CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Oliver remains in bed for the rest of the day. Theresa makes him chicken soup for lunch and a hearty beef stew for dinner with liberal amounts of tea made with lemon and honey. The warm liquid keeps his cough at bay, but he is still tired.

During one of his periods of wakefulness, I ask him how he likes living with his aunt and uncle.

He shrugs and says, “It’s all right. They take good care of me, I suppose.”

“You suppose?”

He shrugs again. “It’s lonely sometimes being here all the time. I miss my friends at school. They send me emails, but it’s not the same as being able to see them.”

“They don’t visit?”

“They aren’t allowed to. Uncle Edmund doesn’t want his house overrun with children.”

I stifle a frown. “Perhaps your uncle will allow you to visit some of them over the summer.”

He brightens a little at the thought. “I hope so. It’ll be warmer then, and Aunt Cordelia says that warm fresh air is good for my lungs. Uncle Edmund doesn’t agree, but I do feel better when I’m outside.” His brow furrows in concern. “Is Aunt Cordelia really all right?”

“Of course she is,” I tell him, hoping the lie sounds more genuine to him than to me. “Just like you, she’s tired. She needs rest.”

He looks down and plays with his fingers.

“What is it, Oliver? What’s wrong?”

He shrugs again. “It’s just… He told me mum went crazy before she left.”

“Who?”

“Uncle Edmund. He told me that my mother wasn’t fit to take care of me, and it was a good thing for me that I ended up with him.”

I can’t restrain myself this time. “That’s a cruel thing to say about someone’s mother.”

He looks away. “If it’s true, is it cruel? I know that some mothers do go insane, and they harm their children. Perhaps if she hadn’t disappeared, she would have harmed me.”

He’s not wrong, but I have serious doubts about lord Edmund’s side of the story in this case. “You needn’t worry about that. You’re in a safe place now with people who care about you.”

He lowers his eyes and plays with his fingers again. “I don’t know if uncle really cares about me. I think he’s only caring for me because it’s his duty.”

The proper response, I suppose, would be to insist that Oliver is wrong, that his uncle loves him very much. I don’t believe I could convince Oliver of this lie, though, so I tell him something I can convince him of, something that is true.

“I care for you, Oliver. Miss Theresa cares for you. Lady Cordelia cares for you. You are surrounded by people who love you, and I don’t care if your uncle is the King of England. We will see to it that you are properly taken care of.”

He smiles softly, but it doesn’t last long. “I hope Aunt Cordelia is all right. I couldn’t bear to lose her. She’s the only real mother I’ve ever known.”

I squeeze his hand and say nothing else. Repeating myself here won’t help, so I only hold his hand and show him that I will be here for him, no matter what.

Meanwhile, I pray that I can find the ghost that plagues this house and bring it to rest. I am no longer fighting only for justice but for the health and happiness of a little boy who risks losing the small safety net he has.

***

There’s another storm that night. This time, the cries are louder. I hear no words, but the wailing I hear sounds unlike any howl of wind or crack of thunder I’ve ever heard. What could possibly cause the storm to sound so much like the fearful and pained wailing of a young woman?

My own worries are far too intense to afford me sleep. I am not young anymore. I will soon need rest. If I endure another night without sleep, I will drive to the pharmacy in town and purchase some sleeping aids.

But tonight, I am awake, and the tea I drink gives me enough energy to overcome the physical exhaustion. I climb the stairs once more, heading directly to the library.

As I suspect, the window is open again. I close them, and then survey the damage. The leather chairs have already cracked from the previous bout with a storm, and a soft musty smell tells me they’ve already begun to mildew. They will need replacement.

I can’t do anything about that tonight, but I can bring a towel and some air freshener. I will mop up the water blown in from the storm and spray some scent on the chairs so the mildew doesn’t overwhelm the room.

I retrieve the necessary supplies and return to the library. The storm outside continues to howl, but with the window closed, those howls sound like actual wind, rain and thunder rather than the shrieks of a girl in mortal peril.

As I clean, I try to take a practical approach to this problem. There is precious little I can do myself. This is an Earl’s castle, and even in times like this, propriety must be followed. If I am caught snooping, the servants will not defend me. Even Theresa will do no more than shake her head and lament that I meddled in the affairs of high lords against her advice.

I will have to rely heavily on Sean. He can move more freely than I without fear that he’ll suffer the wrath of Lord Edmund. Perhaps he has to be careful, but he’s out of the earl’s reach.

The downside to that is that Sean is on the outside looking in. The absence of media presence here indicates just how effectively lord Edmund is at concealing his private life from the outside world. Even Inspector Hargreaves hints at the difficulty he faces investigating these disappearances. Sean is shrewd and very skilled, and I have no doubt that he will find information I can use, but it will take him a long time, and it might not be complete enough for me to act on. If I am to determine the truth of these disappearances, then I must act, even if it puts me at risk.

“No!”

The wailing cry startles me so badly that I shriek and drop the mop handle. It falls to the floor, making a noise like the crack of a rifle.

My heart pounds as I listen for a repeat of the call. There is no one in the room, and I hear no footsteps outside. Could the wind be playing tricks on me again?

“No!”

That one is a little louder. It seems to come from behind the walls, but where?

I look outside, checking the hallway in both directions. There’s no one. The cries appear to have silenced as well.

I close the door softly. It must have been the storm again. Pull yourself together, Mary.

I listen for a few minutes more. Nothing.

I am somewhat disquieted by this experience, but I’m not ready to leave just yet. I approach one of the bookcases that line the walls. This one appears exclusively devoted to religious texts.

Perhaps religious is not the right word. Spiritual. Borderline occult in some cases. Not so borderline in a few others. There are copies of kabbalistic texts and grimoires, including the Key of Solomon and the Ars Goetia . There are Hindu texts that deal with eastern mysticism and esotericism and on one shelf, modern texts of occult secrets designed to enhance one’s life in the areas of wealth, influence and sexual pleasure.

The library has hundreds of texts, and I shouldn’t draw too many conclusions about this one. After all, he also has a case dedicated to scientific tomes, so it’s not as though this case is evidence that lord Edmund is a spiritualist himself.

Still, I can’t pull my eyes away. One shelf—the one at eye level to me—contains such titles as Capturing the Soul, The Essence of Control, and Mystical Techniques for Dominating the Female Will.

I pull that one from the shelf and glance through it. It is as horrible a book as it sounds and essentially consists of advice by which men may guarantee that their women are willing to do whatever their men want them to do in bed.

Still, horrible as it is, there’s nothing in that first glance that I find helpful. In fact, I’m not really sure why I’m looking at these books to begin with. I won’t anything here that will help me in my investigation. I already suspect lord Edmund of being abusive. I won’t learn what happened to Sarah, or to the other two women, and I won’t learn anything that will help me prove lord Edmund’s guilt or perhaps point toward another possible killer.

Still, I browse through the titles. The collection is extensive, as are all of lord Edmund’s collections. The books range in age from Renaissance-era manuscripts to modern-day marvels still shiny with the print on their dust jackets.

I fixate on one book, an old, leather-bound tome with no title. The book is thin, perhaps seventy pages. Little more than a magazine. I pull it from the case and open it. It is written in a brownish-red ink and the characters are of no language I recognize. The paper is yellow and faded, and in some places, the ink is washed away.

But the pictures. Those are clear enough, and they are enough to chill me to my soul. Images of women bound to shackles, tortured by demons, torn asunder by chains, boiled in oil, tied and beaten. Some of the images are too horrible for me to describe. I don’t know if this is a grimoire, a spell book, or just a collection of images of torture for people to amuse themselves with. Whatever it is, it convinces me more of lord Edmund's guilt.

I push the title back into the shelf. It slides further back than it should. I hear a soft click, and the bookshelf shifts, causing a low rumble that echoes throughout the room.

The cry comes again, this one a long, drawn-out moan rather than a shriek. I am familiar with this noise by now, but I still shiver. The cry comes from directly behind this bookcase.

Heart pounding, I push further.

“Hey! What the devil are you doing?”

I scream and spin around, pressing myself to the bookcase in my fright. Lord Edmund stands in front of me, frowning darkly, lightning shooting from his eyes. I am so shocked that I can’t speak. In that moment, I am certain that he will kill me.

“This is my private library!” he thunders again. “Why are you here?”

My senses kick in, and I point to the mop. “The window was open, my lord. I was cleaning the mess.”

“I have maidservants to do that job. You are Oliver’s governess. What were you doing snooping through my books, anyway?” He looks over my shoulder, sees the particular books I was reading, and makes a face. “There is a perfectly good library in Clifton. You can browse… whatever… to your heart’s content on the weekends.”

“Forgive me, my lord,” I say, my voice shaky. “I was only curious.” And that curiosity overcomes my fear. “Um… sir… when I replaced this book, the case moved.”

“Because you shoved it back there like an ox,” he scolds.

He brushes me aside and pulls out several titles to reveal the book pressed against the very normal back of a very normal bookshelf. His frown deepens when he sees this. He gives me a look a parent might give a child snooping on inappropriate websites. “Don’t read this. This is garbage. I keep it for posterity’s sake, but there’s nothing in here except…”

He sighs and rubs his forehead, then replaces the book, careful not to push them too far back. When he’s finished, he pushes hard on the shelves, satisfying himself that I haven’t tipped the case off balance. It remains stock still, and he sighs again, this time with satisfaction.

When he speaks again, he’s no longer angry, simply tired and annoyed. “Go to bed, Miss Mary. And please don’t come into my library again.”

“Of course not, my lord. I’m so sorry.”

I rush from the room. I don’t stop running until I’m in my own room with the door locked. Lord Edmund doesn’t act like he suspects me at all. In fact, he doesn’t act like a murderer at all so much as a prissy and self-centered noble.

But I heard those cries. They came from within this castle. I can’t blame them on the storm anymore because I closed the window myself.

And that shelf moved. I am certain of it. There is something back there.

But how can I find it?

I don’t have an answer to that question yet, but I know one thing for certain. I will visit that library again.