And even if it had been a bona fide gunshot, it was much more likely to be poachers than anyone trying to kill Christopher. I was being silly.
And then another sound caught my attention, one which sounded like it came from inside the house this time. Perhaps even the inside the conservatory. It appeared like a brush of fabric, a sleeve or hem, against the floor or wall or perhaps the furniture. A soft rustle. I froze and held my breath while I waited for it to come again.
When it didn’t, I told myself I must have misheard, that it had just been the sound of one palm frond brushing against another in the breeze from whatever window was open. I’m not sure I convinced myself, but the sound didn’t come again, and there was nothing whatsoever I could do about it. I couldn’t leave my corner to go exploring—or rather, I could have, I suppose, but I had promised Christopher I wouldn’t, so I didn’t. I put my back to the windows once more, and kept my attention forward into the room, and my eyes peeled.
Minutes passed with no more sounds. My heart rate slowly settled down into the normal range again. I was honestly starting to get tired when something moved across my foot.
To this day, I can’t tell you what it was. All I know is that I felt it, and then I jumped about a foot in the air with a shriek, and stumbled back, into the plants in the corner, until I knocked my elbow against the window with enough force to bring tears to my eyes.
And then the door to the hallway burst open, and I jumped again, although at least this time I had enough sense to know I had to be quiet, so I forced myself to stand still with my teeth clenched and tears running down my face, to keep in the whimpers of pain that were threatening to escape.
A figure filled the doorway, a black silhouette outlined by the light behind it.
“Who’s there?” it asked, threateningly, and I was rattled enough by everything that had happened that I couldn’t immediately place who the voice belonged to. It could have been Uncle Harold or Uncle Herbert, Francis, or one of the staff, like Tidwell the butler, or Grimsby himself.
Or perhaps not Grimsby, since he was supposed to be in the formal garden.
It wasn’t Christopher, of that I was certain, and I felt fairly strongly that it wasn’t Crispin, either. The outline didn’t look like him. The man in the doorway both looked and sounded like someone older than twenty-two or -three.
When no one answered the query, the shadow vanished again, as abruptly as it had come, with a slam of the door, and I was once again alone in the conservatory.
By now I was feeling pretty rattled, even if some of what had happened had surely only taken place in my own mind. There was no one else in the conservatory with me, obviously. The rustling I’d heard, that I had taken for cloth, had been the animal that ran—or perhaps slithered—over my foot. It might have been a mouse, a lizard, or a snake, or something else I didn’t want to think about, but that’s all it had been. Some little pest that had stumbled inside, or one that made the conservatory its home.
The gunshot, if it had been a gunshot, had sounded like it came from too far away to be of any importance to us. Poachers in the wood behind the Hall, most likely. Certainly no one aiming at a son of the house standing in full view in the formal garden.
And then I stopped thinking about any of it at all, as the next second, the door from the conservatory to the outside opened and Christopher stepped through.
SEVEN
I removedmyself from the corner and the yucca, and threw myself at him. “Thank God you’re all right.” I patted his arms and shoulders, searching for blood or anything else of concern. “Youareall right, aren’t you?”
“Of course I’m all right,” Christopher said, grabbing me by the shoulders and holding me at arms’ length, peering down at me. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
After taking in my no doubt frazzled expression, his own changed, and he added, “What’s wrong, Pippa?”
“Noises,” I said. “Outside, inside… Something ran across my foot, and the door opened, and someone was there, but he didn’t come inside.” I glanced at the door. “I just hope he didn’t lock it behind him when he left. And I thought I heard a gunshot…”
“You did,” Christopher nodded. “It came nowhere near me, though. It was behind the Hall, probably well off the property. Poachers, most likely. I don’t think you have to worry about anyone having been shot tonight.”
“We’re probably the only ones out here, anyway. And Grimsby, of course.”
“Not Grimsby,” Christopher said, as he turned me towards the door into the hall and gave me a shove.
“No?” I glanced at him over my shoulder as I made my way through the conservatory. “You didn’t see him?”
“Not where I was waiting. I walked all over the formal garden, and stood by the fountain for rather a long time. I don’t see how he could have missed me, or I him.”
He shrugged. “Between you and me, Pippa, I’m just grateful I didn’t have to deal with him again today. It gives us a little more time to try to figure out what to do about the money.”
“We’ll work on it tomorrow,” I said, as we reached the door.
The knob turned under my hand, of course, but the door didn’t open, and Christopher rolled his eyes. “That’s just perfect, isn’t it? “ He applied his knuckles to it. “Tidwell! Where are you, Tidwell?”
In-between knocks and yells he glanced at me. “You couldn’t have stopped him from locking us out? That was the entire reason you came along, wasn’t it?”
It hadn’t been the entire reason, not in my mind, but there was no point in saying so. “I didn’t realize he’d be lockingthisdoor,” I said instead. “I thought he’d lock the one from the conservatory to the outside, not the one from the conservatory in. If he had locked the exterior door, I would have been there to open it for you.”
Since I had a point, Christopher didn’t say any more about it, just renewed his assault upon the door. “Tidwell! Where are you? Tidwell!”
