She knew that this was death, and with the knowledge came an unsought peace, a letting go. And then the strong hand, skinless and inhuman, closed round her throat, forcing her head back against the pillows, and the apparition flung its weight forward. She wouldn’t shut her eyes in the face of death, nor did she struggle. The darkness of the room closed in on her and became the final blackness in which all feeling ceased.

Chapter 16

16

At twelve minutes past seven, in the kitchen, Kimberley was becoming anxious. She had been told by Sister Holland that Miss Gradwyn had asked for her early-morning tea tray to be brought up at seven o’clock. That was earlier than the first morning she had been at the Manor, but seven o’clock was the time Sister had told Kim to be ready to make it, and she had set the tray by six-forty-five and placed the teapot on top of the Aga to warm.

And now it was twelve minutes after seven, and no ring. Kim knew that Dean needed her help with the breakfast, which was proving unexpectedly aggravating. Mr. Chandler-Powell had asked for his to be served in his apartment, which was unusual, and Miss Cressett, who usually prepared what she wanted in her own small kitchen and rarely ate a cooked breakfast, had rung to say that she would join the household in the dining room at seven-thirty and had been unusually fussy about the required crispness of the bacon and the freshness of the egg—as if, thought Kim, any egg served at the Manor would be other than free-range and fresh, and Miss Cressett knew that as well as she. An added irritation was the non-appearance of Sharon, whose duty it was to lay the breakfast table and turn on the hotplates. Kim was reluctant to go upstairs and rouse her, in case Miss Gradwyn rang her bell.

Fretting once again over the exact alignment of the cup, saucer and milk jug on the tray, she turned to Dean, her face puckered with anxiety. “Perhaps I ought to take it up. Sister said seven. Perhaps she meant that I needn’t wait for the ring, that Miss Gradwyn would expect it promptly at seven.”

Her face, looking like that of a troubled child, induced as always Dean’s love and pity tinged with irritation. He moved to the telephone. “Sister, this is Dean. Miss Gradwyn hasn’t rung for her tea. Shall we wait or do you want Kim to make it now and take it up?”

The call took less than a minute. Replacing the receiver, Dean said, “You’re to take it up. Sister says to knock on her door before you go in. She’ll take it in to Miss Gradwyn.”

“I suppose she’ll have the Darjeeling as she did before, and the biscuits. Sister didn’t say any different.”