Page 9 of The Villain’s Fatal Plot (Gravesyde Village Mystery #1)

NINE: VERITY

Quartermaster Sergeant Rufus Russell—known as Rafe, Verity smiled a little at this insistence—was the most deliberately aggressive man she’d ever encountered. Most men she had known, however vaguely, had been polite, bowing and scraping if they wanted something and ignoring her existence otherwise.

Rafe just walked in, declared himself at home, and went to work proving it. Obnoxious . But right now, she felt like a fluffy seed blowing on the wind. She needed grounding—and a roof over her head. How many homes could one lose in a lifetime? Rafe gave her confidence that all might be well, if she developed a plan.

She wasn’t at all certain she was ready to think. It brought back too many fears...

She fed Marmie—Manny? Marmot?—some ham and cheese from the larder, then let him out. She couldn’t even decide on a name. How could she possibly decide what to do with her future? Evidence that she wasn’t thinking at all— she should have picked up scraps from the buffet for the kitten.

She fixed tea for herself. Then, while the sergeant was out, she returned to studying the floorboards in the front room. The kitchen was flagstone, so she was reasonably certain if Miss Edgerton had said boards , she meant the front room.

How did one pry up floors? She crouched down and pushed and pulled at a wide plank. She knew so extremely little of life outside of her father’s books and her uncle’s counting house... She stood again and brought her heel down on a board. It creaked but didn’t move. Were boards laid over dirt? On joists, she thought, to raise the floor above rainwater. She tried to recall treatises on architecture she’d removed from her father’s library. Had she packed any of those in the crates she’d ordered delivered here?

The original cottage floor had probably been dirt or stone. The boards most likely had been added later. She started at the kitchen end of the parlor and systematically stomped on each board with her good foot. All she did was make the broken one hurt.

Had she been wrong about Miss Edgerton’s last words? It wasn’t as if she’d been clear. It had just made sense to assume that Papers. Under... bor. . .sssss meant she’d hidden something under the floorboards. She couldn’t imagine what kind of papers, but they must be important. A will, perhaps?

She’d also said tea . Had she known she’d been poisoned? Why had she not named her killer instead? Because the papers would reveal the killer?

Shudder. There would be a reason for someone to break in. How long would it take to find out who the killer and would-be thief was? The poor sergeant couldn’t live in a lean-to in the yard forever.

And she couldn’t occupy a house not hers for very long at all. She needed to find the papers before she was thrown out.

She let Marmie in, locked the door, and faced the inevitable.

She couldn’t sleep on the sofa forever any more than Rafe could sleep in the yard. She had to go upstairs, invade Miss Edgerton’s personal quarters. She’d done this for her parents. She’d hated every minute of it, the invasion of their private lives, knowing they kept tattered underwear and love letters from their youth...

But she knew from her correspondence that Miss Edgerton seldom ever saw her sister and nieces. They were farm folk and weren’t likely to find time or means to travel from Yorkshire during harvest or anytime soon. Verity had asked in her letter to them if they wished to direct her in disposal of the cottage.

She’d be doing them a favor to start cleaning out private possessions. Or should she wait until Rafe found a maid?

In either case, she must go upstairs and look for a place to sleep. Staying in Miss Edgerton’s home seemed simpler than contemplating setting into the unknown alone—an effort akin to leaping off a mountain into the ocean. The journey here had taken all the courage she could muster.

She took the narrow stairs from the kitchen up to the wide loft over the parlor. The kitchen had been added on and had no second floor. The centuries-old cottage loft had probably once held hay for the animals kept below. People used to sleep with the animals, she’d read. She couldn’t imagine anything more unpleasant... Well, except for murder.

The loft was enclosed but not divided. A heavy drapery hung between the front and back walls, with a rope to pull it forward to create a separate room. She knew Miss Edgerton had company occasionally, since there were two beds on either side of the curtain, and she’d invited Verity to visit.

The larger side of the loft held a simple bed covered in an artistic patchwork quilt adorned with rings of blue roses. The smaller side had a cot with a folded blanket. Both sides had chests of drawers and a washstand. The larger side had a wardrobe and small mirror.

Verity thought she might sleep on the cot. It appeared virtually untouched. She opened the chest on that side and found it empty. The meager belongings she’d purchased after the fire would fit in there just fine.

There were even shelves for the small library she’d hidden in the shed and had crated up before she left. After her mother died, she’d worked her way through all her father’s shelves, saving books she wished to re-read, selling the boring ones. She had some lovely geographies she’d love to see again.

Uncle Warren had never missed the beautiful volumes. She’d tidied his office by stacking his ledgers in the empty spaces. She’d hoped that one day, she’d save enough coins to leave home and support herself, but she’d have been dead before that happened.

Now, she had her savings, plus much more. How much did cottages cost? More than she had, she supposed. But at least she was thinking a little bit again.

Reluctantly, she opened the tall wardrobe. Miss Edgerton had been tall and slender. Her clothes wouldn’t fit Verity. She’d not have felt right wearing them, anyway. She laid out each piece separately, checking for pockets and folding everything neatly. As she’d expected, the fabric was of good quality, but well worn. The quilt had probably been made of pieces too worn to wear. Miss Edgerton wore a lot of blue.

She emptied the drawers, finding nothing of value there either. She’d have to ask the church ladies if anyone could use the clothes.

She should search the desk and bookshelves downstairs next. Had Miss Edgerton known her killer? Known what he or she wanted? Her last words made it seem so, but she might be imagining what she wanted to believe.

Verity was about to head downstairs again when she noticed the rag carpet on the floor. Floorboards . The entire loft had floorboards, and there would be a ceiling below the joists, creating a space.

The hound barked a greeting. She peered out the narrow, mullioned window. The sergeant was returning already, a basket over his arm. Had she ever seen a man carrying a market basket? But he was so huge, no one would dare mock him for it. She realized she’d lived a narrow, if not sheltered life. Men who cooked...

Did she dare trust him with Miss Edgerton’s last words? Not yet. She didn’t know exactly when he’d arrived in the village. She had only his word for it.

She despised suspecting everyone, but after her uncle’s venal treachery, and all she’d seen of London’s cruelty, she did not trust easily. Or at all.

But she needed to eat and knowing a very large man and his dog stood guard at her door somehow made her feel a little safe. Foolish, she supposed, and how Miss Edgerton had gotten herself poisoned.

Since, at the moment, she was a perfectly worthless bit of flotsam, did it matter if anyone poisoned her? Who would miss her? No one. To the world, she was already dead. That was a very sad commentary.

Now that she had freedom, she needed to determine what she wanted. Since she would never be grand and glamorous and certainly had no interest in marrying, she was fairly certain she ought to aim for useful.

Miss Edgerton had been more than useful but Verity had no formal teacher’s training and knew nothing of herbs. Or much of anything else.

She hobbled down the stairs in time to find Rafe unloading his purchases on the kitchen table. “How do I know you won’t poison me? Do I need to catch a mouse and test everything on him? I hate tormenting poor creatures.” She’s saved up a lot of worrying in his absence.

He actually grinned. His was a plain face, with a large square jaw and broad brow and pale lashes. But when he smiled... Her insides lurched and she had to look away.

“I’ll happily taste everything before serving it to you, if you like. Poisoning good food is a sin. Miss Edgerton’s downfall was drinking nasty herbal tea, which tastes like poison even if it’s good for you.” He set out a loaf of crusty bread and what appeared to be meat wrapped in bloody paper. “I’ve asked about for a maid. One or two should be showing up for you to interview. ”

“Thank you.” She supposed she should be grateful. She’d never had a maid of her own. At fifteen, when she’d lost most everything that truly mattered, she hadn’t even been putting up her hair. She supposed a country maid was more likely to dust and do laundry. She had so much to learn.

Since she was being impolite and exploring, she entered the large larder to examine its contents. Jars of neatly labeled herbs and potions lined half the shelves. The rest contained mundane ingredients like flour and tea. “The man at the mercantile said Miss Edgerton would receive her elixir tomorrow. What exactly constitutes an elixir?” She carried out the tin labeled tea.

Rafe was adding kindling to the fire and already had a kettle heating. “I think of it as a sweet liqueur to be mixed with medicines, but I should think Miss Edgerton could ferment one with honey and any kind of alcohol. Although I suppose, ale and cider are about the only alcohol she might buy here.”

“The fermentation process can be complicated, I suppose.” She nodded knowledgeably while spooning tea leaves into the pot. If she’d ever read about such a thing, her eyes had probably crossed.

“Not really, if one has the proper ingredients. Birmingham has half a dozen large breweries these days, so the ingredients are available. I’d like to make my own ale and porter.” He poured boiling water into the teapot.

He had dreams. She didn’t, not anymore.

Verity scooped up the kitten circling her ankles, threatening to unbalance her. She rubbed noses with it, loving the rumbling purr. If she could stay here... Even that was too far to plan. She set the kitten outside to roam. “I think I’ll see what books are on the shelves. That might give us a better idea of what she’s been doing.”

He opened the meat paper and began chopping. “Unless she was independently wealthy, she had to earn a living somehow. Although she may have been paid in food.”

“Someone knows something. I cannot imagine she let in a complete stranger or that one would have any reason to kill her.” That’s what had been bothering her. Miss Edgerton was unlikely to know an army officer and a stranger to town like Rafe. She helped women, mostly, and those would be the ones she’d share tea with.

Horribly sad to think that a woman she’d helped had killed her.

Verity carried her tea to the narrow desk. It only had a few drawers. She checked those first, finding a ledger of expenses and other amounts she assumed to be income. Verity had spent these last ten years in a countinghouse. On long boring nights in an empty counting house, she had taught herself how to read ledgers. But Miss Edgerton’s initials and amounts meant very little. She could assume Bldna 2s might be a rather expensive herb. The initials of the buyer were meaningless until she learned the names of the locals. She’d seen herbs sold at the market, so such sales wouldn’t be unusual.

Setting the ledger aside to study later, she opened a drawer full of correspondence. Miss Edgerton had taught at a girl’s boarding school before becoming a governess. It appeared she’d kept up with many of her former students, as she had Verity.

Scanning the letters quickly, her eyes widened, and she started at the beginning to read the veiled inquiries and laments more deliberately. The letters were mostly signed with common names—Mary, Penny—girlhood names a teacher might recognize. But these were no longer girls. They were women asking for help with adult problems—abusive husbands, unwanted pregnancies...

Oh, my. This could represent a whole drawer full of men who might want to kill Miss Edgerton.

Outside, the wolfhound barked a vigorous warning.