Sir Percy seemed undaunted by the entrance hall’s funereal ambience. He dashed past me, leapt onto the staircase’s bottom step, and flung his arms wide. With his twinkling blue eyes and fluffy, windblown hair, he looked like a slightly mad Santa as he proclaimed, “Welcome to Dundrillin Castle!”
His words were still echoing from the walls when a tapestry drape was pushed aside and a gray-haired, angular woman strode across the entrance hall to join us at the bottom of the stairs. She wore a pale gray twinset, a tweed skirt, and sensible shoes, and her long, pointed face was dominated by a long, pointed nose. She was as thin as a rail and almost as tall as Sir Percy, and she wore her iron-gray hair in a neat, chin-length bob that only served to emphasize her bony jawline.
“Ah, Mrs. Gammidge,” said Sir Percy. “Lori, Will, Rob—this is Mrs. Gammidge, my housekeeper.”
“How do you do, Ms. Shepherd, Master Will, Master Rob?” she said, nodding to each of us in turn.
“Mrs. Gammidge manages all of my estates,” Sir Percy explained. “We don’t usually come north until late May, but she and a few of the staff traveled up from Kent early, to make the castle ready for you.”
An unexpected lump rose in my throat. Kent was in the south of England, hundreds of miles from Scotland’s Western Isles.
“That’s a long way to go at a moment’s notice,” I said, much moved.
“We had nearly a week’s notice, Ms. Shepherd,” Mrs. Gammidge put in. She had a clipped, no-nonsense manner of speaking and the faint trace of a Scottish accent. “We could have made the journey and prepared for your arrival in far less time, had the need presented itself. We are a well-organized household.”
“Bill rang me ten days ago and asked me to be on standby, just in case,” Sir Percy informed me. “We would have made the move next month at any rate, and what’s a few weeks between friends? Mrs. Gammidge has been apprised of the situation, of course, and has taken appropriate action.”
“What appropriate action?” I said, puzzled.
“It’s not uncommon for a man in Sir Percy’s position to become a target for all manner of unpleasantness,” said the housekeeper. “Corporate espionage, blackmail, and kidnappings as well as the occasional death threat are not unknown to us. Security, therefore, is our watchword. I’ve swept your room for bugs—”
“Bugs?” I interrupted, more puzzled still.
“Listening devices,” she explained. “I’ve swept your sons’ rooms, too, and I’m pleased to report that I’ve found nothing suspicious. Cook, of course, has been with us for nearly forty years, so there’s no need to worry about the food. Won’t you come this way?”
As she led our little group up the staircase, I stared at the back of her head in dismay. I hadn’t been worried about food until she’d mentioned it. It had never occurred to me that Abaddon might try to poison us, and the thought of him spying on us electronically hadn’t crossed my mind. As the boys and I raced to keep up with Mrs. Gammidge, it struck me that Sir Percy Pelham inhabited a world quite different from my own. In mine, housekeepers checked under the beds for dust bunnies. In his, they looked for concealed microphones.
Mrs. Gammidge turned right at the second-story landing, strode down a red-carpeted corridor, and came to a halt before a pair of rough-hewn oak doors with elaborate black iron handles.
“I’m sure your guests will wish to see their rooms and freshen up after their journey,” she said, addressing her remarks to Sir Percy, “but I thought it advisable for them to meet Mr. Hunter and Mr. Ross straightaway.”
“Hunter and Ross here already?” said Sir Percy. “Good. We’re on schedule.”
“We are ahead of schedule, sir,” said Mrs. Gammidge. “Mr. Hunter and Mr. Ross arrived last night. I’ve set out a little light refreshment in the parlor, and lunch will be served in the dining room at one o’clock. Would you care to advise Cook on dinner, or shall we leave it to her to decide the menu?”
“Best leave it to Cook,” said Sir Percy. “She’ll know what we have on hand.”
While they discussed household affairs, the boys and I surveyed the corridor. Although carpeted, it had a stark, slightly spooky feel to it.The ceiling was arched in a barrel-shaped curve, and the stone walls were rough and unfinished, like those in the entrance hall. Wrought-iron torch brackets fitted with electric bulbs had been mounted on the walls at regular intervals, but the bulbs flickered so erratically that they seemed to shed more shadow than light—they made Mrs. Gammidge’s angular face look positively skeletal. The eeriness did not go unnoticed by Will or Rob. Although they didn’t breathe a word, they edged so close to me that they were nearly standing on my feet.
“Shall I send Mr. Hunter and Mr. Ross down now, sir?” Mrs. Gammidge inquired.
“The sooner the better,” said Sir Percy. “Thank you, Mrs. Gammidge, I’ll take it from here.”
The housekeeper nodded and sped off down the corridor. Sir Percy took hold of the black iron handles and pushed the oak doors inward.
I winced, and the boys cried out in pain.
Five