Free Sheer Folly by Carola Dunn Page A

Desmond and Lord Rydal can take care of Lady Ottalinebetween them,” Lucy said impatiently, “if in fact she’s come to any harm.”
    â€œWhich I haven’t.” The lady in question came into view, swathed in furs, leaning heavily on her husband’s arm. “You didn’t tell me it was such a long way,” she said reproachfully to Pritchard.
    â€œIt’s not really very far, Lady Ottaline. I’m afraid I didn’t notice your footwear.”
    â€œYou didn’t?” Pouting, she held out one slender—not to say bony—ankle and green glacé shoe with a diamanté clasp and very high, narrow heels. She turned it this way and that. “They’re intended to be noticed.”
    â€œCharming,” said Sir Desmond dryly, “but not intended for a walk through a garden at night.”
    Rhino had arrived close behind them, the smoke from his inevitable cigarette curling up into the still air. He made straight for Julia’s side. He murmured in her ear while Lady Ottaline was complaining, then said to Pritchard, “Well, are we going into your dashed grotto or not?”
    â€œThere are steps. I don’t know if Lady Ottaline will be able to—”
    â€œI’m freezing, standing here. I’m going up.” Lucy started the climb.
    The steps, cut into the limestone cliff surrounding the mouth of the grotto, ascended steeply for about ten feet. Daisy was glad to see a stout-looking iron railing. She set off after Lucy, whose fashionably tubular frock didn’t appear to impede her much, one of the advantages of a knee-length hemline.
    Each step was worn, the centre lower than the sides. Daisy deduced that the flight had been cut by the original creators of the grotto and trodden since by generation after generation.
    Lucy, plodding upwards ahead of her, glanced back. “Darling, this had jolly well be worth the effort.”
    â€œYou must admit it looks intriguing from below.”
    â€œI wouldn’t be up here else. I hope Pritchard’s going to lend me a gardener to carry my stuff tomorrow.”
    â€œHas he given you any reason to suppose he might not?”
    â€œNo,” Lucy admitted grudgingly. “He seems quite a decent little man.”
    Dismayed, Daisy looked behind her to make sure the “decent little man” was not close at her heels. He was not, but his nephew was a few steps below her. The roar of the waterfall had covered the sound of his footsteps, and she hoped it had also covered the sound of Lucy’s condescending words. Unlike Lady Ottaline’s husky contralto, Lucy possessed a penetrating soprano.
    Owen Howell showed no sign of having heard, or perhaps he didn’t care a hoot about Lucy’s opinion of his uncle. Looking up at Daisy, he said something she couldn’t make out.
    â€œSorry?”
    He raised his voice. “My uncle would like you to wait till he gets there to explore.”
    â€œOf course.” Why? Because he wanted to see their initial reactions at firsthand? Because parts were dangerous—falling ceilings, perhaps? Daisy wondered, glancing up a trifle nervously as she followed Lucy from the steps onto the floor of the grotto. Surely not! Pritchard would never permit such inefficiency, and if the hazard was a recent occurrence, Howell was there to keep them away from it. Or was the request to wait related to their host’s mysterious and somewhat sinister eagerness to show them the grotto at night?
    â€œHold on,” she called to Lucy, who was heading for the rear of the cave. “Mr. Pritchard doesn’t want us wandering about before he comes up.”
    â€œWhy not? I can’t see that he’d be much help if one of us fell into the Styx.”
    â€œLucy!”
    â€œI just want to . . . Oh, all right! I probably can’t tell in the dark, anyway.”
    Though murky, it wasn’t really dark in the grotto. Just above head-height on the