05 - Mistletoe and Murder (18 page)

Clara rose late. Annie had
dropped into her room around seven and been startled by the sight of Oliver
sprawled across the bed in the dressing room. She had given him a sound poke
and when he opened his eyes she insisted he explain everything. Which is
exactly what he did, leaving Annie feeling very worried. After she had quietly
and discreetly shuffled him out of Clara’s room she returned, stoked the fire,
and then left her friend to rest.

When Clara finally roused from
a deep and comforting sleep it was close to ten o’clock in the morning and most
of the household had been awake for a couple of hours. Admittedly several of
them were feeling a little worse for wear from the night before and not exactly
bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Clara sat up in bed and a piece of paper slipped
off the covers onto the floor. She leaned down and retrieved it. It was a
blurry photograph, showing the ill-lit corridor and a vacuous, fuzzy figure
walking down it. The experiment with the long exposure had been a partial
success; they had caught an image of someone, it just wasn’t clear enough to
make an identification. Clara slipped the photograph into a bedside drawer,
sneezed, and started to get dressed. She needed a strong cup of tea and time to
think.

Downstairs in the dining room
people were still eating breakfast. Andrews was attempting to master a plate of
black pudding and eggs, insisting to a grimacing Bridget Harper that this was a
certain cure for a hangover. Clara helped herself to kedgeree and sat quietly
at the far end of the table, yawning as she forked up rice.

“Our ghost came again last
night.” Andrews announced down the table, a little too brightly for his own good.
He pressed a hand to his forehead.

“Did they?” Clara said
innocently.

“Several tripwires broken, but
several others intact. Typical behaviour for an Elemental.”

Clara merely nodded.

“Miss Sampford didn’t hear
anything. Did you?”

“No.” Clara lied.

“Humph.” Andrews muttered, “As
I should expect, women sleep so heavily.”

Bridget Harper gave him a
scowl.

“This arrived for you madam.”
Humphry placed a parcel on the table in front of Clara.

“How odd, who knows I am
here?” She pulled at the parcel string and the brown paper flopped open to
reveal a Christmas card and a key.

Clara picked up the card which
showed a rather gauche picture of the Nativity and flipped it open.

Dear Miss Fitzgerald,
read
the contents,
I must apologise for my earlier abruptness, I misunderstood
your intentions. My man returned on Christmas Eve and told me of your kindness
towards him. I found myself regretting the subterfuge I had orchestrated. Thank
you for being so forgiving and please accept this gift as a token of my profuse
apologies. I am sure you appreciate its significance.

Season’s Greetings

John Mollinson.

Clara turned her attention to
the key and smiled. Now she had access to No.49 and one mystery might just be
solved – how was the perpetrator of the ghost getting into a locked house? Now
there was an accomplice on the premises that could be answered simply enough,
but before that? Aside from Miss Sampford the only people who had been inside
the property the entire time of the haunting were Humphry and Mrs James. Clara
was reluctant to blame either servant, they both seemed too dedicated to their
mistress to want to plot her death. In any case, she was confident the
accomplice had arrived with the Christmas guests.

Clara put down the card and
gave no further sign of her excitement. She did not want the whole house
knowing what she had in her hand.

“From an admirer, Clara?” Miss
Sampford asked.

“From a friend.” Clara
answered, “I met them on my second day here and completely forgot I had
mentioned I was staying in Berkeley Square. People are so kind, I must respond
at once.”

“What is that in the parcel?”
Bridget Harper spoke with unprecedented curiosity.

“A card.” Clara said,
pretending she misunderstood, then hurried from the table muttering about
finding somewhere still stocking Christmas cards this late in the season.

A short time later she was
letting herself into No. 49. The house was empty, as was to be expected, but
smelt of new paint and wood. Clara let the door close behind her and locked it.
She doubted the ‘ghost’ spent all her time in the property, too risky after all
with the random visits of workmen, so she was confident she had the place to
herself. Clara rubbed her gloved hands together and prepared for a thorough
inspection of the premises.

No.49 was built on a mirror
image version of the floor plan as No.50, this intrigued Clara as it meant the
ghost could spend as much time in No.49 as she wanted, plotting the best routes
around the neighbouring No.50 without setting foot into the actual house. It
didn’t take Clara long to become convinced that there had to be a secret
passage between the two, but try as she might she could not find it. No sliding
panel, no spring-loaded door, nothing, in fact, in any way reminiscent of the
adventure stories she had read as a child. Clara had to conclude the back stairs
were not the answer.

She went for a wander about
the rest of the house. Mollinson’s alterations to make the property more
suitable as a hotel were apparent. The dining room had been extended into the
back room to make enough space for all the guests and the snug and drawing room
had been merged into one and the first trappings of a lobby were being
installed. In the basement the many small servant rooms were being knocked
around to make larger spaces and to increase the size of the kitchen. The
rubble still present on the floor suggested to Clara this was very much a work
in progress. On the first and second floors the bedrooms had been stripped to
the bone and Clara noted the carpentry work on the floor. The watchman in the
park had been correct when he said he had had to replace a large number of
boards.

Finally Clara found herself on
the third floor, feeling that her excitement had been unwarranted. The house
provided no further clues whatsoever. But, to be certain, she set out to
explore the last few rooms. The builders had not yet made it to the third floor
and the original wallpaper still hung on the walls showing the stains of many
years. Clara found the rooms in surprisingly poor repair. The previous owner
had presumably not needed to use them and had allowed them to simply rot away.
In one there was even a blackbird perched on top of a long forgotten dressing
table. The blackbird shrieked at her vocally before flying straight out the
window. Clara was startled for an instant, until she realised the window
contained no glass.

How odd, Clara mused to
herself. Presumably the window had been broken, the glass removed and never
replaced. With the door shut no one would notice the missing window until they
reached this room, and with no heating in the place it was hardly likely anyone
would notice the cold. Then Clara began to wonder, could this be what she had
been searching for?

Clara peered out the window.
It was a long drop down, but what intrigued her was the ledge that ran beneath
the window. It was barely the width of a foot, but it ran all the way across to
No.50 as part of the decoration. Clara examined it while the cold winter wind
blew in her face, supposing - just supposing – one of the windows in No. 50 was
a tad loose? What Clara contemplated next had never before crossed her mind.
She reached out and felt the ledge. Considering the snowfall overnight the
ledge was suspiciously clear. There was nothing for it but to take a chance.

Clara eased herself out the
window, gripping onto the frame and putting her left foot over the sill first,
then she stretched out the right. Gingerly she pulled herself upright, trying
not to look down. The view was admittedly impressive, she could see into the windows
and gardens of all the houses that backed on to those of Berkeley Square. She
just hoped nobody was staring back at her. With trepidation she slid one foot along
the ledge, then the other. Slowly, a fraction at a time, she moved away from
the window. The wind whipped around her and the feeling of being virtually
walking on thin air was horrible. For a moment she almost went back, but if she
wanted to prove this was the way the ghost was sneaking into No.50 then she had
to carry on. Hoping that Georgian architecture was as sturdy as it looked she
edged onwards, her fingers clinging to the brickwork, her stomach turning over.
About halfway she heard a small voice.

“Cor lummy, Joe, look there!”
Clara dared to peek in the direction of the voice and spotted a small boy in
the alley that ran beside No.50. He was carrying a basket and appeared to be
making a delivery. An older boy stood next to him.

“She’s cooked!” This lad,
presumably Joe, announced in a voice laden with disapproval.

Clara tried to ignore them.

“Miss! Miss! What are you
doing miss?” The younger lad called out.

“I’ve misplaced my key.” Clara
called back.

The boys contemplated this for
a moment before coming to the conclusion that no one climbs to the third floor
of a building and balances on a ledge because they have lost their key.

“Want us to ring the front
bell?” Joe said in the same unsympathetic tone.

“Really I rather you wouldn’t,
I am almost there.” Clara responded, in fact she was now level with the first
window on the third floor of No.50. She tried to lift it, but it failed to
move.

“Are you a burglar?” The young
boy piped up.

“Does she look like a burglar
Sam?” Joe gave his comrade a shove.

“Then why is she up there?”
Sam replied with infallible logic.

“Look, if I tell you, you
won’t believe me.” Clara said, inching her way to the next window, at least the
boys were distracting her from the drop below, “I assure you it is nothing
illegal.”

“So what is it?” Joe demanded,
folding his arms across his chest and looking like a very stern schoolmaster.

Clara couldn’t believe she was
attempting to explain herself to two children.

“I am conducting an experiment
to see if it is possible to climb from a window of No.49 to a window of No.50.”

“Why?” Sam asked.

“Well, because someone has
been sneaking into this house and I want to know how they have been doing it.”

“Sounds fishy to me.” Joe
squinted up at Clara, “Come on Sam, let’s ring the bell and tell ‘em they have
a burglar trying to break in.”

“You said she weren’t a
burglar!”

“Don’t argue Sam, just follow
me!” The boys legged it back down the alley to the front of the house.

Clara was relieved they were
gone, but had no intention of being discovered clinging to the outside of the
house. She was now level with the room where William Henry had met his end and
was beginning to wonder why she had ever considered this a viable route into
the house at all. She got hold of the sash window, expecting it to be locked
like all the others when, remarkably, it opened. Clara stared at the raised
window, but only for a moment as she had no desire to loiter on a ledge for any
longer than necessary. Holding onto the frame she slipped her legs inside and
descended into the room. Then she quietly lowered the window until it was shut.

By the time the boys returned with
Humphry there was no sign of Clara, and he gave them both a cuff round the ear
for wasting his time.

Clara stood in the room where
William Henry had breathed his last and realised she now had evidence that it
was possible (just possible) that he had not, in fact, shot himself. She went
to the door and was relieved to find it was unlocked. So here was how the ghost
had snuck in and out. William Henry had stumbled across her, perhaps, and found
his fate sealed. It wouldn’t surprise Clara either if the ghost had a key to
the room, after all, she had had a key to Clara’s.

A thought suddenly struck her.
She slipped down the stairs as silently as she could and back out the front
door. In the street she hastened to No.49, passing the same boys that had been
in the alley.

“There she is, look, making a
getaway!” Cried Sam.

The boys ran after Clara as
she thudded into the door of No.49 completely forgetting she had locked it.

“Oh bother!”

“What is she doing now Joe?”
Sam queried his friend.

“Surely it is obvious I have
locked myself out?” Clara announced to them, “I completely forgot I had locked
the door when I climbed out the window, and I am certainly not going to climb
back that way.”

Joe and Sam gave her strange
looks, trying to fathom what this bizarre woman was about.

“Why do you want to go in
there?” Joe asked suspiciously.

Clara sighed and perched
against the railing that ran up to the door.”

“You two look like smart
lads.” She said conversationally, “I am sure you have heard about the ghost at
No.50?”

The boys nodded eagerly.

“Well,” Said Clara, “I am on
the trail of the ghost. I know she comes from No.49 and I was exploring about
to see if I could find proof. That’s why I climbed out the window, I think that
is how she gets from this house to next door.”

“You’re a ghost hunter!” Sam
asked with obvious glee.

“Does Mr Mollinson know about
this?” Joe was still looking at her as if she was a common criminal. Clara knew
a fellow cynic when she saw one.

“Yes, he gave me the key for
the house. Here.” Clara handed over the Christmas car from Mollinson which she
had kept in her pocket to avoid it falling into the wrong hands, “And now I
have left his key inside. It is very awkward, I shall have to call a
locksmith.”

“No you won’t.” Joe handed
back the card with a sigh that suggested what he was about to do was against
his better judgement, “I have a key for the back door.”