Lady Marmalade Cozy Murder Mysteries: Box Set (Books 1 - 3)

by Jason Blacker

  Lottie paused and looked over at Lady Marmalade. She smiled and her blue eyes were bright with pain, sadness and lost dreams.

  “I understand, my dear,” said Frances.

  “I eventually claimed some personal items from the government. It wasn’t a lot really, a box of assorted knick knacks of my mother’s that had been in storage almost twenty years. The box contained some letters that my mother had written to a man named Jack Forsyth.”

  Frances nodded.

  “What did those letters say?” asked Florence.

  “They started off quite romantic, talking about undying love and their futures together, but the last couple were of quite a different tenor. My mother informed him that she’d become pregnant. You can hear the joy in her voice as she writes to him...”

  Lottie took a moment and cleared her throat. She looked outside, through the window to steal her strength.

  “He wrote back and said he’d found a doctor who would take care of it for her.”

  “It being the pregnancy?” asked Florence.

  Lottie looked outside again and nodded. She bit her lower lip, took the tissue and dabbed at her eyes.

  “Her last letter to him was pleading almost. She went on about how madly in love they were and how he’d promised he would marry her and they’d have a family. It was almost pathetic. His last letter was short and cruel. He told her he never loved her, never wanted to have a family with her and that she’d be better off if she ended the pregnancy.”

  “That must have been difficult to read,” said Frances.

  Lottie nodded and took a deep breath. Frances sipped her tea.

  “It was. I lived with those letters, that last letter of his really, for a long time. I was angry and I was sad and I didn’t know what to do about it. Finally I got the courage to write to him about six months ago.”

  “What happened?” asked Florence.

  “What you might expect from a man like that.”

  Lottie looked into her teacup expecting she might be able to read the tea leaves for a brighter future, but the tea leaves had clung like desperate children to the teapot.

  “He didn’t write back at first, so I sent him a second letter and told him if I didn’t hear from him I’d come and visit him. He responded then. His tone was mean and blunt. He wanted to know what I wanted.”

  “You hadn’t told him that you were his daughter?” asked Florence.

  “I had, but I think he meant what sort of money I wanted to go away. I told him I didn’t want anything, that I just wanted to talk to him and understand why he’d been so cruel to my mother.”

  “He told me not to bother, nobody would believe that I was his daughter and I’d better watch my mouth and drop this whole ‘silly’ affair. That’s what he called it. A ‘silly affair’.”

  “But you didn’t?” asked Frances.

  “No and he didn’t respond when I sent him my penultimate letter. So about a month ago I sent him another one telling him he better come and visit me or he’d be sorry.”

  “Did he respond to that?”

  “No, I’m still waiting for a response, but I doubt I’ll get one now, seeing as how dead he is.”

  Frances sipped her tea and looked at Lottie for a long while. Lottie met her gaze but then dropped it into her tea without making a splash.

  “I’ve read the last letter you sent. You sound very determined, and also, what’s the word,” she looked at Florence for a moment.

  “Greedy,” said Florence.

  “That’s a little strong, but I got the impression you were trying to blackmail him.”

  Lottie shook her head.

  “No, no, not at all. You have to understand, he wouldn’t meet me, I just wanted to talk to him, I didn’t want his money, but he wouldn’t speak to me. He wouldn’t write, I had to force it. I wasn’t really going to tell his wife, and son.”

  “How did you know he had a family?” asked Florence.

  “I investigated him before I sent my first letter. Anyway, he wouldn’t talk to me, that’s why I had to threaten him.”

  “This brings us to the crux of the matter, Lottie. If you weren’t after his money, why were you with Garrett last night, when he killed his father, trying to find out where the gold was?”

  TWENTY-ONE

  Chapter 21

  LOTTIE looked up in shock and leaned towards Lady Marmalade.

  “No! You’ve got it all wrong. Garrett didn’t kill him. He was only trying to get his father to reason with him. To talk with him. The same problem I was having with Jack Forsyth, Garrett was having too. He was a belligerent and self absorbed man. It seemed the only way you could get his attention was through threats.”

  “We have a witness who saw Jack shoot his father,” said Florence.

  Lottie looked over at Florence and her face turned hard like stone.

  “Let me guess, probably that mistress of his, Meredith, Meredith Church?”

  Florence nodded.

  “I figured as much. He would have brought her along to the pickup.”

  “Are you denying then, that Garrett shot his father?” asked Frances.

  “I most certainly am,” said Lottie.

  “And are you denying that Garrett had a gun with him last night that he was pointing at his father?”

  Lottie placed her teacup and saucer on the table next to her that held the wireless. She fiddled with the damp tissue in her hands.

  “No, that’s true. I told him it wasn’t a good idea to bring a gun. It was too dangerous, I said. But he wouldn’t hear of it. He said he wasn’t going to use it but that it was the only way to get Jack to listen to us.”

  “I’d like to go back a bit if you don’t mind, my dear. You admit you were at the docks last night. You admit that you and Garrett were there to talk to Jack and you admit that Garrett had a gun and pointed it at his father. Am I correct so far?”

  Frances held her teacup to her lips and took a sip. In her left hand she held the saucer which still carried the lemon pip like a boil on its face. Lottie was looking at her tissue and fiddling with it still. She nodded.

  “Yes,” she mumbled, “that’s correct.”

  “What you haven’t told us, Lottie, is why were you meeting Jack, what were you hoping to talk to him about?”

  Florence took the last sip of her tea and put cup and saucer back on the tray on the table. Lottie finally looked up at Frances.

  “It was Garrett’s idea,” she said.

  “Which brings up my other question. How did you and Garrett meet?”

  “A few weeks ago he found the last letter I sent to Jack. He sought me out. He came down to Southport and found out where I lived. It’s not hard, it’s a small tight community here and I work at the Irish Air Hotel. He visited me and we spoke for the whole afternoon.”

  “About what sorts of things?”

  “Mostly about Jack. At first, Garrett didn’t believe me and he asked why I was making more trouble for him and his family. But then I showed him the letters and he believed me. He remembered his father taking a few trips down to London when he was just a boy. And that’s where Jack and my mother, Maude, met. Garrett’s several years older than me and he remembers his father coming back from these trips when he was around six or seven.”

  “I see, please go on.”

  “He confided in me that his father had practically ruined the company and that there was no money to be had. I told him I didn’t want the money, I just wanted to understand why he left my mother so horribly.”

  “And what did Garrett say?”

  “He thought about it for a moment, and then he decided that there was a way we could get Jack to pay. He told me he had heard about some gold that his father was supposedly stashing away and that he was coming to the docks to pick up some new gold. At least that was what Garrett suspected. I told him I wasn’t interested in gold, but he said it would also be an opportunity to confront my father and get the answers I wanted.”

  “And
that’s what you had in mind?”

  Lottie nodded.

  “Yes, I just really, really wanted to understand who this horrible man was who treated my mother so poorly.”

  “And what about the gold?”

  “Well, Garrett insisted that I should get half the gold. He didn’t know how much was coming but he said it wouldn’t be a lot but it was really valuable. It didn’t make sense to me but he said they were American eagles that could fetch a high price. We only needed a few of them and our money problems would be over.”

  “How did he know about these coins?”

  “He said he had seen his father having a conversation with his groundskeeper. The groundskeeper handed him a piece of paper and he heard his father say something like ‘Chan wants the Eagles by Good Friday’. Then Garrett said he had remembered reading an article in the paper which said that a few years ago some American gold coins were stolen or lost. So he put two and two together. I guess.”

  “Did you see any of these gold coins?”

  “No, it sounded a bit too fantastical to me, but Garrett was convinced. He was certain that it would be his chance to head out on his own and make a fresh start regardless of his father ruining the business.”

  “Did you have a chance to talk to Jack about any of this before he was shot?”

  Lottie looked out the window again as a host of sparrows flew by, all smartly dressed in their brown suits.

  “That was the first thing Garrett asked when we confronted Jack. Jack said he wasn’t here to pick up gold, that the gold was back at the house, but he’d never find it and nor should he. He said they were dangerous people who wanted the gold and that Garrett shouldn’t mess with them. Garrett said he didn’t care, that Jack owed him and I for all the horrible things he’d done to his family over the years. Jack swore he was changing now, that this was his last pick up and that his debts would all be paid and he’d be making a new start. I didn’t believe him, there was something about Jack, I think he was just saying all that to calm us down. Garrett didn’t believe it either. That’s when Garrett pulled out his gun and threatened his father. He said that he was serious, that he was going to take the gold and that he’d find it himself but if Jack wanted to live then he’d tell us where it was.”

  “Did he?”

  “No. I think he was about to but then he got shot. His last words were ‘the study’. Then he died, we got scared and ran off.”

  Frances tipped her cup to her mouth and took the last sip. She put the teacup back on the saucer and placed it on the tray next to Florence’s.

  “So, my dear, you weren’t able to ask the questions you wanted?”

  Lottie shook her head slowly and sadly.

  “No.”

  “Did you see who shot Jack?”

  Lottie looked up at Frances.

  “Not exactly. I heard the shot first and then I was in shock for a moment as I realized that Jack had been shot. I looked over at Garrett and he was staring at his father who was now lying on the ground. I looked past Garrett and saw a man in a dark suit run off away from us, on our right. I caught a good glimpse of him under a lamp and I saw that he held a gun which looked similar to the one that Garrett was holding.”

  “Did you get a chance to look at his face?”

  Lottie nodded.

  “I did. Just as he was under a lamp at the docks he turned to look in my direction for some reason and I saw his face. He was jowly, had a bulldog sort of face...Actually, now that I think about it, he reminded me of Winston Churchill. He was older though and his hair was thin and gray. It’s hard to say, now that I think about it, he might have been older, maybe a similar age. I only saw him briefly under the lamp. I couldn’t be certain.”

  Frances looked at Florence and Florence nodded at her and raised her eyebrows. Lottie looked perplexed, she knitted her eyebrows.

  “Do you think you know who did it?”

  Frances nodded.

  “What about Garrett’s gun, are you absolutely certain he didn’t shoot his father?” asked Frances.

  “Yes,” said Lottie, nodding, “I know for certain because I told him he was mad to take a gun to confront his father with. He said it wasn’t even loaded. He showed me the...” Lottie made a circle with her finger to indicate the cylinder, “the circle thingy that holds the bullets and they were empty, you could see right through them.”

  “The chambers inside the cylinder were empty. Are you sure?”

  “Yes, that’s right, the cylinder didn’t have any bullets in them. He showed me and I could see right through the...chambers?”

  Frances nodded.

  “Interesting, then the police will likely find that the revolver they took from Garrett is empty,” Lady Marmalade said to Florence.

  “Indeed,” said Florence.

  “Lottie, dear, did you see anyone else at the docks?” asked Frances.

  “Yes, there was Meredith, I think, it must have been her in Jack’s car waiting for him. As Garrett and I left I saw another man run off. I asked Garrett who that was when we got into the car. He said it was his uncle Gerald. I asked him why his uncle was here and he said he’d told his uncle that he was going to confront his father at the docks that night.”

  “Did he say why?”

  “He said because he and his uncle were going to try and wrestle the company away from Jack and salvage it. Garrett thought it might have been too late already and that’s why he wanted to get the gold as a backup plan.”

  “Did he mention anything about Gerald and Jack’s relationship?”

  “Not specifically but he thought Gerald was mad to be there. He said he was going to deal with it, but maybe Gerald didn’t quite trust Garrett. I asked Garrett why Gerald would be crazy to be there and he said because he’d taken out life insurance on Jack. I asked how much and Garrett said one hundred thousand pounds.”

  “Are you sure it might not have been this other man, identified as Gerald, who shot Jack?” asked Frances.

  “I’m pretty sure. He was going in the other direction to the other man I saw running away with the gun. I didn’t see a gun on Gerald, and he was wearing a lighter suit, a gray suit I think it was. He also didn’t look like the other man. I didn’t get a good look at him, but he was wearing a bowler’s hat and he seemed a bit smaller than the man who shot Jack.”

  “Thank you, Lottie, this is most helpful,” said Frances.

  “Lottie,” said Florence. “Did Garrett see the man who you say shot Jack?”

  Lottie looked over at Florence and shook her head. Her blonde curls shook ever so slowly and slightly as if they might have been cut from brass.

  “No. I asked him. I said ‘Garrett did you see that man who shot your father?’ He shook his head and said no. I said I saw him, he looked right at me. Then we sped off out of there and Garrett brought me home and he slept on the couch that you’re sitting on. He left shortly after eight this morning.”

  “Did you see the woman, who you think was Meredith, do anything before you left the area?” asked Frances.

  “I saw her get out of the car, I think she was Meredith because that’s the name Garrett used when we drove by. She crept up to Jack’s body. She was quite upset you could tell. Her head was darting this way and that and she held a gun in her hand. A gun that looked exactly like Garrett’s only you could tell she didn’t know how to use it. It was sort of just hanging limply from her hand. She went up to Jack and kneeled over him. She put her hand on his cheek and then looked at his chest where he had been shot. She looked towards us as we drove by and brought her hand up to her mouth. That’s the last I saw of her.”

  “Thank you, Lottie, for your honesty. Is there anything else that you might be able to offer that could be helpful?” asked Frances.

  “You must believe me, Garrett didn’t kill his father. I swear it. You will help him get out of jail won’t you?”

  “I believe we can, especially if the gun was empty, I’m sure the police will let him go right away. He
might even be home by the time we get back to Puddle’s End.”

  “I didn’t want his money either. I would have taken it, that’s true, if Garrett had managed to get the gold, but I wasn’t seeking it. I just wanted to understand what kind of a man Jack Forsyth was. He wasn’t a nice man, I can tell you that, but he didn’t deserve this.”

  Lottie was earnest in her expression. It seemed to Frances that she really wanted to impress upon her that she wasn’t that kind of a woman. The kind of woman who would take advantage of easy circumstances. Frances wasn’t convinced. Not that Lottie seemed malevolent, but she didn’t strike Frances as the type of young woman who would turn down an opportunity at some easy money.

  “You do believe me, don’t you? It wasn’t about the money.”

  “That’s not important now, dear. What’s important is that you told the truth, and that will help both you and Garrett.”

  Lottie smiled a thin smile and looked over at her tea. It had become discolored, the cream from the milk settling a little on the top like badly painted whitewash. It was cold and she didn’t feel like the rest of it.

  “I’d really appreciate it if you could come out to Puddle’s End tomorrow for noon. I’m gathering everyone at the Forsyth estate to identify the murderer of both Ginnie and Jack. Florence will pick you up from the station at noon.”

  Florence nodded. So did Lottie.

  “If you recognize the man who shot Jack when you come over tomorrow, don’t give it away unless I ask you,” said Frances.

  Lottie nodded.

  “Is it the same person who killed them both?” asked Lottie, her eyes wide with anticipation.

  “You’ll find out tomorrow,” said Frances smiling.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Chapter 22

  THEY were nearing Puddle’s End. It was just after two thirty and the drive back in Florence’s car had been slow and careful. Florence and Frances had mostly been held captive by their own thoughts.

  Florence was on pins and needles to find out who the killer might have been. She still thought Jack might have killed his wife, but Frances had made a very convincing case that it was Meredith. Tomorrow would reveal all.