The Unseen Guest Page 19

  “Ahwooo!”

  “What did I tell you, children?” Lady Constance climbed onto her chair to scold them. “Stop that noise this instant!”

  But their howling only gained in volume. They pointed into the shadows. From the dark recesses of the ballroom, two yellow eyes glinted.

  “It must be their mother,” the Earl of Maytag declared. “See? They are half wolf, after all. There’s the proof!”

  “A wolf ghost! Well, that’s a new one,” said Baron Hoover. “Can’t wait to tell the fellows at the club about this.”

  The admiral rose to his feet and brandished his cane. “That’s no ghost. It’s a real wolf.”

  “Ahwoooooooo!”

  Lady Constance shrieked and tried to climb on the chandelier. “I heard the servants gossiping that some wolves had been seen near the house. One must have come in the windows. How dreadful! Fredrick, do something!”

  “A wolf in the house, what? I’ll deal with this.” Lord Fredrick pulled a small pistol from inside his jacket and waved it blindly around the room. “Stand back, everyone.”

  “Mama Woof! No house! Go to cave!” But the children’s cries were lost in the hubbub.

  “Mmmph! Mmmph! Mmmph!”

  There was a loud thud—followed by another mmmph—

  “Blast—who’s there?” Lord Fredrick pointed his weapon every which way, causing a cacophony of shouts and screams to rise from the assembled guests. “Is it a ghost? Or a wolf? Or a burglar? Or what, what?”

  “Calm down, Freddy. And don’t shoot. Let’s have more light,” Baron Hoover called out. The children each nimbly seized a burning candle from one of the lit candelabras and used it to light all the rest, revealing two entirely unexpected sights.

  First, tipped on its side, with its four legs poking stiffly into the air, was the taxidermy wolf from Lord Fredrick’s study (the sound of it falling over is what had made the thud). It was no ghost, merely a gray-furred pelt stuffed with sawdust and outfitted with yellow glass eyes that reflected the candlelight in a hauntingly lifelike way.

  “Say, doesn’t that belong in my study?” Lord Fredrick squinted in the general direction of the wolf. “Wait a minute. Who are you?”

  “Mmmph-mmph mmmph-mmph mmmph-mmph-mmph.”

  “It is Simon Harley-Dickinson,” Penelope translated, dashing to his side. He was sprawled on the floor near the wolf. A strip of black cloth was tied around his mouth. Another bound his hands behind his back. This she began to undo at once.

  “Mmmph-mmmph,” he said to Penelope, in a tone that sounded much like a cheery “Hello.” When he saw everyone staring at him, he nodded politely as if to tip his hat, although if he had been wearing one, it had long since been knocked off. He cast his eyes about the room and said, “Mmmph mmmph mmmph mmmph?” by which he obviously meant, “How do you do?”

  Once his hands were free, Penelope quickly untied the gag. “He is no burglar. Simon is a friend of ours from London. And a very talented playwright, too,” she added.

  “Whew! That feels better, Miss Lumley—I mean, Penelope. Say, you’ll never believe what happened, it’s quite a tale—well, look how big you’ve grown, you three!” he said, for the children had jumped upon him in joy, with many cries of “Simahwoo! Simahwoo!”

  Penelope anxiously scanned the room. “I am eager to hear your tale, as always, but first—who on earth tied you up like this?”

  “I did.” A tall man, dressed in black, emerged from the shadows. Everyone was too surprised to speak except Lady Constance, who was adamant about performing her duties as a hostess, despite that fact that she was swinging from a chandelier and had only recently stopped screaming.

  “What a delightful surprise!” she cooed. She sounded as careless and charming as if she had just run into an old friend at the theater. “I certainly did not expect to see you at our merry, ghostly gathering, Judge Quinzy.”

  “You mean Mr. Quinzy.” Penelope fixed the man with a hard stare.

  “I’m afraid you are both wrong.” He spoke in that melodic, deep-voiced way of his. “Hortense, my dear Hortense—is it possible you do not know me, even now? It is me, Edward.” He stepped into the light. “Edward Ashton. Your husband.” With a half smile, he turned to Lord Fredrick and added, “Hello, Freddy.”

  “Now are you satisfied?” Madame Ionesco grinned so widely that it revealed every missing tooth. “I have to say, sometimes I surprise even myself.”

  The Widow Ashton floated unsteadily to her feet. “Edward—my Edward? But I thought you were—oh!” Then she fainted dead away.

  THE FOURTEENTH CHAPTER

  One of Agatha Swanburne’s less popular sayings is unexpectedly quoted.

  “BELLS, BELLS, BELLS, BELLS, BELLS, bells, bells.” Mr. Edgar Allan Poe once wrote a poem that contained this line, and many more like it, for the poem is all about the jingling and tinkling, swinging and ringing, tolling, chiming, sobbing, and sighing of the bells. This poem (which is called, unsurprisingly, “The Bells”) would have perfectly described the noisy tintinnabulation that ensued when the Widow Ashton hit the ground, for all the gentlemen simultaneously ran for help. Every bell pull that could be found was rung and rung and rung yet again, to wake the sleeping servants, call for smelling salts, find someone to run for a doctor, and so on.

  The insensible widow was carried off to the nearest sofa and made comfortable there, but even after the administration of smelling salts and several stimulating spoonfuls of schnapps, she could not be fully roused. Eyes fluttering, she thrashed her head from side to side and called her husband’s name. “Edward! Tar pit! Edward! Tar pit!” she moaned. When the doctor arrived, the door to that room was closed and her cries could no longer be heard, which was, frankly, a relief to everyone within earshot.

  “My work here is done,” Madame Ionesco announced as she slipped off her chair with thud. “I always say, it pays to use a professional. Wolf babies, come see me in the morning. I have some Gypsy cakes for you. Not too early, please.” Then she retired to the Egyptian Room. The ballroom was cleared so that all the weird decorations and dead leaves might be swept up, and the rest of the séance’s attendees—the Baron and Baroness Hoover, the Earl of Maytag, Lord and Lady Ashton, Admiral Faucet, and of course, the man known as Quinzy (who now claimed to be Edward Ashton himself)—gathered in a nearby parlor, for the admiral was livid and demanded that no one go to bed until all had been explained. The children fell asleep as soon as they were settled in a comfortable spot, but Penelope and Simon were not permitted to leave either.

  “How peculiar this all is! I wish I had some chocolate to settle my nerves. Can I offer you something to drink, Judge Quinzy?” Lady Constance paused. “Or should I call you Father Ashton?”

  “Call him a liar, if you must speak to the man at all.” The admiral pointed his cane accusingly. “This is not what we agreed, sir. You were to speak in the voice of Edward Ashton and give his widow your blessing to marry me. Instead you pretend to be the man himself, risen from the grave!”

  “Pretend? Oh, now I am all in a muddle!” Lady Constance exclaimed. “This is better than a show. I wonder what will happen next?”

  The baroness sprawled on the divan and yawned. “Don’t tell me you two are in cahoots! How cheeky. Does that mean we can go to bed now? I am quite exhausted; what a dull evening it has been.”

  “It not bedtime quite yet, Baroness.” Quinzy, as it seemed he must still be called for the moment, held a candle to his face so he could be seen, for there had been no time to light all the lamps in the room properly. “First, my apologies to you all for the deception. The baroness is correct. Admiral Faucet and I are well acquainted. We had a prior agreement that I would impersonate the ghost of Edward Ashton at the séance. In the excitement of the moment, it seems I became carried away with the role. My apologies. Rest assured, Admiral, I will return your payment in full, with interest.”

  The Admiral tugged at his muttonchop whiskers in frustration. “But I planned to marry her; t
hat was the whole point! And now you’ve ruined it.”

  Quinzy turned to Simon. “I owe you an apology as well, Simon, for seizing you from behind and tying you up as I did. I trust you are not injured! But as a man of the theater, I’m sure you can understand. After so much planning had gone into Fredrick’s little play, I simply could not allow anyone to spoil it.”

  The admiral wheeled on Lord Fredrick. “Play? What play?”

  Fredrick looked uncomfortable, but Quinzy smiled. “One with the same plot as yours, Admiral—that I would claim to be Edward Ashton. It was Fredrick’s idea.”

  “Fredrick!” Constance clapped her hands in delight. “You had an idea!”

  “Yes, yes. But it was only a joke.” Fredrick sounded impatient. “I suppose it was at Mother’s expense, and now that she’s ill I feel a bit remorseful. But I couldn’t stand it anymore, all her keening and whinging about Father. And I think it’s rather stupid that he went and got himself drowned in a tar pit—a ridiculous way to expire, in my opinion. Anyway, when Constance told me about this séance nonsense, I wrote to my friend Quinzy and asked if he’d help play a prank.”

  Quinzy shifted the candle to the other side of his face and rubbed at his nose. “Using the stuffed wolf from the study as a prop was my inspiration; that much I will take credit for.”

  Lord Fredrick chortled. “Masterful bit of howling there, Quinzy. You really had me going! I thought there was a wolf in the house for sure. Lucky I didn’t start shooting, what? Poor Mother, though. I never dreamed she’d fall for it. Quinzy looks nothing like Father; I’ve spent enough time staring at that gloomy portrait in my study to know that. How could she be so blind?”

  Penelope found this an ironic remark, coming from Lord Fredrick, but it was hardly her place to say so.

  The admiral sputtered in fury. “All my hopes, dashed—for a prank!”

  The Earl of Maytag fixed himself a pipe. “One schemer has been outschemed by another, it appears. Sounds like justice to me. But let us not forget: This young rogue needs to account for himself, too.” He gestured at Simon. “What were you up to, sir? How did you come to be at the séance, and what mischief did you hope to accomplish there?”

  “I can explain that,” said Penelope quickly. “Simon was here at my request—and for good reason, too—”

  The baron held up a hand. “Let him speak for himself, Miss Lumley. And make sure you tell the truth, young fellow. You are in another man’s house, uninvited. There might be legal consequences, if your explanation rings false.”

  Simon shoved his hands in his pockets. “Well, first of all, let me congratulate you all on the superb plot twists! I’ll try to add mine to the mix without getting them hopelessly tangled up.” He glanced at Penelope, who nodded her permission to confess. “Believe it or not, I also was here to speak in the voice of Edward Ashton, except I was supposed to tell the widow not to marry the admiral. I would have, too, if I hadn’t crossed paths with him.” He jerked his head at Quinzy. “I climbed in through the window and slipped into the shadows of the ballroom, but once I did, I saw the wolf there in the dark. I had no idea it was stuffed! I should have been frightened, I suppose, but I have a knack with animals, plus there was a bit of sandwich left over from luncheon in my pocket. Offering a tasty treat never fails to get you on the good side of most creatures, I find. I tiptoed over and tried to make friends. By the time I realized the poor thing had already met his maker, and the taxidermist, too, hizzoner, or whoever he is, had gotten the better of me. I was trussed up like a Christmas goose before you could say jackrabbit.”

  The admiral spoke threateningly. “And you put him up to it, governess? To prevent me from marrying Hortense?”

  Penelope stood. “I did. But only because I know you intended to squander the Widow Ashton’s fortune on your ill-conceived business plans.”

  “Is this true, Faucet?” Lord Fredrick thundered. “For I’ll not have any of that, if you please. Mother’s personal affairs are her own, but the Ashton estate is very much my concern.”

  “Yes, it’s true. But since my plan has been ruined, no harm has been done, and I will take my leave. I would have made a fortune, too. And so would my investors—but perhaps they were playing a prank as well.” He shot a withering glance at Quinzy. “No need to throw me out, Ashton; I’ll be gone by morning, I assure you. Give your mother my regards, if you like. But I doubt she’ll even notice I’m gone, now that she thinks her beloved dead Edward is back in the picture. Good luck sorting that out.”

  With that, the admiral left. Everyone sat in silence, trying to comprehend what had happened—all except the baroness, who was snoring gently from the divan, and the Incorrigible children, who lay in a heap by the fire like a litter of sleeping puppies.

  “Do you know what would have been terribly amusing?” said Lady Constance in a dreamy voice. “If, in the middle of it all, the ghost of Edward Ashton really had shown up to speak for himself? Oh, I wish he had! That would have been wonderfully spooky. But it seems Madame Ionesco is a fraud after all.”

  “On the other hand, maybe she was right,” said Simon brightly. “Perhaps the man isn’t really dead. After all, the body was never found.”

  Tap. Tap-tap. Tap-tap-tap. Tap-tap-tap-tap.

  The noise at the door startled all who were awake, but it was only the doctor, looking pale and rumpled, as befits a man who was called to work in the middle of the night. “Is Lord Fredrick Ashton here?” he asked.

  “I am,” Lord Fredrick rose. “How is Mother?”

  “Alive, thank goodness. But not out of danger.” The doctor cleared his throat. “My lord, your mother has had a terrible shock. She seems to think her dead husband is alive again.”

  “Yes, I’m well aware. It was all a misunderstanding. We’ll straighten things out tomorrow.”

  “No, you will not—not if you want her to live. However this ‘misunderstanding’ came about, you must carry on as if it were true. The stress of finding out otherwise would be too much for her.”

  Lord Fredrick began to chuckle, but the look on the doctor’s face revealed that it was no joke. “What—do you mean we ought to pretend that Quinzy really is my father? That’s ridiculous. Mother will see through it soon enough anyway. Unless we take away her glasses, of course!”

  “Tell her he’s gone on a trip, if you have to keep them apart. But as her doctor, I assure you: She will not survive another shock like that.” The doctor bowed and took his leave.

  “Well, I don’t envy you, Freddie,” remarked the Earl of Maytag, after a pause. “You’ve got yourself in quite a pickle now.”

  “Quinzy’s in a pickle as well. I’m afraid you’re stuck playing the part, old chap.” Lord Fredrick slapped him jovially on the back. “Pity you don’t look more like Father; we might have had some fun with it. Although you are about the right age, what? And where are your glasses? Don’t think I’ve ever seen you without them before. Did you lose them in the dark?”

  “I suppose I did.” Again Quinzy’s hand flew to his large and oddly formless nose, which, to Penelope’s bleary eyes, seemed to be changing shape in the candlelight, and might have even slipped sideways a bit when Lord Fredrick slapped him on the back. “Given your mother’s fragile condition, it seems I should do as the doctor suggested and leave on some pretense before our ruse is discovered. I will write a note to Hortense—to your mother, I mean—explaining my sudden departure. I shall do it right now, in fact. Good night.” Shielding his face with his hand, he left.

  SIMON HELPED PENELOPE CARRY THE children up to the nursery and put them to bed. It was too dark to give him a proper tour of the house, but he whistled in appreciation at the sheer size of it. Once the children were tucked in, he yawned and looked out the nursery windows. “Nice elm out there! Say, it’s almost dawn; look how the light is changing. Wouldn’t it be fun to take a walk and see the sunrise?”

  Almost dawn—Penelope’s hand flew to her mouth. “It would. Simon, I must find the admiral before he l
eaves. There is something I need to ask him. Will you escort me to the POEHO, posthaste? I have no doubt that that is where we will find him, for that is where all his business papers are, and I know he will not leave Ashton Place without them.”

  Simon had no way of knowing what a POEHO was, but he was game for an adventure as always, and Penelope explained the acronym along the way. They found Admiral Faucet just as she predicted, furiously packing up the last of his architectural drawings for POEs and PIEs, his recipe for SPOTs, his plan for a chain of FOPS (that stood for Faucet’s Ostrich Premium Steakhouse), and the like. Their arrival only inflamed his anger.

  “Why should I speak to you, governess? You plotted against me.”

  “I do not deny it. But if you must be angry, be angry at that man called Quinzy. He is the one who ruined your scheme in the end.”

  Simon stuck out a hand. “That’s right, Admiral. Whatever plot we might have cooked up never came to pass, so no harm done. Let’s part on peaceful terms. As one adventurer to another.”

  Warily, the admiral shook his hand. “And how are you an adventurer, laddybuck? You hardly look old enough to cross a busy street, never mind Parts Unknown.”

  “It’s in my blood,” Simon said proudly. “I come from a long line of sailors. Unmapped seas and the briny deep are practically my middle names.”

  This seemed to put the admiral more at ease. Penelope seized the opportunity to ask, “As I said, it is the man called Quinzy who foiled your plans, not us. Will you tell me how you came to know him to begin with?”

  The admiral scowled. “No reason not to, I suppose. This Quinzy fellow was my principal investor in the ostrich-racing business. He didn’t put much money in to start, but he promised more once I got off the ground, and he coached me all along the way. He was the one who suggested I join the croquet club to meet rich widows—‘the readiest source of capital for a dashing gent like you,’ he said. The flatterer! Croquet’s a bore, but he was right about the widows. Once I met Hortense, he urged me to woo her and then convince her to take me home to Ashton Place, so I could launch my business here, in England. With my ideas, plus her money and society connections, I couldn’t fail. I had no idea he was a friend of the Ashtons; he never said so, although I should have guessed. He seemed to know all about them, and those wolf children, too.”