by Morgana Best
“Why? It looks like you’ve already had one,” Camino said with a straight face.
I looked down to see two suitcases. “Whose are those?”
“They’re mine. You invited me to stay with you.”
I searched my memory banks. I vaguely remember Alder telling Camino she should stay somewhere else. I thought he had meant Ruprecht’s. I plastered a smile on my face. “Yes, of course. Please come in. I’ll have a shower in my en-suite bathroom, and Thyme, you can have a shower in the main bathroom. I’ll lend you some clothes.”
“I can lend you some clothes,” Camino said, tapping her suitcases.
Thyme groaned. “Amelia, do you have wine? Maybe something stronger? I think I’m going to need it.”
Chapter 15
As I woke up, I looked out the window. It was a nice, sunny day, a perfect day for the Halloween fair. I changed my mind when my alarm went off seconds later. I grabbed my phone and turned it off.
Alder struggled to prop himself up on his elbows. “Is it morning already?”
I rubbed my eyes. “I’m afraid so.” We’d had a sleepless night. Camino had snored loudly and kept us awake. I suspect the house had amplified the sound because Camino was keeping the house awake. Camino’s snoring did sound like the thundering of a thousand elephants.
Camino had also burst into our bedroom at three in the morning to tell us she had heard onesies outside. By the time we had run outside, no onesies were in sight.
“You have a little nap while I have a shower,” Alder said.
I was already asleep before I could reply. I awoke in what seemed mere seconds later with Alder shaking me gently. “Wake up, Amelia, it’s your turn to have a shower. I’ll go and make coffee.”
“You’re the perfect man,” I said.
“I know,” he said over his shoulder.
After my shower, I found both Camino and Alder in the kitchen, sipping coffee. Alder jumped to his feet to pour coffee for me.
“Did you sleep well?” Camino said brightly.
“No!” Alder and I said. The house groaned.
“It’s a lovely sunny day for the Halloween fair this year,” Camino said.
“Hopefully, it will be better than last year when we found the dead body of the pumpkin grower.”
“And that dreadful woman, Clara Crocker, kidnapped me and you thought you had turned me into a pumpkin.” Camino clutched her sides and laughed hard.
“I don’t remember you being so annoying,” Alder said to her, which set her off into a fresh fit of giggles.
I pulled a face. “It didn’t seem quite so funny at the time.”
Camino poured herself some more coffee. “Oh well, nothing like that will happen this year at the fair. What can go wrong?”
“What can go wrong?” I echoed. “Um, let me see. We don’t know how many onesies have escaped, and they might all turn up at the Halloween fair and cause havoc.”
Camino did not look at all worried. “Then we will simply catch them and bring them back here and lock them in the room. Amelia, have you had any ideas about how to reverse the spell without my book?”
I sighed. “I haven’t had a minute to think, not with trying to save you from a murder charge while rounding up all the onesies.”
“I doubt you can reverse the spell without the book, but I will consult some of our grimoires today,” Alder told me, “if you can manage without me at the fair.”
“Sounds like a deal,” I said.
Alder clamped his hand on my shoulder. “Be careful, Amelia. I mean it. There is a murderer on the loose and they might think you’re getting too close. Don’t take any chances.”
The scattered rain clouds of the previous day were showing no sign of returning. Alder and I packed all the cakes into my car and soon I was on my way to the Bayberry Creek Park. I pulled up in the parking area next to Thyme, who was getting out of her car.
“Good timing!” she said by way of greeting. “I just got here.”
“And it looks like we’re early for once,” I said. “Just a few others are only setting up now.”
This year, the Halloween fair committee had decided to set up the small tents and trestle tables for everyone, so we didn’t have to bring our own. It was going to be a great help.
“Thank goodness it’s not raining this year,” Thyme said. “Last year was a washout. And I’m glad we have the same allocated spot as last year. It’s a good location.”
It was indeed a good spot, under a huge jacaranda tree that was just beginning to bloom, its purple flowers spilling bountifully over the ground. Jacaranda trees usually grew at the coast, not in the mountains, so it was wonderful to have one in town.
We set up our cakes just as the first people began to arrive.
The black spider cupcakes were popular. “If only I hadn’t been attacked by the mobile pendant fire sprinkler,” I lamented. “Those pumpkin cupcakes would have sold well.”
“As doorstops if you had made them,” Thyme muttered.
I shot her a dark look and would have said something, only a Halloween cupcake ran past us. It was a bright orange Jack-o’-Lantern cupcake with ominous, flickering yellow eyes.
“It’s a onesie,” Thyme said somewhat unnecessarily.
“I’ll go catch it,” I said. I ran after the onesie, which saw me coming and squealed, throwing its little arms in the air. “I’m not going to hurt you,” I called after it. “I just want to put you in my house with your friends.”
The onesie put on a fresh burst of speed and ran behind a tent. I lunged for it and fell flat on my face.
“Are you all right?” a familiar voice said.
I struggled to my feet to see Angela Bloom, the nurse.
“I guess I must’ve tripped,” I said.
“Did you make that wonderful Halloween costume that just ran past me?”
“Um, I’m responsible for it, yes,” I said.
She nodded. “I saw you at the cupcake stall earlier. Are you undercover?”
I nodded and thought quickly. “Yes, everyone in town will be here today and I thought I could maybe get some clues. Why don’t you come with me to the cupcake stall? I’ll give you a freebie.”
“All right.” Her tone was filled with reluctance.
As we walked, something occurred to me. “Are you here with anyone? You could ask him to come too.”
Her expression at once changed and the air around us grew frosty. “No, I’m all alone.”
“So you never married?”
She pulled a tissue from her pocket and dabbed at her eyes. “I’m afraid Henry was the love of my life.”
“I’m terribly sorry to hear that.” I thought that was rather strange, pining after someone for so many years. I had heard of men pining after women, but I’d never heard of a woman pining after a man for more than a decade. Maybe she was the murderer, after all. She had a motive and she was on duty at the time he was killed. Then there was the note in his wallet, I told you not come back to town.
I was still mystified by that note. It wasn’t as if it was left on the body—it was in Henry’s wallet, so the perpetrator would not have had time to pop it into his wallet at the hospital. My initial thoughts had been that the murderer was from out of town and had put the note there to throw police off the track, but that couldn’t be the case as the note wasn’t on the body, but rather in the wallet.
I introduced Angela to Thyme. “This is Thyme. She’s assisting us in our investigation.” I shot a pointed look at Thyme in case she had forgotten the cover story. She nodded. “And Thyme, this is Angela, one of the nurses who was present when Henry Vanderbilt was murdered.”
“I wasn’t present,” Angela sputtered. “It wasn’t like I was in the room or anything.”
“I meant you were on duty in the ward at the time,” I said in even tones.
She nodded rapidly. “I see, I see.”
“Which cupcake would you like?”
Angela was visibly shaken. She pointe
d to the nearest cupcake, a green witch’s hat. “I’ll have that one, please.”
I popped it on a paper plate and handed it to her. “It’s yours.” I took her by the arm and led her out of the tent, to stand by the trunk of the jacaranda tree. “Do you mind if I ask you a few more questions?”
“No.” She was shaking.
“These questions are simply routine. We have to ask these questions of everyone. I heard the terrible thing that Henry Vanderbilt did to you.”
Her face went white. “What was that?”
I exhaled. She wasn’t going to make this easy. “You were engaged to Henry Vanderbilt. I heard it wasn’t a genuine engagement, on his part, at least.”
She shuffled her feet. “That’s true. I couldn’t believe how easily he fooled me. I thought he was a lovely person, but the whole engagement was a joke. He was seeing someone else.”
“Who was he seeing?” I asked her. Maybe there was another suspect.
“Mary Bannister,” she said. “She’s living in England now. She married an Englishman.”
“I wonder if she was in England at the time of the murder.”
Angela nodded. “Yes, we’re Facebook friends. I was on Facebook on my break that day. She and her husband were on vacation. They posted photos of themselves.”
“On vacation in England?” I asked her.
“In the south of France.”
“And so, can you tell me more about this fake engagement?”
She threw both hands into the air. “What’s there to tell? He pretended we were getting married, but he was seeing Mary.”
“Was Mary upset about your fake engagement?”
“Why wouldn’t she be? She was in turmoil!” The volume of her voice rose to a crescendo.
“How did you find out Henry had no intention of marrying you?” I asked her.
“It was at a Halloween fair just like this,” she said. “In fact, today must be the anniversary, or close to it at any rate. He said he was making a big announcement, and all our friends were around, and his big announcement was that he wasn’t getting married to me and it was all a joke.”
I was horrified. “Why, that’s terrible!” I realised that made her more of a murder suspect, so I added, “I’m afraid that doesn’t help your case.”
“My case?” she echoed.
“As a murder suspect,” I said.
She nodded slowly. “I know. I had a motive and I was there at the time. Maybe somebody is trying to frame me?”
I thought that over. If somebody was trying to frame her, then they would have known she was on duty at the time in that ward, and they would have known Henry was visiting when he did. Aloud, I said, “Who knew that Henry was going to visit Nancy at that particular time?”
She shrugged. “I have no idea. Henry visited her the day before at around the same time.”
This was news to me. “Wait. You mean that wasn’t the first day he visited her? The day he was murdered?”
“No, it was the second day.”
“And was Nancy in a coma, the first day?”
She shrugged. “Yes, that was about the time she slipped into the coma. It was only a light coma, you see.”
I was going to ask more questions, but another pumpkin ran past me. “Thanks for your help,” I said, as I sprinted after the pumpkin.
Chapter 16
After the Halloween fair, I had managed to capture two pumpkin onesies and get them home and into the room with the other captured onesies. I had no idea if the cupcake sales figures were good, as I had other things on my mind. All I wanted to do was lie on the sofa with my feet up, but tonight was the inaugural Bayberry Creek Halloween Masked Ball. Alder and I were attending, as were the others. We were all meeting at my place.
I opened the front door to see two Ruprechts standing on the porch, arm in arm.
“That won’t do,” Camino said over my shoulder. “That won’t do at all.”
“The onesie Ruprecht is going to stay here and watch TV and mind the other onesies,” Ruprecht said.
“The house is doing a good job of minding the onesies,” I said. “She has them all trapped in a room.”
Ruprecht shot me a pointed look. “I can’t leave him home alone. The house can mind him too.”
I nodded my understanding and stood aside. “Come in.”
“Any luck with the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man?” Ruprecht asked me.
I shook my head. “For a giant marshmallow, he’s been conspicuous by his absence.”
“He can’t have got far,” Camino said. “Maybe a cow ate him.”
Everyone stared Camino, their jaws open. “A cow? A cow?” Ruprecht uttered.
“Why not?”
“Sit down here and watch TV,” I said to the onesie Ruprecht. “Help yourself to anything in the kitchen. Would you like a snack?”
The real Ruprecht spoke up. “He doesn’t eat or drink.”
“Oh,” I said. “Well, the house is watching Ghostbusters.”
The onesie Ruprecht simply sat and stared at the screen. “Confucius said that success depends on previous preparation, and without such preparation there is sure to be failure,” he said after an interval.
I ignored him and addressed the others. “I had better go and get ready.”
Alder swept out of the bedroom in a long black cloak, while I ran in to throw on my clothes. I’d already spent ages putting on my make-up.
When I walked back out, Alder gasped. “You look beautiful, Amelia.”
I found myself blushing. “Thanks.”
Thyme and Mint had arrived in my absence. “Well, the two of you do look good,” Thyme said. “Husband and wife vampires in Victorian clothes. I wish I could fit into an outfit like that, Amelia.”
“It took a lot of work,” I said, and I didn’t mean dieting. I meant super strength shapewear. I could scarcely breathe. I certainly hoped I didn’t have to sit down anywhere or I might do myself an injury.
“If only my onesies hadn’t all come alive, then I could have given you all onesies for this occasion,” Camino said.
“What a shame,” Mint said with a chuckle.
There was a knock on the door, and I opened it to see Marina. She was dressed in orange with a green stalk coming out of her head.
“You look familiar,” I said. Alder shot me a quelling look.
“Any sign of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man or Camino’s book?” Marina asked me.
“No, alas,” Camino said. “If we don’t find him, then Amelia won’t be able to reverse the spell. Goodness knows what will happen!”
“I’ve looked through all the grimoires, but I can’t find anything that would help us reverse the spell,” Alder said. “We do need Camino’s book.”
Ruprecht nodded. “I’m not surprised. I’m sure this is the first historical instance where someone has made onesies come to life.” He glowered at Marina.
“Why are you going as yourself?” Thyme asked Ruprecht.
He looked decidedly put out. “Of course I’m not going as myself! I’m going as a wizard.”
I looked Ruprecht up and down. He seemed the same as ever. Thyme was dressed as Maleficent and Mint as Morticia Addams. Camino was dressed as a deadly blue-ringed octopus. When she saw me looking at her, she said, “I had to buy this earlier today. The onesie I was going to wear came to life. Luckily, I was able to buy a costume that looked somewhat like it.”
“Err, yes, lucky. You know, I had been looking forward to this ball for ages, but now I think it’s a complete waste of time,” I lamented. “We need to get your book from the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man and reverse the spell. What’s more, we need to solve the murder in a hurry, because as soon as the spell is reversed, then you’re in danger of being arrested for Henry Vanderbilt’s murder.”
Alder slipped his arm through mine. “I’m sure the suspects will be at the ball. We can question them there.”
“One of the suspects won’t be at the ball,” Ruprecht said.
“They meant real suspects, not me,” Camino said.
“No, I meant Nancy Newton,” Ruprecht said.
“She’s not a suspect,” Camino said. “She was in a coma at the time.”
Ruprecht stroked his beard and was about to say something when Alder opened the front door. “Let’s all go to the ball. Goodbye, onesie Ruprecht.”
Onesie Ruprecht waved. I felt sorry for him not being able to go to the ball, but he didn’t appear to mind.
When we were outside, Alder said, “We can take two cars.”
Camino shook her head. “Ruprecht can come in my car. It’s best if we take three cars in case we happen across any onesies.”
“Mint and Marina can come with me,” Thyme said. “Let’s all meet outside the Town Hall.”
I couldn’t help the feeling of dread that hung over me like a dark cloud. The ball was supposed to be a joyous occasion, so why did I feel uneasy?
My spirits lifted when Alder parked in the parking area behind the Town Hall. The Town Hall was brightly decorated with false cobwebs, giant black spiders and bats, and ghostly music emanated from inside. A pair of goblins greeted us as we walked inside. “I hope they’re not your onesies,” Mint said to Camino.
“They’re not,” I said with a shudder. “One of Camino’s goblins attacked me earlier. It looks nothing like these men.”
I gasped as I walked inside the ballroom. The decorating outside had been spectacular, but this was even more so. Metres and metres of black lace were hanging from the walls with spiders in shades of black and green. Giant fake pumpkins lined the walls and Jack-o’-Lanterns stood across the front of the stage. The effect was incredible.
“Now, we’re here for business,” Ruprecht said. “Amelia and Alder, which suspects haven’t you questioned yet?”
“Dr Steven Stylish and Darius Daily,” I said. “It’s going to be hard to recognise them in their costumes.”
Ruprecht waved his hands around, looking for all the world like a helicopter. “The night is but young. There is plenty of time.”
I walked over to the drinks table. Alder selected a Pomegranate Poison Spritz, and I selected a Bleeding Hand cocktail. I sipped it and it was surprisingly delicious, a combination of rum and cranberry.