Death Brings a Shadow Read online

  “It’s certainly worth a look.”

  “If she’s not there we may have to alert the household to search for her,” Prudence said grimly.

  “Her mother will do that for us,” Geoffrey said. “I’m surprised she’s waited this long.”

  They hurried along one of the white shell paths toward a tiny gray stone chapel nestled beneath two magnificent oak trees planted at least seventy-five years before the first brick was laid for Seapoint. Though the chapel itself was newly built, the low stone wall surrounding it had been constructed of the rubble discovered when the foundation was dug.

  Geoffrey pushed open the arched wooden door and stepped inside, Prudence close behind him. Last night’s cool lingered inside the thick walls, making her wish she’d thought to bring a shawl. If Eleanor had indeed fallen asleep there, she’d be chilled through.

  “Eleanor?” Prudence’s voice echoed into the miniature gothic arches above them. No more than a dozen wooden pews stretched on either side of the short aisle down which Eleanor would soon walk. The wood had been freshly waxed and polished; stacks of white ribboned bows and boxes of white candles lay on the rearmost seat.

  But of Eleanor there was neither sight nor sound.

  “She hasn’t been here,” Geoffrey said after a quick walk to the altar and back. Prudence knew he was looking for anything her friend might have dropped or forgotten, any clue that might indicate her presence, however brief. His features tightened the way they always did when he was about to decide that an otherwise unexceptional situation was turning serious.

  “Should we walk along the shoreline?” Prudence asked. “There’s a log just above the high tide mark not too far from here where she told me she likes to sit and look at the water.”

  “Let’s take one of the dogs,” Geoffrey said as they headed back toward the stable yard.

  He whistled to a black lab lying on the sun-warmed bricks. The animal shook itself awake and then loped off ahead of them down the path to the beach.

  “I don’t have anything with her scent on it,” Prudence said quietly. “I didn’t think it would come to this.”

  “Never mind,” Geoffrey reassured her. “The dog knows her. If he picks up a fresh trail and there’s anything suspicious about it, he’ll alert us. Labs are as intelligent as they come.”

  Prudence suddenly went cold with fear of what they might be about to discover.

  CHAPTER 3

  Teddy and Lawrence Bennett rode horseback from Wildacre to Seapoint, leading an unmounted search party of field hands and house servants along the shoreline and through once fertile fields now overgrown with saw palmetto, seedling pines, dwarf wax myrtle, and wiregrass. The searchers carried machetes to cut through undergrowth and billhooks to pull aside thorny branches and lop off snake heads. Most of them walked barefoot; May was a warm month and new shoe leather a rare and expensive commodity on the island.

  “Mark my words,” Lawrence Bennett said as they approached the mansion, “we are wasting our time. That Eleanor of yours is going to materialize out of the woods and have a good laugh at our expense.” Younger than Teddy by sixteen months, he was close enough in looks to his brother that people meeting the Bennett boys for the first time often mistook them for twins. They were handsome men, tall and slender, with lightly bronzed southern skin, thick blond hair, and eyes as blue as the water surrounding the island on which they’d grown up.

  “She’s missing, Lawrence,” Teddy snapped. “This isn’t a prank. She doesn’t know the island as we do.” It tore at his heart to imagine Eleanor lost and fighting her way through the live oaks, sobbing from fear and frustration in the overgrown woods. Worst of all, if she’d gotten that far, were the interior marshlands where wiregrass flayed bare skin to ribbons. He could only imagine her horror if she stumbled into the dark brown waters of the swamp where alligators and water moccasins glided through a wasteland of rotting tree trunks. Bradford Island looked like a paradise from afar, but its reality was dangerous and unforgiving.

  Philip Dickson had ordered every horse in his stable saddled and every man on the place to report to the back lawn. When he gave the command, they would form a long line and move slowly forward into the live oaks. Faces studiously impassive, those who had participated in similar searches in the past knew the chances of finding Miss Eleanor alive and unhurt after a night in the wild were slim to nonexistent. Only the grim, determined expression on her father’s face kept them from voicing their worst fears.

  “Stay within sight and earshot,” Geoffrey cautioned Prudence, who had insisted on donning her riding habit and joining the front rank of horsemen leading the walkers through the woods. “Whatever you do and whatever you see, don’t dismount until you’ve signaled the rest of us to join you. Wait until I get there.” He was thinking of panthers and wild boar who fed on whatever fallen prey they came upon.

  Prudence nodded, but didn’t trust herself to speak. She knew the dreadful scenes he was conjecturing and was doing everything she could to dismiss them from her mind. Despite the misgivings she could sense all around her, she was trying to believe that Eleanor would be found safe and sound. In two days’ time, wearing silk, Valenciennes lace, and ancestral pearls, she would become Teddy Bennett’s bride. To admit to anything else was unthinkable. Holding her head high, Prudence forced herself to smile reassuringly at Abigail Dickson, whose stricken face was almost too painful to look at.

  They set out shortly before noon, the horse brigade first, followed by a pack of hunting dogs and their trainers, last of all the walkers. The live oak forest was eerily silent, its host of creatures retreated into burrow, thicket, and den. Even the birds that normally flitted noisily from tree to tree remained hidden. The only sound was the soft thud of horses’ hooves and the occasional muffled curse of a searcher who stumbled or was raked by thorns. The air was still and densely humid; sweat streaked every forehead.

  At Geoffrey’s suggestion, Prudence had tied a piece of mosquito netting across her face, fastening it to the black velvet English riding helmet she wore. Within minutes of entering the woods, masses of tiny insects and whining mosquitoes buzzed before her eyes, seeking moisture and blood. Waving a hand through the cloud was of little or no use. She held her breath for as long as she could, and eventually, when it couldn’t reach her skin, the swarm thinned out. Eleanor, when they found her, would be covered with bites and stings. Prudence forced back a shudder and trained her eyes on the foliage through which she was passing. Geoffrey had said to watch for the tiniest thread that might have gotten snagged on a branch. She prayed that her friend had put on one of the light-colored dresses they’d packed for wearing in Georgia’s warm springtime weather.

  After the first hour, water carriers went from horse to horse, dog to dog, and man to man, their bottles and jugs still cool from Seapoint’s deep well. Despite the urgency of the search, animals and humans alike had to pause regularly to rest if they were to last long enough to ensure success. A thin hum of conversation rose over the panting of dogs and the snorting of horses, but there was no good news to exchange. No one had seen a footprint or a hastily broken twig or branch. Nothing that might have belonged to Eleanor had fallen to the ground or been caught in a bush or shrub. The dogs hadn’t picked up her scent. Yet she had to have come this way. Seapoint and its grounds and beach had been minutely searched. There was no other place on the island for her to go.

  When they reached the marsh, the riders dismounted and handed their horses over to a pair of stable boys who would remain behind with them. The wiregrass grew so thickly on the flats that an animal’s flanks would be sliced and bloodied before it managed to get halfway across.

  Rifles were pulled from saddle scabbards and extra ammunition tucked into jacket pockets. Though Prudence had never fired anything larger than the derringer she sometimes carried in her reticule, Geoffrey had insisted she not go unarmed. Now he broke open the rifle and slipped it into the crook of her arm. Even though he smiled reassuringly, it still
felt heavy and awkward. She hoped she wouldn’t have to use it.

  * * *

  Prudence had never experienced anything like the swamp that stretched for miles in the deep interior of Bradford Island. Draperies of Spanish moss ghosted from shaggy cedars and gnarled live oaks through ground fog rising above still, dark waters where here and there a thick, rotting trunk broke the surface. Until she looked again and realized she was seeing an alligator lying in wait for unwary fish or careless frogs. Even islanders who had lived all their lives in close proximity to the beasts paused respectfully before making their way along the narrow ridges that were the only safe places to walk.

  “Stay close to me, Prudence,” Geoffrey said, “and watch your footing.”

  She felt off balance clutching the heavy rifle, but she was determined to keep the place she’d claimed as the only woman in the search party. Philip Dickson had dropped to the rear, his age and unfamiliarity with the terrain working against him. Teddy and his brother Lawrence led the way, leaping nimbly across tussocks of swamp grass to the firmer ground of small hammocks and the occasional deer walk. The afternoon sun slanted through the trees, glinting off the water, highlighting brilliant green fern banks and the deadly white of poisonous mushroom gills. It was a world of enchantment, except that the magic conjured up evil instead of wonder.

  The searchers spread out as widely as they could, careful to keep within sight of one another. Occasionally either Teddy or Lawrence would raise his rifle high in the air, signaling silence. Everyone stood stock still to listen for a cry of distress. But time after time, they heard nothing.

  “We brought torches,” Geoffrey told Prudence at the end of one of their halts. “But I doubt they’ll do us much good after dark if Eleanor is unconscious.”

  “How could this have happened, Geoffrey? They were so happy together, she and Teddy. What on earth made her sneak off somewhere on her own and not tell anyone where she was going? I was in the room right next to hers. She could have talked to me if something was wrong. I would have understood. I would have tried to help her.”

  “It’s not your fault, Prudence. I remember your saying once that Eleanor often acted impulsively. I think we just have to accept that this time she made a very, very bad decision.”

  “But you haven’t given up hope of finding her?”

  “No, of course not. This is an island. We’ll find her.”

  * * *

  It was Lawrence who led them to the body.

  He signaled Geoffrey to join him before Teddy, Prudence, and Eleanor’s father realized what he had found.

  “Keep them back,” he ordered the searchers as Geoffrey hurried to his side.

  Hands reached out to bar the way. The hounds whined and crouched on the wet ground. Two of the trackers rushed forward carrying a collapsible canvas stretcher.

  Eleanor lay half submerged in brackish swamp water, her clothing filthy with mud. When they turned her over, Geoffrey quickly laid his handkerchief across her face. No one, especially those who loved her, should have to look at her as she was now.

  * * *

  Abigail Dickson’s fierce self-control broke down when the search party emerged from the live oak forest bearing a stretcher on which lay the sheet-wrapped body of the swamp’s latest victim. A mother’s howl of pain and denial rang through the twilight mists rolling in from the Atlantic across white sand beaches and meticulously tended lawn, sending chills up the spines of those who heard it.

  Her lady’s maid and the housekeeper caught her as she fell. The two women supported their mistress into the house and up the staircase to the bedroom that overlooked the chapel where Eleanor was to have been married. Laudanum sent her into a deep sleep from which she would not awaken until morning. It was the only thing they could do for her.

  Philip Dickson dismounted from his horse like a man gravely wounded. He, too, was caught in arms that held him up as he stumbled into the mansion built at least in part to showcase his daughter’s beauty. She’d been a princess in a modern castle. Now she was a casual fatality he could not bear to contemplate.

  “I’ll see to her, Mr. Dickson,” Prudence promised. She wasn’t sure Eleanor’s father understood what she meant; his eyes had glazed over and the features of his face sagged. She meant she would prepare her friend’s body for burial, would do her best to make her presentable for a final viewing before the coffin lid was nailed down. Somehow, though she knew it was likely to break her heart, she knew she would. She had been preparing herself for it all during the long ride back to Seapoint. Such an intimate task could not be given to anyone who loved her less than a close friend.

  “I’ve ordered them to take her to the wine cellar,” Geoffrey said. He would not leave Prudence’s side until she’d completed what she had to do, even though she had argued that his presence would be unseemly. “It’s cool and private,” he explained. “They’ll bring warm water from the kitchen, and one of the maids will fetch whatever clothing you choose for her to wear.”

  “The wedding dress and veil,” Prudence said automatically. They would go into the ground with the bride who never was, the only fitting destiny for garments selected with so much hope for the future.

  Prudence followed the stretcher down into the damp cold of Seapoint’s dark basement, refusing to leave Eleanor’s body even to change out of her riding habit and boots. Lanterns were lit and hung from hooks in the ceiling, where they burned with a soft, hissing sound. When buckets of warm water, cakes of perfumed soap, and baskets of soft cloths had been brought to the wine cellar, she swallowed the hot, strong coffee Geoffrey insisted she drink. He’d laced it with bourbon to make the task before her easier to bear.

  “Philip Dickson was one of my father’s closest friends,” Prudence informed him as they waited. “I don’t remember if I told you that. He brought Eleanor to the house when my mother died. I was six; she was fourteen. She came every day for weeks, even after my mother’s sister had arrived from England. Eleanor held me while I wept, played dolls and make-believe for hours on end, took me to the park when no one else could interest me in going out. She was the big sister I never had. I clung to her friendship for years afterward. I don’t know how she put up with me, but she did. Even when she came out in Society she made room for me by her side. Not literally, of course, but by sharing all the excitement of her first season. Everyone thought she would be among the earliest of her group to marry, but she told me once that she didn’t think she would ever fall in love.”

  “I think your Eleanor was that rare kind of woman who refuses to settle for second-best,” Geoffrey said.

  “She was. After she met Teddy, it became him or no one.”

  “I wonder how much of that devotion he’s reciprocated,” Geoffrey said.

  “You mean because she was an heiress?”

  He shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t suppose we’ll ever know. Not now. Men of our class aren’t permitted to show their emotions.”

  He stood back from the body as a maid appeared with the dress and veil Prudence had called for. Another maid carried Eleanor’s lace-trimmed undergarments, stockings, and white satin wedding slippers. A third had assembled lotions and powders, brushes and combs, scissors and files to manicure the dead woman’s nails. They had not known the young mistress very long, but in the life she had lost and the children she would never bear, they were all women.

  Geoffrey closed the door softly behind them. He crossed to where Prudence stood beside the decanting table on which Eleanor had been placed, still in her makeshift shroud. Touching Prudence’s arm lightly, he placed his other hand on the body.

  “Shall we begin?”

  * * *

  They cut off her clothing with a pair of silver sewing scissors, washing each limb with warm water and scented soap before proceeding to the next. The body that slowly emerged from the stained sheets in which it had been wrapped bore less evidence of Eleanor’s ordeal than Prudence expected. It was as though her friend had been transported to
the spot where she died, making little or no contact with the wiregrass through which she must have stumbled, though somewhere along the way she’d lost her shoes, and her stockings were in tatters.

  “Could she have been on horseback most of the way?” Prudence asked, drying and powdering her friend’s feet. They were scratched and bitten, but not the feet of someone who had run for miles over bramble-infested and sawgrass-covered terrain.

  “The stable hand we talked to said every horse was in its stall this morning. If she did ride as far as the swamp, it wasn’t on a Seapoint mount,” Geoffrey said.

  “What you mean is that I shouldn’t jump to conclusions.” Prudence hesitated before revealing more of Eleanor’s body.

  “Not yet.”

  Geoffrey’s voice was so neutral and uninflected that she knew he would not be seeing her friend shamefully naked. What would lie before him, under the impartial gaze of his Pinkerton training, would be the corpse of a stranger. His compassion would not be tinged with the ordinary feelings of a man for a woman. It was both comforting and strengthening. When they finished with her, Eleanor would be herself again, but along that journey she would of necessity be someone else. It blunted the agony of what Prudence had promised Philip Dickson she would do.

  It wasn’t until Prudence began to wash her friend’s upper torso that she felt the dislocation of Eleanor’s right shoulder.

  “Geoffrey!” Prudence cupped her hand around the small, hard protrusion that didn’t match the smooth musculature of the other shoulder. The bone seemed to be in the wrong place.

  “If I hold her arm out, then pull and twist at the same time, it will slide back into the socket,” Geoffrey said. He felt around the injury with both hands, careful not to perform the maneuver he had described.

  “Did she fall and pass out from the pain?” Prudence asked, imagining the horror of drowning in shallow water.

  “It’s possible.” But there was doubt in his voice. He dipped another cloth in the warm water, wrung it out, and handed it to Prudence.