Page 16 of Murder at Donwell Abbey

“Emma, must you keep going outside?” her father exclaimed. “You’ll catch a chill!”

“I’m perfectly well. George will come inside in a few minutes, and then—”

Isabella suddenly burst into the room. “Emma, what is happening here? Why is the footman guarding the door? He didn’t wish to let me in.”

Harry hovered in the doorway. “Begging your pardon, Mrs. Knightley.” He glanced at Isabella. “Er, and Mrs. Knightley. But Mr. Knightley told me to stand outside the door and wait for him. So I was just doing what he said.”

“It’s fine,” said Emma. “I’ll speak to you—”

“I insist you tell me what’s wrong!” Isabella’s gaze darted to their father. “Is Father unwell? Should we fetch Mr. Perry?”

“Father is perfectly fine, but—”

“I am not perfectly fine,” Father huffed. “And neither is anyone else, especially that poor, dead girl on the terrace.”

Harry went bug-eyed, while Isabella pressed a hand to her bodice. “Emma, what is Father talking about?”

“It’s Prudence, the maid,” said Miss Bates. “She fell out the window and killed herself.”

“What?” Her sister’s shriek made Emma wince.

“Isabella, please. We don’t yet fully know what has happened. We must be calm.”

“How can we be calm?” Father dramatically pronounced. “There’s a dead girl on the terrace, and Emma and Miss Bates have caught a terrible chill going out to look at her. We shallallcome down with fevers, I know it!”

Isabella gazed at him in horror, and then burst into tears.

Emma sighed as she once more crossed to the drinks trolley, this time to fetch a sherry for her sister. She couldn’t help thinking of all the family occasions that had ended on a similar note of panic—sans a dead body, of course.

Sadly, she knew the evening would only get worse.

CHAPTER4

“How inconvenient that Dr. Hughes has left the party,” Emma said to George as she leaned against his desk. “Normally, one cannot get rid of the man.”

Her husband was jotting notes in his diary—his observations about the body, no doubt. “He had an early appointment tomorrow and did not wish to wear himself out with the evening’s revelries.”

She couldn’t hold back a strangled laugh. “He actually said that?”

“He did indeed. By the by, Dr. Hughes was very impressed by your hospitality.”

“I suspect that good grace will not survive our current situation.”

She glanced at the small casement clock on the desk. Almost an hour had passed since Miss Bates discovered the body. It now was beginning to feel like they were kicking up their heels, waiting for something to happen.

Of course, it had taken some time to soothe Father’s anxieties and Isabella’s hysterics. Thankfully, Mr. Perry had been called in to help. The solicitous apothecary had administered a calming draught to both Father and Isabella, and even now sat with them, supplying a steady stream of medical reassurance.

“Mr. Perry, at least, has not abandoned us in our time of need,” Emma commented.

George closed his diary. “I suspect Dr. Hughes will be displeased to see Perry. He might see it as a challenge to his authority.”

She rolled her eyes. “Dr. Hughes should be grateful to Perry. Otherwise, he’d be dealing with a room full of hysterical witnesses.”

Miss Bates hurried over to join them. “Mr. Knightley, I do hate to bother, but how much longer do you think we must wait? Mr. Woodhouse is fretful, and I fear my mother is tiring.”

“I apologize, Miss Bates,” said George. “But Dr. Hughes should be here very soon.”

“What if Isabella took Mrs. Bates home in our carriage?” Emma suggested. “Mrs. Bates didn’t truly hear anything, and Isabella wasn’t even in the room. The carriage can then return for Father and Miss Bates. Surely Dr. Hughes will be finished interviewing them by that point.”