by C. A. Larmer
“Maurice will manage it? Really? So they don’t want to sell the place and get on with their lives?”
Roxy was surprised.
Helen laughed. “No, I thought that too. But they dismissed the idea. Said they love the retreat, gives them all purpose, income. They’re going to keep it exactly as it is, in honour of Abi. But they know they haven’t got the expertise, and Popeye isn’t interested, he’s finally worked out he’s too old. So they have asked Maurice to step up.”
“Do you think he can do it?”
She shrugged. “I honestly don’t know. But mother seemed to think so... so I should respect that. I should give him the benefit of the doubt. Besides, it’s their island to mess with as they like. You can’t believe how much of a relief that is, all of a sudden.”
She opened the bedroom door. “So, we’ll see you at the memorial service later? We’ll be starting at the main beach around noon and heading off from there.”
“Even in the rain?”
Helen laughed. “Especially in the rain!”
Downstairs, Roxy found Maya, Luc and Doc sharing a table inside the dining room enjoying a cooked breakfast as the rain bucketed down outside. Mary was back at her post and she smiled widely, confidently at Roxy as she settled her into a chair and enquired about coffee.
“I think I’ll go the full cooked breakfast, too,” said Roxy, “and a latte, thanks Mary.” The waitress looked surprised, smiled and then disappeared again.
“Feels really weird,” whispered Maya. “She’ll be Lady of the Manor soon.”
“And good luck to her,” said Roxy.
“Here, here!” chimed Doc.
“So, Poirot, how do you feel this morning?” said Maya. “Pretty smug?”
Roxy laughed. “Relieved, to be honest. I’m surprised you’re even talking to me, after what I did to Wade.”
Maya slapped her lightly on one arm. “Oh, don’t be so silly! Wade’ll con his way out of it before you know it! It’s Joshua who’s in real trouble.”
She narrowed her beautiful blue eyes. “How on earth did you work it all out? I would never have picked him for a cold-blooded killer. Not in my wildest dreams!”
“To be honest, Maya, I didn’t suspect him either, at least not for a while. But once I started to put the pieces together and get a clearer picture of his background, well, it just all clicked.”
“What do you mean, ‘his background’?” asked Luc.
She thanked Mary for her coffee, added two heaped spoonfuls of sugar, then took a tentative sip.
“I was confused right from the start about why Abi was so against Helen and Joshua being together. It didn’t make any sense. I knew Abi loved Joshua, like a son, so I couldn’t understand what she had against him as a potential son-in-law.”
“Yes, she did seem to have it in for him,” said Maya, contemplating this for a moment. “Oh, don’t tell me—Helen and Joshua aren’t related are they?! Not brother and sister, surely? How positively revolting!” She crinkled her perfect little nose up.
“Good question, Maya. I did wonder about that for a moment, too, and no they’re not related.” She shot Doc a quick glance. “But there was a connection between Joshua and Abi.”
She took another, bigger gulp of her latte.
“Joshua first came to Dormay as a baby after his mother, Theresa, fell pregnant out of wedlock. We don’t know to whom—apparently she refused to tell anyone, including her family—but what we do know for sure is that when she got pregnant she was working as a haus girl for a man named Jed Lilton.”
She paused for the penny to drop.
“Lilton? Was he related to Abi?” asked Maya.
“He was Abi’s first husband,” interjected Doc. “And a miserable bastard at that. A philanderer, a brute, an all-round bad guy.”
“That’s right,” said Roxy. “Not only did he slap Abi around a lot, but he used to sleep with all the local women, including his haus girls. That’s why Abi left him and moved to Dormay. So I suppose when she heard that one of his haus girls was knocked up—in every sense of the word I don’t doubt—she decided to do the right thing and brought her out to Dormay, too. That was Joshua’s mum.”
“Ah,” said Luc. “So Joshua’s father was Abi’s ex-husband?”
“Actually, point of error,” said Doc. “Abigail and Jed Lilton never actually divorced, God knows why! But yes, Abi believed that Joshua’s father was Jed. She never knew for sure but she had her suspicions, she told me as much. There were some physical similarities, you see, between Jed and Josh, and they were both bloody hard workers you had to give them that.”
“But Joshua is hardly a ‘philanderer’,” snorted Maya. “Barely looked twice at me.”
She seemed almost disappointed and Roxy frowned.
“Count yourself lucky, Maya,” she said, “because Joshua clearly had a violent streak which we all discovered far too late, and which I suspect Abi had sensed very early on. It was probably the reason she tried to keep the two apart. I can’t know for sure, but I suspect Abi was worried that Joshua would not make a good husband. If he didn’t end up being unfaithful, he might still have the violent gene. In any case she didn’t want to risk it, so she tried to keep them apart. I think that was probably part of the reason she decided to give the island back to the locals—to separate Helen from Joshua once and for all. She was trying to protect her daughter, and it cost her her life.”
“Poor, darling, Abi,” Maya said, shaking her head.
She dabbed a napkin to her glossy lips. “Okay then, enough of all the sadness. A little birdy tells me the book’s back on.”
Roxy laughed. “Bloody hell, news travels fast around here!”
“Small towns, small islands, same diff’,” said Maya. “So you staying on then, to do the book?”
“Not straight away, no. I have to get back home to Sydney first, sort a few things out.”
Roxy thought then of her dear friend Max and of their first catch-up over wines at Pico’s wine bar. It was once their favourite pastime, and she could not wait to do it again. She could almost taste the warm glass of merlot now, her good friend staring across at her from his bar stool, smiling lovingly. Would they remain friends? She wondered. Or would she finally have the courage to take it to the next step?
If there was one thing this episode had taught her, life was too damn short to keep secrets and avoid your true destiny.
Perhaps it was time to put her heart on the line.
“So when will you be back?” Maya was asking, perhaps for the second time, and Roxy shook herself out of her reverie.
“Um, oh, pretty soon, I’d say. Next month maybe. Will you still be around?”
Maya scoffed. “What and give Wade more excuses to loiter about? No thank you, I’m filing for divorce—and please try and look vaguely surprised! I know we were never suited, just thought it’d be a lark, that’s all. It’s been anything but! I’ll never pick a man twice my age again.”
“What will you do?”
“Oh I’m getting back to the real world, sweetie. I’ll head home to London for a bit, get back to my modelling, maybe even do a writing course!” She giggled. “I’ve already worked out art is most certainly not my forte.”
“Speaking of which, what are you going to do, Luc?”
He offered her one of his breathtaking smiles. “Ooh, I am leaving, too, mon ami. Marie-Simone wants me back in Paris, maybe I will try and come back one day to see Helen and the baby. I don’t know for sure if eet eeze mine but you never know. I guess we will find out soon enough.”
“Helen might be back in Australia by that time.”
“Oui, then, if she likes, I will go there. But non, I can not stay here now. It is time for me to depart.”
They all turned to stare at Doc.
“What about you, then?” said Maya. “You nicking off on the first available boat, too?”
He shook his head emphatically. “No, no, you can’t get rid of me that easily. I’m determ
ined to stay and help Helen get through this big change. She’ll need someone beside her that she can trust, help her settle the place properly and move on. I owe that to Abi. And to Helen.”
He winked at Roxy and she knew that eventually he would find the right time to tell his daughter what she needed to know.
“I’m sure Helen would love that,” she said. “I guess she’ll close it off to paying guests until it’s sorted?”
“Hardly, my dear, she’s got a boatload of Yanks showing up next week. Maurice is going to have to learn fast.”
Maya giggled again. “Maurice! Running the place? Imagine it!”
They all sat back then and did just that. Already, Roxy could see the proud young islander welcoming wide-eyed foreigners to his land, showing them the places where his ancestors grew up, worked and played. She could imagine Popeye telling them real stories of the island’s history, Mary presenting local dishes in this very dining room, the same dishes that were once eaten at the tables of her forefathers. Oh, indeed, Roxy could see a very beautiful, very bright future for Dormay and its people. And that, she decided, would be the perfect time to come back.
Chapter 21
As Abigail Lilton was laid to rest on the slopes of Abi’s Point overlooking the airstrip and all those who would come and go, Roxy watched silently from the sidelines, under a wide umbrella, tears streaming down her face. The sky, too, wept long, torrential sobs in Abi’s honour but the villagers remained defiant, their chins high, their eyes blazing with pride.
Abi’s body, which had been wrapped in one of her colourful sarongs and decorated with fronds and frangipani, was placed gently into the rich, red soil along with an assortment of her favourite shells. Eventually Helen said a few words, then Maurice and Popeye stood up and spoke in their native tongue. She didn’t understand a word of it, of course, but Roxy didn’t need a translator to know that they were speaking of love and admiration, of gratification and a determination to continue on.
She knew, then, that Abi had already seen Dormay’s future, had long ago believed in this island and its people. And she believed in Helen, and her ability to do something worthwhile with her life and the life of her baby. But it took her death for all of them to finally believe in themselves.
When Abi’s body was eventually covered with the earth, the last of the flowers strewn across the top, the downpour suddenly stopped and a blinding ray of sunshine splashed across the island. They all stopped and turned to look at it, shielding their eyes and smiling.
Abigail Lilton was at peace at last.
About the author
Christina Larmer is a journalist, editor and the author of Killer Twist (the first in the Ghostwriter Mystery series), An Island Lost, The Agatha Christie Book Club, and the non-fiction book A Measure of Papua New Guinea: The Arman Larmer Surveys Story (Focus; 2008). She grew up in Papua New Guinea but now lives with her musician husband and two young sons in the Byron hinterland of Northern NSW, Australia. Christina is passionate about crime fiction and when she’s not writing fiction or freelance, she can be found immersed in a classic Agatha Christie.
Connect with Me Online
http://www.christinalarmer.com
http://christina-larmerspits.blogspot.com/
[email protected]
Want to read more by C.A. Larmer?
• Look for the first in the Ghostwriter Mystery series:
Killer Twist
• For a sneak peek of the third Ghostwriter Mystery, go to: Last Writes
• Here’s an introduction to C.A. Larmer’s latest release,
The Agatha Christie Book Club
When Alicia Finlay walks out on her boring old book club and decides to start a new one—one devoted to her favorite mystery writer Agatha Christie—little does she know her new club is about to stumble into a mystery of their own. It's a mystery so baffling it would leave even the Queen of Crime scratching her head...
After gathering seven crime buffs together—including young librarian Missy (as ditzy as Miss Marple and as sharp), fashionista Claire, paleontologist Perry (both stylish and fastidious like Poirot), dashing Dr Anders, a poisons expert, and socialite Barbara Parlour—Alicia grows suspicious when one of them fails to show for the next book club. Barbara has disappeared from the face of the earth and her arrogant husband, Arthur, seems coldly unconcerned. The group suspects him of foul play until he suddenly shows up dead. With two baffling mysteries and time fast running out, the book club decides to do as the meddling Miss Marple would do and investigate!
So begins the first exciting instalment of the Agatha Christie Book Club (ACBC), a motley collection of amateur sleuths who use Christie as their guide to help solve a range of mysteries that fall into their lap. Following in the footsteps of Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, the group must sort the clues from the red herrings to solve the murder of Arthur Parlour and determine what happened to his missing wife. Has she been brutally murdered or is she somehow, somewhere still alive?
The Agatha Christie Book Club
Copyright 2012 Larmer Media
Part 1
Everything was ready. The table was set, the flowers arranged, the English Breakfast tea was brewing in a delicate china teapot and there was a plate of cucumber and crème fraîche sandwiches beside it (crusts cut off, of course). It was the perfect backdrop for the inaugural meeting of the Agatha Christie Book Club.
And it was the perfect place to set a murder in motion.
As the seven members of the new book club nursed cups of tea and waved battered copies of Evil Under the Sun around with gusto, one member was watching the group very closely. This person didn’t really care about the book, didn’t give a jot about Agatha Christie if truth be told, had just pretended to care, to gain entry to this club, and to get the devious plan rolling.
And it was a good plan! There was no point in false modesty now. It had taken a lot of time and a lot of effort, but it would all be worth it in the end. If it worked—and how could it not?—it had the potential to destroy one life, wreak havoc on another, and leave this bunch of pretenders for dead.
They would never know what hit them.
The book club member sniggered. Hell, even the great Agatha Christie would be left scratching her head...
Part 2—Chapter 1 (Three weeks earlier)
Alicia Finlay was in the wrong book club.
She hadn’t realised it at first. Had come along, faithfully, every month for three months, the latest Pulitzer Prize-winning novel wedged under her arm, a strained smile on her lips, and pretended to be having fun. But there was no fun to be had.
Finally, on the fourth Monday night, it dawned on her.
You could blame the bottle of red. Alicia had been sitting quietly enough, half listening to a monologue about the central themes of this novel—something to do with British Imperialism and ‘inevitability’, apparently—when a 2007 Margaret River cabernet sauvignon caught her eye. It looked delicious. So, too, did the plate of hors d’oeuvres that had been placed, along with the bottle and eight crystal wine glasses, just out of reach on a side table. Alicia spotted miniature crepes topped with salmon and goats cheese; asparagus sticks rolled in thin slices of prosciutto; and something that looked vaguely like pâté.
But she knew how these things went. It would all have to wait until the serious chatter was over. Alicia glanced furtively at her watch. Forty minutes to go. Her mouth salivated and she turned to the man on her right but he was deeply engrossed in something the woman to her left was saying.
“The glass church is, I think, a potent symbol of Oscar’s vanity and, er, the vulnerability of his misguided belief system,” the woman, Verity, a jittery, primary school teacher, explained. “It’s, well, you know... both strong and fragile at the same time. Don’t you agree, Alicia?”
Alicia darted her eyes from the side table where they’d strayed again to the grey haired woman talking and smiled awkwardly.
“Oh, um, I...” She paused. Chuckled a
little. “Actually, sorry, wasn’t really paying attention. Thought I might help myself to a glass of red.”
“Red?”
“You know, red wine.” She stood up. “Does anyone else want me to get them a glass while we’re chatting? Something to eat?”
The book group’s hostess, Kirsten, sat forward with a start. As always, she was immaculately dressed, this time in a beige cotton top, black linen pants and chunky red, resin beads that looked like they’d been plucked straight out of an up-market magazine fashion spread. Her black hair had been yanked into a stiff straight bob around her neck, no doubt in line with the current fashion but, coupled with sharp cheekbones and porcelain skin, left her looking a little like a wicked witch. Alicia wondered whether she realised that.
“Ahh, sorry, Alicia,” said Kirsten, “but it’s not really time for wine, we’re still in discussion mode.” She tapped her thin, gold wristwatch twice.
“Oh,” said Alicia, dropping back into her seat. “We can’t discuss and drink at the same time?”
Kirsten smiled politely, exchanged glances with another club member—they had exchanged those kinds of glances before—and shook her head, no. Her black bob did not budge.
“Why not?” Alicia persisted and Kirsten looked slightly taken aback.
“It’s just not what we do... here.” She fumbled for her sheet of questions. “Okay then, if we can return to the subject at hand. Where were we exactly? I think we were up to question four? Yes, style of writing. Have you got anything to say about that, Wilfred?”
She stared pointedly at a large man with a shaggy beard and gold-rimmed glasses who was slouched in an armchair across from Alicia. He pushed the glasses back into position and then slid one hand down to his beard and began caressing it lovingly. He’d been waiting for this.