Bath Belles Read Free

motive was called robbery. His money purse was missing, but a small diamond tie pin was left intact. How much cash would a struggling young solicitor carry with him? Surely not enough that he would defend it with his life. Graham would have, though. He was like that. The injustice of it would have caused him to fight to the death. It was not mere chance that had led him to the study of the law.
    “Who do you think killed him?”Esther asked as she went on fitting some drawers into a small wall table.
    “A person or persons unknown,”I said grimly. I really didn’t want to know more or to think about it at all. Some criminal had killed a good, honorable man and gotten clean away. It was done, and no good could come from harking back to it. The police had investigated thoroughly, Yootha had said, and had learned nothing.
    “Esther, come and help me in the kitchen,”Mama said, but her worried voice revealed her reasoning. She didn’t want me reminded unnecessarily of the past. Esther would have a peal rung over her for discussing the murder. As though I could help thinking the same thoughts myself!
    We got the living and dining rooms and a bedroom each put to rights by noon and were ready for lunch. We set off in the proper direction to reach New Bond Street, where we made our meal at a small restaurant. I was in charge of decisions for us all, and my next decision was that henceforth we would eat at the house. Meals out were not only unappetizing and expensive, but also inconvenient. We shopped for food, and then I remembered to go and have the gas turned on. We returned to Elm Street, already finding the little brick house familiar and welcoming after the hour spent amid the busy throng of London.
    During the afternoon we arranged our creature comforts around us in the house, moving lamps and small tables and so on to suit us. We put away the food when it was delivered and were just lighting candles to ward off the early dark of November when the man from the gas company came to connect us. We enjoyed our first meal there by gaslight, and we felt very modern and citified, turning the knobs to make it as bright as daylight till the tyrant decided we were wasting expensive gas and turned them down to a less harsh glare.
    Building a fire in the stove proved difficult. I had seen the servants light the grate often enough that I knew what should be done, but the thing was harder to accomplish in a closed stove. In the end we ate cold ham with bread and cheese in the saloon and heated our tea kettle on the hob while Esther made toast on a long fork. It was cozy, like a picnic, eating around the fire with an unusual quantity of traffic streaming past a few yards beyond. For the first dozen carriages we ran to look out the window, but in the end we became blaséabout the clatter and the bobbing lights. We drew the curtains and settled in to read the papers we had picked up while shopping. Our advertisement had not been inserted yet.
    “I shall put my sign in the window,”I decided, and drew one up to look as official and businesslike as my wobbly print could make it. That it be legible from the street was the important point. “House for Sale. Inquire within”was all I wrote.
    Meanwhile, Esther had discovered the entertainment page of the paper and was busy regaling us with all manner of divertissements open to Londoners and tourists. There were plays and concerts, operas and ballets, lectures, and public dances enough to satisfy the entire population of London. Esther soon decided that what suited a clutch of unescorted ladies from Bath was a comedy to be played for a week at the Haymarket Theatre. She received tentative agreement, pending arrival of our servants with our clothes and approval from Yoofa Mailer, who was to be our social arbiter.
    I spent close to an hour checking the real estate columns to determine if the price we planned to ask for our house was fair. I couldn’t make head or tail of the prices demanded,