by Morgana Best
She shook her head. “No, it’s all rather boring, actually. I work in finance.”
I wondered if it would be pushing it to ask her the name of the company. While I was debating this, Mr Buttons spoke up. “And you want to move to Little Tatterford?” he asked Dennis.
Dennis nodded. “I’m retired, but I lived and worked in Sydney all my life. I got fed up with the hustle and bustle of city life, so I wanted a sea change.” He laughed. “Speaking of sea changes, I can’t swim. I nearly drowned as a child, so I’ve been wary of the ocean ever since. Plus I like cold weather, so I thought Little Tatterford would be the ideal location. Besides, the biggest house in Little Tatterford is a fraction of the value of the tiniest house in Sydney. You get so much more for your money here.”
“You won’t find Little Tatterford boring, after the city life?” I asked him, trying to keep the conversation going.
“Boring would be good,” he said with a smile.
“You said you have retired,” Mr Buttons said. “What line of work were you in?”
“That was boring, too. Now Adrian here is the one who seems to have an interesting job. Who do you work for again? The Office of Geography or something like that?”
I had to admire the way Dennis deflected the question, but I made a mental note to find out what he actually did for a living before he retired. Maybe it had some bearing on the case. At any rate, I was grateful that Blake was working tonight, because we certainly wouldn’t be able to ask these questions in front of him.
Adrian smiled. “The Office of Geographical Names.”
Cressida spoke up for the first time. “What do you do, exactly?”
“We are responsible for new street names. I suppose you’re all aware that several new subdivisions are going up in the Little Tatterford area, and I have to approve those names.”
“Surely all names would be approved automatically?” Mr Buttons asked him.
Adrian shook his head. “There was a recent famous case in Geelong, in Victoria. The developer wanted to name all the streets after Game of Thrones characters, but the locals objected to him naming one street Lannister Street. To answer your question, we have to check each street name for compliance with our rules.”
“Sounds fascinating,” I lied.
Adrian nodded. “We have to liaise with the council and with government bodies. I know it sounds exciting, but it’s actually pretty dry work.”
I looked at him to see if he was being serious about it sounding exciting, but I couldn’t tell. Chef Dubois bounced into the room, holding a tray of plates. “This is Parmentier da Ratatouille,” he said. “I assure you, mademoiselle, it has very little garl-leek.”
Wendy smiled, despite the fact that the meal reeked of garlic. I seized the opportunity to question him. “Chef Dubois, we’ve all been talking about what we did before we came here. Did you come here straight from France?”
He nodded. “Yes, straight from Paris. I am here to learn the English.” With that, he scurried from the room.
“Oh dear, the fire is going out.” Cressida pointed, somewhat unnecessarily, to the fire. “I’ll just pop outside and get some more wood. I didn’t notice that the wood box was empty.” There was a huge brass container in which Cressida kept the firewood for this room. I had no idea of its original use, but it looked quite impressive and imposing.
“I’ll go with you,” I said, not wanting to point out that she shouldn’t go outside in the dark alone, not with a murderer hanging around.
We excused ourselves and walked into the kitchen, but just as I was about to open the door into the kitchen, Cressida caught my arm. She put one finger to her mouth and pointed to the door. I had no idea what she was doing until she put her ear close to the door. I did so, too, and could hear the chef speaking.
As no one was in the room with him, as far as I knew, that meant he was speaking on the phone. What’s more, he was speaking in perfect English, not a trace of an accent, French or otherwise.
I couldn’t make out his words, and would have listened in some more, but Cressida opened the door and marched in. I thought she was going to say something about him speaking in English, but she did not. “Chef Dubois, I’m sorry to go through your kitchen when you’re preparing a meal, but we’re out of firewood.”
The chef put his phone on a high shelf and swung around to us. “It is of no matter. It is not good to be cold.” He waved us through.
I could hardly wait to get out to the woodshed to speak to Cressida. Once we were out there, I whispered, “Did you hear him speak?”
Cressida nodded vigorously. “Yes, he was speaking English, not French, and in an Australian accent! So why is he doing that fake French accent?”
“Maybe he’s the murderer,” I said.
Cressida gave a little laugh. “You sound like Mr Buttons.”
I had to laugh, too. “Okay, so maybe he’s not the murderer, but clearly he has reasons of his own. What should we do?”
“Nothing,” Cressida said with raised eyebrows. “We’ll just watch him. Sibyl, are you sure you can’t remember whether he was in the room when Bradley took fright?”
I shook my head. “I’ve been over it in my head again and again, but I can’t remember one way or the other.”
Cressida let out a long sigh. “Me, too,” she said. “Oh well, never mind. Let’s get this wood inside before we freeze to death.”
After the boarders had all left the dining room and gone to their rooms, and the French chef had returned to his accommodation in Little Tatterford, we were free to speak.
“Is Blake coming over tonight?” Mr Buttons asked me.
I shook my head. “No, he had to go to Sydney for a court case. He won’t be back until tomorrow at the earliest. Mr Buttons, we have information.”
Cressida waved one finger at him. “And don’t go jumping to any conclusions, Mr Buttons, when you hear what we have to tell you.”
Mr Buttons puffed out his chest. “My good woman, I never jump to conclusions.”
I spoke before he could make a long speech. “When Cressida and I went out to fetch more firewood, we overheard Chef Dubois speaking on the phone. And guess what! He was speaking in perfect English. Well, in Australian English, and not a trace of a French accent.”
“He’s the murderer!” Mr Buttons said with something akin to glee.
Cressida groaned. “I thought you said you weren’t going to jump to conclusions.”
“I’m not jumping anywhere,” Mr Buttons said patiently. “I told you something was wrong with him, didn’t I? And I told you both that there was something wrong with Dorothy, but you didn’t believe me, did you? And now she is in prison awaiting trial for homicide. I rest my case.”
“The French chef is certainly hiding something,” I told him, “but we don’t know just what at this point. He might not be a murderer.”
“Maybe he’s a thief,” Cressida said cheerfully. She slipped her hand over her mouth. “No, that can’t be right. Lord Farringdon vouched for him. Mr Buttons, Albert Dubois is on the straight and narrow, according to Lord Farringdon.”
Mr Buttons narrowed his eyes, but did not respond. “I, too, have some news,” he said.
I looked at him expectantly.
“The funeral is tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” Cressida exclaimed. “Isn’t that rather too soon?”
Mr Buttons shrugged one shoulder. “Most likely. Detective Roberts asked me to go so I could be a decoy.”
“What do you mean?” I asked him.
“Remember that the police think I was the intended victim?”
“Oh.” I had completely forgotten that.
Mr Buttons pressed on. “The police want me to attend the funeral to see if I can draw out the real murderer.”
“Why, that is too dangerous, Mr Buttons,” Cressida said, leaning over to pat his arm. Even Lord Farringdon seemed disturbed, and rubbed his chin up and down Mr Buttons’ shin.
Mr Buttons pulled a tiny packet of baby wipes
from his suit pocket and wiped the cat hair from his pants. “Cressida, the detectives think I was the intended victim, but we all know I wasn’t.”
Cressida looked embarrassed. “Silly me. All the stress is getting to me.”
Mr Buttons readily agreed. “Yes, we didn’t find out anything useful at dinner tonight, and one of those four people is the murderer. Blake thinks the robbery money is buried on this property somewhere. That means our lives are in danger.”
Chapter 7
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* * *
I was sitting between Mr Buttons and Cressida in a small wooden church building on the southern end of town. The building smelt musty, and I wished one of the old sash windows could be opened to let in some fresh air. It was cold, but not unbearably so, although the only heating was from electric heaters which were restricted to the vicinity of the pulpit. Next to the pulpit was a wooden frame with the numbers of the hymns on gold cards, and under that was a chalkboard with the words, Turn or Burn!, scrawled in big letters.
It was a dreadfully dreary church building, with the only colour being the Sunday school bulletin board to our left. The sign above a mass of pictures announced they were drawn by children under the age of six. As far as I could tell, the topic was people burning in hell. Flames seemed to be the dominant trope. “Cressida, have you been teaching art to the children of this church?”
Cressida smiled broadly. “No, but what a good idea. Maybe I should start.”
“I’m so bored already,” Mr Buttons said, “and it hasn’t even started. Blake has had a lucky escape, being stuck in Sydney at the court hearing. I wish I’d brought a book to read.”
“You shouldn’t read a book during a funeral service, Mr Buttons,” Cressida admonished him.
Mr Buttons’ eyebrows shot skyward. “Who says so? Who made those rules?”
Cressida appeared to be at a loss. “I don’t know, come to think of it. Perhaps I should have brought a book, too.”
“It’s good of the church to do his service for free,” Mr Buttons said.
I looked at him. “I didn’t know that!”
Mr Buttons nodded. “Poor Bradley Brown didn’t have any relatives at all. He had zero family and zero friends. Well, maybe he made friends in prison, but they’re still in there.”
I thought it over. “Surely not all his friends are still in prison. He was there a long time, so many of the men who were incarcerated would have been released by now.”
Mr Buttons shifted in his seat. “Maybe so, but perhaps they realised there’s going to be a strong police presence here and so they didn’t want to show.”
“Yes, it’s so good of the church to pay for his funeral and associated burial expenses,” Cressida said. “This church is the only one in town that gives free funerals for people with no friends or family. It’s admirable, really.” She tapped her chin. “I wonder if they’ll ask for hefty donations to cover the cost?”
Mr Buttons waved one hand at us both. “I think you ladies should sit over the other side of the room, just in case someone tries to kill me.” He laughed. “Don’t worry, I really don’t think someone is after me. It’s only those two bumbling detectives who think that.” He nodded in the direction of the said bumbling detectives, who were standing at the side of the room.
“If they’re trying to be undercover, they’re not doing a very good job,” I said. It was obvious to anyone that they were police officers.
Mr Buttons elbowed me in the ribs. “Why are all the boarders here, and with the French chef at that?”
Cressida stood up and waved to them. “Isn’t that nice of them to come!”
“But why did they come?” I said. “Don’t you think that’s suspicious?”
Cressida looked taken aback. “Do you think all of them were in it together?”
I looked at the boarders and the chef. They had taken seats halfway up the church, on the right. “Actually, that hadn’t occurred to me before, but I suppose it’s a possibility.”
“I don’t trust that Adrian Addison,” Mr Buttons said darkly. “He’s a troublemaker and a fool.”
Cressida sat back down. “Who are all these people if Bradley didn’t have any friends?”
I looked around the room at the elderly ladies, all sporting fuzzy white hair and floral dresses. They all seemed to know each other, because they were chatting away happily. “I don’t have a clue who they are,” I said, puzzled.
“They’re the churchgoers,” Mr Buttons announced. “Since this church provides free funeral services for people with no friends or family, it’s obvious that they’d ask their churchgoers to attend all the funerals. Otherwise, who would come? There wouldn’t be anyone.”
“I suppose you’ve got a point,” I said. “That makes sense.” My attention was drawn to two ominous-looking men in black suits. At first I wondered if they were detectives, but they were not interacting at all with Roberts or Henderson. “Who are those men in suits?” I asked Mr Buttons.
He followed my gaze. “They look like criminals to me. Mafia, I’d say.”
Cressida readily agreed. “They’re probably here to make sure Bradley is dead. Maybe he owed them money and they suspect that he faked his own death, so they’ve come here to make certain it’s him.”
“How are they going to make certain it’s him?” I asked her. “They’re hardly going to pop down the front and peek inside the coffin.”
Cressida waved a piece of paper under my nose. “This is the notice of service, and it says that it will be an open casket.”
“Isn’t that a bit unusual?” Mr Buttons stopped speaking to dust the hymn book in front of him. “He was murdered, after all. Surely it should be a closed casket in those circumstances.”
Cressida shrugged. “You know what these church committees are like, Mr Buttons.”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t. My family might have been Jacobites, but the religious tradition has not carried down to my generation.”
“I didn’t know your family were Jacobites,” I said.
His hand flew to his mouth. “Never you mind. That was a long time ago.”
“I am sure it’s a matter of policy that they’re all open casket,” Cressida said. “There likely wasn’t enough time to change the policy, given that this funeral has been pushed along.”
“I have to admit, that with Roberts and Henderson staring at me so much, it’s making me a little unsettled,” Mr Buttons said. “They’re hoping someone will leap out and attack me so they can nab him.”
I sighed. “If only they would realise that
Bradley was the intended victim, not you. Then they might make some inroads into solving the case.”
“That will never happen,” Mr Buttons began, but he could say no more as the minister took to the pulpit.
“We are here today on this very solemn occasion, to mourn the death of Bradley Brown,” the minister said in a long, drawling monotone. “Mr Brown could be burning in hell at this very moment—God only knows—so I ask you all, do you know where you will spend eternity?”
I reflected that it sounded dramatic, but it certainly wasn’t delivered that way. I yawned widely and wondered how long the funeral service would continue.
The minister’s words were met with murmurs of approval from all the ladies in the front pews. The men in suits had taken their seat behind the church ladies, so I took the opportunity to study the three boarders and the chef. They were all sitting together, but I didn’t find that in itself suspicious. To the contrary, I considered it normal behaviour for three boarders and a staff member attending the same funeral, even though it was a funeral for someone they didn’t know.
I stretched again, and then saw something out of the corner of my eye. It was Constable Andrews in the opposite back row, but he wasn’t in uniform. There were five other men and women sitting next to him, so I figured they were all police officers. They stuck out like sore thumbs.
The minister went on and on about hellfire and brimstone, and I grew increasingly sleepy. Mercifully, he finally stopped speaking, and told everyone to line up and pay their last respects to Bradley Brown.
“I don’t want to go,” I whispered. “I don’t want to see him.”
“You can do it, Sibyl,” Mr Buttons said in an encouraging tone. “It will give us a good opportunity to watch the reactions of the boarders and the suspicious chef. Make sure we line up just after them.”
“You don’t have to look, dear,” Cressida added. “Just pretend to. Simply avert your eyes when you get to the end of the line.”
I said that I would. The three of us stood up and walked slowly over to the boarders and the chef who had shown no sign yet of standing up. I looked back at Cressida and raised my eyebrows. Mr Buttons took the matter into his own hands. “How lovely of you all to come,” he said. “Please, precede us in the line.”
