A Death, A Duke, And Miss Mifford - Claudia Stone Page 0,31

not when she was medicating with wine, so Mary had taken herself off to her room to ponder on what her next move should be.

Jane, who was equally as voracious a reader of Gothic novels as Mary, had been keen to assist in the investigation.

"Oh, I do love a good mystery," Jane had sighed after Mary had explained the recent developments.

"Excepting, of course, ones that place my neck on the line," Mary had prompted.

"Er, yes," had come the reassuring reply, though it was a second too late to be believable.

Not that Mary could blame Jane. Plumpton was home, but it was terrifically boring at times. Before Mr Parsims had been murdered, the only criminally exciting thing to have happened was when someone sabotaged Mrs Canards' rose-bush before the annual gardening competition.

For the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, Jane and Mary had spoken at length about who might have murdered Mr Parsims and why. They had taken a break only for dinner--for one could not think on an empty stomach--before they had returned once more to their room. There they had again gone through the list that Mr Parsims had kept and wondered aloud what might have motivated any of those listed to kill the rector, though, by the time the sun had gone down, they had been no closer to the answer.

"We shall investigate tomorrow," Jane had assured Mary, before drifting off to sleep.

"If I am allowed out of my cell," Mary had muttered in reply, but she need not have worried.

The next morning, at around ten, Miss Hughes called upon Mary.

"I should like to take a walk with Mary," Sarah said to Mrs Mifford, "Around the village square."

"People will talk," Mrs Mifford had protested, though with less vigour in her voice than yesterday. She was suffering from a dreadful headache, which she insisted had been caused by a low-wicked candle and not the empty bottle of port-wine which stood empty in the kitchen.

"Oh, they will," Sarah nodded in agreement with the matriarch of the family, "If people think that Mary is hiding away in the house, they will assume it's because she's guilty. How clever you are, Mrs Mifford."

Miss Sarah Hughes was quite something, Mary thought with admiration, as she watched her mama fall headfirst into her friend's trap. Mrs Mifford could be relied on for two things; an unhealthy obsession with appearances and her own vanity and Sarah had tempted both.

"I did say that yesterday," Mrs Mifford agreed, as she repainted the past to her own taste, "But she would not listen. Really, Mary, enough of this silliness; go fetch your pelisse and accompany Miss Hughes to town. The fresh air will do you good."

Mary was far too thrilled to argue, and she promptly fetched her pelisse--and Jane--before escaping out the door.

"Freedom," she sighed happily, as she linked her arm through Sarah's.

"A sort-of freedom," Sarah cautioned gently, "You mustn't look too gay when we reach the village, or people will note it."

"Bah," Mary grumbled, though she affixed a suitably sombre expression to her face just in case. Her path was still that of an admirable spinster, she reminded herself. Well, it would be, once she had proved she was not a murderess.

As the three girls walked--with Sarah flanked on either side by a Mifford sister--Mary quickly explained all that had happened since they had last spoken.

"And His Grace wishes to help you?" Sarah questioned, as Mary finished, her focus not on thoughts of potential murderers but on single dukes instead.

"Well, he does have a duty to Plumpton," Mary flushed.

"Not really, when your great-uncle is the magistrate."

"Lord Crabb is not a particularly able magistrate," Mary protested, though she had no real cause to argue for if he was, she would be in a prison cell in Stroud by now.

"But he is the magistrate, nonetheless," Sarah replied, with a glint in her eye, "Northcott need not have bothered to intervene if he had no wish to, so let's not pretend he's merely motivated by a burning sense of justice. I witnessed the way that His Grace was watching you at the assembly--and he was burning with something alright, but it was not justice."

"Sarah!" Mary did her best to look scandalised as Jane snorted with laughter.

"You must not look too jolly," Mary reminded her sister, "It's not becoming when a man has just been killed--and it reflects badly on me."

Jane muted her smile, though her dark eyes danced with mirth. The idea that Northcott might be romantically interested