Jane Carter Historical Cozies: Omnibus Edition (Six Mystery Novels)

by Alice Simpson

  “I’m hungry,” she sobbed. “It was cold in there, and a big rat kept running around. Why did you lock me inside?”

  “Bless you,” Mr. McKee said. “I never dreamed anyone was inside the shop. How did you get in there?”

  “I went inside last night and hid,” Amelia explained in a calmer voice. “It was cold outside, and I had to have some place to sleep.”

  “You never should have run away from the home,” I said. “Why did you do it?”

  “Because I don’t like it there,” the child answered defiantly. “I’ll never be adopted like the other children.”

  “Why do you believe that no one will adopt you?” I asked.

  “Miss Crismond says I won’t be—I heard her tell the matron. It’s on account of a nervous ’fliction. I’m afraid of things, ’specially cars.”

  “Being afraid of cars is very natural, everything considered,” I said, remembering the story Miss Crismond had told me. “I’ll take you to the home.”

  Amelia drew away, and as if seeking protection, crowded close beside Mr. McKee.

  “I’m never going back, even if I freeze and starve!” she announced. “I’ll find me a cave and live on berries. It would be more fun than being an orphan.”

  I gazed despairingly at the old bell maker. With a chuckle, he took the child by the hand and led her toward the cottage.

  “We’ll have lunch and talk things over,” he proposed. “How will that be?”

  “I’m awful hungry,” Amelia admitted, smiling up at him. “But you won’t give me any old boiled potatoes, will you? We have ’em every single day at the home.”

  “No potatoes,” Mr. McKee promised. “We’ll have the very nicest things I can find in the icebox, and maybe a stick of candy to top it off.”

  While Mr. McKee pottered about the kitchen preparing a warm meal, I washed Amelia’s face and hands and combed her tangled hair. Afterward, I telephoned officials of the home, telling them that Amelia was found.

  “I’ll bring her there within an hour,” I promised. “Just as soon as she has had her lunch.”

  Amelia was ravenous. Her face had an elfin quality when she smiled. Her brown eyes, roving about the spick and span little dinette, took in every detail.

  “This is almost as nice as it was at our home,” she said. “I mean my real home when Daddy and Mother were alive. I’d like to stay here. Would your wife let me?”

  “Bless you, I haven’t any wife,” Mr. McKee said. “I’m a bachelor.”

  “Wouldn’t you like a little girl?” Amelia persisted. “I could do your dishes for you and sweep the floor. I’d be real good.”

  “Well, now I’ve often thought I would like a nice little girl,” he replied, smiling.

  “Then you can have me!” Amelia cried, jumping up from her chair. “You can tell the home I won’t be back!”

  “Not so fast, not so fast,” Mr. McKee said hastily. “I’d like a little girl, but I am afraid I can’t afford one. I don’t make much money anymore, and there are other reasons—”

  “I won’t eat much,” Amelia promised. “Please keep me, Mr. McKee.”

  The old man was so distressed that I tried to come to his rescue. However, despite repeated explanations, Amelia refused to understand why she could not immediately become Mr. McKee’s little girl.

  “If I had my old job back, I’d be tempted, sorely tempted,” the old man said to me. “I’ve always wanted someone that was near and dear to me.” He drew a deep sigh. “As things are, I don’t see how it could be worked out.”

  “Won’t you keep thinking about it?” Amelia pleaded. “Anytime you want me, I’ll come right away.”

  “Yes, I’ll think about it,” Mr. McKee promised soberly. “I really will.”

  An hour later I took a very depressed Amelia back to the Greenville Orphans’ Home. I left her there and drove on into town, chancing to see Flo on the street.

  I pulled up beside her and swung wide the passenger side door.

  “On your way home, Flo?” I asked.

  “No, just wandering around in a daze trying to do a bit of shopping,” Florence answered, climbing aboard. “The stores here never have anything I want.”

  “Then why not go to Clackston?”

  “I would if I could get there, but Mother has the car today. It’s the organizational meeting of the Daughters’ of the American Revolution’s Labor Day Picnic and Pig Roast.”

  “Pig Roast?” I could not imagine Mrs. Reverend Sidney Radcliff presiding over a pig on a spit. “I should have thought tea sandwiches were more the mode with the DAR.”

  Flo was laughing. Usually, she’s as solemn as a monk during lent, but occasionally she likes to lampoon her mother.

  “I expect my mother will be forced to relax her standards to the extent of allowing potato salad to be served, but I expect any pork products will be strictly limited to taking the form of frankfurters and ham sandwiches.”

  “Never mind your mother and her frankfurters,” I said. “I’ll take you to Clackston. I need to go there myself on special business, and I could do with the company.”

  “Well, I don’t know,” Florence said dubiously. “I doubt Bouncing Betsy would withstand such a long trip. I shouldn’t like to be marooned halfway there.”

  “I’ll take Dad’s car, then, just to ease your mind. He rode the bus to work today.”

  “In that case, the answer is ‘yes,’” Florence replied instantly.

  I drove directly home to exchange cars and tell Mrs. Timms where I was going.

  “Florence and I may not be back until very late,” I warned her. “It’s possible we’ll attend the theater while we’re at Clackston. There’s a new play on, and everyone says it’s the caterpillar’s kimono.”

  “If you drive after dark, be very careful,” Mrs. Timms insisted. “There are so many accidents on the roads these days.”

  We stopped off briefly at the Radcliff residence to inform Flo’s father not to expect her home for supper.

  We found an ink-spotted Reverend Radcliff in his study surrounded by crumpled papers and muttering to himself about Moses and the manna in the wilderness.

  He nodded absently when informed that his only daughter would be taking in a play in Clackston and said something about boiling an egg for supper.

  “Will your mother still be out attending to business for the Daughters of the American Revolution all evening?” I asked Flo, as we pulled away from the parsonage.

  “No, it’s her evening to chair the biannual meeting of the Temperance Society. My father will enjoy his boiled egg with a nice glass of whiskey—purchased in 1916 to celebrate the opening of Weeghman Park and the Cubs’ triumph over the Cincinnati Reds in the inaugural game. He has precisely one glass left. He keeps the bottle in the garden shed behind the lawnmower, for just such occasions when my mother is out for the evening.”

  “Does your mother know your father keeps a bottle of whiskey in the toolshed?”

  “Good heavens, no. She’d have a thousand fits, even though she’d frequently enjoy a glass of after-supper sherry quite happily until prohibition kicked in and having the occasional tipple ceased to be respectable.”

  We took to the road. I selected the same route which Jack and I had followed the previous night.

  “Is that why we’re going to Clackston?” Florence inquired curiously after I told her the story of what had happened to the Dorner melon truck. “You intend to trace those stolen cantaloupes?”

  “I haven’t much hope of doing that,” I answered. “I want to visit the telegraph office and get an original message which was sent to Dad. His life has been made miserable by a pest who keeps sending him telegrams, and I’m out to catch the rascal.”

  “You jump around from one thing to another so fast I can’t keep track of your enterprises,” Florence said.

  “I concentrate on the ones which offer a prospect of ready cash. If I catch Mr. Seth Burrows, it means precisely one hundred dollars to me.”


  “I used to blame your mercenary nature on your poverty,” said Flo. “Now—”

  “Shep asked after you the other day,” I said.

  “Oh?”

  “Yes, he inquired after your health.”

  His exact words had been, “How’s that fatty Florence keeping?” but we lady novelists know where to prune and prevaricate. Poor Flo is hardly on the verge of qualifying for the light-heavyweight class, but as she’s in the habit of comparing herself to a platypus—to the platypus’s advantage—I didn’t think an exact quote of Shep’s words would work in his favor.

  When we arrived in Clackston, we spent two hours shopping at the large department stores. I then made a tour of the telegraph offices, finally locating the one from which Mr. Burrows’ message was sent. After explaining why I wanted to see it, I was allowed to inspect and keep the original copy which bore the sender’s signature.

  “I’ll turn this handwriting over to the police,” I explained to Florence. “We may be able to trace Seth Burrows by means of it.”

  “Providing the man ever comes to Greenville,” Florence said skeptically. “It seems like a forlorn hope to me.”

  Before I left the telegraph office, I asked the clerk who had handled the message if he could describe Seth Burrows.

  “I don’t remember him well,” the young man answered. “I should say he was well-dressed—probably about thirty-five years of age.”

  “Not much to go on,” I said regretfully. “Thanks anyhow.”

  “Where now?” Florence asked in a weary voice as we finally left the telegraph office. “Shall we buy tickets to the play?”

  “Not yet. I’d like to wander around the market district a bit.”

  For the next hour, we walked around a section of the city where farmers brought their produce to sell in open stalls. I went from one counter to another, inspecting cantaloupes, hoping to find one which bore the Dorner stamp.

  “I’m getting tired of pawing vegetables,” Florence complained. “When do we eat?”

  “I had not observed you in the act of pawing any vegetables.” I protested. “But, perhaps, I have been under a misapprehension, lo these many years, that melons are classified as fruits.”

  Florence sighed deeply and muttered something under her breath about “blasted melons.”

  Scandalous words, indeed, from the mouth of a clergyman’s daughter.

  “All right, we may as well call it a day,” I reluctantly gave in.

  In the downtown section of the city, we found a small cafe which advertised a deluxe dinner for one dollar. We enjoyed a leisurely meal and then bought theater tickets.

  “Jane, do you realize what all this is costing us?” Florence began to worry belatedly.

  “Oh, I’ll soon make it up,” I said. “Wait until I capture Seth Burrows. With my profit from him, we’ll paint the town red.”

  The play was an excellent one, and when the curtain fell, neither Flo nor I begrudged the money we’d paid for our tickets.

  “It’s been a grand day,” Florence said as we left the theater. “Let’s get home now as quickly as we can.”

  The drive to Greenville consumed nearly an hour. As we approached the Moresby Tower, I noted that the hands on the illuminated clock face pointed to twelve o’clock.

  “The witching hour of midnight,” Florence said. “Do you still think that mechanical creature has supernatural powers?”

  “Quiet!” I commanded, idling the car as the big clock began to strike. “I’m going to count the strokes.”

  “I’ll do it too, just so you can’t pull a fast one on me. That’s two now.”

  As each slow note sounded, Florence counted it aloud. She paused when she reached twelve, but the clock did not. There was a slight break, then another stroke.

  “It did strike thirteen,” said Flo “Or perhaps I became mixed up.”

  “You made no mistake,” I said, easing the car to a standstill by the curb. “It struck thirteen, and that last stroke wasn’t like the others.”

  “It did seem to have a slightly different tone. I wonder why?”

  “Someone must have struck the bell an extra tap. Florence, don’t you see? It must be a signal.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  “You have the craziest ideas, Jane,” Florence scoffed. “I’ll admit the clock struck an extra time, but it must have been because something is wrong with the mechanism. A signal, my eye!”

  Lowering the car window, I peered curiously up at the tower which was shrouded in mist.

  “Flo, there’s someone up there in the cupola. I suppose it must be Clarence Fitzpatrick.”

  “You can’t make a mystery out of Clarence.” Florence yawned and stretched uncomfortably in the passenger seat. “Probably, he’s trying to repair the clock. Come on, let’s get home.”

  I reluctantly raised the window glass, but before I could drive on, another car pulled up not far from the tower. The driver, a man in an overcoat, swung open the door, but observing Bouncing Betsy parked close by, he seemed to change his mind. He kept his head lowered so that his face was in shadow and drove away.

  “Who was that man, I wonder?” I said.

  “I’m afraid I neglected to inquire,” Florence said pettishly. “So careless of me.”

  “Whoever he was, he intended to enter the tower. When he saw us here, he became nervous and drove away.”

  “Oh, Jane, you’re the limit.”

  “Maybe I am, but I know what I think. The striking of the clock was a signal for some sort of meeting at the tower.”

  “A board of director’s conference, perhaps?” Flo suggested. “Or perhaps, they too, have a bottle of booze stashed somewhere where their Temperance Society wives won’t find it.”

  “Listen,” I said, ignoring her jibes. “I want to park the car on a side street, and then come back here on foot. Something is up, and I mean to find out what it is.”

  “Oh, Jane,” Florence sighed. “If I don’t get home soon, Mother will back from her meeting. She doesn’t spare a thought to what I do in her absence, but if I’m not home to commiserate and sympathize with her about the trials of chairing the Temperance Society committee for the advancement of public morals and the betterment of society she’ll blow a gusset. I may have neglected to mention it before, but a Mrs. Arnold Pruitt—wife of one of the partners at Pruitt and Lawson, Attorneys-at-Law—has recently been voicing concern that Mother is overworking herself by taking on so much responsibility as chair of such a large number of local clubs. Mother is convinced that Mrs. Pruitt is positioning herself to stage a coup. Mother’s right, of course.”

  “It’d do your mother a world of good to relinquish a few of her responsibilities,” I said. “Well, it’d do her clubs a world of good, anyway. She runs every organization she’s in charge of like a despot.”

  “That may be your opinion, and doubtless many would agree with you, but you don’t have to live with her and listen to an endless recitation of the wrongs against her. If I’m not on hand to lend a loyal ear when she gets home—don’t you realize what time it is?”

  “Thirteen o’clock,” I said. “It may never be that again, so I must strike while the clock strikes, so to speak. How about it?”

  “Well, it’s your car.” Flo shrugged. “I’m powerless in your hands.”

  I drove around the block and parked. Flo and I got out and approached the tower on foot, taking care to keep close to a high hedge which edged the grounds.

  “I never felt sillier in all my life,” Florence complained. “What are we supposed to do now?”

  “Windows were made to look through,” I said. “Let’s see what Clarence Fitzpatrick is doing inside the tower.”

  We circled the building until we came to a window. I placed a rock beneath it. From that precarious perch, I was able to peer into the living quarters of the tower.

  “Well, what do you see, Sherlock?” Florence demanded impatiently.

  “Nothing.”

  “How
perfectly amazing. What do you make of it?”

  “Clarence Fitzpatrick seems to be reading a newspaper.”

  “Baffling! It must have some deep, dark significance,” said Flo. “Better call the police. We can’t have the citizenry of Greenville committing such rash and dangerous acts as reading newspapers in the privacy of their own homes.”

  With a sigh, I stepped down from the rock.

  “Want to look?” I asked Flo.

  “I do not.”

  “Then I guess we may as well go home,” I said reluctantly.

  As I spoke, I heard an automobile pull up in front of the tower. With reviving hope, I placed a restraining hand on Florence’s arm, forcing her to wait in the shadow of the building. A minute elapsed and then the front door of the tower slammed shut. Without the slightest hesitation, I moved once more to my previous position beneath the rear window.

  “Clarence has some visitors,” I reported to Flo in a whisper. “Four men I never saw before. I wish I could hear what they are saying.”

  “Why not smash the window, or saw a hole through the wall?” Flo suggested. If she were a donkey, she’d have had her ears laid back.

  I stepped from the rock, offering the place to Flo.

  “Do look inside,” I urged her. “Maybe you’ll recognize those men. It’s really important.”

  Florence unwillingly did as I requested.

  “I never saw any of them, either,” she said, climbing back down off the rock. “They must be friends of Clarence Fitzpatrick.”

  “It’s a special meeting,” I insisted. “I suspect other men may come along within a few minutes.”

  “I know one thing,” Florence said. “I’ll not be here to see them. If you’re not ready to go home, then I shall walk.”

  “Oh, all right, I’ll come with you. It seems a pity though, just when we might have learned something important.”

  I returned the stone to its original location and hurried after Flo. We drove to the Radcliff home.

  “Sorry to have spoiled your fun, Jane,” Flo apologized as she said goodnight. “If you’ll only arrange to conduct your explorations by daylight, I’ll try to cooperate.”