Fruit Cake and Fear

by Agatha Frost

  Dot scurried out of the café, leaving behind the newspaper. Julia stepped around the corner and picked up the latest edition of the paper. The headline ‘ASTRID WOOD REMEMBERED’ jumped out, along with a picture of a younger Astrid grinning at the camera with a birthday cake in front of her.

  Julia flicked through the pages, landing on a double page spread of photographs detailing the story of what had happened. An old photograph of her café caught her eye, even though it looked completely different. The pale blue exterior and ‘Julia’s Café’ sign were gone, replaced with an exposed wood front, a window filled with hand-carved toys, and a ‘The Toy Box’ sign above the door.

  “It’s quiet in here,” Roxy exclaimed with a stilted laugh as she walked into the café. “Have I come at a bad time?”

  “You’ve come at a perfect time, actually,” Julia said, glancing at the clock. “You get forty-five minutes for your dinner, don’t you?”

  “I have forty-one of them left.”

  “Good,” Julia said as she hurried around the counter to grab her pink pea coat. “Is your grandma still at Oakwood Nursing Home?”

  9

  Oakwood Nursing Home sat on the outskirts of Peridale at the end of a winding country lane. The luxury residential care home was situated in the middle of the countryside, and there were no other signs of life for miles around. For those who had money in the village, it was the perfect place to retire.

  “My grandma is lucky my granddad had a decent life insurance policy,” Roxy said as they drove past the lavish fountain in front of the entrance. “She would never have been able to afford this place otherwise. It’s more like a spa than any care home I’ve seen.”

  “I’ve only been once,” Julia said as Roxy pulled into one of the free spaces behind the 19th century manor house. “My gran blagged her way in and pretended she spoke German.”

  “Sounds like your gran.”

  “Nothing surprises me anymore. I’m just glad you know someone on the inside. I don’t think I could fake my way through reception again.” Julia said.

  They walked around the side of the manor, the leaves crunching underfoot. Before they pushed on the heavy double doors, they both stared out at the sprawling countryside. Dark clouds stained the horizon like ink in water.

  “The village looks so small from up here,” Roxy said, pointing out a small cluster of cottages. “Puts things in perspective.”

  “It does,” Julia agreed. “Somewhere down there, someone knows the truth about what happened to Astrid.”

  “Or someone in here,” Roxy reminded her as they turned to the door. “Let’s hope Alistair doesn’t press his panic button when he sees us.”

  They pushed on the doors and walked across the grand entrance hall, past the biggest bouquet of fresh white lilies Julia had ever seen. Just as she feared, the same young woman was behind the reception desk, reading a copy of Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

  “It’s getting to the good part,” the young nurse announced, holding her finger up as she finished the page. “He’s just about to bite her and – how can I help you?”

  She turned the page and marked her place with a cardboard bookmark with a pink tassel. She placed the dog-eared book on the desk and beamed up at them with her widest ‘customer service’ smile. If she recognised Julia, she was not letting it register on her face.

  “We’re here to see Glynnis Taylor,” Roxy said through a forced smile. “She’s not expecting us, but I’m sure she won’t mind her granddaughters popping in.”

  Roxy gave Julia a look that read ‘play along’, sparking a dreaded feeling of déjà vu from her last visit.

  “Roxy and Rachel?” the young woman said after typing in something on the computer under the desk. “Your grandmother is taking tea in the orangery.” She finished typing and looked up at Julia before whispering, “Rachel Carter? Why does that name ring a bell?”

  “No reason,” Roxy said, linking Julia’s arm and dragging her towards the door that admitted them entry to the home. When they were on the other side of the door, Roxy whispered, “Having a serial killer for a sister has many more downsides than you’d imagine.”

  “Have you been to see her since –”

  “Since she stabbed Gertrude and William Smith?” Roxy jumped in, glancing at Julia out of the corner of her eye as they made their way down a long and beautifully decorated corridor. “I haven’t. Mum has, but Rachel didn’t talk much. She’s convinced herself she’s innocent. I might have been inclined to believe her if you hadn’t been the one to pin the murders on her. It’s just through here.”

  They walked through a door labelled ‘Orangery’, down a small corridor, and out into a large glass conservatory, which looked out on a full-sized tennis court.

  “Is that my Roxy?” a little old woman with large magnifying glasses called out, squinting across the room. “It is! Oh, no. What has happened now, chicken? The last time you came was when you told me about those awful things that crazy sister of yours did.”

  “Nobody else has died,” Roxy said. “Well, not anyone we’re related to. I promise it is just a social visit. You remember my friend from school, Julia?”

  The little woman with white hair that had been rinsed orange squinted through her thick lenses at Julia, a small smile spreading across her tanned, wrinkled face.

  “The cake girl!” Glynnis said with a snap of her bony fingers. “Of course I remember you! You’re Dorothy’s granddaughter. We went to school together. How is ol’ Dot? Still running around the village pretending she’s not on the slow decline to death?”

  “Something like that,” Julia chuckled softly as they took seats across the table, a spiralled tray of sandwiches and cakes in the middle of the table. “Enjoying your afternoon tea?”

  “It’s dry rubbish,” she exclaimed loudly, glancing at one of the nurses who was standing on the edge of the room. “You’d think for the price we’re paying they wouldn’t try and fob us off with this packaged nonsense. They need to get you up here. I’m sure you could teach them a thing or two, that’s if you’re still baking.”

  “Julia has a café in the village,” Roxy said after picking up one of the crust-less sandwich triangles. “She bought Alistair’s old toy shop a couple of years ago.”

  “I don’t get down there much anymore,” she said after a sip of her tea. “There’s no need. Everything I could ever want is up here, except for perhaps a fresh cake every now and then.”

  “I almost wish I’d brought something with me,” Julia said as she glanced over the afternoon tea offering. “There’s nothing worse than dry cake.”

  “Finally!” Glynnis exclaimed, slapping her hand on the table, rattling the teapot. “You’d think I was asking for them to move heaven and Earth. I can’t tell you how many complaints I’ve stuffed in that suggestion box, but do they listen? Do they heck! My Albert didn’t pay his life insurance promptly every month so that I would be forced to spend my twilight years eating dry cake.”

  Julia chuckled as she glanced at the nurse, who was smiling politely in a way that said she had heard it all many times, possibly every day. From what Julia remembered of Glynnis in her younger years, she had always been amusing.

  “I suppose you’ve heard about Astrid Wood,” Roxy said after pouring herself and Julia a cup of tea. “Julia found her.”

  “You did?” Glynnis gasped, her soft fingers resting on Julia’s. “Oh, you poor girl. I can’t imagine that’s something that will leave you.”

  “They found her under Julia’s café, which, like I said, used to be the toy shop,” Roxy said as she circled her finger around her teacup. “Isn’t Alistair a resident here?”

  A wicked grin spread across Glynnis’ face as she loudly slurped down her milky tea.

  “You’ve always been the same, Roxy, my dear,” she said as she set her tea down. “Even when you wanted me to give you money for penny sweets at the corner shop, you’d always ease your way into it. Not like that sister of yours. She would d
emand things. ‘I want. I want’, was how most of her sentences started. And now look at her!”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” Roxy said, her cheeks turning a similar hue to her hair.

  “He’s a resident,” Glynnis said with a nod of her head. “Came up here after his wife passed away. It’s not often the wife goes first, but cancer doesn’t care what gender you are, does it?”

  Glynnis glanced at Julia, and it seemed they were both thinking about Julia’s mother for a second. Julia pushed forward a smile, not wanting her mind to wander back to that place.

  “Is he around?” Roxy asked. “While we’re up here, it would be nice to speak to him. Julia’s quite the amateur detective these days, and she’s promised Evelyn she’s going to look into things.”

  “Batty Evelyn?” Glynnis asked, snorting with laughter. “She was here last month for a psychic night. Started predicting death for everyone. You don’t need to be psychic to know our life expectancies are on the shorter side up here! The nurses had to ask her to perk up, but not until she started channelling dead relatives. Some of the old biddies lapped it up, but I saw right through her performance. She’s a charlatan if ever I’ve seen one!”

  “Grandma,” Roxy said, laughing awkwardly, her cheeks turning an even darker shade of red. “The woman has just found out her daughter was murdered. Maybe you can be a little more sensitive?”

  “I didn’t live through the second world war to be sensitive, dear,” Glynnis said, shaking back her white and orange hair. “When you get to my age, you’ll realise there isn’t a lot of time to be treading on egg shells. Say what you think, or don’t bother talking.”

  “You sound just like my gran,” Julia said.

  “The difference between your gran and I is that I’ve accepted my age,” she said, nodding around the conservatory, which was filled with elderly men and women, some of whom looked like they were narrowing in on turning one hundred. “The thought of her scuttling around that village exhausts me. If you want to speak to Alistair, he’s usually hanging around the tennis court out there with Alessandra.”

  “Alessandra Gambaccini?” Julia asked, craning her neck to look at the tennis court. “Of course. Grace did mention her mother was a resident here.”

  “She’s one of the younger ones,” Glynnis said as she joined Julia in looking out of the window. “She’s got some sense. Took her doctor’s pension and put it to use. She’s a spring chicken compared to most of us. Alistair dotes on her. The man is riddled with arthritis and has a bladder as weak as a pregnant woman, not that he’d know it. If that’s the reason you girls came up here, you can go and play detective and leave me to enjoy my dry cakes in peace.”

  Roxy kissed her grandma on the cheek before they walked out of the open double doors, leaving Glynnis to get back to her afternoon tea. The sun peeked through the murky clouds above, the scent of incoming rain in the air. They walked over to the tennis court, where two women were battling it out, grunting and running back and forth across the court as though they were playing at the Wimbledon finals.

  “There’s Alistair,” Roxy pointed out the man who was sitting on a cooler box, clutching onto a cane. “Is that Doctor Gambaccini? I hardly recognise her.”

  Julia squinted and looked at the woman on Alistair’s side of the court, who seemed to be taking the match more seriously than her opponent. Julia only remembered Doctor Gambaccini from her younger years, as the change-over between mother and daughter had happened while she was living in London. From what she remembered of the doctor, she had been a stern woman without the warmth of her daughter. She had blonde hair, which had always been scraped back into a neat French roll, and Julia had never seen her not in a trouser suit. The woman in front of her had curly blonde hair, which moved freely in the wind as she darted for the ball with her racket, and she was wearing a skin-tight white vest and an above the knee tennis skirt, with white trainers and socks.

  “Is it possible she looks younger now than I remember?” Julia said to Roxy. “She must be in her late sixties, at least.”

  “Suddenly those lines around my eyes feel a little deeper,” Roxy whispered back. “How long do these matches tend to go on for? All I know is when tennis is on TV, all of my favourite shows get pushed out of the way.”

  They stood on the edge of the court next to a group of bystanders, who did not seem as interested in the game as the two women playing. Alistair was bobbing his head from side to side as he watched the ball go from side to side.

  “Out!” he declared when the woman playing Alessandra missed the ball.

  The two women shook hands over the net before retiring to their things on the edge of the court. Alessandra walked over to Alistair, who handed her a towel and a water bottle with shaky hands. When two of the elderly bystanders shuffled forward with their bags, Julia and Roxy took their opportunity.

  “Great game,” Roxy exclaimed, slapping Alessandra heartily on the back. “I’m the biggest tennis fan you’ll meet, and you are up there with the best.”

  “Thank you,” Alessandra said with an unsure smile as she dabbed the sweat from her forehead. “Do I know you?”

  “We’re friends of Grace,” Roxy answered before Julia could say anything. “We’re visiting my grandma, Glynnis.”

  “I don’t know her,” she replied flatly. “Alistair, will you get off that box? I want a cold bottle of water. You’ve clutched this one so hard it’s gone warm.”

  Alistair stumbled up, leaning his entire bodyweight on his cane. He stepped to the side, but when Alessandra did not lean in to open the cooler box herself, Alistair fumbled his arthritic fingers against the clasp while Alessandra checked her fingers, more interested in her chipped manicure than the struggling elderly man. Unable to watch, Julia opened the box for him and pulled out a cold water bottle. She passed it to Alessandra, who strained a polite smile, despite her eyes being empty.

  “It’s good to see you again, Alistair,” Julia said, resting a hand on the man’s shoulder. “How are you holding up?”

  “Oh, you know,” he mumbled through shaky lips. “One day at a time. Alessandra, this is the woman I was telling you about. The one who found poor Astrid under the toy shop.”

  “Oh,” the doctor mumbled, her expression suddenly softening. “I can’t imagine that was easy.”

  “Everyone keeps saying that,” Julia said with an awkward laugh. “It wasn’t. Did you know her well?”

  “She was my daughter’s best friend,” she replied as she twisted the cap off the plastic bottle. “We should move out of the way. They’re about to start a new game, but I don’t think you can call what they do tennis. I was just about to take a walk around the grounds. You girls can join me.”

  Julia and Roxy glanced at her, unsure if it was an instruction or a question. Alessandra did not wait for a response and strode off the court. The two women followed, smiling their apologies at Alistair.

  “You say you know my daughter?” Alessandra said, inhaling the cool air as they set off down a winding stone path, which seemed to circle the entire grounds. “I dare say it’s going to rain.”

  “We went to school with her,” Julia said.

  “Really?” she said curtly, looking them both up and down quickly before continuing with her walk. “You look older.”

  “Only a couple of years older,” Roxy said through pursed lips as she glanced questioningly at Julia.

  “Well, I don’t remember you,” she said with a small shrug as they passed under the shade of a large oak tree. “Do keep up. Your heart won’t feel the benefit if you stroll everywhere like snails. Were you friends of that husband of hers?”

  “We know him,” Julia said, almost jogging to keep up. “Did you know Astrid well?”

  “I told you, she was my daughter’s best friend,” the woman snapped, glancing over her shoulder to shoot a stern look at Julia. “That husband acts like he’s still in school. He hasn’t had a proper job since. Thinks that band is ‘work’. Ha! I’m sure he
accepts peanuts as payment. It’s a good job my daughter followed in my footsteps, or they wouldn’t have a penny to their name. It’s the kids I feel sorry for. What kind of role model is he? I told her not to marry him, but she always did have a thing for the charity cases. I always thought that was why she was a friend to Astrid. She felt sorry for her because of that mother of hers.”

  “Do you remember anything about when she disappeared?” Roxy asked.

  “What sort of question is that?” she snapped, suddenly stopping walking, causing Roxy to bump into the back of her. “Everyone remembers that. We searched the village high and low for signs of her, but who was going to check a basement under a toy shop? I do feel for Evelyn, even if she is a little – peculiar. Maybe it would have been better if she had never found out. I can’t imagine she’s in a good way right now.”

  “She’s not,” Julia said, frowning at the mean woman. “Your daughter seems very happy with Aiden.”

  “Does she?” Alessandra scoffed as she set off walking again. “If she hadn’t just had the baby, I doubt they would have got together. It was their grief that pushed them into each other’s arms, but the baby kept them together. He wanted to be noble, even though he wasn’t the father.”

  “Isn’t that an admirable quality?” Roxy mumbled. “I’m adopted. I had a great life.”

  “It’s idiotic,” she said with a strained laugh. “And your situation was different. I remember your mother crying in my office about her infertility troubles. I was the one who suggested adoption in the first place. Aiden was just a child pretending to be an adult. They both were.”

  “But they are still together,” Julia said, her tone growing increasingly frustrated. “That must count for something.”

  “If you say so,” Alessandra said, glancing up at the darkening clouds as a drop of rain landed on her nose. “I’m going back inside before I get soaked.”