by Mary Daheim
“I don’t know,” Renie replied as thunder rumbled close by. “I can’t see anything.”
Judith glared at her cousin. “Not funny, coz. Here’s the trapdoor,” she added, pointing to an area near a pile of wooden crates that were marked with black letters spelling LINENS.
“I’m not kidding,” Renie asserted. “I can’t see. My chronic corneal dystrophy has come back.”
“Good grief!” She was familiar with Renie’s problem, involving blurred vision and drooping eyelids. Sure enough, Renie’s left eye was half closed. “What brought that on?” she asked in a shocked voice.
“All the gray,” Renie replied. “Not to mention the stress from flying, whether I’m drunk or sober. I’ve got my medication and eye patches with me. I never go anywhere without them. I’ll be fine,” she said, and walked straight into a large wooden crate marked china. “Ooof! What’s this?” she asked, bracing herself on the crate.
“You’re in China,” Judith replied. “Don’t move while I look at this so-called dungeon.” She used both hands to tug at the iron grip that was sunk into the trapdoor’s well-worn wood. Fortunately, it lifted easily.
Judith stared into the opening. “No cobwebs, no dust, no dirt. It’s clean, like it’s used often.”
“Chuckie?” Renie suggested, feeling her way toward Judith. “He goes into the dungeon to play with his imaginary rack.”
“Maybe. I see the rain barrel.” She paused. “Why would it be full of water? There shouldn’t be any leaks down there.”
“Seepage through the walls?”
“Not possible.” Judith sniffed. “Can you smell that?”
“Let me move closer,” Renie said. “Maybe my sense of smell is better now that I can’t see. They say that when you lose…Aaack! I just touched something horrible covered with hair!”
“That’s my head,” Judith snapped. “Don’t lean on me!”
“Sorry. Oops!”
“Now what?” Judith demanded, turning to look at Renie, who had stumbled and fallen on top of a carton cluttered with small objects.
“Don’t worry about me,” Renie snarled. “Now I’m blind andfeeble.” Awkwardly, she righted herself and dusted off her cashmere sweater. “Just carry on with—”
“Open the door.”
The cousins both jumped.
“The same voice,” Judith whispered.
“Almost the same message,” Renie whispered back.
Judith looked around the room but saw no hiding places. All of the storage containers were piled flush against the walls.
“Open the door.”
Renie shuddered. “Way too creepy. Let’s get out of…Aaaaah! I feel something cold and clammy and dead! Help!”
“That would be my hand,” Judith said through gritted teeth. “Stop touching me. Where’s that voice coming from? It can’t be in this hole.”
“Who cares? I’m going.” Renie tripped over Judith’s foot and barely managed to stay upright. “Which way’s the door?”
“You can’t go without me,” Judith retorted. “Shut up and listen.” But the voice had gone silent. “It must mean that we should open the trapdoor.”
“We already did. It’s a ghost,” Renie declared. “I don’t care if it’s giving hot racetrack tips.”
“You don’t believe in ghosts.”
“I changed my mind.”
“Bad timing for that.” Judith pointed to the trapdoor. “Now sniff.”
“Medicinal,” Renie said after a few seconds.
“Not quite…booze!” Judith exclaimed. “It smells like Scotch.”
“That figures,” Renie said. “Philip owns a distillery. Maybe he stores some of his private stash here and it leaked.”
“Into the dungeon? That’s where it’s coming from. Did I see a flashlight on top of one of those boxes by the door?”
“You might have,” Renie said. “I can’t see anything.”
Judith went to the carton where she’d noticed the flashlight. She clicked it on and focused its bright beam on the barrel some ten feet beneath the basement floor. “That’s odd,” she said in a curious voice. “It looks like there’s something floating in the water. Or the Scotch. In fact, it looks like a—” Lightning flashed through the narrow windows. Judith sucked in her breath as thunder rattled the casements. “Holy Mother!” she gasped, reeling backwards toward Renie. “It looks like a head!”
16
Chuckie?” Renie said under her breath.
“I don’t know.” Judith was shaking from the shock. “We’ve got to find the cops.” She steadied herself to recover the strength she needed to put one foot in front of the other. Five minutes later they were back in the kitchen, asking Mrs. Gibbs if she knew the whereabouts of the police.
“They went to your rooms,” she replied, sorting pippins as she peered at Judith. “Are ye ill? You’re verra pale.”
“Just…tired,” Judith fibbed. “Thanks.”
The cousins found the constables knocking on the Flynns’ door. Glen and Adamson both removed their regulation caps when they saw Judith and Renie. “We’re here about the theft,” the taller one said.
Judith recalled that he was Adamson. “Never mind that now.” She let the constables in as Renie excused herself to fetch her emergency eye medication. “Please,” Judith emphasized after she stood near the hearth and tried to sound rational, “don’t think I’m fantasizing. But a few minutes ago Mrs. Jones and I went into the storage room and opened the trapdoor to the dungeon.” She paused, taking in the constables’ stoic faces. “I used a flashlight to look at that barrel in the dungeon because it didn’t make sense to have it filled with water.”
Adamson’s cheeks turned slightly pink; Glen frowned, his eyes avoiding Judith. “A leak,” said Glen. “Something spilled from above.”
“That is possible,” she allowed, “but I saw a head in that barrel. You must look. It’s very strange.”
“A human head?” Glen said, looking skeptical.
“So it appears,” Judith replied. “It could be Chuckie.”
The constables exchanged quick, stupefied glances. “We’ll check it out,” Adamson said. “You’d better stay here.”
That was fine with Judith. She had no desire to watch a body being recovered after what must have been a gruesome way to die. “We’ll talk about the theft later,” she said, seeing the constables to the door.
As soon as they were gone, Judith went across the hall to Renie’s room. Her cousin was cussing and struggling with eye patch, gauze, and tape. “I’m out of practice,” she complained. “What did the cops do when you told them they had to go bobbing for heads in a barrel?”
“Only one head, I hope,” Judith said, sinking into an armchair. “For all I know, they think I’m nuts.”
Renie looked in the mirror and realized that the patch was on crooked. “Damn. These things are tricky, but the good news is that the medication is working so that I can see out of my other eye. Sort of.”
“Good.” Judith shifted restlessly in the chair. “I hate the waiting game. If that’s a corpse, Adamson and Glen will bring in their superiors, a medic, and God knows who all. It could be an hour or more before we hear anything.” She stood up. “Let’s go back to the dungeon.”
Renie was aghast. “No! I don’t want to see a pickled person! I wouldn’t take biology in high school or eat pickled pigs’ feet!”
“Then I’ll go by myself,” Judith said, heading for the door.
“Oooh…” Renie tossed the small box containing her eye supplies onto the bureau. “Okay, I’m coming. But I’ll gripe the whole time.”
“You always do,” Judith said resignedly.
By the time the cousins reached the storage room, Adamson had climbed down into the dungeon. Glen, seeing Judith and Renie, held up a hand. “No closer, please. And keep silent.” He bent down again to talk to his fellow officer. “Well?”
“A head,” Adamson confirmed. “And a body—a dead one at that.”
“Chuckie?” Judith said, a hand to her breast.
Adamson didn’t answer right away. “A wee laddie,” he finally said, his voice lower. “Can you identify this Chuckie?”
Judith blanched. “No. Let his father do that.” She leaned against a stack of cartons and prayed. Chuckie had mentioned that sometimes he slept in a barrel. Maybe he’d been joking. But now, Judith thought sadly, a barrel was where he’d gone to sleep for all eternity.
Glen helped Adamson out of the dungeon. Both constables looked embarrassed. “The initial search should’ve been more thorough,” Adamson said, brushing dust and cobwebs from his regulation jacket. “But who’d expect to find a body in a whiskey cask?”
Judith kept from saying that she’d found bodies in stranger places. “It’s…unusual,” she allowed.
“Aye,” Glen said somberly. “I’ll fetch his father. Mr. Fordyce returned a while ago.”
Adamson nodded to his fellow constable. “I’ll stand guard and call the guv.” He turned sad gray eyes on the cousins. “Do you want to go?”
Renie started to open her mouth but Judith beat her to it. “No. Unless regulations prevent us from staying.”
“Nae,” Adamson said, dialing his cell phone. “DCI MacRae told us to consider you part of the investigative team.”
“He did?” Judith asked, surprised. “That is, I know he—”
She shut up when Adamson spoke into the phone, relaying the message as tersely as possible. Clicking off, he turned to the cousins. “He’ll be here as soon as he can get a police launch. The tide’s in.” He cleared his throat. “Ah…what do you think happened here, Mrs. Flynn?”
Judith found the constable’s deferential manner unusual. Maybe, she thought, the police in the UK were different from the tight-lipped Americans she knew so well. “I don’t think it was an accident. I’m afraid that Chuckie bragged about the knowledge he had—or thought he had—concerning who killed Harry Gibbs. That leads me to conclude that the murderer of Harry and Chuckie is the same person.”
“Very logical,” Adamson murmured. “Incredible.”
“Her middle name,” Renie remarked, fiddling with her eye patch.
“Logical?” Adamson said, impressed.
“No,” Renie responded. “Incredible.”
Judith shot her cousin a dirty look.
“I’m going,” Renie said. “That Scotch smell makes me queasy.”
“Coz!” Judith began, but after a false start bumping into the doorjamb, Renie was on her way.
“Sensitive,” Adamson remarked.
“Not even close,” Judith said irritably.
A moment later, Glen returned with Philip Fordyce. The whiskey magnate’s usual savoir faire was obviously shaken. He was out of breath and his graying brown hair was unkempt.
“Unbelievable,” he said in a hoarse voice. “My God! Not Chuckie!”
Judith discreetly moved as far away from the trapdoor as she could. Adamson descended once more, apparently to position the body for Philip’s viewing. A wrenching groan was the only sound Philip made when he saw his dead son. For a long moment the bereaved father stood like a statue, staring off into the afternoon’s dying light. As Adamson climbed out of the dungeon, Beth Fordyce rushed into the storage room.
“Phil!” she cried. “Phil! Is it true? Gibbs just told me…” She threw her arms around her husband. “Oh no! I can’t look!”
“Don’t,” Philip said quietly. He squared his shoulders, and with Beth still clinging to him, he walked away without another word.
Judith waited to make sure the Fordyces were out of hearing range. “Can you tell how Chuckie died? Was there any sign of trauma?”
Adamson shook his head. “Not that I could see. But even with a torch, I couldn’t find anything suspicious. And I didn’t dare remove the body all the way out of the barrel.”
Judith nodded. “I understand.” She sniffed at the Scotch-tainted air. “There’s another, sweeter odor as well. I’ve been trying to figure it out.” She paused, recalling her nights tending bar at the Meat & Mingle. “Ah!” she exclaimed softly. “I know what it is. It smells like a Rob Roy.”
Realizing it might be some time before MacRae and his forensics crew arrived, Judith went in search of Renie. She knew she wouldn’t have far to look. Renie was in the kitchen, eating bread and cheese.
“Just a snack to tide me over,” Renie said.
“Bring it to my room. Glen’s going to check out our…mishap,” she amended to spare Mrs. Gibbs’s feelings. Theft never sat well with an innkeeper. Murder, of course, was worse, as Judith well knew.
“I gathered you didn’t tell Mrs. Gibbs about Chuckie,” Judith said as they took the elevator to the guest floor.
“I leave that up to the cops,” Renie said. “Besides, she might not have given me any food if I’d mentioned it.”
Five minutes later, Glen arrived in Judith’s room, still looking shaken. “Could Chuckie have had an accident?” he asked optimistically.
Judith shook her head. “Chuckie might have been upset over Harry Gibbs’s death. Granted, his emotional state was fragile. He was epileptic and might have had a seizure, but that’s a stretch.” She pointed to the bureau. “I put the jewel case in the top drawer.”
Glen looked inside. “How long did you have it here?” he asked, putting on a pair of latex gloves.
“No more than an hour,” Judith answered. “We returned to this room a little after two-thirty and left again close to three-thirty.”
“Who,” Glen inquired, “knew you had the box?”
“Nobody,” Judith replied. “Except for whoever put it in my purse, probably at Hollywood House. Has anyone reported it missing?”
“Nae,” the constable said. “Did the case contain jewels?”
“No,” Judith didn’t elaborate about the emails. “The case looked valuable, though.” She turned to Renie, who was sitting cross-legged on the bed, adjusting her eye patch. “Don’t you agree, coz?”
Renie nodded. “It did when I could still see. Old, too, and finely wrought. It was polished, as if it had been someone’s treasure.”
“Mrs. Jones is a graphic designer,” Judith explained. “She has an eye for such things.”
“Only one, it seems.” Glen sounded dubious. “You’re certain you don’t know how the case got into your purse?”
Judith grimaced. “It sounds stupid, but so much has been happening, not just today, but ever since we arrived at Grimloch, that I didn’t check why my purse felt heavy. It’s always overloaded when I travel.”
Glen nodded absently while working his forensic magic on the bureau. “Given the time frame, who do you know was in the castle between two-and three-thirty?”
Judith thought back. It was going on five o’clock, but it seemed as if hours and hours had passed since she’d discovered that the silver case was missing. “Mr. and Mrs. Gibbs, Mrs. Fordyce, and Chuckie.”
“Don’t forget Will Fleming,” Renie added. “We don’t know when Philip Fordyce got back from wherever he’d gone.”
“Mmm,” Glen murmured. “May I take your fingerprints, ladies?”
“Of course,” Judith said. “My husband’s are on file with the U.S. authorities because he’s a retired police detective.”
Glen looked at Renie. “Mrs. Jones?”
She shook her head. “Can’t. Don’t have fingerprints.”
“Beg pardon?” said the constable.
Renie held up her hands. “I have fingers, but no prints. When I was working my way through college I had a civil service job with the city. Everyone had to be fingerprinted, but mine wouldn’t take. My grooves were too shallow. Sorry. I’m a freak of nature.”
“I’m afraid it’s true,” Judith said, “in many ways.” She ignored Renie’s sharp, one-eyed glare. “I’ll vouch for her. I’ve been with her almost the entire time.”
Glen gave Judith a sympathetic look. “We’ll do our best to recover the case.” With a tip of the cap, he departed.
Judith sighed. “I feel just horrible about Chuckie. We should’ve prevented it, but I don’t know how.”
“Coz, you know perfectly well that people do what they want to do,” Renie reminded Judith. “His murder seems to limit the suspects.”
Judith was pacing the room. “Maybe. But we really don’t know who was at the castle today. Somebody could’ve sneaked in. There doesn’t appear to be a security system.”
Renie allowed that was so. “It’s after five. What now?”
Judith considered. “We could find Mr. and Mrs. Gibbs and ask if they know if any other outsiders came to Grimloch.”
Renie shrugged. “Okay. But Mrs. Gibbs was going to do some cleaning in the Fordyce quarters before she started dinner.”
“Then we’ll look for Mr. Gibbs. Go get your coat. He may be outside, though it’s almost five and getting dark.”
Five minutes later, the cousins met in the passageway and started down the winding staircase. At the bottom they saw Gibbs.
“Message for ye,” he said, holding out a slip of paper.
Judith thanked Gibbs and read the brief note before turning to Renie. “We’re wanted by the police.”
This is odd,” Judith said as the cousins hurried across the courtyard. “The message says he’ll meet us and take us into the village to talk about the latest information.”
“Maybe MacRae sent the message before he found out about Chuckie,” Renie pointed out as they got into the lift. “How come you didn’t mention that odd voice we keep hearing to the cops?”
“I’d rather they didn’t think we’re gaga,” Judith replied as the lift creaked its way downward.
A jolt that made the cousins cringe signaled that the cage had hit the ground. It was not only growing dark, but the mist had settled in, shrouding the far shore. As the cousins walked out onto the rocky ground, a strange noise startled them both.
