WADING INTO MURDER: Book Two of the Laura Morland Mystery Series

by Joan Lambert

  William looked shocked. “Me? You want me to go in there and get it?”

  His grandmother didn’t answer. “The question is,” she mused, “how are we to keep the child from getting wet? I shudder to think what is in that water.”

  “Maybe there’s a tunnel we could use instead,” William suggested in a pleasant voice that still had a tendency to crack. “I’ve looked at the old maps and there’s a lot of underground stuff around here, old graves and tunnels. That could be one, back there. It would be fun to explore it.” He pointed to a small iron grating in the wall behind the pool.

  Laura blanched. She had been forced to creep through an old tunnel to break into an ancient manor house last summer, and even the thought of doing it again brought on an attack of acute claustrophobia. She voted for the pool, despite its horrors.

  To her relief, his grandmother agreed. “Thank you, William,” she answered. “I fear, however, that exploration must wait for another visit, considering the bomb and the need to rescue the child in a timely manner. One doesn’t find an abandoned baby in the Baths very often, so we must give that precedence.”

  William looked disappointed, but his grandmother’s face lit up with a triumphant smile. “The umbrella,” she announced. “I should have thought of it right away.” She held up the umbrella and unfurled it grandly. It was even larger than Laura had suspected, and it had a sturdy curved handle. “There,” Lady Longtree said with satisfaction. “This will be the boat.”

  William sniffed the air dubiously. “What’s that awful smell?” he asked, seeming suddenly aware of the odor permeating the underground space.

  His grandmother lied instantly. “A dead rat probably,” she announced. Laura didn’t contradict her. William didn’t need to know just yet.

  “What I want you to do, William,” the doughty lady continued, “is to swim over there with the umbrella and the ropes in your pack. Then you can -

  “Pardon me,” she interrupted herself, turning to Laura. “Could you give me your name? I feel I should know who you are under the circumstances.”

  “Yes, of course,” Laura agreed. “My name is Laura, Laura Morland.”

  “And I am Lady Longtree,” the woman answered. “But please call me Olivia. And this is my grandson, William.”

  “How do you do, Lady Longtree,” Laura answered, feeling that Olivia was a bit informal for a titled lady on first acquaintance. “And William.”

  “No, no,” Lady Longtree protested. “Please use Olivia. I was not thinking. Normally, I use the title only when I need to intimidate someone.”

  Laura laughed. With this lady on her side, anything could be accomplished. “All right,” she agreed, though she doubted she would able to call anyone as formidable as Lady Longtree Olivia. “What is your umbrella plan?”

  “Thank you, my dear. The plan is simple. William will swim across with the ropes and the umbrella and help you tie the baby securely inside it. Together, you will guide it across the pool. The umbrella is quite waterproof. Another rope can be tied to the umbrella handle. William will climb up again with that one and haul the baby up the wall to me,” she finished cheerfully.

  “You mean I get to explore the pool?” William sounded eager again. “I always wanted to try out one of these pools.”

  “William is something of an antiquarian,” his grandmother explained.

  “How fascinating!” Laura smiled at William. “I’d be grateful if you’d help,” she added. “The pool is a bit deep for me, and if I go under you can steady the boat, the umbrella, that is.”

  William looked gratified. “Okay,” he agreed. Leaping onto the parapet, he surveyed the drop dispassionately and was down before Laura could blink. Balancing on a skinny edge of skirting Laura hadn’t noticed before – and fortunately hadn’t hit when she dropped into the pool - he took off his t-shirt, removed his ostentatiously unlaced shoes and looked dubiously at his belt, which was enhanced with shiny metal spikes. He started to take it off and then thought better of the idea. His pants would probably fall down if he did, Laura concluded.

  Belt, rings and all, he jumped into the pool and swam toward her, holding the umbrella, with the ropes coiled inside it, with one hand. He pushed it onto the rocks near her; then, without warning, he dived and disappeared for so long that Laura wondered if she would have to rescue him, too. He reappeared however, shaking water from his spiky hair. In the dim light it looked purple, but it might be black. The face beneath it was remarkably gentle. Laura suspected that under all the trappings he was soft as butter, like so many of the bizarrely dressed students she taught at home.

  William eyed the assortment of objects he had plucked from the bottom. “Not much down there,” he reported. “Just junk tourists throw in and a couple of water snakes. Great place for them down here.”

  Laura flinched and considered mentioning the dirty diaper as revenge. She was willing to bet he’d told her about the snakes to test her mettle. She decided against it. Help was more important.

  There was no need anyway. William got the message as soon as he joined her. “How have you been able to stand the smell?” he asked her, holding his nose. “Maybe we should just leave it here until the mother comes back.”

  “Babies don’t always smell this terrible,” she assured him, not wanting this experience to leave a lasting scar that would impede future fatherhood. “They’re actually a great deal of fun some of the time.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “After they grow up.”

  Laura didn’t bother to respond. “You steady the umbrella on the edge of the pool. I’ll put the baby in and tie it with your help,” she suggested.

  “Great.” William unfurled the umbrella and jumped happily back into the pool. He held it in place with one hand while continuing to hold his nose with the other until Laura needed him to help with the knots. Once the baby was tied in securely, they lowered the umbrella gently into the water. It did make quite a good boat.

  Wishing desperately that she didn’t have to do this, Laura slid into the pool again and grasped one side of the makeshift craft so it wouldn’t tip with the child’s weight. Instead, she lost her footing. The umbrella wobbled precariously.

  “Better let me do it,” William offered. “I’m taller.”

  “I’ll swim one-handed,” Laura said, reluctantly deciding that further exposure to unknown pathogens was less important than the baby’s safety. “Then I can put the other hand on the umbrella, just in case.”

  “Sails ahoy,” William responded gallantly and unexpectedly.

  Together they maneuvered their unlikely craft across the pool. William swung his long body out of the water with easy grace. Laura did the same but without the grace, and landed in a shivering heap on the stone skirting.

  Lady Longtree, she noticed, was now sitting on top of the parapet. Her well-laced brown shoes beat a faint tattoo against the rocks as she watched their progress. Laura wondered how she had got up there in her sensible tweed skirt.

  Pulling on his t-shirt and shoes, William scampered up the wall to the narrow ledge, rope in hand. “Hold the umbrella up as high as you can and I’ll pull it the rest of the way up with the rope,” he instructed.

  Laura took a deep breath, picked up the umbrella, which was very heavy now that it contained a baby, and held it up as William hauled in the rope. He grabbed for the handle, almost fell, recovered his balance and tried again. Laura’s shoulders ached so badly she feared she would drop her burden and fall backwards into the pool, and then suddenly the weight disappeared.

  William held the umbrella up to his grandmother. “Up with the babe!” she exclaimed triumphantly. With commendable calm, she leaned down and grabbed the handle. Together, she, the umbrella and the baby tumbled off the parapet, fortunately in the direction of the platform.

  Laura heard her satisfied voice floating over the wall. “Not even damp,” she announced. “From the outside, that is.”

  “A lot more than damp from the inside,” William commented
as he vaulted over the parapet.

  Left behind, Laura surveyed her predicament. William was up, the baby was up, but she was still here, and she had no idea how to get out.

  William came to her rescue. “Just grab the rope as you sort of walk up the wall,” he told her, dangling the rope in front of her, “and I’ll pull you as far as the ledge. After that it’s easy.” His hands were surprisingly strong; so were his arms, and Laura found herself dragged up the wall with apparent ease despite the fact that her feet barely made contact with the rocks.

  “Thank you,” she mumbled, remembering to retrieve the jacket she had used to lower herself. “I’m afraid I’m not much good at rock climbing.”

  Lady Longtree voice interrupted. “Excellent! I commend both of you. Now all we must do is discover why the child was left in the Baths and who left it. I should like very much to know, too, if the baby’s presence is connected to the bomb business.”

  “It seems a strange coincidence,” Laura agreed.

  Lady Longtree nodded. “Indeed it does. We shall have to find out why.”

  “I think I know the baby,” Laura admitted as she thrust her arms into her jacket and tried to stop shivering. Lady Longtree looked at her sharply.

  “I saw it at the airport in New York,” Laura explained. “It is an easy child to recognize because of its unusual coloring, its eyes especially. It is one of twins, I believe, at least when I saw them in the airport, they seemed to be twins. That made the baby easier to remember too.”

  “How very strange,” Lady Longtree murmured. As if it knew it was under discussion, the baby opened its turquoise eyes and stared at her.

  “I see what you mean,” she said thoughtfully. “A most unusual child.”

  “I saw an article in the morning paper about stolen babies,” Laura remarked. “I wondered if there could be a connection.”

  Lady Longtree nodded. “Yes. I saw the article too. I suppose we must contact the authorities,” she added reluctantly. “I dislike the prospect of involving them, but it should probably be done. Though why anyone…”

  Her words were cut off by the baby. Opening its mouth as wide as it would go, it screamed lustily. The sound was appalling in the echoing space.

  Lady Longtree handed the infant hastily back to Laura. “Perhaps it’s more familiar with your face,” she muttered apologetically.

  “Let’s get out of here,” William said fervently, and headed for the stairs at a run, his hands over his ears. Laura followed, jiggling the baby in a vain effort to console it.

  When she reached the big doors, William was trying to fit a long, old-fashioned key into the keyhole. “Found it on the floor near here,” he yelled over the baby’s howls. “It doesn’t seem to work on these doors, though.” Laura wondered if the cleaning woman had dropped the key and maybe the paper she had found earlier, but she didn’t bother to communicate her thought. Talk was impossible in this racket.

  Shoving the key in his pocket, William pounded on the door with one hand. The other covered an ear. Lady Longtree whacked with her umbrella. “Harder,” she ordered when there was no response. William abandoned his ear and pounded two-fisted. Laura kicked. Their prolonged battering – ably abetted by the child’s howls – eventually produced a man wearing the uniform of a ticket attendant. He looked astonished, and furious.

  “What are you doing in there?” he demanded. “No one is permitted in the Baths. Out – right away!”

  “Nonsense,” Lady Longtree replied scathingly. “There was a baby to be rescued.

  “Not the sort I like to deal with,” she added sotto voce to Laura and William as she swept past the indignant guard. “Perhaps we can find someone more congenial outside.”

  They must make an odd sight, Laura thought as they emerged into the crowded square: two figures dripping black water, one carrying a screaming baby that smelled like a latrine, and a third very imposing figure, despite its small size, leaning on an umbrella, which seemed to function as a walking stick as well as a battering ram and boat.

  “I can take the child to the police station and explain the situation,” Laura offered. “Maybe they will even have a diaper. I am sure they’ll be able to find the mother without much difficulty from flight records.”

  “A nappy, they are called here,” Lady Longtree told her gently. “And yes, that seems an excellent idea. This place is quite confusing just now.”

  “It certainly is,” Laura agreed. She saw no sign of the burned car, but the square was covered with barriers and tape that said police line do not cross, in endless lines. The policemen guarding them looked harassed and anxious. No doubt they wondered why anyone would stand as close as possible to the barriers when another bomb might go off at any moment.

  More to the point, there might not be anyone at the police station. They were all here. Lady Longtree confirmed the thought.

  “We will do better to find help here instead,” she declared. “The policeman over there is a detective inspector, I believe, and he might be interested in this case. He has a good face at any rate.”

  Screwing up her courage, Laura approached him. He met her halfway, looking furious despite the pleasant face. “The Baths are closed,” he told her. “May I ask who you are and why you were in there?”

  Laura decided to go on the offensive. “I wonder if you could help me,” she countered. “I went into the Baths before the closure was announced, and found this baby left on the rocks on the lower level. I would like to see that it is returned to its mother.”

  The policeman stared at her, taken aback. “You found a baby in the Baths? Are you quite sure?”

  “Of course I am,” Laura answered crossly over the infant’s cries. “I would not say so otherwise.”

  The policeman snatched the child from Laura’s arms and probed its wrappings with careful fingers. She watched, appalled. He was searching for a bomb.

  Satisfied that there were no hard objects wrapped around the baby, the detective thrust it back at Laura. Inexplicably, it had stopped screaming but the smell was worse than ever.

  He wrote her name and the place where she was staying in a little notebook and then signaled to a young policewoman standing nearby. She trotted over obediently.

  “This is Sergeant Prescott, my assistant,” he told Laura. “If you will go with her, she will give you all the help you need.”

  Sergeant Prescott gave him a sour look, possibly wondering why she was being saddled with the smelly baby detail instead of the more interesting bomb search, but she did as she was told.

  “We have some emergency supplies at the station – food and nappies and so on,” she told Laura without much enthusiasm. “Once we have the baby fixed up I can take your statement. Perhaps a towel and something hot to drink for you.” She didn’t offer to take the baby, which had resumed its howls.

  Someone pointed a camera at Laura and clicked. A mental image of the picture flashed into her mind: an American woman with soaking wet hair and soggy clothes standing outside the Roman Baths during a bomb scare in England, holding a stolen baby in her arms while being interrogated by two suspicious police officers. How had she got into such a ridiculous situation?

  By being much too curious and getting involved in problems that were none of her business, her ex-husband would say scathingly. Thomas, the charming if enigmatic art detective who had shared her adventures last summer would say much the same thing but with admiration instead of derision. She wished he was here.

  The two officers stepped aside to exchange a few words, and Laura looked for Lady Longtree and William. They were nowhere in sight, and she was surprised. They had seemed so friendly, and she hadn’t expected Lady Longtree especially to desert her. Perhaps it was because she didn’t like getting involved with the police.

  Sergeant Prescott came up behind her. “This way,” she said, taking a firm grip on Laura’s elbow and steering her in the other direction. “It’s not far.”

  Laura obeyed, aware that people were stari
ng at her. No doubt they assumed she was involved in the bomb scare. How did one go about proving non-involvement? One woman especially seemed unable to tear her eyes away…

  “The mother!” she gasped. “Over there – it’s the mother!”

  Another shock followed. Just behind the woman were Lady Longtree and William.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Sergeant Prescott turned to look in the direction of Laura’s pointing finger. “The mother?” she asked in bewilderment. “You mean the baby’s mother?”

  “Yes,” Laura answered. Wrenching her arm from the policewoman’s grip, she sprinted toward the woman. The Sergeant pounded after her.

  Fear transfigured the mother’s face as she watched them. She turned and ran. Despite her bulky clothing she moved fast, and she quickly disappeared into the maze of narrow, twisting streets around the square.

  Laura stopped, frustrated. There was no hope of finding the mother if she didn’t want to be found. But why would a mother run away from her own child? Had the police frightened her?

  The Sergeant grabbed Laura’s arm again and held on tight until they were inside her office in the police station. Suspicion exuded from every pore of her stiff body. Picking up a phone, she asked someone to come for the baby and supplied Laura with the promised towel and cup of coffee. It smelled as if it had been brewing since early morning, but it was hot and Laura drank it gratefully.

  “First, I need information about you, who you are and what brings you to this country,” the Sergeant instructed when the baby had been borne away. “I shall need your passport too. Then I would like to know everything you can tell me about this baby, how and where you found it, and why you thought the woman you saw in the square was its mother.”

  Obediently, Laura handed over her passport, a professional card identifying her as Dr. Laura Morland, explained that she was a professor of gender studies in New York and had come to England to teach a seminar in Oxford, as well as to walk and do some sightseeing. Next she launched into an account of seeing the baby with its family at the airport, and then finding it in the Baths.