Lethal Legend by Kathy Lynn Emerson Page A

Somener had chosen Minerva for her own child, she had probably had a reason. Perhaps she’d had an interest in mythology. “Minerva is another name for Athena,” she said aloud, “the goddess said to embody wisdom, reason, and purity.”
    Ben looked thoughtful. “I only met Min Somener a few times. I can’t say if she embodied those virtues or not.”
    Slapping the top crust onto her pie, Mrs. Monroe picked up a knife. “Sometimes yes. Sometimes no. She did like to read them old books. Died about ten years back.” She made a series of decorative cuts. “Don’t you have patients to tend to?”
    Taking the hint, and what was left of Diana’s sandwich, they left the kitchen. The back stairs were close by, but so narrow that they had to climb single file. “Had you met Miss Dunbar before?” she asked his ascending back.
    Ben took his time about replying. “Till now she was never here at the same time I was.”
    “Did you come here often?” With two steep flights of stairs behind them, Diana paused on the landing to catch her breath.
    “A fair amount. Graham’s mother and mine were distant cousins and he and I are close in age.” He reached the top floor and waited for her, then indicated a closed door. “I’m about to give these men a clean bill of health. They’ve been chomping at the bit to get back to work.”
    Before he could knock, the sound of raised voices reached Diana from the other side. “You’re making a mistake!” a man shouted.
    “I know what I’m doing!” The second voice was softer but sounded just as angry.
    Ben opened the door to reveal two men engaged in a game of cards on one side of the room and a pair of combatants in the opposite corner. At first Diana thought they were also male. Then she realized that one was a woman wearing masculine attire.
    Diana was accustomed to seeing females dressed in a variety of split skirts. The popularity of rational dress had grown enormously in the last few years. But this woman—Miss Dunbar, Diana presumed—wore men’s trousers, high boots, and a loose shirt. The first garment clearly defined her lower limbs, stretching the bounds of propriety by emphasizing a lush feminine figure.
    The woman turned to glare at them, revealing an arresting face surrounded by thick, sun-streaked brown hair braided and wound in a style that was as flattering as it was unusual. She appeared to be about Diana’s age.
    “May I present Miss Serena Dunbar,” Ben said.
    Tension radiating off her like heat from a fire, Miss Dunbar ignored him, flouncing off to the other end of the long room to stare out a window.
    With a shrug, as if her rude behavior did not surprise him, Ben turned his attention to the card players. “George Amity,” he said.
    Grizzled and gnome-like, the signs of arthritis already plain in his fingers, Amity nodded in a friendly fashion.
    “Paul Carstairs.”
    Carstairs set down the bottle of Moxie Nerve Food he’d been sipping from and regarded Diana with suspicion. He wasn’t much older than she was, but to judge by the loose folds of skin in face and neck and the excess material in the trousers held up by braces, he’d recently lost a good deal of weight.
    “And this is Frank Ennis.” Ben indicated the man who’d been arguing with Miss Dunbar. “Gentlemen and Miss Dunbar, may I present my fiancée, Mrs. Diana Spaulding.”
    “Charmed,” Ennis said, bending over Diana’s hand. His pallor was the only thing left to indicate that he had been deathly ill. He was a man in his prime, not an ounce of excess fat on his sinewy frame. Yet for all his appearance of familiarity with manual labor, he had the dreamy, inward-looking eyes of a scholar ... or a poet.
    In better control of herself for her stint at the window, Miss Dunbar advanced on Ben. “Are my men fit to resume their duties?”
    “I’d prefer that they rest for one more day.”
    A chorus of protests drowned out the last word. Frank Ennis’s voice was loudest. “I’m ready