The Jane Carter Historical Cozies Box Set 2

by Alice Simpson

  “I suppose the woman deserves it for putting about the rumor that your mother was incapable of discharging her duties as pillar of the community on account of it being ‘her time of life,’ but I still feel rather sorry for Mrs. Pruitt. She obviously didn’t realize your mother is such a force to be reckoned with.”

  “People rarely do,” said Flo, and sighed. “I’d better get back to my charitable duties.”

  “The Pilgrimage isn’t for ages. Surely posters can wait. If your mother objects, tell her we’re going to carry out a philanthropic enterprise for which time is of the essence.”

  “What philanthropic enterprise?” Florence sounded supremely skeptical.

  “I’ll tell you about it when you get here,” I said and hung up the phone.

  Fifteen minutes later, Flo arrived to find me garbed in an apron, working industriously in the kitchen.

  “What is this all about?” Florence demanded suspiciously. “If you’re expecting help with the dishes, I’m going straight home again.”

  “Oh, relax.” I laughed. “The dishes were done ages ago. We’re going to help out the old wishing well.”

  “I wish you would explain what you mean.”

  “The Sandersons are as poor as church mice, and they need food. At Roseacres this afternoon Abigail made a wish—that her family would have more to eat. Well, it’s up to us to make that wish come true.”

  “You’re preparing a basket of food to take out to the camp?”

  “That’s the general idea. We can leave it on the doorstep of the cottage and slip away without revealing our identity.”

  “That’s a splendid idea.”

  I opened the porcelain door of the icebox and peered inside. I handed out a masala-flavored meatloaf, a potato salad dressed with cumin and ground cloves, bunches of radishes, scrubbed carrots, celery, and a dozen fresh eggs.

  Flo sniffed doubtfully at the meatloaf.

  “This smells funny.”

  “It’s flavored with Mrs. Timm’s secret ingredient,” I said. “Garam Masala powder.”

  “What’s Raram Mosulla powder?”

  “Garam Masala. It’s a mixture of Indian spices.”

  Until recently, Mrs. Timms had been able to satisfy her unusual tastes in culinary seasonings by receiving regular parcels from her sister Henrietta, whose diplomat husband was stationed in Calcutta. However, ever since Henrietta and Mr. Henrietta—I’ve forgotten his name, he’s never figured very prominently in Mrs. Timms’ narratives about her sister’s exotic existence on the Indian subcontinent—were transferred to Hong Kong, Mrs. Timms has had to find a new source. Fortunately, she has a cousin in San Francisco—where apparently one can get such things as powdered fennel and blades of mace—who now keeps her supplied.

  “Dash down to the basement and get some canned goods from the supply shelf,” I instructed Florence briskly. “We ought to have jelly, too, and a sample of Mrs. Timms’ strawberry preserves.”

  “You do the dashing if you don’t mind,” Flo said. “I prefer not to become too deeply involved in this affair. At this rate, Mrs. Timms is going to have to do the grocery shopping all over again.”

  “Oh, Mrs. Timms won’t care—not one bit,” I insisted as I started for the basement. “She’s the most charitable person in the world.”

  In a minute I was back, my arms laden with heavy canned goods. I found a market basket in the garage, and we packed the food inside, wrapping the perishables carefully in waxed paper.

  “There! We can’t crowd another thing into the basket,” I said at last.

  “The icebox is as bare as Mother Hubbard’s cupboard,” Florence pointed out. “What will you all eat tomorrow?”

  “Oh, Mrs. Timms can buy more. She’ll be a good sport about it, I know.”

  I had no misgivings as I carried the heavy basket to the garage and loaded it into Bouncing Betsy. Old Bets’s gasoline gauge registered low, so I siphoned an extra two gallons from my father’s car, and then announced that I was at last ready to go.

  “Don’t you ever patronize a filling station?” Florence protested as we headed down the street.

  “Oh, now and then,” I said. “Dad won’t begrudge me a couple of gallons.”

  “You certainly have your family well trained,” Florence sighed. “I wish I knew how you get away with it. I’m completely under Mother’s thumb. Sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever be able to call my life my own.”

  “Put your foot down,” I said. “Make a stand. Draw a line in the sand. Take a firm stance.”

  Flo scowled in the passenger seat as I cast about for additional metaphors.

  “Stiffen the sinews!” I said, finally locating another. “If only you didn’t live with your parents, it would be harder for your mother to work you to the bone.”

  “But I can’t afford an apartment,” Flo pointed out. “I only have my part-time salary from the library, and that’s not nearly enough to pay rent and keep me in stockings.”

  I had a sudden inspiration.

  “What if you moved in with us?”

  “I couldn’t,” Flo protested. “It would break my father’s heart.”

  “Would it? I should think that if you stopped by the house and stuck your nose in at his study door every week or so, he’d hardly notice a thing had changed.”

  Reverend Sidney Radcliff is an intelligent man, but he has rather the air of a clergyman who lives on a higher plane, or at least a plane where he takes very little notice of the minor tasks and routines of daily life—or the wretched time that his only daughter is having.

  “You’re probably right about Father,” Flo said. “Mother would be furious, of course.”

  “A pox and a pestilence on your mother,” I said peevishly. “If you move out it will only be because she brought it on herself.”

  “I don’t think Mrs. Timms would appreciate me permanently taking over your guest room.”

  “But you wouldn’t have to,” I said. “A while back, my father started to build himself a study in the basement. The fascination faded after he’d hit his thumb with a hammer for about the thousandth time, so he abandoned the project.”

  “You want me to move into your basement?” Flo said. “I was just down there. It’s jammed full of old newspapers and pasteboard boxes and about twenty years’ worth of empty milk bottles.”

  “It was just a suggestion.”

  “Well, moving out is a lovely thought,” Flo said. “But I’m not quite desperate enough to camp out in the midst of a pile of milk bottles.”

  We drove through Greenville and on to the Dorset Tourist Camp. An attendant stopped us at the entrance but allowed us to drive on when he learned that we did not wish to make reservations. I drew up not far from the Sanderson’s cottage.

  “A light is still burning inside,” Flo pointed out. “We’ll have to be careful if we don’t want to be seen.”

  As I lifted the heavy basket from Betsy’s rear compartment, I noticed another car parked nearby.

  “It’s that same Texas car,” I told Flo. “Those men must still be here.”

  “What car? What men?”

  “Earlier this evening two strangers inquired the way to this tourist camp,” I explained. “They said they were looking for Ted Whitely.”

  “Friends of his?”

  “I don’t know who they are or what they want. It did strike me as odd that they would come from such a long distance.”

  “Whoever they are, they must be at the cottage now. Should we leave the basket on the doorstep or wait until they’ve gone?”

  “We can’t very well wait, Flo. They might decide to stay half the night.”

  Carrying the basket between us, we moved stealthily toward the cottage. The curtains had not been drawn, and I could see Mr. and Mrs. Sanderson, Abigail, and the two men seated at the table carrying on an animated discussion.

  “I wish I knew why those Texas fellows came here. If we wanted to find out—”

  “I’ll not listen at any key
holes!” Florence cut me short.

  “I was merely thinking that we could, theoretically speaking. Of course, I never would do such an ill-bred thing.”

  “I’m sure you wouldn’t,” Florence said archly. “For a very good reason, too. I shall take you away before temptation overcomes you.”

  We reached the stoop. Flo relinquished her hold on the basket of food and forcibly pulled me back to Bouncing Betsy.

  Chapter Six

  At the next meeting of the Palette Club, Florence and I eagerly awaited some indication from Abigail Whitely that the basket of food had been discovered by the Sanderson family. When the girl had failed to appear twenty minutes after all the others had arrived, I began to wonder if she intended to absent herself from the Palette Club. I hoped that she had not been so embarrassed by our finding out about Ted’s theft of the chicken that she would avoid us altogether.

  “Oh, by the way, what did Mrs. Timms say about last week’s little episode?” Florence asked me.

  “Entirely too much.” I sighed. “She subjected me to at least three thousand words on the budget problems of a housekeeper. She also waxed eloquent on the considerable time involved in the procuring of the quantity of food-stuffs required to satisfy a household of ‘voracious eaters.’ Tell me, would you describe me as a ‘voracious eater’?’

  “Yes, I would.”

  Just then, Abigail, breathless from hurrying, descended the steps into the basement room where we were meeting. Her eyes sparkled.

  “Something marvelous happened since the last time we met,” she told us. “You’ll never guess!”

  “We couldn’t possibly,” Florence said.

  “Two baskets of food were left at the door of our cottage. It’s silly to say it, I know, but it seems as if my wish at the old well must have had something to do with it.”

  “Did you say two baskets of food were left?” I asked her, looking sideways at Florence as I spoke.

  “Yes, last Saturday, one came early in the evening . Then, the following Sunday morning when Mrs. Sanderson opened the door, she found still another. You don’t suppose any of the members of the Palette Club did it, do you? We shouldn’t like to accept charity—”

  “I’ll ask the girls if you want me to,” I said. “But if any of them did, no one breathed a word of it to me.”

  “Maybe the old well did grant your wish, Abigail,” Florence added. “You know, folks say it has a reputation for doing good deeds.”

  One of the girls interrupted to ask Abigail for help mixing her paints, and this brought the conversation to an abrupt end.

  “Who do you suppose left that second basket on the Sandersons’ doorstep?” I asked Flo as we waited outside the church for Abigail. I had offered to drive her home.

  “Probably one of the other club members had the same idea you did,” Florence suggested. “Anyway, I expect that the Sandersons were well fed last week at least.”

  I had made a point of quietly questioning every member of the Palette Club, but not one of the girls would admit having left the basket at the tourist camp.

  “The mystery deepens,” I said to Florence. “If no one in the Palette Club prepared the basket, then who did do it?”

  “I guess we’ll have to attribute it to the old wishing well after all. Let me see your ears.”

  “What for? Don’t you think I ever wash them?”

  I have been known to go about with loose hems, uncoiffured hair and handbags with the handles missing, but I do try to adhere to basic standards of hygiene.

  “I merely want to see if your ears have grown since we were last at Roseacres. Why, goodness me, I do believe they are larger!”

  Before I could come up with a blistering retort, Abigail joined us. I was curious to learn more about the two Texas men who had arrived in Greenville. I brought up the subject by mentioning that two strangers had asked her how they might locate Ted and Abigail.

  “Yes, they found us all right,” Abigail said. “Mr. Coaten came to see Ted.”

  “An old friend?”

  “Not exactly. I can’t figure out just why Mr. Coaten did come here.”

  Abigail frowned and lapsed into silence. Flo and I did not question her further, and a few minutes later we were on the road to the tourist camp.

  The affairs of the Sanderson family concerned me only slightly. Although I couldn’t help wondering why Mr. Coaten and his companion were in Greenville, I expended far more mental energy on the stone which had been dug up at the Pitts farm. Directly after we left Abigail off at the Sandersons’ cottage, I proposed to Florence that we drive into the country and interview the farmer.

  “I don’t mind the trip,” Flo said, “but why are you so interested in an old rock?”

  “Oh, Dad thinks the whole story may be a hoax. I’d like to learn the truth if I can.”

  At four-thirty we were at the Pitts farm talking to Farmer Pitts in the flesh.

  “I’ve been pestered to death ever since that rock was found here,” he told us. “There’s nothing new to tell. I was plowing in the south field back of the barn when I turned it up. I have heard some talk of Wild Bill Hickock hiding out at this place during my Pappy’s day. Supposedly, the woman Wild Bill took a shine to was a great aunt of mine, but I didn’t lay much store by those tales until George Roth came along and said the writing on it might interest the museum folks. He gave me a couple of dollars and paid to have Old Man Kip haul it into town.”

  “I didn’t know George Roth had an interest in the stone,” I said. “You say he gave you two dollars for it?”

  “That’s right, I was glad to have the rock hauled off the place.”

  Satisfied that we could learn no more by talking to Mr. Pitts, we moved on to inspect the hole from which the stone had been removed, and then drove back toward Greenville.

  “Mr. Pitts seems honest enough,” I told Flo as we rattled along the country road. “If the rock was deliberately planted on his farm I don’t believe he had anything to do with it.”

  “He hardly seems the type to carry out a scheme like that,” Florence agreed. “Maybe the writing on the rock is genuine.”

  “The curator of the museum thinks it may be. All the same, I’ll stack Dad’s opinion against them all. I’ve learned to trust an old newspaperman’s instincts above all others.”

  As we approached Roseacres, I slowed down. To my surprise, there were several automobiles parked in front of the property.

  “It looks as if Mrs. Covington has guests today,” I said to Flo. “Shall we stop and say hello?”

  “Well, I don’t know,” Florence said doubtfully as I drew up at the edge of the road. “We’re not really acquainted with her, and with others there—”

  “They’re leaving now,” I pointed out, jerking my head to draw Flo’s attention to a group of ladies moving toward the assortment of cars parked in the circular gravel drive. “Look! There’s your mother.”

  I turned to look at Flo, but there was no one in the seat beside me.

  “Flo! What are you doing huddled down on the floorboards!”

  “Shh!” Flo hissed back. “I’m supposed to be refreshing the flower arrangements in the sanctuary. There’s a special service tomorrow.”

  “Aren’t there deaconesses to do that?” I hissed back.

  “I am a deaconess,” Flo gesticulated as wildly as one can when curled up in the fetal position. “Stop looking down at me!”

  I returned my attention to the visitors streaming from the house. All were well-known to me as women prominent in Greenville club circles. Mrs. Brandt, a stout, pompous lady who led the procession, was speaking to the others in an agitated voice. Flo’s mother brought up the rear like a collie dog keeping a herd of heifers in tight formation.

  “In all my life I never was treated with less courtesy,” said Mrs. Brandt. “Mrs. Covington at least might have invited us into her house!”

  “I always understood that she was a very odd person,” added Mrs. Applebee, “but one nat
urally would expect far better manners from a Covington.”

  “I shouldn’t object to her manners if only she would allow the Pilgrimage Committee the use of her house.” Mrs. Dunst sniffed loudly. “What a pity that she refuses to consider opening up Roseacres during Pilgrimage Week.”

  Still chattering indignantly, the women got into their separate cars and drove away.

  “What did you make of that?” asked Florence, who was sitting up straight and dusting herself off, now that the danger of detection was past.

  “Apparently, Mrs. Covington handed them the icy mitt. I thought your mother was heading up the Pilgrimage committee, but it appears that Mrs. Brandt is spearheading the movement. Or does your mother just prefer to lead from behind?”

  “I know the Pilgrimage was started years ago by a group of club women who decided to raise money for local causes by conducting a tour of old houses, but I’ve never really understood why people pay good money to walk through other people’s houses,” I said to Flo.

  “Don’t you? I find it rather fascinating. I’d give my eye-teeth to see inside Roseacres.”

  Pilgrimage Week had been set for the twenty-sixth of the month. For a five-day period, various homes and their gardens were to be open to the public. During previous festivals, costume parties had been held at several of the largest homes. I might not be one for tromping around a bunch of old houses, but I do adore a good costume party, so I always looked forward to Pilgrimage Week with great anticipation.

  “Well, there’s only one colonial house that I’d care about getting inside,” I said. “I do agree with you that I should very much like to see the interior of Roseacres.”

  “Maybe we can do it now. Mrs. Covington did invite us to visit her again, but I’m not sure she really meant it.”

  “Why not find out?” I said, swinging open Betsy’s driver side door and clambering down.

  Very little had been done to the property since our last visit. A half-hearted attempt had been made to rake about ten autumns’ worth of matted leaves off one side of the unmown lawn, and an overgrown lilac bush had been mercilessly mutilated. The windows remained shuttered, and the entire place had a gloomy, deserted appearance.