Cecilia laughed. “We haven’t found her yet!”
“If that is where she said she would be, that is where she will be,” Mrs. Vance responded.
As they approached the library, its door opened. To their surprise it was Mr. Turnbull-Minchin.
“Ladies,” he said, nodding to them as he passed them by. And he looked quite pleased with himself, the corner of his lips quirking up in a small smile. Mrs. Vance looked ready to take him to task. Cecilia laid her hand on Mrs. Vance’s arm, encouraging restraint. She looked across the room. Julia appeared as equally upset as Mrs. Vance. Cecilia led Mrs. Vance and Liddy over to her.
“What is he doing here?” she hissed when they came up to Julia.
“He has not been fired,” Julia said. “He just escorted a woman and her husband in to see Dr. Worcham in the parlor. And when he came back out, he looked right at me and laughed.”
“Laughed at you? Why did he laugh at you?”
“Probably because of the shocked expression on my face.”
Cecilia shook her head. “Let’s go to Mr. Montgomery’s chamber to straighten it, as Dr. Worcham requested last night.”
“I’m sure there won’t be anything there to find if Mr. Turnbull-Minchin has been using the room.”
“Perhaps not…He may not have known all the proper places to look. I’m sure our Liddy does.”
Liddy nodded then scrunched her face up and giggled. “I’ll bet he didn’t find the boxes.”
“Boxes?”
“Mr. Montgomery made a special place for my box, too,” Liddy said proudly. “Not my treasure box, my second-best box.”
“Your second-best box?”
“Uh-huh.”
“That was quite kind of him,” Mrs. Vance said, exchanging speaking looks with Cecilia and Julia over Liddy’s head.
“Mr. Montgomery was very smart,” she said.
“I just wish he had been smart enough not to get himself killed,” Mrs. Vance muttered.
Cecilia frowned at her. She shrugged back.
They passed Mr. Quetal entering as they left the library. “Mr. Quetal, if anyone comes looking for us, we have gone to do the task Dr. Worcham gave us last night,” Cecilia told him.
“What task? Where?”
“Clean Mr. Montgomery’s room.”
They went out the library, turned left, then through the door near the end of the hall that led to the treatment rooms, the estate room, and Mr. Montgomery’s room, Liddy leading the way. The gas lamps high on the walls had been turned up fordaytime, yet there remained a gloomy feeling to the hall without windows, and just doors on either side, framed in dark wood. No paintings or sketches or anything hung on the walls.
Liddy reached the door to Mr. Montgomery’s room and impatiently awaited them, rocking from foot to foot. She grinned as she threw open the door, her eyes dancing.
Immediately Cecilia could understand why.
Light flooded the room from a wall of nearly floor to ceiling windows. The glass was similar to the glass in the dining hall, watery diamond panes with occasional colored diamonds of glass. This clear glass appeared so watery it was difficult to see through. Near the ceiling were colorful bible stories.
At first, Cecilia did not see the door Liddy spoke of, then she discerned it from the windows on either side. The room was unlike any other Cecilia had seen at Camden House. A large wardrobe took up much of one wall and it, like the walls and all the interior woodwork, had been painted a stark white. In contrast, the cushions, the rug, the drapes that were tied back, and the bed linens, were all brightly colored. The room appeared double the size of the room Cecilia slept in. There was a desk, a card table, and a small couch.
Unfortunately, it had been, as Cecilia feared, ransacked. Bookshelves and drawers empty, the wardrobe open, one door sagging on a broken hinge, and everything knee deep on the floor.
“What!” protested Mr. Vance. She walked around tossed pillows and books. “This is outrageous!”
