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brought new mysteries. Tory, determined to keep on the right side of her mistress, brought the washed and pressed linen for the yellow chamber to show Lady deCourcy while she was still at the breakfast table.
    “You might want to have a look at these before I make up the bed in the guest room,” she said. “The pillowcases have the family crest worked into them, you see. Done in white, it is hard to see. After all that work, I would have done it in a different color to stand out.”
    “Very nice,” Cressida said, lifting a case to examine the fine stitchery. “Did Lady Dauntry do this work herself?”
    “Not she! She wouldn’t know which end of the needle to put the thread in. She hires Mrs. Campbell, from the village.”
    As the pillowcase unfolded, Cressida saw a largish brown stain on it. “What is this?” she asked in alarm. At first glance it looked like blood. “We cannot put that on a guest’s bed. It looks like—”
    Tory’s red face deepened to cherry. “It’s cocoa!”
    “Yes, I believe you’re right,” Cressida said, taking a closer look.
    “That Jennet! She has gone and spilled her cocoa on it whilst she was ironing, and never noticed it, the simpleton. I’ll have her wash it again.”
    “Send her to me, Tory. I am missing a magazine. Muffet thinks she might have taken it. Or perhaps you have seen it?”
    Tory’s tongue flicked out and touched her lips nervously. “Magazine? No, I didn’t see one about. Jennet is not here just now. She’s—I sent her to the big house to get eggs. For that gingerbread you wanted.”
    Even as Tory spoke, Cressida noticed the aroma of gingerbread wafting on the air. The cake was obviously already in the oven.
    Tory noticed it, too. “And for an omelette for your lunch,” she added. “I put the last of the eggs into the gingerbread this morning, now that I think of it. I must go and have a look at it or it will burn. I’ll ask Jennet about The Lady’s Companion. She will go borrowing things behind a person’s back.”
    On this jumbled excuse, she darted from the room, leaving Cressida in confusion. How did Tory know the name of the magazine if she had not seen it? She was lying, as she was lying about the eggs for the gingerbread. Was the rest of her story a lie as well, about the cocoa spot on the linen?
    Beau soon joined her at the table. “What a night!” he said. “I swear the attic was full of goblins. One of ‘em was sobbing its heart out. Did you hear the racket?”
    “No. That is—I thought I heard something, but made sure I was imagining it.”
    “Miss Wantage heard it, too. The place is certainly haunted, whatever Dauntry says. Wantage don’t want any breakfast, by the bye. Tory took her up some bread in warm milk. I don’t know how she can eat that pap. Daresay she don’t. She is feasting off that lunch she had in her basket yesterday. No wonder she is fat as a flawn.”
    “Then she plans to stay in bed today. She was asleep when I stopped in earlier.”
    “Such a long trip as fifty miles will take her a week to recover. Pity it wouldn’t take the whole summer.”
    “We should try to be kind to her.”
    “Aye, for she’ll carry tales back to Bath if we ain’t. I would like to feel sorry for her, but she sours the milk of human kindness in my breast. It would be easier to be kind to a sinner.”
    Cressida just shook her head admonishingly. “Let us investigate the attic after you have had breakfast, Beau. There is something strange going on here, and I don’t think it is a ghost.” She told him about the magazine and the mysterious eggs, which were to go into a cake that was already made.
    With a mystery to look into, Beau was not tardy in bolting his gammon and eggs. As soon as he was finished, he and Cressida went upstairs, to find the attic door locked.
    “Now, that is demmed odd!” he exclaimed. “They must have a family lunatic locked up there.”
    “Very likely. Beau!” she exclaimed. “You don’t think they