Scarlett huffed. “You think this is the first time I’ve spied on someone?”
“Isn’t it?” he asked.
She rolled her eyes, still in character. “Puuuuleeeeeease!” This time she flicked her hair dramatically, hearing Amanda’s voice in her head calling her a drama queen.
When they reached the bookstore, Scarlett hung back as Tim went in. The place was dimly lit, and it took his eyes a moment to adjust.
How is anyone supposed to read in here? he wondered.
He saw Tarquin by the register behind the counter and approached the proprietor.
“May I help you?” Tarquin asked.
Tim showed the man his military ID.
Tarquin squinted at it. “What am I supposed to do with that?”
“My name is Tim Clarke.”
“Yes, I can read.”
“May I have a word with you?”
“You’ve already had several, haven’t you? I don’t see the harm in a few more words. My stock-in-trade, you know.”
Tim heard the door chime and open. Tarquin’s eyes shifted to see who was coming in. Tim glanced back casually, saw Scarlett step in, then turned his attention back to Tarquin.
“Do you know a man named Bill Knight?” Tim asked, watching Tarquin’s reaction closely.
The man’s pleasant expression didn’t change. “No, I don’t believe so. Should I?”
“He was reported missing last week.”
“Oh, that’s terrible, isn’t it?”
“And found dead a few days later.”
“Even worse,” Tarquin said with only the barest hint of sympathy. “Was he a friend of yours?”
“A friend of yours, I think.”
Scarlett’s eyes appeared between some Young Adult novels stacked on bookcases in the middle of the room.
“Not of mine, no. What name did you say?”
“Bill Knight.”
Tarquin looked away as if trying to remember. “It’s possible he was customer once, but I’d have to check my records. Do you think that might help?”
“It might,” Tim admitted. “But it’s not the customer records I’m interested in.”
“Oh?”
“The property records,” Tim revealed.
Tarquin looked confused. “For which property?”
Scarlett strained to hear what was being said. This is useless, she thought. She needed to get closer. She headed down the aisle to the end at the back of the shop, and pretended to browse the books on military and warfare. She was marginally closer. Maybe if she took a few paces back.
“This one,” Tim was saying. “The bookstore.”
“I own the bookstore,” Tarquin rebuked him.
“Yes, but I believe the prior owner was Doug Knight.”
Tarquin’s eyes narrowed. “Doug Knight you say?”
“Yes.”
“It’s possible, yes. That does sound familiar, though I couldn’t be entirely sure without consulting the files. Is Doug Knight related to Bill Knight, then?”
Scarlett was catching every other word and getting the gist of it, but she wanted to see Tarquin’s face. She grabbed a book off the shelf on the bookcase she had essentially walked around at this point, and opened it up, to look as though she was reading.
“His grandfather,” Tim explained.
“I see.” Tarquin rubbed his chin, as if meditating on a thought. “So you’re investigating the death of the grandson… of a man who may have once owned this bookstore.”
“That’s exactly it, yes.”
Scarlett took a few steps towards the pair. Tim’s eyes didn’t leave Tarquin, but she was right in his line of sight. She didn’t care. She edged closer.
“Well now…” Tarquin rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully. He sensed someone behind him. He turned to see Scarlett staring at his profile.
Scarlett quickly buried her eyes in the book, and suddenly flushed red. The page she had open was a picture book with lots of naked bodies on it. Sex Ed!
Please ground, open right now! she prayed. She glanced up to see Tim smirking, and Tarquin looking perplexed. “Everything alright young Scarlett?” Tarquin asked.
Scarlett coughed, and closed the book, even though she was pretty sure Tarquin had just seen it. “Er, thank you. Yes. I… I…. I’m just looking for a birthday present for my cousin.”
Tarquin raised an eyebrow skeptically. “Well okay. Let me know if you need any help.” He turned his attention back to Tim who had since swallowed his smirk and was all business again.
Scarlett scuttled back behind the YA novels, and more subtly now, resumed her previous spying place from behind the bookcase.
“This does ring a bell, now that you mention it,” Tarquin was saying to Tim. “Yes, it’s possible. My ancestors, I believe, inherited this bookstore when the previous owner died. Doug Knight, that could be the man. I’m sure I could turn over those records, but they’d also be on file with the county record office. I’m afraid I’m not as organized as I should be, so it might be quicker to check the government archives. Not meaning to put you off, you understand.”
“I already have checked the record office,” Tim stated plainly.
“Oh, excellent,” Tarquin said, as if relieve of some burden.
“I’ve also checked the local newspaper archives.”
“Oh?”
“It appears that Doug Knight may have died under mysterious circumstances.”
Scarlett leaned against the bookcase, pressing her body up against the shelf, straining to hear.
“I didn’t know that.”
“And then the property passed from his family to yours.”
“What are you implying?” Tarquin asked.
There was a thunk of a book falling to the floor. And then an onslaught of a number of books following suit.
“Shhhhh-ugar!”
Tarquin and Tim looked over.
It was Scarlett’s voice. There was a scrambling behind the bookcase. “It’s ok. It’s ok,” she said. “I’ve got it. Sorry!” she called.
Tarquin’s attention returned to Tim. “You were saying…” he said, slightly distracted by the sound of books being replaced on the shelf just out of his view.
“Nothing,” Tim shrugged. “Merely letting you know what I’ve discovered.”
“Was there an official inquiry in the Doug Knight case?”
“Yes,” Tim said. “He may have died from an animal attack.”
“How horrible.”
“And unusual,” Tim noted.
“Not in those days, I imagine. We’re much more civilized now, aren’t we?”
“And yet,” said Tim, “there are still murderers among us.”
The shuffling behind the bookshelves had stopped. Tim resisted the urge to glance sideways and see what she was up to now.
“I wish I could help you, Flight Lieutenant Clarke,” Tarquin said. “But I don’t know much about those days. It’s all ancient history to me. But I can assure you that the property is now in my name, and I have had nothing to do with Doug Knight nor his descendants.”
“Are you sure about that?” Tim asked. “Bill Knight came into town and died last week. Isn’t that curious?”
“Tragic, I’m sure. But curious? How?”
“His grandfather died in Bicester and so did he. Perhaps someone wanted him dead. Or perhaps someone was worried that he was here to reclaim his family’s legacy.”
“Like I said, I know nothing of that, I can assure you. In fact, I didn’t even know Doug Knight had a grandson. Nor did I know that that grandson was here in town until you told me just now.”
Tim smiled. “I have an eyewitness that says you did.”
“A witness.”
“Who says that you spoke with Bill Knight personally.”
“When?”
“Last Thursday night,” Tim said. “At the White Hart.”
Tarquin rubbed his chin, as he searched his mind for some lost memory. Then he raised his eyeb
rows, as if struck by a recollection. “Ah,” he said. “Now that you mention it, I was at the pub on Thursday night.”
“I thought as much.”
“I don’t know about your Mr. Knight, though. I spoke with several people, including a man I didn’t know. This stranger might be the one you’re talking about, but we didn’t talk for long.”
“What did the two of you talk about?”
“I don’t remember. It was last week. I can barely remember what I ate for breakfast this morning.”
Tim took out one of his cards and set it on the counter. “If you do remember anything, please let me know.” Tarquin nodded to him and Tim turned and headed towards the door.
As he walked, Tim couldn’t help but turn his head to the left, to where Scarlett had been spying. At first, he didn’t see her. Then he noticed that someone was up on a small step ladder, obviously used for getting to the higher up shelves on the far wall. He paused for a moment and looked up to see none other than Scarlett standing atop it, precariously balanced so she could see over the top. She was so intent on watching Tarquin inspect Tim’s card on the counter, with a book open as if she were browsing, that she completely missed Tim noticing her.
Tim shook his head to himself and got out of the shop before he drew any attention to her. Or should he say, any more attention than she’d already drawn to herself.
Tarquin watched the man go, then glanced down at the card, which said: “Flight Lieutenant Tim Clarke, RAF Bicester, Public Liaison” with a contact number.
Moments later, there was a scuffling behind the stacks and footsteps. Then the door opened. Glancing up, Tarquin saw Scarlett Slater scuttle out of the bookstore.
They came in together, Tarquin realized, suddenly concerned at the coincidence.
+++
Scarlett met Tim around the corner from the bookstore, out of sight of the front door and slightly out of breath.
He appeared from around the corner, and she fixed her eyes on him accusingly. “You had a witness who saw them talking?”
Tim didn’t answer, but walked right past her. He headed toward where his car was parked curbside.
She tailed after him, peppering him with questions. “Is that the same witness who saw me talking to him? Are you just making this up? What’s going on?”
Tim ignored her and kept walking.
“I don’t get it,” she said. “They only talked for a few moments, and they were complete strangers, and no one knew this guy. None of this makes any sense to me. I know I wasn’t in the White Hart that night. So if your witness lied about that, he could be lying about this. He or she. If you even have a witness. Do you? Or is that some kind of bluff?”
Tim shrugged as he reached his car.
“You told me you had an eyewitness!”
“And?”
He was lying. There was no eyewitness. And yet he knew too much. He knew what questions to ask, and he’d gotten information out of Tarquin.
Then it dawned on her.
Cameras!
The pub must have a security system. Of course it did. It served alcohol. It needed security not only for theft but for pub fights and other disputes. They probably had multiple hidden cameras, views from every possible angle.
“You have video footage of that night! Without an eyewitness, that’s the only way you can place us both at the bar reliably.”
He opened his car door. “Yeah. So?”
“Show me.”
He considered it and seemed to be weighing the damage that might do to his case.
“Hop in,” he said.
She did.
Chapter Fifteen
Private Lounge, The Bicester Hotel
“I have to be back in half an hour,” she said as Tim drove them past the wine shop in the Market Square and back to the Bicester Hotel.
She could extend her lunch hour for a few minutes because Karl wasn’t around to see, but no way she wanted to push it.
When they got back to his investigation room, Tim fired up his laptop, found the video file, and showed her the footage on his computer.
In the video footage, at first there was no one she recognized other than the bartender.
But then she saw herself enter the bar.
Oh my God, she clapped a hand over her mouth. I was there.
There was no audio and the video was black and white, but the resolution was pretty good. Enough to make out the faces of the customers, if not to read the words on the wine list sitting open on a table or the names of all the beers on tap.
She didn’t remember any of this, even with the evidence played in front of her own eyes. It looked like she’d just finished work and come in. She sometimes stopped by for a drink after closing the shop, either with Amanda or on her own.
Scarlett watched herself order a beer and wait at the bar. She noticed the other people around her. The pub wasn’t too crowded, and she’d drawn the attention of the room when she first entered, but after a few minutes the patrons all ignored her and went back to their drinks, their friends and their idle conversations.
She was sitting alone drinking, and seemed to be waiting for someone, probably Amanda. Scarlett saw herself check her phone a few times.
“I’ll skip ahead,” Tim said.
He sped up the footage then returned to real time when a man walked in.
Tim froze the footage on a frame that showed the man’s face. “That’s Bill Knight.”
He hit play again, and the scene continued to unfold. Scarlett saw Bill size up the room and approach the bar. He ordered, then moved closer to Scarlett and seemed to be asking a question.
In the video Scarlett seemed to be annoyed at first, listening to the man and trying to put him off gently, but the guy was persistent, leaning in, occasionally touching her on the arm or the shoulder. She avoided his touch when she could but didn’t bother to leave.
Watching it now, Scarlett wanted to scream at her earlier self, Get out! But she knew that would serve no purpose. This was her unremembered and irrevocable past. A part of her stayed focused on the information she was taking in. Another part of her was reeling from not being able to recall a single moment of this.
Another man entered the bar. She recognized him as Cliff. He spotted Scarlett and Bill talking, and he immediately cut in.
I met him before I met him! she realized.
Cliff had claimed to know her on Friday when he bumped into her, but she hadn’t remembered any of it.
How did I forget that night? she wondered.
In the video, Bill and Scarlett coordinated their cell phones, as if they were exchanging numbers, and then Bill left.
Tim fast-forwarded through twenty minutes of footage that showed Cliff and Scarlett talking together.
How could I not remember meeting him?
Then the video showed Scarlett and Cliff leaving together.
“I don’t remember any of this,” Scarlett muttered, only partly for Tim’s benefit.
A moment later, her mind flashed and something triggered a moment of recognition. She remembered blood and teeth. Dark and nightmarish, and her skin crawled as the vision seized her.
In her vision the teeth were coming at her in the darkness, and the face came slowly into resolution, until she recognized the man’s face.
Cliff!
In her nightmare, Cliff was the man with the bloody teeth.
She shook her head to clear the memory, and the room around her came back into focus.
“Are you all right?” Tim asked. “I thought I lost you there for a moment.”
“I just remembered…”
“What?”
“The time,” she said, glancing unseeingly at her watch. “I have to get back to work.”
Feeling suddenly nauseated and disorientated, Scarlett darted out the door.
Tim watched her leave, wondering when might be the right time to bring up the fact that after her very unsubtle escapades at the book shop, Tarquin, and whoever else was invo
lved, was probably on to her.
+++
Bicester Vintners, Bicester, England
When Scarlett got back to the wine shop, she saw that Karl had opened it up after lunch. She checked her watch and saw that she was ten minutes late. Her stomach lurched with guilt.
She felt flustered. She wasn’t usually late, and this was a bad look for her.
More than that, the rush of new information about the murder investigation was too much to process.
How could she have been at the White Hart on Thursday night and completely forgotten about it? She wouldn’t have believed it if it weren’t for the surveillance video. She had no recollection of talking with Cliff. She didn’t even know him then.
And what did it mean when he bumped into her the next day on the street? He pretended not to know her, but according to the video they had talked at the pub for more than twenty minutes.
Was it possible that the video was a fake?
Soldier Tim was military, and they certainly could have faked a video if they wanted to. But why would they? Why would they create fake evidence to frame Scarlett for a murder? She was just a shop girl. Why would she be the target of some vast military conspiracy?
No, that was too crazy. The video was probably real and her memory faulty. Occam’s Razor.
You’re losing it, Scarlett!
She pushed through the door and saw Karl at the register, handling a customer’s purchase. She didn’t want to even talk to him until she got her head on straight. She knew she was late, but she didn’t want to tell him it was because of a murder investigation in which she was a prime suspect.
She didn’t want to lie to her boss, either. She didn’t have the energy right now to make up a convincing story to cover her own arse.
Better not to say anything, she decided.
She rushed past Karl without making eye contact. She knew she probably looked guilty, but maybe she was a little guilty–of being late, if not murder.
I had nothing to do with the murder, she reminded herself as she made a beeline for the back room.
“Is everything all right?” Karl asked her as she ducked into the small passageway.
A Very British Witch Boxed Set Page 18
