Murder in Masquerade
IThere were eight of us seated around the table, all in costume and masked. Of the eight the only one I knew was my employer, Mme. Storey. She had come as Queen Anne Boleyn in a superb black velvet costume with hoops and stays.
The dancers in the hall outside had unmasked long ago, but when midnight was approaching Mme. Storey had suggested to our little party that we would have more fun if we kept our masks on. Where all were unknown to each other there could be no inhibitions, she said; and the proposal was enthusiastically carried. The champagne and the fun flowed fast and furiously, but I couldn't help feeling from a certain tenseness in the atmosphere that there was more going on than appeared on the surface.
In the midst of it all Mme. Storey's partner, a stal
