Murder Always Barks Twice

by Jennifer Hawkins

So Genny told him about pulling around the corner of the house and seeing “the bundle” on the edge of the drive. And Emma told him about turning the body over to see if there was any chance Marcie might still be alive. They told him the time they arrived; they told him about the dogs and about Frank, and about Daphne.

  As Raj was noting all this down, the crunch of tires on gravel cut through the sound of the rain. Emma squinted at the long drive and saw a silver Saab rolling up toward the house.

  Oliver, eternally curious, and completely indifferent to both rain and the smell of wet dog, made to lunge forward. Emma caught his collar just in time.

  “Go on over to Dash, Oliver.” Emma shooed her corgi back. “He needs a friend.”

  Whether or not this was strictly true, Oliver accepted it with a wag and went to curl up beside the deflated mutt.

  Raj, in the meantime, muttered under his breath and ducked back out into the rain. He hurried toward the car, putting up his hands to motion stop! The Saab did stop, and the driver’s-side window slid down.

  Caite Hope-Johnston stuck her head out.

  11

  “Well,” breathed Genny. “This should be interesting.”

  Between the distance and the rain, Emma could only hear the clipped, displeased rhythm of Caite’s speech, not the actual words. She didn’t hear Raj’s reply either, but she did hear Caite shriek. Caite shoved the car door open so fast Raj jumped back. She climbed out into the rain, with a complete disregard as to how it was straightening her carefully styled blond waves—or soaking her blouse through her open, plaid mackintosh. She strode toward the house with impressive turn of speed, considering her wedge-heeled sandals, ignoring the mud as completely as she ignored the rain.

  Raj stood stunned for a second, then he ran ahead. He circled in front of Caite, hands out, motioning for her to stop, just like he had when she was driving.

  Oliver thrust his nose forward like he was hoping to catch an interesting scent.

  Raj was clearly talking. Caite stood where she was, hand on her stomach, listening. Then, slowly, she turned around, and limped back to the car, like one of her straps had suddenly come loose. When she drew level with the Saab, she slammed one hand on the bonnet for balance, bent over and vomited.

  “Plot twist?” said Emma feebly.

  “I’ll say,” murmured Genny.

  “That is not good,” mumbled Oliver.

  Raj patted Caite’s back awkwardly and tried to hand her a handkerchief. She just shook him off and straightened up. Caite gestured toward the house. Raj shook his head.

  “Should I go out there, Emma? I’m already wet.” Oliver wagged hopefully.

  “Not yet, good boy,” she breathed.

  Dash barked once.

  “Dash says he should go. He says Marcie needs him.”

  Emma swallowed and went to rub Dash’s ears. The mutt’s wet, fringed tail slapped the tiles in a slow rhythm. As she did, Emma suddenly heard Marcie’s voice speaking from memory. You’ll make this work, won’t you? . . . It has to be perfect.

  Marcie who was a du Maurier superfan. And all at once Emma realized what the open window and the fallen body made her think of. It was a scene from Rebecca—a scene that detailed an attempted murder.

  Now Emma felt like she wanted to be sick. Because she and Marcie had talked about the book, just last night.

  Outside, Caite climbed back into the car, backed and turned and drove away. Raj shook his head again, wiped at his face and started trudging back over to the doorway.

  At the same time, Emma heard footsteps coming from behind. She and Genny turned and the dogs sat up, all equally startled. A woman strode determinedly up the corridor from the main house. Frank followed right behind, obviously unhappy but just as determined.

  “That’s Helen Dalgliesh,” Genny murmured to Emma. “She teaches up in Manchester. She’s also Daphne’s mum, Frank’s ex and Marcie’s best friend.”

  “That’s a lot,” breathed Emma.

  “You got that right,” murmured Genny.

  Helen Dalgliesh was dressed with casual elegance in a fitted green top and cream trousers and ballet flats. Like her daughter, Helen was a tall woman, with a wealth of curling, dark hair. She had slanting, hazel eyes in a sharp face with a long, crooked nose. Those eyes at the moment were puffy and red and her nose dripped. She’d obviously been crying.

  Genny moved forward and expressed her sympathies, and introduced Emma.

  Helen held her chin up with an angry stubbornness. She clutched a crumpled tissue in one hand.

  “I came to see if you needed anything,” she announced. Her voice was raw.

  Before either Emma or Genny could answer, Frank got round between them and Helen. “Helen . . . come on. You shouldn’t be here. You should be in with our daughter and the rest of the family.”

  “Now is exactly the wrong time to tell me where to be,” Helen snapped. Dash heaved himself to his feet and came over to Helen, whining and wagging his tail. Helen put a hand on the mutt’s head reflexively.

  Raj had reached the door in time to hear this exchange. Oliver headed toward the constable, obviously ready for another good ankle snuffle. Emma scooped him up quickly.

  “I wasn’t going anywhere!” The corgi squirmed.

  “I’m so very sorry for your loss,” Raj said to Helen and Frank. “I promise we won’t be here any longer than necessary.”

  “When can I see Marcie?” asked Helen.

  “We’ll be arranging that as soon as we can. I know this is all very upsetting, and I’m sorry but . . .”

  Frank squared his shoulders in a way that Emma guessed meant he’d decided it was time to take charge. “Look, Raj, what do you need from us, eh? I’m sure Genny and . . . um . . .”

  “Emma,” said Emma. “Emma Reed.”

  He looked down at her like he was trying to remember something, and the something didn’t quite turn up. “Right. I’m sure Genny and, erm, Emma don’t want to be hanging around here, and the family . . . good God, you have to give us some time.”

  “It’s just a little bit longer, Mr. Cochrane,” said Raj. “I promise. The detective is already on her way.”

  “The . . . ?” Frank pulled back. “I mean, no offense, but having you here is bad enough. How can we need a detective?”

  “It’s regulations,” said Raj. Emma wondered if this was true, or if Raj was just saying it because it was the reply for which there was no argument. “Believe me, if there was a choice, I wouldn’t have called in.”

  It was easy to see the implications of this settling into Frank’s mind. Helen’s as well. But their reactions were complete opposites to each other. Frank’s face went pale. Helen’s on the other hand, flushed, but whether it was from anger or fear, Emma couldn’t tell.

  “Do you know what time Marcie got in last night?” asked Raj.

  “No, but I went to bed maybe ten thirty, and she wasn’t home then, so it must have been late.” He paused. “In fact, everybody was out late that night. My brothers, Bertram and August, they weren’t home either. Helen was, of course, and our daughter, Daphne.”

  Raj made notes about all this. “And you didn’t see her this morning?”

  “Well, no,” admitted Frank. “But that wasn’t unusual. Marcie was always up with the chickens. She’d get herself a cup of tea or something and shut herself up in her office to take care of business. Sometimes we wouldn’t see her until lunchtime. Especially during festival season. Isn’t that right, Helen?”

  Helen nodded in agreement, but she didn’t look happy about it.

  “But I don’t want to say it, but we—” Frank gestured to indicate himself and Helen and maybe the rest of the family. “We can pretty well guess what happened, can’t we? My sister’s been depressed, and then, well, things have been going wrong and—”

  “Marcie was not depressed
.” Helen cut him off. “Stressed, yes. Disappointed, yes. But not depressed.”

  Disappointed about what? Emma bit her lip to keep the question from popping out. Now was most definitely not the time.

  “Gus said—” began Frank.

  “Gus doesn’t know his arse from a hole in the ground!” Helen’s face flared bright red. “God!” She pressed both hands against her cheeks. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “It’s okay,” said Raj. “This is awful. I know. I do. But we have to follow procedure, and that means I can’t leave, or let anybody else leave, until the detective gets here.”

  “Maybe Genny and I could wait in the kitchen?” suggested Emma. “We wouldn’t be in anybody’s way there, yeah?” And we won’t be making things even more awkward for the family.

  Everyone looked at Raj. Raj sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “I guess that would be all right.”

  Emma got the feeling he mostly wanted to reduce the number of people standing around getting angry and impatient.

  “Helen? What do you think?” Genny asked.

  Helen blinked. “Yes, certainly. Fine.”

  Emma’s curiosity itched. Badly. There was so much going on here. Frank said his brother Gus had said Marcie was depressed. Except Helen didn’t think so. Emma knew that family members could easily miss the difference between someone going through a bad patch and someone experiencing full-on depression. But then Helen said that Marcie was stressed.

  Stressed and disappointed. About what?

  She looked out at the rain, more than a little ashamed of herself. Frank had just lost his sister. Helen had lost her friend. Poor Daphne was beside herself and here she was, letting her brain run on like Marcie’s death was her problem to solve.

  I just wish there was something we could do. An idea hit. Maybe there is.

  “We could make some lunch,” she suggested. “That’s what we came here for. I’m sure . . . I’m sure everybody’s going to need something.”

  Helen looked startled. Frank looked oddly relieved. “That’s an excellent idea. Thank you. And perhaps some tea? I know I could use a cuppa.”

  “Of course,” said Genny. “You leave it to us.”

  “And maybe you could look after Dash?” he suggested.

  “We’d be glad to,” said Emma.

  “Yes! Yes!” barked Oliver. He nosed Dash in the side. “Come on, we’re going downstairs. Come on!”

  “I’ll take you.” Helen took a step toward the padded green door Emma had noticed earlier.

  “No, I’ll do it,” said Frank. As soon as the words left him, Helen turned on him. This time there was no mistaking the anger that put the color in her cheeks. But Frank was ready for it.

  “Helen, listen,” he said before she could open her mouth again. “I know I’m not the person you want here, and I also know I’m not the person Daphne wants. That’s my fault. I know that. But she needs you right now, not me. What I can do is show Genny and, um, Emma where to go. You take care of our daughter.” He touched her elbow briefly. “And yourself. All right?”

  Helen looked up at him, and for a moment, Emma thought she was going to start shouting. But whatever she saw in his eyes, it seemed to drain the anger out of her, at least a little.

  “Yes,” she said. “Yes, all right.”

  “Good,” said Genny. “I’ll meet you round back then. And don’t worry, Raj. I’ll go round the other way.”

  “Thank you.” Raj faced Helen. “Maybe you could take me to the rest of the family? And anybody else who was here when Ms. Cochrane was found?”

  Helen nodded and set off down the hallway toward the center of the house. Raj tucked his cap under his arm and followed.

  Frank and Emma looked at each other. Oliver sniffed at Frank’s shoes. “Mud,” he mumbled. “And something else, I don’t recognize that, wood, grass, petrol and something . . .”

  Frank stared at the corgi, and stepped back. “Sorry,” he said when he saw Emma’s face. “I don’t get on with dogs well. I’m allergic.”

  “Oh,” said Emma. “Right. Come on, Oliver, leave it.”

  “He doesn’t smell allergic,” muttered Oliver as he came back over to Emma’s side. “He just smells grumpy.”

  “Right,” said Frank. “Well. This way then.” He opened the padded green door and started down a dim flight of stairs to another long, dim corridor. Dash, clearly feeling he was about to be left out of something interesting, got to his feet and followed, leaving a trail of muddy paw prints on the tiles.

  But there was nothing to be done about that either. Emma and Oliver followed Frank farther into the silent house.

  12

  Truscott Grange had been built in the days when the actual work of running a house was kept as far out of sight as possible. That meant that where a more modern house would have a cellar, the grange had a warren of rooms and pantries for storage, sewing, laundry and, of course, cooking.

  The kitchen was huge by modern standards. It had been built not just for one cook but for half a dozen. The oak-topped kitchen island stretched right down the center of the room, roughly long enough to be a runway for small aircraft. The cooktop had been installed right in the middle, with no less than three ovens underneath. In addition to the door they came through, there was another door out to the car park and three more at the opposite end of the kitchen, leading to destinations unknown.

  A massive, elaborate cast-iron stove that to Emma’s (not very expert) eye looked like it was brought in sometime during the Victorian era still stood against one wall. Evidently, somebody had decided that it wasn’t worth the trouble of trying to get it out again when the modern cookers were installed. Now it was a place to put decorative copper pots and whimsical sugar bowls. Other, more functional counters lined the walls under the cupboards. There was an industrial-sized refrigerator, an entirely separate freezer and a double sink large enough to give Dash a bath in, never mind Oliver.

  The windows looked out just about nose level with the gravel courtyard/car park. She could tell that was Genny’s van parked outside, but all she could actually see were the tires and the undercarriage.

  Oliver, of course, had to go into zoom mode, zigzagging around the kitchen, shoving his nose into every corner and mumbling about smells and asking questions. Dash just loped to a spot beside the door to the outside where somebody had put down an old blanket. He flopped down and put his chin on the floor.

  “Well”—Frank gestured to include the entire kitchen—“here it is. Pantry there”—he pointed to one of the three distant doors. “Got its own loo there”—he pointed to a second door. “There used to be bells and so on, but now we all just text each other. How’s that for modern?” He tried to smile and almost managed it. “I don’t suppose . . .” he began. “Did Raj say anything to you about what he thinks happened? I mean, to Marcie?”

  “No. I mean, he couldn’t, could he. Not yet.”

  “But it . . . you saw it,” he said. “I mean, you saw the open window. I mean, I don’t want to say it, but did it sound like he was thinking there’s something . . . wrong?”

  Emma felt her brows knit. “Do you think there’s something wrong?”

  “She’s dead—of course there’s something wrong!” Frank snapped. Then he sighed. “That wasn’t fair. It’s just, there’ve been . . .” Suddenly Frank seemed unable to look at her. He looked at his shoes, at the counter, at the windows. “It’s what I was trying to tell him. There’ve been problems lately, and Marcie’s been . . .” He stopped. “Well, when she wasn’t home for dinner last night, I was worried. I tried to text, but she didn’t answer.”

  Outside, Genny was walking carefully down the stairs from the car park carrying three stacked bins. There was a low thud, thud as she kicked the door to be let in.

  Emma scurried to open the door. Genny stood at the foot of the ste
ps, almost hidden by her stack of bins. Emma grabbed two off the top. Frank came over and grabbed one of Emma’s.

  “Marcie did stop by the King’s Rest late last night,” said Emma. “She had a check to drop off for Angelique.”

  “She did?” Frank put the bin on the counter. “I don’t suppose you know where she was before that?”

  Genny wagged her eyebrows at Emma. Emma shooed her away.

  “No, sorry. She didn’t mention it.” Emma paused, and wrestled with her curiosity for a few seconds. Curiosity won. “I guess she didn’t say anything to you either?”

  Frank shook his head. “No. We . . .” He sighed. “Feels a bit like airing the dirty laundry in public, but I expect you’ll hear soon enough.” He looked at Genny. Genny busied herself with pulling Emma’s checklist out of the portfolio and pretending to read it over.

  “My sister and I did not get along very well,” Frank went on. “We fought over my divorce from Helen and never really made it up.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.”

  He shrugged. “I sometimes think our parents did her a disservice when they left her the grange. It kept her locked in here, isolated from the real world. She didn’t . . . she didn’t understand people very well, or how things actually work. She had control of a lot of money and I always worried somebody was going to take advantage, if you know what I mean.”

  Emma thought about Marcie facing down Caite in front of the board. She hadn’t struck Emma as someone disconnected or out of her depth.

  “But she never married?”

  “Only one of us who didn’t. Considering how that all worked out, maybe she understood people better than I thought. No.” He sighed. “She had her house and her books, and the festival every year, of course. That seemed to be enough. I did think . . . I do think . . . maybe it wasn’t the healthiest life. I should have said something sooner, but I’m only here for the occasional weekend these days and . . . I guess it was easier to believe she’d muddle through somehow.” For a moment, Frank stared out the windows, seeing nothing but the thoughts inside his own mind. Then he shook himself. “I’d better get upstairs. I’m sure Raj will have some more questions and, well, my brothers and Helen, they don’t get on. It could get ugly. Uglier. We’ll be in the sitting room, I’m sure, when that tea’s ready. Turn left out the door, take the stairs at the end of the hall, then turn to your right, go under the landing and then straight on ’til morning.”