Emma found she was not in a mood to argue.
Oliver, of course got his bowl of kibble. He tried the fish, but politely declined, after the chilies made him sneeze, and shake his mouth, and paw his nose.
Emma tried very hard not to laugh. She failed.
Not to be left out, Daniel had decided to show off his own baking skills for the occasion. At the meal’s finish, while Angelique set up the tea things, he produced a sticky toffee pudding so good that Emma announced she was going on strike until he gave her the recipe.
She was sorry when the last crumbs were scooped up and the cups refilled. Not because it was delicious, which it was, but because for a moment, she’d been able to set aside everything that had happened at the grange and simply be with friends. But now all her worries were starting to creep back in. She couldn’t help wondering what was happening back at the grange tonight with Bert and Frank left to themselves inside that dark, silent house. She wondered where Gus was, and if he’d decided to come back or—and she could barely believe this was a real possibility—he had gone to stay with Caite.
And then there was the question of what Oliver had really discovered in the shed and how was she going to get in there to find out?
Daphne offered to help Daniel with the dishes. As they were all piling them into one of the B&B’s bins, Helen drained her mug of tea.
“I think I’m going up to bed,” she told them. “I could really use a minute’s quiet. Thank you for the dinner. It was magnificent.”
Everyone wished Helen good night. Daphne kissed her mother on the cheek and followed Daniel into the kitchen, carrying a stack of dessert plates.
“So.” Angelique poured herself another cup of tea. “From what Pearl says, you all had an interesting day.”
“That’s one way to put it,” said Pearl. She gestured toward Emma with her tea mug. “You first?”
Emma hesitated. Oliver, ever on the alert for her mood changes, pawed at her jeans. Emma scooped him into her lap, and he snuggled down. Emma scritched his ears and was rewarded by a gigantic, and rather dog-breathful, yawn.
“Well,” she began. “When we got there this morning, the family was in kind of a state—”
“A positive tizzy even,” drawled Pearl. Emma waved her off.
“—because nobody could find Marcie’s will. Turns out, she’d hired her own solicitor without telling the family. It further turns out she’d had a new will made just last year, and it left everything to Helen and Daphne.”
“Wait,” said Angelique. “I thought Daphne had turned the inheritance down.”
“She did, but this will was made before she and Marcie had that conversation.”
“Huh. Seems a bit backward,” said Genny.
“Well, that would depend, wouldn’t it?” said Angelique. “Is she actually trying to give the grange to somebody, or does she just want to keep it away from somebody else? Maybe Marcie meant the will as a temporary measure. Something she could do until she had a better solution.”
“There’s a thought,” said Pearl. “Makes you wonder what happened last year.”
“Well, we know one thing that did,” said Emma. “Somebody started quietly selling some of the grange’s more valuable antiques.”
“That’ll get the family knickers in a twist,” said Genny. “How do we know this?”
“Marcie left the evidence with her solicitor, the one who drafted the will.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t Marcie who was selling things off?” asked Pearl. “And trying to hide it from her brothers? I mean, we’ve heard the grange was having money troubles.”
“It’s possible,” said Emma. “But if that’s true, then it means something changed in this balancing act Marcie had kept up for years.”
“So we’re back to what happened last year?”
“Well, something else that happened was a change in Gus’s relationship status,” said Pearl.
“Gus is seeing someone?” said Genny.
Emma nodded. “Gus is seeing the Hyphenated Caite.”
Genny’s eyes bulged as she tried to hold back a spit take. “Hyphenated Caite and Gus?”
“It’s true,” said Pearl. “There’s pictures. At least one. And they left together today.”
“Wow.” Genny shook her head. “Well, you know what? Good for them. I mean, she’s an absolutely awful person, but he’s nobody’s prize either. Maybe they’ll take the edges off each other.”
“Two wrongs making a right?” suggested Pearl with exaggerated innocence.
“I’d agree with you, Genny, except”—Emma paused, trying to collect her words—“I’m starting to wonder whether they might be working together.”
“What do you mean?” asked Angelique.
“What we did not find was Marcie’s handbag, her appointment planner or her mobile.”
“That’s a lot to go missing,” said Genny.
“What has also gone missing is a whole month’s worth of Marcie’s appointments off her computer, and we know that during that time she met at least once with an agent from Christie’s real estate.”
“Real estate?” exclaimed Angelique. “She was going to sell some of the land?”
“She was going to sell off the land,” said Pearl. “And the house. The lot, or at least most of it.”
“Impossible. Bert would never let her,” said Genny immediately.
“How could he stop her?” asked Pearl. “The place was hers.”
“Yeah, tell Bert that.” Genny waved her mug at Pearl. “Or Frank,” she added.
“Maybe she tried,” murmured Angelique. “Maybe that’s why she’s dead.”
Genny pulled a face. “Oh, lord. You’re right. I’d believe that as a motive for either one of them.”
“I think it was a motive for Caite and Gus too,” said Emma. “I think Caite deleted the information on Marcie’s computer and stole her handbag so no one would find out about those meetings with the estate agent.”
“But why would she?” asked Genny. “What could it matter that Marcie wanted to sell?”
“Because,” said Pearl slowly, “everybody, including Gus, thought Gus was supposed to inherit—”
“So if Marcie was going to sell the grange, that would have been that,” said Angelique.
“And if Gus had found out about the sale, he would have had a very strong motive for murder,” added Pearl.
Emma swallowed. “And so would Caite.”
46
“Oh . . . my,” breathed Genny.
“But why would Caite get involved with something like this?” Angelique frowned and swirled the dregs of her tea. “It’s a terrible risk. I know she didn’t like Marcie, but despite what they tell you on the BBC, literary society politics seldom lead to murder.”
“How about for revenge?” said Emma.
“Revenge?” said Genny.
Emma nodded. “Caite blames the Cochrane family for her father’s suicide. And she might be right.”
“Wait, what?” said Genny. “I hadn’t heard this one.”
Angelique nodded. “Her father, Archie, was a lawyer and he found out that Richard Cochrane had been profiting off some shady deals in the City,” Emma told them. “Archie made the mistake of saying something about it. Richard took exception and started a whispering campaign. Archie lost his firm and had to accept a position out of town. He never recovered.”
“That’s awful!” Genny looked down into her tea. “Honestly, I never thought I’d be sorry for the Hyphenated Caite, but that really is too bad.”
“It’s also a motive.”
“I can see it,” said Genny. “She seduces poor Gus—”
“Ew!” exclaimed Pearl.
“Needs must,” Genny reminded her. “And she thinks he’s going to inherit the property, right? So she does what she has to, a
nd when she’s got him, she plans Marcie’s murder. She makes it look like suicide, so Gus will be able to inherit right away—”
“And also not suspect her,” said Pearl.
“Right,” said Genny. “It also removes the possibility of a messy inquest or risk of a police investigation. Living well in the house that used to belong to the people who destroyed your family is the best revenge.”
“Look, I’ve got to say, as a motive, it’s nice and simple,” mused Genny. “But we can’t be sure it was Gus. None of the brothers would want Marcie to sell. Partly because they love to boast about the ancestral home, but really because they couldn’t be sure she would share the profits.”
Pearl set her mug down. “I hadn’t thought of that. She could have just tossed them all out the door and gone off to St. Kitts with the cash.”
“I don’t think Marcie would do such a thing,” said Angelique.
“But what would the brothers think?” put in Genny.
Angelique nodded. “That would be the question, wouldn’t it?”
“And there’s signs that Marcie was becoming disillusioned with the Cochranes as a whole,” said Pearl. “Not only did she know somebody was stealing from the estate—”
“If she wasn’t the one doing the stealing,” said Genny.
“Right, but say she wasn’t. Say she found out that one of the brothers was. She was also digging into the old accidents—Stewart Cochrane’s boating accident and her own parents’ car accident. Maybe she found out, or thought she found out, that they were something more than accidents. I found two ledgers in her office, with press clippings and reports and all that, about both accidents.”
“That’s a stretch,” said Angelique. “I never heard anybody say anything about old Mr. Cochrane’s accident being anything other than a bad combination of a fast car and Irish whiskey.”
“Yeah, but things can get covered up,” said Pearl. “And the Cochranes are good at that.”
“As everybody knows,” added Genny.
“So, maybe Marcie did find out something,” Pearl went on. “And maybe she decided she doesn’t want any part of this legacy anymore.”
“That I could believe,” said Angelique. “The straw that broke the camel’s back.”
“It’s a good theory,” said Pearl. “But honestly, if it’s any one of the brothers, I’m betting it’s Bert. He’s the long-term planner, and family is everything to him. Well, okay, family reputation is everything.”
“Important distinction, that,” agreed Angelique.
“And Bert’s the one who pushed to get the death declared a suicide as fast as possible,” said Emma. “And if he’d found out from the family solicitor there was no will that they knew about, he’d know he had a chance to inherit at least some of it. At the very least, he would have assumed that he would be able to bully Gus more easily than he’d been able to bully Marcie.”
“But we need to think about Frank too, don’t we?” said Genny. “He’s always been in Bert’s shadow. Wants to be the big man, but he’s never quite been able to make it work. Maybe this would be his chance. Save the house for himself and his whole family.”
“Possibly,” said Emma. “Or maybe he’s helping whoever did it, and plans on turning them in later.”
“That’d be a risky strategy,” said Pearl.
“Well, Frank’s not the smartest of that bunch,” said Angelique. “He’s spent years believing that Helen is going to come back to him.” She shifted in her chair.
Genny sucked in a sudden breath.
“What is it?” asked Pearl.
“Well, I hate to say it, but that’s another possibility.”
“Oh, you are not thinking it was Helen?” said Pearl.
“Of course I’m not,” said Genny quickly. “But other people might. Maybe she decided she wanted the place for herself. And she was Marcie’s best friend. That makes her one of the few people who might have known the will was already written in her favor.” She paused, and went on more slowly. “Then, when Daphne turns down the inheritance, Helen decides it’s too much to just throw away. I’m not saying I believe it,” Genny added. “But if and when this goes to the police, they’re going to be looking right at her.”
“What do you think, Emma?” asked Pearl.
Emma laid her hand on Oliver’s warm back. He was asleep, his nose tucked under one paw.
“I think it’s weird,” she said.
“Weird how?” asked Angelique.
“None of this stuff adds up. Not really. We know Marcie died. We know her body was moved. We know that the way she was found looked like suicide. But the latch on the window was broken, maybe tampered with. And these ledgers with all the information about the other important accidents in the Cochrane history are left where anybody can find them—”
“Thank you very much,” said Pearl.
“Sorry. Bad choice of words. Add that to all the things that went missing, with Marcie’s handbag, and the schedule on her computer. I mean, for a situation that’s supposed to look like suicide, really it couldn’t look much more like murder if you tried.”
“So what do you think happened?” asked Genny.
“I don’t know,” said Emma gloomily. “I wish I did. But I don’t.”
Pearl pushed her tea mug away from her. “I’ve just had a very nasty idea.”
“Well, out with it,” said Angelique.
“The bank theft, from the du Maurier society . . . could Caite have done it herself?”
“Easily, assuming she told me the truth about what happened,” said Emma.
“So, what if that was part of the setup? To make Marcie’s death look like suicide?”
“To make it seem that since the estate was in so much trouble, Marcie robbed the literary society, and when that wasn’t enough, she fell into despair and killed herself?”
“After destroying the evidence of her theft,” Pearl pointed out.
“It’s a stretch,” said Emma. “But I mean, maybe.”
“It wouldn’t be that hard,” said Pearl. “Caite follows her home the night of the murder, kills her, and then she puts her up at the window and gets out of there.”
“With or without Gus’s help?” asked Genny.
“Either way,” said Pearl. “We already know she could get in and out of that house on her own.”
“I thought you were Team Bert.”
Pearl shrugged. “A girl can change her mind, can’t she?”
“Marcie was a pretty substantial person,” Angelique reminded her. “I can’t see Caite moving her body on her own. And somebody cleaned up the trail.”
And then hid the murder weapon in the shed and tossed the handbag in the pond, thought Emma. Assuming that was what Oliver saw happen. It was certainly possible.
“Then she did it with Gus’s help,” said Pearl. “Gus finally wanted to be able to lord it over his brothers, and Caite wanted to take everything away from the family that destroyed hers.”
“But wait,” said Angelique. “If Caite was there that night, why not take the handbag and all then? Why wait until the next day?”
“Maybe she got interrupted? Or she didn’t think about it?” Pearl shrugged. “I mean, there was kind of a lot going on.”
There’s a lot going on now. Emma drummed her fingers against the table. “We’re missing something,” she said. “What we’ve got now doesn’t add up.”
Then, she yawned, loudly enough that Oliver kicked and woke himself up with a snort.
“What? What?”
“Oh, gosh.” Emma covered her mouth. “Sorry!”
“Well, that says it all,” said Angelique. “It’s past time we all got some rest.”
“But, Ma, it’s not even nine o’clock . . .” began Pearl.
“No buts. If you feel moved to go over this . . . eviden
ce all night, that’s fine, but Emma needs to get home. No one is going to do anyone any good if they’re falling asleep in their tea.”
“I’m afraid you’re right,” said Emma sheepishly.
“I’ll take you back.” Genny got to her feet. “I was thinking of heading home myself. I’m sure most of the explosions are over by now and the worst of the junk food is all cleaned up.”
“Thanks, Genny.” Emma set Oliver down on the floor. “Let me just go say good night to Daphne.”
Emma, with Oliver following, headed for the kitchen, but before she got there, she saw Daphne, sitting just outside the gate, arms around her knees, staring out at the car park. Oliver whined and wagged, and Emma pushed open the door.
Oliver bounced up to Daphne. Daphne rubbed his head, absently.
“I didn’t see you there,” said Emma. “Um, I guess you heard all that?”
“Some of it,” said Daphne. “You know, when I asked you to find out what really happened to Aunt Marcie, I never thought it’d go like this.”
“I’m sorry.” Emma sat down beside her.
“I mean, I really did think maybe Bert did something, yeah? But I didn’t think there’d be all this circling round and wondering and being afraid. And I really never thought I’d have to worry that somebody might think it was me and Mum.”
“We’ll figure it out,” said Emma.
Oliver put his nose on Daphne’s knee. “Will you?” she breathed. “You promise, old chum?”
“Emma promises,” whined Oliver. “That’s what’s important.”
Emma sighed and rubbed his head. She just wished she felt half as sure.
47
Genny dropped Emma and Oliver off at Nancarrow with another stern admonishment that she should go straight to bed.
“I mean it, Emma,” Genny said firmly. “No Marpleing after nine p.m.”
“Marpleing?”
“You know what I mean.”
“I do, and I think I should be worried about that.”
When they got inside, Emma dropped all the ledgers on her kitchen table and stared at them. She reached out to flip one open. Oliver, who evidently decided that he should be acting in corgi parentis, bonked her calf.
Murder Always Barks Twice Page 27
