Page 22 of The Mystery Guest

“I don’t mean cleaning, Molly. I mean the toxicology reports. I mean the tea on that cart.”

“I’m well aware of what you mean, Detective. Are you aware of whatImean?”

Detective Stark puts her hands on her hips. “Let me just ask you this very directly. Do you know of any maid or other hotel employee, be it yourself or someone else, who had a reason to hate Mr. Grimthorpe?”

I hesitate because I don’t know how to answer. The truth is that I do know of a maid who had a reason to hate Mr. Grimthorpe. But I also know that maid is dead.

Before

I recall it in my mind and can relive it as though it were yesterday. It’s the night after the first day I spent working beside Gran at the Grimthorpe mansion. I’m back at our apartment. Gran has tucked me in and given me her usual caution about bedbugs and sleeping tight. I close my eyes and fall into the deepest, most exquisite sleep of my life.

For the first time in a long time, I’m not plagued by nightmares about the tortures that await me in the schoolyard the next day. Instead, my dreams sparkle and flash, visions of silver and Fabergé eggs dancing in my head. I wake up in the morning refreshed and excited about spending another day at the Grimthorpe mansion.

Gran and I set out at quarter to eight. No expensive taxi today. Instead, we are powered by our own feet, and then a city bus and then another bus. On the long commute, I tell Gran the big revelation I had before falling asleep the night before. “I’ve made up my mind. I know what I want to be when I grow up.”

“What’s that?” Gran asks.

“A maid, just like you.”

“Oh, I don’t recommend it,” Gran says. “The job has many hidden perils. And I think you can aim higher, what with that sharp mind of yours.”

“What do you mean ‘aim higher’? I want to be a maid,” I say.

Gran sighs and pats my hand. “Very well. For now, you can be my Maid-in-Training at the mansion. How does that sound?”

“Like heaven,” I reply.

An hour later, we arrive at the mansion gate. Gran buzzes the hidden intercom to announce our arrival, and the invisible gatekeeper in the tower opens sesame. We’re walking up the cobblestone path flanked by fragrant roses. At the entrance to the mansion, a contorted face I did not notice yesterday stares down at us from above the door.

“Gran, is that Mr. Grimthorpe?” I ask.

“No,” she says with a little laugh. “That’s a stone gargoyle, though I admit the resemblance is uncanny.”

I step up to the door, grab the heavy lion mandible, and knock hard three times. The knob turns, and Mrs. Grimthorpe appears in a beige blouse and a gray skirt, her mouth a tight pucker.

“Good morning, Mrs. Grimthorpe,” I say. “I’m ready to polish and shine,” I say, proud of my new distinction as Gran’s official Maid-in-Training.

Mrs. Grimthorpe does not reply but steps aside to allow us to enter. She crosses her arms and stares at us as we stand in the foyer. Gran removes a cloth from the front vestibule and instructs me to take off my shoes. She vigorously wipes the bottoms of both of our pairs before placing them inside the closet separate from all the other fancy shoes.

Mrs. Grimthorpe sniffs, then leads us down the main corridor, past the bourgeois blobs, and into the house. We arrive in theglorious, sun-filled kitchen, which smells like lemons and spring-fresh air.

“I have shopping to do and errands to run in town today,” Mrs. Grimthorpe announces. “The gatekeeper will drive us to town. Flora, you’ll accompany me and carry my bags. The girl will stay behind and work.”

“Madam, I can’t leave Molly,” Gran says. “Who will look after her?”

“Surely she can look after herself. Also, Mr. Grimthorpe is upstairs in his study and Jenkins is right there in the garden.”

I look out the floor-to-ceiling windows and spot a ruddy-faced man with bulbous eyes and a back as straight as an exclamation point. He’s staring at us as he slices through the hedges with razor-sharp clippers.

Mrs. Grimthorpe checks her watch, then says, “Chop, chop, Flora. Set the girl up in the silver pantry while I gather my things.” Then she click-clacks down a corridor and out of sight.

The minute she’s gone, I feel Gran’s hands come down on my small shoulders.

“Molly, I don’t want to leave you here by yourself.”

“I don’t mind,” I say. “I’ll be fine.”

“Will you? Sometimes I just don’t know what to do,” Gran says, her eyes crinkling up in that way that makes my stomach hurt. This happens sometimes between Gran and me. I feel what she feels; her emotion passes through my skin and burrows right into my being. I make a mental note to look this up in the anatomy book at the library, because even if the Skeleton Song doesn’t say it, there must be an explanation for how Gran’s eyes connect to my stomach.

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