A Trifle Dead: Cafe La Femme, Book 1

by Livia Day

  ‘Yes, that’s fine,’ she said. ‘It will give me more time to work on my art.’

  ‘Have you … seen your other grandson lately?’

  Bev gave me a sly look, as if she knew exactly what I was up to. Nanna’s intuition is a scary thing. ‘No, darl, but I expect he’ll be around today.’

  I smiled, and bought two chocolate-coffee-bean echidnas. ‘Don’t let him know I’m around, Bev. Wouldn’t want to scare him off.’

  Bev winked at me.

  * * *

  When I caught up to Stewart, he was sitting at one of the acre-long tasting tables, contemplating his breakfast. I assumed that the latté was for me, which meant that the double espresso, the cappuccino and the macchiato were all for him.

  ‘Wow,’ I said. ‘You really don’t like getting up early.’

  ‘Hush,’ he said, gazing dreamily at his cups. ‘Yer interrupting our forbidden love.’

  ‘Fine,’ I said, giving him the echidna. ‘But if you see a gorgeous, well-dressed man making similar burbling noises at his caffeine fix, let me know.’

  While Stewart engaged in silent worship, I scanned the crowds. Darrow wasn’t the world’s earliest riser, but I wouldn’t put it past him to sneak in and out before lunchtime, in the hopes of not bumping into anyone who might be looking for him … and on the other hand, no. This was the coffee fair. No way he’d spend anything less than several hours embracing the love of the sultriest bean of all.

  The mocha cream pancakes on a nearby stall were calling to me, and I was on the verge of giving in to their siren song when a familiar voice interrupted me. ‘Tabitha? Hi.’

  I turned to see a pretty blonde woman with a pram. Amy was a nice enough person that I had had nothing in common with except, two years ago, my dad unexpectedly a) retired, b) skipped the state for sunny Queensland, and c) married Amy’s mother.

  That, and Amy’s partner was one of the recent victims of the Trapper.

  ‘Amy,’ I said, delighted to see her for once. ‘Sit down and join us. Tell me what’s been going on with you.’

  Amy was practically dying to spill the details of Danny’s encounter with the Trapper, and it only took one cappuccino and a plate of beige melting moments to get her talking.

  ‘You’d think they’d have taken it more seriously,’ she said, referring to Tasmania’s finest. ‘It’s not every day you come home to find a giant mantrap has been inserted into your house.’ She shuddered. ‘If it had been me and Maddison instead of Danny…’

  That was a nasty thought. Babies weren’t designed to fall ten feet into metal cages. ‘But how did it happen?’ I asked.

  Amy shrugged. ‘We don’t know.We didn’t change the locks when we moved in—you don’t, do you? Turns out the place was a rental to a whole lot of dodgy characters before us. The police have a list of about twenty people who could have had access to our basement.’ She reached out and touched baby Maddison’s hand—she did that a lot, touching and stroking her when she got nervous. Good to know babies were useful for something. ‘I’m not being fair to the police,’ Amy said finally. ‘They did make enquiries—they still are investigating. And Gary keeps us informed when he can. But it’s all so frustrating. That someone could just break into our house like that—do that to us.’

  ‘You mean Constable Gary?’ I asked. Not that I should be surprised by anyone knowing anyone in this town.

  ‘Mm, he was at school with Danny. He babysits for us sometimes.’

  ‘Hobart,’ I said, shaking my head.

  Amy laughed, knowing exactly what I meant.

  Now, to the good stuff. ‘So what happened when Danny walked into the house?’

  ‘That’s it,’ said Amy. ‘He walked in, took two steps on to our hall rug, and fell into a cage in the basement.’

  ‘What kind of cage?’

  Amy waved her hands a little. ‘Just a cage—like something out of a movie. Homemade, the police think, all welded bars and chicken wire. There was an old mattress on the floor, so whoever it was didn’t want us hurt—well, I don’t know what they wanted. I heard the noise and ran out of the kitchen … and there he was. I couldn’t believe it!’

  ‘Hang on, you were in the house at the time?’ I repeated, making a face at Stewart for not giving me this vital bit of information earlier. He must have known it, after his interview with Danny.

  Stewart looked worried about something. ‘Tabitha…’

  I waved him to silence.

  ‘Well, yes,’ said Amy. ‘That’s the weird thing. I’d been in all day. I only went out for milk, about noon. I know I’m sleep-deprived since Maddi was born, but surely I would have heard someone building a trap in the basement! It takes five minutes to the corner shop with the stroller, and five minutes back again. I wasn’t delayed at all. How does someone break into a house and install a full-sized man trap that involves sawing up the floor in the time it takes me to fetch milk?’

  Hmm. Sounded like an inside job. Or something.

  ‘Tabitha,’ said Stewart, more urgently.

  ‘What?’ I snapped back, not wanting to miss any of Amy’s story. Stewart was looking up, above and behind my head. Uh-oh. I turned around, very slowly.

  Bishop stood there, arms crossed.

  How does he do that? I mean, really. How is it possible that he is there to witness every little thing I do that he wouldn’t approve of? When Melissa Marcus shoplifted a sleeve full of lipsticks and the manager detained both of us, it was Bishop who took the call. When the police were called after Sharni Taylor’s seventeenth birthday party went past 3am, it was Bishop who caught me with Xanthippe and a half-empty bottle of gin. And when a certain undergrad prank on a certain gang of med students went horribly wrong, it was Bishop who found me hiding in the bushes on the Sandy Bay University campus, wearing a Warrior Princess costume and some green jelly.

  I tried not to let any hint of guilt cross my face, but I was well and truly sprung.

  ‘Hi,’ said Amy brightly. ‘It’s Leo, isn’t it? We met at my mum’s wedding. And, uh, the funeral. At Christmas.’

  Bishop switched from smouldering, grim-faced policeman to friendly professional in the blink of an eye. ‘Amy. Nice to see you again.’ He shook her hand, and gave her the warm smile that I never get. He nodded at Stewart, managing to not quite glare at him, and then looked back to me. ‘Tabitha, a word?’

  I sighed. Tabitha, not Tish. Much though the old nickname irritated me, my real name in Bishop’s mouth spelled trouble. ‘If I don’t come back alive, Stewart, Ceege gets my frocks.’

  ‘I want yer coffee machine.’

  ‘Fight Nin for it.’

  Bishop and I walked a little away from the tables. I held up a hand. ‘Before you say anything, I want to state that I have done nothing illegal, unethical, or in any way wrong.’

  ‘You were talking about the case. To a witness.’

  ‘I was chatting to my stepsister.’

  ‘You’ve never been interested in Meredith’s family before. You haven’t spoken to any of them in months!’ He had to have heard that from her. Were the family talking to him about me? Not cool.

  ‘Don’t pretend you know anything about me. And stop shouting!’

  Too late for that, of course. We launched from there into one of our usual howling fits, neither of us listening to the other, too busy coming up with the next accusation to throw.

  To our credit, we walked several more paces from the table first, so our yelling wouldn’t frighten the baby.

  ‘I am not interfering in police business!’

  ‘I don’t know what the hell you think you’re doing —’

  ‘Stop treating me like a child!’

  ‘Stop acting like a spoiled brat. How much attention do you need—’

  ‘Not everything is about you and your stupid police work.’

  After about five minutes straight, we both stopped at the same time and breathed heavily at each other. ‘Done here?’ I said, finally.

  ‘It’ll do
,’ he grouched, and we went back to the tables. Constable Gary had joined Stewart and Amy, and was sharing a bucket of hot chips with them. I kicked my handbag out of the way, and sat down next to him. ‘These aren’t espresso flavoured chips, are they?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Gary, pleased to see me.

  I prodded his arm. ‘Still in one piece, then? Should you even be back on duty yet?’ It gave me a whole different excuse to shoot Bishop a dirty look. ‘I’d think being shot by a bow and arrow entitled you to a holiday…’

  ‘We can’t all dump our responsibilities whenever we feel like it,’ Bishop said back, without any particular heat.

  ‘Message just came through from Inspector Clayton,’ Gary said, looking nervous.

  ‘What message?’ Bishop rapped out.

  ‘You might want to call and talk to him yourself.’

  ‘Right.’ Bishop strode away, muttering to himself.

  ‘Wow,’ Amy said. ‘He gets kind of shouty around you, doesn’t he, Tabitha? I always thought he was—you know, ordinary and nice. A bit on the broody side, but dependable.’

  ‘Apparently I bring out the homicidal maniac in him,’ I said, stealing some more of Gary’s chips.

  ‘Case isn’t going well,’ Gary said. ‘Inspector Clayton has been doing a lot of yelling, too.’

  ‘Oh, really?’ I glanced over to where Bishop was talking into a mobile phone. He looked like he was about to punch a tree. ‘What’s up, then?’ I asked, and could have kicked myself. The last thing I needed was Gary telling Bishop that I’d been pumping him for information.

  But it’s so not fair to get a girl all interested, and then keep secrets. I can’t help being a gossip queen.

  Lucky for me, Gary’s chat gland was already kicking into overdrive. ‘Take a walk with me, Tabby?’

  I jumped up so quickly, I almost tripped over the bench. ‘Stewart, don’t eat all the chips. And watch my handbag.’

  ‘I didn’t want to say anything in front of Amy,’ Gary said in a low voice as he led me away. ‘But apparently one of our witnesses has changed her story. That Claudina girl, the redhead who’s been sobbing into tissues and yelling to the world that Morris was never a junkie? According to Clayton, she’s now ready to make a statement that the victim was taking everything under the sun. She also reckons that he was into carpentry in a big way. Clayton is getting a lot of heat from the Drug Investigation Team, and they’re building a case that Morris was the Trapper, and he just got tangled up in his last trap due to being high on something that killed him.’

  ‘Right,’ I said. ‘Why, exactly, are you telling me this? Bishop will take off your head.’

  Gary hesitated. ‘I wanted you to know that it’s almost over. You don’t have to worry or anything.’

  I patted his hand. ‘You’re very sweet, but obviously a crazy person.’

  Bishop was looking over at us, and, something dark passed over his eyes. He closed his phone with a snap.

  ‘Quick,’ I said. ‘Veronica at the post office—on with her yet?’

  Gary looked startled. ‘No!’

  ‘Good.’ I smiled tightly as Bishop strode towards us. ‘Now you can say quite honestly that I was advising you on your love life.’

  * * *

  ‘Claudina,’ Stewart repeated, some time later. Amy and her pram had abandoned us, and a grouchy Bishop had hauled Gary back to the station. Stewart and I were hanging out at the wishing cauldron (basically an old cast-iron fishing pot, but try telling that to any of the wide-eyed kids who toss five cent coins in for their wish). The giant silos at the end of the street loomed over us, possibly more than they should have done due to us both being strung out on caffeine.

  ‘Claudina,’ I confirmed.

  ‘Claudina told the police Morris was a drug user?’ he said.

  ‘If you keep repeating everything I say, I’m going to have to ban you from the espresso.’

  ‘Tabitha, I spent hours with those redheads yesterday. Claudina is evangelical about Morris being clean. No way she would suddenly change her mind.’

  ‘Unless someone changed her mind for her—or maybe she found something out?’

  ‘Not that yer interested in a police investigation?’

  I threw the empty chip bucket at him. ‘It’s not my fault if it keeps getting interesting in my face. People are practically flaunting the investigation at me. I’m not trying to be involved.’

  Stewart gave me an exasperated look. ‘Oh, yer not trying at all—Tabitha, have ye considered the possibility that ye like Bishop being angry at ye?’

  ‘That’s just—that’s completely…’ A brief image of Bishop’s dark, furious eyes flashed through my mind. Not sexy at all. In the least. Oh, hell. ‘You have a very twisted imagination.’

  ‘Uh-huh. So when I contact Claudina for a follow up interview, ye don’t want to come with me?’

  I opened my mouth and then closed it, trying to figure out which answer would be least incriminating. ‘If you will excuse me, I have a landlord to stalk.’

  ‘I’ll keep meself busy. Pretty photos tae take, moral high ground tae keep.’

  ‘No more long blacks,’ I chided him as we went our separate ways. ‘They’ve made you delusional.’

  * * *

  Subtlety was getting me nowhere, so I spent most of the rest of the day helping Bev Darrow at her cake stall while keeping my eye out for her eldest grandson, who failed spectacularly to make an appearance.

  By the time the fair was drawing to a close, I was ready to kick something. Two days, and Darrow had neither responded to my blatant closing of the café, nor turned up to his favourite public event of the year.

  Obviously, he wasn’t just in hiding. He was going out of his way to avoid me.

  Nin came past the stall at one point, and came close to stabbing me with those eyebrows of hers. ‘Café still closed tomorrow?’

  I swallowed hard. It wasn’t working—but what if three days was the charm? ‘Yes.’

  Nin gave me a look, and I resisted the urge to hide under the cake stall. ‘Fine,’ she said, in a voice that kind of implied, ‘I hope you die.’

  ‘That is a dangerous lady,’ said Kevin Darrow, after Nin had moved on. Smart kid.

  After 4pm, the road was officially unblocked and Salamanca Place filled up with the cars and vans of stallholders. Bev left Kevin and me to pack up while she fetched her own van. Stewart came over to smile giddily at me. ‘Good day?’

  Oh-oh. ‘Have you been here this whole time? Do I need to take you to have your stomach pumped? How much coffee have you actually consumed?’ I had cake on my shoe. How had I ended up with cake on my shoe?

  ‘All of it, I’d say—took some great photos. Gotta go do some blogging. Make some phone calls.’ Stewart was speaking faster than usual, the words blurring into his accent. ‘Café free tonight, aye? Key please. Want tae paint walls. Many walls. Inspiration has hit.’

  ‘You’re not going near my walls until some of that coffee’s worn off,’ I said, rummaging in my handbag for a tissue to deal with the cake-shoe situation, and not the key to the café because he shouldn’t be encouraged.

  ‘Do me best work on high caffeine levels,’ Stewart insisted. ‘Paint brush moves faster. Ne’er a bad thing.’

  My handbag was full of the usual crap. I pawed through scraps of paper, hairbrush, half a dozen abandoned lip glosses, receipts, shiny things—‘Ow!’ A sudden spark of pain clutched at my fingers, and I dropped my bag.

  It was somewhat gratifying, the way that Stewart was instantly at my side. ‘Are ye well?’

  ‘Something bit me,’ I said, sucking my finger.

  Half of the contents of my handbag had spilled out on the ground. Stewart picked through them, looking for the culprit.

  ‘Hey, that’s private,’ I protested, trying to think if there was anything embarrassing in there.

  Boys! Give them a crisis, and they turn into amateur forensics experts. Kevin Darrow produced a plastic bag and held it out,
while Stewart deposited each item into it. Lip gloss, purse, tissues, tampons, ping pong ball…

  Just as I opened my mouth to identify that as an alien object, Stewart picked up the ping pong ball between finger and thumb and gave a little jump, dropping it again. ‘We have a winner.’

  ‘I was bitten by a ping pong ball?’ I suppose stranger things have happened.

  ‘Ye were no’ bitten,’ said Stewart. ‘This has an electrified charge.’

  ‘Can I see?’ asked Kevin, far more interested in this than I had ever seen him around adults before. Which was to say, slightly.

  Electrified charge. I had to sit down for a minute. ‘I was electrocuted?’

  ‘Only a wee bit,’ said Stewart.

  I was outraged. ‘What do you mean, only a wee bit? Someone put an electrified object in my handbag.’

  ‘Calm down, it’s nothing serious. More of a practical joke, I’d say.’

  ‘It’s not funny,’ I growled.

  Stewart looked at me, and then nodded. ‘No, not funny. But how long has it been in here? That’s the question.’

  I glared at the sinister ping pong ball, sitting there on the ground all innocent. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘When did you last clean out your handbag?’ Kevin asked.

  I gave him a blank look. ‘Excuse me?’

  Stewart laughed. ‘So young, so much tae learn about girls.’

  ‘I resent the implication,’ I sniffed. ‘I’m always groping around in there for my keys or whatever. If that ball works every time, it can’t have been in there all that long.’

  Kevin swept some Tupperware containers off the stall. ‘Let’s have a look at it, then.’

  Using a pocket knife and a couple of toothpicks, my two amateur Boy Scouts dismembered the ping pong ball, analysing the innards with great interest.

  ‘What kind of person could make something like that?’ I asked finally. ‘How would they even think of it?’

  ‘It’s a simple enough idea,’ said Stewart. ‘We used tae make up stuff like this at school all the time. Like I said, practical jokes. I’m worried about the “who”, though. I canna help thinking that whoever did this might also be responsible for trapping cats in nets, or postmen in cages.’