Trick or Murder?: A Sophie Sayers Village Mystery (Sophie Sayers Village Mysteries Book 2)

by Debbie Young

Swinging his lion’s head by the mane in one hand, and keeping his other arm tightly around me, Hector walked me back to my cottage. He let go of me only to take my key from his pocket and unlock my front door.

  “Do you want me to come in?” His voice was gentle.

  Of course I did, but by this time not only was I feeling emotionally drained, I was also nauseous from all the wine and dancing, thick with mud at least as far as my knees, wet through from the rain and chilled to the marrow. I didn’t want to make the evening any worse by being sick in front of Hector. Nor did I want to seem afraid.

  “No, it’s OK, thanks. I think I’ll call it a night.”

  “Are you sure you’ll be all right on your own?”

  I hesitated, about to change my mind until I caught a glimpse of my face in the hallstand mirror. The make-up I’d applied so carefully at the start of the evening had turned into a murky, tear-streaked mess, and my hair looked like I’d been turning cartwheels in a hurricane.

  “No, don’t worry, I’ll be fine. Thanks for walking me home.”

  Hector let go of the door. “OK, if you’re sure. Goodnight, Sophie. See you at work on Monday.”

  I turned my face away, embarrassed that I looked such a mess. I could have been mistaken for one of the undead we’d been dancing alongside earlier. Hector stepped forward to give me a hug and a paternal kiss on the top of my head. I wasn’t sure whether the night had moved our relationship backwards rather than forwards.

  He hesitated on the doorstep, his hand still on the door handle. “Bit of a wash-out as a second date, wasn’t it?”

  At least he still counted it as a date. I tried to be brave.

  “Well, not to worry, we’ve got our meal out next weekend to look forward to.”

  I stood at the open door just long enough to watch him stride down my front path, close my front gate behind him and rejoin the High Street, where, elegant in his frock coat, he put his lion’s mask back on and sauntered off through the mist towards his flat above the bookshop.

  22 Gloomy Sunday

  When I finally heaved myself out of bed the next morning after a restless night, dreaming of rabid gorillas in wellies running amok with sharpened umbrellas, I could hardly bear to look at the shiny yellow ballgown draped mockingly over the wardrobe door. Beautiful as it was, I wasn’t looking forward to donning it again the next day for fear of bringing back the negative associations from the disco. But I knew I’d have to, because Hector and I had promised the children that on Halloween itself, we’d be in fancy dress all day in the shop.

  As I made myself some toast and coffee for breakfast, I realised this was the first time since starting work at Hector’s House that I’d ever not looked forward to a Monday morning. After all, Monday morning meant seeing Hector after a Sunday without him.

  Spreading raspberry jam on my toast, I wondered whether Stanley and his friends had managed to catch the Grim Reaper. A few hundred years ago, they might have lynched him in a place like this. Fancy getting lynched for being the Grim Reaper.

  Someone knocked at the kitchen window, and I jumped, sending the jam jar flying off the table. It landed in a blood-red mass of broken glass at my feet. I looked up to see a thin, lined white-haired face peering in at me, a silvery scythe in his hand. It was Joshua, of course.

  “I’m sorry if I startled you, my dear,” he said, opening the back door to let himself in. I’d fallen into the village habit of leaving it unlocked. “I just thought I’d pop in to see how your party went last night.”

  “My party?” I looked blank. “Oh, you mean the Halloween Disco. How did you know about that? It was meant to be a secret.”

  Joshua chuckled. “It’s hard to keep secrets in this village, my dear. I trust you enjoyed it.”

  I nodded dumbly, trying not to stare at the scythe, sparklingly sharp beneath the kitchen spotlights. Surely Joshua could not have been the Grim Reaper? I knew he disapproved of Halloween, but that would be taking it too far. Besides, earlier that evening he’d seemed to have been getting into the spirit of it with the trick-or-treaters in his own benevolent way. Pitching up a few hours later to admonish the whole village for its celebrations seemed an unlikely about-face. Nor did he seem agile enough to escape the middle-aged men who chased after the intruder, never mind the younger ones. Unless his frailty, that had seemed so pronounced lately, was all a clever act to disguise a sinister alter ego. After all, he was still fit enough to keep his garden immaculate.

  Joshua followed my gaze to the gleaming blade.

  “I don’t usually take a scythe to church, you know.”

  So he’d just got back from church. Now I felt bad for suspecting him. Or was this another bluff? I held my tongue.

  “I just happened to find it lying in the churchyard after I’d visited to lay flowers this morning, ready for All Souls’ Day. Flowers for Edith – and for May.”

  I felt even worse for not knowing that this is what you were meant to do on All Souls’ Day.

  Joshua broke the silence. “It appears Billy left my scythe leaning against the far wall that backs on to the fields above Stanley’s barn. I am not best pleased. You should never leave garden tools out overnight, especially in the rain. That’s the fastest route to rust.”

  I frowned. The Grim Reaper couldn’t possibly have been Billy. He wasn’t tall enough. Besides, he had been propping up the bar all night, dressed as the vicar.

  “Why are you blaming Billy?”

  Joshua looked at me as if I was the village idiot. “Because Billy uses it to keep the grass down in the churchyard between the graves. He has my scythe on semi-permanent loan. He’s meant to keep it safe in the churchyard shed when he’s not using it. I knew it was mine the moment I saw it. It was my father’s before me, you know.” He raised it up and made a few slicing motions through the air. I stood well back. “I recognised the wooden handle, worn smooth from decades of use in his strong hands.”

  I recognised it too, for different reasons. Joshua stared out of the window absently, and smiled. “My father was born into a different age, my dear. His first job on leaving school at the age of twelve was as a rook scarer. An old fellow who used to farm down yonder took him on to keep the birds off his crops one spring. Then he kept him on to do odd jobs all year round till he was grown into his man’s body.”

  As he patted the scythe’s handle affectionately, I noticed how shiny the wood was, and how clean the blade. The culprit had taken care to remove the evidence of last night’s escapade. Now the only fingerprints on there would be Joshua’s.

  Joshua remained preoccupied with his nostalgic reverie. “Of course, I haven’t much use for it since they invented the electric mowing machine.” He kept his small patch of lawn in immaculate condition with a bright orange hover mower that he must have been nurturing for decades.

  I decided to take a risk by telling Joshua about the mysterious apparition at the disco. If he looked less than surprised, I’d have more reason to suspect him. Only half way through did I realise how rash I was being, considering Joshua was listening with a murderous weapon in his hands.

  “I don’t know who the Grim Reaper was, but it certainly wasn’t Billy. There’s any number of people it might have been – a teenager or an adult, judging by the height, but the figure was entirely obscured by a big black hood. Lots of men chased after him but I don’t know whether they caught him, or where. I’m guessing the culprit must have run up the hill towards the churchyard and dropped the scythe as he climbed over the wall.”

  I was careful not to mention the vicar, to avoid another lecture about Neep being the best man for the job.

  When I’d finished, Joshua stared at the scythe in his hand with the disappointed look of a husband hearing his wife confess to an affair. He seemed far more upset about his scythe than the disco.

  “What a disrespectful way to treat a faithful old tool. I wonder whether the vicar can shed any light on the matter. He may have spotted the prankster from his study or bedroom window
s, which overlook that part of the churchyard. Still, I’m glad that the practical joker left the scythe in the churchyard, rather than taking it home or tossing it into a hedgerow. I should hate to lose it, especially as it was my father’s. And, speaking of my father, will you be joining us for the All Souls’ Day service on Wednesday? I think you might find it comforting.”

  I grimaced.

  “Don’t look so worried, my dear. It’s not a mournful service, more a positive way to remember those who have gone before us, until we meet again.”

  He’d hit a bullseye on my conscience, but the thought of attending a service led by the Reverend Neep made me feel ill. I struggled to make excuses without offending Joshua.

  “Thank you for thinking of me, but I’m not really a churchgoer. I’ve never been religious. I’d feel like a fish out of water at a church service. I wouldn’t know what to do. I used to like singing hymns and Christmas carols at school, and I can recite the Lord’s prayer, but that’s about as far as it goes with me.”

  “Sophie, that doesn’t matter. No-one will scold you if you aren’t word perfect in the service, or if you have to look at the hymn book to know which words to sing.”

  I played for time. “When is it again?”

  “All Souls’ Day, this Wednesday, at 11am.”

  I spotted an escape route. “Ah, no, you see, I wouldn’t be able to get the time off work then. Hector will be away from the shop visiting Slate Green Secondary School’s librarian that morning, so I’ll be holding the fort.” I congratulated myself on my cleverness, knowing that as Joshua would be in church, he would never rumble my lie.

  “I’m sure that’s an appointment that Hector would willingly change if you asked him.”

  I fidgeted in my seat. I’m very bad at lying, but that’s not the only reason I practically never do it.

  Joshua gazed at me thoughtfully as my blush deepened. He eyed the splat of jam on my floor, where it lay, blood red and accusatory, peppered with shattered glass. “Still, don’t let me keep you. I see you have some cleaning up to do, and I’m sure you’re weary after all your fun last night.”

  He pushed back his chair, picked up the scythe as if it were a walking stick, and steadied himself with the wooden handle before moving off. “The invitation to the service will remain open, so do come if you change your mind. Good morning to you, my dear.”

  As I watched him walk unsteadily down my garden path, I wondered whether he knew more than he was letting on about the Grim Reaper. His lecture about the service might just have been a cunning diversion from the subject. If so, his ploy had worked.

  Then, to my relief, I remembered Hector’s quote from Sherlock Holmes. I was not watching the back of the Grim Reaper from the disco. Joshua’s gait was altogether different. This was not the man who escaped, leaping off the trailer and over the churchyard wall.

  With a start, I realised I hadn’t yet heard how the chase ended.

  23 Hung Over

  I grabbed my phone to call Hector, ignoring my rule about leaving him in peace on a Sunday. It went straight to voicemail. Then I texted him, and when he didn’t reply, I resolved to knock on the door of his flat. Normally it would have felt taboo to disturb him at home on the one day he had off a week, but now that we’d been on two dates, I was prepared to make an exception.

  I glanced at the clock. It was nearly noon. I wondered how long it would take him to bleed to death from a scythe wound.

  I’d never walked so fast to Hector’s House, rehearsing in my head the best way to speak to the emergency services and trying to remember whether or not you were meant to apply pressure to stop open wounds bleeding. To my relief, when I got there, I saw his Land Rover was gone. Unless the Grim Reaper was also a car thief, it at least meant Hector was fit to drive, even if it had been for a trip to hospital.

  As I walked back round from the door to his flat to the front of the shop, one of the school mums was passing with her two little boys, each walking a lively Jack Russell. She looked interested to see me there.

  “If you’re after Hector, he’ll have gone to his mum and dad’s, I expect. He often goes down to them at Clevedon for Sunday lunch.”

  There was still so much I didn’t know about him.

  “Thanks,” I said, feeling a little foolish. Given that her children were with her, I didn’t like to enquire whether she knew if anyone had been lacerated by the Grim Reaper the night before. As the village shop is closed on Sundays, I decided to head to another excellent source of intelligence and comfort, The Bluebird.

  Donald was unhappy. There was hardly any lunchtime trade in the pub, given that a large proportion of the community was still nursing hangovers from the PTA Disco. Being on duty in the pub the night before, he’d missed the excitement of the chase. It was small compensation that once the hunt was called off, most of the men had called into the pub on the pretext of checking whether the Grim Reaper was propping up the bar. Not surprisingly, Donald hadn’t served any suspicious strangers dressed in black and bearing a scythe. I supposed there was an outside chance that the Grim Reaper could have been Donald, as we’d not seen him at the disco, but he’d have to have done a very quick change to be serving as usual behind the bar when the thwarted search party arrived.

  “So, do you have any theories as to who the prankster might be, Donald?” I tried to sound casual as I stood at the bar, sipping my ginger ale. He’d given me a knowing look when I had ordered a soft drink in preference to my usual wine.

  Donald wiped the spotless bar with a cloth, for want of anything better to do. “Not a clue. Whoever it was, he must have been light on his feet. Either that or found a very good hiding place. Though that wouldn’t have been hard on such a dark night, especially if he lay low in Stanley’s woodland for a while, rather than heading for the churchyard straight away. I’m afraid he’s got away scot-free, Sophie.” He tucked the cloth into his back pocket. “Still, I suppose no real harm was done. I mean, it’s not as if he chopped off anyone’s head with his scythe. You all lived to tell the tale, didn’t you? It was probably just some teenager, too old to come to the disco as part of the primary school, and too self-conscious to come with his parents.” He produced some new beer mats and set a neat pile next to the beer taps. “There’s not enough for teens to do in a village like this. They inevitably get into mischief, not thinking of the consequence of their actions. Like that time young Tommy Crowe hid in a wheelie bin on dustbin day till his mum had gone to work so he could bunk off school. Good thing his little sister ratted on him to the bin men, or he’d have been crushed before you could say ‘scythe’.”

  “It didn’t feel like innocent mischief to me, Donald,” I said. “It felt more like a threat, especially when it was made on the same spot that poor Linda died.”

  Donald leaned his elbows on the bar.

  “I think you’re letting your imagination run away with you, Sophie. You know what teenagers are like these days, all Goths and Emos and I don’t know what. It doesn’t mean anything when they behave like that. When you’ve known these kids since before they were born, like I have, you know it’s just little Sally or Joe or whoever going off on one. I wouldn’t lose any sleep over this Grim Reaper lark if I were you. By this time next week, everyone will have forgotten about it and will be on to the next bit of excitement, whatever that may be. There’s never a dull moment in Wendlebury, you know.”

  He gave me such a kindly look that I backed right down. If no-one else was anxious about the whole thing, I shouldn’t be either. It would be foolish to share the news that the scythe was Joshua’s and risk dragging him into it. And after all, if someone had been killed or even wounded by the Grim Reaper, we’d all know about it by now.

  I sat down on a bar stool, watching the bubbles burst in my ginger ale. It wasn’t them, it was me. Maybe I just couldn’t take a village joke, with my townie ways and silly flights of fancy. It was disappointing, for sure, when I thought I’d become part of the village, but I was completely o
ut of kilter with popular feeling.

  Declining Donald’s invitation to stay for a pub lunch, I slouched out after just one drink, and glanced up the road to Hector’s House to see whether Hector had returned. However his Land Rover was still missing from its parking space at the side of the shop, so I realised I’d have to wait till the next day to find out his take on the matter.

  24 The Beast of the Bookshop

  After losing myself in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and a hot bubble bath for most of Sunday afternoon, I challenged myself with cleaning the cottage from top to bottom. By bedtime I realised my spirits had revived a little, as evidenced by the fact that I could think of the word “spirits” without feeling spooked.

  On Monday morning, I didn’t feel quite as anxious as I’d expected when putting on the Beauty dress to wear in the shop. I hoped Hector hadn’t forgotten our plan to wear our costumes all day on Halloween. I’d feel pretty silly if I pitched up in my frock and he was in his usual jeans and t-shirt. After all, it wasn’t often that I dressed like the love interest in a fairy tale.

  I was in luck. He was once more an exquisitely tailored Beast, and his outfit looked even better in the daylight than in the shadowy barn. He left his mask on the counter all day, which struck me as eerie at first, but by lunchtime I’d got used to it. Hector predicted correctly that any little girls who came into the shop after school would spend ages plaiting and unplaiting its mane.

  I just had time before the first customers of the morning arrived to recount my conversations from Sunday with Joshua and Donald. Although everyone kept telling me not to give the incident any further thought, I was glad Hector now also seemed to want to know who had done it. As we tried to narrow down the suspects, I couldn’t help but think of us as a team of ace detectives, like Holmes and Watson. I made a mental note of that idea for next year’s Halloween costumes, hoping it wouldn’t mean I’d have to wear a moustache.