Plaid and Plagiarism

by Molly Macrae

  “You aren’t late. Yet,” Christine said. “You grab and scoot. I’ve got this.”

  Janet was pleased with their strategy for her exit. She and Christine had cooked it up in case Tallie’s curiosity and daughterly suspicion kicked into overdrive. This way, Christine could give Tallie and Summer the few facts they knew about the letters and the garbage, and Janet would have some time alone to process the latest “glitch” in her new life. Not that she was going to keep the information about a half-sibling from Tallie or shade the truth. She didn’t believe in doing either. But even a thin scab over this new wound would make it easier for her when she did tell her children. Christine wanted her to make Curtis tell them, and Janet liked the idea of making him squirm. But that would put the burden on Tallie and Allen to bring up the awkward topic with her, to let her know they knew. They didn’t deserve that. Besides, she didn’t trust Curtis the rat to do it.

  She forced her mind away from Curtis as she climbed the stairs, thinking instead about the other letters—not quite a thought for each step she went up, but a steady progression. About lists. List making. The kind of people who think in lists. Checklists. Agendas. Personal agendas. Hidden agendas. Hiding. Seeking. Searching. When she reached her room, she put the garbage bags in the corner near the door and crossed to the window. The sky was the shade of blue she thought of as Highland blue. Small sailboats and a few fishing boats dotted the harbor, giving it the picturesque look of something staged for a movie. She saw three cats stretched out on the harbor wall. Rab wasn’t soaking up the sun with them. Neither was Ranger. She wondered where else the two of them spent their time and what kept them busy—or kept them from being busy.

  Janet opened her laptop and logged into the cloud document. The second part of the plan she and Christine had cooked up was for her to add the same information Christine was telling Tallie and Summer downstairs. Christine said it was an efficient use of their time. This way they wouldn’t both be tied up with the telling. Janet said it was also avoidance on her part, but she was happy to multitask. She started with a note about Pamela’s idea concerning Kenneth and the committee, typing in, Pamela wonders if Kenneth had been on the committee, would Una still be alive? Is there a connection between the committee and the murder? Then she tapped in the heading Letters & Lists—knowns, and followed that with her own list, leaving Curtis off, at least for the time being.

  8 letters found in recipe tin (previously empty)

  All appear to be typed on typewriter.

  To: Agnes, Emma, Ian, Kenny, Moira, Tristan, Scotty,

  Sharon—who are they?

  Letters are unsigned, undated.

  Under a second heading, Letters & Lists —questions, she started another list.

  Did Rosie bring them and pretend to find them?

  When did one of us last look in the tin?

  Who else has been in kitchen or had access? Pamela, Kenneth, unknown hikers, Una, decorators, Jess, Rab, Constable Hobbs? Any of the Major Investigation Team? (And anyone else who slipped in while the door was open for the hikers. Drat.)

  Is the person who wrote the letters also the one who left them?

  Will the person who left them come back for them?

  Should we put them back?

  Should we worry?

  Rab said opening the envelopes was like opening Pandora’s box. What does he know about any of this?

  Is it possible to determine dates through some of the details?

  Is “If you’re reading this, it’s too late” a threat?

  Under a third heading—Rubbish In —she entered what they knew and what they wanted to know about the garbage.

  The vandal knows the connection between the house and the bookshop.

  The vandal has or had access to the house.

  Does the vandal have access to the bookshop?

  Is the garbage connected to Una’s murder?

  Is the garbage a threat? To the shop? To one of us?

  Rab cleared away the garbage, then brought back what he could find.

  What’s in it? Is it the same garbage he took away?

  Janet checked the time. Their plan was working perfectly. She had time for one more note. Ask Sharon Davis if she has a recipe for lemon butter biscuits.

  She closed the document and the laptop, and slipped the brick-weight of contest entries into their Scottish Library and Information Council bag. For the next part of the plan, she would make a brief stop at the sales desk to check in with Christine and the girls. Then she would have plenty of time for the mile or so walk to the new Inversgail Public Library and Archives for Sharon Davis’s dratted working lunch. And if she left soon, she’d have time to stop by Paudel’s along the way to pick up a sausage roll or bridie and an apple so she wouldn’t have to sit through the dratted meeting watching Sharon and Ian Atkinson eat their lunch while she had only a pencil to chew. She looked out the window again—still gorgeous, and probably warm, too. She took her umbrella and a sweater anyway, knowing how quickly gorgeous and warm could turn into cold and drenched.

  She was pleased to see a short queue at the sales desk when she got back down to the shop—good for business, good for slipping out from under her daughter’s inquiring eye. She breezed up to the desk, ready to wave good-bye. But just as a gorgeous, warm day might turn around and bite, so too with well-laid plans.

  17

  Summer and Christine were handling the customers at the sales desk. Tallie was helping the old woman reach another book of patterns off the top shelf in the craft books aisle. The woman hadn’t been tall to begin with, and was now quite bent. She wore dark brown trousers, a neatly tucked blouse, a fawn-colored cardigan, and a pair of ankle-high, suede, flat-soled boots that looked as though she might be hiding hobbit feet.

  Tallie handed the book to her—a collection of patterns for knitted sea life. The woman leafed through the book and beamed. Then she handed Tallie a ten-pound note and a five, and with a slow, slightly lurching gait, went back to the chair near the fireplace.

  “She doesn’t look quite safe,” Janet said when Tallie came over to her, “but she seems determined to get around. Speaking of which, I should be on my way.” She patted the bag with the contest entries hanging from her shoulder.

  “If you can hold on another minute, Christine wants to show you something before you go.”

  “Oh. Well—”

  “The meeting isn’t until noon, is it? You’ve still got loads of time.” Tallie didn’t appear to be in a hurry to do anything more than smile and give Janet the feeling she was onto something.

  Janet returned the smile, and then practiced a mother’s age-old tactic of substituting one object of interest for another. “What do you think of our knitter?” she asked, turning to look at the old woman.

  Tallie turned to look, too, as Janet thought she would. “We all like her,” she said, “but we don’t know anything more than that. She seems sweet. She hardly says two words, though. Christine says she’s a happy soul with a simple goal: she sits and she knits. That she’s bought books is a plus. She adds a cozy touch to the place, don’t you think? I wonder if she’d let us display some of her knitting with the books.”

  “She reminds me of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle,” Janet said. “And that reminds me, what do you think about carrying Beatrix Potter postcards and stationery? She had ties to Scotland.”

  “Perthshire, though, wasn’t it?”

  “But that’s not so terribly far from here, and it wouldn’t be such a stretch. Cards and notebooks might be popular with the tourists.”

  “Especially if Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle comes in with any frequency,” Tallie said. “Sure. Let’s go for it.” She nodded toward Christine and Summer. “They’re finishing up the last customers.”

  “Ah. Good.” Janet intended to cut and run as soon as she heard what Christine wanted to tell her. She and Tallie hung back from the desk, though, while Summer gave her customer directions to the nearest pub.

  “Are we clear?” Christine as
ked when that customer left.

  “Except for Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle,” Tallie said, discreetly pointing at the old woman.

  “And maybe not for long, and Janet needs to be on her way,” Christine said, “so let’s make this fast. We need a decision. Should we tell Norman about the letters?”

  Janet stared at Christine. She’d never realized how hard it would be to read Queen Elizabeth’s mind. “Have you already discussed this . . . to some extent?” she asked.

  “We’ve had a bit of debate,” Christine said, “with no consensus. One for, one against, one sitting on the fence.”

  Janet had the feeling Tallie was watching her, but she didn’t check to see. She shifted her gaze from Christine to Summer. “How do you vote?”

  “For. And I’m surprised there’s any question. I covered a lot of criminal trials over my years at the paper, and I stopped being amazed a long time ago at the small, the seemingly totally inconsequential details that either make a case or derail it.”

  Janet almost let herself be derailed by Summer’s “for” vote— astounded by it, because she’d been sure that was Tallie’s position—but she made herself focus on the reasons Summer gave. “That’s a valuable perspective and a persuasive argument.”

  But Summer hadn’t finished. “And that’s beside the question of why we wouldn’t tell the police, and the question of what we plan to do with them if we don’t tell the police. If we’re reading them for clues, then we think they’re evidence, and they belong with the police. If we’re reading them because we’re nosy, then ick. Bad manners.”

  “What if we just put them back where we found them?” Christine asked. “They’re unpleasant, but do we have any reason to believe they’re anything more than that? Do any of us believe Rosie was led to them in a psychic trance?”

  “But do any of us believe they’re totally benign?” Tallie asked. “I’m the one sitting on the fence about telling Constable Hobbs, Mom, but it’s more of a yes vote with reservations. A delayed yes.”

  Janet chanced a look at her daughter. Whether or not Tallie had been watching her all along, she was watching her now. Not a probing or cynical look, though. Concerned? Thoughtful? Possibly a mirror image of her own face.

  “But Summer’s reasons are clear,” Tallie said, “and they make excellent sense. So if you agree with her, and you think we should turn the letters over immediately, then I’ll say yes, too.”

  “I want to hear your reservations,” Janet said.

  “Someone put the letters there recently. Since we took over the business. We don’t believe Rosie’s a psychic. She might believe she’s psychic, but I think she’s fitting every odd thing she encounters into that selfdiagnosis. She remembered seeing Una walking up the hill that day, and she’s pairing that with folklore about what it means to see a wraith in the late afternoon. Or maybe she likes the attention she’s getting for announcing her ‘gift.’ Who knows, but now I’m off track, and Rosie is beside the point.”

  “Interesting, though,” Christine said.

  “But it doesn’t explain why you don’t want to turn the letters over to the police,” Summer said. “It has to have occurred to you that Una might have written them and left them here. She was in the kitchen the day she was killed.”

  “Also interesting,” Christine said. “There have always been rumors that she wrote the letters for her column herself. Maybe they weren’t just rumors. Maybe she was into writing all kinds of letters. Do your reservations still stand, Tallie?”

  Tallied nodded. “But I’ll sound about as flaky as Rosie. I think whoever put the letters in the tin did it either so they’d be safe or so they’d be found by someone safe.”

  “So take them to the police,” Summer said. “Safest place of all.”

  “Not necessarily,” Janet said.

  “And that’s my point,” Tallie said. “Maybe they were left here specifically. Here, because someone was afraid of who might find them and read them. Because that person trusts us. Or doesn’t know us from Adam but knows we aren’t likely to talk to the wrong person. Those are huge leaps, I know.”

  “She’s not ordinarily a leaper, Summer,” Janet said.

  “So I’d like a leap of faith from you,” Tallie said with a smile that came and disappeared. “And I’d like a little bit of time before we give the letters to Constable Hobbs. To see if we can figure out who left them and why.”

  “I’m going to go along with Tallie,” Janet said. “Let’s give ourselves a few days.”

  “A few days that might be crucial to the authorities’ investigation,” said Summer.

  “We’re already halfway through Wednesday,” Janet said, “and we don’t know how long the letters have already been sitting there. Let’s give ourselves until Friday morning, and we’ll call Constable Hobbs now about the garbage. We can see what he says about that to gauge his interest in peripherals.”

  “Peripherals, I like that,” Christine said. “Call him.”

  “Now? I’ll be late for the meeting.”

  “No, you won’t. Our plan was going to have you out the door way earlier than you needed to be.”

  The bell over the door jingled, saving Christine from Janet’s best betrayed and accusing look. “Fine. You help the customer.” Janet went into the office.

  Tallie and Summer followed, with Tallie asking, “A plan? What plan?”

  “Foiled,” Janet said. “End of discussion.”

  The whisky and plaid were there on one of the desks; the stack of letters and the recipe tin sat beside them.

  “I’d feel better if we don’t leave the envelopes where someone else can find them,” Janet said.

  “Lock them in the desk?” Tallie asked.

  “Safer than a recipe tin,” Summer said, “but we don’t know if the Lawries still have keys.”

  “We’re suspicious of them?”

  “Think of it this way,” Janet said. “We have no good reason not to be suspicious of them. And welcome to the Sisterhood of the Suspicious. Christine and I are charter members.”

  “I’ll lock them in my computer bag upstairs.” Tallie took the stack of envelopes.

  Janet pulled out her phone and called Norman Hobbs. He answered, turning his name into a faint and swallowed howl with a yawn.

  “Hi, Norman. This is Janet Marsh.”

  Tallie and Summer mouthed, Hi, Norman, at each other. Janet turned her back on them.

  “There’s been another development. Rab found some of the rubbish he cleared away from behind the bookshop. He brought it here in two clean bin bags. Will you come get it, or should we bring it to you?”

  There was silence from Norman Hobbs.

  Janet looked over her shoulder at Tallie and Summer. “It might be a bad connection. Did you hear me, Norman?”

  “I did. Thank you for calling, Mrs. Marsh.”

  “What would you like me to do with the garbage?”

  “I appreciate your civic-mindedness. Unfortunately, unless Rab remembers seeing anything that obviously identifies the perpetrator, I doubt it will be of any use to us. Even if we know whose rubbish it is, we won’t be much further ahead. No one locks their rubbish up in Inversgail. It’s free for the taking.”

  “I didn’t think of that. Or the vandal could’ve brought it from another town altogether.”

  “That would be more work than necessary,” Hobbs said, “but aye.”

  “Well, that’s disappointing. You don’t think, if you dusted, you might find fingerprints?”

  “The rubbish will have passed through too many hands by now. In all likelihood we would find too many fingerprints.”

  “Oh, right. Fingerprints galore. By the way, did you know ‘galore’ is a Gaelic word?”

  “Is it? I’ll enjoy knowing that. Thank you. Is there anything else, Mrs. Marsh?”

  “Well, yes. Rab said the garbage was fresh. Not days old. And the bags weren’t wet from the rain we had last night. I think the rain stopped sometime shortly after midnight. Y
ou should be able to find out the exact time with a quick phone call, but the important thing is that he said some of the paper pieces were dampish, but none of the garbage was soaked. Those facts should help, don’t you think?”

  “Thank you. It’s possible they will. Is that all?”

  “One more thing, and then I’ll let you go. I have to run myself. But here’s my question, if you don’t want the rubbish, do you mind if we look through it?”

  “If you’ve a mind to.”

  “Should we wear gloves so we don’t smear any fingerprints, in case there are useful ones?”

  There was another silence on Hobbs’s end of the conversation.

  “We might have gotten disconnected,” Janet said to Tallie and Summer.

  “No, I am still here, Mrs. Marsh.” Janet heard what might be a tic of impatience in his voice. “By all means,” he said, “wear gloves to avoid smearing fingerprints, aye, but also because it is, after all, rubbish.”

  “You’re just in time,” Christine said when the other three rejoined her at the sales desk. “I sold five copies of The Haggis: A Little History and two of those Gaelic phrase books. And then, all on my own, I accessed the cloud. I absolutely love the sound of that—accessing the cloud—it makes me feel like we can rise above any and all misfortunes that someone might sling or shoot at us. Now watch this. I’m going to add my first note to the cloud. Not over my shoulder, though. I can’t type straight when people hang over my shoulders.”

  They stood back and waited until she raised both arms like a gymnast sticking a difficult landing.

  “A solid ten performance,” Tallie said, shaking Christine’s hand. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

  They gathered around the computer and read, What if we don’t have all the letters? What if one or more was taken from the tin before we found them? What if some have been mailed?

  Janet felt as though the letter in her back pocket was glowing and turning a toasty red. Her cheeks, too. But Christine had a good point. “How would we find out?” she asked. “If you don’t know if something existed, how do you look for it?”