Walking Into Murder (12 page)

With the agility of a cat, he sprang to his feet, raising his knife to strike. This time, Laura knew, he didn’t mean to be deflected.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Laura screamed at the top of her lungs and then screamed again, in the vain hope that someone would hear her. The scream resounded deafeningly in the small space. Before the noise died down, she grabbed Catherine’s hand and charged for the door of the shed, swinging her makeshift weapon wildly at Morris as she went. Her tactic worked; they raced past Morris before he could react.

Dragging Catherine behind her, Laura ran. She headed for the track, but then thought better of the tactic. Morris was probably faster and their only hope might be to hide in the bushes and take him by surprise. Catherine at least had some ability to defend herself, and she still had her long stick. She veered down the slope toward the bushes, still pulling Catherine behind her. If only the moon would go behind a cloud so he couldn’t see them!

Morris was catching up. She could hear his thudding footsteps. He was running with incredible speed for someone who had been flat on his back only moments ago, as if rage had given him unnatural strength. Madmen were supposed to be unnaturally strong, weren’t they?

She heard other footsteps, different ones, and tried to think what they were. The horse. The horse was coming after them too.

Morris was almost upon them now; she saw his knife flash in the moonlight, and then Catherine’s hand was wrested away…

Laura stopped, searching the gloom for the girl. There she was, only a few steps behind her. Morris was right beside her, and this time Laura was certain she saw the knife flash. She leaped toward the two figures, brandishing her stick.

A terrified whinny followed by another scream, a scream of pain this time, brought her to halt once more. Catherine was still in the same place, but Morris was lying on the ground. Had Catherine managed to knock him down again?

“Senator,” she heard Catherine whisper into the sudden silence. “Oh, Senator.” The horse nuzzled her gently, and she threw her arms around the huge neck and began to sob, long, painful gasping sobs.

Laura was beside her in seconds. “It’s all right, Catherine,” she soothed. “It’s all right. We’re both all right.”

“He was frightened,” Catherine sobbed. “He heard me scream and he saw Morris running after me with the knife, acting so crazy. And then Morris ran in front of him, trying to get me, and he reared….”

Her voice dwindled away. Senator nuzzled her again, a little harder this time, and Catherine held on to him as if she would never let go.

Laura bent over to look at Morris. He wasn’t a pretty sight. Senator’s hoofs had caught him mostly in the arm and shoulder, but in the semi-darkness it was hard to tell about other injuries. He was still breathing, but he looked badly hurt. They would have to get help for him as well as Thomas.

The knife, knocked from his grasp by the horse, was lying on the ground nearby. Laura went over and picked it up, wincing with distaste as her fingers touched the cold steel. As cold as its owner’s eyes, she thought irrationally. She wrapped it in the bandanna she always brought with her and slipped the bundle into an outside pocket of her pack.

Catherine’s sobs diminished. Laura put a comforting hand on her arm. “We need to get help,” she said. “We’ll check on your father and then maybe you can ride Senator back and alert someone at the manor.”

Catherine looked at her in confusion. “But who do I alert?” she asked in a voice that bordered on hysteria. “Stewart and Morris brought Dad here, and that means… that means they could all be in it…”

Her voice trailed off. She was right, Laura realized. Stewart must be involved in whatever was going on at the manor. Antonia and everyone else could be too. She wasn’t going to let Catherine ride unsuspectingly into a den of thieves.

“You’re right,” she agreed. “Let’s check on your father instead.”

Catherine sprinted for the shed. Laura followed as fast as she could. Still, she heard Catherine’s joyous exclamation well before she managed to catch up. “Dad! Dad! Are you okay? Oh, Dad! I was so scared…” She started to cry helplessly, like a child.

Relief shot through Laura when she saw Thomas sitting up. He looked dreadful in the glow of her flashlight, but he was definitely alive. He even tried to smile when she came in. His arms were clasped around Catherine, who was still sobbing.

“I am very glad you’re alive,” Laura told him sincerely.

“Alive, yes,” he replied, putting one hand up to rub his head while he stroked Catherine’s back with the other. “The rest is up for grabs. I should have stayed unconscious a while longer. No one could sleep through that racket, though. What happened?”

Catherine stopped crying. “I rammed him,” she said with a trace of pride. “Aren’t you glad you paid for all those lessons?”

Thomas looked appalled. “Rammed who?”

“Oh, I forget. You were knocked out. Morris. He had his knife and was going to use it on you so you would answer his questions. So I had to do something. He was real mad at you for telling him off in the woods.”

Any color that had been left in Thomas’s face bleached out. “You rammed Morris?” he asked incredulously. “
I
wouldn’t dare do that even if I could. Nor would anyone else I can think of.”

“It’s all right now,” Laura assured him hastily. “Morris is out of commission for the moment. The horse finished him off.”

Thomas gaped at her. “Oh, Lord, here I thought I was leaving Catherine ensconced in your safe hands and now it sounds like all hell’s broken loose instead. I should have known better than to put you two together.”

Laura bristled. Why couldn’t the man say something appreciative instead of criticizing them? She had suffered a lot of discomfort on his behalf and Catherine had displayed extraordinary courage.

“Catherine was perfectly safe, we both were,” she protested indignantly, “until we saw you wrapped up in the rug and decided we ought to rescue you. We didn’t have a car so we came on Senator. You wouldn’t have liked it much if we hadn’t come, so you could at least be grateful.”

Thomas took a deep breath, which appeared to hurt a lot. “Blasted ribs,” he muttered. “No, I wouldn’t have liked it if you hadn’t come,” he conceded, “and I am grateful. Thank you, Catherine, thank you Laura.”

His face became stern as he looked at his daughter. “I do appreciate what you’ve done for me and I admire your courage, but I still intend to take you out of here at the earliest possible opportunity.”

“Okay, Dad,” Catherine agreed meekly. “But first we’ve got to find out why they brought you here. I mean, rolling someone in a carpet and bringing them way up here to the shed? That’s a really strange thing to do.”

“And I want to know why you didn’t call,” Laura inserted.

Thomas considered. “Well, I was looking around in the barn and I guess someone snuck up behind me and coshed me,” he said. “Then Morris asked me questions but I was too groggy to understand, which really made him mad so I guess he hit me again. That’s about all I remember. I guess they wrapped me in a rug after that, though why a rug I can’t imagine, except maybe to hide me.” He managed a smile at Laura. “Hard to make a call when you’re knocked out and wrapped up.”

“What were you looking for in the barn? And why did someone hit you over the head in the first place?” Laura pressed, determined to get as much out of him as she could while he was in a confessional mood.

To her chagrin, Thomas was once again saved from answering, this time by Senator, who distracted all of them by poking his head through the door and eyeing them quizzically, as if he too wanted some answers.

“Look, Senator wants to come in!” Catherine chortled, running outside to join the horse and rub his velvety nose. Laura smiled, glad to see Catherine enjoying Senator’s antics after all that trauma.

Thomas’s voice brought her back to reality. “They hit me over the head because they don’t like me interfering, and I was looking for clues in the barn because I am paid to interfere,” he said quietly, so Catherine wouldn’t hear.

Laura’s eyebrows went up in surprise. He had actually answered her!

“And I believe they brought me here because this is Morris’s favorite spot for questioning,” Thomas added caustically. “Nice and remote. No interruptions.”

“Morris is an appalling man, and I am very glad he didn’t have a chance to question you again,” Laura agreed. “However, he was badly hurt when Senator came to Catherine’s rescue and he needs a doctor. Do you by any chance have a cell phone?”

Thomas rummaged in his pocket. “I did, but I don’t seem to now. I guess they took it. Cell phones don’t work well up here, or for that matter, anywhere in England except London, so they’re not much use anyway.”

His expression changed. “What’s that in your hand?” he asked, pointing to her makeshift weapon.

Laura looked at the object closely for the first time. “It’s a walking stick, I think,” she answered, pleased with her discovery. “It has carvings on it and some kind of metallic handle.”

Taking it from her, Thomas examined it carefully. His face was set in tight lines. “Where did you get it?”

“It was on the floor near you, and I grabbed it when Morris turned up,” Laura explained. “Why? Do you know something else about it?”

“I know the person who owned it,” he answered grimly. “She was a colleague of mine and she always had it with her. She had it made to her specifications. The top works as a club, and I believe there’s a retractable knife in the other end. Though how one would get it out in time I can’t imagine,” he added in a faint attempt at humor. “I’ve never been able to make gadgets like that work.”

Laura regarded the walking stick with renewed respect. Maybe she would keep it. It would be useful next time she encountered a sadistic fiend like Morris. Or even a bully.

“I’d better see what else is in this shed,” Thomas said wearily, getting to his feet. He swayed unsteadily and began to crumple.

“No, you won’t. I will,” Laura told him firmly, and helped him to sit down again.

Turning on her flashlight, she roamed around the shed. A pile of what looked like crumpled cloth caught her eye and she went over to examine it more closely.

“There are some clothes here, and some papers under them,” she reported in a low voice. “I’ll bring them over.”

She picked up a jacket and saw with a jolt of fear that it was dotted with rusty stains. Blood? Under it was an old manila envelope. It looked ready to fall apart with age, as if it had spent long years in an attic. The attic at Torrington Manor? She made a mental note to search it.

More clothes lay in a pile nearby, contemporary ones – jeans and a gray t-shirt and similar items. Laura took them wordlessly to Thomas. She had little doubt that they had belonged to the missing cook.

“That could be blood on the jacket,” she said, wanting to prepare him. “Doesn’t look good for whoever owned it.”

“The aforementioned colleague, I expect,” Thomas told her tersely. “She came here posing as a cook.” His face twisted with grief and anger. “Bastard,” he muttered. “She didn’t deserve this.”

Laura shuddered and tried not to not to think about what her fate must have been, especially if Morris had her up here. “I’m sorry,” she murmured, feeling helpless in the face of his obvious distress.

She turned with relief to the envelope and undid the clasp, anxious to see what was inside. There wasn’t much, just a photograph and an old newspaper clipping. It seemed a pathetic bundle of clues.

“A newspaper clipping,” she reported. “An old one. And a photograph. Do you think your colleague was collecting clues about whatever was going on at Torrington Manor?”

“Could be,” Thomas replied absently. He picked up the clipping and frowned over it, perplexed.

Intrigued, Laura trained her flashlight on it and began to read. Her bewilderment grew as she scanned the article. It was about a long-ago society wedding in France. How did that fit into the puzzle? There were no photographs of the bride and groom and no names either. The whole top of the article, where presumably photos and names would have been, had been torn away, which was interesting in itself. The article did say that the groom was a Baron, though, and she immediately thought of the grande dame. Was this how she had become a Baroness? But why would the art detective posing as cook want to know about that?

She turned to the photograph. That made more sense. Three paintings were lined up side by side, and they were exactly alike.

“Three photos of the same painting or three paintings?” she asked Thomas.

“Three paintings,” he answered with only a cursory glance. He didn’t sound surprised, and Laura wondered whether that was because he already knew making forgeries was part of this scam or because he was part of it. She still couldn’t quite get that thought out of her mind.

“How does someone make such exact copies?” she asked curiously. “And surely the fakes don’t fool the experts.”

“They can and they do,” Thomas answered, perking up at the prospect of a discourse on art. “In one easy lesson, there are three major types of forgeries. The first is a copy of a masterpiece sold as the original. If the techniques are right it can and often does fool the experts. The second is a pastiche, a painting of typical scenes copied -”

A loud whinny and the sound of pawing hoofs cut off his words. Catherine’s agitated voice followed. “Come quickly! Morris is talking and he’s got Senator all upset. He wants to go down there and I’m not sure I can hold onto him. Hurry!”

Grabbing the walking stick, Laura ran outside. Senator really was upset. His eyes were rolling wildly and his big head jerked up and down as he tried to pull away from Catherine’s tenacious hold on his reins.

Gathering her courage, Laura walked slowly toward the agitated horse, murmuring soothing words as she went. Senator seemed to calm a little, and she put her hands on the reins just below Catherine’s. Together, they managed to haul Senator up the hill away from Morris.

Catherine took a deep breath. “Thanks. He was just frightened. I think he’ll be all right now. It was Morris. He’s mumbling and cursing. Maybe we’d better look at him.”

“You stay with Senator and I’ll go to Morris,” Laura instructed. “If you keep the horse calmed down, I’ll calm Morris down. He hasn’t got four lethal feet,” she added in an effort at humor. Catherine looked much too pale and strained.