The Red Book of Primrose House: A Potting Shed Mystery (Potting Shed Mystery series 2)

by Marty Wingate

  —

  After dinner at her cottage, she sought some topic of conversation other than murder, and pulled up the photo that Mr. Wilson had emailed that showed her sitting next to Simon.

  Christopher patted his pockets until he found his glasses, then sat at the table. Pru sat across from him, watching his reaction. “Do you think we look alike? That we could be related?”

  He stirred, looked at her, and back to the screen. He took his glasses off, reached for her hands across the table, and searched her face. “Yes, I do think so. Can you not see it?”

  Pru stood up to look over his shoulder at the photo. “I’m not sure—I guess I can. Why would Simon say we aren’t related if we are?” A thought occurred to her. “Maybe he doesn’t know. George and Birdie Parke brought him up. He said that his mother was Birdie’s sister, and so he’s no relation to George Parke. But perhaps there was a Parke on Birdie’s side of the family that she’s forgotten to mention.”

  Christopher stroked her hair. “Perhaps. Will you try to find out?”

  “Yes. The Wilsons sent me Birdie’s phone number. I’ll talk with her. I could even go meet her—I’m sure our workweek will be light.” She felt a spark of hope. “Maybe I do have relatives after all.”

  —

  Sunday breakfast was a revelation.

  “I’m fixing biscuits,” she declared when he walked out of the bedroom. A cloud of flour rose from the counter.

  “American biscuits?” She’d explained to him the difference between English biscuits—which were cookies—and the biscuits her dad had taught her to make.

  When she set the steaming plate on the table, she said, “Butter them while they’re hot.”

  “What, all of them?” he asked.

  “Yes, butter all of them now, and put them back on the plate. Then have at it. We have marmalade or damson plum jam—Ivy’s, of course.” She crossed her arms. “I hope you like them.”

  She decided breakfast was a success after he’d eaten six biscuits. “My God,” he said. “I need a walk. Or a nap.”

  “Let’s start with the walk.”

  They avoided the walled garden entirely and headed off in a different direction, skirting around to the far side of Primrose House and down to Repton’s wood. As they walked, they began to go over what she knew.

  “How did they know to ask her about Liam?” she asked. “Who would’ve told them that?”

  “Who had reason to tell them?” Christopher asked.

  She nodded. “Jamie, I suppose, out of jealousy. That means someone told him that they were at the Two Bells together. Maybe that’s why he was asking me about the pub. But what was Jamie doing even talking with the police?”

  “They could’ve contacted him first, looking for Cate.”

  That seemed reasonable. They stopped near an enormous beech, the one that Davina had wanted her to climb. “Cate acted as if she’s had no contact with Liam at all, but I don’t believe that’s true.”

  “Why would she lie about it?” he asked. “Who would that protect?”

  “It would protect”—Pru frowned—“her. If Jamie thought she was seeing someone else, he could become violent again.”

  “And if Cate wasn’t lying—if she really hadn’t seen Liam the day of the murder or after?”

  He was leading Pru in a direction she didn’t like, creating an unwelcome doubt in her mind about Liam.

  Christopher put his arms around her from behind and held on. “If he wasn’t with her on Thursday, he quite possibly doesn’t have an alibi. I know you want to think the best of everyone…”

  She smiled. “Yes, I know—I’m trusting and generous—code words for gullible.” He gave her a squeeze and kissed her ear. She looked out at the woodland and the fields beyond. “Where are the hedgehogs?” she asked.

  “There’s a subtle change of topic,” he said, and she laughed. “The hedgehogs are hibernating—no sense in spending energy looking for food when it’s scarce.” And he began to tell her about the hedgehogs’ year as they walked back to the cottage.

  It was already dark when he was ready to leave. They stood at her front door. “I’ll be fine this evening,” she said. She wouldn’t, of course, she would long for his company, but couldn’t say that when he’d already sacrificed to be there. She picked up his bag. “It’s very light.”

  “When you said I should bring a few things down to leave here, I packed this bag and put it in the boot of my car so I would be all ready—I didn’t know I’d be back so soon. That’s all right, isn’t it?”

  She had walked back into the bedroom before he finished talking and opened the wardrobe. She’d left space and hangers, and one large drawer completely empty just for him. A few shirts and a pair of trousers were hung, and when she pulled the drawer open she saw sweaters and underwear neatly folded.

  “I unpacked while you were in the shower this morning. Did I put them in the right place?” He leaned against the doorjamb.

  Her eyes glistened as she said, “Who knew that socks could make me cry?” She took his hand, led him back into the kitchen, and took a key out of the top drawer. “Here. You can let yourself in next time.”

  He took it and turned it over in his palm before putting it in his pocket. “What will you do tomorrow?”

  “Talk to Davina, try to figure out what will happen next.” She felt his eyes on her as she looked at her hands. “You know, about the garden. No Liam and Fergal tomorrow, but they’ll be back Tuesday. Robbie, too, I suppose, if Ivy doesn’t keep him away. Tuesday I’m going to talk with Liam.”

  He took her hands and looked into her eyes, a long look that lasted even longer than usual.

  “Yes?” she prompted him.

  “I find myself in a difficult position,” he said at last. “I want you safe. I understand that you know these people, but you may not know everything about them, and I don’t want you involved in situations that could put you in danger.” She kept quiet, hoping his preamble would lead to permission to snoop around a bit. “I’m not a part of this investigation—and neither are you.”

  She sighed. “I am not a police officer.”

  “But you’ll let me know if you hear anything that might be relevant to the case?”

  The words came out so reluctantly that she laughed. “Really?”

  He nodded. “Really. You will take care?”

  “I will.” She stood close, one finger tracing the edge of his ear and down to the base of his throat. He began rubbing that spot low on her back in a slow circle until she took a sharp breath and stepped away, putting her hands behind her back. “Go,” she said. “Go now, or I may not let you go at all.”

  —

  After he left, Pru paced her tiny cottage, checked email, saw what was left in the fridge, and washed out their tea mugs. She realized what she was missing—being able to sit with her friend Jo and talk about nothing over a glass of wine. They chatted on the phone now and then, but it wasn’t the same, and she’d made no close women friends around Bells Yew Green yet. And now she felt Christopher’s absence even more.

  Finally, she sought refuge in Repton’s Red Book—far away from murder, loss, absence. She kept it in her wardrobe, hidden among a stack of sweaters—it wasn’t safe, it wasn’t secure, but it was dark, cool, and dry—sort of like storing potatoes for the winter. Christopher had made sure to lay the fire—one of his modern-art installations in wood—so she followed his instructions to strike a match and stuff it into the crumpled papers below. She sat on the sofa and opened up the Red Book to a random page. She and Repton were becoming good friends, and she thought she had a fair number of passages memorized by now, but the sentence that jumped out at her had echoes of more recent events at Primrose House.

  “And in landscape gardening,” Repton wrote, “everything may be called a deception by which we endeavor to conceal the agency of art and make our works appear the sole product of nature.”

  Concealment and deception—it seemed that not even Repton c
ould keep her from dwelling on the murder.

  Chapter 16

  On Monday afternoon, Pru headed for Primrose House. It had become her habit to walk from the cottage to the house by circling around to the bottom of the walled garden and picking up the trail near the brush pile. Her mind was so full of other thoughts that her feet took her this way—she was on peripatetic automatic pilot. What would she do with Robbie tomorrow? Was Liam with Cate at Francine’s flat on the evening of the murder? What was Davina hiding? Should she order pillar roses for the walled garden or ramblers?

  Her questions ceased when she reached the yellow tape. It stretched from the corner of the walled garden out to the potting shed, around the brush pile and to the back gate. In the middle of it all lay the scattered pile of yew branches, and she imagined that she could see a bloody stain.

  “Pru?”

  She jumped. “Oh, Sergeant Hobbes, you startled me.”

  “I’m sorry. But you shouldn’t be down here.”

  “Yes, I know. I forgot—well, I didn’t forget, obviously, it’s just that I was thinking about so many things I didn’t pay attention to which way I was going.” Pay attention, Pru, she thought. “Why are you here?”

  “I wanted to take a look at this,” he said. “Do you use it much?”

  He nodded toward their access track. It came off the lane farther down, past her cottage, taking a path that snaked between groups of trees and ended up near their brush pile.

  “Occasionally,” she said. “It’s a direct shot from the lane, and it was the easiest place to put it. Too bad the ground is a streak of sticky clay—it’s the only clay soil we’ve got in the garden, and it’s a real nuisance. I want to bring a load of gravel in to lay on top, but I haven’t quite got to that yet.” Far too many pressing tasks had pushed this job toward the bottom of her never-ending list. “Why do you ask?”

  “It certainly is sticky,” Hobbes said. “Sticks well to everything, including tires.”

  “Yes,” she said, laughing, “maybe we should open our own pottery…” But then she realized what he’d said.

  “Sticks to whose tires? Do you think the murderer drove in that way?”

  “We’re taking samples from everyone’s cars,” he said, “although the track itself is difficult to read. I doubt we could get a good cast of tire tracks. Who would drive down here?”

  She racked her brain trying to think of the last time they used it. “The manure was delivered that way. I don’t remember the last time any one of us drove on it. What will you do if you find that clay stuck on someone’s tires?”

  She knew he wouldn’t answer. “It’s just part of the investigation, Pru,” he said.

  —

  Later, she sat with her elbow on the kitchen table in Primrose House, chin in hand. Davina stood at the Aga, having put the kettle on. Tatt was expected.

  “Ned always talked as if he owned the place,” Davina said with a sad smile. “I didn’t mind, really. He used to work for the earl, you know, up at the castle. He said he’d always hoped someone would take Primrose House. He could be a bit bossy, but always in a quiet way.”

  It’s easy to speak well of the dead, Pru thought. “Why did you ask me about Ned after I told you about the yew being cut? Did you think he had something to do with it?”

  Davina frowned. “Oh really, Pru, it doesn’t matter now, does it? Let’s remember him as—”

  The brass knocker, in the shape of a badger’s head, made a deep, rich sound on the wood door and it reverberated down the hall. It had been Pru’s introduction to Primrose House—she still remembered stroking its snout for good luck.

  Tatt followed Davina back to the kitchen, caught sight of Pru, and said, “My God, must you be everywhere?”

  “I beg your pardon,” Davina said, turning on him.

  “Mrs. Templeton, I don’t see the need for your head gardener to sit in on every conversation—”

  “My head gardener,” Davina cut in, “has every right to be here. Have you not even considered the trauma she’s been through? Is this how you treat all your witnesses, Inspector?”

  Pru almost laughed aloud—she didn’t think her employer actually wanted her there. What Davina really wanted was to annoy Tatt, who was already off to a bad start.

  Tatt was speechless, but that passed quickly, although when he began again, it was in a subdued tone. “Mrs. Templeton, we are investigating the suspicious death of…”

  “It’s all right, Davina,” Pru said, standing. “I need to get to work.” She turned to the back door, but stopped, did an about-face, and walked to the hall door instead. There was no need for her to stay, she thought, when she might hear a great deal more if she was out of the kitchen. “I’ll just leave by the front, shall I? I want to see how the roses are doing.”

  Davina and Tatt both acknowledged her departure. Pru let the door swing closed behind her. She sprinted the length of the house on tiptoe, opened the front door, and closed it again, making sure to give it a shove so that the sound echoed all the way to the back of the house. Then she kept to the wall and retraced her steps, walking silently toward the kitchen to listen. No danger here, she told Christopher in her head.

  The voices came through the door loud and clear. Tatt had apparently asked Davina to go through her whereabouts on the day of Ned’s death. She had little to offer, saying that she and Bryan had gone up to London that morning. But she had questions for Tatt.

  “Do you have any suspects?”

  A pause. “We are following several lines of inquiry…” Pru rolled her eyes.

  “You have the murder weapon, Inspector,” Davina said. “Did you find fingerprints?”

  “There was a veritable cornucopia of fingerprints on the handle of the hatchet. Ms. Parke’s, both Liam and Fergal Duffy’s, even the victim’s.”

  “Well, that seems logical, don’t you think? They all work in the garden. You didn’t find Robbie Fox’s fingerprints?”

  “There was a partial print,” Tatt said, “but we couldn’t identify it. It wasn’t from the boy.” Pru arched an eyebrow at the disappointment in Tatt’s voice.

  “I don’t believe that Pru allows Robbie to handle those sorts of tools.”

  “Do you know if the victim had any enemies?” Tatt asked.

  “Ned? Ned had no enemies,” Davina said. “Even Lord Hamilton knew him—go ahead, ask him. Ned was the unofficial historian of Bells Yew Green—he took the long view of events.” Pru could hear the smile in Davina’s voice. “I remember him telling us once about some brickworks that used to be nearby. He said, ‘Oh, but that closed back in the ’90s.’ Except he wasn’t talking about the 1990s, he meant the 1890s.”

  “Mrs. Templeton,” Tatt said, “you know of no problems Bobbins had? No one is universally well liked. Had he no business irregularities or family difficulties—someone he could’ve angered by something he said? Did he ever threaten anyone that you know of? Or was he threatened by someone?”

  “Must you assume the worst? Is that your job? I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I have no terrible secrets about Ned. I can’t imagine anyone would wish him ill.”

  Pru thought about the many remarks Davina had made about Ned’s hold on her and Bryan, when she suddenly heard Tatt’s voice come from just the other side of the door. “Thank you, Mrs. Templeton, we’ll be in touch.” Adrenaline rushed through her veins and confused her—should she stand and fight or make a run for it?

  She’d got only halfway to the front door when Tatt bellowed, “Ms. Parke?”

  Her face was hot and she was out of breath, but Pru tried her best for nonchalance, leaning up against the wall. “Oh, Davina,” she called past Tatt, “I’ve just looked in on the weeping fig here in the dining room—the one you asked me about. I’m afraid it looks as if it’s been overwatered.” She feigned surprise. “Oh, Inspector Tatt, I didn’t realize you were still here.”

  “The what?” Davina called, coming to the kitchen door.

  “The…weeping fi
g. Here,” Pru said, jerking her head toward the dining room. No, Davina hadn’t asked her to take a look, but Pru remembered the plant had appeared a bit peaky last time she’d seen it several weeks ago.

  “Bryan,” Davina said dismissively. “He’s always walking around with a watering can.” She turned to Tatt. “Anything else, Inspector?”

  Tatt glared at Pru, as if to say he didn’t believe a word of her cover story. “Good day, Mrs. Templeton,” he said, and added as he passed Pru on his way out, “Ms. Parke. I’m sure I’ll see you again.”

  —

  She got herself ready to ring Birdie that evening. Birdie’s importance had mushroomed in Pru’s mind. Her mother had lived in Ibsley; Birdie, George, and Simon had lived in Ibsley. To be this close to someone who might know something about her mother as a young girl in England, someone who might lead her to a distant relative—however precarious that lead may be—was almost more than Pru could bear. She sat at the kitchen table, staring at her phone for ten minutes, practicing what she would say and trying to think up questions to ask. She wondered if it was too presumptuous to suggest that they meet. She tried to remember the names of people her mother had talked about—had she ever mentioned a Birdie? She wished that she had that small box of photos and letters her mother had saved. It was still stored at her friend Lydia’s in Dallas. She should’ve had it sent over by now, but it seemed too precious to trust to the vagaries of international shipping.

  Finally, she dialed the number, and when, after several rings, an elderly woman answered, Pru took a deep breath.

  “Hello, my name is Pru Parke, Mrs. Parke. Vernona Wilson gave me your phone number. I met Simon on Boxing Day. You see”—she had to exhale and inhale again before she could continue—“I’m American.” Oh God, she thought, I sound like an idiot; of course I’m American, she can tell that. “But my mother was English, and her name was Parke.” She felt light-headed, and paused for a moment to try to catch her breath.

  “Yes, I was expecting you to ring. Of course I knew Jenny,” the woman said in a quiet voice.