The Last Refuge

NINETEEN

‘I don’t have a problem with having servants. If they weren’t serving us, they wouldn’t have a job.’

Jack Donovan, Patriot

The servants had been given the day off, so except for the security guard there appeared to be nobody in the house but me.

In full view of the SelectoZoomMini mounted on the back wall, I made a leisurely show of dropping my hat, kicking off my shoes, and peeling off my stockings, leaving them in an untidy heap on the floor. Then I wandered into the garden in my bare feet.

The stones were hot, so I took to the lawn, descending the terraces one by one until I reached the pond. Extending my arms like a tightrope walker, I teetered playfully along the bricks that lined the canal that carried water from a natural spring into the pond, one foot ahead of the other, gripping the stones with my toes.

The bee hives were buzzing in the late afternoon sun, so I gave the industrious insects wide berth, skirting behind the spring house until I reached the wall. As Paul had promised, the bottle was wedged into the same vertical slit where I’d left it for him several days earlier. I eased it out, then leaned against the bricks, enjoying their warmth against my back as I tried to determine the best way to get at my husband’s message.

The cork came out easily, but extracting the note was quite another matter. I stuck my index finger into the neck, but only succeeded in spinning the note around. I’d need a tool, I decided, and if that failed, I could always break the bottle. I slipped the bottle into my pocket where it could make friends with the notebook Paul had given me, and headed back to the house.

As I passed the spring house again, I pulled up short. Something (or someone) had disturbed the grassy plot just in front of the door. Fed by the same natural spring used by the bathhouse and the pond, the spring house, set about four feet into the ground and lined with brick, remained cool throughout the year. It was where we kept our milk and butter. Had someone been pilfering?

And then I saw the hat. A black tricorn with a blue cockade.

I took a deep breath, wrenched open the door and peered inside.

Lying in a puddle of milk on the bricks below, wearing the same suit I had seen him wearing at the burning of the Peggy Stewart, was Alex Mueller. Nearby lay a crock of milk, a fist-sized chunk broken out of its side. ‘Alex!’ I scrambled down and knelt beside him. I touched his cheek, hoping for a sign of warmth, but it was cool, clammy. Then I felt his neck for a pulse.

Nothing moved under my fingers.

Alex’s beautiful eyes stared blindly at the wall, the lashes hanging over them like awnings. There was a nasty gash on his temple. ‘Oh, Alex, what the hell were you doing out here? Did you fall?’

I remembered the muddy grass, the torn up bits of sod and thought: Drew Cornell. He’d been watching the house. He’d been inside the house. He knew what room everyone slept in. Had he discovered the relationship between Amy and Alex the same way I had? Had he killed Alex in a jealous rage? Struck him on the head with a blunt object and pushed him into the spring house, leaving him to die, cold and alone?

Fueled by rage, I hoisted myself out of the spring house and sprinted through the boxwood. I raced up the long walk, taking the stairs as I came to them two at a time. When I reached the porch, I paused to catch my breath. I needed to dial 9-1-1, but to do that, I’d need a telephone.

‘Help! Help!’ I screamed as I ran into the house.

Where was everyone? Where was the security guard, for that matter? Using both hands, I pulled the front door open, looked right and left, but the guard had inexplicably disappeared.

I closed the door, fell back against it and tried to think.

To one side of the entrance was a red fire alarm box, and at that moment it seemed to be shouting, ‘Hey! Look at me! Look at me!’ I reached out, took firm hold of the handle and pulled down.

Covering my ears against the wail of the claxon, I retreated to the front steps where I nearly ran into the security guard, rushing into the house, in the act of zipping his fly.

‘Where were you?’ I shrieked, although the evidence of the fly probably told the whole story.

‘I had to take a piss,’ he said. ‘There aren’t any bathrooms in this freaking house so I had to use the freaking privy. What the hell is going on? Where’s the fire?’

‘I needed to call 9-1-1,’ I babbled, ‘but I didn’t have a phone and I couldn’t find you, so I pulled the fire alarm. Alex Mueller, our dancing master, fell into the spring house. I think he’s dead!’

‘Jesus.’ He reached into his pocket and pulled out a cell phone. ‘I’ll call it in.’

‘You wait here.’ I jabbed a finger at the sidewalk: X marks the spot. ‘I’m going back to stay with Alex until they get here. Do you know where the spring house is?’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said, sounding professional at last. ‘I’ll show them how to get there.’

I’ve seen dead bodies before, more than my share. When the spirit’s gone, it’s gone, abandoning the body it no longer needs, leaving nothing behind but a hollow shell. I knew there wasn’t anything I could do for Alex Mueller. One minute, two minutes, three minutes, four. It wouldn’t matter to Alex how quickly I got back to the spring house where he lay, but I couldn’t stand the thought of leaving him alone. As I looked down at his body again from the doorway, at his open eyes and slim, beautiful fingers, fingers that had coaxed magnificent music out of an otherwise un-pedigreed violin, I grieved for his talent, silenced forever.

It was cold in the spring house, damp. I resisted the urge to return to the house for a blanket to cover him with, or a shawl, because I knew better than to add or subtract anything from the scene before the police got there.

So I sat down near a rhododendron in a patch of sun, hugged my knees to my chin and wept. Barefooted and bare-legged, my torn gown and stained petticoats pooled around me, I must have looked like Cinderella, sulking in front of the fireplace long before her fairy godmother turned up to wave her magic wand.

In the time it took for the first emergency vehicle to arrive, I kept turning a single thought over and over in my mind. Back in Amy’s bedroom, when I didn’t know who had climbed into bed with me, I’d said his name: ‘Alex?’

Had I signed Alex Mueller’s death warrant that night?