Lineage Most Lethal

by S. C. Perkins

  I heard her words as if she’d just said them. I wondered if she’d used that accent when she’d spoken to Naomi Van Dorn, claiming to be Naomi’s long-lost aunt.

  Always stick as close to the truth as possible. That was what Grandpa had advised—and that was exactly what Mrs. P. had done, wasn’t it?

  Wait, I thought. She had screwed up. She’d screwed up this morning in asking me if the trouble with my car had been my brake lines, telling me Pippa had confessed the real reason we’d crashed into the juniper trees. Yet when I’d spoken to Pippa later this morning, she’d said she’d just woken up. There was no way Pippa could have told Mrs. P. about my brakes at all.

  I stood up so fast, the blood rushed to my head.

  “Pippa,” I whispered in horror, staring at the closed barn door in front of me, which kept me from seeing into the rest of the cottage or to the front door, where she had answered a knock some minutes earlier.

  Pippa had opened the door to a killer.

  FORTY-ONE

  I moved to the sliding barn door, but didn’t open it. Maybe she was just in the kitchen. “Pippa?”

  Silence. How long had it been since she’d gone to answer the front door? Five minutes? Ten?

  “Hey, Pippa!” I called out again, trying to sound unconcerned.

  Nothing.

  I didn’t want to open the office door. I decided to go even louder, but keep it casual, like I wasn’t rapidly becoming scared out of my wits.

  “Hey, Pippa, I have something funny to show you. Come in here.”

  The silence was covering my eardrums like a thick duvet. There was no response.

  Could Mrs. P. have killed Pippa and now be waiting in the house for me?

  Oh God. I spun around. I needed a weapon.

  I lunged for my tote bag. While it held a veritable slew of items from my knit cap to my folders, faux-snakeskin clutch with my essentials, and my little makeup bag, the only thing I could possibly turn into a weapon was my keys. I put them in my vest pocket.

  Catching sight of a peppermint, I swore. Another bullet point was added to the list: the chocolate mint plant. Mrs. P. tracked it into the hotel, yes, but it wasn’t from the knot garden, was it? No, I was betting it was from Chef Rocky’s backyard. That’s why she jumped so fast to take it from me when Boomer kept trying to get at it.

  Boomer, I thought, my heart clutching. Had Mrs. P. hurt him, too?

  Hurrying now, I moved around Pippa’s desk, picking up a blue plastic letter opener sitting by some envelopes. It wasn’t the knifelike kind, but instead a safety style that was flat, about the size of an egg, and was probably not good for cutting much. It did have a sharply pointed part for inserting into envelopes, however. I tested it on my palm and decided if I had to stab someone with it, it would probably break, but it would hurt enough before it did. I was about to put it in the back pocket of my jeans, then changed my mind and slid it underneath the left cuff of my sweater, against the inside of my wrist.

  I looked into Pippa’s trash can. Nothing except for papers. The pens we’d been using to decipher the last of Hugo’s codes were basic ballpoints with a dull rounded tip, so from her decorative containers I grabbed a sharpened pencil instead, sticking it in the shaft of my right bootie. Lastly, I grabbed the two paperweights. The smaller, with the picture of Boomer, I slipped into my other pocket. The other, sporting a large red heart on a pink background, I grasped in my right hand.

  None of it was much, but it was better than nothing. I moved back to the barn door, listening for sounds in the house. I was pretty sure I would have heard if Pippa had brought Mrs. P. into the house, whether at her invitation or against her will. Still, I steeled myself, then yanked open the barn door, ready to fast pitch the larger paperweight at Mrs. P.’s head.

  The cottage was silent. No voices, no Pippa. I glanced around, craning my head to see into the kitchen. No Boomer, either.

  I sprinted to the window, flattening myself against the smooth wall beside it, desperate to see if Pippa was out there and hurt—or worse. The shutter louvers were open. Carefully, and for only a split second at a time, I took darting glances out onto the porch and the immediate grounds.

  It had all but stopped raining, though fat drops of water dripped in consistent rhythm off the porch roof. Across the vast lawn, I could see the hotel in all its graceful glory, but now I truly appreciated how much distance was between it and Pippa’s cottage. Even if I stood outside and waved my arms, someone at the hotel would have to be on the second floor and using binoculars to clearly see me.

  Mrs. P. had also gotten what she’d told the groundskeeper she wanted: all the outdoor prep for the gala had been completed before the rains. Not a single soul could be seen anywhere, including Pippa, Boomer, and Mrs. P. herself. Then I shifted to look left and saw a patch of buttery yellow fur lying still on the grass.

  “Boomer!” I said, anguish filling my voice. I opened the front door and was instantly hit by a blast of cold wind. The temperature had dropped ten degrees. With the wind chill, the temp was no doubt close to freezing, and my lightweight down vest wasn’t doing much to keep me warm. I grabbed my coat from the sofa and scanned all around once more for signs of Mrs. P. Seeing none, I raced out the door and over to Boomer.

  He was breathing. He looked to be just asleep. Looking around, I saw a scattering of little dark nuggets that I recognized as Boomer’s liver-flavored dog treats.

  “He goes crazy for these things, for reasons only he knows. He’ll do anything you want once he gets a whiff of them.”

  I put my hand on Boomer’s side. His fur was soaked, and I worried he would get hypothermia. I didn’t think twice, but took off my coat and placed it over the dog, hoping it would keep him warm enough until a vet could come.

  I stood up, shivering and looking around for the larger paperweight, then realized I’d put it down when I put on my coat.

  I was about to run back inside and get it, and maybe go to the kitchen for a better weapon, when a blast of icy wind hit me and made another one of Boomer’s treats tumble over in the grass, looking like a large caramel.

  I stifled a cry. The caramels! Would Mrs. P. have poisoned them, too? I remembered how I’d teased about sneaking one and she’d encouraged me to.

  “You deserve one,” she’d said.

  Why, that conniving, evil … My fingers shaking, I found the contact I’d put in my phone labeled simply “Tom,” and typed a text.

  Caramels poisoned!

  I hit send. Would he know what that meant? I started panicking. Grandpa …

  To keep myself from going crazy waiting on Tom’s reply, I looked around for which way Mrs. P. and Pippa could have gone. Due to the rain, there weren’t any discernable footprints or a clear indication of which way they went. Could Mrs. P. have taken her down to Lady Bird Lake Trail?

  My phone dinged and my heart skipped a beat.

  Confiscated. None eaten.

  My hand to my forehead, I made a slow spin, weak with relief. I was about to text him back when a couple of broken reedlike grasses caught my eye, and just beyond, I saw it: the path Pippa told me ran behind her cottage and into the woods to the temple-like folly.

  I recalled her saying it was a place she had gone to since she was a child to escape when things got overwhelming, and that there was such dense thicket surrounding the folly that she hadn’t been heard when she’d broken her ankle and was calling for help.

  Yet I did hear it—a faint scream of pain in the distance.

  “Pippa!” I cried, and nearly jumped out of my skin when my phone rang, Detective Dupart’s name on the screen. I was holding my phone to my ear and saying, “Detective, bring help!” even as I took off down the path.

  “Ms. Lancaster! What’s wrong?”

  I was running, following the path as it curved out of sight, snaked around a couple of trees, and straightened out again, the cold wind biting at my cheeks and whipping my ponytail around to lash me in the face.

  “It’s Mr
s. Pollingham,” I said. “The Hotel Sutton’s front desk manager. She’s the killer, and she has Pippa!”

  “Ms. Lancaster,” he shouted. “What happened? Where are you?”

  I dropped my voice to a whisper. “She’s got her in the woods by the hotel. Probably in the folly.”

  I heard a sound behind me and I whirled around, my arm and face smacking into the low branches of a young tree. Stumbling backward, I held on to my phone, but somehow my thumb slipped over the red button on the screen, hanging up on Detective Dupart.

  I looked around. No one was behind me, so I pulled my keys out, threading them through my fingers, and plunged back down the wooded path. There was enough cover from the taller trees overhead that little of the ground had gotten soaked, but it was damp enough that my footsteps were muffled.

  It muffled another’s footsteps as well. I skidded to a stop, nearly losing my balance on the wet leaves, as Mrs. P. emerged from behind a large oak, holding a pistol with a silencer.

  FORTY-TWO

  “Drop the phone,” she said, and gone were the warm tones in her voice. “And the keys.”

  “Mrs. P.,” I breathed, letting my keys fall to the ground. I still had the smaller paperweight in my pocket. “Why are you doing this? Did you shoot Pippa?”

  “Drop the phone. Now.” She took a step toward me. If she hadn’t had a gun, I would have tried out some of my self-defense moves. But the pistol in her hand and the coldness in her tone made me do what she said.

  My fingers opened to let my phone drop just as Dupart called back. I tried to hit the red button again that would ignore the call so she couldn’t see his name, but this time I missed.

  The angry flush that crept up Mrs. P.’s neck and onto her cheeks made me take a step backward.

  Ffft. I leapt out of the way with a yelp as my phone’s screen shattered. I stumbled awkwardly onto a rock and fell, landing hard on the ground with an “oof,” my right wrist taking the brunt of the fall. I sat up quickly, holding it gingerly.

  “Oh, get up,” Mrs. P. said, disdain flooding her voice, gesturing at me with her pistol. “If you’d broken it, it’d be obvious.”

  I stood up, attempting to wiggle my fingers and succeeding. My wrist was already beginning to swell, but she was right, it wasn’t broken. Then I saw her looking down at something on the path. The paperweight had fallen from my pocket and tumbled toward her, landing so that it looked like Boomer’s face was staring up at her.

  “That dog’s an idiot,” she all but spat. “Stupid enough to take the liver treats, and then tried to bite me as he was falling asleep.”

  Good boy, Boomer, I thought.

  Using her toe, she kicked the paperweight and it flew off into the brush. Then her lip curled. “And you’re an idiot for thinking you could stop me.” She used the gun to gesture me to walk in front of her. “Move, now, or you’ll get a dose of what your phone just went through.”

  I made my legs work, though I almost couldn’t feel them.

  “Where are we going?” I asked. My teeth weren’t just chattering from the cold.

  “Oh, I’m putting you with little Miss Pippa. I’m going to have to take off after this and put the plan for the rest of my life into action, so I don’t have time to deal with you two separately. So, you know, two annoying little birds with one stone—or two shots, as it were.”

  I looked over my shoulder at her. Over her black cargo pants and gray sweater, she wore a barn jacket in that heavy twill material. It, too, was black, but also nice looking, with large pockets, two of which were bulging.

  I understood. She was dressed to make a trek through the woods and come out onto some part of Lady Bird Lake Trail looking like a stylishly dressed tourist who would blend in if spotted by anyone out walking in this weather. She was also dressed to blend into the night. And the huge pockets on her jacket said she could hide a pistol until she could dispose of it.

  She made a noise of frustration. “Och, I’m so angry I had to do this today. I had a plan for you and Pippa on New Year’s Eve. A couple of shots during the fireworks display … a shove into Lady Bird Lake … but you made everything go sideways.”

  I glanced over my shoulder, utterly speechless except for croaking out, “H-how?”

  “I’ve been watching you, Lucy dear,” she said. “When you came back from picking up your rental car this morning, I could tell you’d had news. Your face was all anxious, but lit up at the same time, like a little chipmunk who’s discovered a stash of nuts. Then I saw you racing over to Pippa’s house with your copies of The Thirty-Nine Steps. That’s when I knew you were close to exposing me.”

  “But why, Mrs. P.?” I asked, trying to do the dumb act. “Why do you want to kill Pippa and me?”

  My attempt earned me a harsh laugh. “Och, really, Miss Know-It-All Genealogist? I’m not buying that you haven’t figured it out. Ask me things that are more meaningful to you, why don’t you.”

  The first question I could think of was a silly one, considering, but it came out anyway.

  “Where will you go?”

  “My ancestral homeland,” she replied, a note of happiness in her voice.

  “England?”

  “No, dear, Germany. About five years ago, I made contact with a cousin outside of Dresden. I’ve visited her on vacation and we’ve become close. She, too, believes Germany should have won the war, and she’s working to keep the ideals of the Nazi Party alive in the fatherland. She’s offered me a place to stay and live, and she’s helped me create a new identity for myself.”

  I glanced back, in complete shock to hear her calmly admitting to the same twisted ideologies her double-agent grandfather had believed.

  “What will your name be?” I asked. “Or will you be a von Pöllmacher once more?”

  “Oh, look at you, pronouncing my family name correctly,” she said in a singsongy voice, but didn’t answer my question.

  “All right, then,” I said, and changed tack. “What about Hugo? Why did you poison him with something as heinous as radium chloride? In fact, why did you poison him at all?”

  She made a dismissive noise. “Because it was apropos. He was as interested in the war as I was, and was always warning me to be careful when I cleaned my war-era timepieces that had glow-in-the-dark faces. It irritated me that he felt I wasn’t capable enough to handle them properly, so I thought he might like to know what real radium chloride poisoning felt like.” A note of gratification came into her voice. “It was easy. I was at the Sutton Grand all the time, no one thought twice. And I already had a reputation for sending him a whiskey as a nightcap. No one even noticed when I stirred in the scrapings from my watch faces.”

  She let her voice go to a stage whisper. “To be honest, I didn’t even know if it would work, but he wasn’t the healthiest man and I figured it would make the issues he already had much worse at the very least. Overall, I was so pleased with the effects.”

  I gave her a horrified, sickened look, which only made her chuckle.

  “And Chef Rocky?” I said, my voice shaking. “Why an ice pick in the ear?”

  I heard more mirth in her voice. “Well, I couldn’t use radium chloride again, could I? So the ice pick was a convenient way to dispatch him. Years ago, I dated a very attractive ex-military man who taught me that move, and how to pick a lock and enter a house quietly, too.”

  “You’ve used an ice pick on someone before?” I squeaked.

  “Only on a mannequin,” she said with a little too much blitheness. “Of course, it was harder than I thought in real life.”

  “I’m glad you have some remorse,” I replied bitterly.

  She laughed. “No, dear. I meant that if I’d done it right, I would have been able to get the ice pick out, leaving no trace of it being there.” She made a tutting noise. “Alas, it was not to be.”

  Bile rose up in my throat, but I swallowed it back.

  “Pippa once told me you were stunned by Chef Rocky when you met him,” I said. “Was th
at because you recognized him as one of your targets?”

  I felt her tap me between my shoulders with the barrel of her gun. “Och, right again! My, you are good at this.”

  Her taunting voice made me want to swing around and kick her, but she was still talking, so I didn’t.

  “I’d been wanting to avenge my grandfather’s death ever since I found out how he was betrayed, of course, but I never knew where to start.”

  “When did you find out?” I asked.

  “Oh, about ten years ago,” she said. “I learned that, after the war, my grandmother was branded the wife of a traitor and went from being a member of the landed gentry to losing her place in society. Still, even though she raised my dad in a small flat above a shop, she had contacts. Some were in the SOE, and she managed to find out both what had happened and the mission’s code name. I never researched it until one day, about two years ago, after I met a genealogist much like yourself at the Sutton Grand. She told me the mission may have been declassified and, if so, I could find out the names of those involved.”

  While I had no doubt my unknown fellow genealogist wouldn’t have said anything if they’d known, it still hurt knowing Mrs. P. had been set on her path by someone like me.

  Mrs. P. said, “Eventually, I started looking into it, and lo and behold, I found the spies of Operation Greenfinch.”

  “But how did you find out their first names so you could trace their descendants?” I asked. “I only got their first initials, last names, and code names.”

  “Worried I’m better at this than you?” she asked with a bark of laughter. “Aww, now don’t you worry, Lucy dear. Their names are out there, all right. I just had more time to find them than you did.”

  “Right,” I mumbled.

  Mrs. P. was still musing on her accomplishment, the merry note back in her voice.

  “Then I had to become a nosy genealogist myself and work to make sure I found the right descendants. After that, I got to pick and choose the descendant I felt was best worth killing. It was kind of fun doing the research and tracking down all my targets.” I got another little nudge between the shoulder blades. “But I’ll admit, you could’ve knocked me down with a feather when I realized I was already working for one of them. For the very great-granddaughter descending from Agent Helen ‘Nell’ Davis, no less.”