Miss Seeton Paints the Town (A Miss Seeton Mystery Book 10)

by Hamilton Crane

  Mel could see from her friend’s anxious expression that Miss Seeton, tying herself into ethical knots, desperately wanted the young reporter to understand. And Mel was quick, and bright: brighter than she seemed. Originally noted for the tough manner, acid tongue, and mid-Atlantic accent which she had assumed during her early years in Fleet Street, Mel had been influenced by Miss Seeton’s admiration for the interesting bone structure of her face, and the beautiful eyes she had disguised with heavy black shadow. Both her makeup and her manner had mellowed; she felt confident enough now to face the world as she really appeared and let the world be fooled, if it so chose. Looking soft and acting tough rendered Mel a highly effective service: by the time the people she dealt with had worked out what was happening, it was too late. She might look too gentle to take advantage: but the advantage was always on Mel Forby’s side now.

  Not that Mel would ever have dreamed of taking advantage of Miss Seeton. “Don’t worry, honey,” she said, patting the older woman gently on the shoulder. “Relax—I won’t badger you again, though it was a pretty good idea, while it lasted—but if you’ve got other commitments, why, I understand.”

  Miss Seeton sighed with relief. She did not care to let her friends down, but really, she was so busy—although it might be possible for her to let dear Mel use one or two of the sketches she had promised the Colvedens, for the Competition—entirely without payment, of course, that must be quite understood, and provided also that nothing of Plummergen’s plans would be made known, in case Murreystone learned of them—but it might be rather interesting, to find out if and how the printing process altered one’s work, which would have to remain anonymous, as well, for fear of upsetting the police, when they’d already been so good about allowing one to—what was the word . . .

  “Moonlight, of course,” decided Miss Seeton at the end of a long, thoughtful silence—silence, that is, from Mel and herself, though not from the blacksmith. Dan Eggleden had been hammering and working the iron all this time, and a small crowd had gathered to watch.

  Mel jumped. “Moonlight? You mean sunstroke, don’t you. Miss S.? It’s going to be another scorcher of a day. Unless you’ve got something planned for later this evening?”

  “Oh, dear.” Miss Seeton had suddenly remembered where she was supposed to be. “This morning—and I’m late—the children will be waiting, such a bad example—but so interesting to watch, the sparks falling in such graceful curves, and no fear of burning, it seems, unless one goes too close, which it would be most unwise to do.” Briskly she furled her umbrella. “Do excuse me, my dear. I hope to see you again before too long . . .”

  And she hurried off up The Street.

  chapter

  ~6~

  WITH A SMILE Mel watched the little figure trot anxiously away until an overhanging hedge partly hid her from view. That, thought Mel, had better be pruned before the Best Kept judges get here: she wondered who it belonged to, though it hardly mattered. Plummergen, she knew well enough, would bring every citizen to order at a time like this: the offending greenery was as good as firewood already.

  Not so strange that she should be thinking of fires just now, as there was a rumour that a pyromaniac, or a group of them, might be going into action in the Ashford-Plummergen area. As Mel had said, she had spies everywhere—or rather, the editor of the Daily Negative had them, and when anything to do with Kent came up, he allowed Mel, the acknowledged Seeton expert, to make use of their intelligence. He’d hardly made any complaint at all when she’d dropped hints about another holiday when she’d barely come back from the cruise she’d taken with Thrudd Banner, fellow (though freelance) reporter and extremely close personal friend. Thrudd had been called away on a foreign assignment by World Wide Press, leaving Mel free to scoop whatever story there might be burgeoning. And if it was anywhere near Miss Seeton, then burgeon, Mel felt sure, that story certainly would . . .

  But her cover of a series on the Rural Revival was something more than that. She’d enjoy writing up the blacksmith and his beautification of the village; she’d try to talk to the farmers who were having their haystacks burned down, and learn about combine harvesters and thatching and whether the rabbits enjoyed all the excitement. And she might just slip in a few artless questions about spontaneous combustion . . . give the cunning yokels a chance to score over the ignorant townies, and let slip more than perhaps they ought. Mel had every intention of fooling the rustics as much as she fooled her fellow reporters—and especially if there was likely to be a Battling Brolly angle to the story when it eventually broke. Which was more than likely, seeing how Ashford was no more than fifteen miles away from where Miss Seeton lived—and that umbrella of hers seemed born to trouble as, well, as the sparks fly upwards, thought Mel.

  Her eye was drawn back to Daniel Eggleden and his brawny—yes, there was no other word for it, hackneyed though it might be—arms wielding the hammer and periodically thrusting the cooling iron back into the fire to be heated again. The sweat dripped from his brow, and the red gleam of the fire brought out gold highlights in his hair. Mel watched his muscles ripple and thought wistfully of Thrudd.

  There was a movement at her side as someone materialised just out of her line of vision and, clambering against her, planted a warm, moist kiss on the back of her neck. With a yelp of surprise, Mel turned.

  To find herself gazing at two huge brown eyes set in an aristocratic face: a face long-boned and finely featured, a narrow face framed by two drooping ears.

  “Your dog,” Mel complained to the man on the other end of the lead, who was clearly struggling to frame an apology, “has just accosted me. The least you can do is introduce us properly.” Firmly she removed the huge silky paws from her shoulders. “And to his friend,” she added, noticing that he held another, better-behaved dog on a second lead. “His, or hers? With all that fur it’s not easy to tell.”

  “I most humbly request your pardon, madame.” The man, a tall, distinguished figure almost as elegant as the two dogs he now kept firmly at his side, bowed low. “Such a disturbance has never before occurred—I regret that I allowed my attention to wander.” He gestured briefly towards the forge and the busy figure of Dan Eggleden. “Happenings of this nature I have not witnessed previously, and it was of great fascination to me—too much so, if it permitted such a lapse. I apologise again, for the sorry behaviour of my companions. Their only excuse must be that they are still in high spirits after the walk they have taken in the fields by the imperial waterway.”

  He hadn’t spoken more than a half-dozen words before Mel was wondering about his accent. Something exotic, foreign—eastern European, but cultured, nevertheless. Almost like a stage Russian aristocrat, with the dogs as props. Weren’t they—Mel had vague memories of once covering an Exemption Show where the judge went berserk with a stainless steel water bowl and laid out the presenter of the Sit, Stay, and Come Cup—those Russian Wolfhounds, indeed? And to call the Royal Military Canal the Imperial Waterway was, okay, a logical translation perhaps, but rather overdoing it . . .

  So what was a phony Russian doing in Plummergen? And why was he so busy staring at the blacksmith’s forge? Could he be admiring Dan Eggleden’s muscles just as she’d done, in a purely aesthetic way, of course—or were there more sinister overtones? Maybe he wanted the smith to forge him a picklock or something, and was wondering how best to phrase the suggestion . . .

  All the while she was furiously thinking, Mel was making a fuss over the two Borzois, stroking their gracefully arched spines and admiring the plumes of their gently waving tails. And the man was ignoring her, still intent upon what Dan was doing at the anvil, though the dogs began to whine and lick and reciprocate Mel’s advances. They pulled on their leads and panted with pleasure, their long tongues slurping along her hands as she caressed them.

  They really were splendid creatures; it almost didn’t matter that their master had an aura of mystery—and phony mystery, Mel was willing to bet—about him. “What are their
names?” she enquired and forced the man to drag his attention back from what the blacksmith was doing and to direct it towards her. After all, she’d been slobbered on by one of his dogs, which was as good an introduction as any, and one Mel would turn to her own use.

  “Boris and Sasha.” Yes, that figured. Keeping up the pretence right along the line. “It is Boris who took such a startling interest in you, for which I must again apologise. He is normally a most well-conducted animal.”

  “Boris and Sasha,” said Mel, duly patting both dogs as she spoke. “Forby—Amelita Forby,” she introduced herself with a smile, and an inquisitorial glint in her eye.

  There was only the briefest of pauses before the man, with another bow, said: “And I am Mr. Alexander. An unexpected pleasure to have made your acquaintance, Miss Forby, but a pleasure indeed. However”—he glanced at his watch, and twitched one eyebrow in a gesture of polite dismay—“it is too long this morning that we have been away from the house, and you must, if you will be so good, excuse us. You are staying in the village? Then we may perhaps meet again. It is my duty to accompany Boris and Sasha on their walk every morning, both there”—he glanced back down The Street past the point where it narrowed between Sweetbriars and the row of cottages where Martha Bloomer lived, then headed southwards over the canal—“and, as you see, back.”

  He bowed again, a stately inclination of his silver head which reminded Mel of the courtiers in Anastasia. What was with this guy, hamming it up like that? And what a name to choose—Mr. Alexander, indeed. Why not call himself Alexei and have done with it? Talk about obvious.

  And Mel glared after Mr. Alexander as he and his two dogs departed north up The Street, following in the footsteps of Miss Seeton. “I’d like to see what Miss S. makes of him and his oh-so-Russian act,” she murmured, thinking of various occasions when Miss Seeton had, with her sketches and their insight into human nature, shed light on behaviour which had other people puzzled. “Yes, I’d like to see it, very much indeed . . .”

  What Mel in fact now saw was a car—one of the taxis from Crabbe’s Garage—driving slowly down The Street, passing the little group that had just left her and drawing up outside the George and Dragon on the other side of the road. Jack Crabbe, who recognised Mel from her previous Plummergen visits, nodded a brief greeting to her as he climbed out of the driver’s seat and hastened to open the passenger door.

  A woman emerged, dusting herself down with an irritated air. Jack Crabbe looked hurt: evidently he’d picked her up from Brettenden railway station, but she could hardly have become covered in grime during the six miles to Plummergen. His cab, as Mel well knew, was always spotless.

  Above the continuous clanging of Dan’s hammer in the forge behind her, Mel was unable to hear the conversation between Jack Crabbe and the newcomer; but from the toss of the latter’s head, and the wink Jack tipped in Mel’s direction when he climbed back into the taxi, it required fewer investigative skills than those possessed by Amelita Forby to guess that the townie had come off worse in whatever little exchange there had been. Normally Jack carried his passengers’ bags into the hotel and stopped for a chat: not this time, however.

  Leaving Daniel Eggleden to his work, Mel strolled back across The Street and smiled at the woman who stood outside the George and Dragon’s ivy-covered frontage scowling down at the two tweed-covered suitcases dumped by Jack Crabbe at the edge of the road. “Need a hand?” enquired Mel, gesturing towards the luggage. “I’m staying here, too,” she added with a further smile as the woman’s eyes narrowed. “Name of Forby, Amelita Forby. Miss,” she found herself appending in a way she’d never done before.

  Mel found the woman unnerving. She was tall and thin, her bony features made more prominent by the steel-grey bun into which her hair was scraped. Balanced on her hooked nose were spectacles with what looked like steel rims, and the thickest lenses Mel had ever seen outside mad professors on children’s television. And through that thick wall of glass glittered eyes full, Mel could tell, of strong convictions; an uncomfortable personage, indeed.

  “Hawke,” returned she of the spectacles, after something of a pause. For goodness’ sake, surely she didn’t suspect Mel of designs upon her luggage—a craving for that bulky shoulder bag, of all unlikely things? She could at least have said thanks for the offer, Forby, but I’d prefer to manage on my own.

  “Ursula Hawke,” she said gruffly after having favoured Mel with one of her piercing glances. “Thank you.”

  Without another word, Miss (Mel had spotted her ringless left hand) Ursula Hawke bent her bony knees with a series of creaks and picked up the smaller of her two cases. Mel was not sure whether to be amused by the effrontery or annoyed; while she was making up her mind, she began to grapple with the larger case and followed Miss Hawke towards the white-pillared doorway of the hotel. By the time she had climbed the two low steps, breathing hard, Ursula Hawke had reached Reception and settled her case on the floor beside her.

  There was nobody there: but there was a small brass bell standing on a handwritten label instructing visitors to ring if attention was required. From the brisk tintinnabulation Miss Hawke produced, it seemed that attention was very much required. Mel dropped the case and clapped her hands to her ears.

  “Careful with that,” barked Miss Hawke, then took no further notice as she shook the bell once more.

  In response to the urgent summons, Doris appeared from a back room somewhere, breathless and red of face. Head waitress at the George and Dragon, she served also as part-time receptionist; but not, she was quick to inform Miss Hawke as the latter checked in, as a porter.

  “Not with my back, I couldn’t, not if you was to pay me a thousand pounds. You’ll have to wait till Mr. Mountfitchet gets back”—Charley Mountfitchet was the landlord—“unless Miss Forby might like to, er . . .”

  Mel pushed her features into a smile of resigned cooperation and waited for Miss Hawke to express her gratitude. “Pretty poor state of affairs,” opined Miss Hawke, without a word to Mel, then picked up her case again and trudged off towards the stairs. Evidently Mel was supposed to follow with the larger case without being asked again.

  Oh, well, it took all sorts, and the reporter in Mel had been intrigued, as well as a little unnerved, by Miss Ursula Hawke. What was she doing in Plummergen? Was she always so brusque and ungrateful, or had something happened today to make her worse than usual? And what—Mel wheezed as she mounted the stairs, reduced to bumping the case from step to step while Miss Hawke trod briskly upwards—had she packed in her suitcase to make it so heavy? Journalists, jetting around the world at short notice after stories, of necessity travel light. If they don’t, they must be on holiday. Mel, not for the first time, wished Thrudd Banner were with her.

  Miss Hawke paused outside her bedroom door and checked the number on the key Doris had given her. “Fine,” she said as she slipped the key into the lock and began to twist it. Mel puffed to a standstill beside her, thankfully dropping the case and contriving to bump against the smaller one Miss Hawke had elected to carry. She wanted to know just how hard-done-by she ought to feel when she brooded over this cavalier treatment in the privacy of her own room, or when—if he managed to get through on the international telephone system—she was telling Thrudd of her adventures.

  The smaller case never even wobbled as Mel collided with it. Maybe Miss Hawke wasn’t quite as ungrateful as Mel had thought: the thing must be at least as heavy as the larger case, if not—Mel nudged it questingly once more—heavier. Much heavier . . . almost, Mel thought, what might be called a dead weight.

  “Come far with this little lot?” asked Mel, when, having got the door open, Miss Hawke seemed likely to vanish inside without another word. But the reporter was going to end up with some sort of information if it killed her. After all, they were guests in the same hotel. There was an etiquette about these things. “I’m down from London,” she offered, making to pick up the case she’d struggled with. Maybe if Miss Hawke belie
ved the privacy of her room might be invaded by this inquisitive Samaritan, she’d let out something—anything—to get rid of her. There was a pause.

  “Maidstone,” said Miss Hawke at last, then seized the handle of her case and hefted it over the threshold. Mel’s efforts, it seemed, deserved some explanation. “But it was too far. Plummergen is more convenient. Much.”

  And, dragging her other suitcase with her, Miss Hawke disappeared inside her bedroom; and closed the door; and, to Mel’s surprise, carefully locked it behind her.

  chapter

  ~7~

  “ERIC, DON’T OPEN the door!” squeaked Mrs. Blaine as Miss Nuttel, shopping bag in hand, was about to summon her friend forth. “There’s that man with his dogs, right outside our house—and on our side of the road, too!”

  Norah Blaine was peering through the white net curtains which allowed The Nuts to see out of Lilikot’s plate-glass windows, but nobody to see in. “He’s smiling,” she hissed. “Too sinister—what’s he got to be so cheerful about?”

  Miss Nuttel sat down heavily on the stripped-pine bench in the hall. She pressed a bony hand to her side and gave a gasping little cough. When nothing happened, she uttered a groan and dropped her shopping bag on the floor.

  “Eric!” cried Bunny, startled, as her friend had intended. “Are you all right?” She came scuttling out of the lounge and rushed down the hall. “Eric—what is it?”

  “Those dogs,” muttered Eric, shuddering at the memory. “Barking—ready to attack—”