“They don’t know anything. None of us knows anything.”
“Then it’s my time that’s wasted, isn’t it?” Frank replied, tucking his notebook back into his pocket but giving it a little pat to remind her that he had her name if she thought about giving him any more trouble.
She sniffed again and started into the house, surging ahead like a schooner at full mast. Frank had to assume she expected him to follow, which he did, but the instant he reached the doorway, she turned abruptly and snapped, “Wipe your feet before you come in here!”
Cow, he thought, but he wiped his feet. Didn’t want her complaining to VanDamm about his manners. It would be bad enough when she complained about his visit.
The interior of the house was dim, since the windows were all heavily draped. The sun faded fabrics, as his mother had told him time and again, and the VanDamms had a lot of fabric to fade. It hung in lavish folds around each window and was upholstered onto numerous pieces of furniture. This Frank glimpsed through a series of doorways during his hasty trip through the entrance hall to the long staircase at its opposite end. The hallway was paneled in dark wainscoting and wallpaper so elaborately patterned it made him dizzy to stare at it. An amazingly large crystal chandelier hung down from the second story. He knew exactly what Kathleen would’ve said: How in heaven’s name do they clean it?
He followed the housekeeper up the stairs and remembered when he’d followed Sarah Brandt up a similar set of stairs. He’d been tempted to look at her ankles, but he wasn’t the least bit tempted to look at Mrs. Hightower’s.
Upstairs, the hallway branched to the left and right, seeming to go on forever in each direction. She turned right, still surging along like a ship at full sail, never even glancing back to make sure he was behind her. A thick carpet muffled their footsteps, and Frank was struck by how silent the house was. Silent and forlorn, as if it were mourning the loss of the girl who had lived here. Or maybe it was just the result of the place being uninhabited, Frank thought, because no one really lived here even when they were here.
A little astonished at such a profound thought, Frank almost didn’t realize the housekeeper had stopped in front of one of the closed doors. Her hand was on the knob, but she hesitated for a long moment. Frank thought she was just being obstinate, making him wait so she could show her power over him. But then he noticed she was blinking furiously as she stared resolutely at the panel of the door. Good God, she was trying not to weep. For all her coldness, she must have genuinely cared for the dead girl.
Maybe Frank could use this to his advantage.
After waiting respectfully for her to regain her composure, he remarked, “You must’ve known her a long time.”
“Since the day she was born, right here in this house.” Her voice was thick with unshed tears, tears she was probably too proud to let Frank see.
“Mr. VanDamm said she’d been here a little over a month. I guess she hadn’t been feeling too well.”
Mrs. Hightower, fully recovered now, glared at him. “It was nerves, is all. That girl was never sick a day in her life.”
“What did she have to be nervous about?”
Her thin lips thinned down even more, obviously because she realized she’d already told him more than she’d intended. “I’m sure it’s not my place to know. Well-bred girls are all high strung.”
“Like thoroughbred horses,” Frank suggested.
Mrs. Hightower did not approve of his comparison. “Miss Alicia was sensitive. She let things upset her.”
Now if Frank could only find out what those things were. “She was like her mother, then?” he suggested.
“Her mother?” she echoed suspiciously.
“Mrs. VanDamm,” Frank prodded, wondering if she could have actually forgotten her own mistress.
Her expression pinched with disapproval. “She’s nothing like Mrs. VanDamm. She’s an angel.”
Frank watched as she realized the irony of her assertion. Her strong face sagged with despair as the reality of her loss struck her anew.
He gave her only a moment to absorb the impact before using her weakness to press his case. “Is the door locked?”
She glanced at it in surprise, as if she’d only just realized where she was. “No, of course not. Why would it be locked?”
“Then you can go about your work while I look around. I’ll let you know when I’m ready to talk to the servants.”
For a second he thought she would refuse to leave, but then she glanced at the door again, and he could see how painful it was for her to even consider opening it. Just as he’d suspected it would be.
After making him wait another few seconds, she nodded. “I’ll be in the kitchen.” And then a final, sharp, “Don’t disturb anything,” before she launched herself down the hallway again.
Frank waited until she was on her way down the stairs before he opened the door. It was solid oak and moved silently on its hinges. No squeaking here. The interior of the room was dark like the rest of the house, the drapes drawn against the glare of the sun. Giving his eyes a chance to adjust, Frank looked around, getting his bearings. Then he went to one of the windows on the far wall and pulled back the draperies. He needed a minute to figure out how the chords worked for tying it back, and when he had it secured, he looked around again.
The room was large, larger than his entire flat back in the city. And if he’d known nothing about Alicia VanDamm before, he would know everything about her from simply seeing this place. While her room at the boardinghouse had been stark and impersonal, this one was hers entirely. The furniture was white with gold leaf accents, everything curved and delicate and graceful and completely feminine. The drapes and the coverlet on the bed and the canopy over it were all a pale rose and of some kind of rich material. The wallpaper depicted scenes of young maidens frolicking gaily. In one corner sat a doll’s house. Frank walked over to examine it more closely, and he saw it was furnished with remarkable attention to detail, even to the curtains on the windows. Everything was all arranged, just so, and the tiny doll family were seated around the dining room table. They even had real china dishes and a maid to serve them. Next to the house stood a chest, and when Frank lifted the lid, he found toys inside. Some dolls, worn from years of playing, the paint of their faces almost rubbed off and their clothes ragged from use. A top. A life-sized tea set. Everything had a neglected air about it, as if it hadn’t been used in some time, but Frank couldn’t help noticing the things were still here, near at hand, as if their owner hadn’t quite been ready to part with them yet. As if the owner hadn’t been ready to leave her childhood just yet.
Frank had been thinking of Alicia VanDamm as a young woman. She was pregnant, after all, so she most certainly had a lover, but now he was struck with how recently she had taken that step into adulthood. So recently that her toys were still here in her room, as if she wanted to be able to maintain her ties with the world of childhood while also trying her hand at being an adult.
Frank glanced around again, trying to imagine what kind of a person Alicia VanDamm must have been. Her room spoke of innocence. And purity. Neither of which applied to Alicia VanDamm. Something was out of kilter here, and Frank needed to find out what.
And more importantly, why.
He started his search of the room and conducted it systematically, going through each drawer and cupboard carefully so as not to disturb the contents. Mrs. Hightower would probably know what he’d done, but at least she wouldn’t be able to complain he’d left things in a mess. And of course if he didn’t leave things in a mess, he could always deny he’d searched the room at all. He reached beneath the mattress and checked under the chair bottoms and behind each piece of furniture. Behind and under every drawer. He even took each of the books off the shelf and shook them out. Examining every possible hiding place. He had no idea what he was looking for, of course. A diary naming her killer would have been just the thing, but naturally, he didn’t find one.