The Red Book of Primrose House: A Potting Shed Mystery (Potting Shed Mystery series 2)

by Marty Wingate

  “She’s gone out with the little miss, about an hour ago.”

  It was, of course, Arabella Sock—whose country accent was as broad as her smile—with Trevor in tow. Pru walked to the end of the drive. “Thanks,” she said, wondering if Mrs. Sock was taking messages for the house now. “I’ll stop back by.”

  “You’re welcome to wait here for them—I can put the kettle on.”

  Mrs. Sock and Trevor looked dressed for a walk. “I don’t want to hold you up if you were about to leave,” Pru said.

  “Oh, Trevor and I are in no hurry, are we now, boy?” The beagle sat down.

  Well, why not? “Thanks so much,” she said as she walked across the road and up Mrs. Sock’s front path—past twiggy spireas, thorny roses, and a tangled mass of clematis, all waiting for spring. “I’m Pru Parke, a friend of Cate’s.”

  “I’m Arabella Sock, and this is Trevor.” Trevor stood and Pru knelt, putting a hand out for the dog to sniff.

  “Hello, Trevor,” she said, petting him as his back half wagged. “That’s a very nice name you have.”

  Pru followed her hosts down a narrow hall, careful not to jostle a wall shelf teeming with photos. On the way, Mrs. Sock pointed to a jolly-looking man standing next to a brown-and-white cow in one of the frames. “There’s my Trevor,” she said as they walked into the kitchen.

  “Trevor?” Pru asked. The beagle gave a minor yip.

  “My dear husband Trevor died three years ago,” Mrs. Sock said as she put the kettle on and reached for the tea tin. “So I sold our dairy farm and moved here to be near our two boys. They thought I needed a companion, seeing as how I didn’t have my own Trevor any longer, and a friend of theirs knew about this re-homing for beagles—finding homes for dogs that didn’t have a place to live. Well, when they told me they had a beagle named Trevor t’were looking for a family, I knew we were meant for each other. Isn’t that right?” Mrs. Sock looked down at Trevor, who sat at her feet and whined.

  “Do you need a bickie?” she asked him. Trevor stood, his tail a metronome set on allegro; Mrs. Sock reached in the pocket of her coat and pulled out a treat.

  “I think Nanda would love to meet Trevor,” Pru said, taking her own treat from the plate that Mrs. Sock put out. She remembered how Nanda and Trevor barked at each other across the road.

  “She’s a cute one, that little miss,” Mrs. Sock said, pouring the tea. “And her mum is lovely. I notice she has a friend who looks in on her. I’d say he’s a mite more helpful than that other one lurking in the laurel.” She raised an eyebrow.

  Whoa, Pru thought. Mrs. Sock really does keep an eye on things.

  It was just one cup of tea and a generous slice of bakewell tart, but it was a restorative visit. They talked about gardens and cows—the Socks had raised Ayrshires. In the course of the conversation, Mrs. Sock asked Pru if she had any family. Pru opened her mouth and after a moment stumbled over a few words—“I have…We don’t…”—and the older woman carried on with another topic. When Mrs. Sock noticed Cate was home—she had an excellent view of Francine’s drive and front step from the window in her own front door—Pru stood to leave.

  At the door, Mrs. Sock said, “You know, Pru, there were a good few years when my sister and I didn’t speak to each other. I don’t even remember what it was about now. But I was too proud and she was too stubborn—or maybe t’were the other way round.” Mrs. Sock smiled. “But then, one day, she rang me—or I rang her—and it was as if nothing had ever happened.” She shrugged. “Families. You just be patient.” She patted Pru’s arm.

  Tears sprang to Pru’s eyes before she could stop them. She had the sudden urge to tell Arabella Sock the entire story of her family in hopes that she would ring Simon and sort it all out.

  “Thanks for the tea, Mrs. Sock.”

  Chapter 28

  “Pru, come in. Cup of tea?” Cate asked.

  “I’d love one, thanks,” Pru said. You can never have too many cups of tea, she thought, even if she might end up floating back to her cottage. It’s an especially fine conversation lubricant. “Where’s Nanda?”

  “I dropped her at Chaffinch’s. Francine was finished for the day, and they’ve gone to the shops,” Cate said. “It’s a great entertainment, and Nanda gets an ice lolly at the end of it all.” She hesitated and then said, “Jamie often rings about this time, and it’s easier if Nanda isn’t around to hear. And if I don’t answer, he stops by.”

  With tea in hand, Pru asked about Jamie, explaining that she’d seen him after Ned’s service.

  “We were a bad match from the beginning, but I was dazzled by him—he was older, good-looking, and a charmer—and I was itching to leave home. It was only after we’d married I found out what a control freak he is. He’d ruled my life for too long. But it was finding his red book that did it.”

  Pru started. “Red book?”

  “He has a little red diary,” Cate said, frowning. “He’s been keeping it for, I don’t know, years, I suppose. And inside”—she looked down into the palms of her hands, as if she saw the pages there—“was an accounting. He kept track of people that he thought had wronged him.” She looked up at Pru, her eyes wide in amazement. “Can you imagine? Every little thing he thought someone had done to him, in a tidy list.”

  Pru knew that a “diary” in England meant an appointment book—but couldn’t shake loose the vision of Jamie’s red book, so different from Repton’s promise of a beautiful landscape. “Did you recognize any of the names?”

  Cate stared into her tea and nodded almost imperceptibly. “The first one I saw was a fellow he worked with last year—gave Nanda that little pig there, just to be nice. Jamie didn’t like it—but he couldn’t take it away from her, by then she loved it.” She looked up at Pru, her face hard. “That fellow’s name was crossed off. And then I remembered that, not long after the pig, this same fellow got blamed for mixing up sprayers at work. Instead of spraying fertilizer on all the flats of annuals to go out as summer bedding, it was an herbicide—killed them all off.”

  “You think that Jamie mixed up the sprayers on purpose—as a way of telling him to back off?”

  “He’d been taken care of,” Cate said. “That’s one of Jamie’s favorite sayings—‘I’ll take care of it.’ What kind of a person does that? Keeps track of petty grievances, little jealousies, things that most people wouldn’t think twice about.” Her eyes grew wide. “And I saw Liam’s name there.”

  “What had Liam done?”

  “I’d gone to the Two Bells to meet Francine—a rare occasion, that, Jamie actually letting me out on my own. We ran into Liam and Fergal. I didn’t say more than two words to him, but someone must’ve seen and told Jamie.”

  “Is that when he hit you?” Pru asked.

  Cate wrapped her arms around herself. “He hit me when he saw me with his red book—I’d come across it in his drawer. He hit me and then he fell to the sofa and cried and cried—such drama,” she said in a bitter tone. “I took Nanda and left. I rang Francine, and we came here. The next day, when I was sure he was at work, I went back and packed a couple of bags.”

  “Is he bothering you?”

  “So far he’s mostly ringing. He’s very upset about Dad.”

  “Did your dad really want you to stay with him?” Pru asked, unwilling to paint Ned as an enabler.

  Cate shrugged, and poured them both more tea. “Dad didn’t know how Jamie was. I never told him—I felt so ashamed, as if it was my fault. Dad always thought about his own growing up—it was just his mum and him, no dad—and how hard it was. And it must’ve been difficult for him after Mum died. ‘Two parents, Catie,’ he’d say, ‘you need the two.’ I was going to tell him what happened after we were settled here, but I never got the chance.” Tears filled her eyes. “It’s just as well.”

  Pru thought back to the timing of that event—it was just as they started to work after the holidays. Perhaps Ned remained a supporter of Jamie because he didn’t know how his daughter was
being treated. But Liam knew. And right after the holidays, Liam suddenly couldn’t stand to be in Ned’s presence. He argued with Ned, and shouted at him that something needed to be done. An incredible sadness filled Pru’s heart. During another visit, Cate had told Pru that she had made a “terrible mistake.” What was that mistake—telling Liam what Jamie had done to her, instigating Liam’s anger toward Ned?

  Francine and Nanda tumbled in the door, and after many greetings and several goodbyes, Pru left for home, having missed another opportunity to ask about Liam’s whereabouts. But that wasn’t what caused her to pull over to catch her breath. She suddenly realized that if Jamie Tanner had his own red book that listed people who had done him wrong, it was quite possible her name was in it.

  —

  That night, she tucked herself in and waited for Christopher to ring. Without him as a living hot-water bottle beside her in bed, she had gone through her usual routine of laying wool socks on the warm Aga until they were toasty, at which point she pulled them on, dived under the covers, and peered out to admire her surroundings. She loved her cottage in lamplight, the way the two-foot-thick brick walls gave off a warm glow and the huge oak beams cast shadows on the ceiling. No well-planed wood here, but rustic, massive pieces that suited the former cowshed. When her phone rang, she snuggled down and began with the news of the day.

  “It’s a boy,” she said. “Cordelia was in labor for eight hours, and finally, out he came. No problems. Jo says he looks just like Alan—seems a bit of a stretch for a newborn to already look like his grandfather.”

  “That’s good news. What’s he called?”

  “They’ve named him Oliver. Oliver Alan—I’m not sure what surname they’re using,” she mused.

  “And who is Oliver?” Christopher asked.

  “Don’t know,” Pru said. “Maybe it’s another family name.” She sat up to give her latest investigation report. “I could’ve told you about most of this over the weekend, but,” she said, sticking her bottom lip out to no one in particular, “I was having too good a time.”

  “It’s always a rush, isn’t it?” he asked.

  “There isn’t much we can do—at least not at the moment,” Pru said. “Perhaps when this is all finished…the garden, you know.” He had said it—they needed more time together.

  “Perhaps I’ll take you away somewhere.”

  “I will let you,” she whispered.

  Silence, then Pru launched into telling him about Hugo and the chat with the Courier’s editor. “I thought I’d try again to talk with him,” she said. “It’s getting difficult to take any time away from the garden, though. I can’t let Davina think I’m a slacker.”

  That elicited a small laugh. “How could anyone think that?”

  “And there’s something else.” Briefly, she told him the story of Robbie’s one-hour vanishing act, and went into greater length to explain why Ivy didn’t want attention called to it. “What should I do?” she asked.

  “Would it do any good to talk with Robbie?” Christopher asked. “Or find out from Francine if he’s close to any adult—perhaps someone stops by Chaffinch’s to visit. It isn’t ideal, keeping it from the police—really, Hobbes should know. But I understand her concern.”

  She wasn’t quite ready to alarm him with the story of Jamie and his red book—perhaps she could save that for the weekend—and so she veered off into a long and involved account of her tea with Arabella Sock and Trevor. “Wouldn’t it be lovely if Cate got to know her—Nanda would have a granny figure around.”

  “What did you learn from Cate about Liam?”

  “Foiled again—Francine and Nanda arrived before I could get to it. I’ll ask Liam or Cate more about it. As soon as I can pin one of them down.”

  This collaboration eased her mind. Christopher had allowed her equal say in the evidence, and it gave her a sense of power. “Thank you for talking me through this.” A bit of gloominess crept in. “I miss you,” she said.

  He was silent a moment. “And I you,” he said. “I’ll see you on Friday.”

  Chapter 29

  Midweek, the box arrived; the delivery truck pulled onto the lane just as she got to her front door. Lydia had taken great care in packing: inside the shipping box was another box, and inside that was the box from Titche’s department store in Dallas—from the days when department-store boxes were worth keeping. A whole life in a shirt box, Pru thought, as she took it out and set it on the sofa. When she lifted the lid, she caught a whiff of old paper and perhaps a memory of her mother’s favorite cologne, Youth Dew.

  The contents had shifted slightly, but everything looked intact. Under the packet of letters that were tied with a faded blue ribbon, Pru found her school awards and set those aside. Next was an article about her dad, who had worked for the highway department, and his involvement in building the Dallas–Fort Worth turnpike in the ’50s. Below that were old photos, and it was to those that Pru went first, sorting through the people she recognized, looking deeper to find…and there it was.

  A copy of the same photo that Birdie had shown Pru had been within Pru’s reach the whole time. Her parents, Birdie and George, Pru and Simon—the whole family, such as it was.

  Pru stared at it for a few minutes and then went back to the packet of letters. She had tried to look at them just after her mother died and had discovered they were letters her mother had written but never sent; both the letters and the unaddressed envelopes were yellow with age and brittle. She took one out gingerly, and, heart beating too fast for comfort, she began to read.

  My sweet baby boy,

  I will never see you grow up. I will never clap as you stand for the first time, and I will not make you custard for your tea. I will never hear you call me “Mama.” I wish you could know how much I love you.

  Pru trembled as she put the letter down gently. Tears started flowing with the realization of what she held. She’d read the letter before, but had assumed that her mother had had a miscarriage, and she was writing through her grief for a lost child. This had been too much for Pru to bear, and she had put the letters away, not wanting to intrude on her mother’s grief. Now Pru knew the truth: her mother was indeed grieving for a lost child, but not one who had died—one she had given up. It was a letter to Simon.

  She took another out and read a few lines:

  My dear boy,

  You should be playing cricket by now. Is the bat too much for you? And what about football? Your father wishes he could teach you American football—he wishes he could just see you, hold you. You’re probably too old for that these days, aren’t you?

  Although they weren’t dated, Pru realized that the letters followed the passage of the years. She opened another and read:

  Dear boy,

  You have a sister. I hope someday you will know that. She looks like you—are you surprised?

  Pru’s crying became sobs. “Why?” she asked the air. “Why didn’t you tell us?” She carefully put the letters back in their envelopes. These letters were not hers to read—they belonged to Simon, and she must give them to him.

  —

  Pru was so very happy to see Friday come, and thought she might just be able to take the entire weekend off. Perhaps she and Christopher could go for a drive somewhere—they could have dinner at the hotel where they had spent their first weekend. The memory of that time, sitting by the fire and walking to the wood, distracted her at the end of the workday.

  She lingered near Primrose House after everyone had left the site. The stonework should begin soon, and after that they could plant. She needed to fill the space and make it a good show for the open garden day in July. She made her way down the slope, enjoying the silence and the emptiness of the winter landscape—still no sign of green from the trees, but she noticed new growth pushing up out of the earth, displacing the damp, matted cover of decaying leaves. Wood anemones, columbine, perhaps a clump of snake’s head fritillary in the damp spots of the meadow—it would be Pru’s first s
pring to see native wildflowers in their habitat. And with any luck, a few primroses.

  The light was growing dim as she walked just inside the beech wood, and then she turned to look out toward the site of the pond. She heard the arrow sing past her ear and heard it thunk into the tree trunk before she realized what had happened. It was almost directly in front of her face, and still quivering from its swift journey from bow to trunk—it must’ve passed inches from her head! Her knees went wobbly, and she stumbled as she whirled around to look deeper into the copse, but it was too dark to see and she heard no sound.

  “Hello?” she called, bracing herself against the beech trunk. “Is someone there?” Was that a shadow darting between trees? “Who is it? I see you in there—you’d better come out here now.” A bogus threat, and one that went unheeded. Had someone really just tried to skewer her? She made a fine target in her yellow waterproof jacket.

  She backed out of the wood, staring into the darkness before she turned and ran, her heart beating furiously and her only thought to get far away. Out of the wood and alongside the yew walk. Primrose House was dark, so she kept running, taking the lower and quicker path toward the walled garden and up to her cottage. Even as she fled, she realized if someone wanted to hit her, she was an easy target the whole way.

  She slammed the door and threw the lock before sinking to the floor. Breathing hard, she pressed her hand against the stitch in her side. She must ring Tatt or Hobbes—the police needed to know, and she would tell them everything. As her breathing slowed, her mind began to calm. She would wait and tell Christopher first. He could help her sort through what happened and present it in a reasonable order to the police. Perhaps she hadn’t really been part of someone’s target practice—maybe it had just been a local hunter.

  Unsure of what time Christopher would arrive and unable to keep still, Pru bounced from sofa to sink to fireplace as if she were the shiny silver ball in a pinball machine. She had seen no one in the wood, but easily conjured up the image of Jamie Tanner, bow in hand.