Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 127368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 637(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 425(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 637(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 425(@300wpm)
“But how do you explain them knowing the code to the History Room and the combination to the safe?”
“All the safes have been checked. Nothing moved into them, nothing missing, except what you found in the Brandy Room. We’ve changed the code to the door to the History Room. There are several safes that have been switched to electric. Those codes have been changed too. The ones that require combinations will be more difficult. But to answer your question, I can only deduce that someone was around to watch someone else entering the codes or combination. That’s the only explanation because, in working with them to search the house, it’s apparent Dad, Daniel nor Stevenson are behind this.”
I asked the million-dollar question, even if I knew he had no answer.
“And why would someone be doing this?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” he told me what I already knew on a sigh, then pushed up slightly in the sofa. “It doesn’t add up. All of these areas are not used by family. Only staff would find these things. Also, why lay out the flute, then put it away? I discovered from Stevenson that those rooms aren’t cleaned except once every four months. No one has been in them for ages, except you.”
“I wandered the house on my own on the tour. And Brittany saw me up there, maybe she mentioned it to someone else. It would have been easy for someone to see me. Perhaps they knew I saw it, and then moved it, the better to freak us out that it was there, then gone.”
“Perhaps,” he allowed, then asked, “Did you see any of these other things?”
I shook my head. “I can’t say my perusal of those rooms was thorough, though. And I didn’t look into many rooms on the southeast wing. It was clear from seeing a few those were family quarters, and I didn’t know whose was whose. I didn’t want to pry.”
He nodded yet again, slumped back into the couch, rested his head on the back and did the pinching of the bridge of his nose thing.
Watching him—and being pissed on his behalf that this was happening in his home, a blatant mindfuck, a violation—it suddenly hit me.
“I saw a girl coming out of the Whisky Room. I haven’t seen her before or since.”
He turned his head to me. “A girl?”
“She was wearing what Jack and Sam wear during the day.”
“Ah,” he murmured. “One of the cleaning girls.”
“Cleaning girls? Don’t Harriet and Rebecca and Laura do the cleaning?”
“They do,” he affirmed. “It’s beside the point, but it’s my feeling we’re grossly overstaffed. I’ve often seen people idle. Something I’ve since discussed with Stevenson, and he agrees. Therefore, Brittany will not be replaced, and it’s likely, when one of the others leaves, they won’t either. A cost-cutting measure that won’t affect the running of the house but will allow me to increase Mum and Dad’s allowances, which might assist me in making them more amenable to the other changes I intend to make.”
I thought of Harriet hanging in the kitchen, eating toast, and nodded, but outside noting how very much Ian paid attention, and cared about his house and his parents, I said nothing.
Ian continued, “But those women’s responsibilities tend more toward the personal. Making beds. Tidying bathrooms. Doing laundry and otherwise seeing to our clothes. All in the spaces that we use. They clean other areas as well and serve. But this is a big house. We own a great many things. And it’s our responsibility to see that it’s all cared for and maintained. We don’t need a leak in the roof and water damage that we don’t know is happening. Wood will get dry and crack if it isn’t oiled. Chandeliers collect dust. There’s silver that needs polishing and china to be fetched, depending on which room it’s being called for.”
I cut in to have my suspicions confirmed. “So each room has its own set of china?”
“Not exactly, but some of them do. Pearl. Rose. Which makes sense, Rose being the room of the lady of the house, Pearl being the room where we most entertain outsiders. But for the most part, the service selected matches the room it’s being taken to. I’ve seen it all, though there’s so much of it, I don’t have a register of it in my head. However, masculine rooms have masculine services, and vice versa. I suspect favored rooms of members of the family over the years had services purchased for when they used those rooms. It stands to reason. We’ve had centuries to collect it and money to burn on those kinds of things.”
“Hmm,” I hummed.
“Tell me about this girl,” he ordered.
“There’s not much to say. Slender. Brown hair. She avoided my eyes. I thought she was shy. Now I wonder if she was somewhere she wasn’t supposed to be.”