Chapter 3 - The Cellar Door.
The cellar stairs were colder than Adrian remembered.
He descended with Nora behind him and the head of security, Martin Cole, carrying a flashlight even though the old wall lamps still worked.
Lily remained upstairs with a nurse from the family clinic.
Adrian had wanted Nora to stay with her.
After Lily's last words, he no longer knew whom to trust.
The portrait of Evelyn hung at the bottom of the stairs.
Dust had collected along its carved frame, but the painted red roses in her arms seemed almost bright in the weak light.
Adrian stared at his late wife's face longer than he meant to.
"Show me," he said.
Nora hesitated.
"Sir, I never meant for Miss Lily to come down here alone."
"Show me."
Nora reached behind the portrait and pressed a brass catch hidden in the wood paneling.
A narrow compartment opened with a soft click.
Inside was an empty keyhole.
Adrian held up Lily's brass key.
The torn silver thread fluttered from its teeth.
"How did Celeste know about this?"
Nora looked at the floor.
"She saw me here."
"Doing what?"
"Trying to open it."
Martin shifted behind them.
Adrian inserted the key.
It turned smoothly.
A section of wall released and moved inward several inches.
Cold air slid through the gap.
Martin raised the flashlight.
Behind the wall was not a room.
It was a narrow passage descending farther beneath the mansion.
Adrian's stomach tightened.
"Did you know this existed?"
Martin shook his head.
"No, sir."
Nora said nothing.
Adrian looked at her.
"You did."
"I knew there was a space behind the wall."
"That is not an answer."
Nora finally met his eyes.
"Your wife told my mother about it years ago."
Adrian stared at her.
"Your mother?"
"She worked for Mrs. Vale before I did."
A dozen old memories shifted in Adrian's mind.
Evelyn had employed a housekeeper named Mara Bennett, a quiet woman who disappeared from the household shortly after Evelyn died.
Adrian had been told she moved away.
"Mara was your mother?"
Nora nodded.
Before Adrian could ask another question, Martin lifted one hand.
"Sir."
His flashlight pointed toward the floor.
There were fresh marks in the dust.
Small shoe prints.
Lily's.
Beside them were deeper prints from narrow heels.
Celeste's silver shoes had thin pointed heels.
Adrian followed the tracks into the passage.
They ended at a small concrete room.
A chair lay on its side.
Lily's damp cardigan had been thrown into a corner.
Her inhaler was on a shelf high above the floor, far beyond a child's reach.
Adrian stared at it until his vision blurred with anger.
Nora covered her mouth.
"I didn't know it was here."
Martin stepped closer to the wall.
"There's something else."
A square of newer concrete interrupted the old stone floor.
At its center was a metal ring.
Adrian crouched and pulled.
The slab lifted like a hatch.
Beneath it sat a black metal case.
The brass key opened that too.
Inside were legal documents wrapped in waxed cloth.
A photograph rested on top.
Adrian picked it up.
It showed Evelyn standing beside Nora's mother, Mara, in the estate greenhouse.
A third person stood with them.
Adrian recognized him immediately.
Martin Cole was fifteen years younger in the photograph, but it was unmistakably him.
Adrian turned slowly toward his security chief.
Martin's flashlight lowered.
May you like
"Sir, I can explain."
Then every light in the cellar went out.
