Free Cruel as the Grave by Dean James Page A

she finally accepted what Sylvia had told them. Trying not to cry, Maggie clutched at her father’s hand. He grasped it in his own. She noted dully that his hand felt as cold as hers.
    Claudine moved first, her bright yellow dress a sudden blur of color and movement, pushing her way through the door, jostling Sylvia aside. Quickly Adrian followed her, and after a moment they could all hear the footsteps of the two rapidly ascending the marble steps. Gerard and Maggie began to follow, while Lavinia herded Sylvia toward a chair, clucking solicitously over the young woman. Retty, Harold, and Helena remained where they were, standing aimlessly near the doorway, still trying to absorb the impact of Sylvia’s announcement.
    When Maggie and Gerard reached Henry McLendon’s bedroom, they found Claudine leaning against the closed door. “Don’t go in there,” she advised them bleakly. “Dear God above, it’s awful. I’d better go call the police.” She proceeded on shaky legs down the hall and disappeared inside her room next door.
    The door opened, and Adrian stepped out. Pale of face, one hand rubbing his stomach, he glanced nervously between Maggie and her father. “There’s nothing any of us can do now,” he said blankly. “You’d better go back downstairs.”
    He tried to push them gently back toward the stairs, but Gerard stood firm. “What happened?” His tone of voice was stern, a tone which had forced many a cocky graduate student to quail. Adrian’s normally assured manner was no proof against the older man’s air of command.
    “He’s dead, and someone killed him,” Adrian said, his breathing ragged. “Let’s just leave it at that. Please.” He closed his eyes and covered them with one hand.
    “Could someone have gotten into the house and done this?” Maggie asked, trying to control her trembling.
    “No,” Adrian said, his voice flat. “I switched on the security system before we started the movie. No one could have gotten in.”
    “Oh, my,” Gerard said softly. He reached out blindly for Maggie, who herself felt as if the floor were about to disappear beneath her. They clung to each other for a moment, until Adrian, recovering slightly, urged them to go downstairs.
    With Adrian on one side and Maggie on the other, Gerard moved down the stairs as if he had aged forty years. This frightened Maggie for several reasons, not the least of which was the fact that she had never seen her father in such a state. But at the back of her mind, she fretted over the fact that one member of the household was a murderer. Someone in the family had killed Henry McLendon.
    By the time they reached the entertainment room again, Sylvia had evidently recovered enough to tell the others what she had found. Helena, pale but curiously dry-eyed, sat in the corner by herself, her fingers picking ceaselessly at something on the leg of her tracksuit. Retty sat with Sylvia, who cried quietly, while Retty patted her hands soothingly. Harold stood in a corner, his back to everyone else in the room. Lavinia sat curled up in a corner of one of the couches, nursing a glass of some dark-colored liquid.
    Gerard’s entrance roused Helena from her quiet perch. After one long look at his face, she moved quickly to a cabinet in the wall, fetched out a decanter and a glass, and poured a generous amount of what looked to be brandy into the glass.
    “You look like you need this,” she said gruffly to Gerard as she pushed the glass into his hands. “Drink up.”
    Maggie weakly smiled her thanks at her aunt, who promptly fetched another glass for Maggie, whose pallor she seemed to notice for the first time. Gratefully Maggie sipped at the liquid while she watched the color come back into her father’s face. His breathing became gradually less labored, and Maggie’s concern for him ebbed a fraction.
    “The police are on their way,” Claudine announced from the doorway. She headed for the brandy and poured herself a generous amount.