The Vampyre Read Free

choice.’
    â€˜Because she was a Ruthven?’
    Melrose nodded.
    â€˜And yet now you want to try to stop me?’
    â€˜No, Miss Carville, it is not a matter of trying. I will stop you. I will not give you the keys.’ Melrose stared into Rebecca’s narrowing eyes. He looked away, rising to his feet, crossing to a window and the darkness out beyond. ‘She vanished,’ he said at last, not turning round. ‘A few days after I gave her the keys. The police never found her. There was never anything, of course, to link her disappearance with Lord Ruthven, but I remembered all he had said, and what I had glimpsed in his face. I didn’t tell the police - afraid of seeming ridiculous, you understand - but with you, Miss Carville, I am prepared to risk seeming comical.’ He turned round to face her again. ‘Go away. It’s getting late. I’m afraid our meeting has come to an end.’
    Rebecca didn’t move. Then slowly, she smoothed her hair back from her face. ‘The keys are mine,’ she said unblinkingly.
    Melrose raised his arms in anger and frustration. ‘Didn’t you hear what I said? Can’t you understand?’ He slumped into his chair. ‘Miss Carville, please, don’t be difficult. Just go, before I have to ring for you to be taken away.’
    Rebecca shook her head gently. Melrose sighed, and reached across his desk to press an intercom. As he did so, Rebecca took a second sheaf of papers from her bag. She pushed them across the desk. Melrose glanced at them, then froze. He took up the first page and began to skim down it, glassily, as though unable, or unwilling, to read it through. He muttered something, then pushed the papers away from him. He sighed and for a long time said nothing more. At last, he shook his head and sighed a second time. ‘So, she was your mother, then?’
    Rebecca nodded. ‘She kept her maiden name. I took my father’s.’
    Melrose breathed in deeply. ‘Why didn’t you say?’
    â€˜I wanted to know what you thought.’
    â€˜Well, you know. Keep away from Fairfax Street.’
    Rebecca smiled. ‘You’re not serious,’ she said, then laughed. ‘You can’t be.’
    â€˜Would it make any difference if I say again that I am?’
    â€˜No. None at all.’
    Melrose stared at her, then nodded. ‘Very well, then,’ he said. ‘If you insist, I’ll have the keys brought to you.’ He pressed a button. There was no response. ‘Must be later than I’d realised,’ he muttered, rising to his feet. ‘If you’ll excuse me, Miss Carville.’ Rebecca watched him as he left his office, and the doors glided shut. She began to gather her papers together. Her certificates she slipped back into her bag; the bundle of letters she kept on her lap. She fiddled with them; then, as she heard the doors behind her opening again, she laid her slim fingers on the edge of the desk.
    â€˜Here,’ said Melrose, holding out three keys on a large brass ring.
    â€˜Thank you,’ said Rebecca. She waited to be given them, but the lawyer, as he stood by her, still kept the keys clutched tightly in his hand.
    â€˜Please,’ said Rebecca. ‘Give them to me, Mr Melrose.’
    Melrose made no answer at first. He stared into Rebecca’s face, long and hard, then he reached for the bundle of letters on her lap. ‘These,’ he said, holding them up, ‘the mysterious letters - they were your mother’s originally?’
    â€˜I believe so.’
    â€˜What do you mean, believe?’
    Rebecca shrugged. ‘I was approached by a bookseller. He had been sold them. Apparently, it was well known that they had once been my mother’s.’
    â€˜And so then he came to you?’
    Rebecca nodded.
    â€˜Very honest of him.’
    â€˜Maybe. I paid.’
    â€˜But how had he got them? And how had your mother lost the letters