Page 90 of Ghost in the Garden
Constance caught her gaze and held it fiercely. “You are covering up amurder!”
“So I am, dear, so I am,” Ida said comfortably.
And that was when Constance realized she had seen more than the apron on the floor. She glanced down again to be sure. A corked and labeled bottle of wine, still dusty from its stay in the cellar.
Her mind reeled. For the barest instant, she grasped blindly for the significance, and finally caught it. Ida wasn’t covering for Angela. She had taken the bottle and hidden it to trick Duggin and Lambert, and very probably Angela too. Constance couldn’t take her eyes off it.
“And Gregg?” she managed. “Why did Gregg have to die?”
“He knew too much. He threatened Angela as well as Lambert when he decided to spill his guts to the inquiry. He came round here specially to tell them that. Couldn’t let him do it. So I had a quick word when he was leaving.”
And now Constance knew too much too. That Solomon was only a few yards away on the other side of that door was not the comfort it should have been. She had to grab the evidence and get out of here…
Ida was edging toward the door side of the bed, stretching her feet toward the floor.
“It was you with Gregg’s body that we chased to the edge of Devil’s Acre,” Constance blurted. “How on earth did you get it from the cellar and onto the donkey’s back?”
“Angela helped me, of course. She knew what I’d done and why. We’re used to working quick, her and me. And you were obliging enough, you and your lovely man, to wait where she’d put you.”
“Did she always know the body was in the cellar?”
“Not till you told her.” Feet on the floor, Ida bent as though to tie her flapping shoelaces.
“Did she know about Caleb, too? Is she covering for you, or did you plan it tog—”
Contance ducked down and swiped up the bottle and the apron. In the same movement, she began to sprint back around the bed—and then skidded to a halt, for Ida lunged right at her, a bloody axe in both hands, wielded high above her head.
*
Solomon was notunaware of Duggin’s hostility. In truth, he returned it. He was just better at keeping his distaste in check. He wished Constance better luck with the cook. Mostly, he was relieved that she had opened her mind to the possibility that Angela was the guilty party. Guilty of more than reluctant complicity with her husband.
He knew it hurt Constance. She had felt some kind of bond with the woman, an understanding that may have been sincere on one level but not on any others. A shared background of crime and squalor, followed by a climb to riches, did not make them sisters. But Constance liked to see the best in people, and where Angela was concerned, the scales seemed to fall from her eyes very slowly.
They needed the servants’ testimony to get to Angela. The police would never get it from them, and clearly Constance carried no weight with Duggin, to whom she was still an outsider.
Solomon tried a different tactic.
“So is this it?”
“What?” Duggin asked.
“The rest of your life. From Lambert’s strongman to Mrs. Lambert’s butler. Is that really enough?”
Duggin smirked. “You really don’t know what you’re talking about. Mr. Lambert was a good man, a successful man, everything strictly legal.”
“Is that why he was betrayed?”
“Ask the stupid little cow he was f—”
“Don’t bother,” Solomon said wearily. “Everyone knows Iris Fraser didn’t do it.”
Duggin regarded him with his pale, oddly inhuman eyes. “What’s it to you, anyway? Why d’you care? No one thinks it was you or your girl.”
“How do you know it wasn’t?” Solomon asked softly.
Duggin’s expression never changed. “How do you know what happens to people who ask too many questions?”
“Is that a threat, Mr. Duggin?”
