by Maddy Hunter
“This didn’t have to happen,” Enyon bawled. “All he had to do was lift his feet. Was that too much to ask? You saw him trip over the scatter rug in the dining room. He shuffled around like a dotty pensioner. I warned him there could be dire consequences one day.” He choked up, his voice escaping in whimpers. “I just didn’t think…today would be the day.”
The kitchen door creaked open and Wally crept out, looking uncharacteristically self-conscious. He’d been enjoying a leisurely soak in the hot tub when all hell had broken loose, so he was wearing his heart on his shoulder and feeling guilty that he’d been unavailable to lend assistance when I’d needed him. As a form of contrition, he’d banished himself to the kitchen after the coroner had left and had been there ever since, which was a good thing because he was taking over where Lance had left off, which meant we might actually have food on the table tonight.
“About ten more minutes before the pies come out,” he said as he crossed the floor toward us. “And I pulled a few things out of the refrigerator that look as if they might have been intended for tonight’s dinner.”
“Cornish wild garlic yarg wrapped in nettle and served on bruschetta,” sniffed Enyon.
“Wild garlic what?” asked Wally.
“Yarg. Cheese from the milk of Friesian cows. You wrap it in a nettle coating that allows the most delicious gray mold to grow all over it. Creamy near the edge, crumbly near the middle.” He yanked another tissue out of the box. “It was one of Lance’s specialties.” The memory spurred another round of tears, after which he blew his nose and inched away from me. “Please don’t think me impolite, but would you excuse me? I feel a migraine coming on.”
“You bet.” I helped him to his feet. “And don’t give dinner another thought. Wally and I will see that the troops get fed.”
“Splendid. I fear these migraines usually last for three days, though, so the running of the place is officially in your hands now.”
I stared at him, gobsmacked. “Excuse me?”
“I can’t possibly manage things from my sick bed. In another hour I’ll be so knackered I won’t be able to lift my head off my pillow, so I’m delegating my duties to the next people in the pecking order: the two of you.”
Anxiety gripped my spine like a multi-jaw bench vise. “An inn of this size, and you don’t have backup staff?”
“Lance had suggested we enlist a couple of girls from the village to help with the daily slog, but I thought the idea rather absurd at the time. I told him I was perfectly capable of handling everything myself.” He let out a forlorn sigh. “In hindsight, I’ll admit he was probably right. That might have been the only good idea Lance ever had.”
“How have you managed without outside help?” questioned Wally. “How do you have time to do it all? The laundry. The bed-making. Scouring the bathrooms. Mopping the floors. Dusting the furniture. Cutting fresh flowers. Schmoozing with the guests. I live in a six hundred square foot condo, and I have a cleaning lady.”
“A strict schedule,” said Enyon. “That’s the key.”
I was suddenly feeling like the world’s biggest slacker for giving up care of my hardwood floors to an iRobot vacuum cleaner that glided through the house like a tiny dust-sucking hovercraft. “You and Lance have been doing this for how long?”
Enyon peeked at his wristwatch. “Exact amount of time or could I round it off?”
“Whichever.”
“Approximately…five hours.”
Brits could be so literal. “No, no. Prior to our arrival, how long had you been operating the inn?”
Enyon regarded his watch again before squinting at me, perplexed. “I told you. Five hours. You Yanks have the distinction of being our very first guests.”
“Ever?” Wally’s expression hinted that he might lapse into cardiac arrest.
“Ever.”
Visions of our blog-worthy Mostly Cornish tour began disappearing like water down a bathtub drain. I suddenly felt so light-headed, I swayed slightly on my feet. “How…how did you have the nerve to accept reservations for twenty-two guests if you’ve never done this before?”
He considered that momentarily before shrugging. “We had to start somewhere, and everyone in the hospitality business says it’s best to start off with Yanks. You people are so laid back that you’ll put up with an incredible amount of bother before you ever start complaining.” He snatched the tissue box off the sofa and hugged it to his chest. “I have complete confidence that the two of you will keep the ship from foundering while I recover. I shall repair to my bedchamber now, prostrate with grief, so please consider my room off-limits unless the house is burning down…or the roof collapses.”
“But—”
He gave my arm a heartfelt squeeze. “To quote a phrase, ‘Keep calm and carry on.’ Now I must leave you before I’m forced to crawl to my room on all fours.”
“But what about Kathryn Crabbe?” I asked as he circled around me. “She doesn’t have a room.”
He paused long enough to heave a lengthy sigh. “My dear Mrs. Miceli, the man with whom I was to run this establishment is dead. So please don’t think me inelegant, but I don’t give a toss where Kathryn Crabbe sleeps. Find an empty space and squeeze her in. Whatever you think will work.”
He waddled off, head bent and shoulders sagging, leaving me to gape at Wally from across the room.
“It seems our four-star, all-inclusive holiday has turned into a self-catering affair,” quipped Wally.
“This isn’t funny,” I freaked. “Does he expect us to serve breakfast tomorrow morning, then come back from a day of touring and serve dinner as well? I’m not a chef. I’m not good in the kitchen. I can prepare meals, but I can’t actually cook them.”
“I have no idea what that means.”
“Preparing meals doesn’t involve the use of a cookbook or any kind of culinary skills. Its basic requirements are twenty minutes of free time, a can opener, a microwave oven, and a nonstick fry pan. Voilà: dinner.”
Wally grinned. “Look, Emily, neither one of us is stupid. We can handle this through breakfast tomorrow, and if Enyon isn’t recovered by then, we’ll inquire in the village about hiring a cook on a temporary basis. Let’s not hit the panic button until we have to.”
“Too late. Mine got activated about two minutes ago.” I’d confronted crazed killers, marauding sea lions, Irish ghosts, and surly bus drivers, but nothing terrified me more than the thought of cooking a meal for more than two people. My lack of culinary expertise would be on full display, and the result would be humiliating—not to mention either half-cooked, charred, or completely inedible.
I hung my head and groaned. Compulsory KP duty should not be one of my escort duties. Maybe it was time to tweak my job description. “Kitchen drama aside, what are we going to do about Kathryn?”
“Unfortunately, every available suite is being occupied by Destinations Travel guests. There aren’t any rooms left. Just think of the straights we’d be in if Freddy wasn’t bunking down someplace else.”
Freddy was our coach driver. He lived in the area, so he’d leapt at the chance to sleep in his own bed for the next few nights. “So where do we put her?”
“Well, she’s already commandeered the half bath. Bernice is reporting telltale sounds of computer keys being clicked frenetically.”
I winced as my stomach started to bubble like a caustic stew. “She’s probably composing her blog for tomorrow, which, I’m sure, will include some rather choice words about today’s debacle. Scathing publicity on our first day out. So much for my blogger idea.” I hoped I’d packed enough antacids.
“Should we ask your grandmother and Tilly if they’d be willing to accommodate a third person in their room? Space would be pretty tight, but if Enyon has a rollaway cot, then—”
“I wouldn’t do that to Nana and Tilly. Kathryn needs to be in a single. I�
�m getting the impression that she’s way too inflexible to share a room with any of the other guests.”
“You want to give her my room?” asked Wally. “I don’t know where I’ll sleep, but it would certainly solve the problem.” He eyed the groupings of loveseats in the lounge and nodded to the nearest one. “I could sleep out here. I might even fit if I sleep in a fetal position.”
“You’re not going to sleep on half a sofa. You need a good night’s rest more than any of us. So there’s only one other alternative.” I sighed with resignation. “I’ll offer her my room.”
“Which forces you to relocate where?”
With the only other person besides Wally, Mason Chatsworth, and I who’d booked a single room.
“I’d love to share my room with you!” Jackie squealed, executing a little pattycake clap before throwing her arms around me and pressing my face into her sternum in a bone-crushing hug. “It’ll be like old times in our New York walkup! You, me, ten square feet of living space, and a wonky shower.”
“What’s wrong with your shower?” I mumbled into her chest.
“The pipes.” She led me halfway across the floor and opened the door of a room that made an airplane lavatory look cavernous by comparison. “When I turned on the water, I thought I was being gunned down. And it didn’t let up. The pipes rat-a-tat-tatted through my whole shower. If the plumbing had been less raucous, I might not have missed out on all the hysteria in Kathryn’s room.” She glared at the showerhead. “This place should be slapped with a fine for violating the noise pollution ordinance.”
“Does Cornwall have a noise pollution ordinance?”
“If they don’t, they should. So”—she flashed her most exuberant smile, her eyes twinkling with excitement—“who do you think killed the cook?”
Oh, God. “No one killed him, Jack. According to Enyon, Lance never picked up his feet. He was a serial shuffler. So on his way to the basement to fetch a toolbox, he fell down the stairs, unassisted, and broke his neck.”
“You actually believe that?”
“It’s not my theory. That’s what the coroner said. I don’t have a theory.”
She turned as coy as a cat stalking another cat’s dish of warm milk. “Are you telling me you’re not the least bit suspicious? Even after those two guys closed off the kitchen this afternoon so they could engage in war games?”
“I’m not suspicious, Jack. There’s no killer.”
“I’ve been on your tours before, Emily. There’s always a killer.”
“Not this time. Lance’s death was an accident.”
She studied her nails with an air of nonchalance before polishing them on the sleeve of her tunic. “We’ll see.”
I hung my head and groaned. “You’re all jazzed to tail someone, aren’t you?”
“Maybe.”
The only reason Jackie delighted in tailing possible suspects was because it allowed her the opportunity to wear tacky disguises. I shook my head. “How many wigs did you bring with you?”
She had the decency to look guilty as she lowered her voice to a whisper. “Only one.”
“What color this time?”
It was as if I’d flipped a switch to the on position, activating the personality she used to have before she went into enforced mourning. “Red! And it’s a beauty. No one will ever be able to tell it’s me. You want to see it?”
She needed to work on erasing the delusion that a six-foot transsexual in five-inch stiletto boots could don a red wig and not be recognized as a six-foot transsexual in five-inch stiletto boots.
“Knock, knock.” Wally appeared in the doorway. “Are you two all settled here?”
Jackie wrapped her arm around my shoulders and hugged me against her with such might, she nearly collapsed my lung. “Yes! We’re gonna be roomies!”
“Great.” He smiled at Jackie. “Thanks for offering to be part of the solution. You’re really helping us out of a pinch. So the pies are out of the oven and cooling on the counter. Would the two of you see about setting the table while I lure Kathryn out of the loo?”
“Good luck with that,” quipped Jackie. “According to my sources, she’s been in there so long, it’ll be a miracle if the door isn’t stuck shut permanently.” She tapped her forefinger against her chin as she gazed into space. “I wonder what the going rate for powder room rentals is? This could be a really attractive alternative for tourists who are into that tiny house craze.”
“I should probably move my stuff out of my room before Kathryn takes possession.”
“I can do that for you,” offered Wally. “After I talk to Kathryn.”
“Eh!” Jackie held her hand up like a crossing guard raising a stop sign. “No offense to present company, but guys cannot be entrusted with such critical duties. I’ll move Emily’s things. That way she can be sure nothing’ll get left behind. You men are so slapdash. You don’t see anything that’s not right in front of your nose. But happily, I’m living proof that massive doses of female hormones can eliminate the problem completely.”
I handed her my room key. “Sounds like a plan. We can get the cot out of the utility room later.”
We scattered like billiards, with Wally pausing outside the loo to address Kathryn while I continued on to the kitchen. The fragrant aroma of fresh-baked piecrust teased my salivary glands as I opened the door, reminding me that I’d failed to sample any of Lance’s scones earlier. Six stargazy pies sat cooling on trivets on the island, which seemed far too few considering how hungry I was. Heck, I figured I could eat a whole one by myself.
At least, that’s what I thought until I actually stood over one of Lance’s famous creations.
Uh-oh. This was definitely going to be a problem.
five
“I swear to God,” Helen ranted into her phone the following morning. “There were a bunch of creepy crawly critters climbing out of the middle of the pie, like…like little alien creatures trying to squirm out of quicksand. They had claws for hands, and beady black eyes, and so many antennae that they could probably pick up the local cable channels. And we were expected to eat them. I’ve never been so appalled by anything in all my life.” She paused. “No, wait. There was that time your father—” She paused again. “Never mind. This was even more appalling than that.”
The Teigs occupied the seat in front of me on the bus, and while the rest of us were suffering shellshock from having our bus whiplashed by overgrown hedgerows on narrow lanes with no shoulders, Helen was completely oblivious, conducting a phone conversation with one of her children in Iowa, complaining about Lance’s stargazy pie the night before.
Dick snatched the phone away from her. “And that wasn’t the worst of it. For an appetizer they tried serving us moldy cheese on toast, so no one ate anything last night, except for one blogger guy who probably has a stomach made of cast iron. And Emily. Man, she really packed it away.”
Of course I’d packed it away. I was starving. Besides, the stargazy pie—with its cluster of mini lobsters baked into a sauce of bacon, eggs, onions, and mustard—was absolutely delicious. Lance might not have been blessed with charm and charisma, but he’d obviously made up for the deficit with extraordinary culinary skills. None of which we’d be sampling for the rest of our stay.
“Breakfast?” Dick boomed into the phone. “Breakfast was great. Dry cereal and toast. But we’re not paying top dollar to eat corn flakes. Hell, we can get that at home.”
My eyes rolled around in their sockets like misdirected pinballs. The locals ate stargazy pie and Cornish yarg, both of which had been served last night, but neither of which he would sample. That’s what he was paying top dollar for, but it wouldn’t do me any good to point it out because I doubted he’d see the connection.
We were on our way to the Bedruthan Steps, a secluded beach near St. Eval that was famous for the great chunks of cliff that had b
roken away from the headland to form a Jurassic-like series of columns that resembled gargantuan elephant legs. The surf was unsuitable for swimming because of the strong currents, and visitors ran the twofold risk of either being cut off by the tide or crushed by falling rock, but photos of the beach had looked so amazing that I insisted we give it a try. So with the tide schedule in our favor, sunshine overhead, and some newly rented equipment stowed in our baggage compartment, we were planning to spend a couple of hours at the beach metal detecting.
The owner of the hardware store where we’d rented the detectors had congratulated us on scheduling our adventure the day after a squall because local beaches apparently became a beachcomber’s paradise in the aftermath, exposing treasures that might have been buried beneath the ocean floor for centuries. When Wally passed this information along, the gang seemed excited about the prospect of finding authentic buried treasure, but they seemed even more excited about having the opportunity to eat lunch somewhere other than the Stand and Deliver Inn—at a place where they’d be able to order American fare with only a hint of Cornish flair. Like maybe having the meal served on pink-and-white striped plates.
The view out the coach windows was more claustrophobic than enchanting. Towering hedgerows on both sides of the road. Ramshackle sheds. Tidy stone fences. Grassy fields. Rolling hills. One red phone booth at the edge of someone’s driveway. And every so often a break in the hedgerows to allow banks of pink flowers to overhang the road. In Porthcothan Bay we passed a community of homes as pale as seashells that were nestled on a hillock overlooking a white sand beach. The beach stretched between a deep split in the headland and was bisected by a series of flowing tidal streams, but at high tide I suspected that, like the Bedruthan Steps beach, the Porthcothan beach would disappear completely.
The bus’s sound system rasped into life as Wally activated the mike. “Only a few more kilometers until we reach our destination, folks, but before we arrive, I want to turn the microphone over to Caroline Goodfriend, who has an exciting offer for you. Caroline?” He handed her the mike.
