She pressed her lips together, eyes brimming. Preston just blinked at her.
“I wasn’t going to accuse you of that,” he said softly. “I think you have a point. We don’t know exactly how this all shook out, and Blackmar refuses to speak the word Angharad, so we aren’t going to get any answers from him. Tonight we’ll probe Greenebough’s editor as best we can.”
Effy nodded, very slowly. She continued up the stairs, but her nausea didn’t subside.
Blackmar’s guests began arriving in the late afternoon, just before dusk, the waning orange-gold light pooling on the sleek hoods of their cars. They went up the circular driveway and parked in neat columns, like an arrangement of insects under an entomologist’s glass. Effy watched from the window, counting the guests as they exited their cars, women trailing gossamer shrugs and men frowning under their mustaches.
There were at least thirty of them, and Effy wondered if that was better or worse for their purposes. Such a large affair might make it more difficult to get the editor from Greenebough alone, but a more intimate one would make her and Preston appear like awkward interlopers. Already their ages would make them stick out from the crowd: none of the arriving guests were younger than Effy’s mother. It made her uneasy, and she drew the curtains shut.
She and Preston had found nothing about the affair in Myrddin’s diary. In fact, every entry that should have appeared between April 189 and March 190 had been torn out right from the spine of the book. Preston looked more dejected than Effy had ever seen him.
Hoping to cheer him a bit, Effy said, “Even proving that Myrddin had a secret affair—that’s something, isn’t it? Was he already married at the time?”
“I’m not sure,” Preston said. “There are almost no records of his personal life, no marriage certificates that I could find. A secret affair is something. But it isn’t enough. Those letters are worth a salacious newspaper exposé, and maybe a paragraph or two of a thesis, but they don’t constitute a thesis in and of themselves. We need more context, and we need more proof.”
I don’t want more proof. But Effy couldn’t bring herself to say it.
Trying to put it out of her mind, Effy went to the wardrobe to choose something to wear for the party. She flipped through the dresses like they were catalog cards at the library, silk hissing between her fingers. She stopped when she found a dress of deep emerald green, with a corseted back, a low bustline, and cap sleeves made of shimmery tulle.
A memory invaded her with such intensity and suddenness that she felt almost blown backward by it. The photographs of the girl on the chaise longue, her empty eyes, her naked breasts—all of it came rushing back to Effy with the force of water thrashing against the cliffside.
“Preston,” she said. “Do you remember those photographs?”
He frowned at her. “The ones in Myrddin’s lockbox? You don’t think—”
“I think that was Blackmar’s daughter. It must have been. The writing on the back, that line—‘I will love you to ruination.’”
“That certainly explains why Myrddin felt the need to hide them.” Preston kept his tone subdued, but his eyes had grown bright.
“That’s proof, isn’t it? I mean, maybe it’s not incontrovertible, but it’s significant. Proof of the affair, and proof that Myrddin owed something to Blackmar. The photos were found in Myrddin’s own house, tucked into his diary. What if—”
Effy stopped herself, drawing in a sudden breath. She had almost said something naive and fanciful, something that sounded as childish as believing in the Fairy King. Preston looked at her oddly.
“What if what?” he prompted.
“Nothing,” she said. “Never mind.”
“We have to go back for them,” Preston said, voice urgent. “We’d need both the letters and the photographs to prove the affair. It’s only one step after that to prove Blackmar wrote the book, or at least parts of it. We have to find them before Ianto does—”
He cut off, seeing the look of panic on Effy’s face. She was remembering the envy in Ianto’s eyes as he’d watched them leave. The idea of him finding the photographs was even more horrifying to her.
“Maybe we should leave now,” she said. “To hell with this stupid party—”
“No.” Preston shook his head. “We have to get something from Greenebough, whatever we can. Proving the affair is one thing, but proving it’s connected to Angharad is another. We need Blackmar and the editor for that.”