The Valentine's Day Mini-Mystery Compendium

by T B Audrey

  “I thought Bullet needed a break,” I said, smiling.

  “Well.” His face turned a light shade of red. I could see why Bianca had a thing for him. Up close, his craggy face had a sort of rugged charm and I liked the way he smiled. It was crooked and carefree. “Don’t tell anyone, but that may have been a little white lie.”

  “Ah. Your secret is safe with me.”

  He led Bullet back out into the arena and helped me mount him. The big horse felt strange beneath me and I nudged him hesitantly to get him walking. For the first few minutes, I was totally concentrated on Bullet, but after I became accustomed to the rocking motion of his walking, I turned my attention to John.

  “Bianca speaks very highly of you,” I said, circling John slowly. Bullet had settled into a slow walk. “She’s the one who recommended I try riding today.”

  “Is that right?” John didn’t meet my eye. Instead, he stared at Bullet’s flank.

  “Yes. She’s such a sweet girl. I wonder why she isn’t married?” I said. I wasn’t really expecting an answer, and I didn’t get one. John lowered his brows and gave me a strange look.

  I patted Bullet’s neck distractedly. Was Bianca married? I’d never asked, but she had never mentioned a husband. Surely not.

  John encouraged me to try some exercises, so I took Bullet through a series of cones at a trot and walked him over some poles that John pulled into the arena for me.

  “Try trotting over them,” John said, with an encouraging smile. I could tell he enjoyed having a student who wanted to do more than plod around in circles.

  I prodded Bullet into a trot and took him around the arena once, aiming him at the three poles on the ground when we came back around. He did not slow as he approached them. He trotted right through without touching a single one. I bounced up and down on his back quite a bit, but I was proud all the same.

  “Good job,” a female voice said. John and I looked over to see Cicily leaning on the fence.

  I guided Bullet over to stand next to her and John moseyed over as well. “We get a break between breakfast and lunch,” she told me. “I like to come out and visit with the horses.”

  She reached out a delicate hand to rub Bullet’s neck. He nudged her shoulder with his nose.

  “He’s wondering where his treats are,” John said. He smiled crookedly.

  “Didn’t bring any today, boy,” Cicily said, rubbing the soft, velvety part of his brown nose. “Sorry.”

  “Try cantering him.” Cicily added to me. “He’s wonderful.”

  After about fifteen more minutes of riding, I managed to get him up into a canter. I felt exhilarated, but exhausted, when I finally slid out of the saddle. Cicily came over to give Bullet one last pat and excused herself.

  “Got to get back to work,” she said.

  John patted her on the shoulder affectionately. “Don’t work too hard. Make Rob do his part.”

  Cicily laughed. “I will.”

  She walked slowly back toward the house, John’s eyes on her back. He shook his head and took Bullet’s reins from me.

  “Can I untack him?” I asked, before he could lead him away. He looked surprised, but agreed.

  “It’s not often that guests want to do the work part of riding,” he said, leaning against the stall door while I pulled the saddle off of Bullet and set it on a nearby saddle stand.

  “Well, I like this part,” I said. “I used to ride often when I was younger. I miss it, the barn almost more the riding. The smells.” I inhaled deeply, taking in the scent of straw, leather, and horses.

  He nodded with complete understanding.

  “So, you and Cicily are friends?” I asked, taking Bullet’s blanket from his back. His brown coat was mussed and sweaty underneath. John took the blanket from me and hung it over the stall door.

  “She’s a sweet girl. I worry about her with that Rob. He’s no good,” he replied, frowning. “She likes the horses, so she comes out here often. When we’re not so busy, she rides out with me. It drives Rob crazy.”

  “Well,” I said, glancing at him. “I can’t say I blame him.”

  John laughed. “It’s not like that.”

  “Did they meet here? Cicily and Rob?” I asked.

  “No. Cicily was here before, I think. He came out to be with her.”

  That had possibilities. And they had come into the library while I was there. Maybe Cicily spent a lot of time in the library.

  Suddenly, I had an idea. Literature. The letters were discussions of literature.

  I finished rubbing down Bullet and thanked John before hurrying back toward the house.

  After the cool air outside, the house felt stuffy. I went into the dining room. It was empty. All the breakfast food had been removed and the tables reset for lunch, but lunch was not served until 11:30 a.m. I glanced at the clock in the lobby. 11:15.

  I was standing there trying to decide whether or not to peek into the kitchen to see if Cicily was in there when she walked in just behind me.

  “Ready for lunch already?” she asked with a smile.

  “Not quite,” I replied, clasping my hands in front of me. “I just had a quick question for you. You were in the library before when I was looking for books. I thought you might know where to locate a specific book I’m looking for.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Mrs. Walker,” Cicily said, she twirled a strand of brown hair around her finger. The ponytail had been let loose, and her hair fell down almost to her waist. “I’m not much of reader. To be honest, I’ve never read any books in that library, so I don’t know them well. Rob and I go there sometimes on our breaks, just so we can be alone. The guests hardly ever go in there. You should ask Joanne. She knows the library like the back of her hand.”

  “Joanne?” I said thoughtfully. “Thank you, Cicily.”

  “Sorry I couldn’t help you more,” Cicily said. “Bring your husband down for lunch. Lavinia has outdone herself. Shepherd’s pie and it’s amazing.”

  I thanked her again, promising to return for Shepherd’s pie, and set off for room 213.

  “I think I have found the receiver of our love letters,” I told Dave triumphantly when I reached the room.

  He looked up at me from the bed. His laptop was closed and his cell phone was nowhere in sight. “That’s good,” he replied. “Who is it?”

  “Joanne!”

  “Really?” he asked.

  “Yes, but obviously she never left. She stayed right here and the romance faded. She chose Samson’s Corner over her lover,” I ended dramatically.

  “Wow. You really are enjoying this, aren’t you?”

  I nodded and sat down next to him on the bed. He sat up and put his arms around my waist.

  “Are you going to give her the letters? She may not want one of her guests taking off with her memories.”

  “True.” I went over to the desk and took the letters out of the drawer. “I suppose I should give them to her. She might have forgotten they existed at all.”

  “I’d like to see this,” Dave said.

  We went in search of Joanne together. She wasn’t in the dining room or the library, so we checked with Bianca at the front desk.

  “She’s probably in her office,” Bianca said. “I’ll check for you.”

  “Would it be possible for us to talk to her there?” I asked. “This matter is a bit… personal.”

  Bianca paused and looked like she was about to ask a question but stopped herself. “Of course. Follow me.”

  She led us down a hallway behind the reception area and stopped in front of an ancient looking door with a variety of scuff marks and stains on the lower portion. She knocked.

  “Yes?” Joanne’s tremulous voice came from inside.

  Bianca opened the door a crack and peered in. She said a few quick words, then opened it wide and gestured for us to go in.

  Joanna sat at a desk that looked almost as beat up as the door with piles of paper all around her. She removed the reading glasses that ha
d been perched on her nose and looked at them worriedly.

  “Nothing wrong, I hope?” she asked, setting the glasses on her desk next to a half-empty cup of coffee.

  “Not at all,” I said. “We’re enjoying our stay very much. Everything is wonderful.”

  “Sit down,” she said, gesturing toward two foldout chairs positioned across from her desk. The tiny room looked like it had once been a utility closet. Shelves still lined the walls and held various odds and ends needed to run a household.

  We sat across from her. I shivered. The metal chair felt like ice against the back of my arms.

  “It’s just that…” I paused. I hadn’t thought about how I was going to say this.

  “My wife ran across something in the library while she was looking for a book,” He looked at Joanne pointedly, obviously thinking she might remember what she had hidden there.

  Joanne’s face went red. “Oh, I’m terribly sorry. I will have a talk with them. This is not the first time and they have been warned before.”

  Dave and I glanced at each other. “No, it’s not that. Not what you think.”

  “Not Cicily and Rob?” she asked, her eyes wide.

  “No.” I laughed.

  “Oh, I apologize.” Her face went a shade redder. “What did you find then?”

  I handed her the letters, which I had bundled together with a rubber band. She looked at the bundle curiously and opened it. Dave and I sat silently by while she read several of the letters. When she looked up at us, she had tears in her eyes.

  “Oh, excuse me, I’m so sorry.” She got up and fled the room with a letter in her hand. A small sob escaped just as she reached the hallway.

  I looked at Dave and reached for his hand. He took my hand and squeezed it reassuringly. “Should we wait?” I asked quietly.

  “We should probably let her be alone,” he said.

  However, just as we reached the reception area, we ran into her. She was walking towards us with one arm around Bianca. Bianca now had tears in her eyes as well.

  “You found his letters,” she said. She wrapped her arms around me. I stiffened at the sudden affection from a near stranger. After a moment, I returned the embrace awkwardly.

  “They’re your letters?” I asked when she released me from her grasp. Mascara trails wound their way down her face and she rubbed futilely at them.

  “Yes,” she replied. “They’re mine. From my husband, Charlie.”

  “You’re married?” Dave asked, looking confused.

  “Was married, yes. Charles and I were high school sweethearts. He went to college and I stayed here. That’s when we exchanged these letters.”

  “What happened?” I asked quickly, my curiosity overtaking my sense of propriety.

  Bianca started to answer but Dave interrupted, “You don’t have to answer that. It’s obviously private.”

  Bianca shook her head, tears still leaking intermittently from her blue eyes. “No. It feels good to talk about it. I’ve been trying to avoid even thinking about this week since there’s all this Valentine’s Day hoopla, but it’s really better to just face it.”

  She took a deep breath and Joanne put a sympathetic hand on her shoulder. “I’m a widow. Charlie died in a car accident three years ago. I moved back here a year later because I didn’t know what else to do.”

  My heart felt like it came to a standstill and I felt suddenly nauseous. “I’m so sorry,” I said, reaching for her hand. Since I had read those letters, it felt somehow personal to me.

  “Wait… you grew up here?” Dave said. Understanding dawned on his face as he gazed at Bianca and Joanne standing next to each other.

  “That’s right. Joanne is my mother,” Bianca said. “Didn’t you know?”

  I put a hand over my face. “I had no idea.”

  “Didn’t you see her portrait in your room? I put you in Bianca’s old room. Room 213,” Joanne said. She beamed at us. “I did it myself. I used to be quite the artist.”

  Bianca laughed and shook her head. “Mother,” she said affectionately. “I’m not sure the rest of the world has your appreciation for your painting skills.”

  “It all makes sense now,” I sighed. “We’ve been trying to figure out who the letters belonged to. I’m an absolutely terrible detective. We thought they belonged to you, Joanne.”

  Joanne smiled. “I’m afraid not. I haven’t received any love letters since I was teenager.”

  “Cicily said you knew the library like the back of your hand. How did you not find them before now?” I asked Joanne.

  She shrugged. “There are a lot of books in there. I haven’t read some of them in years. Where were the letters?”

  “Inside an old book on the top shelf.”

  Joanne grimaced and gestured down at her left knee. “I’m afraid it has been a while since I could get anything down from the top shelf. Daphne’s probably the only one who climbs up there and that is just to dust. I doubt if she even does that as often as she’s supposed to. It’s not as if anyone checks.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said to Bianca. “We’ve invaded your privacy and been terrible guests.”

  “No, not at all,” Bianca said. “I am glad to have these back. I had completely forgotten what I did with them. It seems like so long ago.” She looked down at the letter in her hand solemnly, tracing the faded writing with her finger.

  “Forgive me for saying so, but some of the letters have a few bitter parts to them,” Dave said. “I hope it won’t pain you to read those.”

  Bianca laughed through her tears. “Charlie always liked to be a bit dramatic,” she said. “Especially in his love letter writing. Besides, doesn’t every romance have bitter parts? It just makes the sweet parts even sweeter.”

  Dave nodded, entwining his fingers through mine. “Well, we had better let you be alone. We left the rest of the letters in the office.”

  “Thank you,” Bianca whispered as she hugged me quickly again. One of her rings scraped my arm as she released me. I glanced down at her left hand and realized that hidden amongst the large, sparkling fake gems was something very real: a wedding ring.

  Bianca joined us often for lunch during the rest of our vacation. She told us about Charlie and their life together, and we told her about our tortoiseshell cat, Georgia, and our expensive flat in the city, which we hoped to escape one day soon.

  Dave hadn’t opened his laptop again, for which I was very grateful, and I hadn’t seen him on the phone once. He seemed committed to enjoying our vacation. We even tried ice skating, though we did it by daylight.

  One morning while Dave slept in, Bianca and I had breakfast together. A long, drawn-out breakfast during which we both consumed far too much coffee.

  “John is quite handsome,” I said at one point during our conversation.

  She smiled. “He is. He’s a very good person.”

  I nodded, watching her face. Her eyes brightened ever so slightly and her cheeks became a bit rosier. “He sent the poinsettias, didn’t he? For Valentine’s Day?”

  Dave and I had been out riding with John several times, and whenever I brought Bianca up in a conversation, John acted strangely and quickly changed the topic.

  “He did,” she admitted, stirring more sugar into her coffee. “With a note. This isn’t the first time he has expressed interest and I appreciate the gesture...” Her voice trailed off.

  “But?”

  “But I told him I couldn’t. Not yet. That was six months ago. He keeps trying.”

  I looked down at the table. “I know it must be hard.”

  “Hard is an understatement,” she replied dryly. “I don’t even know where to begin.”

  “So, things haven’t changed at all?” I asked.

  Bianca shrugged. “Not enough. It still feels too strange.” She looked up at me with a small smile. “I think they will, though. With time. After reading Charlie’s letters again, it helped me to realize that he wouldn’t want me to be alone for my entire life. He
would want me to have someone.”

  She took a sip of coffee and stared out of the window. “People tell me that constantly, and ask me when I am going to start dating again, but I just need a little more time. Even though I know it’s true.”

  There were no words that would help. Nothing she hadn’t heard before. I reached across the table and squeezed her hand. Sometimes that’s all you can do.

  On the day Dave and I departed, a cold sleet set in. All of our things had been packed and carried down to the lobby and most of our goodbyes had been said.

  Cicily had bid us farewell at breakfast and Bianca had come up to our room to help us carry our things down. Once we made it down to the lobby with all our bags, she led us over to the desk and had us sign the guest book again. I let Dave do the honors. He thought for a minute, the pen poised over the page, then scribbled something quickly. I peered over his shoulder to see what he had written.

  “Our stay at Samson’s Corner was not only comfortable, but memorable,” I read aloud. “Thanks to all the staff, our Valentine’s Day was everything we hoped for and more. We will return soon. Dave and Meg.”

  Bianca smiled appreciatively. “We’ll be expecting you.”

  Just as we were about to make our exit, Joanne came out and thanked us again for staying at Samson’s Corner. She walked with us out onto the front porch, where we ran into John.

  “Just wanted to wish you folks a safe trip home,” he said. “This is some rough weather.”

  We thanked him and Joanne and I stood watching from the porch while he helped Dave pack our luggage into the car. When they had finished, I sprinted out, the sleet stinging my face, and jumped in the passenger’s side.

  Dave, who was still standing just outside the driver’s side door talking to John, finally shook John’s hand and climbed in. He quickly switched the heater on.

  We inched down the steep driveway, which was beginning to become slick, and out onto the small road.

  “Thank you for our vacation,” I said, reaching over to squeeze Dave’s knee. “I appreciate the fact that you took time out of work to come with me. And that you didn’t spend the entire time on your laptop.”