Baker's Coven

by Nancy Warren

  I promised Sgt. Lane that I’d keep myself safe. He seemed relieved. I made a mental note not to talk to Gateau in front of him and definitely not to react to Gerry’s antics if he was around, and then we parted ways. I felt grateful knowing that people like DI Hembly and Sgt. Lane were out there, protecting the community. That fact, and the amethyst around my neck, would hopefully help me get some sleep tonight. Because, murder or no murder, I had the final baking challenge in the morning.

  Inside the pub, the rest of the bakers had mostly dispersed. It wasn’t late, only nine p.m., but I figured they were in their rooms, getting ready to bake tomorrow. And that’s what I should be doing, too, though the trauma of witnessing a man’s death had pretty much dimmed my enthusiasm for baking.

  I felt like I’d done several rounds in a boxing ring today, from my highest high, winning the cake challenge, to my lowest low, finding poor Arnold Bentley. I desperately wanted a good meal and a large glass of red wine but wasn’t sure I could face anyone who might be left in the pub. I definitely didn’t have it in me to make polite conversation about the best temperature for cooking fudge or whatever baking topic was top of the list tonight. Not after what I’d seen this evening.

  Besides, I was pretty sure that Gateau would be waiting for me, luxuriating on my bed, and I needed her comfort. The drama of the evening’s events had finally caught up to me, and I felt like someone had drained the life right out of me. I wondered if I could have food sent up to my room. This place didn’t have a room service menu, but I bet if Eve was around she’d be willing to send up a tray.

  I began to climb the stairs when I heard my name bellowed from the dining room. I winced. It was undeniably Florence’s musical voice, and I was busted. I retraced my steps and entered the pub. It smelt of a rich meat stew, and the red tapered candles were flickering on the oak tables. A fire crackled merrily in the grated fireplace, and the whole setup looked so inviting, I almost melted into the chair that Hamish pulled out for me. I joined him, Florence, and Gaurav, who were polishing off a bottle of wine. I felt safe here and among friends. Maybe I didn’t want to be on my own after all.

  “Where have you been, Pops?” Florence asked, pouting and pouring me a glass of wine. “We wanted to celebrate you and your win today. You always seem to be running off, doing errands, instead of spending time with your friends.” I could barely muster a smile, but she was right. I was always disappearing from the group, and every time I did, something bad happened.

  Florence might be too self-involved to see what was under her nose, but Hamish was a police officer, and I’d found he didn’t miss much. He poured me a glass of water from the jug in the middle of the table and handed it to me.

  “Are you okay?” Hamish asked, sounding very nasal. “You don’t look flushed with victory. In fact, you’re very pale. You haven’t caught my cold, have you?”

  I didn’t reply. I took a long drink of the water.

  He looked at me again, and then his eyes opened wide. “I’ve seen that expression on you before.” He paused. “I’m drinking a hot whiskey for this cold. It’s got plenty of honey in it. Maybe you should have one too. And something to eat?”

  I shuddered at the mention of honey. “The wine is fine.”

  “And you must eat something,” Florence insisted.

  “Maybe some soup.” I couldn’t fancy anything heavy. Florence went up to the bar to order for me. She returned and told me that a bowl of minestrone soup was on the way. She might not be very observant, but once she’d been alerted that I was pale, she was a good friend.

  “Now, spill whatever it is that’s happened,” she said. “You’re scaring me. Did they decide you didn’t win your baking challenge after all?”

  I shook my head.

  “Something worse? They made a mistake and decided to send you home instead?”

  It was so ridiculous, I laughed. “No. Nothing to do with baking.”

  She put a hand to her chest, her dark nails as dramatic as her fears. “Thank goodness.”

  I took a long sip of the red wine. I looked at each of their expectant faces and didn’t want to ruin the fun of the weekend by telling them someone else had died on the grounds. But in a small village like this, word would soon spread.

  So I breathed deeply and told them everything, right from the beginning. How I’d returned Sly, the gooseberry picking, the gifted happy chickens’ eggs and contented bees’ honey, and that I’d been on my way to tell Susan the good news of my win when I found her and her husband on the ground beside a toppled beehive. I took a breath. “And he was allergic. Deathly allergic. Of course, the bees were homeless and angry, and he was stung. And now he’s—”

  “Dead?” Florence cried. “Holy mother of God. What craziness is happening at Broomewode?”

  Hamish sneezed. “Poor guy. What a way to go. You worry about being allergic to bee stings, and then BAM: worst fear realized.”

  Guarav was quiet, but his eyes gleamed. I couldn’t tell if it was the red wine or the drama of my news. His mind was obviously whirring. He took another sip of his wine and said, “Surely a man allergic to bees would have an EpiPen on him? Like at all times? Especially if his zany wife kept bloomin’ bees on their land?”

  I nodded sadly. “That’s the thing. Arnold did always keep an EpiPen in his pocket. And he never went anywhere near the beehives.” I looked at Hamish. “It was his worst fear. Susan said he often had two EpiPens on him. So what he was doing by the beehives and leaving the house without a pen… It doesn’t make sense.”

  Hamish was shaking his head. “Nope. This doesn’t add up at all. I hate to say it, but it sounds a lot like—”

  “Don’t say murder,” Florence implored him.

  Gaurav was gobsmacked. “Come on,” he said, disbelief spreading across his face. “I know last weekend was a shocker, and we’re all kind of recovering from what happened to Gerry, but we can’t go jumping to wild conclusions. It’s an unfortunate accident, that’s all.”

  Wow. I guess it took a bee-related death to bring shy Gaurav out of his shell.

  Hamish looked thoughtful. “I think I have to agree with Gaurav here. I’ve never worked with the homicide department, but years of being a beat police officer tells me there’s just no motive here. Why would anyone murder a retiree tucked away in a tiny village in Somerset?”

  It was a good question. My bowl of soup arrived. It smelled fragrant and herby, and the curls of pasta floating on top looked delicious. I quickly buttered a warm, crusty chunk of baguette and tucked in. I was famished again. What would it take to truly throw off my appetite? The apocalypse? Probably not even then—I had images of me chowing down on a cheeseburger while the world went up in flames and the cockroaches reigned supreme.

  “If there’s one thing Gordon taught us, it’s that first impressions can sometimes count for nothing,” Florence said. “Just think about it: this time last week we were breaking bread with a homicidal manic. We welcomed him into our fold.”

  “True,” Hamish said, shaking his head. “I even bought the rotter a beer. Maybe my instincts aren’t what they used to be.”

  I looked up from my soup. “Don’t say that, Hamish. None of us could have predicted how Gordon would turn out.”

  “So what I’m saying is,” Florence said, steering the conversation back to her musings, “maybe this Arnold Bentley wasn’t who he appeared to be, either.”

  I said nothing. I agreed wholeheartedly, but I really didn’t want to be the one who led my fellow bakers away from the food processor toward conspiracy theories. I took another bite of my baguette.

  “We could look him up on the internet,” Florence said, whipping out her phone. “What was his full name?”

  “Arnold Bentley, no idea of his middle name.” I wondered how much I could share from overhearing a police questioning and then remembered that Susan had told me of her husband’s former profession before he’d died. I wouldn’t reveal anything she’d said to the police, but I didn’t
feel like I was breaking rules to share that he’d been in London and worked in investments.

  “Good,” Hamish said, scooting next to Florence to stare at her screen. The moonlight shone through the pub’s window and spilled onto Florence’s hands as her long, polished nails tapped across the phone.

  I shook my head and kept eating. I’d had a mini debate with myself as to whether to tell the group about my near miss with the falling stone. Now I was especially glad I hadn’t. The last thing I wanted was to stir up any more fuss and amateur detective work. Although Hamish was no amateur. I kept forgetting that his real-life job was on the force. To me he was a brilliant baker with a flair for fondant icing. I spooned the last of my soup and turned my attention back to the internet stalking I’d accidentally encouraged. Way to go, Pops.

  “Hmmm,” Florence said, frowning. “A Facebook profile page of someone in Florida.” She swiped a few times. “Ooh, this looks promising. It’s a business networking site. You said he was in finance, right?”

  I nodded reluctantly.

  “Oh. This Arnold Bentley is a thirty-two-year-old architect.” Florence sighed. Gaurav had returned to his silent self, but he was watching Florence’s search the way I watched my dad trying to text. With amusement. Like me, he seemed to be having some internal battle. But I guess one side overcame the other because he said, “You won’t get very far like that. Let me have a look.”

  “You’re in biochemistry,” Florence replied. “What do you know about internet research? I have to do a lot of background work when I’m preparing a character.”

  “I’m pretty good with computers.” Gaurav stood. “Gimme a sec. I’ll be back with my laptop.”

  I took another sip of my wine. Florence and Hamish tried to prod me for more details. If these three wanted to find out what really happened to Arnold Bentley, then who was I to stop them? I’d brought them the information, and now I was going to have to deal with the consequences.

  I described Arnold in detail, from the sweep of gray hair, elegantly combed away from his high forehead, down to the navy cashmere sweater he’d been wearing when I first saw him in the pub and flannel trousers. “And he had these really polished brown brogues on,” I said. “I was embarrassed by my muddy sneakers.”

  Gaurav returned and flipped his laptop open. “Okay, this is how the pros do it. Poppy, I need to know every little thing about Arnold Bentley that you can remember. No detail is too small.”

  I thought hard, but I really didn’t know very much at all. I knew his wife’s name, that he rented Broomewode Farm directly from Lord Frome, who was an ex-client of his. He drove an old Land Rover and had an amazing border collie named Sly. When he asked me for Arnold Bentley’s approximate age, I guessed at early sixties. But it was hard to tell. To me, as soon as you started wearing cashmere and driving around in a Land Rover, you’d made it to grown-up status. In comparison, I still felt like a kid, rattling around in my battered Renault Clio, and most of my woolens came from Marks & Spencer and were definitely not cashmere.

  Gaurav quietly tapped away, looking utterly absorbed in his screen, while I finished my wine. Hamish raised an eyebrow at me. “Proper little hacker we have here,” he said, laughing before it turned into another sneeze. Florence jumped away from the table and came over to my side. “Safer over here,” she whispered into my ear. I laughed, and we started to talk about tomorrow’s final challenge, speculating about who might be going home.

  “I don’t want to be mean, because I think she’s lovely, but Evie really does seem like the most obvious choice,” Florence said.

  I nodded. “I have to agree. She’s clearly a great baker, but she loses it when the cameras are on. She has to learn to hold her nerve on this show.”

  Hamish made a sound a bit like a moan. “Don’t forget my parsnip disaster. Why, oh, why, didn’t I use something sensible? I was too clever for my own good. It’s likely me as’ll be sent home.”

  “We still have tomorrow,” I reminded them. “Any of us could make the kind of mistake you can’t recover from. Hamish, you’ll feel better, and Evie could be brilliant. If she can get over her nerves on camera. Jonathon should stay away from her. I think he makes her worse. He’s so much tougher on contestants than Elspeth.” It was true. Although I’d busted him rehearsing his lines about fruit cakes, Jonathon did judge more harshly than Elspeth. Maybe I was biased, considering Elspeth was essentially my witch mom.

  Gaurav looked up from his laptop and spun it round to face the table. “I wonder if this had anything to do with his death.”

  The three of us stopped talking immediately and turned to stare at the screen. Gaurav had found an article in the London Financial Times from five years earlier about the downfall of an investment fund. “You’ll see that Arnold Bentley was the owner of the firm. It went bankrupt, and his investors lost millions. He was investigated for fraud, but nothing was ever proven. It was put down to a bad economy and bad management.” He hit a button and another article appeared. “And here’s an article about a class-action suit. The investors got back ten pence on the pound.”

  “No!,” said Florence, putting her hands to her chest. “He was an embezzler.”

  Gaurav shook his head. “Arnold Bentley lost his license, but fraud was never proven. The judge determined that he was too much of a risk taker with other people’s money but not a criminal, so he avoided jail.”

  “Ten pence on the pound?” Hamish gave a low whistle. “Sounds criminal. What happened to the other ninety?”

  “Let’s not get carried away.” I’d met him, and they hadn’t. He’d seemed like a dull sort of man who’d done well in life and earned a quiet retirement. For some reason, when I thought of an embezzler, I pictured someone flashy and full of cheap charm. “That is certainly one big jump to a conclusion. I believe the judge and he was simply a bad investor, not a crooked one.”

  Hamish tried to say something but then blew his nose again. He sounded too sick to bake again tomorrow, but as we all knew, the show had to go on. In a thick tone, he asked if there were any names mentioned.

  Gaurav nodded, looking quite pleased to be asked. “Most of his investors were small—people who had their retirement money and children’s education funds invested—but among his principal investors were Lord and Lady Frome. The same Lord and Lady Frome who own Broomewode Hall.”

  “Yes,” I said. “They rented the farm to the Bentleys. For a modest price, according to Susan. Why would they do that if they were enemies?”

  Florence said, in her rich, theatrical voice, “Perhaps Lord and Lady Frome offered them the farm to get them close, plotting ways for their death. I studied a play like that once. And, as we bakers know, revenge is a dish best served cold.”

  Chapter 10

  “Oh, not you again,” I said, opening the door to my room. Gerry was practicing levitating from my bed to the ceiling.

  He looked delighted to see me. “Hello, stranger. It’s like you don’t even sleep here. I was going to float down to the dining room and haunt you all, but I couldn’t be bothered.”

  Thank goodness for that. “It’s been quite the day,” I said, slipping off my boots and flopping onto the bed beside him.

  “Well, I spent my evening hovering around the kitchen. I miss steak and kidney pie. And mashed potatoes. And buttery cabbage. Oh, and stay away from the bread pudding tomorrow.” He put a finger to the side of his nose. “And that’s all I’m saying.”

  “But Gerry,” I said, sighing, “you can’t taste anything. Why bother?”

  “My taste buds might be blinkered, but my memory is perfectly intact. It’s torture, knowing that all those delightful dishes are being prepared downstairs and I can’t enjoy a single one.”

  “Well, believe me, there are worse things.” I paused, wondering if telling Gerry there had been another death might cause more trouble. But since he’d soon find out anyway, I took a deep breath and relayed the day’s events for the third time this evening. It definitely didn’
t get any easier.

  “Holy smokes!” Gerry exclaimed. “I bet you any money it was that oaf of an electrician, Aaron Keel. I’ve been watching him, you know, and I’m telling you, that guy is suspect. I know Marcus Hoare sabotaged my ovens, but there’s something I don’t like about Aaron.” He shook his head. “Nope. I don’t trust him as far as I could throw him.”

  “That’s not very far, Gerry,” I reminded him. “And it’s no good jumping to conclusions like that. Why would he kill Arnold Bentley? If it was even murder. Why Arnold was anywhere near those bees is still a mystery.”

  Gerry stroked his chin in mock detective style. “Another case for me to solve.”

  I didn’t remind Gerry that it was actually Gina and I who’d apprehended his murderer. We’d sat on his back and restrained him with a celebrity baker’s scarf, no less.

  “Look,” I said. “You need to stay out of trouble if you’re to have any hope of passing on. The police are already investigating. Leave it to the professionals.”

  “Oh, you mean Mr. Dimples? Don’t blush. I’ve seen the way you look at him.”

  Yeesh. Gerry was fast becoming the brother figure I never wanted. I needed to get him on another subject, so I told him that Florence’s theory was that Lord and Lady Frome had given the Bentleys the farm for a good price to lure them here and then waited until enough time had passed that they could do away with Arnold Bentley. Him having an allergy to bees had played right into their hands.

  Gerry looked interested. “I’d float up there and snoop if I could, but you know I’m tethered to the inn and the baking tent. If you can lure the Fromes into the pub, I could sit at their table and eavesdrop on their conversation.”

  “Would they really talk about the man they murdered in the local pub?” I’d never seen them leave their property. They seemed so snooty and full of themselves, I could not picture them in the local pub, never mind gossiping over their shepherd’s pie and Guinness.