A mufflied voice came through the wardrobe’s back panel. “Who else would it be? Glad to know I’ve got the right address, at least. Think you could let me in?”
“I don’t know,” said Emma. “You’re in back of a wardrobe that must weigh at least a ton.”
A muted groan came through the wall.
“Hang on,” said Emma. “Let me take a look.” She dumped her clothes unceremoniously out of the wardrobe and onto the floor, then flicked on Crowley’s flashlight and examined the back panel. “I don’t see any hinges, but there’s a row of pegs down the center of the panel. Maybe, if I ...” She climbed into the wardrobe and, crouching, tugged at the top peg. It came away in her hand, and the others followed suit. Stepping back out of the wardrobe, she called, “Try sliding the right side of the panel sideways.”
The panel rattled, creaked, and finally began to shift slowly, one half slipping neatly behind the other. Cool, musty air wafted out of the darkness; then Derek emerged, with a flashlight in one hand, dusty smudges on his face, and cobwebs in his hair.
Emma pulled her robe around her and schooled her face into a neutral expression. Derek took one look at her and began to apologize as though his life depended on it.
“Emma, I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am that I didn’t let you know what I was up to. I should’ve come by sooner, and I meant to, but I’ve been rather on the go these past few days, and I simply lost track of the time, and I know it’s a piss-poor excuse, so all I can say is that I hope you’ll forgive me and I promise that it won’t ever happen again.” He paused to take a breath, sneezed three times in a row, wiped his nose on a dusty sleeve, sneezed once more, then peered down at her imploringly and added, “What d’you say?”
Emma was vaguely unsettled by the amount of pleasure Derek’s heartfelt apology gave her. “I guess this means that I don’t get to smack you in the kisser,” she said, half to herself. Then, smiling: “It’s okay, Derek. Now, go in the other room and wait there while I put on some clothes.”
Emma changed quickly into her gray trousers and Nanny Cole’s blue sweater, returned the rest of her clothes to the wardrobe, and joined Derek in the bedroom. He was perched on the arm of one of the overstuffed chairs, peering at a schematic drawing from the old portfolio.
“Told you the place was a honeycomb,” he said. “Meant to take my time exploring it, but, circumstances being what they are, I pushed it a bit.” He handed her the house plan. “An annotated version.”
“Secret passages?” Emma asked, tracing a line of red ink with her finger.
“Most weren’t included on the older set of house plans, none at all on the newer ones. Want to see what I’ve found?”
Emma didn’t bother to answer. Instead, she turned off all the lights in her room, switched on her flashlight, and headed for the wardrobe, where she moved aside to let Derek take the lead. Once she’d closed the wardrobe door behind her, she pushed through the hanging dresses and stepped into the gaping hole, then waited while Derek slid the panel back into place. As the darkness enfolded them, Derek said, in a low, excited voice, “You’re not going to believe this.”
18
The flashlights danced an eerie pas de deux on the smooth stone walls, and the silence was absolute. No moaning wind disturbed the musty air, no lightning pierced the inky darkness. The coming storm might break and shake the rafters, but it would not touch the core of Penford Hall.
The massive building slumbered all around them, and the passage stretched before them endlessly. The floor was dry and level, the ceiling high enough for Emma to walk upright, though Derek crept, half crouching, by her side. They scanned the way ahead, their shoulders touching, the thick stone walls absorbing every sound.
“I imagine the castle had a network of passages just like this one,” Derek told her. “Grayson’s predecessors probably used it to store their loot.”
“But I thought the first duke gave up piracy,” Emma objected.
“And what did he get in return? A title and a scrap of land unsuitable for farming. Old habits die hard, Emma, and food must be put on the table. I’ll wager the old devil gave up piracy for smuggling and perhaps a spot of wrecking now and then.”
In the past, small coastal towns had considered shipwrecks a boon to the local economy. For some, “wrecking” had become a way of life. Emma had read chilling tales of bonfires lit to lure ships to their doom, of sailors left to perish while their vessels were plundered. “The Nether Shoals would make it easy enough,” she agreed, with a shudder.
“I’m all for carrying on family traditions,” Derek commented dryly, “but there’s such a thing as carrying them too far. Ah, here we are.” He played the beam of his flashlight on a narrow opening to his right, where a spiral staircase wound away into the darkness. “Runs from the subcellars to the roof,” he explained. “This passage and several others feed into it, and at least four rooms open off of it.”