Page 25 of Murder in Moonlight
“Your favorite horse?” Solomon asked lightly.
“Yes. She was my first adult riding horse, and now she is my sister’s.”
“She still loves you too.”
“They do love, you know. Papa used to laugh at me for believing so.”
“I expect he was teasing,” Solomon said diplomatically. He approached the mare and idly stroked her nose. “I’m sorry you have all this mess to put up with. It is bad enough mourning a parent without having police prying into everything.”
“Do you think they will?” she asked naïvely. “My father was not nobody, you know.”
“I do know. So do the police, which is precisely why they are bound to fully investigate what happened and why.”
Miriam shook her head, closing her eyes as if that could prevent her from seeing the inevitable images scored across her mind. “Who would do such a thing? I cannot believe anyone in this house is responsible. Itmustbe an intruder.”
“Perhaps the police will find it is so,” Solomon said. He didn’t believe it, but it seemed kinder, and the girl looked so lost, her safe world turned upside down. She could only have beennineteen years old. “Did your father have enemies beyond these walls?”
“Enemies?” she said, startled. “I was thinking more of a disturbed burglar, a madman…”
Since Winsom had been stabbed in the back, he had clearly not disturbed whoever killed him. Unless he was running for help…? No, that made no more sense than the madman theory.
“We must help the police consider all possibilities,” Solomon murmured. “Your father was a successful man. It is difficult to achieve what he did without making some enemies—however inadvertent. I speak from experience here.”
She regarded him, frowning, her eyes unexpectedly direct. Slowly, she nodded. “Then I must take your word for it. I do remember a man swore at him in the street once—it must have been a year or so ago—because Papa had dismissed him from the bank. But to commit murder…”
“It would need to be a powerful grudge,” Solomon agreed. “That is why I ask about known enemies.”
“Mr. Bolton would know more about such things. He would not discuss them with us.”
“Mr. and Mrs. Bolton must be a great comfort to your family,” Solomon said. “You will have known them a long time.”
“All my life. Or, at least, all I can remember of it. They are family friends as well as Mr. Bolton being Papa’s partner in the bank.”
“I wonder which came first?” Solomon said. “Were they friends before they formed the bank?”
“Yes, since they were at school. Papa made a sizeable sum on imports and on the stock exchange. Mr. Bolton is a genius with figures and accounting. According to Papa, he had the money and the imagination, Mr. Bolton the necessary financial skill, which was how they came to found the bank.”
“It has an excellent reputation. I’m sure your brother will continue the fine tradition.”
For an instant, Miriam looked doubtful, then she smiled. “He will.”
“I don’t suppose,” Solomon said apologetically, “that there were any quarrels with neighbors? Tenants? Anything like that?”
She shook her head immediately. “Not while I lived here, and I never heard of anything after I married. I’m sure Mama would have told me.”
Solomon nodded. He had thought she would say that, though he would still ask around. “I am only a new friend,” he said, “but if I can help in any way, know that I will.”
“Thank you,” she said huskily.
Solomon inclined his head, beginning to move on toward his horses, who, hearing his voice, were whinnying at the far end of the stable. By way of a parting shot, he said, “Your father must have been very proud to see you settled so happily with such a fine man as Mr. Albright.”
It took her by surprise. She blinked several times. “Yes. It was what he wanted for me.” She tried to smile, a trembling effort that steadied under his gaze.
He merely smiled back and moved on, but he had already seen more than she had intended, more than he had.
Constance was right. Miriam did not love her husband, but she was strong enough to live with the choice. Just for a moment, her determination had wobbled, as if she were acknowledging that her father had only had a year to enjoy her appropriate marriage. Miriam had a lifetime. And if she had waited a year, she probably would not have married him at all.
How angry did that make her under the surface of her gentle demeanor?
