Death at the WI

by Oster, C. G.

  Other people stood around the village, watching the spectacle.

  A chill went through Dory. Somehow, this all felt a little unreal as she asked questions and considered motives and lies, but searching for an actual body made this much more real. There was loss and tragedy here. A man had lost his life—and Edith. In a way, she didn’t like to think of it as fully real. This was the unpleasant part—a part that Michael was familiar with. Perhaps it was the part which urged him to discourage her from dealing with any of this.

  “Most curious,” Ruth considered. “I hope they don’t make a racket. I’m playing bridge this afternoon.”

  On the surface, that seemed like a heartless statement, but Ruth had no idea why they were here, or what they were searching for. “I’m sure it’s essential business that brings them here.”

  Again there was that disapproving look as if Dory had said something wrong. “Good day, Mrs. Ridley.” She started walking quickly, her paper wrapped provisions lodged under her elbow.

  Dory continued into the store to collect her rations. She had a cake to bake, the one she would bring when she went for tea with Sue and her mother. All the way home, her thoughts were on Constable Worthing and what he was doing. He must have convinced his superiors that there was enough evidence to suggest Mr. Stubbs had never left the village. That was who they were looking for. If what Worthing said about pigs was what had happened, they might not find him. Now a shiver went through her. That would be an awful fate.

  At home, she baked and checked the time to ensure it was ready for a decent time to go around for afternoon tea. She made an upside-down pineapple cake with the tinned pineapples that had been available a few weeks back. It wasn’t the most spectacular cake, but Dory was sure it tasted better than it looked.

  With her trusted cake tin, she walked to Sue’s house and balanced it as she knocked on the door.

  “Dory,” Sue said as she opened the door. “Please come in.”

  A young boy pushed past as she stepped in the door.

  “Harry!” Sue admonished. “Careful. We have a guest. I’m so sorry. He has no manners at all.”

  “No harm. I have two brothers, so I know what it’s like.”

  “Come through,” Sue said and led her into the formal room at the front of the house. Dory would be just as happy at the kitchen table, but they wanted to make a good impression. It was kind of them to care about her impression.

  “I brought pineapple cake.”

  “Ooh, very exotic.”

  “It’s only tinned pineapple. My husband found some in London.”

  “We don’t get tinned pineapple in Beaconsfield, do we, mother?” Sue said. “Tea?”

  “Please.”

  “Well, it’s lovely you’ve come to visit, Mrs. Ridley. How long have you lived here now?”

  “Not long. Six months?”

  “You’re in the new development, I take it.”

  “Yes.”

  “Fancy houses those.”

  “It is a strange neighborhood as just about everyone who lives there are strangers.”

  “I couldn’t imagine,” Sue’s mother said.

  “This is a lovely house,” Dory said, looking around the room that held most of the family’s precious objects.

  “We’ve been here for generations,” Sue said. “Not in this house, but in the district.”

  “It’s a lovely district too,” Dory said with a smile. “I’m growing so fond of it. And the friends I’ve made at the WI. I would hardly know anyone here if it wasn’t for the organizations.”

  “Were you a member before you came to Beaconsfield?”

  “No, I was part of the WRENS during the war.”

  “Is that right? What did you do for them?”

  “I manned the searchlights in London for a while. Then drove coal down the canals.”

  “You’ve had an adventurous life.”

  Dory smiled, but chose not to mention some of her other adventures, not wanting to come across as blowing her own horn. But come to think of it, she’d had some adventures. “I met Eleanor Stubbs the other day,” Dory said.

  “You know what I heard?” Sue said with emphasis. “Her farm is crawling with policemen. Whatever could they be looking for? You don’t think they suspect her of murdering Edith Wallis, do you?”

  “No, of course not. They have always been friends,” the mother said.

  That proved how fast news spread in the village. No doubt everyone had heard about the visiting policemen at this point.

  “I understand Eleanor Stubbs used to be a member of the WI. She doesn’t seem to come anymore.”

  “That husband of hers was a brute. I don’t think he let her come, and even now, I doubt she has the time.”

  “I had heard he wasn’t the most pleasant person,” Dory said. “Penelope was also great friends with Edith. Is she friends with Eleanor as well?”

  “No, those two never got on.”

  Now that she thought about it, there seemed to be some frostiness between Penelope and the other members of the WI, the ones in her age group. “That is curious,” Dory stated.

  “It wasn’t to do with Ruben Stubbs, was it?” Sue asked, saving Dory the trouble.

  “No, it had something to do with Eleanor’s brother, years ago.”

  “Brother?” Dory said, feeling the hairs on her arms rise. There was a brother?

  “He died during the war. In the first few months, actually,” the woman said.

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” So, not the brother. “There is a rumor,” Dory said carefully, knowing this was going to be provocative, “that Ruben Stubbs never left the village.”

  Both Sue and her mother stared at her for a moment, then looked at each other. “That would not be good,” Sue finally said. “Is that why there’s policemen at her farm?”

  “Yes, it would be,” Dory confirmed.

  Sue mother leaned back and stroked her fingers across her mouth.

  “And I think Edith knew what had happened,” Dory continued. “Eleanor very much has an alibi for when Edith was killed, so someone else had to be involved—someone who killed Edith.”

  The ringing silence continued and Dory wondered if she’d made a mistake bringing this up.

  “Who would Eleanor call if she’d done something drastic?”

  “You know I could see that happen,” Sue’s mother said. “Pushed too far, she would snap one day. She must have snapped.”

  “This is awful,” Sue said, looking ill.

  “Would she call Edith?”

  “Not in the first instance,” Sue’s mother said.

  “Who would she call?” Dory asked.

  “Marjorie.”

  “Marjorie?” Sue asked.

  “Yes, she would call Marjorie.”

  Their gazes all passed between each other.

  “But Marjorie was at the meeting. She was at the back...” Sue’s voice trailed off. “No, it couldn’t be.”

  Now goosebumps rose across Dory’s entire body. Marjorie had done this. It couldn’t have been without Hesta knowing, as she had been in the back too. It was perfectly possible Marjorie could have snuck out of the back, done the deed and be back before anyone noticed.

  “Well, this was not the chatter I expected,” Sue said, looking at her mother.

  “I think we must tell Constable Worthing,” Dory said. “I will. I’m sorry, but I must go do so straight away.” The women both stared at her as she stood. She hadn’t even had the chance to taste the cake, but this couldn’t wait. “I’m sorry,” she said and grabbed her handbag.

  “No, of course he must be made aware. You might not find him if he’s searching the farm,” Sue’s mother said.

  “Yes, of course,” Dory said absently. “I will have to find some way of getting the message to him.”

  “No, it can’t be Marjorie,” Sue said beseechingly, clearly in shock. “It can’t be. She’d never do something like that.”

  “It might not be,” Dor
y said, not really knowing what she was saying. There was a certain feeling she got when she landed on the right person, and she had that feeling now.

  Chapter 32

  DORY RAN TO THE CONSTABLE’S office. It had started raining, but she didn’t care about that now. If he was still out at the Stubbs’ farm, Dory didn’t know how she’d get in touch with him. Maybe she could call, in some way?

  Luckily, the door was open. Someone was there. Hopefully Worthing would be there too.

  Noise reached her before she got to the door. Men talking.

  “Constable Worthing?” Dory called at the door. The small office held more men than it should and they all quietened and looked at her. Worthing came over.

  “I can’t speak to you now,” he said and urged her away.

  “Did you find anything?”

  “I’m sorry. I can’t speak. I’ll be in touch at some other date,” he said and kept urging her away. He closed the door on her. His superiors and colleagues were here and now he treated her like an embarrassing secret. It was understandable. And likely he didn’t want her around in case she let slip something she knew about how he performed in this job.

  But there were more important issues to deal with. Dory knocked on the door and kept doing so until he answered it, giving her a wide-eyed look as if she was being unreasonable.

  “Marjorie Woodcock is the one you’re looking for,” she said.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “She killed Edith. She’s the one Eleanor would call if she got herself into trouble.”

  Worthing quickly stepped outside and closed the door behind him, as they still had the attention from the other policemen.

  “How do you know?” he asked.

  “She was in the back of the hall during the meeting,” Dory said, trying to get everything out at once. “She could easily have snuck away and returned before anyone noticed. She must have helped Eleanor with her husband, and Edith knew too. It could even be that she had been called in to help. That I don’t know. And I swear Hesta Brown knew, because she and Marjorie are thick as thieves, and she was in the back of the hall too.”

  “Slow down,” Worthing begged. “What proof do you have?”

  “Absolutely none. I’m not a policeman. It’s for you to do. Did you find a body? Why are you back from searching?”

  “Yes, we did. Seems she couldn’t feed him to the pigs after all.”

  A gesture of distaste worked through Dory’s features. “That’s...”

  “Probably proves her undoing in the end. So you reckon she’d called Marjorie to help bury him.”

  “Probably Hesta too. And Edith knew, if she wasn’t there to help. Edith was the one who didn’t cope with the knowledge, and she proved to be a threat. Something must have happened the day before when they saw her to prepare for the meeting. Edith must have said something, or else it was planned even before that. Maybe involving Edith in the meeting had a sinister purpose all along.”

  “Motive, opportunity and means,” he said. “We don’t have a murder weapon.”

  “It has to be somewhere between the Wallis’ house and the meeting hall. Or she took it back to the hall and then disposed of it more carefully.”

  “We are questioning Eleanor Stubbs shortly. She’s being taken to Aylesbury for it. I guess we have some more questions to ask her,” he said. “Thank you for letting me know. Is there anything else?”

  Dory tried to think quickly, but nothing came to mind. “No.”

  “Well, we have no proof, but we can start looking, and maybe Mrs. Stubbs will confess. It will be hard for her to claim she didn’t know about it as she stated her husband had called her. That will be hard to explain away.”

  “Right,” Dory said and nodded.

  “I have to go,” Worthing uttered and opened the door to the constabulary again. “Thank you for the information,” he said louder, and Dory knew she wasn’t the only intended recipient of it.

  “Good luck,” Dory said with a smile and then watched as he closed the door again.

  Turning, she looked out on the square. Things felt settled. The puzzle had been solved and she could let this go now. More slowly, she walked home. For a moment, she wondered if she should return to Sue’s house, but that would seem a little morbid considering the unpleasant things that had come out. There was a chance Dory would never be invited around again.

  Her house was quiet when she got home, but it didn’t feel oppressive this time. After everything, a bit of peace and quiet was welcome. Perhaps because her emotions still felt riotous. How could this have happened? Friends turning on each other like this?

  Curiously, it was a friend calling for help that had drawn them in, and then one of them couldn’t hold the secret. Edith had become a threat—or Marjorie had believed so. It could be that Edith was struggling to live with the secret.

  Sitting down on one of the salon chairs, Dory stared out the window. On one level, she wasn’t sure how she felt about all this. Ruben Stubbs had been a brute, and Eleanor must have snapped, or sought some way to end her suffering. It could even be self-defense, but there was also a chance that she had sought to do away with her husband rather than leave the situation she’d found herself in.

  What would she do if a friend had asked her for help? It was hard to say. If it was someone she cared about and she knew their heart, then she could well be tempted into hiding a crime. However, murdering Edith was a step beyond. It was for the purposes of keeping their act hidden. That Dory had a much harder time forgiving. In no way did Edith deserve what happened to her.

  The cold-hearted person would say she threatened her friends’ wellbeing, and that was true. The law wasn’t always understanding to women who murdered their husbands. Eleanor Stubbs could hang for it if she couldn’t make the case for self-defense sufficiently well. The subsequent actions to hide the murder were damning—as was another murder.

  It surprised her when Michael’s car pulled into the driveway. Had time gone so quickly? She hadn’t even started supper. Rising from her chair, she smoothed her skirt and went to meet him.

  “What’s the matter?” he said as he walked in the door and looked at her. He must have seen it on her face.

  “There has been some resolution,” she said quietly. Curiously, now she didn’t really want to talk about it. In fact, she wanted to put it all behind her now.

  With this, the central pillar of their WI group had been ripped out. Who would take over? It would leave the group reeling, and Dory might not be as welcome anymore. It any case, it would be awkward. This could signify the end of her involvement, based on everyone’s unease.

  “So who was it?”

  “One of the ladies covering up that she’d helped hide Ruben Stubbs’ body. It could be two, but I will leave that for Worthing to sort.”

  “You look tired.”

  “I feel drained.” It wasn’t just the anxiety, but also the needlessness of it all. If they had only come forward about Ruben’s death, this could all have been avoided, but perhaps they feared that it wouldn’t be seen as self-defense and they’d agreed not to take the chance.

  “How about we go away this weekend?” he suggested.

  “That is an excellent idea.” Being away from the village for a few days would do her good. “I’m afraid I haven’t started supper yet, but it won’t take long to cook.”

  “Alright,” he said and walked into the salon. “I could use a moment to sit with myself.” He pulled out his tobacco pouch.

  “I think I might have burned some bridges,” Dory admitted.

  “That is a natural consequence. Policemen are not readily popular, but you take that on as part of the job. But then we don’t tend to investigate in our own communities, because people will displace their anger at the crime to the people who catch them.”

  That was what Dory feared hearing. On some level she knew it and felt that crime had to be investigated no matter what the consequences were. On the other, this was n
ever something she had to get involved with. Now anger could well be directed toward her, and there was nothing she could do about it.

  After supper, she would write to Lady Pettifer about the developments. “I won’t be long,” Dory said and walked into the kitchen and turned the stove on.

  Was it that she had managed to lose all the friends she’d made in the village? It could be. That was the price. Michael had urged her to stay away from it all, but it simply wasn’t in her nature.

  In the coming weeks, she would see what the fallout would be. It could well be that she had to make new friends amongst the incomers on the new development. That would be sad. Granted, many of the people at Wallisford Hall still held it against her the part she’d played in uncovering Lady Wallisford’s crime, but they were not her good friends and they never would be. Perhaps she simply needed to be more discerning. And if people would more happily live in calm delusion rather than address a crime, then did she really want to be friends with them in the first place?

  Not everyone was going to like her, and that was something she would have to get used to.

  Chapter 33

  THINGS REMAINED QUIET for Dory for a few weeks. No one called on her and she heard little about what Constable Worthing was doing, mainly because she didn’t go see him. On her walk to the grocer, she’d seen a number of cars outside the Constable’s office, so the people from Aylesbury were still here.

  Her interest in the case had dissipated somewhat, because the reasons for why people did things like this were simply sad. As was the punishment facing them. Perhaps that was an inconsistency on her part. The mystery drew her, but when it came time to deal with the resolution of the crime, she stayed as far away as she could.

  On one hand, she knew Marjorie and Hesta—respected them. In many respects, they were good women, but they had done this to Edith, and it wasn’t something that could be overlooked. Even if Dory understood what had driven them to do it, it couldn’t be overlooked. Even Eleanor she felt conflicted by. It was understandable that she sought to end years of abuse from her husband. Her life might even have been in peril, but the decisions they’d made afterward wouldn’t help her now.