The Secret Woman by Victoria Holt Page A

sight of each other,” I said.
    She nodded. “And we’ll exchange journals so that even when we can’t see each other as often as we’d like to, we shall know everything that is happening.”
    â€œI shall know everything that is happening to you in Castle Crediton.”
    â€œEverything,” she declared solemnly. “Anna, have you ever felt you would like to be a fly on the wall to hear and see everything and no one be aware of you there?”
    â€œWho hasn’t?”
    â€œWell, that’s how it is going to be. You’re the fly on my wall.” She laughed. How she lightened my spirits! And how I was going to miss her!
    ***
    Ellen, married to Mr. Orfey, came back to say that he had no objection to her coming in in the mornings to give a hand; Mrs. Buckle continued to come in to dust and polish, but she left at four o’clock, and from then on I was alone in the Queen’s House.
    It was when the shadows fell that I would find myself brooding on Aunt Charlotte’s death.
    I would wake up suddenly from a dream in which I walked down to her room and took the pills from the bottle, to hear myself crying out: “No. No. I did not do it.” Then I would lie still listening to the clocks and it would seem as though they soothed me. It must have happened as Chantel said. There was no other explanation.
    I should not brood on the past. Goodness knows the future was stark enough. How was I going to pay Aunt Charlotte’s debts? Many of the pieces which I believed were hers had not been paid for. She had spent far too much of her capital on the Chinese collection; during the last years the business had not been paying its way. Alarming as this was it gave credence to Chantel’s theory. Obsessed by ever-increasing pain, always impatient of inactivity, seeing her debts rising and eventual bankruptcy, she had forced herself—and I knew the extent of her will power—to get out of bed and seek oblivion.
    I should have to make some decision. I could not allow things to drift. Indeed I should not be allowed to do so. I formed all sorts of plans. To advertise for a partner with money? To sell out and see what remained? Enforced sales often meant cut prices. If I realized enough to pay my debts I should be lucky. There would be nothing left but the house. I could sell that perhaps. That was the answer.
    So my mind raced on during the sleepless nights, and in the mornings, when I looked at my face in the mirror, I would murmur to myself: “Old Miss Brett.”
    Chantel came and left her journal for me while she took mine away. She would return with it the next day.
    That night I took it up to bed with me and the thought of reading it brought me out of my melancholy. My life was drab, and even frightening, but Chantel, as before, was my savior. To look in on what was happening at Castle Crediton would give me the respite I needed. Besides, I would always be particularly interested in anything that happened in Redvers Stretton’s home.
    I felt my spirits lighten a little as I lay back on my pillows and brought the oil lamp—which I had carried up from downstairs—nearer to my bed and started to read Chantel’s journal.

The Castle

Five
    April 28th, 1887. Today I came to Castle Crediton. I couldn’t help feeling rather pleased with myself. I had a new patient and I should not be too far from Anna. We should see each other frequently. I was going to make sure of that. The Castle I knew was not a real one. “Fake,” Miss Brett had called it, but that meant little to me. It had all the appearance of a castle and I liked driving under the great archway with the gate house overhead. But I never cared for antiquity. I’ll ask Anna about it all sometime, if I ever think of it. The stone walls of the castle looked as if they had been there for centuries. I wondered what had been done to give them that appearance. Another thing to ask Anna—if