Murder by the Book

by Debbie Young

  He turned back to the book to read the “About the author” bit, but stopped before he got there at the dedication page. Beneath the printed dedication was a handwritten thank you from Hector to May. Horace read that aloud.

  “Ah, sweet,” he said, then stopped short, holding the page up for me to see. “But Jeez, have you seen the printed dedication: ‘To Celeste.’” He lowered the book for a minute and stared at me. “There aren’t many girls called Celeste. Does this mean what I think it means? Could this really be dedicated to Hector’s Celeste? In which case, are Hermione and Hector one and the same?” Spotting my guilty expression, he threw back his head in a laugh that rippled all the way down his six-pack. “Strewth! I’ve got a sister and I didn’t know it! All along I thought we were twins, when really we’re triplets.” He closed the book and hugged it to his chest. “Sweetheart, this is priceless!”

  I couldn’t help but laugh, torn between my promise of secrecy to Hector and Horace’s infectious sense of fun. I ran my finger and thumb across my lips as if zipping them closed.

  “Please don’t ask. I’m saying nothing.”

  His laughter subsided into a roguish smile. “Why hasn’t anyone else in the village sussed out his alter ego? No, wait, I know – the little minx would never deign to visit him down here. Not posh enough for her. That’s her loss, not Wendlebury’s.” He chewed his lip thoughtfully. “So Hector doesn’t want me to know either, eh? I’m not surprised. He knows what a lark I could have with this. This joke could run and run.” He turned serious for a moment. “I hope his adoring readers are paying him lots of dosh for his efforts.”

  “He does OK, but he doesn’t earn as much as he could if we really promoted the books. That’s why I set up a Twitter account for Hermione Minty. You saw me logging into it on Sunday. I wasn’t following her. I was tweeting for her. I’m trying to raise her profile, to help him sell more books.”

  Horace looked doubtful. “If I’ve learned anything from my commercial ventures down under, it’s that you have to make a big splash to be heard above the crowd of also-rans. You need to get other people to talk about her. It’s no good tweeting alone in the jungle of noise out there.” He paused to flick through the book again. “What you want is a big publicity stunt – in real life, not online. Where I work, we do that kind of thing all the time to draw attention to our tours.”

  “What, like wrestling crocodiles?” I could picture him doing that.

  “To be more honest, it’s more like taking tame wombats to tourist hotspots as a talking point. The ladies can’t resist coming up to give them a cuddle, and then’s our chance to chat them up and sell them tickets for our bush safaris.”

  I scratched my head thoughtfully. “I’m not sure we’ve got a match for wombats in Wendlebury. I don’t think Billy’s ferrets would have the same appeal.”

  Horace held the book by its chunky spine and flicked through the four hundred pages. “Phew, I wish I had Hector’s staying power. And his brains. I don’t know where he finds the time, working six days a week in the shop. And he must have written loads. Mum seems to have dozens of books by her – by him.”

  I smiled modestly. “That’s why he hired me – to buy him more time to write while I do the donkey work in the shop.”

  “Well, if he’s going to hire a donkey, he might as well hire one that’s sweet and pretty.”

  “Aren’t all donkeys?” I said playfully, then hoped he didn’t think I was flirting.

  He laughed. “And thank you for not wanting to tell me his secret. You’re a good woman, Sophie, and that’s what Hector’s long deserved.”

  He put the book back on the coffee table and set his hands on his knees with the self-satisfied posture of someone who has achieved his objective.

  “So, not only have you managed to resist my charms,” he said cheerfully, “but as a bonus, you’ve demonstrated to me how much you care for my big brother.”

  “Actually I think you’re bigger than him,” I said, reaching out to touch one of Horace’s bulging forearms. “I mean, you must get a lot more exercise and outdoor activity, to build your muscles up. Not that his muscles don’t get a good work-out lifting boxes of books.” I didn’t want to sound as if I was putting Hector down.

  Horace suppressed a smile as he stood up, ready to go now he’d accomplished his mission.

  “Size isn’t everything, sweetheart. Now you take care of my brother, or you’ll have me to answer to next time I’m home.”

  14 Mint Condition

  “I’ve cracked it, miss,” said Tommy, flinging open the shop door so it crashed against the wall. “It’s the vicar.”

  “What’s the vicar?”

  Hector didn’t look up from his keyboard. “The vicar, in the crypt, with the thurible.”

  “What’s a thurible?” I asked him.

  “Liturgical incense burner,” he replied. “Long metal ball on a chain. Not that they go in for that sort of thing much at St Bride’s.”

  “That would make a great weapon,” said Tommy cheerily, “if you swung it round your head a few times, like a bold knight with one of those spikey balls on a stick.”

  “But WHAT is the vicar?” My curiosity had been aroused.

  “Oh, Herbie Tony Minty,” said Tommy. “I think he’s that Minty person. He gave me his code to let me in on the secret.”

  Hector looked up. “The vicar’s got a secret handshake? That’s news to me.”

  If there was a freemason’s lodge in the village, I wondered who would be the grand master. Apparently not Hector, unless this was a double bluff.

  “Who said anything about secret handshakes?” Tommy looked disappointed that he might have missed out on one. “I’m talking about sweets. The vicar gave me a mint sweet in a wrapper. And when he gave it to me, he said, ‘It’s distinctly Minty.’”

  He slumped down on a tearoom chair as if the strain of receiving his coded message had exhausted him. “I don’t think it could get any clearer than that, do you?”

  “About as clear as a stick of peppermint rock, Tommy. He told me the other night that the reason he gives out mints is to make people remember his name.”

  “Yes, Minty.”

  “No, Murray. Didn’t you read the packet the sweets came in? They’re called Murray Mints. Murray is the brand name.”

  Crestfallen, Tommy pulled his diary out of his pocket and turned to a page filled with a scrawled list of mostly crossed-out names. He put a line through another one.

  “I’d better keep looking,” he said sadly. Stuffing the diary back in his pocket, he trudged out of the shop into the grey and drizzly High Street, little knowing that every step put more distance between himself and the real Hermione Minty.

  Just then, a vaguely familiar green Mini went past the shop, the driver going so slowly as to be almost kerb-crawling. Tommy let out a yell and came running back to the shop, put his head round the door, and shouted to Hector and me.

  “That was Hermione Minty in that car!”

  “What?”

  “Didn’t you see the number plate? Who else round here would have a number plate saying M1 NTY?”

  Before we could reply, he’d run off down the street, gaining on the car that was now dawdling past the school. I stood outside the shop door to see what he would do next. As he reached the car and banged on the passenger’s window, the driver unaccountably put a spurt on, and with a crash of gears accelerated far beyond the speed limit, heading straight out of the village again.

  I turned to Hector. “Do you know anyone who’s got a green Mini?”

  “Yes, but that’s not her driving style,” he said, getting up from behind the counter and coming out to join me in the street. “That was the driving style of someone completely different.” He pursed his lips.

  Suddenly the Mini came back into view, driving towards us, this time at full speed, until it screeched to a halt outside Hector’s House. It veered sharply across the road and turned ninety degrees to park in front of Hector�
��s Land Rover on the hardstanding beside the shop. The personalised number plate was precisely level with the shopfront, as if purposely positioned for maximum visibility. A tall figure in outsized sunglasses, scarlet lipstick, and a huge fuchsia pink silk head scarf unfolded herself on to the pavement, floral skirt swinging beneath a mink jacket.

  “The speed limit’s twenty through this village,” said Hector tersely, as the driver stretched her arms and legs, wobbling on high heels.

  Tommy, running back along the pavement at full pelt, stared as Hector put a strong hand on the visitor’s shoulders. He drew her towards the door of his flat, stopping only to fish his house key out from under a pot of snowdrops and turn it in the lock before they disappeared up the stairs together.

  “The speed limit signs are there for a reason, you know,” we heard him say as he pushed the woman firmly across the threshold. “You need to kill that throttle, if you know what’s good for you.”

  Tommy took a step back as he pulled out his diary and started scribbling in it. I read over his shoulder what he was writing: “Hector Munro said he wanted to throttle Mrs Minty.”

  I was about to explain that throttle meant something different in this context, then thought better of it for fear of getting into a conversation about Minty’s true identity. Plus it would be rude to admit to reading over his shoulder.

  Tommy closed his diary, stuffed it back in his pocket, and turned to look at me wide-eyed.

  “So what do we do now?”

  I considered my words carefully to protect Hector’s secret. Perhaps this was the real Minty, and Hector had simply been her editor. If not, allowing someone else to be mistaken for Minty could provide a useful decoy.

  I cleared my throat. “As Hector seems to have a meeting, I’d better get back to tending the shop.”

  Tommy frowned. “Then I’ll carry on working on this case by myself.” And with that he stumped off in the direction of the village shop.

  I tried to concentrate on bookshop business till closing time, although my heart was pounding. Who was the stranger anyway? For a moment I even wondered if it was Celeste. Perhaps Celeste was Minty, or the books had been a joint venture between her and Hector, and she’d come to claim her share of the takings. I’d always imagined Celeste to be shorter and slimmer.

  Maybe it was Celeste who Horace had accompanied on the flight, not some random billionaire. Or maybe Celeste was a billionaire now, having made her fortune in Australia. Women can be billionaires too.

  As long as she hadn’t returned in hope of a reconciliation, I might just about cope with meeting her.

  I took comfort from the fact that Hector’s greeting had hardly been friendly. Normally so gentle and tender, he’d given the stranger a forceful shove into his flat. By now they might be having a fight. Or she might be holding him hostage. She looked robust enough to overpower him. Notwithstanding her high heels, if it came to a fight, my money would be on Miss Minty.

  I suddenly felt like I didn’t know Hector at all.

  Annoyingly, a steady trickle of customers began to appear from nowhere, as many as we’d normally have on a busy Saturday. Most were middle-aged women with a strangely furtive look about them. They lingered, browsing, for ages, and those who ordered tea or coffee made their drinks last until they were cold.

  When Ella, who never visited the shop on a weekday, came charging purposefully through the door at a quarter to five, I beckoned her behind the counter.

  “What’s going on?” I asked in a low voice. “Suddenly half the village is here, just when Hector’s decided to take the afternoon off, too.”

  “Has he taken Hermione Minty to The Bluebird? I didn’t think it opened till six. Mind you, Donald’s wife’s a big Minty fan, so I’m sure he’d be prepared to open up especially for her.”

  “What do you know about Hermione Minty being here?” I couldn’t believe how fast word spread in the village.

  “One of the mums told me when she picked her kids up from after-school club. She heard it from Carol, who got it from Mrs Crowe, who said Dinah had told her you were planning to fix up a visit from Hermione Minty. Honestly, Sophie, you might have given me a bit of notice that she was coming today. I’d like to have brought my mum to meet her.”

  The mention of her mother was like a bolt of lightning to my brain. The car was Nancy’s, but the driver was far too tall to be her. Of course! Hermione was Horace in disguise.

  So this was his idea of a publicity stunt to help us sell more of her books. I closed my eyes, trying to picture the scene upstairs, and wished I had a baby monitor to hear their conversation.

  Ella rapped on the counter to regain my attention. “So where are you hiding her? In the stockroom?”

  I chewed my lower lip. I couldn’t get away with fibbing to Ella. She knew me too well. I kept my voice to a whisper.

  “Actually, she’s upstairs with Hector.”

  Ella’s eyes widened. “And are you happy about leaving your boyfriend alone with a steamy romantic novelist?”

  I grinned. “I’m quietly confident that Hermione Minty holds no temptations of that nature for Hector.”

  “So when are you going to bring her down? That’s what all these people are hovering about for. Didn’t you realise? They’re hoping to get a glimpse of her.”

  Certainly half of them were currently holding Minty books.

  I thought quickly. “Not today. I think she and Hector are talking terms. I hear Miss Minty’s a shrewd businesswoman. She’ll probably name an appearance fee so vast that we won’t be able to afford it, and that will be the end of the matter.”

  Ella narrowed her eyes. “But think how much business you’d get out of it. The woman has rarity value. Mrs Crowe told me Minty never makes public appearances. This would be a real coup for Hector’s House. You’d be mad to turn her down, whatever her price.”

  I shrugged. “I agree, but what can I do? It’s Hector’s House, not mine.”

  She frowned. “Well, tell him from me, I think he’s a fool if he doesn’t sign her up.” She glanced at her watch. “But now I must dash. I’ve got a governors’ meeting to prepare for tonight. I’ll catch up with you soon.”

  She headed for the door, and then turned to call over her shoulder to me. “Don’t forget, if you do book Hermione Minty, give me as much notice as possible so I can bring my mum.”

  As soon as I’d shut the shop – I’d had to turn off the lights to persuade the last few stragglers to leave – I slunk round to the side of the building, squeezing past the green Mini. Retrieving Hector’s front door key from beneath the pot of snowdrops, I unlocked the door to his flat as quietly as I could, replaced the key in its hiding place, and tiptoed up the stairs.

  Hector and Horace were sitting opposite each other in the fireside chairs, like a pair of disgruntled bookends. Both were leaning forward and talking tersely. Horace had ditched the shades as well as the headscarf. The only light in the room came from the wood burner, blazing away in the dusk. They’d clearly been too intent upon their discussion to even notice that it had got dark while they’d been talking. Nor did they acknowledge my arrival.

  I coughed. Neither looked round. I flicked on the ceiling light, which made them both blink and go quiet. Then Hector turned to glare at me, while Horace, mock cheer in his voice, said, “Hiya, Sophie. I thought I’d take your advice and come to see my big brother when I was sure to find him at home.”

  I perched awkwardly on the coffee table, rather than the sofa, diplomatically equidistant from each brother. Trying to lighten the mood, I pointed to my lips.

  “Horace, I don’t think film star scarlet is your colour. Bright lipstick is so last year. This spring’s going to be all about the natural look. You’d be better with a nude.”

  “Sophie Sayers, you little flirt!” said Horace, spluttering with laughter, but Hector was not amused. Blushing as I realised what I’d said, I clapped my hands over my mouth.

  “At this point, I’m not sure I want your
opinion,” said Hector, unsmiling.

  I frowned at him. “You don’t think this stunt was my idea, do you? It’s all down to Horace.”

  Horace shot me an apologetic look. “That’s right. It was my idea. I thought it would be good for business.”

  “And to be fair, he was right,” I said quickly. “The shop’s been heaving since Horace arrived.”

  Horace brightened. “See? I told you it was a good idea. What do you want me to do next? I’ve got time on my hands till I go back to Oz. I’m not leaving now till the fifteenth of Feb. The airline is practically paying me to fly with them then.”

  Hector looked at him sternly. “The best thing you can do is get downstairs, ditch those fake plates, and get going, before word spreads any further that the village’s favourite author is at large.”

  Horace scowled. “Those fake plates cost me fifty quid. I’m not going to chuck them in the bin.”

  “If you leave them on and the police stop you on your way home, you’ll be charged for fraud. You could even end up getting Mum’s car confiscated.”

  I gasped. “Really? Just for the sake of a practical joke?”

  Hector nodded while Horace shook his head. They looked like Tweedledum and Tweedledee but with a healthier BMI.

  Horace sighed. “Oh, for goodness sake, Hecate, lighten up. Don’t you get it? I’m on your side. Can’t a brother help a brother now and again?”

  For a few awkward moments, neither said anything, then Hector stood up, pulled his Swiss Army knife out of the pocket of his jeans, and flourished it towards Horace. I wondered whether anyone had ever used a Swiss Army knife to commit murder, and if so, which of the blades would be the most effective murder weapon.

  “I’m going down to remove those plates now, and then you’re taking Mum’s car back,” he said. “You did ask her whether you could borrow it first, I presume?”