As I squelched into the larger bedroom, I made a mental note to buy a copy of Wuthering Heights for the nursery at home. Bess rarely had a restless night, but when she did, a literary sleep aid might come in handy.
She was the exact opposite of restless as she napped in the hotel’s crib. I paused to smile down at her, then hung my jacket on the showerhead in the bathroom, draped my wet clothes on the towel warmer, dressed in soft jeans, wool socks, and a fleece pullover, and returned to the sitting room, taking care to shut the bedroom door behind me.
Bree was in the kitchenette, pouring boiling water from an electric kettle into the dainty teapot.
“No need to order a fresh pot,” she said over her shoulder. “I found tea bags in the cupboard, and I’ve barely touched the cream and sugar Francesco delivered earlier.” She put the lid on the teapot, then turned to face me. “Well? What’s the verdict? Is Mrs. Craven guilty or not guilty?”
“I hate to say it,” I said, “but the jury’s still out.”
“What does Hayley Calthorp think?” Bree asked.
“Hayley Calthorp thinks Mrs. Craven is as pure as the driven snow.” I poured myself a cup of weak but steaming tea and carried it into the sitting room. “But Minnie Jessop and her cronies think differently—very differently.”
“Who’s Minnie Jessop?” Bree asked, resuming her perch on the sofa.
I sank into an armchair, wrapped my chilled hands around my teacup, and began, “Minnie Jessop is a purveyor of nasty rumors. . . .” It took me less than twenty minutes to summarize everything I’d learned at Nash’s News.
“Poor Ted Fletcher,” Bree said when I fell silent. “I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead, but . . . ick.” She folded her arms across her chest and shuddered. “Can you imagine what it must have been like to pull his body out of the slurry pit?”
“I’d rather not, thanks.” I sipped my tea and let my gaze drift toward Moo. “I’ll never look at Mr. Malvern’s dairy farm in quite the same way again.”
“I suppose they have to put the muck somewhere,” Bree said. “As for the widow’s curse . . .” She tossed her head derisively. “We’ve gone from a spy novel to a fairy tale—an extra-grim fairy tale.”
“The same thought crossed my mind,” I said. “I was ready to write off Bob Nash and Minnie Jessop as a pair of cranks until—”
“Until Hayley Calthorp mentioned the rosebushes,” Bree broke in, nodding. “That part gave me the creeps, too.”
“Psychopaths are supposed to be good at fooling people,” I said, staring pensively into the fire. “Mrs. Craven told me that she fooled the nice young constable who questioned her after Zach Trotter disappeared. She practically bragged about it.” I turned my head to look at Bree. “What if she fooled Hayley’s gran as well? What if Minnie Jessop is right about Mrs. Craven, and Hayley Calthorp is wrong?”
“No two ways about it,” Bree said decisively. “We have to pay a call on Minnie Jessop.”
“I agree,” I said. “We’ll take a look at Dovecote tomorrow morning, then knock on Minnie’s door. Something tells me that she won’t be reluctant to speak with us.”
“She’ll probably talk our ears off.” Bree ran a hand through her pixie cut and glanced toward the windows. “Are we done for the day, then?”
“I am,” I said. “I need to recharge my batteries before I face Old Cowerton again.”
Bree bounced to her feet. “While you recharge,” she said, “I’ll go for a swim.”
“Did you bring a bathing suit?” I asked, surprised.
“No,” she replied blithely. “I thought I’d liven up the place by skinny dipping. It’s a Kiwi thing. We always swim au naturel.” She kept a straight face for a heartbeat, then dissolved into giggles. “Of course I brought a swimsuit, Lori! Didn’t you?”
“No,” I said. “I was too busy packing diapers and whole-grain crackers to think about packing a swimsuit.”
“Never mind,” Bree said, heading for her bedroom. “If you ask nicely, I’m sure Francesco will fly a seamstress in from Milan to make one for you.”
I was dying to see if Bree would don a bikini or a tank suit or a glittering King Neptune costume, but I didn’t get the chance. She left the suite swaddled in a White Hart bathrobe.
I finished my tea in one quick gulp, then placed my cup on the coffee table and pulled the blue journal from my shoulder bag. With Bess in dreamland and Bree in the pool, I could tell Aunt Dimity where my incurable curiosity had taken me.
“Dimity?” I said as I opened the journal. “Bree Pym, Bess, and I are sharing a suite at the extremely fancy White Hart Hotel in Old Cowerton—Mrs. Craven’s old hometown.”
I felt myself relax as Aunt Dimity’s familiar copperplate began to scroll across the blank page.
I won’t pretend to be surprised, my dear. I knew that your sense of justice wouldn’t allow you to sit at home, twiddling your thumbs, while a potential wolf in sheep’s clothing lurked among your unsuspecting neighbors. Did you recruit Bree to travel with you? What a clever thing to do!
“I didn’t have to recruit Bree,” I explained, pleased to be praised for my sense of justice instead of my nosiness. “Once I told her about Mrs. Craven’s crazy confession, she insisted on coming with me.”
Again, I’m not surprised. Bree is a darling girl and an asset to any investigation. Have you been in Old Cowerton long enough to learn anything of value?
“We’ve learned quite a few things,” I said. “Whether they’re of value or not remains to be seen. Our personal concierge—” I broke off as a single line of graceful script raced across the page.
You have a personal concierge?
“We do,” I said, blushing. “I told you: The White Hart is extremely fancy.”
It must be.
“Our personal concierge is named Francesco,” I continued stoically. “When we asked Francesco about Annabelle Trotter, he hinted that we should rethink our plan to ask the townspeople about her. He warned us that her name might arouse strong feelings in Old Cowerton. And he was right.”
I described our disturbing encounter with Bob Nash at the Willows Café and recounted my lengthy chat with Hayley Calthorp at Nash’s News. When I finished, I sat back to await Aunt Dimity’s response. Her first comment was somewhat unexpected.
I knew that Bess’s presence would help rather than hinder your inquiry. She broke the ice with both Mr. Nash and Hayley Calthorp.
“Bess threw Moo at Mr. Nash,” I agreed, “but she didn’t even throw a glance at Hayley Calthorp.”
Precisely. Hayley decided that you must be a sensible person as well as a responsible parent because you didn’t allow Bess to rampage through her shop. Respect and gratitude made her warm to you and loosened her tongue.
“I’ll thank Bess when she wakes up,” I said, smiling, “but I’m pretty sure that Hayley’s tongue would have been loosened by anyone who said nice things about Mrs. Craven.”
Your microscopic survey seems to indicate that the town is divided into two factions.
“Two warring factions,” I said, remembering Mr. Nash’s flushed face. “The Hayley Calthorp faction believes that Annabelle couldn’t hurt a fly and that the widow’s curse is a load of old rubbish. The Minnie Jessop faction is convinced that she’s responsible for bumping off Zach Trotter and cursing Ted Fletcher.” I wrinkled my nose. “Poor Ted. Can you think of a worse way to die?”
We can only hope that the fumes rendered him unconscious before he drowned.
“Fumes?” I echoed, aghast.
Slurry pits can emit poisonous gases.
“Good grief,” I murmured, pressing a hand to my lips.
Hayley Calthorp wasn’t being melodramatic when she said that dairy farms can be dangerous places, Lori. They were even more dangerous in Ted Fletcher’s time. There were minimal safety regulations in those days. Slurry pits were
n’t required to have fences with locked gates, and dairymen were allowed to work alone near them. If a dairyman was overcome by fumes, or if he slipped and fell into a pit, there was no one to sound the alarm, much less to rescue him. People who complain about health and safety laws don’t remember—or don’t realize—what workplaces were like before health and safety laws. Elementary precautions were ignored and the workingman paid the price.
“Ted Fletcher paid the ultimate price,” I said, “but it wasn’t because of the widow’s curse.”
Of course it wasn’t. Minnie Jessop must have a vivid and a rather morbid imagination.
“I’ll let you know,” I said. “Bree and I intend to visit her tomorrow morning, after we check out Dovecote.” I smiled wryly. “I may have to handcuff Bree to the pram to keep her from climbing into the back garden to dig up the rosebushes.”
Her enthusiasm does her credit. I would, however, discourage her from purchasing a spade. To review: Dovecote was the Trotters’ home and the Trotters lived next door to Minnie Jessop.
“They lived adjacent to her,” I clarified, “in a row house—one of the ‘homes for heroes’ built on the edge of town after the war.”
As I recall, the so-called homes for heroes were produced cheaply and quickly. Most had rudimentary plumbing and paper-thin walls. A row house with paper-thin walls isn’t an ideal home for a newlywed couple, but it would be a gift to a dedicated gossip.
“One can’t avoid hearing one’s neighbors through paper-thin walls,” I said, nodding.
I advise you to ask Minnie Jessop what she heard on the night Zach Trotter disappeared.
“We may not have to ask,” I said. “Zach Trotter’s disappearance seems to be Minnie’s favorite subject.”
Indeed it does, which is why you must examine Dovecote and its surroundings carefully. How many houses overlook the Trotters’ back garden? Did someone other than Minnie Jessop witness suspicious activity near the rosebushes on the night in question?
“Annabelle left Dovecote a long time ago,” I pointed out. “I imagine most of her former neighbors have either passed away or moved away.”
You never know. There may be a few neighbors who’ve hung on, as Minnie Jessop has.
“If they’re alive, Bree and I will do our best to find them,” I promised.
After you survey Dovecote, you must persuade Minnie Jessop to invite you into her home.
“Why?” I asked.
Row houses tend to have identical floor plans, Lori. Once you’re inside Minnie Jessop’s house, you’ll be able to study a reasonable facsimile of the alleged crime scene.
“According to Hayley, the houses have been improved since they were built,” I said. “They may have been remodeled.”
Even so, you should be able to glean relevant information from Minnie Jessop’s floor plan. Hayley Calthorp told you that Zach Trotter was big and tall, didn’t she?
“Yes,” I said. “She described prewar Zach as big, tall, good-looking, and polite.”
Let’s focus on his size for the moment, shall we? When you’re in Minnie Jessop’s house, try to gauge how far the bottom of the staircase is from the back door. Ask yourself if a petite young woman could drag a big, tall, and no doubt heavy corpse such a distance. Look for obstacles that might have impeded her progress. Is there a raised threshold, perhaps, or an impossibly awkward turn?
“I’ll give it a test run,” I agreed. “I’ll try to push the pram through Minnie’s house to her back garden.”
An excellent notion. If the pram gets stuck, chances are that a corpse would get stuck, too.
“A corpse would be more flexible than a pram, though,” I said reflectively. “After the rigor passed off, it would bend around corners.”
Oh, dear. What a distressing image.
“We’re investigating a possible homicide,” I reminded her. “Distressing images come with the territory. Annabelle didn’t wrap Zach in tissue paper and slap a bow on his nose after she smashed his head in. She claims that she rolled him onto a rug. All I’m saying is, a body on a rug would bend more easily than Bess’s pram.”
Forgive me, Lori. You’re quite right. It’s no time to be squeamish. Perhaps Bree would volunteer to be rolled onto a rug. I’m sure Minnie Jessop would approve of the reenactment.
“She probably would,” I said, “but I’m not going to dump Bree on a rug and drag her through a stranger’s house, just to prove that it could be done. Besides, Bree isn’t big or tall. She’s as short as I am and much slimmer.”
You must do as you think best, my dear. The pram may produce limited results, but limited results are better than no results at all.
I heard the click of a lock in the foyer and grabbed my shoulder bag.
“Bree’s back,” I whispered. “Gotta go. More tomorrow.”
Before I closed the blue journal, I caught of glimpse of Aunt Dimity’s parting words.
Good luck!
I thrust the journal into my shoulder bag and threw the bag onto the coffee table mere seconds before Bree came through from the foyer.
“The pool’s heated,” she said, flopping limply on the sofa. “I had it all to myself until every mummy and daddy in the known universe decided that swimming would be an excellent rainy-day activity for the kiddies. I was suddenly surrounded by a thousand screaming children doing cannonballs.”
“What did you do?” I asked, laughing. “Hide in the sauna?”
“Nope,” she replied. “I had a massage. Ask for Mariana. Her hands should be immortalized in marble. What are we doing for dinner?”
“Would you mind room service?” I asked. “Bess has had to deal with a lot of new sights and sounds today. She’ll sleep better tonight if we keep her in more or less familiar surroundings.”
“Room service works for me,” said Bree.
“Will an early night work as well?” I said. “I can just about guarantee that Bess will be up by seven tomorrow.”
“I was counting on an early night,” said Bree, rubbing her eyes. “If I were Bess’s age—or Mrs. Craven’s—I’d take a nap right now.” She yawned loudly. “I blame Mariana. I’m so unwound I can hardly sit up straight.”
“Go ahead,” I told her. “You’re on holiday. You can take as many naps as you like.”
“What will you do while Bess and I are snoozing?” Bree asked, standing.
“Contemplate tomorrow,” I said. “And make another attempt to reach Bill.”
“Too energetic for me,” she said. “See you in forty winks!”
She retreated to her bedroom and I took my cell phone from my shoulder bag. When Bill proved to be unreachable yet again, I rested my head against the back of the armchair and rehearsed the questions I would ask Minnie Jessop, if she opened her door to us. The sound of rain falling in the walled garden made it difficult to concentrate, however, and the flickering fire was more soothing than a Mariana massage.
Before I knew it, I was napping, too.
Eleven
We rose from our naps with energy to spare. A brisk wind had chased the rain away, but it was blowing too hard for comfort, so we stayed indoors. To keep Bess from going stir crazy, Bree and I took her for a long walk up and down the hotel’s corridors. We were in the library, searching for a copy of Pride and Prejudice, when my cell phone rang. I pulled it out of my trouser pocket and scanned the small screen.
“It’s Bill!” I exclaimed.
“Let’s hope you can hear him this time,” said Bree.
As we were the library’s only patrons, I didn’t hesitate to fling myself into a chair and answer the call. To my relief, my husband’s voice came through loud and clear.
“Lori?” he said. “Sorry about being out of touch. Our campsite was in a dead spot.”
“Was?” I queried. “Have you moved to a different campsite?”
“I found a
better site in Grasmere,” he replied. “It’s not quite so far off the beaten track.”
“I tried calling you several times at your old campsite,” I told him. “Did any of my messages get through to you?”
“Something about a girls’ getaway?” he hazarded.
“Bingo,” I said. “Bree Pym, Bess, and I are staying at a spa hotel in a place called Old Cowerton. It’s not far from Finch.”
“Sounds ideal,” said Bill.
“How’s camping?” I asked.
“It’s great,” he replied. “We took the ferry across Lake Windermere to join a guided hike with a park ranger on Friday, we went fishing yesterday, and we’re going to Ravenglass tomorrow to ride the steam train.”
“Will and Rob will love the train,” I said. “Let me speak with them, will you?”
“Can’t,” said Bill. “They’re down at the lake, skipping stones. Don’t worry,” he added hastily, “I can see them, and they’re still high and dry. Well, they’re mostly dry. Is Bess with you?”
“Of course,” I said. “I’ll put her on.”
I held the phone to Bess’s ear and watched with pleasure as her face lit up. She told her daddy all about Francesco, Moo, and our run-in with Mr. Nash, but since Bill wasn’t as fluent in baby talk as I was, he didn’t understand her. He understood me, however, and while I refrained from telling him the real reason for our visit to Old Cowerton, I also refrained from telling him any outright lies.
“They’re having a complete blast,” I reported to Bree after Bill and I had said our good-byes. “Hiking, fishing, steam trains—”
“No murders, curses, or grisly accidents?” Bree interrupted. “How dull.”
“I’m just happy they’re having better luck with the weather than we are,” I said. “When I think of them sleeping in a tent, I almost feel guilty about our fabulous suite.” I stashed the phone in my pocket and grinned. “Almost.”
Bess made an unsteady dash for freedom, but Francesco appeared in the nick of time to prevent her escape. As he entered the library, he scooped her up, turned her around, planted her on her feet, and herded her toward me like an affectionate sheepdog.
Aunt Dimity and the Widow's Curse Page 9
