Fay glanced at her watch. It wasn’t quite six o’clock yet. Ordinarily she would be heading upstairs to shower and get ready for the day, joining Morwen in the kitchen for breakfast preparation at around six-thirty. Apparently, she would be delayed this morning.
She thought for a moment and decided it would be okay. The muffin batter was already mixed. All Morwen had to do was bake it for the required amount of time. There was half a key lime pie in the fridge that could be cut up and served for breakfast. And there were white chocolate-chip cookies in the pantry. As long as they had some baked goods to offer the guests for breakfast it would be fine. Morwen could handle the rest of the set-up alone.
“This is Detective Sergeant Bowden of the Metropolitan Police Service in London,” Sergeant Jones said, indicating a man of about Fay’s age. “And this is Detective Constable Shufi.” He indicated a woman in her mid-twenties.
Fay shook hands and led the way to the kitchen.
“Coffee or tea, officers?”
“Coffee would be smashing, thanks Fay.” Sergeant Jones had dark circles under his eyes. “These two phoned me awake at three-thirty this morning. I’ve been on the go ever since.”
DS Bowden indicated that he would have coffee, while DC Shufi asked for tea. Fay took the tray upstairs to the residents’ lounge. Morwen would be coming into the kitchen at any moment. Fay didn’t want her to find her workspace cluttered with cops.
Something had happened. She was sure of it. She just hoped it wasn’t another murder. Police officers didn’t commonly knock on civilians’ doors before six o’clock in the morning. They also didn’t get their colleagues out of bed at three-thirty. Only murder or a matter of national security provoked that kind of response. It was clear to Fay that she had somehow become a person of interest in a police investigation. She would do well to watch her step.
She handed around the coffee and tea and sat opposite the three police officers, relaxed but watchful.
“What has happened?”
“Last night at around midnight an unknown person broke into the premises of Pinkerton’s Rare & Collectible Books in Tabernacle Street, Truro. This person conducted an intensive search of the shop. At this stage, it is not clear if anything is missing.”
“What does the CCTV show?”
“My colleagues have watched it once. The person was wearing an overcoat and a knitted hat. It is not possible to tell if it is a man or a woman.” As he said the word “woman” he looked directly at Fay.
She began to get an idea of what was going on.
“You were in Truro yesterday morning, weren’t you, Ms. Penrose?” said DC Shufi. “Our records show you boarding the eight-thirty ferry from Bluebell Island to Falmouth.”
“Then they should also show me boarding the eleven-thirty ferry back to Bluebell Island. I was home in time for lunch.”
Neither officer indicated by so much as a blink whether they already knew this.
“You visited Pinkertons’ Bookshop,” said DS Bowden.
“I did.”
“Would you mind telling us why?”
“I had been invited by Cecil Travis who works there to take a look around the shop. I recently attended a seminar on medieval manuscripts and he thought I might find it interesting. He gave me the grand tour. We had some tea and a chat, and then I left. Any number of people saw me here at lunchtime and throughout the rest of the day.”
“The last ferry to the mainland leaves at ten pm,” said Bowden.
“And then the service stops until the first ferry gets to Bluebell Island at six in the morning.” Fay looked at her watch. “It must have arrived about ten minutes ago. So, if I was skulking around Truro in an overcoat at midnight last night, how did I get back for my morning run before six? Did I swim here?”
“There are numerous charter boat services operating between here and Falmouth. I believe your friend Kathleen O’Grady owns one of them.”
Fay kept her expression neutral. They were trying to goad her into becoming angry or defensive. Witnesses were more likely to make unguarded statements when they lost their tempers. She wouldn’t play their game. Instead she would see how much she could get out of them.
“If the break-in happened around midnight and you phoned Sergeant Jones at three-thirty, how did you find out about it so quickly? Was there an alarm?”
“A bobby on the beat discovered the door to the shop standing slightly open.” DS Bowden saw Fay’s blank look. “You’re American, aren’t you? A bobby is a police officer in uniform. They walk a beat that takes them along Tabernacle Street a couple of times a night. The officer entered the shop and saw that the back room had been tossed. He phoned it in and it came to our attention.”
“You would have discovered that the owner of Pinkerton’s was murdered on Friday morning,” said Fay. “Then you would have phoned Sergeant Jones here who would have told you that he had three suspects in the murder – me, the elderly librarian Agatha Tribble, and her assistant Paul Leblanc. You would have realized that I not only spent the morning in Truro but visited the scene of the crime too. And that’s how you come to be here at the crack of dawn. How am I doing?”
DS Bowden raised his eyebrows at Sergeant Jones who just shrugged and said, “I told you so.”
“I believe you were a member of the police force in New York City, Ms. Penrose?” said DC Shufi.
Fay sat a little straighter. “That’s correct. I was on the force for twelve years – eight of them as a homicide detective.”
“We can neither confirm nor deny your theories,” said Bowden.
“I think I can figure out the rest of it. The part that interests me is that an apparently unimportant break-in at a tiny bookshop in a Cornish town provoked such a flurry of middle-of-the-night investigation from senior officers at the Met in London. Now, why?”
“As I said, Ms. Penrose …”
Fay held up her hand. “I’ll figure it out. Just give me a moment. What did that bobby, as you call him, find in the back room of Pinkertons that caused him to alert detectives of your and DC Shufi’s caliber? I happen to know that Desmond Pinkerton was particularly interested in collecting artefacts connected to Eleanor, the queen consort of Edward I. Could it be that Pinkerton had come into possession of items that he shouldn’t have had at all? Items that had been reported stolen, perhaps?”
She scanned their faces for a response. DC Shufi’s face was impassive but Bowden’s eyes darted from side to side.
“Items stolen from a private collector, perhaps?” she went on. “No, there would be nothing sensational about that. Items belonging to the Royal family on the other hand would cause quite a stir. Perhaps even items belonging to Her Majesty the Queen.”
Chapter 18
The police officers looked shaken. Even DC Shufi’s poker face had slipped.
“Like I said,” said DS Bowden. “I can neither confirm nor deny …”
“You don’t have to,” said Fay. “I’ve worked it out. Don’t worry – I won’t blab about it. I have nothing but respect for Her Majesty. I’d like to help you to get her property back.”
“I must remind you that you are a civilian in this country, Ms. Penrose.”
“I’m a civilian in America too, Detective Sergeant. I have been ever since the day I resigned from the force. I have no intention of getting in your way.”
It was interesting that they hadn’t denied that property belonging to the queen was missing. That meant that whatever they had recovered at Pinkerton’s was not the full story.
“You will probably speak to Cecil Travis who is currently managing Pinkerton’s bookstore. You might already have him in custody. The thing about Cecil is that he only took over the bookshop last Friday. It was Desmond Pinkerton who was in charge before that. According to Cecil, Desmond inherited most of his stock from his grandparents and added to it over the years by attending auctions for the contents of deceased and insolvent estates.”
“What is your point, Ms. Penrose?” B
owden sounded impatient, but Fay could tell he was interested in her answer.
“My point is that both Pinkerton and Travis might have come by the stolen goods in good faith. Pinkertons Bookshop might have inherited or purchased the items without being aware that they were the private property of the queen. It all depends on whether the theft of the items is current or historical. Did it happen now, or did it happen way back when?”
She looked at the faces of the two detectives and laughed.
“You’re not going to tell me, and so you shouldn’t. It’s none of my business. But I’ll probably find out anyway. In the meantime, I’m sure you will do your homework to establish that I was seen right here on Bluebell Island from lunchtime yesterday until about ten in the evening when I went to bed. Various guests saw me, as well as the innkeeper of the Cat’s Paw, Morwen Hammett. This morning I was seen on my run by various fishermen at about five-thirty. I suppose it is just about possible that I hired a charter boat to take me to the mainland, travelled to Truro, searched the bookshop, and got back in time for my morning run, but you won’t find any evidence of that because there isn’t any.”
“We know how to do our jobs, Ms. Penrose,” said DC Shufi.
“Sergeant Jones has probably told you that I was one of three people in the library when Desmond Pinkerton was killed. I hope he has also mentioned that the librarian gave a statement that I was within her sight the whole time. So, unless there is anything else, I have a litter of kittens to feed, and breakfast to prepare for a houseful of guests.”
The police officers got to their feet.
“That’s it for now, Ms. Penrose,” Said DS Bowden. “But it is very possible that we’ll be back.”
Fay fed the kittens on autopilot, her mind buzzing with the events of that morning.
She was so preoccupied that she almost didn’t notice Zorro approaching one of the dishes and sniffing it with great suspicion. Fay wrenched her mind away from plots and stratagems to watch the tiniest kitten.
This was the point at which she always backed away, too intimidated by the scary food to give it a try.
“Come on, baby. It’s exactly the same food you’ve been licking off my finger for the past two days. All you need to do is stick out your little tongue.”
As Fay held her breath, Zorro’s sniffing became bolder. Instead of backing off as though the food had attacked her, she got closer and closer until her muzzle was almost touching it. Her tongue shot out and tasted the food.
Fay could see her little mind figuring out that this was something she had enjoyed before. She tasted it again. And again. And soon she was eating as eagerly as her litter mates.
After the kittens had been cleaned up by Smudge and Olive, Fay sat in the nursery and let them climb all over her, practicing their pouncing and chasing skills. She gave each one a lot of handling. It made her happy to see how playful and affectionate they were becoming. She was glad she still had two months with them before she would let them go to carefully screened homes.
When they showed signs of getting tired, Fay left the playpen and went downstairs to help with the breakfast set-up.
“Morning.” Morwen was turning sausages in a frying pan when Fay came in. “The muffins are baking, and I put out the cookies you suggested, but now there’s nothing for tea. I was planning to use the key lime pie for tea, but I don’t think it will survive breakfast.”
“I’ll bake some cheesecakes for tea. And I’ll get started on an apple pie too.”
“What did the police want with you at that hour of the morning?”
Fay went to the pantry to choose ingredients for her cheesecake. She decided to make one plain and one blueberry. Fresh berries weren’t in season yet, but she had frozen blueberries in the freezer.
“It’s all a bit odd. I told you I went to Pinkertons Bookshop yesterday morning. It seems somebody broke in last night and searched the place. And since I’m still on the list of suspects for Desmond Pinkerton’s murder, they came to find out where I was last night. They’ll probably take a statement from you about whether you saw me in the evening.”
“I can tell them you were here all night if you like.”
Fay laughed and shook her head. “Thanks for the loyalty Morwen but lying to the cops is always a bad idea. They’ve got the person on camera. They couldn’t see the face, but I think I’m too shrimpy to match the suspect’s build. They don’t really think it’s me. They were just being thorough.”
Morwen tipped the sausages into a chafing dish, put the lid on, and took it to the breakfast room where it would be kept hot throughout breakfast time. Fay followed with the bacon and scrambled eggs. Guests who wanted their eggs in any other style could ask for it directly from Morwen.
Fay went back to the kitchen to mix the batter for her cheesecakes. Morwen followed out of curiosity.
“Do you think the break-in at the bookstore is related to the murder? It must be, surely?”
“Not only related but perpetrated by the same person.”
“Is it all about the dowry? The one they discussed at that seminar you went to?”
“It’s the only thing that makes sense. What interests me is that killing Desmond Pinkerton didn’t get the killer what he or she wanted.”
“How do you figure that?”
“Pinkerton had been boasting about a discovery he had made in the search for Eleanor’s dowry. It was the sort of thing he did often, and it usually didn’t come to anything. This time someone seems to have believed him. He had a habit of going into the library of every small town he visited. Anyone who knew him would have known that. On Friday, he was in our library looking at something in the medieval section when he was killed. Later that day someone came into the library and stole one of the books he had taken off the shelf.”
“What book?”
“It was about codes and hidden meanings in medieval culture.”
“That sounds like it’s all connected to the dowry.”
“It does. And now, days later, someone has broken into his bookshop in the middle of the night and searched it thoroughly. At this stage the police still don’t know exactly what’s missing.”
Fay kept the promise she had made to the police officers that she wouldn’t tell anyone about the fact that property belonging to the queen was missing. As much as she trusted Morwen in all important matters, she knew she wouldn’t be able to resist spreading that morsel of gossip around the village.
“So, whatever Pinkerton was killed for wasn’t enough,” said Morwen. “The killer is still looking for something else – something that will get them closer to the dowry.”
“Exactly,” said Fay. “If I can figure out what that is and get to it first, I’ll be one step ahead of the game.”
They turned their heads at the sound of footsteps in the breakfast room. The first guests had arrived. Morwen hurried away to greet them.
After breakfast, Fay strode down the hill towards the village.
Henry and Marigold Bessinger and Cecil Travis had all claimed to have alibis for the time of the murder. They had said they were at the Cracked Spine on Friday morning, and that Nella Harcourt would vouch for them. But instead of backing them up, she told Fay that they had all left the guesthouse on various errands - Marigold to order flowers, and Henry for an undisclosed reason. According to Nella, Cecil had left early that morning and only got back to the Cracked Spine around midday.
All their alibis had fallen apart. Fay looked forward to hearing what they would have to say for themselves now.
As she walked past the surgery, Doc Dyer popped out like a Jack-in-the-box.
“Fay, love!”
She pressed a hand to her heart. “Morning, Doc. You startled me.”
“Sorry about that. Where are you off to on this fine Tuesday morning?”
“Just to the village. People to see. Things to do.”
“Won’t you come in for a minute? I want to tell you something.”
“Sure, but aren’t
you in the middle of consulting?”
“Isobel kept an hour clear for us this morning because David had a friend arriving and he wanted me to be there to welcome her as well. You remember Laetitia Poynter?”
“Of course. The doctor from Harvard. David’s girlfriend.”
Doc Dyer responded with what could only be described as a grimace. “That’s her. She has just arrived.”
“Oh. Well, then I won’t come in. It would be an intrusion. We can catch up later, Doc.”
“Just for a few minutes, Fay. It would be a great favor to me. I never know what to say to her, you see. And I really do have something important to tell you.”
“Urgh. Okay. But David is going to hate this.”
Fay allowed herself to be led into the surgery and past the receptionist’s desk where Isobel gave her a friendly greeting. She had only met Laetitia once before, about a month earlier. They hadn’t exactly hit it off. She wouldn’t be thrilled that Fay was practically the first person she was seeing on the island.
Doc Dyer stood back to let Fay into the living room. She could hear from the clink of cups and saucers that tea was underway.
“Look who I found,” said Doc.
“Oh, there you are, Dad,” said David. “We wondered where you had got to. Hello, Miss Penrose.”
“It’s Fay. Sorry to intrude, but your father practically kidnapped me. Hello, Dr. Poynter.”
Laetitia gave her a long look. “You’re the person who runs a bed-and-breakfast in this village. I remember now." She turned to David. “What is she doing here, darling?”
Chapter 19
The Dyers rushed to fill the awkward silence.
“Fay is a good friend of my father’s,” said David.
“I asked Fay to join us for tea,” said his father. It was clear that he believed his son’s guest to be lacking in manners but was too well behaved himself to say so.
“Have you told Fay about …?”
The Cat That Got Your Tongue Page 11