Free Escapade by Walter Satterthwait

approve of brandy at this hour.”
    Mrs. Corneille smiled again. She was better at that than I would have been, if I’d been the one smiling at Mrs. Allardyce. “You needn’t worry,” she said. “Only a thimbleful.”
    Sir David started to say something to Mrs. Corneille but just then Miss Turner returned to the room. She was wearing her glasses now and she was buttoning up the front of a shapeless gray bathrobe. None of Miss Turner’s clothes lived up to her blue eyes. Not many clothes could.
    “Come along, then,” said Mrs. Corneille. She took Miss Turner’s left arm and patted it. She turned to the rest of us. “Pleasant dreams.”
    Miss Turner glanced at all of us again but she said nothing.
    They walked off. They made an interesting pair—Mrs. Corneille sleek and glossy in her red silk, Miss Turner taller and stiffer and almost drab now in her gray wool. You wouldn’t think it was possible for someone to look drab and proud at the same time, but Miss Turner somehow managed to pull it off.
    Without looking back, the two of them walked out the door into the hallway.
    I said to Mrs. Allardyce, “What was it, exactly, that woke you up?”
    She blinked. She was surprised, I think, by my asking. “Why, that awful screaming, of course. The silly girl gave me a horrible start. I thought my poor heart would stop.” She put her hand on her heavy chest. Probably she had a heart and probably it was in there somewhere.
    “Miss Turner screamed twice,” I said. “Which scream woke you up?”
    “The first one. It would’ve awakened the dead. ”
    “When you heard the scream, what did you do?”
    “I sat up and I switched on the electric light.” She frowned. “Why on earth do you ask?”
    “An excellent question,” said Sir David. “What are you playing at, Beaumont? Amateur sleuth?” He was annoyed at Miss Turner, I think, for calling him a fool. And probably at Mrs. Corneille, for plucking Miss Turner away. He was taking his annoyance out on me, probably because I was a witness, and a male. I could live with that for a while, if I had to.
    “Mr. Houdini will want to know,” I said. “This is the kind of thing he came here to investigate.” It sounded reasonable to me, but it seemed to bother Sir David.
    I looked at Mrs. Allardyce. “You turned on the light as soon as you heard the scream?”
    “Yes, of course.”
    “What happened then?”
    “Well, the—the poor girl screamed again, a dreadful scream, absolutely pitiful . ” She was on her best behavior now. She was assisting the Great Houdini with his research. “I had no idea what to think. But I got out of bed and I put on my robe—I was concerned about Jane, you see, and I thought I should go and have a peek at her. And then she came running through the door. She was completely hysterical.”
    “You didn’t see anybody else coming from her room.”
    “No, of course not. Only Jane. There was never anybody else in her room. Jane’s a charming person, good-hearted, but clever , of course, and terribly imaginative. It’s all those books she reads. And last night, you see, Lord Purleigh told us all some truly horrifying stories about the ghost who’s supposed to haunt this part of the manor. An ancestor of his, the third Earl, Lord Reginald Fitzwilliam. Far be it from me to criticize , Robert’s a dear sweet man, but really, he ought to have known better—anyone can see that Jane’s an excitable person. What must’ve happened is that after hearing all that, Jane dreamed she saw Lord Reginald, and then, of course, because she was sleeping in a strange bed, she was disorientated . And so she thought the dream was real , you see.”
    I nodded. “You heard two screams,” I said.
    “Yes, didn’t I just say so?”
    “Uh-huh. You mind if I take a look in Miss Turner’s room?”
    If she’d had eyebrows, she would’ve raised them. Instead she raised the ridge of her forehead. “Is that absolutely necessary, do you