Springtime for Murder

by Debbie Young

  I shook my head. “I’m not talking about her culinary methods. I mean, she put washing-up liquid in her tea.”

  “Now that is an acquired taste.”

  “What I mean is, she was outside in the garden. She’d sneaked outside while Billy was asleep. Though she’d have everyone believe she’s agoraphobic.”

  Hector sat up straighter. “The cheek of it! She told me she’d not been out of the house for five years. That’s why I’ve been delivering her and Bunny’s book orders all this time. She’s been taking advantage of my good nature!”

  “Not only that.” I jabbed him in the chest with my forefinger. “If she’s not really agoraphobic, it could have been her who pushed Bunny in the wheelchair up the High Street and left her for dead in Mr Harper’s grave.”

  19 Eyes and Ears

  “Have you seen my ears, Sophie?”

  Jemima swung her school book bag on to my small teaching desk in the stockroom. She had been the first pupil to come to me for coaching after school, and I’d become very fond of her.

  I lifted up one of her long blonde plaits to inspect beneath it.

  “Your ears look fine to me. Why, have you got earache?”

  Jemima took her plait from my hand and replaced it carefully over her shoulder.

  “No, silly, not my real ears. My bunny ears. I had blue flowery ones, and I lost them somewhere on Friday. I thought I’d left them at school, but they weren’t there today, nor in the playpark. So I thought I might have left them here after school when we came in to get milkshakes.”

  Blue flowery bunny ears. I bit my lip.

  “You mean the sort of ears Carol makes to sell in the village shop for Easter?”

  “Yes, that’s right. Easter Bunny ears. I particularly chose those ones because my favourite colour is sapphire.”

  Her lessons were doing wonders for her vocabulary as well as her reading confidence.

  “Small flowers or big ones?” I was hoping against hope that hers weren’t the ones we’d found on Bunny.

  “Miniscule ones.”

  I hesitated. That wasn’t the answer I wanted to hear.

  “Perhaps the easiest thing would be to ask Carol to make you another pair exactly the same as the ones you lost. She might still have some of the same material in her ragbag.” Carol made the ears of out of scraps, ensuring an excellent profit margin as well an appealing variety. “In the meantime, I’ll keep an eye out for them, and if I find them, I’ll keep them for you until our next lesson. Now, what page did you get up to last week?”

  I looked pointedly at my watch, hoping she wouldn’t notice its battery had run out, to hint that we should focus on what her mother was paying me for. Our half hour lesson always flew by, even when we weren’t diverted.

  Jemima flipped open Matilda at her bookmark and began to read, but I didn’t hear the first few paragraphs, too distracted by the fate of her ears. I hoped the village grapevine would never reveal the truth to this innocent little girl. Thank goodness Bunny had survived. It would have been so much worse for Jemima if Bunny’s fall had been fatal.

  As usual, Hector called through to me when our half-hour was up. Jemima and I returned to the public part of the shop to find her mother contentedly reading a novel in the tearoom. A new book, tea and cake were a voluntary tax frequently paid by my pupils’ parents while they waited for their child’s reading lesson to finish. No wonder Hector was happy to let me use the stockroom for free.

  Jemima ran across to her mother, handed over her book bag, and went to the counter to collect a free lollipop from Hector, a lure he insisted on giving my pupils as a reward after each lesson. I worried that reading would prove bad for their teeth.

  As her mother got out her purse to pay me for the lesson, I said, loudly enough for Jemima to hear, “I was just saying to your daughter, we haven’t found her bunny ears in the shop, but we’ll let you know if we come across them.” With my back to Jemima, I widened my eyes as a warning, to see whether her mother knew the truth about where they’d been found. Her mother grimaced and gave a scarcely perceptible shake of the head. So she knew too.

  “Jemima, let’s pop into the shop on our way home, and we’ll ask Carol to make you some more exactly the same,” she said to her daughter.

  “That’s just what Sophie suggested,” said Jemima, with a knowing look to Hector, seeking empathy at the frustrating conspiracies between grown-up ladies.

  But they left happily enough, Jemima holding her mother’s hand and engaging her in deep conversation as they went up the High Street. I was left wondering what had become of Jemima’s ears when Bunny was taken off in the ambulance. I took comfort from the thought that they’d have brightened up the day for the patients and staff in the accident and emergency department. Perhaps they were still at the hospital in Bunny’s bedside locker. I wondered whether we should hand them in to the police, along with the fur coat and pink slippers. A bit of hard evidence might prompt them to take the incident seriously at last. On the other hand, that might do more harm than good. After all, what could they prove? That Jemima was somehow involved in Bunny’s bizarre disguise? She was hardly the Artful Dodger. And I still had no idea who the fur coat belonged to.

  “Sophie, could you log these arrivals into stock while I cash up, please?”

  I took the laptop, scanner and the small box of books over to a tearoom table and worked my way through them. They were all specials that we’d ordered at customers’ specific requests. I remembered a pleasant teenager ordering the study guide for Macbeth, which was on the GCSE English syllabus that year. One of the primary school mums had asked for the fancy gift edition of The Wind in the Willows. But I drew a blank at the next book: How to Plan a Funeral. It was the only order of the three that I hadn’t taken myself.

  “Who’s this for, Hector?” I held it up to show him.

  Hector stopped counting pound coins. “I don’t know. Not one of mine. Becky must have taken that order on Friday.”

  “Becky?” I didn’t know Becky had been helping in the shop. She’d only helped out once before, in a crisis. “What was Becky doing here on Friday?”

  Hector looked away. “Don’t you remember? You had the morning off to go to the dentist. I got her in to cover for you, so I didn’t lose writing time.”

  During quiet moments, Hector would work on his latest novel behind the trade counter. Would he have told me about Becky coming in if I hadn’t asked about the funeral book? Was he planning for Becky to become a regular part of our team?

  Hector hauled the order book down from the shelf behind him and flicked it open at the previous week’s page. He ran his finger down the list.

  “Yep, it’s one of Becky’s.”

  One of Becky’s? So she was a master saleswoman now too, was she?

  “So who’s it for?” My pen was poised over the reservation ticket to slip inside the cover.

  Hector’s eyes widened as his finger stopped at the right order line.

  “Miss Carter. It was ordered on Friday, by Kitty, presumably. Over the phone.”

  Thoughts of Becky vanished like a flame beneath a candle-snuffer.

  “Goodness, do you think that means she was planning to kill Bunny all along?”

  Hector slipped the last of the coins into a plastic bag.

  “If she was, she’d be daft to incriminate herself like that. Besides, considering she’s Bunny’s carer, and Bunny is getting on a bit, it’s not unreasonable to order a book like that. Personally, I’d be more suspicious if a person with no ageing relatives asked for it.”

  “Maybe it was ordered by someone pretending to be Kitty, to place the blame on her? The real perpetrator trying to cover his or her own tracks?”

  Hector shrugged. “There aren’t many customers who order books from us by phone. They usually either come into the shop or bypass us and order books from online retailers in the comfort of their own home. Kitty and Bunny have never got their heads round the internet, nor do they leave the hou
se. Which is why they’re an exception.”

  “If someone wanted to set Kitty up, it would be easy to fake a phone order. It might even have been Bunny. Their voices are very similar. If Becky had never met either of them, she would take on trust whatever name the person on the other end of the phone gave her.”

  “Next thing, you’ll be telling me that Paul or Stuart did it, faking a high voice to pretend to be Kitty. But why would they do that?”

  “There’s one way to find out. We’ll ask Kitty, and if she claims she has no knowledge of it, we’ll know it was a hoax.”

  Hector piled the moneybags into the safe and set the combination while I powered down the laptop.

  “Or else it’s a double bluff. She could deny all knowledge so as to suggest someone else is trying to frame her. But is Kitty smart enough to think that up? I wonder.”

  20 All Change

  A lean businessman I didn’t know, still handsome though his face was lined beyond his middle-aged years, brandished a fifty-pound note at me across the trade counter.

  “Could you kindly change this into one-pound coins?”

  His lips were so tightly pursed, I could hardly see them.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t have that many pound coins in the till,” I replied. “My boss has just cashed up and gone to the bank. I’m only still here because I’m setting up for the Writers’ Group meeting this evening.”

  If he’d bought a book or even a greetings card and asked for pound coins in the change, I’d have been more cooperative.

  “Well, I need some pound coins now for a parking meter.” He pointed out of the window to a shiny black Lexus parked outside the shop.

  “Fifty of them? That’s expensive parking! Where’s that? Not here, obviously. We don’t have any parking meters in Wendlebury Barrow. We don’t even have yellow lines.”

  I sat down on Hector’s stool and folded my arms. The man’s eyes darted this way and that, looking everywhere but at me.

  “They’re for later, in town,” he said quickly. “A few of them, anyway. What I mostly need them for is—” his face brightened. “—is a penny mile the vicar’s doing as a fundraiser. You know, where you ask people to lay down coins in a long line as a way of donating them to your charity.”

  That was news to me. I pulled the shop’s copy of the parish magazine out from under the counter and turned to the church news page. No sign of any fundraisers there. I looked the stranger in the eye.

  “That’s funny, I’d have thought the vicar would have mentioned his penny mile to me. I teach Sunday School for him, you know.” I might not have started there yet, but I wanted to assert my authority. “However, I’ll be seeing him on Sunday, so if you’d like to leave your donation with me, I’ll be sure to give it to him then. I can change it into coins from the till at the end of trading on Saturday.”

  I smiled sweetly and reached for his banknote. He snatched it away and stuffed it back into his pocket.

  “No, no, don’t worry. I’ll catch him later. I’ll come back.” Remembering his manners, and perhaps a little embarrassed at being caught out in an obvious lie, he backed away towards the travel section. “Perhaps I’ll just have a browse while I’m here.”

  I took the opportunity to examine his features in profile – the lean, slightly horsey face and the aquiline nose. Surely this was one of Bunny’s children? There was a touch of Paul’s snideness about him as well, though he lacked his brother’s arrogance.

  “I thought for a moment you had come to collect a book order.” I indicated the specials shelf behind me, where all the fulfilled orders stood, awaiting collection. I pulled out the funeral book at random and held it up to show him.

  “Funeral planning? What would I want with a book about funeral planning? I’m sorry, you must be mixing me up with someone else.”

  He looked genuinely baffled.

  The cadence of his voice matched Paul’s, as did his accent, in common with half the village. Could this be Stuart? His hands had the same long, tapering fingers that Bunny had wrapped around the volume of John Clare’s poems, though his were as yet unbent by arthritis.

  “If you don’t mind me asking, are you Mrs Carter’s son?”

  His face clouded. “Yes, I’m Stuart Brady, her youngest son. How did you know? And why do you ask?”

  When I glanced involuntarily at the funeral book on the counter, he turned pale.

  “You mean – you don’t mean – she’s not dead, is she?”

  I had not intended to frighten him. I meant only to assess whether he might have faked Kitty’s order for the funeral book.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to alarm you. She’s as well as can be expected under the circumstances. At least she was when I went to visit her in hospital on Sunday morning.”

  He laid a hand on the counter to steady himself. “What’s she doing in hospital?”

  If he was feigning ignorance, he was doing an impressive job of it. Why had Paul and Kitty not told their brother about their mother’s accident?

  “She had a fall.” I was pleased with myself on improvising such a diplomatic yet truthful answer. “She’s in Ward 27 if you want to go and see her.”

  He replaced the book he was holding and thrust his hand back into his pocket for the fifty-pound note, his eyes brightening. “Oh, well then, I’ll be needing some pound coins for the hospital car park.” He held it out to me again, more expectantly than before.

  Although I could have broken in to the next day’s float, something told me not to comply. Had I subconsciously noticed the note was a fake? We didn’t take many fifties in the shop, and I seldom had any in my purse, so I wasn’t familiar with them. Then I realised I could easily bypass the problem.

  “Don’t worry, you won’t need coins to park at the hospital. It’s all done by card with a number-plate recognition system. You don’t even need a paper ticket. Just flash your credit or debit card as you leave.”

  His shoulders sagged as he stashed the note away again. It looked as if it was the only banknote he had. Perhaps he wasn’t as flush as I’d first thought.

  “Were you planning to visit your mother at home tonight? Is that why you are in Wendlebury? I’m sorry if you’ve had a wasted journey.”

  “I was coming to meet my brother, Paul.” His left eye twitched.

  “At your mother’s house?”

  “At The Bluebird. He told me he wanted to meet on neutral territory to discuss my mother. I suppose he means without my mother or half-sister present.”

  “Wouldn’t it have been easier to meet in Slate Green?”

  His eye twitched again, and he put up his hand to still it.

  “I suppose so, but I’ve been away from the place more often than not lately. On business, you know. Still, Paul asked me to come to Wendlebury, so here I am. Though it will feel odd to be back in The Bluebird.” He gave a wan smile. “Old haunts from my youth. I can’t remember the last time I had a drink there. I don’t suppose Paul does, either.”

  “He’s been at The Bluebird a lot over the last few days.” I watched Stuart closely to assess his reaction. “The landlord’s hired him to do some building work on his new courtyard garden. I expect he’s been working there today.”

  “Unlike him to get his hands dirty. That’ll do him good. I wondered why he was asking me to meet him so early. I thought the pub wouldn’t open till six. I suppose Paul will be knocking off for the day about now.”

  I glanced at the clock on the wall, conscious that I still hadn’t set up the Writers’ Group meeting, and he took the hint.

  “Well, I’d better be getting along, then. Thanks for your help. Sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

  “I’m Sophie Sayers,” I said. I was glad we were parting on friendly terms, even though I hadn’t given in about the pound coins.

  “Thanks, Sophie.”

  When he plunged a hand into his trouser pockets to retrieve his car keys, a multitude of coins jangled, as if he’d just hit the jackpot on a f
ruit machine. How much parking was the man planning to do that night?

  As soon as he’d left, I closed the door and locked it behind him.

  21 Overheard

  Just as the Writers’ Group was wrapping up its discussion about our spring readings event, an altercation in the street interrupted the conversation. It was getting louder, heading up the High Street towards Hector’s House from the direction of The Bluebird.

  “You’re an embarrassment, Stuart,” snapped a familiar voice. “If you must play those wretched machines, play them well away from here.”

  The gruff response was unintelligible.

  “Just when I’ve been getting on so well with the landlord too. And think of poor Mother. How is she going to feel when she knows her son’s been banned from her local for breaking a fruit machine?” So that’s what he wanted the pound coins for. “You always were a bad loser. You were just the same when we were kids, playing Monopoly. You could never bear it when I won. You even taught Kitty to play before she was old enough to think strategically, just so you could beat her.”

  They came to a halt beside Stuart’s car. As the lights were out at the front of the shop, they must have presumed there was no-one in it.

  “Sounds like the Brady brothers,” said Dinah.

  Karen started taking notes. “That’s given me a great idea for a short story: how childhood games morph into adult problems. Do you think that’s why Stuart Brady became an accountant and Paul a builder? Childhood battles over the Monopoly board?”

  “Shhh!”

  We all craned towards the window to hear better.

  “Don’t kid yourself you’re suddenly the expert on family relationships,” Stuart was saying. “When you phoned to arrange to meet tonight, you didn’t even think to tell me Mum was ill.”

  “If you visited her more often, you’d have found out for yourself. You only ever go to see her when you’re broke. It’s pathetic, a grown man still sponging off his mother. What would Father say if he were still alive? What would your clients say if they knew?”