by Morgana Best
The man narrowed his eyes and continued to look at me, so I nodded enthusiastically and smiled. “What neighbours?” he asked me.
Aunt Maude answered for me. “Geoff Currey, and his poor nephew, Weston,” she supplied. “Are you good friends with either of them?”
He shook his head ever so slightly. “No.”
“Were you good friends with Beckett?” Aunt Maude asked him.
“No,” he said again in a quiet voice. His eyes narrowed once more. “Beckett was having an affair with Francine Finnegan. She is a married woman. I’m sure her husband, Frank, would take a dim view of it if he knew.”
“Do you think he doesn’t already know?” I asked him.
He shrugged ever so slightly. “Maybe he does and maybe he doesn’t.”
“It’s a good thing Beckett died of natural causes as Frank Finnegan would have been a suspect,” I said, hoping to elicit more information.
“Why would he be a suspect?” he whispered.
“Well, because his wife was having an affair with Beckett,” I said. I resisted adding, Isn’t that obvious?
“Perhaps they have an open marriage.”
Aunt Maude butted in. “Do you think they have an open marriage?”
He shrugged, again a slight movement. “Maybe they do and maybe they don’t. I’m surprised if Frank doesn’t know, because Francine would come out here any time of the day or night, as brazen as you please. Why, she often even waved to me. The hide of that woman.”
“Yes, Weston didn’t seem too happy about it when he told me about his uncle’s and Francine’s relationship,” I said.
“He’s no clean potato, that one,” Alec said.
“Why, what has he done?” Aunt Maude asked him.
He held his finger to his lips. “I’m not a gossip.”
“Of course you’re not,” Maude said. “Neither am I, so what did Weston do to make you think he was no clean potato?”
Alec closed his eyes for so long that I thought he had fallen asleep on his feet. Finally, he opened them. “He’s not making any money out of his sheep farm, but he has expensive things in his house.”
“Maybe he inherited them,” I said. I tried to remember what I had seen in his house. He did have a huge flat screen TV, and his furniture was all new.
He shook his head. “He has expensive tastes, and he’s not making any money out of his sheep farm.”
“Perhaps he has investments such as the stock market or real estate,” I said.
He shrugged one shoulder. “It’s strange he’s not contesting the will. That shows he’s getting money from another source.” He touched his chin lightly. “And speaking of money from other sources, I think Francine is pilfering the charity money. She seems to make friends with a lot of elderly men around town, and I’m sure they donate to her charity.”
Aunt Maude and I were standing quite close to him, trying to hear everything that he said. “You don’t think Francine is killing elderly men to get their estates for her charity, do you?” Aunt Maude asked him.
I was shocked that she asked him, and expected a similar reaction from him, but his face remained impassive. “It has occurred to me from time to time,” he said. “I’m not one to gossip, mind you, but I did wonder whether Beckett’s death was not accidental, after all.”
“Do you think someone possibly murdered him?” I asked him.
He made a hissing sound that sounded like a snake. “He was a healthy man. He was careful what he ate, and he was fit. I thought it was strange that he died so suddenly. Of course, he was a diabetic, so he had insulin in the house. I wondered if someone had perhaps injected him with an overdose.”
I exchanged a look with Aunt Maude. That’s exactly what we had thought. “If someone had murdered him, do you have any idea who it would be?” she asked him.
He stared off into the distance. “No, he was well liked. The only person who had anything to gain was Francine Finnegan, or her husband Frank, if he did it in a fit of jealousy.”
“Did you tell the police?” I asked him.
He shook his head. “No, they didn’t ask me. They haven’t even spoken to me.” He continued to talk, although his voice was now a whisper, and I couldn’t hear what he said.
“Did Beckett have a housekeeper?” I asked him.
Alec looked surprised. “A housekeeper? Why do you ask?”
“When I went to his house the day that he died, he thought his housekeeper was still there. He went to make a cup of tea and was surprised that there was no sign of his housekeeper. After he died, there was no housekeeper in sight. If he was murdered, then I thought perhaps that his housekeeper did it.”
Alec bit his lip. “His housekeeper,” he whispered.
“Is that an aphid on your rose?” Aunt Maude said, out of the blue.
“What rose?” he said in horror.
“I believe that’s a David Austin Lady of Shalott rose there,” Maude said, pointing to a flowering bush of striking apricot-yellow blooms. “I’m sure I saw aphids halfway down.”
Alec bent over swiftly. It was the fastest I had seen him move. As quick as a flash, Aunt Maude reached over his hair and tugged out some strands.
Alec straightened up so fast that some petals fell off the rose bush and stuck to his head. “What was that?” he said.
“There was a bee on your head, so I knocked it away from you,” Maude said, somehow managing to keep a straight face. “I’m so sorry I startled you.”
“It is of no consequence. At any rate, I didn’t see any aphids.”
“Such a relief,” Aunt Maude said. “Still, I’m sure a garden as well-kept as yours wouldn’t have a single aphid. I don’t know whatever possessed me. It must be my eyesight. I have a headache coming on, and I was seeing dots in front of my eyes.”
He peered at her for a moment, and then said, “Would you like some aspirin?”
Aunt Maude wasted no time in replying. “That would be lovely. Thank you.”
He beckoned us to follow him. His cottage was long and low, and not attractive. It was a pale shade of green, so was well camouflaged within the beautiful garden. Once we are in the enclosed porch, he said, “I’ll be right back.” He disappeared into the house.
I raised my eyebrows at Aunt Maude. She pulled her hand out of her pocket and held up some pieces of hair to show me. She stuffed them in a plastic bag and put the bag back in her pocket.
“That was very quick thinking on you part,” I said.
She nodded, and then whispered to me, “Look around and see if you can see anything that might give us a clue.”
“Like what?” I asked her.
She shrugged. “No idea, but just look for anything that seems out of place. Beckett’s murderer is involved with The Other, so see if you can find anything at all.”
I had absolutely no idea what I could possibly find, but I looked around the little covered-in porch. There was a wood box up one end filled with wood, and a small, metal bucket filled with kindling. Everything was as neat as a pin. There was no dust around the wood box. In fact, there weren’t any woodchips or shavings. At the other end of the porch was an old cedar meat safe that had been turned into a storage area for gardening tools. “Your Aunt Agnes would have a fit if she saw that antique used in that manner,” Maude said.
It was impossible to see inside the house because the windows were covered with heavy curtains. It only took a few moments for Alec to reappear. He handed Maude a pretty glass, clear crystal with a rose pattern around the top, and a packet of aspirin. She thanked him and took two. She swallowed them and then handed him back the glass and the packet of tablets.
He took the glass, and then held up one hand. “Feel free to keep the aspirin,” he said. “I have plenty.”
Aunt Maude thanked him again. We said our goodbyes. As soon as I was in the car, I turned to Aunt Maude. “I’m relieved he didn’t take the tablets out of the packet before he handed them to you. What if they had been poisoned?”
Aunt Maude looked horrified. “Why would he want to poison me?”
I pulled a face. “No idea, but I’ve become far less trusting ever since I’ve moved to Lighthouse Bay. Anyway, what did you think of him?”
She sighed. “I think I have ear strain. I could barely hear a word the man said. And he’s certainly a busybody, isn’t he!”
I agreed. “He sure is. Did you see how he was trying to throw the blame onto other people? If only we could have found out more about his relationship with Beckett.”
“But if he did it, then surely he wouldn’t suggest to us that Beckett was murdered,” Maude said.
“It might’ve been a ploy,” I suggested. I leant forward and put my head in my hands. “There are far too many suspects. It’s all too hard.” I tried to remember the conversation with Alec. There was something I was missing. I was sure of it. But what?
Chapter 16
Aunt Maude and I hurried into the living room at Mugwort Manor to tell the aunts of our success with the toenails and the hair, but they weren’t there. We heard voices coming from the kitchen. When we reached the kitchen, we found the new cleaner, Molly Myles, sitting opposite Aunt Agnes and Aunt Dorothy. I would bet anything that they had sprinkled sugar, calamus root, and liquorice root all over her chair. The air smelt sickly sweet.
“Oh you’re back,” Aunt Agnes said, waving us inside. “We’re having a nice cup of tea, and we were about to tell Molly our rules for working here.”
I had no idea where she was going with this, but I nodded.
“There are former sheep dip yards on this site,” Aunt Agnes said, somehow managing to keep her face straight as she told the outrageous lie, “and of course, until recent times sheep dip was full of arsenic. Everyone who works here needs to have their hair tested to see if they have arsenic in their hair. It’s for insurance reasons.”
Molly looked quite concerned. She clutched her handbag to her chest. “You want some of my hair?” she squeaked.
“Yes, only a few strands,” Aunt Agnes said in a reassuring tone. “We compensate you, of course.” She slid a fifty dollar note across the table to Molly.
Molly couldn’t take the money fast enough. She stuffed it in her purse as quickly as she could. “Does it hurt?” she asked.
Aunt Agnes shook her head. “No, not at all.” She hesitated, and then added, “We could cut a little bit off the end of your hair if you’d prefer?”
Molly’s hand shook. “I’m not sure. It wouldn’t hurt to cut it off, but it might hurt to pull it out, but then pulling it out would leave a better effect than cutting it off, because then my hair might be lopsided.”
I looked at her head, which was an unruly mess of loose curls. I’m sure no one would notice a whole chunk being cut off, let alone a tiny piece. “Aunt Agnes will only cut off a tiny piece in a place where no one would notice it,” I said.
Molly still looked doubtful. “Can you do it just before I’m finished for the day, rather than now?”
Aunt Agnes shook her head. “No, we’ll do it now, and then you can take the rest of the day off. We’ll pay you anyway.”
Molly’s eyes glittered. “Okay. You can do it now, and then I can go home?”
Aunt Agnes slid some more money across the table to her. “Yes. I don’t want to upset you, so this is compensation. It’s just for our insurance. They insist on it.” She stood up, picked up a plastic bag, and walked around to Molly.
Molly leant back and clutched her throat with both hands. “I’m not sure about this.”
Aunt Agnes’s face flushed red and she looked as though she wanted to throttle the woman. “I’ll only snip a tiny bit of your hair.”
“Maybe you should pull out a few strands,” Molly said doubtfully. “And what about the new boarder?”
“What about him?” Aunt Agnes said. “I thought you already cleaned his cottage.”
“I did.”
I wondered why Molly was being so strange about the aunts taking a piece of her hair. Was she in fact a vampire, possibly Beckett’s murderer, so she knew they were going to do a spell to reveal the culprit? She sure was acting strangely. Who would mind having some of their hair taken, especially when being paid for it?
Aunt Agnes’s exasperation was clearly evident. “Would you rather me pull a few strands of hair or cut a tiny bit off?”
Molly bit her lip. “How long do I have to decide?”
“Five seconds,” Aunt Agnes said flatly, brandishing the scissors at Molly.
“I think perhaps pull a few strands,” Molly said, eyeing the scissors.
Aunt Agnes lunged at her and tugged at her hair. Molly let out an ear-splitting shriek. Aunt Agnes shut the plastic bag while Molly pushed herself back and stood up. “That really hurt!” she said.
“Well, you were the one who wanted me to pull it out rather than snip some off.” Aunt Agnes’s voice was devoid of sympathy.
Aunt Maude hurried over to Molly. “You go and buy yourself something nice with that money from the insurance company. I’ll walk you to the door.” She took Molly by the arm and encouraged her to walk. Molly was inclined to hang back, and she was looking daggers at Aunt Agnes.
“What an entirely irritating woman,” Aunt Agnes said after Maude and Molly disappeared. “All that fuss about a little bit of hair. I’m sure Molly is quite unhinged.”
“She’s high on my list of suspects now,” I said. “I do agree that it was an awful amount of fuss over you taking a small piece of her hair. I find that suspicious.”
Aunt Agnes nodded. “You and me both.” She held up the plastic bag in front of my face, and I could see a chunk of hair in there. No wonder Molly had screamed. Before I could remark on the matter, Aunt Maude spoke up.
“We got that man’s toenail clippings,” she said, waving the bag of the hideously long toenails at the others.
“And he flirted with Aunt Maude,” I said.
Maude shot me a withering look. “Not another word of that, Valkyrie.”
I chuckled, and hummed Love is in the Air. Aunt Agnes raised an eyebrow, but didn’t comment. Instead she said, “We have all the suspects’ personal concerns now. Have we missed anyone? We have personal concerns from Geoff Currey, Molly Myles, Francine Finnegan, Frank Finnegan, and Weston Maxwell.”
“Oh, we haven’t had a chance to tell you yet,” Aunt Maude said gleefully. “We managed to get some hair from that creepy man, Alec Aldon.”
Aunt Agnes was visibly impressed. “How did you do that?” she asked her.
I was the one to answer. “Aunt Maude was very clever. He waved us down, and asked us where we had been, so Aunt Maude pretended she wanted to see his roses. When he was bending over, she pulled out some of his hair.”
“Did you get to see inside his house?” Agnes asked.
We both shook our heads. “No. We got as far as the front porch, but that was all,” Maude said.
“What sort of spell are we going to do?” I asked them. “And will we have time before the new boarder arrives? Don’t forget, he hates pets, so I have to find Hecate and lock her in my cottage, or maybe lock her in the manor.”
Aunt Agnes shook her head. “You can’t lock her in the manor, because the boarder will come here first, and we have the cat door in the back door so she can come and go as she pleases. I know you have a cat door, too, Valkyrie, but you have another door you can shut across it. I think your cottage is the best bet. Why don’t you see if you can find Hecate now and lock her up, and then we’ll see how much time we have left. Maybe we’ll have time to do the spell before the boarder arrives.” She waved her arms expansively. “If not, we can simply do it after he books in.”
I nodded. “Thank goodness we only have one boarder coming and no others in residence at a time like this,” I said. “I’ll go and find Hecate now.”
I walked out the back door and into the veggie garden. Hecate liked to chase butterflies out here. There was no sign of her, so she could be anywhere. She might even be playing in th
e spinifex grass down on the sand dunes near the beach.
I was concerned that I wouldn’t be able to find her, and she would show up when the new boarder arrived. A particularly unpleasant sounding man, Mr Jones had called us more than once and emailed us several times to tell us that he could not abide pets. He was staying for five days, so I was going to have to do my best to keep Hecate away from him the entire time.
I walked to my cottage, calling her. She wasn’t in my garden, so I unlocked my door and walked in. I looked everywhere in my house, even under my bed and in the cupboards, as Hecate liked to sleep in cupboards. Finally, I opened a packet of dry cat food and went outside, rattling it as loudly as I could. There was still no sign.
An anxious sensation settled in the pit of my stomach. I needed to make a go of the Bed and Breakfast for the sake of my aunts, and it was important that this man’s stay went well.
The phone Lucas had given me rang, and I pulled it out of my pocket and then promptly dropped it. “Lucas!” I said, as soon as I retrieved it. “What were you going to tell me the last time you called?”
“There’s no time for that,” Lucas said breathlessly. “Pepper, are you all right?”
“Yes, I’m fine,” I said. “The aunts are about to do a spell to reveal the identity of the murderer.”
Lucas muttered something, and then said, “I don’t like it. I’ll be back soon. Can you hang tight until I get there?”
“Of course,” I said. “I do have to help the aunts with the spell, though.”
“Are you sure you’re all right, Pepper?” There was a moment when he did not speak, and I felt as though he were struggling to tell me something important. “Pepper?”
“Yes?”
“Be careful. I can’t lose you.”
“You won’t.”
“I have to go.”
“I know,” I said, regretfully.
“Be safe,” he ordered, and then he hung up the phone.
I encircled my cottage, and then Lucas’s cottage, and then walked back to the manor. I was about to walk in the back door, when I thought I should do one more lap. I walked slowly around Mugwort Manor, looking under all the bushes and rattling the cat food. Still, there was no sign of Hecate.