Aunt Dimity's Death Read Online Free Page B

lady, would you please tell my son and me the story entitled
Aunt Dimity Buys a Torch
?”
    I sat bolt upright in the chair, sputtered a few incoherent syllables—and fainted. The shock of hearing those words on a stranger’s lips did what a polar expedition on top of a hectic day without food had failed todo: awakened my sense of drama. I vaguely remember gaping in astonishment and then I found myself gazing blearily into Willis, Sr.’s face from a prone position on a couch.
    “Miss Shepherd, can you hear me?” asked Willis, Sr., leaning over to peer closely at my face. “Ah, you are awake. Good, good.”
    I hardly recognized the man. The cool politeness in his eyes had given way to a look of warm concern, a lock of white hair had fallen over his forehead, and the hand that had shaken mine with such formality was now solicitously tucking an afghan around me. Suddenly I could see a clear resemblance between father and son.
    “I am so very sorry about this,” he said, with a worried frown. “I had no idea it would affect you so severely. But the terms of the will are quite clear and I had to be certain you were who you claimed to be. I was under strict orders, you see, but I never dreamt—”
    “How did you know?” I murmured muzzily. “How did you know about Aunt Dimity?”
    “I think we shall have a bite of supper first. You appear to be in need of sustenance,” said Willis, Sr. “And then J will answer
your
questions for a change. A change for the better in my opinion, and in yours, too, no doubt.” He beamed down at me. “I am so happy that you are here, my dear. I feel as though I have known you for years.”
    However much I disliked having my questions deflected yet again, I had to admit that food sounded like an idea whose time had come. I pulled myself into a sitting position as Bill entered the room pushing a supper-laden trolley.
    “Feeling perfectly fine, are we?” he asked cheerfully, and I felt myself blush. He wheeled the trolley to within my reach and pulled up chairs for himself and his father. “If you’d felt any better, we might have had to call an ambulance.”
    “This is no time for levity, my boy,” admonished Willis, Sr., gently. “If you had given Miss Shepherd a proper meal when she arrived, we might have avoided this unfortunate incident.”
    “You’re quite right, Father. I stand corrected,” said Bill, and I sank a bit lower on the couch.
    “Please, Miss Shepherd, try some of the consomme,” said Willis, Sr. “There’s nothing like a good beef broth after an upset. And then, if you’re up to it, a bit of the roast, I think …”
    The two men fussed over me, filling my plate and keeping it filled, and between bites I told them the story of Aunt Dimity’s quest for a torch. I felt awkward, hauling out a part of my childhood for these two strangers to examine, but Willis, Sr., assured me that it was a necessary part of theGreat Q and A, so I went ahead and told it, word for word, exactly as my mother had told it to me. The only difference was that this time it put the teller to sleep instead of the listeners. Although it was barely eight o’clock, I dozed off with a dessert plate still in my lap.

I awoke in the small hours of the morning. The room was pitch-dark, but I didn’t need light to know that I wasn’t in my own bed. The mattress was firm and the pillows were soft—instead of the other way round—and when I stretched, my hands bumped into something which felt suspiciously like a headboard. Reaching to one side, my groping fingers found a nightstand, then a lamp. I turned it on.
    Definitely not my room. A large, tweedy armchair sat in one corner, a small, graceful desk in another, the kind that sits in the front window of a fancy antique store and costs half the gross national product. A crystal carafe and a tumbler sat on the nightstand; the carafe was filled with water. The bed had a footboard to go with the headboard, and both were made of the same