“Hello!” Annabelle cooed cheerily, crouching down to scrub their ears. They yipped and panted their approval. She looked up at Philippa. “Are you taking them to Janet?”
“Yes,” Philippa said, taking the opportunity to attach their leashes while Annabelle distracted them with her petting. “For a check-up and a chat. Are you sure you want me to give them to the shelter?”
Annabelle pursed her lips regretfully as she continued to stroke the soft fur of the floppy-eared strays.
“Oh, I don’t know, Philippa. It’s a terribly big responsibility. We would have to buy all sorts of things for them, and what about the flowers? Once they get bigger, they might trample all over the garden!”
“Hmm, they haven’t done it yet. They’ve actually been rather well-behaved for a couple of puppies.”
“They certainly have,” Annabelle said, giving them one more playful chuck behind the ears before standing up. “But dogs are like people – they have the capacity to do the most unexpected things.”
Philippa smiled. “But you do say that it is our duty to help our fellow man when he is in need. I’m sure that applies to dogs too.”
“We’ve already got Biscuit.”
“Oh! That cat is never around anyway! Plus she’s already taken a shine to the pups. You should have seen them all sleeping together this morning.”
“You seem awfully fond of them. Why don’t you adopt them?”
“I would, Reverend, but I spend so much time at the church that they might as well live here all the time.” She looked down at the two puppies who were standing to attention, their tails wagging, and their big brown eyes fixed upon Annabelle. “Plus they seem to have made their own preference rather clear.”
“We’ll see,” said Annabelle, nodding a farewell and heading to the cottage.
It was still early when Annabelle got into her Mini Cooper and shut the door with the same satisfaction as the day she had first driven it. She settled herself snugly into the seat, drew her seatbelt across her chest, and turned the keys in the ignition. The motor chugged into life, and Annabelle felt a sense of girlish delight emanate from her fingers upon the wheel. As long as she could drive her little Mini wherever she liked, she would be happy; a simple, but endless, pleasure.
The car had always been more than a mere mode of transport for the Reverend. As she spent most of her days either in church or around others, her time in the car was a much appreciated opportunity to enjoy the idyllic landscapes that surrounded Upton St. Mary in solitary contemplation. The fervent beauty of the small, Cornish village and the local countryside had been one of the most compelling reasons to leave her inaugural clerical position in her hometown of London.
The deeply satisfying sensation of being cocooned in the Mini’s small yet cozy interior while the exquisite English landscape sped by her window was never greater than during winter. The cold weather made it difficult to take the kind of striding jaunts across endless fields and sun-speckled woods she enjoyed so much in the summertime. However, with the Mini’s tiny heater on full blast and its puppy-esque enthusiasm for the open road, she never felt confined.
In fact, Annabelle spent many happy hours in her car. She had built up a warm affection for the automobile that she lovingly kept pristine. In her more whimsical moods, she could even fancy that it spoke to her. It was almost as though the thrum of its engine indicated its contentment like the purr of a cat, while the gentle squeak of its seat as she sat on it was like a greeting from an old friend. Even the bumps and wheezes of its wheels as it navigated obstacles in the road sounded like the grunts and groans of an old man hurdling an obstacle.
The musical tics and idiosyncrasies of her Mini were like a song she knew intimately, which is why she found herself increasingly bothered by the weak sound of the engine as she made her way to the hamlet at Folly’s Bottom. She had intended to discuss the failing attempts to raise funds for the cemetery renovations with a parish council member there, but she had barely reached the halfway point of the five-mile trip when the Mini Cooper’s trials grew noticeably worse.
“What on earth is the matter with you?” She pressed the accelerator harder and found the Mini struggling to respond with its typical ready increase in speed.
For the next half-mile, the Mini’s engine weakly hummed at an almost inaudible level, occasionally sputtering back into life again with a snap, only to trail off once more. Eventually, Annabelle’s fear became a reality – the car stopped entirely.
Annabelle turned the key back and forth a few times in an attempt to get the car started, but the Mini only offered a limp whine in response. Breathing deeply, Annabelle refused to get angry. Instead, she lifted her gaze to the ceiling of the car and silently demanded an explanation from God.
Tightening her coat around her, she stepped out into the chilly wind and closed the door. For a brief moment, she considered checking beneath the hood for the cause of the car’s problems, but she quickly realized that would be of little use. Annabelle’s passion for driving did not extend to a mechanical aptitude, and she didn’t want to make anything worse. She looked in both directions up and down the road, and with one final huff and frown, she began marching her way back toward Upton St. Mary and the local car workshop and gas station, owned by Mildred Smith and rather unimaginatively named Mildred’s Garage.
A short way into her trek, Annabelle decided to take a shortcut and avoid the need to walk along a large curve in the road that went around a farmhouse. She took a small, rough path, fenced on both sides by the fields and surrounding hills. For a few minutes, Annabelle was rather pleased and allowed herself to feel proud of her knowledge of the extensive web of footpaths, lanes, and fields that radiated from, through, and around the vicinity of Upton St. Mary.
Her sense of triumph proved brief, however, when soon into her walk she found the entire way ahead obstructed by a densely packed herd of cows, moving slowly along toward their milking shed.
“Excuse me!” Annabelle politely asked, as she tottered and nudged them to find a gap. “Vicar coming through!”
She quickly realized the animals were – rather rudely, in her opinion – in no mood to let her pass, their stoic faces uninterested in her pleas and their large bodies incapable of moving at a greater speed anyway. Annabelle gazed beyond the large mass of white, brown, and black to find farmer Leo Tremethick at their head.
“Leo! Over here! Leo!” she called, waving her arms frantically like a woman drowning at sea.
The overall-clad figure in the distance briefly turned and removed his flat cap to wave back at the Reverend. Annabelle smiled widely, thinking that the farmer would surely do something to allow her to pass, but instead he merely smiled back, gestured at the cows and shrugged his shoulders apologetically. The meaning was clear; there was nothing he could do. He shouted something that Annabelle couldn’t quite make out over the sound of cows mooing and hooves clopping, then turned back to trudge on in front of them.
“I know that you cows are God’s creatures,” Annabelle exclaimed, as she narrowly avoided yet another cowpat, “But I really must say, you’re showing very little respect for the authority of the church!”
For a full twelve minutes, Annabelle inched forward through the muddy, cowpat-filled path behind the herd, pulled along only by the prospect of treating herself to a nice slice of cake at the end of it. When the cows finally turned off into their milking shed, she hurried forward into the junction where the path rejoined the road.
As she made her way to the garage, which was situated on the outskirts of the village alongside one of its largest family pubs, Annabelle found herself with plenty of time to notice her surroundings, including the occasional car that sped by. One of them struck her in particular, a black, sporty Mercedes Benz with dark tinted windows. It was the kind of car one would usually encounter outside a nightclub in a bustling city, so it stood out starkly in this part of the world. The villagers of Upton St. Mary, and indeed, the wealthier families who lived
in the mansions and estates surrounding the village, had rather conservative tastes in cars. SUVs, the odd BMW, possibly a classic British sports car or luxury sedan were the most expensive vehicles that you were likely to find on the roads through and around Upton St. Mary. Most people drove pickup trucks, small hatchbacks, or minivans. The very notion of blacked-out windows seemed preposterous. Annabelle wondered just who could possibly be driving such a car, or even more intriguingly, why they would feel the need to hide themselves away as they did.
Her ruminations were quickly broken, however, when a small van pulled up beside her. She recognized it immediately and walked up to the passenger side window.
“Alfred Roper!” Annabelle called as greeting. “How are you? Off to a job?”
“Aye, Vicar. Busy weekend.”
Alfred had become well-known for his wonderful gardening and landscaping skills during the thirty-odd years he had been tending to the grounds of larger houses in the area. He was almost sixty, yet the fresh air and physical nature of his work gave him a fit, powerful bearing. His brown eyes and grizzled beard were rarely accompanied by anything but a pleasant smile, and Annabelle always enjoyed his company.
“But not too busy that I can’t give you a lift,” he continued with a wink. “Hop in.”
Annabelle clapped her hands with glee and eagerly got inside the earthy-smelling van, its comforting warmth making her realize how cold she had been previously.
“Oh, thank you so much, Albert. My car—”
“Broke down on the road to Folly’s Bottom? Aye, I just passed it,” Albert said in his gruff voice.
“Yes,” Annabelle laughed. “If you could just drop me off—”
“At Mildred’s Garage? Of course, Vicar.”
Annabelle smiled and settled into the seat.
“Well, I owe you a cup of tea for this at the very least, Alfred. Do drop by the church if you find the time.”
“Oh, it’s nothing, Vicar, I always offer anyway. In fact, you’re the fourth person I’ve picked up from the roadside this week.”
Annabelle turned her head to Alfred with a look of disbelief.
“Really?” she said.
“Aye.” He chuckled slightly as he noticed her reaction. “If you ask me, it’s all these new technologies they keep sticking in the cars. So many dongles and apps and mp3s and i-whatsits – something’s bound to go wrong! I don’t even trust automatic transmissions, myself,” he said, patting his gearstick affectionately.
“But Alfred, my car is a Mini! It might have go-faster stripes, but it’s hardly tricked out with all the latest doo-dads, for heaven’s sake!”
Alfred shrugged slowly before turning his chin up musing. “Probably the spark plugs then. Yeah. That’ll be it.”
He pulled the van over to the curb in front of Mildred’s Garage and nodded his head politely as Annabelle effusively offered her gratitude and the promise of a cup of tea once more. She waved as he sped off to his next job and walked over to the short, wide building that housed Mildred’s workshop.
Mildred’s Garage had seen better days. Its paint was peeling, and both of the large metal shutters that fronted the workshop were rusting, but the reputation of the business was spotless. Since inheriting it from her father, Eric, nearly thirty-five years earlier, Mildred had overseen most of the villagers’ very first cars, their upgrades to family vehicles, and for the more successful community members, their luxury vehicles and sports cars. In many respects, Annabelle often thought, Mildred was much like a vicar herself, witnessing and supporting people through the gravest and grandest milestones of their lives.
Though the world had changed and most vehicles were now computers on wheels, Mildred’s was still a comforting first port of call for many when a knocking noise started up, a tire ran flat, or a simple oil change was needed. In many respects, much of the garage’s popularity was down to its old-fashioned values. People knew they would get a job well done at Mildred’s for a fair price – and more often than not, plenty of courtesy and a cup of tea thrown in. She or her assistants would even pump gas for customers while they sat in the comfort of their cars, a luxury long since abandoned just about everywhere else in England.
Despite being sixty-two, Mildred was enthusiastic, gnarly, and as strong as an ox – though only half the size. Annabelle marched up the front lot, in between the vintage cars (restoration projects Mildred enjoyed in her spare time), scanning for a glimpse of her frizzy red hair.
“Mildred!” she called, as she drew closer to the garage. “Mildred! It’s Annabelle!”
One of the bay doors was open, a small hatchback neatly parked inside. Annabelle noticed the peculiar silence that seemed to permeate the garage. She visited regularly, at least once a week to fuel up, and got regular check-ups throughout the year, but she had never seen it as quiet as this. It often seemed that Mildred spent every waking hour at the garage, hammering or clanking away at some problem or dealing with the phone calls that seemed to interrupt her work every few minutes. On the rare occasions that she was away, one of her assistants would be there: Ted, a grizzled man in his forties who always wore the pained, despondent expression of a man recovering from a hangover, or Aziz, the teenage apprentice who would, to the chagrin of his colleagues, blare hip hop music from a device on his workbench as he tinkered with the cars.
Annabelle stepped into the garage, around the hatchback, and alongside the cluttered workbench.
“Ted! Aziz! Anyone?!”
She knew Mildred well enough to know that neither she nor her assistants would leave the garage unattended. Not without a notice of some kind, unless something was severely amiss. She strode back into the center of the garage, spinning around as she scanned its walls and the two bays.
Apart from the hatchback, there was no other vehicle inside, and with the garage’s open plan, there were few nooks and crannies to investigate. Annabelle paced anxiously, keenly studying everything around her for something out of the ordinary.
Just as she was about to go outside and walk around the garage in search of clues, she crouched suddenly and looked beneath the small car in the middle of the workshop floor. It was dark, the lights of the inspection pit beneath the car were off. She strained to remember what such pits looked like. At the far end, toward the back, Annabelle thought she noticed something sticking out. A tool of some kind. She stood up, walked around, and crouched once more to see what it was and whether it could illuminate the mystery of the empty garage.
“Oh dear God!” Annabelle suddenly squealed, pulling back and covering her mouth.
It was no tool.
It was nothing mechanical of any kind.
It was a hand.
CHAPTER TWO
ANNABELLE FORCED HERSELF to crouch down again and look more intently under the car. She could see the hand reaching out from the pit, almost imploringly. After squinting and shuffling to gain a better perspective, Annabelle was in no doubt that the hand’s rough texture and slim, taut muscles could only belong to one person – Mildred.
“Mildred!” Annabelle called desperately. “Mildred, are you alright?”
The hand remained still. Annabelle stood up and looked around nervously to consider her options. She could seek out the keys to the car and try to move it, but there was no guarantee she would find them, and she would waste precious, possibly crucial time trying. She could call for help, but when she patted herself down in search of her phone, she stamped her foot when she realized she had left it on the dashboard of her Mini.
Looking toward the office, she considered using the garage phone to call for help, before reconsidering. Something troubling had obviously happened here, and that phone might prove an important clue. She had seen enough drama in her career as a priest to know how important it was to leave a scene intact.
There was only one option, Annabelle thought, as she launched herself away from the garage using remarkably long, powerful strides. The pub across the road. I’ll get help there – maybe it won
’t be too late.
Upton St. Mary boasted three pubs, the Dog and Duck, the King’s Head, and the Silver Swan. It might seem to outsiders to be a tad excessive for a small village to have three drinking establishments, but it is by no means unusual in England. Annabelle had been inside them all on one occasion or another. The Silver Swan was a rather different pub from the other two. Whereas the Dog and Duck and the King’s Head had catered to the working men of Upton St. Mary for generations, the air above their mahogany tables ever-crowded with the forceful rhythm of male conversation, the Silver Swan was a decidedly more laid-back establishment.
It had been owned and managed by the same family for three generations. With its famously hearty meals, leather chairs, and large fireplace, no patron left without feeling as if they had been a welcome visitor in somebody’s home rather than a mere consumer of the excellent local beer. While patrons of the Dog and Duck or Kings Head could play a game of darts or pool and drink the stoutest of local ales, the Silver Swan had the great advantage of a large outside seating area, allowing drinkers to enjoy a magnificent view of the rolling hills that surrounded Upton St. Mary. This alone had made it a beacon for all the outdoor adventurers who enjoyed the miles of gorgeous countryside.
Every Saturday and Sunday, the pub would be filled with members of the local cycling club both before and after their scenic rural rides. Until they were banned, Wednesdays and Fridays saw outdoor explorers of a starkly different kind when the pub hosted the local pipe-smoking club that convened to puff away at the vast outdoor benches while comparing tobaccos. Every day, hikers would plan their routes so that they found themselves at the pub at lunchtime in order to enjoy the hearty fare on offer and rest their weary feet. Yes, it was a place that did brisk business, indeed.
Grave in the Garage (A Reverend Annabelle Dixon Cozy Mystery Book 4) Page 2
