Live and Let Diet (Australian Amateur Sleuth Book 1)

by Morgana Best

  At that point, Sandy ran past me and jumped up on the two officers, trying to lick their faces. She was beside herself with excitement. “Excuse me; I’ll just go put her out the back,” I said, dragging the over-exuberant Labrador toward the back door. I shut the back door, and hurried to the front door, my heart in my mouth.

  “Miss Potts?” Constable Wright asked, and I nodded my head, not yet having found my voice. It was early, and my caffeine levels were low. He knew who I was; he had been there at the whole unfortunate alarm incident.

  “We’ve had an anonymous tip that we can find a stolen painting in your cottage,” he said.

  I was shocked and my jaw fell open. “A stolen painting?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the man said.

  “That’s ridiculous. What painting?” They didn’t answer, so I stepped back and set my mug down on the small table near the door where I threw my keys whenever I got home. I looked at them. “Come in,” I said, without really thinking about it, but the look Blake shot me was enough to make me instantly regret being so inviting. What kind of rights had I just given up, letting them in so easily? I didn’t know, but I bet it hadn’t been a good idea. Still, I hadn’t done anything wrong.

  Both officers stepped inside. “Tell me about the painting I supposedly have,” I said, hoping that my voice wasn’t shaking.

  Constable Wright glanced around my small living room and then turned to me. “It’s by Ian Bleakley.”

  I searched my mind for Ian Bleakley, but I came up short. I didn’t know too much about art, but I knew the big names in Australian art: Arthur Boyd, Sydney Nolan, Brett Whiteley, Tom Roberts, Albert Namatjira, John Passmore, William Dobell—and I was still recalling names when the constable spoke again.

  “An anonymous tip said you have the painting here.”

  “An anonymous tip? Not many people know I’m living here,” I said.

  Blake spoke up. “We have to check out all cases of anonymous tips.”

  Constable Wright shrugged. “Mind if we look around?” he asked.

  I looked at Blake, who was standing a little distance behind the other cop, and when our eyes met, Blake mouthed the word, “Warrant.”

  I was worried that would make me look guilty, so I turned back to the constable and nodded. “Go ahead,” I said, but Blake shook his head softly as Constable Wright smiled.

  “Thank you so much, Sibyl,” the constable said in a slick voice that made me feel uncomfortable. I did not like him using my name. I opened my mouth to tell him to call me Ms. Potts, but I thought better of it and held my tongue.

  “Do you mind waiting outside?” he asked. “It’s a small place, and it would be easier that way.”

  “You don’t have to,” Blake said.

  “I’ll stay,” I said, earning a small nod of approval from Blake.

  “Suit yourself,” Constable Wright said, as he pulled a small camera from his pocket and strode into the center of the living room. He began taking pictures, turning in a slow circle, and he repeated the process in the kitchen, my bedroom, and the tiny bathroom as well, before he even started touching anything.

  After he finished taking photos, however, he certainly did start touching. He opened drawers, emptying them out on the floor; he lifted the mattress on the bed, and left it leaning on an angle. All the while Blake was searching as well, but I could tell he was taking more care, working not to disturb my home too much.

  An hour passed, and I was shocked that a search of my tiny place could take so long. I was beginning to grow resentful toward Constable Wright. I glared at him. He was tall and broad, with a slight belly, his hair thick. His face was handsome with a wide jaw and a nose that had been broken once.

  The cop caught me looking at him and grinned, his lips curling in an unpleasant manner. “Well, it looks like I got some bad information, huh?”

  “I guess so,” I said sharply. Blake was drifting toward the front door, but Constable Wright remained in the center of the living room. He craned his neck, looking at the ceiling.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “What?” Blake and I said in unison, and Blake came over to stand beside the officer. He pointed upwards, and I saw that there was a small square hatch in the ceiling. I had never noticed it before.

  “How do you get up there?” Blake asked, looking at me.

  I shrugged, worried that they were interested in the hatch. “I’ve never noticed it before,” I said.

  “There’s got to be a ladder out in that shed,” Constable Wright said.

  “There might be. I haven’t looked around out there yet,” I said, and the officer left to check.

  “What’s up there?” Blake asked in a quiet voice, and I felt myself growing annoyed.

  “I told you, I don’t know anything about it,” I snapped. “I just moved here.”

  Blake nodded, and then Constable Wright was back, banging through the screen door with an old wooden ladder. He unfolded it and placed it under the hatch, then climbed the ladder quickly.

  The hatch was a wooden square which lifted upwards. We call them manholes in Australia; they are for access to the roof space, as Australians very rarely have attics.

  “Seems to be empty up here,” Constable Wright called, and I breathed a sigh of relief. “Hang on; there’s something here.” He soon climbed back down the ladder with a large, black bag under one arm. Then he went to the couch, placed the bag upon it, and unzipped it.

  Blake and I crowded in behind him, as he finished the zipper and reached inside the bag. Out came a painting, a landscape of an Australian scene of the early colony days, the painted sunlight falling at an angle over half of the picture.

  “Aha,” Constable Wright said softly, leaving the painting on the couch and turning as he turned to me. “Sibyl Potts, you’re under arrest,” he said as he stepped forward, but Blake stepped between us and held his hands up.

  “Now wait just a minute,” Blake said. “She just moved in here. She says she doesn’t know anything about it, and I’m inclined to believe her.”

  “I can see why you would be inclined to believe such a sweet little thing, Sergeant, but the fact is we got a tip that said her name, and said it would be at her new house, and there it is. That’s good enough for me, and I know it’s good enough for you.”

  “I’m telling you; it’s not,” Blake said firmly.

  Constable Wright made to step around Blake, but Blake cut him off.

  “This is what will happen, Constable.” He emphasized the word ‘Constable’ as if to remind him that it was a lower rank than sergeant. “I’m going to take the painting down to my office, and I’m going to leave Ms. Potts right where she is until I get some more information. I will, however, send out the fingerprint team.”

  Constable Wright was fuming. His lips were thin, his eyebrows furrowed down so much they were almost meeting in the middle of his forehead. Finally, he took a deep breath and stepped away. He narrowed his eyes at me. “Don’t go anywhere, all right? You have enough on your plate apart from running from this, too.”

  “I didn’t know about the painting!” I snapped. I was scared—it was clear that someone had framed me. But who? Had Cressida tried to poison me last night, and, having failed, tipped them off as to the painting’s whereabouts?

  Constable Wright ignored me. “I’ll be outside,” he said to Blake over his shoulder as he turned away. Blake went to the painting, put gloves on, and slid it back into the bag.

  “Sorry about that,” Blake said. “Try to stay out of trouble.”

  “I am trying,” I said. “I haven’t done anything wrong.”

  Blake nodded and left, and I was left with a somewhat messy house.

  I started to clean up, but my curiosity got the better of me. I sat on the couch and pulled my small laptop onto my lap. I typed in ‘Ian Bleakley’, and his paintings came up. One looked just like the one the cop had found in the hidden space in my house that I didn’t even know I had. One of the first links
I clicked on was about its theft, and I read the entry.

  A private collector in a town called Warwick had owned it, along with some other art. Several paintings had been stolen from his private collection three years ago. The collector was a man who had wished to remain anonymous, and I was unable to pull any other information about him through any other articles.

  Still, something kept prodding my mind as I clicked through each article about the theft. Finally, it came to me. Warwick. I had heard the town’s name somewhere else, only recently. Then I remembered. Mr. Buttons had said Warwick was where Tim Higgins had lived, until he moved to the boarding house.

  I shut my computer and sat back, and slowly a plan formed in my mind.

  Chapter 17

  I knew I wasn’t supposed to go anywhere, but within a half hour of deciding to go to Warwick, I had delivered Sandy to a delighted Mr. Buttons, had an overnight bag packed, and was throwing it into my mobile pet grooming van. I climbed behind the wheel and started the engine. It started on the third go, and off I went.

  I had GPS on my phone, though service dipped and dropped completely, but Warwick wasn’t hard to get to—it was just time consuming, being several hours away. A few hours into the trip, I realized it was well past lunch and I hadn’t eaten all day. I stopped off the highway and went through a drive-through, eating a burger and sucking down a milkshake as I got back onto the road.

  I wondered what Blake was going to say if he found out I had left. It was worse still that I had gone away right after the constable had told me not to go anywhere. I decided I really didn’t care all that much. After all, the constable hadn’t said, “Don’t leave town,” like they do in the movies.

  This was serious; someone was framing me. I didn’t think Constable Wright cared much about who he fingered with the crime. He just wanted to close the case. That left it all up to me, and I would do what I could to clear my own name.

  The sun was just starting to fall when I reached Warwick, and I found a small motel built a bit back from the main stretch of road in town. I stopped at the front office and got myself a room.

  I quickly let myself into the room and looked around. It was just like any other motel room; nice enough but unremarkable. After freshening up, I left my van parked there and walked back to the main road, moving up and down the street as I looked in the windows of the shops, all of which were either now closed or getting ready to close.

  I had a bit of a start when I saw the antique store. It was brick and nondescript, with brass letters hanging over the doorway. I recognized it; it had been Tim Higgins’ place. I had seen a picture of it in a scrapbook of sorts that he had kept, when I had gone through his room. I tried the door but it was locked, and I resolved to come back first thing in the morning once they had opened.

  I walked back to the motel and got some dinner from a dingy vending machine sitting in a covered hall a few doors down. I went back to my room and ate my fattening loot, and then I took a shower. I got into bed, made myself as comfortable as I could, and tried to go to sleep. Sleep did not come, so I turned on the TV and watched late night talk shows until I finally drifted off.

  The following morning I dressed and walked into town. The antique store had been open for six minutes by the time I got there. As I pushed the door open, a small brass bell chimed over my head, and a thin woman in her thirties came out from behind the counter near the back of the store.

  “Hello,” she said with a smile. “We could do with some rain!”

  By now I was used to people in the country greeting me with mention of what the rain was or wasn’t doing. As I made my way to her, the thin woman was joined by someone who could only be her husband, a thin man himself, but taller than maybe anyone I had ever seen.

  “Hi, I have some questions,” I said, and the couple looked at me with interest.

  “Well, we’ll try to help you as best we can,” the man said.

  I was a little discomfited, wishing I had said something to indicate that I was not coming to look at antiques. “Do you know Tim Higgins?” I said, figuring there was no point beating around the bush.

  The couple looked at one another.

  “Why do you ask?” the woman said.

  “I know him, well, not really, but he lived near me,” I said.

  “We never knew whatever happened to him,” the man said. “And that’s all right with us.”

  “I’m Sibyl, by the way,” I said, offering my hand across the counter. The couple took turns shaking it, and introduced themselves as Cathy and Bob.

  “You bought this store from Tim?” I asked.

  “Why are you asking, if you don’t mind?” Cathy asked.

  “Tim died the other day. There are some questions about his death.”

  “Oh my,” Cathy said.

  “And you’re a police officer?” Bob asked.

  “No,” I said. “I’m just doing some digging, trying to help.”

  “I see,” Bob said, but it was clear he didn’t, really. “Well, we didn’t know him well, but we bought the place from him when he was selling some years ago. Gosh, I guess it must be almost ten years now. He and his wife were moving.”

  “He had a wife?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know if they were actually married, but they were living together. They were inseparable. In all things, I guess you can say.”

  That got my interest. “What do you mean by that?”

  “When we bought the place, the police came through and took inventory of everything. Literally marked down everything in the shop. Something was going on with those two, and everyone here in town knew it. We had always loved the shop. We love antiques, but dealing with them—well, it wasn’t pleasant. When they announced they were selling it, we both quit our jobs and bought it. It’s been a dream come true,” Bob said.

  “Only we had to keep an ‘Under New Management’ sign in the window for a year,” Cathy added, “to let everyone know that reputable people had taken over.”

  “What had they been doing?” I asked.

  “Maybe dealing in stolen goods,” Bob said. “It’s a pretty big racket for this industry, if you care to put your life and reputation on the line.”

  I nodded. I had guessed as much. “And the police went after them?”

  “I don’t think they ever got them on anything,” Bob said.

  “And he had a wife, um, partner? Had they been together long?” I asked. It had seemed odd that no one in Little Tatterford had mentioned his partner, and I hadn’t seen anything in his room to indicate he had one.

  “I think they had been. We moved here in our early twenties and they were together, and that was twenty years ago. They were together ten years after that, when they left here.”

  I thought for a moment. I didn’t know how and if Tim was involved with the stolen painting, but the timeline didn’t work out quite right, if he had left town ten years ago, and the painting was stolen three years ago.

  “What did his partner look like?”

  “She was a fair bit younger,” Cathy said. “Short and slim, blonde hair.”

  I shook my head. “Do you know about the paintings that were stolen from a collector in town three or so years ago?”

  The married couple looked at one another, and they seemed to hesitate together. Finally, Bob spoke. “We heard about it of course.”

  “Do you know who the collector was?”

  “He doesn’t want to be bothered,” Bob said, somewhat sharply, and I knew not to ask any more questions about it.

  “Well, thanks for your time,” I said. I didn’t bother to shake their hands again, as the mood in the shop had taken a noticeable turn, and the chilly glares I got told me all I needed to know. I turned and headed back out to the street.

  I had only gone half a block back toward the motel when I paused. I turned, having had the undeniable feeling of someone watching me. There were a few people out walking in the morning, and a couple of cars buzzed by. A group of school children
ran by, hurrying to the corner where the school sat. I couldn’t see anyone looking at me, but I knew I hadn’t imagined it. I turned and hurried back to my motel.

  I used the small key I was given at the desk to open my room, and at once a sense of nausea passed over me. The vision came out of nowhere, a vision of someone going through my things at my cottage. In my vision, I walked into my cottage, and I looked over to where I kept a few of my makeup items out on a table. They were in a different position. The vision faded as quickly as it had begun.

  I hurried to pack my small bag, and then checked out. I couldn’t wait to get out of Warwick. I hurried out to the road, and then the few miles to the highway which would take me back home. I couldn’t shake the feeling of having been watched, and the feeling of being violated by having some unknown person go through my stuff. I felt queasy, and shortly after getting on the highway, I had to pull over as hot tears stung my eyes. They were tears of fear, and anger. I couldn’t stop them; I just had to let them fall down my cheeks, while cars sped by me on the highway.

  Eventually I got everything under control. I merged back into traffic, and started for home once more. I only stopped three times, once when I needed gas, and twice for snacks. I didn’t dare speed in case I got a ticket, and then the horrible Constable Wright would know that I had left town.

  It was late afternoon when I pulled into my dirt driveway in front of my cabin. I hurried inside, and sure enough, my make up items were all out of position. Someone had indeed been here, going through my things. I locked both doors and wedged chairs against them, then went through the small house and locked the windows as well. Sandy was with Mr. Buttons, so I had no concerns there. As it was winter, it was already dark, and I turned on every light in the house, and lit the fire before huddling in front of it. There was nothing quite as comforting as a wood fire, but my shivering was not only caused by the cold; it was also caused by fear.