Read Online Borrower of the Night: The First Vicky Bliss Mystery by Elizabeth Peters - Free Book Online Page B

herself, wandering around…. Follow me.”
    The upper floor was a maze of corridors, but Tony threaded a path through them without hesitating once — another proof, if I needed any, that Tony had already explored the Schloss thoroughly. So, I reminded myself, we were not collaborating. He didn’t have to tell me anything…. I wished I knew what George had been doing. I could feel his presence close behind me. For a big man he was very light on his feet.
    On the first floor of the tower Tony tried a door. It creaked open. The flashlight showed an unfurnished circular chamber with rags of moldering tapestry on the walls.
    “Nobody lives here,” said George, peering over my shoulder. “Irma must be on the next floor.”
    The stairs led up to a narrow landing with a faded strip of carpet across the floor. There was a single door. Tony hesitated, but George marched up to the door and turned the knob. His face changed.
    “Lawrence. Look at this.”
    “What’s the matter?”
    George grabbed his hand and directed the flashlight beam onto the doorknob. Below it was a large keyhole, with the shaft of an iron key projecting from it. Tony gaped; but I didn’t need George’s comment to get the point.
    “Door’s locked. From the outside. Either this is not Irma’s room—or that wasn’t Irma we saw walking tonight.”

Four

    “MAY I ASK WHAT YOU ARE DOING AT MY niece’s door at one o’clock in the morning?”
    The cold, incisive voice came from the darkness of the stairs above us. Tony jumped. The flashlight beam splashed and scattered against the stone arch and then steadied, showing the form of a woman.
    She was rather tall, though nowhere near my height. Her hair was snowy white—a beautiful shade that owed its tint to art rather than nature. Her figure was still slender, and her face retained the traces of considerable beauty. Her makeup and her handsome silk dressing gown were immaculate. She had fought time with some success, but the signs of battle were visible; the keen blue eyes were set in folds of waxy, crumpled flesh, and her neck had the petrified scrawniness older women get when they diet too strenuously. I would have known who she was even without the reference to her niece. She looked the way a dowager countess ought to look.
    “Good evening, Gräfin ,” George said calmly. “So this is your niece’s room. Did you lock her in? And, if so, when?”
    He had gall. I have a considerable amount myself, but I wouldn’t have dared to ask that question. To my amazement, the old lady answered it.
    “I locked her in at eleven o’clock, as I do every night. What has happened?”
    “We saw someone in the Great Hall just now,” George said. “It looked like your niece.”
    “I see.” The light was bad, so I wasn’t sure; but I rather thought she was smiling. “Let me show you that it cannot have been Irma whom you saw.”
    She unlocked the door and flung it open. When modest Tony hesitated, she took the flashlight from him and turned it on the bed.
    Irma lay curled up under a thin sheet, her cheek pillowed on her hand. She stirred and muttered as the light reached her eyes. Then she sat bolt upright.
    “Wake up, Irma,” said the Gräfin . “It is I.”
    “Aunt Elfrida?” The girl brushed a lock of curling dark hair from her eyes. Then, seeing other forms in the doorway, she snatched at the sheet and drew it up over her breast. The extra covering wasn’t necessary; her nightgown was a hideous, heavy dark cotton that covered her from the base of her neck down as far as I could see.
    The countess moved to the bed.
    “You have been asleep? You have heard nothing? Seen nothing?”
    The seemingly innocuous question had a frightful effect on the girl. Her chin quivered, her mouth lost its shape, and her eyes dilated into staring black circles.
    “ Ach, Gott — what has happened? Is it — has she—”
    “No questions,” the older woman interrupted. “Sleep again. Sleep.”
    “Stay with