“Welcome, Ms. Beckenswidth,” said Frances. “I’m Lady Frances Marmalade. Please, call me Frances.”
“Lula Beckenswidth,” said the young woman finding it hard to keep her eyes on Lady Marmalade’s.
“Do come in. You’re just in time for tea.”
The grandfather clock struck nine. Frances led the young woman back into the living room and Lula sat in an armchair across from the couch that Frances sat back down in.
“Is there something wrong?” asked Lady Marmalade.
Lula played with her hands in her lap, her eyes upon them as if they held a valuable prize. She darted a look at Frances before she spoke.
“It’s my grandmother, she thinks someone is trying to kill her and she told me to come and speak with you.”
Lula went back to looking at her hands.
“Who is your grandmother, my dear?”
“Ms. Margaret Hollingsberry, though she prefers Madge.”
“This sounds to me, my dear, like something that you should rather be speaking to the police about.”
“She doesn’t want the police involved. She said they’d never believe her.”
“I see,” said Frances, squinting slightly.
Ginny came in with a tray carrying the teapot and two cups with saucers. There was lemon, cream and sugar on the tray, too.
“Thank you, Ginny.”
“I thought I heard you had company, my Lady,” said Ginny, looking over at Lula.
“This is Ms. Lula Beckenswidth. Ms. Ginny Johnson is my housekeeper.”
Ginny smiled at Lula but barely received a glance from her in return. Frances took the teapot and picked it up.
“Would you like some tea, my dear?”
“Yes, please.”
Lady Marmalade poured tea for Lula, leaving a little room in case she wanted to add cream and sugar. Frances poured a cup for herself and squeezed a wedge of lemon into it. She watched as Lula poured a generous amount of cream into her cup and added three sugars. It was practically overflowing and it made the stirring very difficult.
Lula was splashing tea all over the sides and into the saucer. Frances watched with incredulity and curiosity as Lula continued stirring and splashing tea down the side of her teacup as if that was the natural way of doing things.
When she was finished, Lula lifted the teacup off the saucer and poured the tea from the saucer back into the teacup, while two drops of tea dashed themselves against the edge of Lula’s cardigan which she didn’t seem to notice.
Lady Marmalade took a sip of her tea and placed the cup back onto its saucer and then down onto the table near to her. She watched as Lula put the teacup to her mouth to test the temperature, and finding it cool enough, she drained half of its contents into her in two big gulps.
“All right then, please tell me why your grandmother seems to think that someone is trying to kill her.”
“She’s not very well. She’s bed ridden mostly, but she’s been getting these letters from someone that she says are threatening to kill her.”
Frances looked at Lula fidgeting with the hem of her dress. Her nails were bitten down to the quick and had no nail polish on them. She seemed like a woman who had been brow beaten to death, and yet she was so young and fragile.
“I see, Lula, and what do these letters say exactly?”
Lula looked up at Frances and offered a wispy smile, that vanished as soon as Frances looked back at her.
“She says they say threatening things, and she’s sure they’ll make good on killing her.”
“So you haven’t seen any of these letters, have you, my dear?”
Lula shook her head, looking down at her lap. She was wearing a rather plain cream colored dress and a gray cardigan overtop. She had on brown, flat shoes that you might find a hospital matron wearing. She wore no makeup, not that any would help. Her teeth were the same off color cream as her dress and a mess of overcrowding.
“Do you know how many letters there have been?” asked Frances, sitting on the edge of the couch to try and make Lula feel more comfortable. Lula also spoke very softly like the light whisper of wind amongst trees.
“She didn’t tell me, but I’ve seen three letters written with the same hand writing arrive three weeks apart. I don’t know if there have been others.”
“So you have seen them then?” Frances was hoping the young woman would make up her mind.
“No, my Lady, I’ve only noticed them from the writing on the envelope when I take them up to my grandmother.”
Lady Marmalade picked up her teacup and sipped from it again, before replacing it. Lula took the opportunity to drain the remaining tea in her cup in two gulps.
“Would you like some more tea dear?” asked Frances.
Frances poured her another cup, being sure to leave additional room in this one. It didn’t matter, Lula made sure to fill it to the brim with an even healthier splash of cream and the same three sugars. She stirred, spilled the tea and poured it back into the cup just as she had done the first time. Lady Marmalade couldn’t quite be sure if she wanted to laugh or yell at the young woman and instruct her in proper etiquette. She decided against both options.
“So, how do you know that these letters are the ones that contain the threatening content?”
Lula lifted her eyes up and looked at Frances before letting them drift down and look at the coffee table between them, as if her eyelids were made of lead. Lula gave the impression that every act was an act of great cost. To move, to speak, even to breathe seemed to her more like a penance.
“Every time I’ve taken these letters up to my grandmother she complains about them, saying that these are the same ones that are going to ruin her.”
“Does she know who they come from?”
“She says she does, but she won’t tell me.”
“Have you seen a name or return address on any of the envelopes?”
Lula shook her head slowly as if to do so quickly might cause it to snap off her thin neck.
“There are no return addresses and no names on any of them.”
“And how are you related to Madge Hollingsberry?”
“I’m her granddaughter.”
Lula said it as if it might be the first time that she had mentioned that Madge was her grandmother. There was not a sneer or a tone that would indicate otherwise. She poured half the cup of tea down her throat in another two big sips and licked her lips. She put the teacup down on the edge of the table.
“Yes, dear, I gather that she is your grandmother. Rather, I’m wondering how you are related to her as your grandmother and how you’ve come to be the one to give me this message.”
“Madge is my mother’s mother.”
“And you live with her I take it?”
A small nod of the head and the averted eyes.
“Where is your mother dear?”
Lula looked up at Frances and balled her small hands into fists which she rested upon her thighs, each fist to its own thigh.
“My mother died during the Spanish Flu in 1918. I’ve lived with my grandmother ever since. She raised me as her own.”
“I see, I’m sorry to hear that.”
Frances took her teacup and saucer into her hands and took a sip from it. She hadn’t quite finished half of her first serving of tea and Lula was making quick work of her second.
“It doesn’t matter, my mother is long dead and I hardly knew her when she was alive.”
An odd feeling, thought Frances, looking the young waif of a woman up and down. She was hard to peg. Perhaps more than met the eye, or perhaps that was all there was to her, a broken shell of a human being, the yolk long lost and spilled.
“Has there been anyone come round the house lately who would give you reason that they were out to hurt your grandmother?”
Lula took a moment to think about it. She unballed her fists and straightened her hands, spreading them over her dress, her eyes darting over her hands as she looked at them. Then she picked up h
er teacup and drank the last of her tea and cradled the empty cup and saucer in her lap, and looked over at the teapot greedily.
“None but the usual guests and visitors that come to see her.”
“She doesn’t mind them then?”
“Not all of them. Lots of them are hangers on, now that she’s dying or thinks she’s going be murdered.”
“You don’t quite seem convinced that your grandmother is about to die. Is that true?”
Lula looked up at Frances and shrugged her small shoulders.
“She’s been saying that she’ll be dead for a long time now. But maybe this is different, maybe someone really is trying to kill her, but she won’t let me help her. She won’t let me take a look at her letters. She keeps them in the drawer by the side of her bed and when she leaves her room she locks the drawer and takes the key with her.”
Lula seemed mesmerized by the teapot on the tray. Frances wasn’t sure she wanted to offer the young woman another cup of tea, the spectacle was quite unnerving. One would think the young thing hadn’t ever tasted tea or for that matter had anything to drink the whole day.
“More tea, dear?” asked Frances.
Lula nodded her head and thrust out her cup towards the teapot. Frances picked it up and poured just about the last of the tea into her cup. Lula poured the cream into her cup, tipping it upside down and holding the jug like that until she was certain no more cream was coming out of it. More sugar, more stirring, splashing and refilling.
“How does your grandmother think I can help?”
“She asked me if you’d come round and see her. She says she won’t show anyone else the letters she’s been getting, except for you.”
A tip of the teacup to Lula’s lips and when it was rested back on its saucer, half of its contents were gone.
“But why me in particular, Lula?”
“She says you’re the greatest detective and that you’ll be able to catch whoever’s doing this to her before they can harm her.”
Frances looked at the table for a moment and on the front page of the daily paper was an article about the ongoing Battle of Midway. An aerial photo of a Japanese aircraft carrier was shown billowing smoke. She looked at Lula and thought the young woman was having a battle of her own.
“When would your grandmother like to see me?”
Lula looked up at Frances briefly.
“She’s waiting for you now,” said Lula, “if you’d be willing to come.”
Frances shook her head and smiled.
“My dear, we’ve just come off an air raid siren and it’s after nine. I’ll be sure to call upon her first thing in the morning, if you’ll leave me her address. Give me one moment.”
Lady Marmalade got up and walked into her study. When she came back out she was holding a piece of paper and a pen. She placed it down in front of Lula on the table. She noticed that Lula’s teacup and saucer were now back on the tray, empty and practically bone dry.
Lula leaned in to the corner of the table and wrote an address on the piece of paper that Frances had provided. She handed it to Frances who took it and looked at it. It was a Hyde Park address, only a couple of blocks away.
“Thank you, Lula, you can tell your grandmother that I’ll be round tomorrow for nine a.m.”
Lula sat stiff and upright in her chair, not moving, not taking the moment to leave.
“Is there anything else?”
“She wanted me to tell you that things are going missing too. That she’s being robbed.”
“I see. What sorts of things.”
“Mostly jewelry from what she’s told me but she says there are other things, too. A hairbrush has gone missing and her favorite lipstick. I think there are other things but she hasn't told me.”
Frances nodded and stood up. This was Lula’s cue that her stay was no longer welcome and there would be no more tea coming. Lula reluctantly got up. Though she stood still where she was. Frances put her arm around the young woman’s shoulder and started to guide her out. She wouldn’t move.
“What is it dear?”
Lula looked at her feet, her hands were knitting themselves together.
“Nothing.”
“Tell me,” said Frances.
“Well, it’s just that Granny’s been acting strange lately and I can’t explain it. She seems to be getting more paranoid over the last few months.”
“I see. Perhaps she has reason to be. You did say that she’s been getting these strange letters.”
“They don’t seem strange to me except that they don’t have a return address on them.”
“But you aren’t aware of their contents are you?”
Lula shook her head.
“I’ll come by for a visit tomorrow and we’ll see what I can find out.”
Lula looked up at Frances and nodded. She pinched her lips together and let Frances walk her out of the living room and down the hall to the front door.
“Would you like me to have Alfred walk you home? It is getting late.”
Lula nodded. Alfred was just behind them as they spoke.
“Happy to walk the young lady home, my Lady,” he said.
“Thank you, Alfred.”
Lady Marmalade closed the door behind them and went back into the living room. Ginny came in and put everything onto the tray and then took it away. It was less than fifteen minutes later when Alfred returned home. He came back into the living room just as Frances was finishing up with the paper.
“Quite a queer young lady,” he said as Frances looked up at him and smiled.
“Quite odd, indeed.”
“If I may, my Lady?” asked Alfred.
“By all means Alfred.”
“She said something strange to me on the way there. It was the only thing that she said, actually.”
“Interesting, and what was that?”
“She said that war does peculiar things to people, makes them remember their misdeeds and seek retribution. It also clouds the minds of those who have not lived righteously.”
“Was that all? No context?”
Alfred shook his head, standing tall as he was with his hands clasped behind his back.
“Nothing else at all, my Lady. It was quite strange. I didn’t know what to say, so I said nothing.”
Lady Marmalade nodded her head thoughtfully and smiled at him.
“This is a puzzle, isn’t it?”
“I should say so.”
THREE
Chapter 3
IT was a little before nine when Lady Marmalade left Marmalade Park with her butler Alfred walking alongside her. It was a bright and sunny day. The blue dabbed sky keeping everyone’s moods jolly. All about, men and women were carrying on with their daily business. And even though there had not been any bombs for some time, crews were working hard at cleaning up the rubble that was still about.
It was an ongoing concern and one that would only be completed years after the war ended. But idle hands do the Devil’s work, and as such there were better things to do, such as keep London as presentable as one could.
Bayswater Road held rows of expensive townhomes that looked out across Hyde Park. Hyde Park, which was such a beautiful and tranquil park, had not been spared from the German’s bombs. Her face was pock marked in places, though not as badly as one might have expected. A whitewashed complex of these townhomes greeted them and Frances checked the address one more time and found the gate corresponding to Madge Hollingsberry’s home.
They walked up to the front of the home and Alfred knocked on the door. A younger and more rotund man than Alfred opened the door. He was dressed in a fine black tuxedo with tails and wore white gloves that had never known dirt or grime. His face was round and cherubic with a slight sheen to it and he had a cheery disposition. A wreath of black curly hair was about his crown and the rest of it was, by contrast, straight.
“Good morning. Lady Marmalade, I presume?” said the butler bowing. “Please, do come in.”
France
s and Alfred walked in, Alfred taking off his bowler hat and holding it in both hands. It was stiflingly hot inside, as if they had walked into an oven.
“This is my butler, Alfred Donahue,” said Frances looking over at Alfred.
“A colleague and a friend. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, sir.” he said, holding out his hand for Alfred to shake. “I am Jeremiah Rondleton.”
They shook hands.
“May I take your coats? You might find it warm in here.”
Lady Marmalade took off her coat and handed it to Jeremiah. Alfred handed him his black jacket, too. Already, Alfred could feel the prickling of sweat at the temples.
“I hope you don’t find it unbearable; Madam Hollingsberry finds the cold terribly annoying. Must be her years spent in India, I imagine,” said Jeremiah.
He put their coats away in the closet as Lady Marmalade took off her pale blue scarf from around her head and tied it loosely around her neck.
“Who is it, Jerry?” came a screech from upstairs.
“It’s your guests, mum,” said Jeremiah as he closed the closet door.
“I’ll be down in a minute,” came another screech.
From where Frances was standing she couldn’t see the upstairs landing, only the flight of stairs.
“If you’ll come with me,” said Jeremiah smiling all the while, “I believe Madam Hollingsberry would like to entertain you in the living room.”
They followed Jeremiah down the hall which was littered with tables and assorted trinkets and statues from India as well as elsewhere. Lady Marmalade noticed items from the Far East too. Towards the end of the hall they turned into a large living room, crammed with additional pieces of unnecessary furniture, batiks and artifacts. One had to be cautious to move carefully about.
Frances wondered if perhaps things were not so much getting stolen as broken and quietly discarded. That wouldn’t surprise her in the least.
“Please make yourselves comfortable and I’ll have Mollie start some tea.”
Jeremiah left them and Frances sat down on a large modern couch. Alfred sat down on the same couch. From what Lady Marmalade could see, there seemed no rhyme or reason to the menagerie of trinkets and assorted pieces of art and furniture that were scattered around the home.
Lady Marmalade Cozy Murder Mysteries: Box Set (Books 1 - 3) Page 24
