“Yes,” said Sebastian. Although she had stopped at Ludlow again on the way. She’d registered at the Feathers Inn as Mrs. Emma Chance and then set about assembling a wardrobe appropriate for a woman claiming to have been widowed some six months.
Miss Owens rested her outstretched palms on the top of one of the low stone walls edging the bridge and leaned into her arms. The air smelled of clean running water and blooming heather and sun-warmed earth, and she was silent for a moment, her gaze on the rippling waters flowing beneath them.
Then she looked over at him. “I don’t understand. Why would someone kill her? How could anyone do that? She was so full of life, so passionate, so brilliant and strong. She had her entire life ahead of her—so many dreams and plans, so much to give. And someone took it all away.”
Sebastian found it hard to meet the woman’s pain-filled gaze. “Is there nothing you can tell me—nothing at all—that might help make some sense of what happened to her?”
“No. I can’t think of anything.”
“Would you mind if I looked at her room?”
The request seemed to take her aback. Then she blew a harsh breath out through her nostrils and nodded. “No. I can see it must be done.”
“I would like your assistance.”
She nodded again and pushed away from the bridge.
Chapter 29
Emma Chandler’s chamber was one of two that lay at the top of the cottage’s steep oaken staircase. With whitewashed walls and dormer windows set into a sloping ceiling, it was a pleasant room, the view from the windows looking out across the tumbling river toward the Long Mynd. The furniture was sturdy and plain. But Emma had covered the walls with her own exquisite art. In addition to simple sketches, there were also watercolors and oils, with brooding views of the Long Mynd hanging beside thought-provoking, character-filled faces of the very old.
“She purchased a few items after she came into her inheritance,” said Miss Owens as Sebastian let his gaze drift around the room. “A silver brush and comb set, some new clothes, a trunk—and lots of art supplies, of course. But she was mainly focused on finding a house, something large enough that we could turn into a school. She wanted to stay in the area. It’s a good location for a school, halfway between Ludlow and Shrewsbury.”
“How much did she inherit? Do you know?”
“Ten thousand pounds.”
Sebastian turned to look at her in surprise. He’d been imagining a legacy of several hundred pounds, perhaps, at most. Ten thousand pounds was a substantial sum. “Who does she leave it to?”
Miss Owens gave him a blank look. “I’ve no idea. Why? Surely you don’t think her inheritance could be the reason she was killed?”
“It seems unlikely. But I don’t think we can discount it entirely.” He went to scan the titles of a row of books on a shelf mounted on the wall near the window. The volumes were simply bound but well-worn, and he noted works by Blake and Donne, Coleridge and Shakespeare. There was a copy of Hamlet, but when he took it down and turned to the last page, he found the last line intact.
“What are we looking for?” asked Jane Owens, watching him.
Sebastian slipped the book back in place. “Anything that might explain what happened to her.”
She nodded and went to open the top drawer of the small chest beside the bed.
They worked their way quietly around the room. It didn’t take long, for Emma Chandler’s possessions had been few, her habits neat and tidy. It wasn’t until he noticed a pencil sketch of Crispin Seaton tacked up near the window that something occurred to him.
“Did Lord Seaton ever write to Emma?” he asked.
Jane Owens glanced up from her search. “He did, yes. She received a letter from Windermere not long before she left.”
“Have you come across it?”
She shook her head. “No, I haven’t. You think that’s significant?”
“I don’t know.”
Jane Owens was searching a small cupboard built into the wall beside the fireplace when Sebastian noticed a strange charcoal drawing affixed to the inside of the cupboard door. A young girl of perhaps twelve or thirteen stood before a building engulfed by a raging fire, her dark hair loose and flying across her face as the fierce air currents driven by the flames whipped the hem of her dress around her. In her arms she held another child she’d obviously rescued from the fire. A child whose face, he suddenly realized, was identical to her own.
“Emma did that years ago,” said Miss Owens, following his gaze as she straightened. “I think she told me once that she was twelve.”
“It’s amazingly good.”
Jane Owens nodded. “You wouldn’t recognize it, but the burning house is Miss LaMont’s Academy.”
They stood in silence for a moment, studying the troubling and yet powerfully uplifting image.
“She’s rescuing herself,” Sebastian said after a moment.
“Yes. That was Emma.”
Jane Owens closed the cupboard door and leaned back against it. They had discovered nothing.