Read Fire When Ready (Manor House Mystery) for Free Online

opening, and Violet's urgent voice. "Lizzie? Wake up. You have to get up. We've been bombed."
    Elizabeth sat up, shaking the sleep from her mind. "Bombed? Where? At the manor?"
    "No, of course not. You would have woken up long before this if we had. Have you got your blackout curtains closed?"
    "Yes, of course. But . . ."
    Violet switched on the light. She stood in the doorway, her frizzy hair standing on end. Obviously it had not received the benefit of a comb. One hand clutched the neck of her wool dressing gown, while in the other she held a torch, the beam of which swept the ceiling as she gestured with it. "Get up, Lizzie. The Germans have dropped a bomb on the factory."
    "Oh, no!" Elizabeth threw back the covers and reached for her blue quilted dressing gown lying at the foot of her bed. "When? What happened?"
    "I just heard the news from George. He's downstairs waiting for you. He's in such a dither, you'd never know he was a blinking policeman the way he's carrying on."
    Elizabeth dragged on her dressing gown and squinted at the clock. "What's the time?"
    "It's almost one o'clock. George says the bomb must have been dropped at about eleven. Fred Shepperton called him from the Tudor Arms. You'd think a farmer would have his own telephone, wouldn't you, instead of having to ride his bike down the coast road to the pub."
    "I don't believe it." Elizabeth struggled to clear her mind. "How did German planes manage to find that building in the dark without being detected by the American base or the army camp?"
    "Don't ask me. They must have all been asleep on duty over there."
    Violet was shivering, but whether from cold or fright Elizabeth couldn't tell. She was cold herself, in spite of her heavy dressing gown. Their only source of heat was a coal fireplace, and her fire had long gone out, leaving the room as damp and chilled as the lawns outside.
    "What about the American officers?" Elizabeth demanded, following her housekeeper to the stairs. "Did anyone wake them?"
    "Not only woke them up, they're on their way to the base." Violet's face was white in the reflection from her torch.
    "And Martin and Sadie?"
    "In the kitchen. Martin's got the old blunderbuss from off the wall again. Won't let go of it. Keeps saying he's going down fighting."
    "Oh, dear." Elizabeth wrapped the collar of her dressing gown closer around her neck. "I do hope he didn't load it."
    "I doubt if it would fire even if he did. It's older than he is." Violet reached the bottom step and hurried toward the kitchen. "I left Sadie making a pot of tea. Though I don't know if we'll have time to drink it. We might have to evacuate the manor."
    Not if I have any say in the matter
, Elizabeth thought firmly. This was her home and no Nazi bomber was going to put her out of it.
    Inside the kitchen, the light seemed all the brighter after the eerie glow of Violet's torch. Police Constable George Dalrymple sat at the table with Martin, both men sipping a cup of tea. As Elizabeth entered the room George dropped the cup back in the saucer and shot to his feet.
    Martin's cup clattered into his saucer as well. Hestruggled to rise, hampered by the clumsy firearm he clutched in one hand.
    George nodded in Martin's direction. "I tried to take it off him, m'm. Refuses to give it up, he does."
    "It's all right, George." Elizabeth gave Martin a reassuring smile. He looked particularly frail right then. The few straggly gray hairs on his head were tangled together, and he'd forgotten to put on his glasses. Instead of his usual neat attire of a crisp white shirt and tie, vest, and jacket, he wore a knitted cardigan—which had definitely seen better days—over his pyjama jacket. He kept blinking his watery eyes, as if he were trying to wake up from a bad nightmare.
    "I'm sorry to disturb you this time of night, your ladyship," George said. "Thought you'd like to know what's going on."
    "Yes, of course." Elizabeth glanced at Sadie, who stood by the stove, a steaming cup in