“So I rounded on her. Didn’t I, Deborah? I told her straight. No one’s going to look at a skinny mean-faced person like you.”
“Was she angry with you?” asked Rose.
“Not a bit. She got this smug smile on her face and said, ‘I’m spoken for’.”
“Maybe someone in Derbyshire. I think that’s where her home was,” suggested Rose.
“That’s what we thought,” said Deborah eagerly. “But she said it was one of the fellows here. I say, when do we start with the ouija board?”
“Give me an hour and I’ll meet you in the library,” said Rose.
Upstairs, Rose rang for Daisy and told her about the ouija board. “You’re lucky,” said Daisy. “My friend, the psychic, had one.”
“What’s it like?”
“Well, the board is about eighteen by twenty inches. It’s got the letters of the alphabet across the middle and numbers one to nine – oh, and a zero – in a line underneath. At the top left-hand corner there’s a Yes and in the top right, a No. Down the bottom left it says Good Eve and bottom right Good Night.”
“A polite board.” said Rose.
“Oh, my friend told me the spirits like a bit of courtesy. Now, a little table about three or four inches high with four legs is placed on top of the board. Someone sits down next to you and you each grasp the planchette – they calls it that – with thumb and forefinger. Then the question is asked: ‘Are there any communications?’ The table will move around to Yes or No. Then you go on asking questions and the answers are spelled out by the legs of the table.”
“But what if nothing happens?” asked Rose.
“You make it happen. It only takes a little nudge.”
Daisy was sprawled in an armchair in Rose’s room while Rose sat at her dressing-table. She eyed her maid in the mirror and felt a sharp rebuke trembling on the edge of her lips.
Almost as if Daisy sensed the change in atmosphere, she leapt to her feet. “I am going down to the stillroom, my lady. Mrs. Trumpington’s lady’s maid has made some rose-water and she promised me a phial of it for you.”
“Be back in time to come with me to the library.”
Daisy bobbed a curtsy. “Certainly, my lady.”
♦
The American sisters were in high excitement. “Never thought to have such fun in this stuffy hole,” said Deborah. “I wrote home to my friend and said we were staying in this fake castle and she wrote back saying, weren’t we good enough to be invited to a real castle? So shaming.”
“You and Deborah start first,” said Harriet.
Daisy gave a discreet cough. “May I suggest, ladies, that we turn down the gas and light a candle? The spirits can be very shy.”
“Oh, do that now,” said Deborah. “I can’t wait.”
“Aren’t you frightened?” asked Rose.
“We’ve played with it before and never had anything to be frightened about,” said Harriet. “Last time I asked the board for the name of the man I would marry and it spelled out Xaz-urt. What sort of name is that?”
Daisy placed a lighted candle on the table which held the ouija board with its little table.
“You’re supposed to take the board on your lap,” said Deborah, “but it’s so awkward. You sit next to me, Lady Rose, and take the corner of the little table nearest you between your thumb and forefinger. As you’re the psychic, you start.”
“Are there any communications?” asked Rose.
To her amazement, she felt the table move. “It’s resting on Yes,” screeched Deborah. “Go on. Ask it something.”
Rose longed to ask if Miss Gore-Desmond had been murdered but decided to ask something silly and simple. “Will Miss Deborah Peterson marry?”
The little table lurch and the leg rested again on Yes.
“My turn,” said Deborah. “What is the name of the man I will marry?”
“It’s moving,” said Rose.
Slowly the letters were spelled out. H-A-R-R-Y.
“There’s that divine captain, sis,” squeaked Harriet.
“There is also Harry Trenton,” Rose pointed out.
“Oh, he’s so dull. Ask it for his second name.” So Rose put the question but this time for some reason the little table did not budge an inch.
“It does that sometimes,” said Deborah, disappointed. “Maybe we should pack it up and try another time.”
“Wait,” said Rose, throwing back her head and closing her eyes. “I feel a presence.”
The table jerked over the alphabet and came to rest on M. Then jerkily it went on to spell out the full word – MURDER.
Deborah screamed. Harriet shouted, “Light the gas.”
Daisy darted around the room with a taper until every gaslight was lit.
“That was sure a fright,” said Harriet, fanning herself. “I mean, what murder? Mary’s death was an accident.”
“Perhaps it wasn’t,” said Rose, whose thumb and fingers were aching with the effort of guiding the legs of the table over the right letters. “I mean, Miss Bryce-Cuddles tone’s maid knew something and she has disappeared.”
“You mean Mary might have been murdered and Hedley’s used his influence to get the whole thing kept quiet?” asked Deborah.
“Perhaps.”
“But that’s awful,” exclaimed Harriet. “I say, I’ve read all the Sherlock Holmes books. Have you read the latest, The Hound of the Baskervilles?”
“No, not yet.”
“I’ll lend you a copy. You know something,” said Harriet, “I don’t think you’re a psychic at all. I saw the way you moved the table. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to spoil Deborah’s fan.”
“Fun!” exclaimed Deborah. “I got the fright of my life.”
“I think you suspect a murder and are trying to find out if we know anything. Come on, fess up.”
Rose gave a reluctant smile. “I’m sorry. But I am sure there was something suspicious about Mary’s death. Her lady’s maid said she never used arsenic as a cosmetic to clear the skin. But if Hedley knew of my suspicions, he would send me home. I would like to find out how she really died.”
“But how do you go about it?”
“You ask questions. I confess I have been very bad at it so far. I have been too direct with the gentlemen. I do not really know how to flirt.”
“How too horribly sad,” said Harriet. “But we do, don’t we, sis? We’re the best flirts in America. And if this lot here think we’re going to waste our dowries on them, they’re mistaken. I want a duke. It would be fun.”
“I think she might have been having an affair,” said Rose.
“What? That mousy little thing? You mean, one of the men did her in?”
“Perhaps. Or a jealous woman. Your lady’s maids might have heard something.”
The sisters’ faces were immediately marked by the same looks of hauteur. “We do not converse with our servants,” said Harriet. “Too vulgar. Anyway, we’ll flirt with the men and see what we can find out. You haven’t seen us in action because we didn’t figure there was anyone worth bothering about. But just you wait until this evening.”
♦
Rose thought the sisters were in splendid form after the gentlemen joined them in the drawing-room after dinner. They flirted, they chatted, they flattered, until they were surrounded by a group of adoring men.
When she had all their attention, Deborah said, “We had such a fun time today. Lady Rose is a psychic.”
Rose was aware of Harry’s amused eyes on her. “She’s in contact with the spirit world,” Deborah went on. “So we got out the ouija board.”
Rose stiffened. She did not want them to talk about murder.
“And what did the spirits tell you?” asked Freddy Pomfret.