CHAPTER FIVE

I believe I am a reasonably fit woman for my age, but with Veronica not present to sap his strength, Lucas has every ounce of the energy that a healthy boy of seventeen should have. I soldier on as bravely as I can, but after three hours of scampering from place to place across the grounds, exploring the hunter's blind, the "folly," as Lucas calls the three-story miniature castle on the other side of the north woods, and several other locations that he proudly claims are unused and ignored by the rest of the family, I have to finally admit I am overcome. I tell Lucas that his first assignment is to create a photographic collage that will fully capture the spirit of the Carlton estate and send him ahead to complete it while I limp back to the house gasping for breath.

My body is overwhelmed, but my mind is more alive than it's been in months, perhaps years. I laugh as I ascend the last of the hills between me and the manor. Look at me running around like a girl. I haven't done anything like this in as long as I can remember.

I decide I like Lucas. He really is a charming and eager young lad. Perhaps a touch immature for his age, but that's to be expected considering his upbringing. At least his immaturity expresses itself as innocence and curiosity and not as arrogance and vindictiveness.

I think back to our conversation about his family. I am disturbed by his insistence that his siblings don't love him. As I replay his words, a few things stand out to me.

Dad left his first wife for my mother. Not our mother, my mother. They think I don't belong.

When I think of the arrogant, handsome Oliver and the regal, confident Eliza, I have to say I agree. I don't feel this in a negative light, of course, but it's easy to see the family resemblance between the other two Carlton children. Eliza is not as brash as Oliver and Oliver is not as poised as Eliza, but they both comport themselves with an air of superiority that I don't think they're even aware of. They remind me in a manner of their father. Sebastian has had time to temper his arrogance and so it doesn't show as much as theirs does, but the regal bearing and confident demeanor are entirely his.

Lucas, in contrast, is reserved and quiet at first and very awkward socially. I've thoroughly enjoyed today, but it certainly isn't the sort of activity I would expect a boy his age to engage in. He does talk—rather effusively, in fact—once he is comfortable with you, but his conversation can be quite abrupt and inappropriate. In this manner, he resembles neither Sebastian nor Veronica. Veronica is effusive, but her anxiety is born of nervous tension, not the flattened deflation Lucas showed the first two days I was here. Neither she nor Sebastian is awkward with others, while Lucas doesn't appear to have any concern at all with propriety or social grace.

My mind begins to wander to speculations it should not entertain. My mother, he said. Not our mother. The two older children definitely show more signs of their father's ancestry in their behavior. And they don't get along well with Veronica. For her part, she seems almost antagonized by them.

And she was overseas when Lucas was conceived and, according to Lucas, when he was born as well.

I wonder about that. Eliza told me that she came back pregnant, but Lucas told me he was born in South Africa. I suppose it's possible that Veronica returned to Johannesburg to deliver him, but why? Is it possible that Sebastian is not Lucas's father?

Damn it, I keep breaking my promise to myself that I wouldn't get involved. This is none of my business.

I look up to see I've reached the house and release a sigh of relief. I'll make myself a cup of tea to settle my body, then perhaps I'll shower while the rest of the family is still out.

I head to the kitchen and begin to brew the tea. As I set the kettle to boil, I hear the front door open. I head out to see who it is, and my eyes widen when I see Eliza. I check the clock on the wall of the foyer. It's barely noon. Why is she home so early?

"So call Horace to pick you up! It was your choice to let your license expire."

I stare at her, dumbfounded for a moment. Then it occurs to me that she's on the phone and not speaking to me directly. I redden a bit and head back to the kitchen. Behind me, I hear her say, "So figure it out! Be an adult! You can do that, right?"

I decide she'll need some tea as well. I prepare a second cup, and when the kettle boils, I pour the water over the bags and add cream and sugar to Eliza's.

I carry the tea to the parlor and find Eliza sitting on the couch, a pensive expression on her face. She has her feet up but quickly sits up straight and smooths her skirt when I arrive. She smiles at me apologetically, and when she notices the tea, her eyes widen. Then she blushes. "I guess you heard me."

"No need to worry about that, dear," I say. "I know how to mind my own business." And if you believe that…

She chuckles bitterly. "I wish everyone did. I suppose the proper thing to do would be to scold you for eavesdropping, but I'm in a bit of a mood, and tea does sound wonderful, so I'll save the scolding and thank you for the consideration."

I smile—not too awkwardly, I hope—and say, "Well, thank you for sparing me the scolding. I've just had a rather exhausting day following Lucas all over the estate, and I don't know if I could handle a scolding on top of all of that."

She looks at me with amazement. "Really? Lucas left his room?"

"He did. He showed me a number of his favorite places and talked my ear off about his photography. He's a very bright and inquisitive boy."

She gives me an odd look and doesn't say anything for a moment. Finally, she says, "Hmm. It's amazing what a person can do when they're not suffocating under Veronica's attentions."

There it is again. Not my mother. Veronica.

"Well, mothers are like that sometimes," she continues. "I suppose, in my own way, I'm as stifled as Lucas. She simply chose to frame her suffocation as profound disappointment in my case."

I don't know how to respond—a distressingly common occurrence when talking with this family—so I sip my tea instead. If only it were wine.

"Has Lucas told you about the girl in the wall yet?"

I gasp when she says that. Unfortunately, I do so with my cup to my lips and inhale a healthy half-ounce of Assam tea into my nose. I cough and splutter, and only decades of experience and wisdom allow me to set the cup down without spilling more.

"I see he has," Eliza says ruefully. "He imagines he sees Minnie in our walls at night. He's convinced that she was killed and buried somewhere on the estate."

"Goodness," I say through more coughing. "How horrible!"

Her lower lip trembles briefly. "It was." She shrugs. "But life is horrible, isn't it? Nothing beautiful exists without decay. Not even for lovely young women like Minnie."

"Were you two friends?" I ask.

She smiles, and again her lower lip briefly trembles. She regains her composure quickly, though. "We were. I was older than her, but… well, there aren't many girls my age in this part of the Cotswolds. She and I grew close because we could talk to each other about things girls talk about. It was refreshing to have someone to chat with." She looks wryly at me. "I think you can tell how important good conversation is to me."

"Good conversation is important to everyone," I reply, slowly gaining my composure. "I'm sorry for your loss."

She scoffs. "Don't be sorry for me. Her parents were so devastated they moved to South Africa."

An image crosses my mind of Annie laughing and pulling me along with her on one of our many childhood adventures. A lump forms in my throat, and I take another sip of tea to loosen it before saying, "It's a terrible thing to lose a loved one."

She shrugs. "I wouldn't know."

The bitterness in her voice tells me she does know and very well. I should be respectful of her grief and mindful of my commitment to stay out of the drama this family suffers. I should do a great many things, but as always, my curiosity gets the best of me, and I ask the question I should leave unasked.

"Why does Lucas feel that she went missing on the grounds?"

She meets my eyes, and there's a coldness in her gaze that chills me. I'm about to apologize for going too far when she says, "I forget sometimes that you're not from around here, so you can't be aware of the news."

"The news?"

"Yes. She was last seen alive here, in the Carlton estate."

The temperature in the house drops precipitously, and the sip of tea I take does little to dispel the chill. The drama surrounding this family instantly takes on a far darker and more sinister turn.

"Not here in the house," Eliza clarifies, "but here, on the estate. Depending on who you ask, I was the last person to see her alive. Or it was Oliver. Or my parents. More likely than not, it was Lucas creeping around with his camera and trying to see if he could get an angle down her shirt."

I really should scold her for saying that about her brother, but my curiosity still has me in a tight grip. "What happened?"

Eliza sighs. "She left for home and never arrived. The police never found her. They tried to get a warrant for the estate so they could have dogs sniff for her, but my father fought that and eventually they backed off. Said there was no reason for them to hunt for a body when everyone agrees they saw her leave the estate."

"Did you all see her leave?"

Eliza looks down at her tea and doesn't answer. After a moment, she stands.

"I feel like baking," she says. "Mother says it's unbecoming for a lady of class to work in a kitchen, but I feel like ignoring my mother's wishes today. Thank you for the tea."

She heads for the kitchen but pauses at the entry to the parlor and turns to me. "You seem like a good woman, Mary, but not everyone is worth saving."

She leaves without another word. I remain where I am for several minutes, trying to process everything I've heard.

So Minnie was last seen on the Carlton estate. She was friends with Eliza, and her portrait at one point was hung in this house before being buried in the attic and then disposed of. There's a picture of her in Lucas's collection, and a mysterious gardener whom Lucas caught gazing at her with what appears to be a mixture of lust and hate.

I try to convince myself—again—that it's not my business, and I should just let it go, but Annie's face flashes across my mind, and I know I can't walk away from this mystery. Perhaps not everyone is worth saving, but everyone deserves justice.

And I will find justice for Minerva.