Murder at Marble House (8 page)

“I hardly think Consuelo would be so scheming. It’s not like her—”

“She’s gone to one of her friends’ homes, I’m sure of it. Why, she’s probably sipping tea this very moment with May Goelet or Carrie Astor or . . . let’s see . . . are the Oelrichses in town this summer?”

“And if she’s not with May or Carrie or Blanche,” I persisted. “What then?”

Aunt Alva’s dark eyes went wide. “Good grief, you don’t think she’s . . . she’s . . .”

“She’s what?”

“With Winthrop Rutherfurd? What if . . . what if they’ve eloped? Oh, dear gracious heavens, Emmaline, we’ve got to find them. We’ve got to stop them!”

She started for the door, but I stepped in front of her and gripped her shoulders. “Don’t you think you’re jumping to conclusions? We have no reason to believe . . .” I trailed off, releasing my hold on my aunt.

“What are you thinking?” she demanded. Suspicion narrowed her eyes. “Do you know something?”

“No, but I might.”

Hurrying down the corridor, I returned to Consuelo’s bedroom. Nothing seemed disturbed since I’d been there earlier, no signs of sudden flight. I went into the dressing room. Again, nothing seemed rummaged through, no drawers gaped half open, and upon opening the wardrobe, I saw that all looked as neat as a pin. There were no signs that Consuelo had run upstairs during the chaos of the murder and packed a bag.

I went back out to the main room and yes, even her diary sat where she had left it that morning, when I’d interrupted her writing. Why would she have left it behind? Two possibilities presented themselves to me. Either someone had snatched her from the property against her will, or she had left on her own but impulsively, perhaps even blindly. Had she been desperate enough to do so?

I snatched the tome from the bedside table, but then I hesitated. Did I have the right, under
any
circumstances, to read my cousin’s private thoughts? Was I once again betraying her confidence? Oh, but if I could forestall her making a grievous mistake. . .

Knowing I might be partially responsible if Consuelo had done anything drastic, I flipped the book open to the last place she had penned her innermost thoughts, the page marked with a satin ribbon, and read:

Here a blotchy stain blurred the words. My own eyes stung. Had I believed my meddling had helped earlier today? Had I thought I’d helped my cousin face her future with a bit more courage? I’d only fooled myself into thinking so because I couldn’t bear the truth—the truth Consuelo felt she could impart to no one but the cool, white pages of her journal. Apparently, I’d placed a sorry second when it came to confidantes. But there was more, and I read on.

“Well, Emmaline?”

Startled, I snapped the diary closed and looked up to see Aunt Alva poised in the doorway. “What?” I said stupidly, trying to blink away the guilt I was sure blazed in my eyes. Good heavens, not only had I
not
made things better with my interference, I’d made them much, much worse. If Consuelo had run off somewhere, it was only because of what I’d said to her and my foolish notions of courage.

Could
she have run off to elope with Winthrop Rutherfurd?

“Did she leave us any hints in that ridiculous book of hers?”

“I . . . ah . . . no.” It wasn’t a lie. Consuelo hadn’t left so much as an inkling of where she might have gone, or with whom. But as the seconds ticked past, I became more and more convinced that she had, indeed, gone.

And then I realized why her bedroom felt so completely empty.

Muffy was gone. Perhaps Consuelo had been in too much of a rush to grab her diary, but she would never abandon her cat. . . .

“You have to find her, Emmaline. That’s all there is to it.”

“Aunt Alva, surely this is a matter for the police—”

“If you say that one more time, Emmaline, I swear I’ll scream. The police cannot be involved. Can you imagine the scandal? And with the Duke due to arrive within the next two weeks?” Her fist flew to press her chest just below her collarbone. Her breath rasped in and panted out in such rapid succession I became alarmed and went to her.

“You’ll faint if you don’t calm down.”

She grasped my wrist and squeezed like an iron vise, until I began to fear the bones would snap. “She is with one of her friends, Emmaline. She must be. And you must find her. Don’t go telling me you can’t. You were the one who discovered who murdered my brother-in-law’s financial secretary. Surely you can discover the whereabouts of one silly girl.”

Her intensity frightened me. And she was hurting me. “Yes, all right. I’ll find her, Aunt Alva. Just let me go before you break my wrist, please.”

“Oh.” She looked down, saw how her fingers were trembling because of how tightly she held me, and immediately let go. “Sorry. I think you should try Ochre Court first; she’s very probably with May Goelet. Or . . . Let’s see, where else would she go?”

Her eyes closed and a little groan escaped her. With one arm clamped around her middle, she made her way back to the chaise and sank onto the cushions. For a moment I feared she’d be ill.

“Aunt Alva?” I knelt beside her and reached up to put an arm around her shoulders.

“Oh, Emmaline, if she’s eloped with Winthrop Rutherfurd it’ll be the end of the world.”

“That’s a rather extreme outlook, don’t you think?”

“After all the care I took in raising her,” she lamented as if I hadn’t spoken. “All the planning I’ve done. She’s meant for better things than being the wife of some obscure New York fop.”

“The Rutherfurds are hardly obscure.”

Her eyes opened and she treated me to one of her quelling glares. “That’s not the point.”

“No, I suppose not.” I stood. “I’ll call on the Astors and the Goelets on my way home. I’ll check with cousin Gertrude, too.”

“Home? Emmaline, there isn’t time to go home. You must find her immediately and—”

“If I’ve learned anything, it’s never to underestimate the power of the servants’ rumor mill. I would never have discovered who killed Alvin Goddard if it hadn’t been for Nanny’s help. She has ways of sweeping hidden little details out into the open. We need her in this, Aunt Alva.”

“She’ll be discreet?”

I wanted to shake sense into the woman. What was more important, her daughter’s life or some silly reputation?

But I knew the answer. In Alva Vanderbilt’s world, a woman’s reputation was everything, every bit a commodity as the empires their men controlled. Oh, there were limits for every woman from every rung of society, but for most of us it was nearly impossible to imagine how much harm even a breath of scandal could do to a young woman like Consuelo. In my aunt’s eyes, her daughter would be better off dead than with a tarnished reputation.

That made me immeasurably sad.

It was on the ride home that a thought struck me. That last conversation with Aunt Alva kept playing over in my mind, until I suddenly stopped my aging hack short.

“Barney,” I said out loud for no other reason than that sometimes voicing a thought helped me judge its validity, “you don’t suppose . . . No, never mind.” I shook my head and was about to cluck my tongue to the horse. His ears twitched in my direction for the signal to resume our trek home. But I hesitated, my mouth slightly open.

“Would Aunt Alva stoop so low?” I whispered to the gathering afternoon shadows.

Was it possible she knew exactly where Consuelo was, and Aunt Alva’s distress was nothing more than a ruse to distract . . . me? Beneath the trees in the quiet of Bellevue Avenue, near the bend where that grand street turned onto Ocean Avenue, I began ticking off the facts one by one, to the rhythm of the ocean waves at nearby Bailey’s Beach.

Four suffragettes currently inhabited Marble House; five if you counted Aunt Alva.

Consuelo faced an unwanted marriage and virtually choked on the irony that her mother’s bullheaded independence would never extend to her daughter.

Aunt Alva had orchestrated today’s so-called entertainment with Madame Devereaux in an effort to persuade Consuelo to cooperate. But in this instance, it was the medium herself who balked at cooperating. Who had outright told Consuelo she’d never be happy if she married
him.

Madame Devereaux was dead, and Consuelo was missing. The two incidents couldn’t be a coincidence, and the sudden, sickening question was, would Aunt Alva resort to murder and then kidnap her own daughter to avoid letting Consuelo’s future slip through her fingers? And setting me on Consuelo’s trail? Well, wouldn’t that distract me from discovering the truth?

“Oh, Barney, tell me this can’t be true. Tell me I’m jumping to conclusions.”

But that loyal old soul simply gave his head an impatient shake to let me know he was tired, hungry, and wanted a brisk brushing down. I clucked to set him back in motion. I needed Nanny and Brady to help me sort out my suspicions and approach the matter with a clear perspective. Furthermore, I needed Nanny to work her magic among her well-placed connections in Newport. If so much as a breath of a hint existed as to where Consuelo might be hiding—or was hidden against her will—Nanny would get wind of it, eventually.

“W
hat do you think?” I asked my little family back at home once I’d filled them in on the details of that harrowing morning.

Saying nothing, Nanny pursed her lips and reached for the teapot. When I arrived some half hour ago, feeling and probably looking battered after my day at Marble House, she, Brady, and I had gathered around the morning-room table for sandwiches and a pot of strong Irish tea that Katie had brewed for us. And dare I confess each time Nanny poured a cup she also trickled in a tiny bit of the spirits, just to shore up the constitution.

Brady cradled his cup in his palms and leaned back in his chair. “Alva Vanderbilt is no murderer. The old girl doesn’t have it in her, Em. If I’m certain of anything, it’s that.”

“But that temper of hers,” I reminded him. “We’ve all seen it. Goodness, just about
everyone
has seen it at one time or another.

“All bluster,” he replied with a quirk of his lips.

“I think so, too,” Nanny said. “As far as murder goes. But as for her possibly using that poor woman’s death to hide her daughter away . . . well. Can’t say as I’d put it past her.”

“Then again . . .” I watched the thin stream of whiskey make its way into my tea before Nanny handed me the refilled cup. “Alva was with the rest of us the entire time. It was Consuelo who slipped away, supposedly to her room.”

“Alva might have had a servant do her dirty work,” Brady said, “to steal Consuelo away.”

I shook my head. “I doubt she’d trust any of them enough.”

Nanny’s eyebrows went up. “How about the butler?” “Grafton? Alva had him search the house for Consuelo—” I broke off, and the other two studied me with burgeoning “aha” expressions.

Brady nodded. “Bet he didn’t find a thing, did he?”

“No, he didn’t,” I conceded. “Or at least he said he didn’t.”

“Mm-hmm.” It was Nanny’s turn to nod knowingly. “But if Consuelo was there, my guess is she’s gone now to who only knows where.” She reached for the whiskey again. I shot her a glance. She returned it with an unapologetic narrowing of her eyes. “Are you going to play mother with me now, Emma?”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.” And really, it wasn’t Nanny fogging her mind I worried about. I’d never in my entire life seen her tipsy, except, of course, each Christmas Eve, but that was a mellow, contented form of tipsy where she sat in her favorite overstuffed chair and smilingly contemplated the Yule log. No, Nanny often suffered from dyspepsia and I feared the strong liquor might exacerbate her condition. She wasn’t a young woman. I didn’t want her doing anything that might shorten the time we had together. “Whether Alva is behind it or not,” I said, “you’re probably right that Consuelo is no longer at Marble House. But where would a girl like Consuelo Vanderbilt hide?”

“She’s much too beautiful to simply ‘blend in’ anywhere,” said Brady. “Or for that matter, to travel anywhere unless someone put a bag over her head. Even if she managed to cross the harbor without being noticed, somewhere along the line someone would recognize her. And then we’d hear about it.”

“So she’s most likely somewhere on the island.” The thought raised my hopes. If Consuelo was somewhere on Aquidneck Island, chances were I’d find her eventually. I leveled my gaze on Nanny. “Can you alert the network?”

She gave me one of her shrewd little grins.

“But . . .” I placed my hand over hers where it lay on the tablecloth. “We need the utmost discretion. You can only share this with friends you trust absolutely.”

“That does narrow down the field quite a bit,” she said with a sigh. “But I believe I might be able to tap into a few prudent, well-placed sources of information.”

“Good. Thank you, Nanny. Brady, if you think of anything that might help, or hear anything, you’ll let me know, yes?”

“Of course. And exactly what are you going to do, little sister?”

“I’ve got several important social calls to make. But first I’ve got an article to write and deliver. I’ll be hanged if I let Ed Billings steal a byline from me again.”

Oh, yes, I’d written up a brilliant article only two weeks ago after a body had literally fallen at my feet during my cousin Gertrude’s coming-out ball at The Breakers. Eagerly I’d brought my article to my employer at the Newport
Observer,
confident in having reported the facts exactly as they happened, without the taint of sensationalism. What did Mr. Millford do? He literally patted me on the head and advised me to stick with the society page. Then he proceeded to publish Ed Billings’s ridiculous ramblings about events he hadn’t witnessed.

The injustice rankled.

 

The unfairness continued to fester the next day when, upon seizing the morning’s
Observer
from my front stoop, I saw that no headline peered up at me from the front page. I scanned the main articles again before running to the morning room, where I spread the paper out on the table and began flipping through the pages.

Nothing. Not even another byline stolen by Ed. There was simply no article relating to Madame Devereaux’s murder.

Well, I’d see about that. But first, of course, there were obligations to be met. Despite Aunt Alva’s impatience, I didn’t begin actively searching for Consuelo until later that morning. Mid-morning, to be exact, when I knew I’d catch everyone on my list at home and unawares. The wealthy never stirred from the comforts of their “summer cottages” before noon, nor did they expect to be disturbed before that hour. Yet the ocean air would surely prod them from their beds much earlier than they typically rose, and I’d likely find Consuelo’s friends wrapped in silken dressing gowns enjoying tea and scones from the comfort of cushioned lounge chairs placed just so on their wide verandas facing the sea.

Putting my frustrations about my missing article on a back-burner, I knocked first on the door of Winthrop Rutherfurd. From Consuelo I already knew he was spending the summer in one of the older, shingle-style homes on a shady side street off the west side of Bellevue Avenue—not a mansion, no ocean view, but fashionable enough for a single man. For propriety’s sake, Katie stood beside me, so his neighbors wouldn’t gossip about how that poor Vanderbilt relation visited Mr. Rutherfurd alone. I was about to tap the knocker again when Winty, as Consuelo called him, surprised me by opening the door himself.

He squinted out at me, recognition slowly dawning. Winthrop was not a young man; in fact, he was at least a decade older than I. He was, however, a trim man, tall and athletic-looking, his hair dark and full, though typically worn slicked tightly back. Invested in his family’s New York real-estate concerns, Winty had money of his own, though not in the sort of heaping abundance Aunt Alva deemed necessary in a suitor.

With the morning sunlight slanting across his features, he looked even older than usual, or perhaps a late night had deepened the creases across his brow and beside his eyes. I wondered what—or who—might have kept him up.

“Miss . . . Cross, I believe? To what do I owe the pleasure?” His expression didn’t register pleasure, only perplexity.

I wasted no time with niceties. “May I come in, Mr. Rutherfurd?”

“I . . . uh . . . I suppose . . .” He gave his lightweight morning coat a dignified tug as he stepped back from the threshold. Katie and I stepped into a dim foyer, made all the darker by the brown and beige pattern of the wallpaper.

“Is there somewhere we can talk privately?” I asked, my bluntness obviously taking him aback once more.

He glanced around at the various doorways opening into the foyer, then seemed to settle on a direction. “Follow me.”

Katie moved to trail me, but I gestured for her to wait by the door. I trusted my maid, in my employ since the spring, to a point, and I felt not only protectiveness, but a sincere fondness for her. But I had to admit the young Irishwoman possessed a nervous constitution and could be something of a chatterbox. I couldn’t take the chance of her blurting private information to the greengrocer, the butcher’s wife—or whomever else.

I followed Winty across a parlor furnished in rich leather and through another doorway that led down a narrow passage. A wary tingle grazed my back—where was he taking me? But finally we entered a morning room much like my own, with sturdy oak furniture and a homey, informal air. We were no longer alone; a footman busily gathered plates from a sideboard and voices drifted from an open door through which I glimpsed a service pantry.

Good. Though my fears were certainly unfounded, a woman had been murdered yesterday, and until the murderer was apprehended I shouldn’t fully trust anyone.

“Please have a seat, Miss Cross.” Winty pulled out a chair for me at the table. “I’d just finished my breakfast when you knocked, but may I offer you some coffee or tea?”

The footman stopped midway to the pantry, the stack of plates balanced precariously in his hands. When I shook my head and said no thank you, the young man nodded and continued on his way. Winty sat at his own place, where the morning issue of the Newport
Daily News
blazed a headline up at me.

 

M
URDER AT
M
ARBLE
H
OUSE
!

 

A part of me selfishly wished Winty subscribed to the Newport
Observer
instead, and that it was my article splashed across the page. I still didn’t understand it. I’d rushed into town yesterday evening to deliver my account of the murder before the presses stopped for the night. For once I’d beaten Ed Billings at his own game, and Mr. Millford, the owner and editor-in-chief of the
Observer,
had assured me my article would run in the morning’s edition.

“Nasty business, that,” Winty said, pointing at the paper. The comment roused me from my ambitions. “Poor Consuelo—uh, Miss Vanderbilt. Tell me, how is she taking it? Is she very distraught?”

He sounded sincerely worried about my cousin, although who knew how accomplished an actor he might be? “Have you spoken with my cousin recently?” I asked.

He blinked and then raised his eyebrows. “No, how could I?”

I ignored his question and asked another. “You’re quite sure you had no word from her yesterday?”

“I wish I had, Miss Cross. Maybe I could have comforted her. I’ve been trying to speak with Consuelo ever since she arrived in Newport, but that wooly mammoth of a mother of hers won’t let me anywhere near her. Not in person and not by telephone.”

I’d never heard Aunt Alva described in quite those words and, despite the seriousness of my visit, I stifled a snort of laughter. “So you’ve had no communication with Consuelo all summer?”

“Well, I wouldn’t exactly say that. There was the Astors’ ball last month. We were both there, and when her mama wasn’t looking we managed to exchange a few words. Someone obviously saw us, though, and reported back to Mrs. Vanderbilt.”

“So that’s why my aunt had Consuelo virtually under lock and key in recent weeks.”

His gaze swept over me before connecting with my own. “What is this all about, Miss Cross? I understand Consuelo must be terribly upset over what happened in her gardens yesterday, but why are you
here?
” His eyes sparked with alarm. “Has something happened to Consuelo?”

“That’s what I’m trying to find out.”

“Miss Cross, I wish you’d stop speaking in riddles.”

“But that’s precisely what this is, Mr. Rutherfurd. A riddle.” I paused to choose my words carefully. “You see, Consuelo isn’t . . . presently at home. I don’t know where she is—”

“And neither does her mother, does she?” I expected an ironic smile; instead, lines of concern aged his face beyond his thirty-odd years. “This isn’t like Consuelo, not like her at all. She doesn’t do things like this, doesn’t rebel or run off in fits of temper. Or fits of anxiety. Dear heavens . . .” A waxy pallor suddenly replaced his outdoorsy complexion. “Do you think whoever murdered that woman . . . but no, the maid did it, didn’t she? And she was caught red-handed. Surely the woman couldn’t have had time to strike twice. . . .”

I cut his outburst short. “Is she here?”

“I—what? Who?”

“Consuelo, Mr. Rutherfurd. Is she here?” I ground out each impatient word from between my clenched teeth.

Winty’s palm slapped the table in a way that had me wishing for the reappearance of his footman or a maid or anyone else. “How
dare
you imply such a thing, Miss Cross?”

His anger all but shuddered in the air between us. I drew back in my seat, but I forced myself not to look away. “I am not implying anything, Mr. Rutherfurd. I’m merely asking a direct question. You did ask me to stop speaking in riddles.”

His nostrils flared. “That was no simple question, Miss Cross. You’re practically accusing me of . . . of stealing Consuelo away from her home and hiding her here.”

My hands balled into fists around the purse strings in my lap. “Did you?”

Winty sprang to his feet. “I most assuredly did not. Do you honestly believe I’d play with her reputation in such a dastardly way? The woman I lo—”

He broke off, but I heard his unspoken sentiment. The woman he loved. “All the more reason to steal her away from her impending marriage. An
unwanted
marriage.”

“I’m afraid it’s time for you to leave, Miss Cross.”

I came to my feet but refused to budge any further. How I managed such audacity I couldn’t say. Instinct forced from me words and actions I’d never have been capable of under normal circumstances. But just as when Brady had been accused of murder and my faith in his innocence compelled me to hazard any risk to clear his name, so did my concerns for my cousin’s life prompt me to defy a man in his own home.

“If Consuelo truly isn’t here,” I said calmly, “then you shouldn’t mind if I take a look about.”

“You may not, Miss Cross,” he said in a tone that brooked no debate. He worked his jaw from side to side. His gaze swept to the servants’ doorway, then back to me. When he spoke again, his voice was less stern, but adamant. “You’ll have to take my word for it that your cousin isn’t here, nor have I seen her since the Astors’ ball last month, except now and again from a distance as we happened to pass each other in town. As for searching my house”—he drew in an audible breath and smiled grimly—“how dare you insult me, Miss Cross. You have all but called me a liar.”