Chapter 7: The Girl at the Gate

I took one step toward Gwen, and she lifted the phone higher.

"Go on," she said. "Slap me again. It's recording."

I stopped where I was.

Rain ran off the brim of her hood and onto the boards.

"Delete it," Kendrick said.

"I don't think I will, Mr. Ferrow." Her voice was warm and sorry. "I'll show it to Mrs. Aldercott at breakfast, unless Lydia does one small thing."

"What thing?" I asked.

"On Friday, when the lawyer comes, you let me sit at the head of the table."

"No."

"Then I'll show it."

She turned and went up the lawn in her yellow slicker, a small bright shape against the black grass, and she didn't look back once.

Kendrick said, "I'll go and speak to her."

"You'll make it worse."

"Then I'll go and be dismissed in an orderly way."

"Kendrick."

He looked at me, and I thought he was going to say something else.

He picked up the lamp instead and walked up the hill into the rain.

The gatehouse cottage sat at the end of the long drive under two oaks, with smoke coming out of its chimney at seven the next morning.

I had never once been inside it.

Maud opened the door with a dish towel over her shoulder.

She looked at me for a long moment and stepped aside.

"She's in her room," she said. "Don't shout. She's been up since four."

The kitchen was small and clean, with a blue kettle on the stove and a calendar from the feed store on the wall.

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