Leo let out a shout of laughter, then proceeded to entertain us with stories about his life in Australia, where he’d worked shearing sheep, mining opals, picking grapes, crewing racing yachts, and tending bars in small towns and big cities alike. It sounded to me as though he’d spent the past forty-odd years exploring the continent rather than pursuing a career, and I admired him for it. What he lacked in material possessions, he more than made up for in memories.
When Kit and I had eaten our fi ll, Leo looked at us from under his white eyebrows and said with a wry smile, “I hope the pair of you didn’t drag yourselves out on such a fi lthy day just to check up on me.”
“We didn’t,” Kit said. “As a matter of fact, we were looking for someone—a tall, thin man wearing a long cloak and pointed boots.
Have you seen anyone like that since you’ve been here?”
“Sorry, mate, no,” said Leo, shaking his head. “I haven’t seen a soul since I arrived—excepting your good selves, that is.”
“If you do, will you let me know?” said Kit. “We don’t know who he is, and since young children ride at the stables . . .”
“Say no more,” said Leo, tapping the side of his nose. “I’ll keep an eye peeled for the mongrel.”
Kit hauled water from the spring to rinse the dishes, and Leo produced a towel to dry them. By then a steady rain had begun to fall,
70 Nancy Atherton
and Kit decided that it was time for us to return to Anscombe Manor.
I didn’t argue with him. I thought we’d accomplished quite a bit in the past four hours. Granted, we hadn’t laid eyes on Rendor, but we’d proved that the twins hadn’t invented him and we’d identified Aldercot Hall as his likely lair. We’d have to gather more hard evidence before I could state conclusively to Bill—or to the police—that a pervert was at large, but we had enough to be going on with.
I’d also had enough of the great outdoors. I couldn’t wait to get home, get out of my grungy clothes, and get into a steamy, gardeniascented bath. I was all ears, therefore, when Leo suggested a return route that didn’t involve climbing.
“If you go through there,” he advised, pointing to a gap in the trees encircling the hollow, “you can follow the old track along the north pasture.”
“I know where the old track is,” said Kit, “and I was planning to take it. I grew up here, too.”
“You’ll know your way round, then,” said Leo.
“Well, I didn’t grow up here,” I put in, “so I’m glad you guys are so familiar with the lie of the land. I wasn’t looking forward to scaling Emma’s Hill again.”
“Emma’s Hill?” Leo’s eyebrows rose. “Is that what you call it? In my day it was called High Point. But I like Emma’s Hill better.”
I pulled my day pack onto my shoulders and invited Leo to stop by the cottage for a cup of tea before he left the area.
“You can’t miss it,” I told him. “It’s a mile up the lane from Anscombe Manor, on the left. My husband is in London at the moment, but I’d love to introduce you to my sons.”
“You must come to the manor house as well,” Kit chimed in.
“I’m sure the Harrises would like to meet you.”
“The Harrises,” said Leo. “Do they own the manor now?”
“They’ve owned it for more than a decade,” Kit informed him.
“They’re good people. You must come and say hello to them before you leave.”
Aunt Dimity: Vampire Hunter
71
“I’ll have to check my social calendar,” said Leo, grinning, “but I think I might be able to fi t them in.”
Kit and I thanked him warmly for his hospitality, then made our way through the gap in the trees and onto the rutted, weedy lane that skirted Anscombe Manor’s north pasture. I didn’t like leaving Leo alone in the rain, but after listening to him recount his adventures in the Australian bush, I agreed with Kit—Leo was a man who liked his independence.
“Well,” I said, sidestepping a rain-pitted puddle, “Leo’s not Rendor. He’s not skinny or pale, and he was wearing the wrong kind of boots. Plus, he’s too jolly to be a creepy, child-molesting pseudovampire. So you must have been right about the boot prints in the first place. Rendor must have been heading for Aldercot Hall.” I stopped walking and looked at Kit in alarm. “He may be terrorizing the DuCarals as we speak.”
“Or he may be their guest,” Kit pointed out. “We won’t know until we go there, and we’re not going there today. It’s too far. We’d end up coming back in the dark. Why don’t we pay the DuCarals a visit tomorrow morning?”
“Count me in,” I said.
Kit nodded. “In the meantime I’ll talk to the staff about safety and security. We’re always vigilant, but until we find out more about Rendor, we’ll need to be extra vigilant.”
“You should tell them about Leo, too,” I said. “We don’t want any of the young bucks tackling him by mistake.”
“I’ll see to it that no one bothers Leo.” Kit paused for a moment, then added, “Although, if you think about it, we don’t really know who Leo is. He talked a lot about the years he spent Down Under, but he didn’t say much about his life in England.”