Wait Until Midnight by Amanda Quick Page B

cushions and opened the curtains.
    "We appear to have arrived at your address." He gave her a heart-stoppingly intimate look. "I can only regret that the journey did not take a good deal longer."
    She did not know what to say to that so she looked out the window instead. Two figures stood on the doorstep. They, in turn, were staring at her in openmouthed astonishment.
    She was instantly jolted back to reality.
    "Oh, dear," she murmured. "This may prove to be a trifle difficult for you, sir."
    Adam studied the pair on the step. "Your aunts, I presume?"
    "I'm afraid so"
    He reached for the door handle. "I told you that I am considered to be quite respectable. Surely they will not object to me bringing you home."
    "The problem is that they will insist on inviting you in for a cup of tea."
    "Excellent. I could do with a cup of tea."
    "Wait, you don't understand," she said. "It won't be just the tea. There will be questions. A lot of them."
    He smiled his mysterious smile and got out of the vehicle. "I don't mind a few questions," he said. "As it happens, I have a few of my own."
    TEN
    Some twenty minutes later she was still wondering uneasily what Adam had meant by that last cryptic remark. She studied him covertly, uncertain of his mood. He should have been showing signs of impatience, she thought, but instead he seemed to have made himself quite comfortable in the little parlor at Number 22 Corley Lane.
    He was seated in an armchair, legs stretched out in front of him, one ankle stacked casually on top of the other. On the table beside him there was a half-finished cup of tea and a plate of Mrs. Plummer's pastries. He had made great inroads on the latter.
    "I'm sure your niece has explained to you both that I believe that Elizabeth Delmont was in possession of a certain diary at the time of her death," he said around a mouthful of jam tart.
    Milly and Emma had been polite but wary at the start of the conversation. However they appeared to be falling very quickly under Adam's spell.
    "Yes," Milly said. "Caroline told us about the diary. " Emma frowned. "I will admit that we are all quite curious about the contents."
    "Naturally." Adam swallowed the last of his tart. "I regret to say that I cannot satisfy your curiosity entirely. I'm sure you will understand when I tell you that the diary contains some information of an extremely personal nature about other people of whom I happen to be very fond. "
    "How did you come to discover that Mrs. Delmont was in possession of the diary?" Caroline said.
    He hesitated briefly. She knew he was deciding just how much to tell them.
    "A fortnight ago I received word of the death of an old friend named Maud Gatley," he said. "I was saddened by the loss, but the news was not unexpected. Maud had been addicted to opium for a long time. In recent years the drug had taken control of her life. In the end, it killed her."
    "How tragic," Milly whispered.
    "A few days later I received a blackmail note threatening to reveal the contents of Maud's diary unless I left a very large sum of money in a certain location." Adam reached for another tart. "Until that moment, I had not realized that Maud had kept a journal. I immediately made some inquiries and soon discovered that what few possessions she had left behind had been claimed by a cousin. "
    "You tracked down the cousin?" Emma asked.
    "Yes. Discovering that Maud had a relative was some-thing of a surprise, too. She had always claimed that she had no family."
    `Amazing how long-lost relations emerge from the woodwork when a person dies and leaves behind a few items of value," Emma said dryly.
    Adam was amused. "Yes. In any event, I realized that, given the timing of events, the unknown cousin had no doubt found the diary among Maud's things, read it, saw the potential for profit and fired off the anonymous extortion note. I made a few more inquiries and identified Elizabeth Delmont as the woman who had come to Maud's lodgings and taken away what little