Read Online Silent as the Grave by Bill Kitson - Free Book Online Page A

angrily and for a moment I thought she was about to go for me again, then her expression softened. ‘I regret that,’ she confessed. ‘Your face still looks a bit on the pink side, does it hurt?’
    I stood up and smiled at her. ‘Not much, it was a bit tender shaving this morning.’
    â€˜What do you think happened to Beaumont? Do you really believe he went out in the snow?’
    â€˜I want to hear what the others have to report. If they’ve found no trace of him there is another, far more serious fact to consider.’
    â€˜Go on, Sherlock, tell us.’
    â€˜If Beaumont left the castle via that door and there’s no trace of him within the building, can we assume that he didn’t come back in?’
    â€˜Yes, I suppose so. I fail to grasp the significance though.’
    â€˜I do,’ Charlie said suddenly. ‘If Beaumont didn’t come back in, who did? Who left the snowy puddle on the floor and who bolted the door?’
    â€˜Well done, Charlie,’ I told him.
    â€˜You mean somebody else followed him outside?’ Eve asked.
    â€˜Or arranged to meet him outside, perhaps he had an assignation?’
    â€˜Not another one! I thought you’d cornered that market.’
    I stared at her. ‘What does that remark mean?’
    â€˜I was referring to the string of females you had traipsing in and out of your room half the night.’
    â€˜I thought you went to bed early with a headache; or was that all pretence?’
    â€˜There’s more than one reason for a woman to feign a headache,’ she told me. ‘Anyway, what about Beaumont?’
    â€˜You tell me, he’s your friend not mine.’
    â€˜He’s no friend of mine,’ Eve denied hotly. ‘Give me credit for a bit better taste than that. I can’t stand him. One of the reasons I was so angry was I’d had to put up with the creep for so long.’
    â€˜Sorry, I thought you and he were an item.’
    Eve shuddered. ‘Perish the thought. Anyway, at least I only deal with one item at a time; I don’t have a shopping list.’
    She glanced round, we were alone. Charlie had already darted off to see what the others had discovered. ‘So which is it to be; who’s at the top of your list? Is it Lady Rowe senior, Lady Rowe junior, or the Randy Restaurateur?’
    â€˜There is no list, and therefore there’s no one on it, either at the top, the middle, or the bottom,’ I denied.
    â€˜So if you’re not Charlotte’s gigolo, Harriet’s old flame, or the Sexy Chef’s dish of the day, why are you here?’
    â€˜I’m supposed to be investigating the Rowe family curse and those mysterious disappearances from hundreds of years ago.’
    â€˜And now we’ve got one that’s just a few hours old.’
    None of the others had returned to the sitting room when we reached it, but they entered in a large chattering bunch shortly after our arrival. Nobody had discovered anything of the slightest significance. It was, as Polly remarked, ‘as if he vanished into thin air.’
    If Eve had been mildly sceptical about my theory regarding Beaumont’s disappearance, the rest of the gathering were frankly either incredulous or dismissive; in most cases both.
    Polly Jardine was the most critical of the idea. ‘You can’t honestly expect anyone to believe Beaumont would have ventured out into a snowstorm on a night like last night. What possible reason could he have?’
    Harriet was scarcely more supportive. ‘Polly’s right, Adam. Apart from Beaumont having no reason to go out, nobody uses that entrance except in summer. The rest of the time it’s kept locked and bolted. Even if Beaumont had wanted to go outside he would have found it far easier to use the kitchen entrance.’
    â€˜In any case what possible motive could the man have for venturing out in the middle of a blizzard?’ It was