurse, followed by Mamma.
Isabel handed Oliver over to those who could better care for him.
She found the butler and passed on the instructions for the doctor to be called.
The butler, in turn, gave her a note that had just arrived.
She opened it immediately.
Isabel—
Grandfather is sending for us Monday morning next for the remainder of August, and into September.
I cannot host our planning session. I will do all I can to help when I return no later than September 7.
Rose will be back at school, and Alex has promised to visit for at least a fortnight, staying for the fair.
Do come visit before we leave.
Jane
The fair? Without a chaperone, she could not meet with Mr. Dalrymple.
Between Mamma’s state of mourning and Susanna’s bout of lunacy, all possibility of Leadon Hill hosting was gone.
Kellmore hadn’t been a viable host since the death of Lady Lightwood six years ago.
Though it should not matter with all that was happening, and the news that Jane was leaving, it broke something in Isabel.
She stumbled into the Rose parlor to sit.
The stupid new curtains reminded her of the situation above stairs. Susanna mad? Impossible.
The fair would have to be canceled unless she could convince Mr. Dalrymple to take on the whole of it. The thought had crossed her mind more than once that the fair may need to be moved to Pittsfield. Mr. Dalrymple likely would not offer easily. How could she convince him?
She couldn’t even think straight, not with Oliver’s cries still echoing in her ears and the image of Susanna’s wild eyes burned into her mind. Why worry about the fair? Susanna must be helped first.
The letter crumpled in her fist—the fair. The workers looked forward to it, the tradition that meant everything to the Godderidge name. Her father’s name.
What was she to do? She couldn’t abandon Susanna, Oliver, and David. But she couldn’t abandon the fair either. Jane was leaving. She would be alone with all of it. Completely, utterly alone.