I Sang Loudly in Dominic Vale’s Mansion Until He Put Down a Strange Key and Turned Pale

At the moment when Dominic Vale interrupted my singing, all the doors of his mansion locked at once and the guards reached for their weapons.

The music was still playing when he took off his jacket and signaled to Marcus Cole with his eyes to go outside. And I stood there holding a feather duster, trying not to let anyone notice how my knees were trembling.

“Forgive me,” I said at last. “I thought you would not return until evening.”

“You already said that.”

“Then perhaps I should tell you that you are very good at appearing unexpectedly.”

Marcus’s jaw tightened. But Dominic cast me a look as if there were not a person in front of him, but an object left behind by mistake.

“Music is not heard in my house,” he said.

“Now it is.”

“That was not an order.”

“Neither was my singing a public concert.”

Silence fell. Not ordinary silence. The kind that probably every wall in this house knew, and because of which the employees breathed in whispers.

And I was still holding my little red, strawberry-shaped hair clip. It had come loose from my hair in the morning and I had put it in my pocket. My mother gave it to me for my sixteenth birthday, in the same week when my father left the house and never returned. A person keeps such things when they can no longer bring back what has been lost.

Dominic looked at my pocket.

“What is that?”

“A hair clip.”

“Why are you holding it?”

“Because you are looking at my singing as if it were a weapon.”

Marcus exhaled quietly. For the first time something appeared on Dominic’s face that did not look like anger. A momentary tension. As if the word had found some old place.

At five in the evening I was washing glasses alone in the kitchen when Marcus appeared at the door. He was holding a small metal box. The box had dried dark stains at its corners.

“Dominic summons you,” he said.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“You have been working here for six days.”

“That is not an answer.”

Marcus looked away.

“He has questions concerning your work.”

“Or about my singing?”

“About both.”

In his office, the wall clock showed six. Dominic stood by the window and watched the rain lying over the city. Three things lay on the desk: my work card, a copy of an old document issued in my mother’s surname, and that very metal box.

My heart began beating so fast as if I already knew that all this was connected.

“You investigated me,” I said.

“I must know everything about anyone who works in my house.”

“Did you find my father’s name too?”

Dominic slowly turned around.

“Daniel Bennett.”

The room seemed to grow smaller.

“Did you know him?”

“Why are you asking me?”

“Because you said his name in such a tone, as if he were still living here.”

He did not answer me. He opened the metal box, but inside there was only a narrow copper key and a folded paper. Dominic’s fingers moved toward the paper.

At that moment the sound of a heavy object falling came from the upper floor. Marcus opened the door and reached for his weapon.

But Dominic looked for the first time not at me, but at the closed box.

Then he slowly moved his hand toward the folded paper…

Then he slowly moved his hand toward the folded paper, but a second blow sounded behind the door and Marcus ran toward the stairs.

Dominic closed the box immediately.

“Stay here,” he told me.

“Is that advice or an order?”

“This time it is a chance to survive.”

He left too. The door lock clicked shut, and for several seconds I remained alone in the darkness. The box lay on the desk. Beside it was my work card. And there too was the copy of the document issued in my mother’s surname, which I had never wanted to see.

The sound of footsteps was coming down from the upper floor. Slowly. Heavy footsteps.

The door handle moved.

I held my breath and closed my hand around the red strawberry-shaped clip. In childhood Mother used to tell me that even small things can keep great secrets. Then I thought she was simply calming me.

The door opened and Dominic entered. A thin line of blood showed by his eyebrow.

“What happened?” I asked.

“A window was broken.”

“A window does not break by itself.”

“Many things in this house do not happen by themselves.”

He looked at the box.

“Did you open it?”

“No.”

“You did not even touch it?”

“The way you are looking at me made me want to, but no, I did not open it.”

Dominic went to the desk. A small piece of glass hung from the sleeve of his shirt. When he raised his hand, I saw that there was black dust on his fingers, not blood.

“Who was Daniel Bennett to you?” he asked.

“My father.”

“He disappeared twelve years ago.”

“Mother told me that he left us.”

“That is what your mother thought?”

“What do you know about my family?”

Dominic lowered his eyes.

“More than I should know.”

That answer frightened me more than any threat.

At ten at night the alarm went off in the house. All the lights came on, while the mechanisms hidden in the walls gave out a low, buzzing sound. Marcus appeared in the corridor and gripped my arm.

“Go into the room.”

“Why again?”

“Because someone has broken into the security system.”

“And you think I did it?”

“I think someone knows who you are.”

“Who am I?”

Marcus answered me only when Dominic came up to us.

“Daniel Bennett’s daughter.”

Dominic’s gaze hardened.

“Marcus.”

“It is already too late to hide,” he said. “They left a letter.”

I saw a folded sheet in his hand. Only one sentence was written on it: “If she sings again, the next voice will be hers.”

Cold poured into my chest.

“Who are they?” I asked.

“I do not know yet,” Dominic answered.

“But you know why they are threatening me.”

“I know that your father had something. Something because of which he was killed.”

The word “killed” fell heavily into the room.

I leaned against the wall.

“You knew?”

“No.”

“But now you know?”

Dominic stopped very close to me. His voice was low, but for the first time it no longer sounded like a threat.

“Now I know that someone searched your bag before you came to my house. I know that we found a hidden microphone in your room. And I know that whoever is doing this is also planning to kill me.”

He picked up the metal box.

“Daniel left this box to me on the night when he disappeared.”

“Then why did you not open it?”

“I did not have the key.”

I looked at the copper key.

“Now you have it.”

Dominic nodded, but did not open it.

“First we must know whom we can trust.”

At that very moment his phone rang. Marcus’s number was displayed on the screen, although Marcus was standing in front of us.

Dominic answered.

From the other side his own voice was heard: “Ruby Bennett must leave the house tomorrow morning.”

Dominic slowly lowered the phone.

The recording continued…

The recording continued, and Dominic’s voice sounded more clearly in the room.

“If she stays, she will find Daniel’s file. The girl must not realize that her father did not disappear because of me.”

I looked at Dominic.

“Did you say this?”

“No.”

“It is your voice.”

“They can imitate my voice.”

Marcus took the phone from me and played the recording from the beginning. Dominic stood motionless, but there was no color left in his face.

“This voice was recorded yesterday,” Marcus said. “Although Dominic was outside the city at that time.”

“Then who was speaking?” I asked.

The office door opened and an elderly woman entered. Ellen Moore, the house’s head manager, was holding an old music box. A worn silver bird was engraved on the box’s lid.

“I know,” she said.

Dominic turned toward her.

“Ellen, you should not have come in here.”

“I have been silent for twelve years. I cannot endure another night.”

She placed the box on the desk. When she opened the lid, instead of a mechanism there was a small recorder and a folded sheet.

My fingers went cold.

“Daniel left this,” Ellen said. “On the night when he left the garage.”

“Why now?” Dominic asked.

“Because Ruby came. Because he knew that one day all this would reach her.”

I approached the recorder. Ellen turned it on.

First came a hissing sound, then the tired breathing of a man.

“If someone is listening to this, I am Daniel Bennett. Dominic Vale never stole money. The accounts were altered on Victor Hale’s orders. He began transferring the capital, and then blamed everything on Dominic.”

Dominic struck the table with his hand.

“Victor?”

Ellen lowered her eyes.

In the recording Daniel’s voice was trembling.

“Victor knows that I have evidence. If something happens to me, look for the double wall of the dark wooden cabinet. The complete documents and a recording of the conversation are there. Anna was with me that night. She heard everything.”

Dominic stepped back, as if there were no air left in the room.

“Anna died in the car,” he said.

“Victor registered it as an accident,” Ellen replied. “And Daniel was taken away. His body was never found.”

I remembered my mother’s words: “Your father left and never looked back.”

My voice barely came out.

“Did Mother know?”

Ellen looked toward me.

“Your mother received the recording. She knew that Victor was looking for her too. That is why she hid the truth from you and left the city.”

“Then why did she die alone?”

Silence changed everyone’s face.

Ellen said:

“She was not ill, Ruby. Victor’s man changed her medicines.”

My knees gave way. Dominic held out his hand to me, but he himself had such a look, as if he were looking at his own past.

Marcus opened the second sheet. Written there were Victor’s signature, the dates of the transfers, and the final order: “Bennett’s daughter must be silenced.”

Dominic picked up the sheet.

“He thought singing was only noise,” he said.

At that moment the phone rang again. This time it was an unknown number.

Dominic answered.

From the other side Victor’s calm voice was heard:

“Now you know who I am. But you still do not know where your sister is.”

The call ended.

Dominic did not move for several seconds. Then he rushed to the old photograph hanging on the wall.

In the photograph Anna was a little girl. Beside her stood another child, whose face was hidden in the shadow of the frame.

Dominic took the photograph down and opened its back.

There was only one new address written there.

“The old train station. Midnight. Come alone.”

And for the first time Dominic looked at me as if this time not his life, but my choice, were at stake…