but. That’s really no guarantee against my having missed one!”
Evelina Vaughan’s china complexion is thin with weariness and flushing in—well, I can’t call it excitement. But I’ve seen something similar. The difference on this occasion is that I think it’s naturally occurring, like the northern lights firing across a black skyline or iridescent seaweed floating off the prow of a clipper.
Not the same as Rye, chemical every-colored eyes like an oil spill.
Tom Vaughan tilts his wife’s chin tenderly back in his direction. “When did you leave the house, Evy?”
“Oh, I couldn’t say exactly. After the meeting, and I read for a spell though I don’t recall which book. So it can’t have been very interesting, can it?” She laughs again. “I had a cup of soup and worked on the invitations for the Crippled Veterans’ Picnic next week. I’m sorry about the note, Tom, I’ll remember next time. But it was beautiful, the trees all telling me secrets and the wind shushing them. Oh, are those my scones, Miss James? How do you find them?”
Mrs. Vaughan comes to a stop with a questioning smile on her face, dressed for riding without any horse. Her energy could blot out anything—a roaring hearth, a wildfire. She could knock the sun for a loop and not break a sweat.
“Delicious.”
I try to say this fastidiously. I manage rapt.
Her husband, poor old sport, is plucking the worst of the great outdoors from her nimbus of hair so sadly and sweetly that I can’t look it straight on. “Join me in the other room, Evy?”
“Oh, but we’ve a guest! And she even likes my baking. I believe we’ll have to keep her forever.”
“Evy, please come with me.”
My cue here is obvious. “I ought to be going anyhow, Mrs. Vaughan.”
“No!” She lets her husband pass his arm around her back, nestling in. “I only just met you. I’ve been rambling for a few hours and probably look a fright, but—”
“Evy, I came home at midnight from the station house,” her husband snaps. He softens immediately. “I thought it got dark without your noticing and you stayed with one of the ladies from the meeting, like last time. You’ve been missing all night again.”
She turns in the circle of his body, lips parted in shocked denial. “Oh, no. No, I was only walking. Not that far even, just . . . I can’t remember exactly. I’m so sorry about the note, please forgive me.”
“It was dark when you left, yes?”
“Yes, but—”
“What time is it now, sweetheart?”
Evelina Vaughan turns to her own bay window and stares at the daylight with about as much enthusiasm as would your average vampire. The almond-shaped grey pools shimmer.
“I didn’t mean it.”
“I know, Evy.”
“I never do, please, I swear.”
“Shh, you’re all right. Say goodbye to Miss James now, and come along.”
“Oh, Miss James.” She takes a step, the apologetic hand she lifts as marked as the plaid shirt she wears. “You must forgive the state I’m . . . in, apparently, though I didn’t know it. Come back for more scones, would you? When I’ve had the chance to rest and I’m more myself.”
You’re more yourself presently than I’ve ever been in my life.
She’s like a tamed deer standing there, balanced on small feet and blinking expectantly, and I’ve the maddest urge to feed her bits of her own remarkable baked goods.
“I’d love to, if able,” I answer.
“Will you tell me your business, though? Here you are in my house and apparently it’s just past sunrise, so I’m dying of curiosity you see. I can’t abide not being in on secrets, not when we’re to be friends as soon as I feel a bit better.” She smiles, an open-air expression without a hint of jealousy.
“I’ve been staying at the Paragon Hotel writing an article, and I regret to tell you that yesterday Davy Lee went missing.”
The smile freezes for some two or three seconds before it shatters like a fallen icicle.
“What did you say? You. I’ve never—You live at the Paragon?”
“Only since very recently,” I hasten to explain. “I work for a newspaper, you see, and the hotel is of immense social interest—you tutor there weekly, yes? I actually saw you, when you were last visiting Blossom.”
She glances at her husband. The subtle contrast of her deep widow’s peak grows starker as she pales. “Yes. I . . . did go to the Paragon. Day before yesterday, after you mentioned there was a raid, Tom. I needed to see everyone was all right. What’s