A Deadly Snow Fall

by Cynthia Gallant-Simpson

  “Thanks, Liz. You are a pal. Well, gotta go. Mom’s expecting me to take over the store while she goes to her needlepoint class. But you can be sure I am never going to look at a ham bone, chicken wing or a standing rib roast the same ever again. Do you think this is important, Liz?

  “Yes, I think it is very important and you will get credit for finding it. Hope that takes the onus off your feelings about the police. All kids get into trouble of some kind. I’m sure when I tell the Chief what a good thing you did by reporting this, he will forget your crime spree of two years ago.”

  “Thanks. I’m outa here. Bye.”

  The bone case was taking on a whole new aspect. I headed into the Police Station to find James busy talking to a couple whose outfits, complete with cameras strung around their necks, gave them away immediately as tourists. From what I could make out from an unobtrusive distance of about ten feet, was that the woman’s purse had been grabbed on the street and they’d come to file a complaint.

  The red-faced husband said, “Ya, a floozy with bright pink hair and wearing a long sequin covered cape over what looked like green tights and a matching bra. Unbelievable! What kind of a getup is that for a purse snatcher?”

  Not sure what the man expected a purse snatcher to wear, I continued to eavesdrop. James looked my way surreptitiously. Turning back to the man, he put back his proper cop mask.

  “The wife and I came here because it seemed like it ought to be a safer place than the Jersey shore with all those mafia guys vacationing there. But since we got here we’ve seen more damned crazily dressed people. You got some kind of early Halloween thing goin’ on here, officer?”

  The man went on to say that his wife’s purse had been snatched by the person in the pink wig. James managed a glance in my direction and I held up the plastic bag containing the finger bones.

  Assuring the couple that he would take their description out onto the street and track the thief, he suggested they go and have a nice cappuccino at the Green Genie coffee shop. He took their cell phone number and promised to contact them within the hour. The couple departed although their facial expressions displayed a lack of confidence in a man of the law who would live in a town full of weirdly dressed residents.

  James quickly moved to my side and took me by the elbow. He steered me into the meeting room where the attorney had announced Edwin’s bequest to me. Déjà vu.

  “Where? Who? When?” James looked through the clear plastic and, as I had, knew immediately that the bone did not belong to a goat or a seal.

  “Shelley found it in her Dad’s vegetable patch.”

  “Time to back off, Liz. Please.”

  “Pardon me, James. I do not recall you taking over as my keeper.” I was coming on a little too harshly considering I knew James had a perfect right to be worried about me.

  He looked so sweet and concerned that momentarily I considered taking his advice and backing out of the case. I’d certainly have enough on my plate with the inn during the busy months ahead. Agatha Raisin’s strident voice shouted inside my head. A good sleuth never backs down. Finish the job and show that arrogant male what you are made of, woman. Never let down the side.

  Unfortunately, Agatha provided no avenue for rebuttal or I would have shouted back, James is hardly arrogant and I have nothing to prove to him. He is just concerned for my safety. But I knew that my favorite sleuth was right and no matter what the risk, I was not about to butt out. I was not a quitter.

  “Please Liz; this could be dangerous. We have a possible three crime situation here, two current and one cold case, and if you continue digging you could be the fourth…situation.”

  I’d told him about Daisy Buchanan’s bone pile, but we both knew this finger bone had not come from there.

  Leaving my concerned boyfriend with the phalange, I left the station. Meaning to head back to the inn, I had a sudden idea. Instead of turning down Honeysuckle Lane, I kept on going down Commercial Street in the direction of the Fairies in the Garden Shop. A loud commotion behind me grew louder and louder until I just had to turn to see what was going on.

  About six feet tall and wearing a bright shiny pink wig, a silk cape covered in sequins flying out behind him like a super hero in a comic book and exposing lime green tights and matching bustier, the superhero, aka Bernie Williams, nearly knocked me down as he flew by. He was carrying a bone and swinging it like a baton.

  As he passed, he shouted over his shoulder, “I didn’t do it, the bone did! I’m telling the truth.”

  Summer cop Eddie Mason, hired back early to help with the crowds the Boston newspapers had brought to town, also shot by me in hot pursuit. He jumped over a dog sitting in the middle of the sidewalk and when the pink-haired runner tripped on the uneven sidewalk, Eddie caught him by the flying cape. Sequins went flying like confetti. The bone took off like a missile landing at the feet of the aforementioned dog who gave it a thorough sniff before rejecting it. Still adamantly protesting his innocence as the cop clamped on the handcuffs, Bernie’s wig fell onto the road. The dog also checked it out with even less interest.

  Back at the station, the prisoner told his tale. James and I laughed when he later told me the whole story of Bernie, aka Busty Betty, who performed nightly at the Crown and Anchor.

  According to Bernie, the bone had been found wedged into his dog’s house. When Bernie retrieved it, he recalled his college anatomy and was sure it was human. “I had it under my arm and I was headed to the station, when it grabbed a lady’s purse. Next thing I knew, this guy was yelling and chasing me. I thought he was a guy I owe some money to so I managed to lose him when I turned down Mayflower Lane and ducked into the tumbled down fish packing plant. The damn guy was shouting, ‘Thief, thief!’ Wasn’t about to try and deal with him. Then, I looked down and saw what I’d done. What the bone had done.”

  The bone had belonged to a robust steer and had evidently come from Daisy’s bone pile. Bernie was released, the purse returned and the couple left in a huff promising never to return to Provincetown. James laughed when he told me the man was overheard saying to his wife that they’d never come back to “this town full of dizzy whackos in Halloween costumes.”

  I’d continued on to the Fairies in the Garden Shop, as the culprit was led away. I knew I’d be brought up to date on the bone-wielding Bernie by James, later. Like having a police band radio, I knew everything that went on in James’s professional life. The little bell on the door made a Tinker Bell jingle as I entered Emily’s shop. Once again, my sinuses screamed their objection to the atmosphere of competing attar of roses, cinnamon, citrus and assorted other scents.

  Emily stepped through the beaded curtain from the back room wearing a Donna Reed era housedress with high top pink sneakers and a gray felt beret.

  “Hello, Ms. Ogilvie-Smythe. Isn’t it a lovely spring day? Hot chocolate?”

  “Yes, it certainly is nice out there. (Nicer by far than in this unbreathable atmosphere!). No thanks. Just finished an iced coffee. How are you, Emily?”

  “Just jolly. Thanks for asking. How are you, Liz?”

  “Great. I’ve come to ask a favor. It would help the police a great deal,” I fibbed, “if you could look into your crystal…Eloise…and see if she has any clues to the bone found in my back garden.” Lying and playing into the hands of crazies was becoming natural. What a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.

  My Scottish Granny always said, “Tis easier to catch flies with honey than vinegar.” So, honey dripped from my lips until I was sure I might suddenly take off and fly around the shop like one of the ubiquitous fairies on a sugar high.

  Emily looked doubtful. It passed through my mind that this request might be outside her purview. Could bones communicate once they were separated from their skeleton? I wondered. It also occurred to me that I’d been thinking far too many unscientific thoughts lately for a student of hard science.

  “Perhaps in doing so, you could help the victim to be at rest.�
� Emily’s response could be seen in her eyes. She liked the idea. Maybe this could work after all.

  “My powers are generally used to bring people together or ask important family questions of the dear departed. But I suppose I could try. Eloise could, that is.”

  “Try is the best we can ask for Emily. Thank you.”

  We sat. The crystal ball gave me the creeps. It seemed to be alive and waiting. Waiting to cause trouble.

  Emily moved the orb closer to her and began speaking low and intimately to the glass ball. It occurred to me that there was not much difference between Eloise communicating with Emily and my hearing the sound of Agatha Raisin’s voice in my head. Oh, I thought, I will need much more than a few weeks on an analyst’s couch. Maybe a month in Monte Carlo.

  My poor head was so stuffed, I worried that I might begin to hallucinate from pressure brought to bear on my brain. Had that angel doll sitting on the shelf straight ahead of me just winked? No, not possible. I must be drunk on flower scents. A whole new kind of high.

  Emily’s voice seemed to come from a long distance away. “Sorry, I don’t think this is the kind of thing that Eloise can do.” Her voice sounded shaky and perhaps, I thought, scared.

  I remained as silent as the grave (pun definitely intended).

  “Hm. Very interesting.” Emily looked up at me. “Sorry, Liz. Princess Proudfoot says that the bone is one of her peoples.’ Not much of a mystery.” With that, Emily pushed Eloise away from her. Subject closed.

  “Wait, Emily. Are you saying the bone in my garden was from an Ind…native American?”

  “Not surprising. Disgraceful how the old tribal burial sites were tossed to construct modern buildings. The Princess says that the bone must be returned to the ancient burial ground off of Shank Painter’s Road or….”

  “Or? What Emily? What?”

  “Or there will be more troubles. More retribution.”

  What could I say to that? It was obvious that Emily had no intention of helping.

  Emily reached for a white linen cloth and covered Eloise. “That’s all. Eloise has shut down. Good day, Liz.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Unable to put off any longer the many inn-related responsibilities waiting for me, I headed back there. My goal was to have the inn ship-shape when Katy Balsam arrived from college just before Memorial Day to take over her duties as manager. In the meantime, I had to interview local girls interested in housekeeping positions, order supplies and deal with the kitchen re-do. My time with Emily had produced nothing of value except to verify my opinion that Eloise ran the show.

  Sitting at the kitchen table with the Dean and Deluca catalog in front of me, nearly drooling with anticipation of the great new recipes I had planned, I organized an order for the gourmand food supplier. But my mind was not fully on the project at hand.

  Emily’s behavior, in conjunction with Eloise’s, had disturbed me more than I wanted to admit. The woman obviously knew lots and lots of secrets, but she was standing obdurately in the way of solving the town’s mysteries. Damn her. And her orb.

  The ringing of the front doorbell surprised me. Since I had my friends trained to come to the kitchen door, I concluded that whoever was there ringing the bell was someone I did not want to see. Oh, how correct I was.

  Standing there in the warm sunshine on the front stoop, stood a droopy young man in an even droopier, too large for his slight frame, old-fashioned chauffeur’s suit and cap. After two years in town, I’d grown accustomed to costumed people everywhere, but this was somehow quite different. Behind him, parked at the curb, I could see a Boston taxi cab and a face I wished was still across the wide Atlantic Ocean. My heart sank fifty fathoms.

  “Hello, Miss. I’m delivering Lady Gwendolyn Ogilvie-Smythe. Her card, Miss.”

  Oh no! Not now! My first thought was to slam the door and move a large piece of furniture in front of it as a barricade. When Lady Gwendolyn paid a visit, the world was always turned on its head.

  Then, completely out of character, my mother opened the cab door and stepped out. As far as I knew, my mother had never opened a car door for herself. Will wonders never cease?

  The last thing I needed at that moment or, at anytime, was my bothersome snob of a mother. Alighting from the cab, Lady Gwendolyn, wearing furs from head to foot on a sixty-eight degree day, called to the chauffer to return immediately to unload her luggage. When I spotted the suitcases that filled the trunk plus the two cases that had traveled on the front seat with the driver, I knew without a doubt that life as I presently knew it was over.

  “Mother, what a surprise.”

  “Oh, Elizabeth, darling! What on earth is that thing you are wearing on your head? Have you become a hippie late in life? God, its tropical here. I certainly hope you have central air. I shall expire.”

  My hand went to the scarf covering my hair that I wore when dusting. I pulled it off and stuffed it into my jeans pocket.

  “Mother, you might remove a few animals from your body and find that it’s not that hot. Come in.”

  Lady Gwendolyn, my officious snob mother, took three steps into the front hall and stopped dead. Gazing around with her proud eagle eyes, she harrumphed loudly. “So this is where that foolish woman ended up. That is what comes of marrying out of one’s class. Did you know that two dukes and a count wanted to marry Libby?”

  No point in defending my ostracized aunt at that juncture. Let it go, Liz. You have never won an argument or made a convincing point with this woman, so don’t try now.

  “I’ll make some iced tea, Mother. Hang those furs on that coat tree over by the stairs. Make yourself at home in the living room and, for God’s sake, give that phony chauffeur a big tip; he’s melting in that suit. Where did you get him that terrible chauffeur’s getup?”

  “At a costumer’s shop in Boston. I could not allow him to drive me in one of those disgusting muscle shirts and droopy pants, could I?”

  “No, I’m sure his driving skills were greatly improved by the monkey suit.”

  Returning with a tray of tea things and cookies, I found my mother engrossed in a photo album put together by Aunt Libby.

  “Look here, darling. This is me at the Fairfield School for Girls. Did you know that your Aunt Libby and I were chums there and she introduced me to her handsome brother, your dear PaPa? She invited me to a hunt weekend at the Smythe’s country house in Sussex and there was your dear PaPa in his military uniform. Oh, he was so chic. What wonderful memories are reopened for me by these old photos. If only she hadn’t betrayed us all.”

  “How nice, Mother. Now tell me, what on earth are you doing here?”

  “That tone of voice hardly makes me feel welcome, Elizabeth. I’ve left Percy. I don’t want to talk about it. My psychologist advises that I not burden you with our troubles. We both love you and will continue to, but I simply cannot live with him any longer.”

  “You’ve left PaPa? But why? And why come here? You could have gone to the country house or the Riviera or rented a flat in London. Cry on the shoulders of your friends. Why, for heaven’s sake, come all the way here?”

  “I thought my darling daughter would be happy to see her MaMa, but this is hardly the reception I hoped for. Don’t worry; I’ll be gone in a fortnight.”

  “Two weeks! Well, you can’t because, because…every room is booked.”

  Having let that lie slip, I had no idea of how I could pull it off. Every room was tumbled, beds were stripped and bathrooms smelled of bleach. But, if forced to, I’d invite everyone I knew to a stay with meals included just to stand behind my word.

  “Mother, be serious. I have a business to run. I do not have the time to entertain you.”

  “Oh, darling! I don’t need entertaining. I will entertain myself. I intend to walk around and get to know the village, gossip with the humble villagers and hand out coins to the dirty unfortunate children.”

  “Oh, that attitude will make you welcome, indeed. Mother this is not England. People h
ere are not snobs and the children are not dirty and unfortunate.” In the back of my mind I could see my haughty bejeweled mother giving fashion advice to a gaudily dressed female only to discover that her name was Tom or Mike or Henry.

  “And anyway, I can sleep in your room. Certainly you will not deny half a bed to your dear MaMa. I’ll be gone in no time...after my heartbreak heals.”

  “On that subject, where do you plan to go from here? In fact, do you have even a semblance of a plan for your future?”

  “Of course I do. I’m going out to the west coast to spend time with an old beau who’s been after me to visit for years. He’s in the movie business or the music business or something very exciting out there. I just plan to be a gypsy for a few years after so many years of living in your PaPa’s huge crushing shadow. Being an indentured slave wears one down, darling.”

  “Two things, Mother. Gypsies travel light. I’m not sure you can survive with a backpack as your only luggage. And second, when have you ever been a slave? You have never lifted a finger to do anything for yourself except perhaps in the privacy of the bathroom.”

  I went to answer the ringing phone and Lady Gwendolyn returned to her photo memories.

  “Sorry, Daphne; can’t make it to book club tonight.” I put my hand over the mouthpiece just in case my mother’s keen hearing was still working.

  “What are you talking about? That’s ridiculous. What on earth would keep you away? Another murder, right in your kitchen?”

  “You’ll never believe it, but my mother is here. She left my father and she plans to stay around for a fortnight. God, I think I’ll just drown myself.”

  “Hey, bring her along. Love to meet the old gal. So would the girls. Do bring her along.”

  “No, Daph. Really. Don’t even suggest it. She’ll bring a plague upon your good house. She’ll just ruin the evening. She takes over wherever she is and tries to run everything.”