The Beekeeper's Apprentice - Laurie R. King [71]
“A very strange sort of a message, Miss Russell.”
“Yes, isn’t it? I have a rather eccentric aunt who occasionally tracks me down. I suppose it was she. I’m sorry if she bothered you. How was she looking?”
“Well, Miss, I would never have taken her as a relative of yours. Black hair like that and ugly as—Beg your pardon, Miss, but she should really have a doctor do something about that great ugly mole on her chin.”
“When was she here?”
“About three hours ago. I offered to let her stay here and wait for you, and gave her a cuppa tea, but when I went to lock up the back, she said she’d go, and she was gone when I got back. If she returns, shall I bring her up?”
“I think not, Mr. Thomas. Send someone for me and I’ll come down.” The way from my rooms to the gate house was enclosed, so I wouldn’t get wet again. However, I did not want a stranger admitted straightaway. My eyes went to the pigeonhole from which he had taken my letters. Very curious. Who was this who wanted to know where my room was, and more important, why?
I thanked Mr. Thomas and went past him into the hallway that led to the wing my rooms were in. I sat on the bottom step to remove my boots—I think, though I cannot be sure, that I only removed them be-cause they were so uncomfortable, and I did not wish to make more of a mess for Mrs. Thomas to deal with. Whatever the motive, conscious or no, I continued up the stairs in stockinged feet, without even the rustle of the waterproof to betray my presence.
The building was silent, oppressively so. The rain on the landing windows was the loudest sound. And to think I had often, coming up these stairs, shuddered fastidiously at the quantity of noise a number of women living together can produce. Veronica’s rooms here, the doors shut as they rarely were, her presence so strong I could almost hear the wild party she’d had in that room a week earlier. Jane De-laField’s rooms here, quiet and religious and cocoa-drinking Jane with the unforeseeable gift of limericks, followed always by a blush. And Catharine, whose attractive brother had the odd passion for, what was it, roses? No, iris. And all of them gone now, back in the bosoms of their families, warm and secure, while Mary Russell, cold and lonely, went up the cold draughty stairs to her rooms.
At the top of the stairs I turned towards the back of the building and pulled my key from my pocket. As I reached for the knob my mind was so filled with dolorous thoughts as to have forgotten the odd episode of Mr. Thomas’s ugly woman, and so I very nearly overlooked the marks on my door. The key was inches from the lock when I froze, feeling some-thing like an automobile engine must when it is moving forward and is suddenly thrown into reverse gear. There was a black and greasy smudge on my shiny brass doorknob. There were tiny, fresh scratches on the in-side of my keyhole. There was light coming from under the door...
I shook myself. Come, Russell, don’t be absurd. Mrs. Thomas often set a light burning at dark for me and laid a coal fire in the grate. There was nothing to be concerned about. I was on edge still, from the vile weather and the delay of my escape to Berkshire, my nerves were raw from the tutorial I had been through, nothing more. Nothing but an ordinary room on the other side of the door, as I could even see when I bent down and looked, through the keyhole and, feeling ever more ridiculous, under the door.
I reached again with my key, but my antennae were well and truly quivering now, and I drew back and looked around me, for confirma-tion of one attitude or the other, but no omens presented themselves. However, looking down the corridor, I was aware of a vague feeling that I had indeed seen something, some tiny thing. I went slowly back down towards the stairway and saw, on the sill of the window that had been built to illuminate the landing, a smear of mud, two ivy leaves, and a scattering of raindrops.
How did those get in? How did