Aunt Bessie Needs

by Diana Xarissa

  “I’m sure he will, but I can’t, that is, I’m not…” She shook her head. “I’m not going to hide myself away. I’ve already run from him once. Starting over was incredibly difficult. I won’t do it again.”

  “At least come and stay with me for a few days,” Bessie suggested. “I’m far enough away from Douglas that he’d have to work at finding you. I’ll feel much better knowing you’re safe.”

  “Thank you, Bessie, but no. I’m going home and I’m going about my normal life. Maybe, having killed one woman, he’ll feel he’s had his revenge.”

  Bessie wanted to argue further, but she couldn’t work out what to say. Laura seemed determined to ignore everything that Bessie suggested, and as she wouldn’t even speak to John, she clearly wasn’t going to take any advice from him, either.

  “I know I’m upsetting Henry,” Laura said after a moment. “But I think he’s probably better off without me, anyway.”

  “He cares about you a great deal.”

  “I know, and I care about him, but I don’t want to put him in any danger. Marcus has already killed one innocent person. Henry will be better off if we stop seeing one another.”

  “I’m not sure Henry would agree with that,” Bessie said dryly. “Why don’t you tell him the whole story and let him decide.”

  “He’d go after Marcus,” Laura replied. “And then goodness knows what would happen. I’m not going to do anything tonight. I’m too tired to deal with anything more than going home and going to bed.”

  “I think you’re wise not to do anything hastily. Perhaps the police will solve the murder quickly and set your mind at rest.”

  “I suppose if Marcus were in prison, I would sleep better at night,” Laura replied. “But he’s smart enough to not get caught.”

  “The police on the island are very good at solving murder cases. There’s no doubt in my mind that they’ll find Julie Randall’s killer, and quickly.”

  “I wish I had your confidence,” Laura told her. “I’m afraid Marcus is more clever than you give him credit for. If the police do find that woman’s killer quickly, it will probably be because Marcus set that person up to cover his own tracks.”

  Bessie bit her tongue. She was starting to think that she’d quite like to meet Marcus. From everything that Laura had told her, it would be interesting, at least. Somehow he’d managed to turn Laura’s own mother against her, and now Laura was suggesting that he could accidently murder the wrong person and still manage to put the blame on someone else.

  Laura sighed deeply. “I might be getting a bit crazy about Marcus,” she said. “I’m sure I sound insane to you, at least, but, well, let’s just say he’s left lasting emotional scars. Maybe I’m crazy. Maybe he isn’t after me and maybe he didn’t have anything to do with that murder.”

  “If he did, I’m sure Pete will work it out,” Bessie said, feeling better as the other woman seemed to pull herself together. “But I still would prefer it if you came and stayed with me for a few days.”

  Laura laughed. “I might take you up on that later,” she said. “But for now, I’m okay.”

  Bessie closed the small gap between them and gave the woman a hug. She was surprised to find that she could smell alcohol on the woman’s breath as she did so.

  “And yes,” Laura said as she took a step away from Bessie. “I had a few glasses of wine with dinner tonight. I felt as though I deserved them.”

  “I can’t imagine drinking on a night when I have class,” Bessie said with a chuckle. “I can barely manage to remember anything now. I’m sure I’d be much worse if I’d had a drink or two.”

  “It relaxes me,” Laura told her. “And right now I need to relax.”

  Bessie opened her mouth to reply, but the door behind them swung open and the rest of the class streamed out of the building. Laura smiled brightly at Henry as he approached her.

  “Henry, I’ve been grumpy and miserable for days. Let’s go and have a quiet drink somewhere and talk, really talk,” she said.

  Henry glanced at Bessie and then looked back at Laura. “I have to work the early shift tomorrow, but I suppose we can go for one drink, if you’d like.”

  Bessie and the others watched as the couple walked away. Henry was parked near the edge of the car park, and Bessie suddenly found that she was holding her breath as Laura walked around to the passenger side of the car. When they were both in the car and Henry was driving slowly away, Bessie let out her breath.

  “What did you say to her that cheered her up like that?” John asked in Bessie’s ear.

  “Nothing,” Bessie replied. “She was telling me how she was sure that Marcus killed Julie Randall and that she was going to be next, and then she told me that she thought maybe she was overreacting and that Marcus had nothing to do with any of it.” Bessie shook her head. “It was quite odd.”

  “I’m a little bit worried about her mental state,” John said. “She was polite to me, but she refused to speak to me about anything. I told her I was concerned that a woman who lived in her building and looked something like her had been murdered, but she just laughed it off.”

  “How?”

  “She said life was full of odd coincidences. She was full of sympathy for the victim and her family, but insisted that it had nothing to do with her.”

  Bessie sighed. “I wish I knew what was going on. Do you know Marcus’s surname?”

  John gave her a wary look. “Why?”

  “I’d really like to meet the man. I’ve heard so much about him now that I’m curious.”

  “You know I don’t like you getting mixed up in murder investigations,” John said slowly.

  “Officially, he’s not even involved in the murder investigation, though, is he? He didn’t know the victim, right? Anyway, I’m not going to go looking, exactly; I just thought it would be good to know his name in case I, well, bumped into him somewhere.”

  John sighed. “He’s Marcus Porter, but I’d really rather you stayed far away from him.”

  Bessie made a mental note of the name. She wanted to ask John which bank he worked for, as she couldn’t remember, but she knew that he had worked with Julie Randall. Details of her employment had been given in the local paper. “As I said, I’m not going looking for him, but it is a small island. I may ring a few friends and see if anyone can tell me more about the man.”

  “Pete has been doing some quiet investigating,” John reminded her. “So far he hasn’t found anything that’s raised any question marks.”

  Bessie frowned. “Pete’s an excellent investigator. I would have thought he would have found something, even if it was just whispers and innuendo.”

  “I would as well, but maybe he just hasn’t dug deeply enough. He’s trying to be discreet. Thus far, we’ve no reason to suspect the man of anything, remember.”

  Bessie nodded. “Of course. Just because Laura thinks he was involved in Julie Randall’s murder doesn’t mean that he actually was.”

  “We don’t even know how much of what Laura has told you about her marriage to the man is true,” John said gently.

  Opening her mouth to argue, Bessie stopped herself. Laura had been acting oddly tonight, and she’d been drinking. Was it possible that her story wasn’t completely true? Bessie hated the niggles of doubt that had begun to creep in, but the more she got to know Laura, the more she wondered about her story.

  While Bessie and John had been talking, the car park had slowly emptied. Bessie frowned when she realised that she hadn’t said goodbye to any of the others, including Marjorie. Doona was standing quietly by herself, seemingly writing something in a notebook.

  “Sorry, Doona,” Bessie said. “It’s quite late, isn’t it?”

  Doona dropped her notebook into her pocket and smiled at Bessie. “You’re fine,” she said. “I don’t work again until tomorrow afternoon. I can have a late start tomorrow.”

  “I need to be in at six, however,” John said. “I really must go.”

  He insist
ed on walking the women to their car first, though. Bessie waved as Doona pulled away. John started his engine and followed as they made their way through the quiet Laxey streets.

  “Do you want to stay at my cottage tonight?” Bessie asked as Doona yawned. “You’ll be able to get to bed a little bit sooner, at least.”

  Doona shook her head. “As much as I love your cottage, I’ll feel better at home.”

  When they got back to Bessie’s, Doona insisted on parking and going inside to check that everything was okay at the cottage. Bessie stood in the kitchen, waiting for Doona to finish annoying the dust bunnies under the beds, and argued with herself about having a cup of tea. In the end, when Doona was finally satisfied that the cottage was safe and had gone, Bessie felt too tired to bother with tea. Instead, she got herself ready for bed and then snuggled down to a dreamless sleep.

  Chapter 5

  When Bessie woke up the next morning, the first thing that popped into her head was that someone had told her that today’s local paper was going to have more information about the dead woman and her family and friends. Of course, there was no point in heading for the shop at the top of the hill yet. It wouldn’t open until eight and the local papers probably wouldn’t arrive until around ten.

  Bessie took a longer than normal walk, going as far as the row of newly built houses that had recently been constructed. They were far too close together for Bessie’s taste, but Doona kept hinting that she might want to buy one. Nearly all of the “For Sale” signs were now covered with “Sold” stickers. If Doona really was interested, she’d need to make an offer soon, Bessie thought.

  A large moving truck was parked in front of the one of the houses, and Bessie smiled and waved to a middle-aged woman who was standing on the patio at the rear of the property. The woman frowned at her.

  “Stanley? Stanley? There’s a woman on our beach. Where are you?” she shouted loudly.

  A large man with a red face joined her a moment later. Bessie kept walking, but she slowed her pace, curious to hear the next part of the conversation.

  “What are you shouting about now?” he demanded in a voice that easily carried to Bessie and beyond.

  “There’s a woman on our beach,” the woman snapped. “Just walking along as if she had every right to be here.”

  “She’s probably wandered off from the care home down the road,” the man replied. “No doubt someone will come and round her up eventually.”

  “I don’t want her gone eventually. I want her gone now,” the woman said shrilly. “She’s interfering with my view.”

  Bessie felt both angry with the woman and slightly amused by her attitude. Once all of the houses were occupied, there would be a lot of people interfering with the woman’s view.

  “Say, hey, you there,” the man shouted.

  Although she was tempted to pretend that she couldn’t hear him, Bessie stopped and turned around. The man was stomping down the beach towards her, looking angry.

  “Hey, what do you think you’re doing?” he demanded when he reached her.

  “I’m having a walk,” Bessie said, keeping her voice calm.

  “My wife doesn’t like you being here.”

  Bessie nearly laughed out loud. “She’s not going to be happy when all of your neighbours move in, then, is she?” she asked. “And you aren’t that far from the holiday cottages, either. I’m sure some of their guests will make their way over here to try to find a quiet stretch of beach for themselves.”

  “Yes, well, I shall be talking to our solicitor about that,” the man said arrogantly. His use of the word “solicitor” rather than “advocate” instantly marked him as from across for Bessie.

  “You do that,” she said. “I believe you’ll find that I have every right to walk along this beach and that your property line stops only a few hundred feet behind your home. The rest is a public right of way.” Bessie was confident about that, as she’d seen the plans when Doona had looked at the houses. While each property included a small strip of the beach directly behind each home, there was a larger stretch of sand from the property line to the sea that the homeowners did not own.

  “We’ll see about that,” the man snapped. He did his best to spin abruptly away from Bessie, but the thick sand almost tripped him. As Bessie swallowed a laugh, he stormed back up the beach.

  “She’s going, isn’t she?” the woman shouted as the man got close to her.

  “I’m calling Neville,” the man replied. “We’ll see about public right of ways.”

  Bessie shrugged and turned around to walk a little bit further. When she decided that she’d gone far enough, she turned back and walked slowly along the water’s edge. It wasn’t long before she was within earshot of the angry man and his unpleasant wife.

  “I appreciate that you sent us copies of all of the paperwork,” the man was yelling down his mobile. “But you should know me well enough to know that I didn’t take the time to read every little detail. A whacking great public right of way behind our house is a huge problem.”

  As Bessie slowly crossed the sand, she could see the man’s wife waving papers at him. Feeling amused, she continued on her way, not giving into the temptation to linger just to annoy them further.

  “We were already unhappy with how close together the properties are,” the man was saying as she moved away. “I think we might want to simply cancel the purchase and…”

  Hoping that the couple was going to follow through on their threat, Bessie kept walking. If she never saw either of the pair again, that would suit her. She was feeling rather tired by the time she reached Thie yn Traie, but her cottage was in sight now and she pressed on, ready for a cup of tea and a biscuit.

  It didn’t take long for her to recover once she’d sat down with her tea and sweet treat. She read a few chapters in her latest mystery and was pleased to find that she enjoyed it a great deal. Clearly her mind was more settled now than it had been lately. Leaving her tea things in the sink, something she rarely did, Bessie put her shoes back on and headed up the hill. While she walked, she tried to decide how many slices of cake she was going to buy. More than two would be a huge indulgence, but she did want to try them all. Maybe she should invite Doona for dinner and then share the slices with her.

  “Good morning,” Bessie said to the girl who was moping in front of the frozen food freezer. “I’ve come back for more cake.”

  The girl’s face lit up. “Really? Did you like it?”

  “I enjoyed both slices very much,” Bessie told her. “Although I liked the Victoria sponge better. I’m hoping you have some different types today for me to try.”

  The girl grinned. “I have a nice vanilla sponge and also some Battenberg cake and some jam roly-poly.”

  Bessie crossed to the table and studied the selections. “When do you have time to do all of this baking?” she asked.

  “Well, I’m between boyfriends at the moment, so I seem to have a lot of spare time. And sometimes I don’t sleep very well. I woke up early today, for instance, and did the jam roly-poly. The other two I did last night.”

  Bessie couldn’t stop herself from selecting a slice of each. She added the local paper to her basket as well.

  “Let me know which ones you like best,” the girl said. “I’m thinking of taking one or two of the best to some of the local restaurants. I’m hoping they might want to buy whole cakes from me.”

  “Good luck with that,” Bessie said. “I’d love to see your cakes in a few restaurants in the area.”

  When she got home, Bessie made herself a cup of tea and then unwrapped the jam roly-poly. She nibbled her way through it while reading the local paper. When she’d read every word she could find about the dead woman and her family, Bessie sat back with a sigh.

  “I don’t know that I learned much,” she muttered. “But I suppose it’s a start.” Feeling as if she should take a few notes, Bessie dug out some scrap paper and a pen and began to write. When she was finished, she frowned at
her notes. What she really need to do was talk to someone about the suspects. That was more effective than just jotting down notes. While she was trying to work out which friend to ring, someone knocked on her door.

  “Grace? Hello, but what brings you here?” she asked when she’d opened the door.

  “Moghrey mie,” Grace said. “There was a power cut at the school so we all got sent home early,” she explained. “Except I didn’t feel like going home. I’m sorry for dropping in uninvited, but I thought maybe I could take you to lunch somewhere for a treat.”

  Bessie smiled. “I’d love that,” she said. “Come in. I’ll just need a minute to comb my hair and touch up my lipstick.”

  Grace sat down at the kitchen table while Bessie rushed upstairs to check her appearance. She was back down only a moment later.

  “Where would you like to go?” Grace asked as the pair walked out to Grace’s compact car.

  “Oh, anywhere,” Bessie told her. “I’m not at all particular.”

  “What about that place in Lonan that everyone keeps telling me about?” Grace asked. “The one that does all the sampler plates that are supposed to be so delicious.”

  “I love it there,” Bessie replied.

  “You’ll have to give me directions,” Grace said.

  “It’s right on the main road. You won’t be able to miss it.”

  The small car park for the restaurant was only about half full. Bessie hoped that didn’t mean that the place was becoming less popular. She knew the young couple that ran the restaurant were hoping to start a family soon, but they couldn’t afford to do that if business was down. The last time she’d visited, they’d been talking about hiring extra help, but maybe they didn’t need it any longer.

  When she and Grace walked inside, though, Bessie found that she was worried over nothing. Every single table was full and there were two waitresses that she’d never seen before circulating around the room. Bessie looked around for Dan and Carol Jenkins, the owners. There was no sign of Carol, but Dan came out of the kitchen as the women stood in the doorway.