Murder at the Mayfair Hotel (Cleopatra Fox Mysteries Book 1) by C.J. Archer

Author:C.J. Archer [Archer, C.J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: www.cjarcher.com
Published: 2020-11-30T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter 8

I could tell by the way Harmony brushed my hair that something bothered her. She raked the brush through with vigorous strokes then thumped it down on the dressing table.

“You don’t have to do my hair if you don’t want to,” I said. “I’m capable of doing it myself.”

“I want to.”

“Then can you be a little gentler? I’d like some hair left when you’ve finished.”

Hand on hip, she regarded me in the mirror’s reflection. “When I told you to ask Victor to open a locked door for you, I wasn’t expecting you to leave the hotel in the middle of the night.”

“Ah. So you heard about that.”

“The whole hotel heard!”

I spun around in the chair. “My uncle?”

“I don’t think anyone would have told the Bainbridges. We don’t talk to them as freely as we do each other.”

I turned back to the mirror. “Does anyone know that I went out with Victor?”

“No, but you probably should have let on that you met him. Everyone thinks you went out alone. A lady can’t do that without everyone thinking the worst of her.”

“I don’t care what the staff think. I know what I was doing, and it wasn’t what you’re implying. Just as long as my uncle doesn’t hear of it. I’d rather not incur his wrath this early in our acquaintance.”

Harmony twisted a section of my hair and checked the effect in the mirror. Satisfied, she proceeded to stick pins into it. Fortunately her temper had cooled and she didn’t stab my scalp. “Next time you have to go out at night alone, wear a disguise so the doorman doesn’t recognize you.”

“He wouldn’t let me back in if I didn’t show my face. Or if he did, the night porter would accost me in the foyer.”

“Then just don’t go out. You can’t have nasty gossip attached to you.”

I sighed. I wasn’t going to win, even if I reminded her that a murderer needed to be caught.

“So where did you go?” she asked.

“I’d rather not tell you until I have more answers. I don’t want to implicate an innocent person.”

“I can just ask Victor.”

I hadn’t sworn Victor to silence, but I hoped he would also be discreet. I suspected Harmony could be quite determined when she wanted to be, however.

“I’m not sure if we discovered anything important anyway,” I went on. “It was probably nothing.”

She finished my hair and left to begin her cleaning duties while I ate breakfast, delivered by one of the footmen. He eyed me with a narrowed gaze as he passed me the tray and did not wish me a good morning as he had done the day before. It would seem my reputation was thoroughly ruined, at least as far as the staff were concerned.

I nibbled the toast but left the boiled eggs untouched. I was still reeling from the news that Mr. Armitage had been arrested for theft as a boy. If Mrs. Warrick knew him back then, and knew of the arrest, she would certainly

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