Deadly Illusions. Brenda Joyce

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СКАЧАТЬ that it was next door to A.T. Stewart’s.”

      A.T. Stewart’s was a popular department store. The sweet-shop shouldn’t be that hard to locate. Gwen brought her a cup of tea carefully, as there was no saucer to catch any spills. Francesca smiled her thanks and inhaled. “It does smell delicious,” she said, meaning it. The tea was strong and spicy, exotic, and obviously expensive. It seemed like quite an indulgence for Gwen O’Neil.

      “It is wonderful,” Gwen said almost proudly. “I put a spoon of sugar in it. I hope you do not mind.”

      “Thank you so much,” Francesca said, knowing that sugar was another expense Gwen could not afford. She took a sip and found the tea as rich to the palate as it was aromatic. She set the cup down. “How did you find the body and when did you find it?”

      Gwen’s smile vanished. “This morning. I was leaving to go to work. I was late because Bridget has a cough and I made her an elixir before I left. I let her stay home from school yester day and today.” She began to cry. “As I went down the hall, I saw that Margaret’s door was open. That was odd, so I glanced inside…and saw her lying there on her bed, as dead as could be.” She began to shake.

      Francesca stood and hurried to her. “There, there, it’s all right. It’s fortunate that you found her. Was her door ajar Monday night when you returned home from your employment?”

      “I don’t know. I don’t recall. If it was open last night when I came home, I didn’t notice. Miss Cahill, was he killing her, right next door, while me and my baby slept?”

      Francesca hesitated and clasped her shoulder. “We do not yet know when she was murdered, Mrs. O’Neil.”

      Gwen sobbed. “Dear God, it could have been me or my little girl!”

      IT TOOK FORTY-FIVE MINUTES to get uptown, and by the time the doorman let Francesca into the Cahill mansion, situated on Fifth Avenue across from Central Park, the gilded clock on the marble mantel in the salon adjacent to the receiving room indicated that it was half past eight. As Francesca handed off her hat and gloves, she did not need to know the exact time in order to know just how late she was. The dining room was several doors down, but she could hear the robust conversation of her mother’s dinner party. As it was accompanied by the tinkle of crystal glassware and the tapping of silver upon china, she knew that supper was already in progress.

      Her head throbbed and her new, white kidskin shoes were too tight. Like Gwen O’Neil—and perhaps Margaret Cooper—her feet were sore. She knew there would be some huge cost to pay, but she’d already decided to sneak up to her room, avoiding the party altogether. Besides, how would she explain that she was late? Her parents frowned upon her sleuthing, as she was only twenty years old and still a part of their household. Of course, she had no doubt she could be thirty and mar ried with children and Julia would still despair over her reputation should she continue investigative work. Many times she had half promised Julia that her days as a sleuth were over. But the half truths were merely that. As much as she disliked lying to her mother, she had found her calling in life. She was an excellent investigator, and she had the record to prove it.

      Attending supper was out of the question. Francesca smiled at the doorman and began to cross the long receiving room. The press had dubbed the Cahill home the “Marble Mansion” upon its completion some eight years ago. Her father, raised on a farm in Illinois, had become a butcher and eventually expanded into the country’s largest meatpacking business. Francesca had been born in Chicago, but the family had moved to New York City when she was a child. The press had had a field day with her home—and even as a six-year-old, she had read the dailies. At the time, Andrew and Julia Cahill had outdone the Astors and the Melons. Almost the entire room she now sought to cross was marble—the black-and-white floors, the pale Corinthian columns, the carved panels on the walls.

      The mahogany dining-room doors were open. Francesca touched her hair, trying to tuck some loose blond tendrils behind her ears. By now, the bit of rouge she had started wearing on her cheeks and lips had long since vanished, the hem of her skirts was dirty and she was quite an untidy mess. She hoped no one would note her passing.

      As Francesca started past the open double doors, she stole one sidelong peek into the room, where twenty-two guests sat at the linen-clad table. The table sat ten on each long side, one at both heads, hence twenty-two guests, unless a place re mained vacant for her. Then Julia’s entourage would number twenty-one. She glimpsed a room filled with fine crystal and gilded china, the ladies in evening gowns, the men in tuxedos, and she grimaced, ducking and increasing her pace.

      But there was no escaping Julia. “Francesca!” Julia Van Wyck Cahill cried. Her tone was stern and it halted her daughter in her tracks.

      Her cheeks warmed with guilt. Francesca felt like a thief caught with her hand in someone else’s safe, not for the first time. Well, there was no escaping now. Slowly, she returned to the threshold of the room, attempting a pleasant smile for the large audience.

      All conversation stopped. Mild stares were turned her way.

      Julia stood. There was no mistaking the resemblance between Francesca and her mother. Julia was blond, blue-eyed and still of a fine figure. She had been a reigning beauty in her day. As always, she was resplendently dressed in a blue evening gown of silk and lace with three-quarter sleeves, with sapphires at her ears and neck to match. She seemed rigidly displeased, but Francesca did not notice. Instead, in shock, her gaze whipped past her mother to the dark man sitting so indolently at the table in its center.

      There was no vacant place, because Calder Hart had taken it.

      But he was supposed to be in Chicago, wasn’t he?

      Her heart slammed and raced. Calder was home. “You’re back,” she whispered, stunned, and their gazes locked.

      He slowly got to his feet, a very slight smile on his dark face, and he bowed.

      Francesca had missed him and there was no denying it. Maybe her attraction to Hart was purely physical, but she dearly hoped not. And if it was, then she was not the first to be so foolishly smitten.

      Francesca had always assumed she would one day marry a man like her father, someone respectable, admirable, honorable, a reformer and an activist—someone like Rick Bragg. Instead, she was engaged to the city’s wealthiest businessman and most notorious womanizer. She still remained uncertain as to how this had happened, and so quickly. One moment she was friends with the enigmatic and oh-so-charismatic Hart and he was under suspicion for murder. The next, they were secretly engaged—until he had taken matters in his own hands, tired of her procrastination, making a public announcement. How had she fallen in love with Calder Hart? And was it even love?

      Whenever she was with Hart, she felt as if she had boarded a locomotive that had lost all its brakes and was speeding downhill on an endless track. But as frightening as it was, she would not jump off, oh no.

      She had made up her mind.

      Francesca could hardly breathe as Julia said, “Are you going to join us, Francesca? You are a bit late, of course, but I am sure the traffic must have been terrible. And as you can see, your fiancé called. Of course, I invited Calder to stay and dine with us.”

      Francesca had the utmost difficulty tearing her gaze from Hart. But there was an odd note in Julia’s tone, anxiety, per haps, or tension. And then she gave up, simply staring at the man who had somehow, inexplicably, offered marriage, mum bling, “I had better go upstairs and change.”

      Calder stepped away from the dining table. With СКАЧАТЬ