Jane learned that Elizabeth’s “Molly” was Margaret Clarendon. She’d been employed by Emil Roth from the time he’d moved into the castle until three months after the deaths of John McCawley and Elizabeth Roth. She’d died, unmarried, according to the records, sixth months after her dismissal, when she’d careened off a cliff. Whether she’d thrown herself off or fallen, there was no record. But her death had been labeled accidental. Had Margaret Clarendon thrown herself off the cliff? Remorseful for what she had done? Or bitter, because with all her machinations she’d failed to win the lord of the castle? No way to tell from the records. So Jane left the office and headed up the stairs again to the second level. As she climbed, she remembered to grip the handrail.
Halfway up, she ran into Scully Adair.
“Do you know anything?” Scully asked her anxiously.
“No, Scully, I’m so sorry. I wish I did.”
“They questioned me forever. They think I’m a murderer!”
“Not necessarily, Scully. They have to question everyone like that,” Jane assured her.
“They still have Emil in there,” Scully said.
“He’ll be fine,” Jane said.
“I just wish he’d come out. They’re talking to everyone so long.”
“They’re being thorough, listening for something someone might not even realize is a clue to what is going on.”
“I’m going to get some coffee and something to eat. Do you want to come?” Scully asked her.
“I’ll be there in a minute. I have something to check on,” Jane said. “I promise, I’ll be right along.”
Scully nodded, then gripped the banister tightly as she went on down the stairs.
When Jane reached the bridal suite, she was alone. Elizabeth was nowhere to be seen and Jane didn’t sense her presence. She went straight to her computer and video-phoned Angela at the home offices of the Krewe in Virginia.
Angela was with the first Krewe of Hunters. She’d earned her stripes in New Orleans. She was now married to Jackson Crow, the field director for all Krewe agents. While Jackson managed most of their commitments, there was still their overall head, Adam Harrison, who’d first recognized those out there with special intuition—that ability to talk to the dead. He was an incredibly kind man with a talent for finding and recruiting the right people for his Krewe.
Angela came online. She was a beautiful blonde who looked like she should have starred in a noir movie.
“Anything?” she asked Jane.
“So much!”
Jane told her about the morning’s events, then said, “I need you to do a search on a woman named Margaret Clarendon, who lived here in the mid-1800s. Find out anything you can about her—before and after she worked for the Roth family.”
“What are you thinking?”
“Elizabeth Roth believes that she was murdered, and that her fiancé was murdered, too. She thinks she was killed by this maid.”
“And that will help you now?” Angela asked.
“I think so,” Jane said. “There’s no one to benefit from Emil Roth’s death or from him being ruined. There has to be another motive.”
“And you think Margaret Clarendon, despite the fact that she might have been a murderess, felt that ill was done to her?”
“We’ve seen it before. Sometimes there’s a descendant out there who feels that they have to right a family wrong,” Jane said.
“But remember that sometimes people just act on greed, jealousy, or revenge. Modern day psychos or self-centered asses,” Angela reminded her.
“I’ll watch from all sides,” Jane promised her.
She said good-bye and they cut the connection. Jane drummed her fingers on the table for a minute, and then hopped up again. She was going to have to wait for results, but she couldn’t sit idly by.
Time to try to pay a visit to John McCawley again.
“Here’s what I can’t figure. If Mrs. Avery was hit on the head, she had to have been hit on the head with something. Where is that something she was hit with?” Sloan asked.
“Whoever hit her took it with them,” Logan said.
Sloan was the one driving as they headed back to the castle. He saw a coffee shop and switched on his blinker, ready to pull into the lot.
“We’re stopping for coffee,” Logan said.
Sloan grinned. “I thought we’d try for a little more gossip.”
“Sounds good to me. And coffee, too,” Logan told him.
They went in and were noticed right away by the hostess, who stood at the cash register. A number of patrons were sitting around at the various faux-leather booths. They were definitely the outsiders, probably known as the people who were the guests at the castle. Where bad things happened.
“Sit anywhere?” Sloan said, smiling at the cashier.
“Wherever,” she said.