03 - Murder at Sedgwick Court Read Online Free PDF

offer to mend her skirt before
Lavinia caught sight of her.
    ‘Oh, it’s
nothing, really it isn’t.’ Vera spoke hurriedly, as if she had become aware
that Rose might think she was behaving rather oddly. ‘It’s just that I was so
hoping that it would be a small house-party, well hardly a house-party at all given
that it was just to be the four of us. I’m not very good at dealing with lots
of people. I never know what to say. I’m always putting my foot in it or else I
get nervous and say the most boring, inane things, one wouldn’t believe.’
    Rose
nodded sympathetically although she was not convinced by Vera’s explanation for
her agitated manner. It seemed to her that a woman in Vera’s position, heavily
involved in arranging church events and good causes as she was, would be well
versed in dealing with large gatherings to say nothing of handling the members of
the nobility who were persuaded to open her father’s church fetes and bazaars.
    ‘Oh, I
know I’m not explaining myself very well. And you probably think I am being
very unreasonable. Why shouldn’t Lavinia come home and bring any number of
friends with her? It’s just …’ Vera faltered and looked away into the distance
apparently lost in her own thoughts.
    Rose was
just wondering whether Vera had forgotten she was there when the woman turned
to her, her face now flushed.
    ‘Tell me,
Rose, have you ever been in love, really in love, I mean? So much so that you
feel you would die if it wasn’t returned?’
    Rose,
taken aback, was for a moment lost for words. Whatever she had expected Vera to
say, it was not this. Perhaps it had been a rhetorical question, for Vera did
not wait for an answer, did not seem to expect one even, but ploughed on.
    ‘I was
wondering whether you and Cedric felt that way about each other. Oh, I know
it’s none of my business, but it’s always so hard to analyse other people’s
relationships, isn’t it?’
    ‘I
suppose it is.’
    ‘From a
distance the people concerned might appear quite contented, but scratch the surface
and one might find all sorts of things wrong. I’m so afraid that we might be
like that, Theo and me, I mean. I know that if one were to scratch away at our
surface, I’d be perfectly happy underneath, just as happy as I am above. But
it’s Theo I’m concerned about. I’m so desperately afraid that he might be
unhappy with his lot. With his current life as much as with me. We’re not
enough for him you see, even if he’s not aware of it yet.’ Vera smiled sadly.
‘It would be just like him not to know. He’s so wrapped up in his work, you
see, that he might not feel anything yet, not see the wood for the trees.’     
    Rose certainly
did not see. What was more, she was startled that Vera should see fit to
confide in her, a relative stranger. Should she apologise to Vera and say that
she didn’t quite understand what she was saying? But she would feel uncomfortable
doing so, afraid that to be voicing such a sentiment would awaken Vera to the
fact that she had made Rose privy to her most intimate thoughts. Sooner or
later she felt sure Vera would come to her senses and bitterly regret confiding
her inner most fears. But what to do now? Rose looked around the vast hall helplessly,
seeking a chance of escape or a diversion of some sort. But the hall was
strangely empty of everyone, even the servants, and her mind had gone
unhelpfully blank of ideas.
    ‘Don’t
you think I’m right?’ continued Vera, apparently oblivious to Rose’s
discomfort. ‘I suppose I’m rambling on a bit, but I thought it all made perfect
sense, at least to me it does. But, no, I suppose for you it’s different. And I
don’t suppose for a moment that it would matter so very much to Theo and me if
it wasn’t for her .’   
    ‘Whom?’
Rose could not help herself from asking, despite her good intentions not to
become involved in what appeared to her essentially a private matter.
    ‘Why, the
heiress,