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cater for his needs? She could so easily have handed him the keys, and that would have been that. He hadn’t entered into any arrangement to employ her, and her manner certainly wasn’t such that it was designed to endear herself to him. It posed the obvious question to him; why was she bothering to do something she so patently didn’t really want to do at all? Was it because the upkeep of the house was more important to her than anyone who happened to be in it? Was it because she didn’t trust him to treat the property of her late employer in a proper manner? Whatever the reason, it was something of a mystery, and like all mysteries, it aroused his interest.

    Absurd as such a notion might be, an unnatural obsession with the care and welfare of the house and its contents was a possible explanation. As he had already noted, everything was cleaned and polished to perfection, yet why did she still go to so much trouble? It begged the question; was any provision made in the will to pay her beyond the retainer he knew about, just to do this? If that was the case, Charles had singularly neglected to mention it to him, and that wasn’t at all like Charles. Even if it was true, from what he had seen, the level of attention bestowed upon the task was remarkable, even down to the touch of cut flowers that he had found upon arrival. Yes, it was undoubtedly a mystery of sorts, and right now a mystery of any sort was something he needed, just to be distracted.

    What exactly, he wondered, had been the relationship between the frosty housekeeper and his late uncle? It seemed most unlikely they had been having an affair; with that surly expression and abrupt manner she simply didn’t look the type to attract that sort of interest from anyone. No; an affair seemed out of the question; if she had been half as brusque with her late employer as she had been with himself, it would have taken a much braver man than Martin to even attempt such intimacy. That fact in turn left the question; what had possessed his uncle to employ such a sour-faced harridan in the first place? Perhaps as a medical man he had wanted to make sure that nobody in their right mind would ever suspect that there was anything improper in their relationship? He smiled inwardly at the thought. Much more likely she had other skills and attributes of which he was currently in ignorance

    He continued to mull the matter over as he busied himself eating, and he finally resolved to make a few discrete enquiries concerning her antecedents on the morrow. With his meal finally complete, he took the tray and empty dishes through to the kitchen, and acting purely upon a whim, washed them up. It amused him to think that the ultra-efficient Mrs Brent would undoubtedly return in the morning expecting to clear up behind him. He tried to picture the astonishment she might feel when she discovered what he had done. With everything finally packed away, he returned to the study, intending to spend some time in a closer examination of any books or papers left by his late benefactor.

    In the event he stayed in the study for the rest of the evening, looking through the desk and then the drawers and cupboards of the various pieces of furniture in the room. It soon became obvious that all personal papers had been removed as he had been told, for he found very little of interest. The books that he examined were mostly on medical subjects, a few being quite old and possibly rare volumes. One somewhat incongruous volume placed amongst the medical and scientific books was entitled ‘The Dictionary of Fact and Fable’ written by somebody he had never heard of called Rev E. Cobham Brewer. It was so out of keeping with the rest of the library that he assumed that it must have been a gift from someone. Moving on from examining the books, he found a few faded photographs in one of the desk drawers, and these, as he soon recognised, were of his late aunt. He remembered her only vaguely from the