Three of the ladies made their way back to the house while Aunt Alva and Mrs. Stanford and I waited in the pavilion until the police arrived. At Mrs. Stanford’s insistence, Aunt Alva stopped pressing Clara for answers, though she never unpinned her gaze from the girl, not even for an instant. Not that she had much to worry about. Clara barely moved, but instead continued in an almost catatonic trance with her back jammed against the column.
I maintained my vigil beside Madame Devereaux and on one occasion even had to nudge her upright or she might have tumbled over at my feet. That slight movement of her body had seemed so lifelike, bolts of alarm shot through me, and only a firm inner admonishment could resettle my nerves. I’d closed Madame’s eyes, but that didn’t make it any easier to gaze down at that lifeless face or place my hand on that frigid, stiffening shoulder.
Once I felt assured of having her well balanced in the chair, I used the opportunity to study my surroundings. The tarot cards, fanned across the table, meant little to me at first—merely tools of the woman’s trade—until I connected them to the coins littering the tiles beside the desk. Then it struck me. The medium hadn’t simply been awaiting the arrival of Aunt Alva and her guests; she had been engaged in reading someone’s fortune.
Whose, Clara’s? Would a maid have money for such a frivolity? I considered questioning Clara right then, but another glance at the glazed vacancy in her eyes assured me of the unlikelihood of receiving a lucid answer. I resumed my inspection of the pavilion, until something sent me hurrying from Madame Devereaux’s side.
“Look at this,” I said to no one in particular. I bent low, examining bits of muddy grass and tiny pebbles tracked across the floor. I traced the untidy path from Madame Devereaux’s chair to a few feet from the pavilion’s entrance, where the concentration of plant matter suddenly thinned, no doubt due to the arrival of the ladies and me. Apparently we had scattered the evidence with our own footsteps.
Still, I searched for telltale contours that might with some accuracy be called footprints, yet I could make out nothing substantial enough to identify a type or size of shoe. My only educated guess was that the shoes had been damp in order to have tracked in the mess.
Odd. It hadn’t rained in days.
“Finally. The police are here.” The sounds of tramping feet rendered Aunt Alva’s announcement unnecessary.
I couldn’t have said which emotion reigned supreme inside me, relief or chagrin. Yes, I was thankful the authorities had arrived, but the expression on Detective Jesse Whyte’s face made my stomach sink. But perhaps I should clarify. The moment our gazes met, his ironic expression proclaimed he’d not only realized I was once again caught up in a murder investigation, but that he wasn’t the least bit happy about it. I suddenly wished I’d returned to the house when Consuelo had.
Jesse’s first words to me dismissed any doubts I might have had about his sentiments. “Really, Emma? So soon after last time? Is this something you particularly enjoy?”
“There were footsteps. I heard them, sir. Running across the grass.”
“She’s lying!”
Once again I hastened to intervene between my aunt and Clara Parker. “Please, Aunt Alva, let her answer Detective Whyte’s questions. How else will we learn the truth?”
“We won’t learn the truth if the chit insists on lying.”
While the uniformed men proceeded to question Marble House’s battalion of servants, the rest of us had moved into the house and upstairs to the room that had once served as Uncle William’s study during the short time he’d lived here before the divorce. Of all the rooms in Marble House, this was the least ornate and the most practical, with clean, masculine lines rendered in leather and hardwood furnishings. Here, one needn’t hesitate to sit for fear of ruining priceless embroidered silks or smudging a gilded finish.
Clara was seated in a stiff-backed side chair in the middle of the room, her body so rigid she might have been held with ropes. One by one, Roberta and Edwina Spooner gave their statements to Jesse and his partner, Detective Dobbs. Next, the officers questioned Lady Amelia, and finally, Hope Stanford. Each gave a nearly identical version of the story. Had they seen anyone other than their little group enter or leave the pavilion? No. Had they seen anyone else in the vicinity of the pavilion? No. In the gardens? No. Were they together during the estimated time of the murder? Yes. And what did they see upon entering the pavilion?
Again, the answers were all the same: Madame Devereaux slumped over the card table and Clara Parker standing directly behind her, her hands on the dead woman’s neck.