Hush Now, Don’t You Cry (23 page)

“Yes, Daniel,” I said in simpering wifely fashion, making him laugh.

“You can’t fool me with this sudden meekness.” He reached up and ruffled my hair, then took my face in his hands and pulled me down to kiss him. “You’re a good woman, Molly Murphy,” he whispered, as I nestled my head on his shoulder. “And I want to keep you around for a long while.”

I felt his heart beating against mine and gave a little prayer of thanks that he was still alive. My first task now was making sure he recovered quickly and fully, and I’d leave Chief Prescott and his men to pursue this murder investigation, however tempting it was to join in. I closed my eyes and fell asleep against Daniel.

Twenty-four

In my dream I thought that an audience was applauding. Then I opened my eyes and realized that the rain had come—a hard pattering against the thatch that sounded remarkably like clapping. I got up and looked out of the window and thought I saw a flash of lightning out to sea. At least we were snug in our little cottage tonight and didn’t have to go anywhere. Martha tapped on the door at that moment.

“I’m off home then, Mrs. Sullivan,” she said. “I’ve heated up the soup like you wanted, and there’s cold ham and tongue and some salad for you at the table in the dining room.”

“Thank you, Martha.” I followed her down the stairs.

“I’m glad he’s feeling better, ma’am,” she said as we reached the front hall. “Mrs. McCreedy said this morning that she thought the poor man was done for and we’d have a second death on our hands.”

She took her shawl down from the hook.

“Tell me, Martha,” I said. “How long have you worked for the Hannan family?”

“About five years, ma’am.”

“So you weren’t here when that terrible thing happened to little Colleen?”

“No ma’am. We heard that a tragedy had befallen a child on the estate and then we saw the funeral, of course. But that’s about it. When they came in the summer they brought all their own servants from the city with them. Mrs. McCreedy and the gardeners were the only locals they employed, and frankly the Hannans were not looked upon with much favor among the people of Newport. Newly rich upstarts—no better than ourselves, not old money like the Rockefellers.”

“I see,” I said. “Well thank you for your help, Martha. It’s been a big comfort to me.”

“We changed our minds later,” she added as she opened the front door. “Mr. Hannan was a generous man. He paid well.” She opened the door and looked out. “We’re in for another wild night, I can tell. Best hurry home before it starts in earnest.”

I watched her go out into the rain. I had just shut the front door again and was on my way to the kitchen to see about Daniel’s soup when the front door opened.

“It’s me again, Mrs. Sullivan. There are some people outside the gate. I could hear them talking softly in the darkness. Should we tell them at the big house, do you think?”

“What kind of people?”

“Hard to tell in the dark, but I heard one say, ‘There has to be another way in.’ And knowing what just happened to the master, I thought I should tell someone.”

I took down my own cape. “Quite right,” I said, although I suspected that her return to find me had more to do with her own unease than with her sense of duty. “I’ll come and see if you like.”

“Oh, go carefully, ma’am. They might be armed.”

“It’s not as if it’s the middle of the night,” I said. “I don’t think we can be in too much danger.” But even as I said it I realized that Brian Hannan had probably died in the early evening hours and nobody had seen anything.

However I put on a good show of bravery as I walked ahead of her toward the gate. The rain had died down to a gentle patter on the dry leaves. At first I couldn’t see anybody but I soon picked up a rustling just behind the wall.

“Have you found a door yet?” came a shrill whisper.

“There had better be one. I’m not about to climb over the top,” came a whisper in reply.

“They’re trying to get in.” Martha grabbed my arm. “Shouldn’t I run and tell the gentlemen at the house?”

I inched closer to the gate and peered out. I caught a movement of light fabric, contrasting with the darkness of the ivy. It seemed to be a skirt, moving in the breeze. The words white lady flashed into my mind. The boys swore they had seen somebody running across the lawn. Maybe their ghost had been all too real—a real person who had managed to gain access once and was now back again. The thought struck me that news of Brian Hannan’s death would have reached New York by now and that these intruders were most likely newspaper reporters, determined to get a scoop. Suddenly I wasn’t afraid, just angry.

“What are you doing out there?” I demanded. “If you want to see the Hannan family you can telephone them to make an appointment. Or you can return in daylight.”

“It’s not the Hannan family we want to see.” One of the figures came out of the ivy and started to walk toward me. “We understand you have a Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan staying on the property. It’s them we’ve come to visit.”

And out of the shadows stepped my dear friend and next door neighbor Elena Goldfarb, usually known to her friends as Sid. She was followed by Miss Augusta Walcott, of the Boston Walcotts, who went by the nickname of Gus. I saw delight and recognition flood their faces as they saw who I was.

“Molly, my dear,” Gus said, running toward me, arms open. “I am so glad to see you.”

“We came as soon as we got the telegram.” Sid was one pace behind her. “We thought you wouldn’t want to be alone at such a difficult time. How is Daniel? Are we too late?”

“Over the worst, thank God,” I said. “He survived the crisis last night and I think he’s going to be all right.” To my own surprise these last words came out as a great hiccupping sob and tears welled up in my eyes.

Gus extended her hands to me through the bars of the gate and I took hold of them. “Oh, that’s wonderful news,” she said. “We were so worried all the way here. The wretched train moved at a snail’s pace.”

“Molly, can you please let us in?” Sid said. “I’d like to give you a hug and there are bars in the way. I feel like a prison visitor.”

I swallowed back the tears. “Wait a second.” I turned back. “Martha, come and give me a hand with this gate.”

Together we raised the peg that locked it and dragged it open.

“For some reason the gate is always locked at nightfall here,” I said. “But come in, do. You don’t know how happy I am that you’re here.”

“Molly, dearest. As if we’d stay away in your hour of need.” First Sid then Gus enveloped me in a big hug.

“I’ll be off home then, Mrs. Sullivan,” Martha said. “Seeing as how these are friends of yours.”

“Oh, right. Yes. Thank you, Martha,” I said. Together we shut the gate behind her.

“So everyone is imprisoned for the night?” Sid asked.

“There is another door, apparently, but I haven’t been shown where it is,” I said. “Come inside, do, before the rain picks up again.”

“Oh, we got good and soaked getting into the cab and then walking up to the house, didn’t we, Sid,” Gus said. “But there’s no harm in a little rain. We didn’t wear our best hats.”

And she laughed.

“We’re not staying in the big house,” I said, steering them away from the main gravel drive to a small flagstone path.

They stared up at the massive dark shape beyond us. “Oh, I remember this, don’t you, Sid?” Gus said. “We laughed about it. We called it the Evil Castle.”

“And we wondered why anybody would choose to build a new house to look so old and uncomfortable.”

“It was to remind Brian Hannan of his homeland, I understand. And to remind everybody else that he’d come from a peasant cottage and could now afford a castle.” I turned back to them. “So you’ve seen it before? I remember that you stayed in Newport last summer.”

“Of course we’ve seen it. We could hardly miss it, could we, Sid?” Gus said. “My cousin’s estate is next door and our windows looked straight at the monstrosity.”

“Wait—your cousin’s house is next door? You don’t mean the house built like a Roman temple, do you?”

“Exactly.” They laughed.

“What a coincidence.” I led them up to the cottage door. “Here we are. Cozy but cramped.”

“How awfully quaint.” Sid laughed again. “Not only does the man build the most uncomfortable-looking castle but he’s added the peasant cottages around it too. Has he imported an Irish bog or two for the peat?”

“We shouldn’t laugh about him,” I said, suddenly remembering. “The poor man was murdered two days ago.”

“Mercy me,” Gus said. “Daniel nearly dies of pneumonia and your host gets murdered. And you thought you were here for a quiet week on the seashore.”

“I know.” I opened the front door. “As I said, it’s rather cramped, so I’m not sure how we’ll manage with sleeping arrangements…”

“Molly, don’t worry about us,” Sid said. “It’s all sorted out. Gus telephoned her cousin the moment we received your telegram, and the upshot is that we are most welcome to camp out in marble luxury next door. The housekeeper there will take care of our needs and we shall be free to look after you and Daniel.”

“That is wonderful,” I said. “Here, let me take those wet coats.”

“How very dinky.” Sid was already poking her head in doorways. “A real Irish cottage. And supper already laid out on the table.”

“I’ll take you up to see Daniel and then we can eat,” I said. “We should go quietly just in case he’s sleeping.”

But he wasn’t. He opened his eyes in surprise as we came in.

“Daniel, dear. Look who has come to be with us,” I said.

“Now I suppose I’m to get no peace from a pack of women,” he replied, but his eyes were smiling.

“I can see you are on the mend, Captain Sullivan,” Sid commented.

As for me, I felt as if a great burden had been lifted from my shoulders. My husband was getting better and my dear friends were here to support me. Everything would be all right after all.

Twenty-five

I awoke to a great crash and leaped up, my heart thumping. Was it someone hammering on my door, or trying to break in? Part of my brain was already calculating how long it had been since I’d been allowed an undisturbed night’s sleep. Daniel beside me murmured in his sleep but didn’t wake. Instinctively my hand went to his forehead and I was relieved to feel it pleasantly cool. I grabbed my robe and tiptoed to the stairs. At that moment the room was bathed in a flash of light and I realized that the crash I had heard was only thunder from the storm that had been threatening. I went over to the window and watched as lightning flickered out to sea. Thunder rumbled again nearby and the heavens opened in a veritable downpour. I stood for a while watching it until the thunder died to a distant murmur and the rain abated.

I was about to go back to bed when I saw something pale moving through the bushes. I peered out into the blackness of the night wishing for more light, trying to work out what I had seen. Then it appeared again, closer this time. There was no mistaking what I saw: A person dressed in white was dancing in the rain. The boys’ white lady. I was downstairs in an instant and ran toward where I had seen it. It, or rather she, must have heard me coming or sensed my presence because it ran lightly across the lawn to the tower and then simply disappeared. I followed, my feet cold and tingling on the wet grass. I reached the tower and searched diligently. No sign of her. Nowhere she could have gone. I felt the hair on the back of my neck standing up as I tried to come up with a reasonable explanation. I had to conclude that there had been a ghost after all. The ghost of a young woman. Who was she and why had the family never mentioned her?

I dried myself off and climbed back into bed, snuggling against Daniel in an attempt to bring back warmth to my cold, wet body, but sleep wouldn’t come. A dead child who must not be spoken of—a young woman in white who was never mentioned, and now a murder. Daniel had always said to me when speaking of investigations, “First find the connection.” What had happened at this place, to this family that they were keeping from the rest of the world? And who was the mysterious woman in white? I was determined to find out.

At first light I was still awake. Daniel beside me was breathing peacefully but noisily. However it was no longer the rattling rasping of someone who was suffocating in his own fluid. I got up and dressed silently, then I let myself out. It was a lovely still morning with the promise of a fine day ahead. Birds were chirping in the trees. A squirrel ran across the grass, then up the nearest cedar tree when he spotted me. I headed straight for that tower and started to pull apart the ivy, looking for a hidden door. After a long and diligent search I was forced to the conclusion that there wasn’t one. The ivy here had really been allowed to take over in this part of the house, growing thickly and unbroken around the base of the tower.

I extended my search to the castle wall on either side. The ivy was not so rampant here. But neither was there any kind of door or opening through which a person might have slipped. My figure in white had definitely not run around to the front door or to the back of the house. I would have seen her against the darkness of that building. I stared up in frustration. The first windows seemed to be in the upper floors and they were closed. I was about to give up when I noticed a tendril of ivy on the ground. Of course it could have been brought down by the force of the storm, but I parted the ivy close to where it lay. No, I hadn’t missed the door, but what I did see was a solid trunk of ivy tree stretching upward and dappled daylight shining down on me. It might just be possible for someone young and agile to climb up inside the ivy at this point. I had no idea where she would be going, but it was worth a try. I hitched up my skirts and was tempted to remove my pointed and impractical shoes. After I slipped on the wet ivy a couple of times I did remove them, leaving them hidden under the ivy.

Then I hitched up my skirts in a most unladylike manner and up I went. It really did seem as if there was a route upward. As I climbed higher the ivy branches became more fragile and I worried about it supporting my weight and pulling away from the castle wall. I was high now—at least two stories up, but nowhere near at the level of the turret itself. I hesitated, wondering where this would lead and whether I was risking my life for nothing. But then I found a couple of ivy leaves that were crushed, as if someone had gripped the branch right there.