Plaid and Plagiarism

by Molly Macrae

  “What was that all about?”

  “Professional advice. One of their rascals has turned klepto. I didn’t like to tell her that they start by taking keys and end up driving getaway cars. It’s all over now for the poor little chap.”

  “You’re terrible.”

  Their first Saturday operating the bookshop on their own was busy, but not busier than they’d planned for. Christine and Summer took the day off from prepping the tearoom to help with book sales, and the steady flow of customers through the door was nothing they couldn’t handle. That’s what they told Pamela when she called, and it was the story they stuck to even when Janet heard Kenneth in the background questioning what Pamela was relaying to him.

  “I keep forgetting to bring his length of tartan out of the car,” Christine said. “I’ll phone later and let him know I’ll have it for him Monday.”

  Bethia knitted in her spot near the fire, no more communicative after their visit the evening before, but no less pleasant, either. By then, she’d knitted an entire armada of Nessies. Tallie slipped into the kitchen to make her a cup of tea. Janet missed calling her Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle.

  Maida Fairlie came in during the early afternoon.

  “Shall I tell her that her grandchild is doomed to a life of crime?” Christine whispered to Janet.

  “Don’t you dare. Hello, Maida. I talked to a couple of giggling grandboys this morning.”

  “I was in Edinburgh yesterday. I was going to tell you they send their love. I guess there’s no need, now.”

  “Never too much love. What can I do for you?”

  “I’m here to see a Ms. Jacobs.”

  Summer looked over from ringing up a stack of postcards. “I’m Summer Jacobs. What can I do for you?”

  Maida handed Summer a business card. “You called to arrange for a cleaning team? I’m here to assess the job and make sure that we’ll be providing you with adequate staff for your needs. I understand you’re preparing for a health inspection. We want to ensure that you pass.”

  “Sure,” Summer said. “This is great. Come on and I’ll show you around. Christine, you want to come along? You guys can do without us for a few, can’t you?” she asked Janet and Tallie.

  “Of course,” Janet said. “Why don’t I put the card in the file.”

  Summer looked at the card in her hand, shrugged, and handed it to Janet.

  “What file?” Tallie asked after Summer and Christine left with Maida.

  “‘Affiliated Cleaners,’” Janet read. “Affiliated with whom?” There were two numbers on the card. The first was local. She called the second.

  Tallie said she could handle the desk and told Janet to go. Janet hurried upstairs to their makeshift “crime lab.” She swept their piles of sorted envelopes, receipts, and miscellaneous papers back into the bin bags Rab had brought them in. Then she ran back down the stairs. In the meantime, Tallie sent three texts. Summer and Christine received theirs, and when they saw Janet at the door of the tearoom, they excused themselves and left her alone with Maida. Christine pulled the door almost closed and stayed there to listen, and to charge in if necessary.

  Janet was only slightly taller than Maida, but she felt as though her eyes were boring down into the other woman’s. She was a snake hypnotizing a mouse. Mousie Maida. Maida’s eyes kept shifting to the bin bags, and Janet didn’t need any further confirmation. But her phone buzzed with an incoming text, and what she read clinched it.

  “From Nicola,” Janet said. “The key they thought Wally took and put back—twice—is their copy of my house key. They’ve been worried about him turning into a liar and a thief, because he said he didn’t do it. He’s three. And he’s your grandson.”

  Had she thought Maida would crumple? Her beady eyes glared back at Janet.

  “And Jess Baillie. Do you have any idea what you put her through? Jeopardizing her business? Letting her believe Una Graham was out to get her?”

  “Go ahead and despise me.”

  “Despise you? Why on earth would I?”

  “I’ve got eyes.”

  “Use them and look in a mirror, then. There’s nothing wrong with you but what you see in yourself. Come on, now. Your daughter loves you and your grandsons adore you.”

  “You didn’t mention your son.”

  “Allen loves you because they love you. Mind you, he’s still leery because of the kilt you were going to make him wear—oh, my gosh. I was joking about Allen and the kilt, but you aren’t. Really? You’re still upset about the wedding?”

  “My only daughter. Her only wedding. Do you know how much money I put into it? How much I borrowed? And then you told them to elope and I lost it all.”

  “Maida, I didn’t tell them to elope.”

  “You said you supported it one hundred percent.”

  “Of course I did. They’d already done it and were perfectly happy.”

  “You trashed her dreams, so she trashed yours?” Christine asked.

  “She said her behavior surprised her, too, and she’s never done anything like it before.”

  “And yet she did it three times and fabricated rats out of whole cloth. Did she at least apologize?”

  “Not really,” Janet said. “But I think she’s been kind of out of touch with reality lately.”

  “Oh, no. She’s in touch with reality, all right. It’s just her own version of it.

  Janet pictured Maida’s beady eyes as they’d blinked back tears. “She might have had a nudge back to our reality from the Presbyterian ancestors who always look over her shoulders. Or maybe that’s a reality she’s finally laid to rest.”

  Elizabeth II looked askance. “And then you told her we still want her cleaning crew for the tearoom before the inspection?”

  “Because that’s part of the myth of small towns I will continue to believe in. We have to try to get along.”

  Allen called Janet that evening. He’d driven to Crieff and visited Lucy. A sweet girl, he said, who likes fairies and country and western music.

  “Her favorite song is ‘Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue,’ but she doesn’t understand why her eyes don’t turn blue like her mummy’s when she sings it. She has a picture of her mother on her bureau.”

  “She can’t have two blue-eyed parents,” Janet said, thinking of Curtis’s handsome, lying blue eyes.

  “I just got off the phone with Dad. He accepted Emma’s word for it because he felt guilty and assumed he was the only one. He never followed through with the paternity test.”

  “Typical.”

  “Anyway, she’s a sweet girl, it’s a cheerful place, and she does get other visitors. She chattered on about Auntie Jess, who always brings her a fairy cake when she visits, and she asked if I want to be her daddy, too. Twisted my heart a bit.”

  Janet disconnected and sat by the window watching the tide run out. Then she went down the hall and knocked on Tallie’s door.

  “She told Allen that Auntie Jess has brought her about eleventy-teen fairy cakes in all. The other night, at Nev’s, Jess told me she didn’t know anything about Una’s children. I guess, technically, she wasn’t lying because I didn’t ask about grandchildren.”

  “Who do you think the other daddy is?” Tallie asked.

  “I don’t know, but I think I should call Norman Hobbs.”

  “Go ahead. Maybe those are stray pieces of the puzzle. But if there’s nothing in it, there’s no harm done.”

  “I hate being suspicious of everyone,” Janet said. “Do you know what that does to a nice retirement?”

  “You’re hardly retired.”

  “Well, it’s disturbing.”

  “Then let’s get this crime solved so we can get back to our quiet, bookish lives.”

  28

  Yon Bonnie Books had always kept shortened hours on Sundays, and the new owners kept with that tradition. The free morning came as a welcome breathing space. Christine took her parents to church. Tallie and Summer rented kayaks and went to look for harbor se
als. Janet spent the morning reading. She started out being virtuous, by picking up the contest entries, put them aside to finally start The Bludgeon in the Bothy, then gave up and sank into pure enjoyable escapism with an M. C. Beaton Hamish Macbeth mystery.

  They opened their doors at one that afternoon. Bethia arrived with her knitting. And Pamela Lawrie arrived without Kenneth.

  “Did he stop by?” she asked. “He hasn’t been himself lately. He left in a huff early this morning. He didn’t come home for his dinner. I can’t phone him because I have his, and mine’s not working.” She glanced around as though she might find him lurking or tucked on a shelf.

  “He hasn’t been in,” Janet said. “Did any of you see him this morning?”

  Pamela watched them shake their heads. “I’m worried,” she said.

  “If we see him, we’ll tell him,” Janet said.

  When she’d gone, Christine remembered the tartan fabric again. “She has an interesting look to her ‘worry,’” she said. “I’m just as glad the tartan’s still in the boot. If I’d given it to her, she might use it to strangle him.”

  It was a quiet day in the shop. Summer and Tallie rearranged the craft books, moving knitting and crochet down several shelves and leather and woodworking up. Even if Bethia was leaving, the new arrangement made sense.

  Sharon Davis came in halfway through the afternoon. She approached the counter with the same selling smile she’d worn the first time Janet met her. Janet braced herself.

  “How are you, Sharon?”

  “Wonderful on a wonderful day.”

  Oh, boy. “And what can I do for you?”

  “It’s more what I can do for you.”

  Oh, boy.

  “Would you like to appear on my Book Blather show on Radio Nevis tomorrow? It’ll be a great plug for the shop.”

  “I hate to admit it, but I don’t know anything about the program.”

  “Actually, I’m not surprised, but it’s fun. We talk books—any kind, as far ranging as we want. Read excerpts, debate favorites, talk about new releases, anything goes, because it’s my baby. A couple of librarians letting loose. I’ve been doing it for three months now, and I love it, but filling an hour on my own is demanding.”

  “No kidding. When and where?”

  “We can do your portion over the phone, if you like. The station’s in Fort William, so understandable if you can’t get away. But if you can come over with me, that would be grand. Live is, well, livelier.”

  “How long would we be gone?”

  “And that’s why you might prefer phoning in. It’s a time commitment, but while I’m there I treat myself to a meal out and get some shopping done. I leave here at four and I’m usually back by eight or half past.” “You should do it,” Christine said.

  “Is that a yes, then? Oh, sorry.” Sharon’s phone tweedled with an incoming text. She took it out, and as she read, her eyebrows rose steadily higher. “He’s pathetic,” she said, shaking her head, which returned her brows to normal. “Ian. Sounds to me like he started on the whisky a little early and thinks he’s one of his own characters. Pick you up tomorrow, then? Great. See you.”

  “Tallie?” Janet asked.

  “Already checked,” Tallie said. “She was on the air on Monday.”

  “And we can scratch her off our list of suspects,” Christine said.

  Janet’s phone buzzed. “Also from Ian,” she said. She started reading it to herself, but stopped. “Watch my eyebrows, girls, because this is a lulu. ‘I have absolute proof and the evidence to back it up in the murder of Una Graham. It’s at the bothy, but I do so like a clever criminal so I’ll give you one hour to collect it and make it disappear. When the hour’s up, I’ll call in the police.’”

  Before she’d finished reading, Christine’s phone buzzed. “Mine’s the same. How absolutely annoying. It means he’s solved it, and he’s beaten us.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” Janet said. “And he hasn’t. It’s a ploy. He’s using a shotgun—scattershot. He doesn’t know who he’s trying to snare. And who knows how many of these texts he’s sending.”

  Tallie and Summer had their phones out, waiting. And waiting. Waiting. They put them away in disgust.

  “Aren’t we shifty enough?” Tallie asked.

  Janet patted her cheek. “You two are obviously the more upright, responsible, trustworthy members of our business.”

  “I’m insulted,” Tallie said. “I want to be just like you.”

  “You two will need to hold down the fort while we go out to the bothy,” Christine said.

  “Oh, no, no, no, no, no,” Tallie said. “What makes you think you need to go out there? If he’s set some kind of trap, then it’s going to be dangerous. When there’s danger, you’re not supposed to run toward it.”

  “We won’t be running toward danger,” Janet said. “When we get there, the killer will already be in custody. This will be a way to have closure so we can get back to that quiet, bookish life we talked about last night.”

  “Or you might run into the killer retrieving the evidence,” Summer said, “and that might be a different kind of closure.”

  “Do you believe he has evidence?” Tallie asked. “What if he’s the killer and he’s going to pin the evidence on whoever shows up? Can’t you leave it to the police? Please, yes, leave it to the police.”

  “We will,” Christine said. “We’ll wait for that hour, and then we’ll go out when the police do and let them do the dirty, dangerous work. But Janet’s right. It will be good to be there to lay this to rest.”

  “What makes you think he’ll really call the police?” Summer asked.

  “Because he’s going to catch the villain,” Janet said, “but he’ll need them to make the arrest and congratulate him on his success.”

  To make Tallie and Summer feel better, Christine called Norman Hobbs. He told her he knew of the situation because, being the local police, he tended to be in the loop on most local police matters. Christine, in an aside, told Janet he sounded testy. Hobbs then asked how they knew of the operation. Christine told him Atkinson considered them suspects.

  “Is it possible to hear someone rolling his eyes over the phone?” Christine asked Janet.

  Tallie made Janet promise to text her and let her know when it was over.

  The drive to Ian Atkinson’s bothy took them along the Sgail until the river leaped over some rocks and turned wild, running away into a glen that disappeared into a gorge. The road took an easier route, climbing the hills and circling around until it came out with a view of the sea, the mountains, and the tops of the trees in the Sgail Gorge woodlands. Ian’s bothy sat in the sun near the gorge in a spot of breathtaking beauty. Janet and Christine got out of the car and saw no one.

  “I knew it,” Christine said.

  “That we’d miss it?”

  “No. Sheep.”

  “What a disappointment,” Janet said. “Let’s at least look around.”

  “You go that way.” Christine pointed toward the watching sheep. “I’ll go away from them.”

  Janet walked toward the sheep thinking they might back up and she could save Christine from her somewhat silly fear. The sheep parted as she approached. A good start. But then they went around her and toward, rather than away from, Christine.

  Christine, in the meantime, had approached the edge of the gorge and peered down at something, and called. Janet couldn’t hear what she said. Then Christine turned toward her, calling her name, and at the same time saw the advancing sheep. She took a step back. “Whoops,” she said, and slipped from view.

  Janet ran toward the gorge, and so did the sheep. The sheep stopped at the edge. Janet stopped several yards from the sheep. The sheep parted again and started back up the hill. Janet, terrified, inched her way to the rim and looked over.

  Christine had slid fifteen or twenty feet down the side of the gorge— part slope, part bluff, with loose soil where the slide occurred, decaying leaves, fallen branches, r
ocks. Christine, on her back, rested on her elbows. Janet whimpered and wanted to follow the sheep back up the hill. “Christine,” she called.

  Christine looked up. “I’m all right. But Janet—Reddick was here. And his dog. I heard him calling for help. When he saw me, he said, ‘You were on the list. She wasn’t.’ And then I slid down, and he went over an edge below me. I’m going to try crawling along that log and see if I can see him.” She moved toward the log and slid down a few more feet.

  “Don’t move again, Christine. Can you hear Reddick?”

  “No. The dog didn’t go over, though. I think he’s found his own way down farther along there, and I think I can—”

  “Don’t you dare move. I’ll get help.”

  Janet backed away from the gorge and called Tallie. “It’s Mom. I need you to listen. We’re okay. We need help at Ian’s bothy. Call nine-nine-nine, tell them where we are, that a policeman has fallen into the gorge; he’s probably badly injured. It’s Reddick. Call now. I need to help Christine and won’t be able to stay on the line with them. Love you and see you soon.”

  Janet disconnected and ran to Christine’s car. She got the tartan from the trunk and ran back. “Christine, I’m going to let the end of this down to you. Reach for it carefully and hold on to it.” She tied one end of the tartan around her waist and then pitched the length of it down the slope. The weight of the woolen fabric carried it close enough to Christine that she was able to get hold of it.

  “Are you okay up there?” Christine called.

  “I’m going to sit down so I can’t see how far down it is.”

  “I think this is a good omen, though, Janet,” Christine called. “We’ve faced the twin terrors of sheep and high places. We have nowhere to go but up.”

  “For your sake, let’s hope so.”

  Norman Hobbs arrived with a scatter of gravel. Tallie and Summer arrived on his heels—in Rab MacGregor’s small pickup. They’d left Rab in charge of the shop. Janet took the tartan from around her waist and gave the end to Hobbs.