Read Online The Whispering House by Rebecca Wade - Free Book Online

photograph, and for the first time properly noticed the two seated figures. “Is one of these Maisie’s mother?’
    â€œThat’s her.” Mrs. Wilson pointed to a pretty, dark-haired woman who, unlike the others, wasn’t looking at the camera at all. She seemed abstracted, as if the photographer had caught her when she wasn’t ready and was thinking about something else.
    â€œAngela,” said Mrs. Grocott unexpectedly.
    â€œWhat’s that, Mother? Mrs. Holt’s name wasn’t Angela.” She shook her head. “Getting confused now. Not surprising.”
    â€œShe looks just like Maisie,” said Hannah. “Mrs. Holt, I mean.”
    Pat Wilson frowned and seemed about to say something, but then appeared to change her mind. She pointed to the second figure. “And this one’s Miss Holt.”
    â€œMaisie’s aunt?”
    â€œThat’s right. No oil painting, was she? No wonder she never found a husband!”
    Miss Holt had a narrow, pinched face, thick black eyebrows, a long, pointed nose, and a jutting chin. In between, her mouth had an expression of angry disapproval. It was hard to see how this woman could possibly have been the aunt of that pretty child, but quite easy to see why she might have been unpopular.
    â€œWhere’s Maisie’s father?” asked Hannah. “Do you know why he wasn’t in the photo?”
    â€œCaptain Holt was a soldier. He was away a lot, fighting some war or other, and got himself killed soon after Maisie died. I rather doubt he even knew what had happened to her, which was just as well, considering.” Again Mrs. Wilson frowned, and Hannah sensed it was the right time to ask the question she’d tried to put to Mrs. Grocott.
    â€œYour mother said that after Maisie died, there was talk among the servants. Do you know what she meant?”
    Mrs. Wilson glanced at the old lady in the chair, whose eyes were closed once more. “You’ve got to remember,” she began slowly, “that feelings run high when a child dies. And everyone loved Maisie, I believe. The trouble was, so far as I can tell, that this Miss Holt took all the nursing on herself, and when the little girl died, everyone looked for someone to blame.”
    â€œThey thought she’d let her die unnecessarily?”
    â€œWorse than that.”
    Hannah stared at her. “You can’t mean . . . ?”
    Mrs. Wilson nodded. “It seems crazy, doesn’t it? What did she have to gain from the child’s death? All the same, the servants got it into their heads that she’d deliberately done away with that little girl.”
    â€œBut were they right?”
    Mrs. Wilson simply spread her hands helplessly. “How can anyone be certain, after all this time? Nothing was ever proved, that’s all I know.”
    â€œSo if she did”—Hannah swallowed—“deliberately kill Maisie, she got away with it?”
    â€œI wouldn’t say that, exactly. Miss Holt might not have been found guilty officially, but the result was much the same as if she had been. Word got around, you see, and after Maisie died, no one would employ her aunt. I believe eventually she ended up in the workhouse, and she died there shortly after.”
    Hannah shivered. She had heard of conditions in Victorian workhouses. Then a thought struck her. “Did Maisie’s mother think she was guilty too? Is that why she couldn’t stay on at Cowleigh Lodge?”
    Mrs. Wilson’s face flushed. “No one stayed on after Maisie died. Mrs. Holt moved away and the house was sold.”
    Hannah looked curiously at her, wondering why she seemed suddenly ill at ease. Was it the thought of Maisie’s mother, living out the rest of her life with her only child dead and no husband to support her? Whatever the truth, it was a depressing story. But there was still something she needed to know.
    â€œDid Maisie . . . did she ever say