by Lily Ashton
An enormous pizza was placed in front of her and the waiter handed her a cutter. Alice ran the implement across the circle of lusciousness, the round blade slicing through the dough like a hot knife through panna cotta. She closed her eyes and bit into the crisp base, savouring the sweet tomatoes, creamy mozzarella and fragrant basil. Perfecto!
“Do you mind if I join you?”
Alice opened her eyes to find Harry Horton sitting opposite. “This is the only available seat. I didn’t expect it to be so busy.”
“Of course. I suppose people are buzzing from yesterday’s opening and the word has got around.”
Harry glanced at the menu. “We would have come too, but Cheryl had a last minute meeting and couldn’t get away.” He jabbed the menu at the wall. “I believe you were responsible for curating the photos. They look good.”
“Emilio selected the ones he wanted and I had them framed and hung. I’m pleased with how they turned out.”
Harry ordered. “So, how are you getting on with the inventory at Renton Hall?”
“It’s slower work than I anticipated. I didn’t realise there were so many small bits and pieces tucked away.”
“The Carberrys have always been collectors. I don’t remember them ever getting rid of anything.”
“They have some wonderful things. It’s a pity they can’t all be displayed in the hotel.”
Harry’s pizza arrived and he refused the cutter. “Eleanor tells me the interior decorator is a dragon. Won’t let her hang the things she wants.”
Alice smiled. “We will have to work on Gina!”
Harry picked up a slice of pizza, hesitated, and put it back down on the plate.
“Alice,” he said. “I just want to say, on behalf of Eleanor and myself, that we don’t believe for a minute that you had anything to do with Nick’s death.”
Dough caught in Alice’s throat and she coughed into her napkin. She took a gulp of water.
“DI Salisbury called on Eleanor at home and I happened to be there at the time. He said they’d found your fingerprints on the murder weapon. The service revolver. And that he was treating you as a suspect.”
It was the second time in two days that Alice’s stomach had lurched and her face burned while sitting on the same seat.
“Eleanor explained to him that you were doing an inventory and that, of course, you had to pick up the … piece. All above board.”
“And what did DI Salisbury say?”
Harry picked up the same pizza slice again. “He said that he could see why you had touched it. But that he had to thoroughly examine every clue nevertheless.” Harry blushed. “That goes without saying, but you as a murder suspect …”
So, Nathan really was treating her as an actual suspect. “Did Nathan say what other lines he was pursuing?”
“He was going to interview Simon Newgate after he left us. About time if you ask me, he’s the obvious suspect.” Harry finally bit into his pizza.
“What makes you think that?”
“Simon was angry with Nick over his relationship with Devi, because it cost the agency her account. A pretty lucrative one too. But also,” – Harry looked behind him and leant towards Alice – “Cheryl told me that Nick had lent someone money from the company. Which he shouldn’t have done. And then they couldn’t pay the money back.”
Cheryl Horton was a cool customer. She had fed her husband her own story and passed it off as someone else’s.
“And I guess Simon found out,” said Alice. “Did he confront Nick about it?”
“Nick and Simon did have a furious row about money, apparently. And that was the day before Nick died. Nick was upset about it and he confided in Eleanor. He told her his concerns about Simon and his worries about their future partnership. So, together with the Jamaican invoices, you see why we’re so sure it was Simon who killed Nick.”
Alice did see.
“I just wish that Nick had told me. I could have helped him.” Harry’s voice wavered, but he swallowed hard. “I would have done anything for Nick, anything at all. He’s family after all.”
When Alice thought of family, she thought of Christian. Their father had disappeared years ago, their mother was living her own life with a new husband. There was Aunt Tracey of course. Alice had fond memories of her aunt, but contact had decreased over the years and they rarely saw each other anymore. That just left her brother. Alice could not imagine her life without him. At the end of the day, Christian was really all the family she had. And she would do anything for him. Even welcome his relationship with Devi.
Alice looked at the top of Harry’s head as he finished his lunch. She believed that he would have done anything for his cousin, Nick. He could not possibly have killed him. But the same could not be said about Harry’s wife.
Chapter 20
Suddenly, the reception area had furniture. Sofas, easy chairs, side tables, a coffee table. Gina spread her arms and turned a circle on the new carpet.
“So, here is the hotel reception. It is good, no?”
Alice took in the pale blue sofa with its brilliant peacock and pink flower print, the easy chair with feather-patterned cushions.
“It’s bright and fun. And I love the colours.”
“We still need curtains and some little finishing touches, but it is welcoming, you think?”
“Oh, absolutely, and I like how you’ve tucked the reception desk in the corner. You don’t see it at first, so you feel as though you’re walking into someone’s house.”
Eleanor smiled. “Thank you, Alice, that was the effect we were looking for.”
Alice caught a large oil painting on the wall between two windows. A profusion of daisies – white, purple, lilac – bulged from a white ceramic vase. It was simple, but stunning.
“This painting …” Alice said to Gina. “Did it come from your dealer in Paris?”
“That one, no. I bought it for another client, but in the end, I didn’t like it in the space. But here, it works very well, so now everyone is happy.”
Gina’s mobile buzzed and she went into the dining room to take the call.
“Eleanor.” Alice stroked the top of the sofa. “I wanted to ask whether you’d had a chance to—”
“I’m making payments later, I’ll do yours then. It’s just getting the time to do all these admin tasks.” Eleanor looked to the floor, so she missed Wilson jump onto one of the sofas. Alice shot forward, arm outstretched, but not far enough to touch the dog.
“Get down, Wilson!” yelled Eleanor.
The dog gave his mistress a fierce stare, then sauntered to the edge of the sofa, hovered for a moment and hopped down. Eleanor rubbed a hand across a peacock breast, now sporting a couple of terrier pawprints. “Oh dear, it needs cleaning already.”
“Actually Eleanor, I was going to ask you about the Renton Hall plans. You said you wanted to hang them in here?”
“That was my idea. I thought they could go in that spot just inside the front door.”
“I wondered if you had the original plans, that is the ones from 1913 when your grandfather bought the estate. The location plan you showed me was the updated version, it just added the additional land your father bought.”
“But it shows the estate as it is now, which is the point I think.” Eleanor bent down and grabbed Wilson’s collar. She dragged the dog with her and disappeared, presumably to find some cleaning products.
Now that Alice had seen the first furnished room of the new hotel, she had a better idea of how the whole building would look. Gina’s descriptions were one thing, but they did not show the depth of colours or the feel of textiles. Alice genuinely liked the reception area and she was excited to see how the other spaces would work out.
She was determined to keep up her end of the bargain and recommend artworks for the hotel. She cleared a space on th
e trestle table at the far end of the attic to collect her pieces together. She retrieved the Margaret Thomas wild flowers painting, Simon Newgate’s gift. Although Eleanor had marked it down for auction, Alice loved the piece and it would work perfectly in the hotel. She needed to convince both Eleanor and Gina to use it and she was not giving up without a fight.
Alice added the plans for Renton Hall and the South African calla lily. Plus a watercolour of a heron painted by Eleanor’s grandfather, and a photograph of Wilfred with his new bride, Edith, on their wedding day, which Alice had found in the plan chest. She wanted to add one of the sculptures from Jeremy’s snug, but she would collect that later.
Alice lay on the beanbag in Daisy’s saloon sucking on an apple and ginger drop. Laptop on her knees, she hovered her fingers over the keyboard. She had no other jobs lined up and her fledgling business would nosedive if she did not land another client soon. She scanned through the emails. Apart from one polite ‘No thank you’, the rest were from companies looking for business from her.
Roddy lumbered down the companionway with a canvas tucked under one arm.
“Am I intruding? I can leave if you’re working.”
“Come on in, this is a work-free zone.” Alice could not thaw the ice in her voice.
Roddy propped the canvas against the coffee table and plopped down onto the sofa. “Oh dear, business still not going well?”
“Not really, no. I don’t have any future work booked and the clients I have now won’t pay me.”
“Now there’s a familiar story. People and their money are practically impossible to separate. And, in my humble opinion, the more money people have, the less keen they are to part with it.”
Alice put her laptop on the coffee table. “That’s certainly true of Eleanor. Livvie told me that she hasn’t paid her bill for the party food Livvie did for her. And as for Emilio Gambi, the devil. When I had lunch at his restaurant today, he waived the bill, saying he’d take it off my invoice!”
Roddy threw back his head and roared with laughter. “Paying you in pizza, I love it.”
Alice wasn’t laughing. “The trouble is, I’m fast running out of money and soon I won’t be able to pay my own bills.”
“Joe will tide you over for a short time won’t he? And living in his apartment must be cheaper for you.”
“I give Joe something towards bills and food. But I still have Daisy’s costs too, so if anything it’s more expensive. And I’m not asking Joe to help finance my business, he’ll think I’m hopeless.”
“Dear girl, if anyone understands your situation it’s Joe. He’s been through all the same things when he set up his own company.” Roddy put down his canvas and took a sweet from the jar on the coffee table. “Besides your money worries, is life with Joe improving?”
“Maybe.” Alice hesitated. “I think I need some time to get used to it. It still feels odd to be at the same address as somebody else.”
“It does mean that you can’t just do what you want when you want. I think it’s good for us to consider somebody else’s needs before our own. You miss it when you don’t have to.”
Roddy avoided her eye. After the sudden death of his fiancé when he was in his thirties, Roddy had had a string of failed relationships as he struggled to cope without his soulmate. Eventually, deciding life would be more straightforward if he lived alone, he bought the creaking barge next door to Daisy and resumed his painting. And life was more straightforward. But sometimes it was lonelier too.
“How is your work going, Roddy? Is the exhibition coming along alright?”
“Yes, it is. And I’ve brought something to show you.” Roddy picked up the canvas and held it upright on the kitchen counter. “What do you think?”
The languid river scene, a small farmhouse amongst yellow and green fields looked familiar, but Alice could not place it.
“I love the painting, the colours and forms. It’s definitely the best landscape you’ve done recently. Where did you paint it?”
“From the end of my barge. It’s our own dear river.”
Now Alice began to see the resemblance. “But it looks different, very different. It’s the style, no the colours.” Alice put a finger on her lip. “Okay, tell me, what have you done?”
“I’ve painted it somewhat in the style of Cezanne. I hope that doesn’t sound pretentious. See, the simplified shapes, the square for the farmhouse and the rectangular fields. But also I’ve copied his blocks of strong colour.”
“And all those short brushstrokes,” said Alice. “Horizontal for the river and vertical for the trees …, of course, I can see it now. The River Nare through the eyes of Cezanne, what an interesting idea. But what made you think of it?”
“Boredom. I’d finished a few paintings and they were starting to look a bit samey, so I felt like doing something different. I’ve always loved Cezanne’s landscapes and I experimented with his techniques in this picture. I was worried it wouldn’t work, so I’m relieved you like it.”
Alice clapped her hands. “You could do more paintings like that, I mean in the style of other artists. That would be a hoot. How about a vase of cowslips in the style of Van Gogh’s sunflowers?”
“Or the Nare in the mist à la Turner.”
Alice threw her arms wide. “Or algae on the river in the style of Monet’s dreamy water lilies.” They both roared with laughter. She hadn’t laughed so much in a while, and it felt good.
When they settled down, Roddy said, “Dearie me, we got quite carried away there. Anyway, that’s me sorted. Let’s see if we can sort you out.”
Roddy took a sweet out of the jar and wandered over to Alice’s incident board. “Wow, that’s got some bite!”
“I think they overdid the ginger, but it’s alright once you get used to it.”
“Still three suspects, I see?”
Alice peeled herself out of the beanbag and stood beside Roddy.
“Actually, we can eliminate Harry Horton.” Alice unpinned Harry’s picture and scrunched it into a ball. “I met him today at Emilio’s and he’s devastated by Nick’s death. He said he would have done anything for Nick and I believe him. Besides, I was talking to Harry at the time it happened, so he couldn’t have done it.”
“Dear girl, I hope you’re not getting sucked in by fake tears and a pseudo sob story. As Sherlock Holmes said, even if something looks impossible, you can’t eliminate it because people pretend to be idiots!”
Alice slapped her hand on her thigh. “He did not say that.”
“Probably not. But what I’m sure Sherlock Holmes would say, is that you can’t dismiss a story until you have proved that it can’t be true. Ergo, I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss Mr Horton.”
Alice frowned at the ball in her hand. She looked back at Roddy. Then she straightened Harry’s picture and re-pinned it to the board.
“Cheryl Horton’s money problems,” said Alice. “She’s obviously desperate to keep her company afloat. Borrowing money and not paying it back isn’t a good look in a murder scenario.”
“I agree she’s a strong suspect. And Simon Newgate?”
“He’s my prime suspect. He was at Renton Hall the morning I discovered Jeremy Evans.”
“Again, agreed.”
Alice rubbed finger and thumb together. “How are you getting on with your hunt for blondie?”
“Disastrously! Do you know how many men with blond hair live in Great Wheaton? Hundreds! I fear I’ve set myself an impossible task.”
“Well, I think we need to find him. I feel sure he must be around here somewhere.”
Roddy tapped Jeremy Evans picture. “I don’t understand why poor Jeremy was also killed.”
Alice planted the tips of her fingers under her chin. “Everybody seems to have liked him. It’s a mystery.”
“Almost as mysterious as the fabled dog.”
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“My thoughts exactly. I did find a dog, a grey stone thing, in the pet cemetery in the wood dividing Renton Hall from its neighbour. I assumed the cemetery belonged to the Carberrys at first, but it appears that it belongs to Bill Trevelyan next door.”
“And?”
“And I was thinking there could have been an argument over land, a dispute about the boundary. But the plans on that side of Renton Hall’s estate haven’t changed in over a century. I’m beginning to wonder whether Sarah Evans has led me down a blind alley on that one.”
“So, what do we conclude from this little chat?”
“I am in need of one suspect, one brother and a whole lot of clients.”
Chapter 21
Alice pulled drawers open in Joe’s kitchen, looking for a tin opener. She was going to surprise Joe with a rare home-cooked dinner and she had dug out what was described as an ‘easy’ spaghetti with tuna sauce recipe. But controlling multiple pans on a hot stove, working out instructions and using the right ingredients was not her forte.
A pungent smell of garlic filled the kitchen and Alice pushed vegetables around a frying pan with a wooden spoon. She searched for spaghetti and, spotting it jutting out from behind the toaster, grabbed one end. As she did so, a siren blared above her and she looked up to see the red light from the fire alarm flashing on the ceiling.
She leaped over and was stretching up to turn off the alarm when Joe rushed into the room.
“Hey! What happened?” He threw his keys onto the table and pushed a button on the box.
It fell silent and Alice heaved a sigh. “I was just cooking dinner.”
“Is that what you call it?” Joe pointed to a trail of spaghetti on the floor.
“Oh no.” Alice held up the near-empty plastic wrapper. “I didn’t realise it was open.”
Joe bolted past and took the frying pan off the burner, plunging it into the sink. He switched off both gas rings and turned on the extractor. Alice peered into the pan and saw squares of blackened onions.