The Marmalade Murders

by Elizabeth J Duncan

  Penny nodded. “Yes, I remember her. She was so upset when her grandmother wasn’t there to see her win the competition. And she and her little dog looked so sweet in their costumes. How is she doing?”

  “The police Family Services officer told me to try to keep everything as normal as possible for her, so that’s what I’m doing. We’re sticking to our routine. But Macy knows that she can’t go to her nain’s house for tea anymore, and she really misses that. She’s very clingy with her granddad now and is spending more time with him. She loves his beautiful chickens. She’s almost as proud of them as he is.”

  Victoria had remained silent and her face was soft with sympathy.

  “Macy doesn’t know the circumstances about Mum’s death, though,” Michelle continued. “We’ve all agreed to protect her from that for as long as we can. I just hope some bully at school doesn’t take it upon himself to tell her what happened and then taunt her with it. You know how cruel some kids can be. Macy’s eighth birthday’s coming up, so that’s going to be hard for her. For me, too. Mum always made the most beautiful themed and decorated cakes, really special they were, just for her Macy.”

  As tears welled in Michelle’s eyes and she blotted them with a paper napkin, Penny thought about Elin Spears winning Best in Show for her elaborately decorated cake. The rivalry between Elin and Gaynor probably included baking, too, as well as the Women’s Guild presidency and Carwyn Lewis.

  “Sorry,” Michelle said, with an embarrassed shake of her head. “All this talk about Mum … sometimes it all just gets to me. Anyway, Macy also gets upset when the police come round, although they’re nice to her. She just associates them with something bad happening. I’ve asked them to let me know when they’re coming, so I can make sure she’s somewhere else.”

  Michelle dabbed at her eyes again as the door opened, admitting the uniformed police officer who had spoken to Penny and Victoria outside the Green Bedroom. He didn’t look as if he was there to grab a late lunch. He scanned the nearly empty room, then, catching sight of Penny and Victoria, took a few steps in their direction. A ripple of silence trailed in his wake as the few remaining diners became aware of the presence of the officer, and conversation stopped.

  “This doesn’t bode well,” said Penny in a low voice. Michelle glanced over her shoulder to see what Penny was looking at. As the police officer reached their table, all three women looked up at him.

  “I’m glad you’re still here,” he said to Penny, opening his notebook. “I was wondering if you can help us. We need to know more about Miss Vickers. Can you tell us if she has any family or if you know of anyone we should contact?”

  “We’re not the best people to talk to,” said Penny, indicating Victoria. “We just recently joined the Women’s Guild, and although we all come from the same town, we don’t know everybody.”

  “What town is that?” asked the police officer.

  “Llanelen. It’s in North Wales.”

  “Yes, I know it.”

  “But this lady should be able to help you,” Penny said, nodding at Michelle.

  “Barbara Vickers isn’t married, and if she has family, I don’t know about it,” said Michelle. “Her closest friend, as far as I know, is Joyce Devlin. Joyce owns a dog kennel and Labrador retriever breeding business just outside the town. She can probably help.”

  The officer made a few notes and then nodded his thanks.

  “Can you tell us how Barbara is doing?” Victoria asked him.

  “No, I’m sorry, I can’t say too much. This Joyce Devlin, is she here with you today?”

  “No, she’s not a member of the Women’s Guild.” Michelle thumbed through the contacts list on her phone until she found what she was looking for, and then, without looking at the officer, she held up her phone. “Here’s her number. Her husband is my uncle Daffydd.”

  “Oh, I see. That’s helpful,” he said, copying the number into his notebook. “Right,” he said, handing the phone back. “Well, that’ll be all for now. Thank you.”

  Michelle frowned as he departed, the watchful eyes of almost everyone in the room boring into his broad blue back.

  “It seems like we’re all finished,” said Penny. Let’s clear the table and then maybe explore the garden or finish the house tour.”

  Michelle picked up the tray that had been leaning against her chair, placed it on the table, and they loaded it up with everyone’s used dishes and cutlery. “That’s better,” said Penny as Victoria disappeared with the tray to the food-service area.

  Michelle cleared her throat, clasped and unclasped her hands, then stood up. “I’m going out for a cigarette. I’m sorry to say I started smoking again when Mum died.”

  On the way out, she passed Victoria, who was headed back to the table, carrying a cup of coffee.

  “Just saw Michelle leaving.”

  “She said she was going out for a cigarette.”

  “Everybody else seems to have gone, too. Maybe I should have got this coffee as a takeaway. What time is it?”

  Penny checked her watch. “Let’s go. And I’m sure if you ask, they’ll put that in a takeaway cup for you.”

  There was no sign of Michelle when they got outside.

  “We’re running out of time,” said Penny. “We spent so long in the café that I think we’ll have to leave the gardens, kitchen, and servants’ quarters for another day.”

  Under the shade of mature trees, and accompanied by the sound of cheerful birdsong, they strolled along the walkway that led to the car park. Others with the same idea had arrived before them, and the coach was almost full when they boarded. Within minutes, the stragglers arrived and Carwyn Lewis walked down the aisle, counting heads. When he had returned to the driver’s seat, Elin Spears rose from her seat at the front of the coach and accepted the microphone he handed her.

  “I hope you all enjoyed your day here at this beautiful property,” she began. A murmur of agreement rippled up and down the rows of seats, and she held up her hand for silence. “Unfortunately”—as this word dropped, an immediate silence settled over the group—“there was an accident of some sort involving one of our group, Barbara Vickers, and I’m sorry to have to tell you that she’s been taken to hospital.”

  Everyone began talking at once, and shouting out questions. Finally, above the clamour, one question became clear: “What happened?”

  “I don’t know,” Elin replied.

  The drive back to Llanelen was silent and sombre. Penny sat hunched in her seat, staring unseeingly out the window while she pondered the words Barbara Vickers had whispered to her: “The marmalade. It wasn’t hers.”

  Nineteen

  The day out at Speke Hall had turned out nothing like Penny or anyone else had expected and she arrived home exhausted and emotionally drained. She had just finished feeding Harrison and was thinking about her own supper when Detective Inspector Bethan Morgan rang, asking to speak to Penny as soon as possible. Penny agreed, and twenty minutes later, Bethan was at her door.

  Penny showed her into the sitting room. “I’ve just made some coffee. I need some, and thought you could use some, too.”

  Bethan thanked her and sat down. “It’s good of you to see me, Penny,” she said as Penny handed her a cup of coffee. “I expect you’re knackered. You had an eventful day.”

  “Oh, you mean Barbara Vickers?” Bethan nodded. Penny thought about that for a moment. “Oh, I see. Merseyside police were in touch with you,” Penny said, referring to the police service covering the greater Liverpool area.

  “They were. It’s their case, of course, but they informed us what happened today, as Barbara comes from our area, so there will have to be cooperation between the two police services. Merseyside’s going to need our help. They told me that you and Victoria were the ones who found Miss Vickers in a bedroom at Speke Hall.”

  “We did.”

  “Now, you see that’s of interest to us, because, frankly, our investigation into the death of Gaynor Lewis has
stalled. While we’ve found a few people who didn’t like her, we haven’t found anyone with a good motive, so we’re hoping that if there is a connection between the two deaths, we might get some leads into the Lewis killing.”

  “Wait. Did you say two deaths? Does that mean that Barbara Vickers has died?”

  “Oh, I’m so sorry. How insensitive of me. I thought you’d been told, but yes, I’m sorry to say she succumbed to her injuries.”

  “Injuries?”

  “We won’t know for sure until we get the postmortem results, but it looks as if someone tried to strangle her. It’s possible the killer was interrupted and then fled, leaving her for dead. She was still alive when you found her, I was told.”

  Penny’s shoulders drooped as she slumped forward and rested her chin on her hand. “I’m so sorry to hear this. We knew she was in a bad way when the police officer asked about her next of kin, and we feared the worst, but we really hoped that somehow she would pull through. I feel as if I let her down.”

  “You did everything you could have done, Penny. In fact, the police officer was really impressed with the way you and Victoria handled the situation. Nobody could have done more for Barbara than you did.” She remained silent for a moment to allow Penny to pull herself together, then continued. “The Merseyside police would like me to ask you a few questions. Would that be all right? Do you feel up to answering a few questions now?”

  “Of course,” said Penny.

  “Besides the details about what happened at Speke Hall, I’m also really interested in exploring with you the connection between Barbara’s death and that of Gaynor Lewis.”

  “That makes sense. So you do think they could be connected?”

  “The victims are certainly connected. They were both at the agricultural show, and they were both members of the Women’s Guild. So there’s that; plus, they knew many of the same people. But it’s the timing of the two deaths, so close to each other, that raises a red flag and makes it seem likely that there’s some connection. And it’s my job to find out what that connection is.” After a moment, Bethan continued. “Let’s start with this. Tell me everything that happened when you found Barbara Vickers. Probably easiest if you start at the beginning and work through everything in order, as it happened.”

  Penny straightened in her chair, took a deep breath, and in her mind tried to sort out the series of events. She wanted to get this right, and make it easy for Bethan to understand what happened.

  “When Victoria and I reached the top of the stairs, a volunteer was sat there, and he told us all the rooms were open and to take our time looking around. So we wandered around for a bit, looking in the bedrooms. As we made our way down the corridor, we noticed some drop cloths on the floor of a little hallway that led off the main one. It was roped off. And then when we reached the Green Bedroom, the room was cordoned off with a ‘Wet Paint’ sign stuck on the door, but there was no paint smell. So I opened the door a little and peeked in.”

  “And that’s when you found her.”

  “Right.”

  “She was still breathing when I dragged her out of the priest hole. She was just a small woman, so it wasn’t difficult. I got her onto the carpet and I asked her what had happened to her and who had done this to her, but she didn’t say. All she said was, ‘It wasn’t hers. It was someone else’s.’ When I asked what she meant, she said, ‘The marmalade. It wasn’t hers.’”

  “Do you have any idea what she meant by that?” Bethan asked.

  Penny shook her head. “Not exactly, no. But I think it might have something to do with Florence’s missing marmalade.”

  “Florence’s missing marmalade?”

  “Oh, it’s just something that happened that has us all puzzled. On the Thursday night before the show, Florence got a phone call telling her to bring in her entries for the show on the Saturday morning, but that would have been after the entry deadline. Victoria and I were at the show on the Friday night, accepting all the entries into the competition, and when we realized Florence’s entries hadn’t been submitted, we rang her, and she and Mrs. Lloyd hurried over and they got her entries in on time. But we want to know who rang Florence and told her not to bring her entries, and why. So I’d asked Barbara Vickers just this morning on the coach if she could shed some light on that. She was the agricultural show’s general secretary, you see, and she’d been there on Friday night with Joyce Devlin, supervising things and making sure everything was ready for Saturday.”

  “So you asked Barbara about the marmalade while you were on the coach?”

  “Yes, we’d arrived at Speke Hall and I moved across the aisle and sat beside her while the others were getting off. And then Elin Spears told us we needed to leave, too, so Carwyn Lewis could lock up. So we got off, Barbara and I, and while we were walking from the car park to the Hall, Barbara said she had noticed something—not on the Friday night, but later, on the Sunday morning after the show. She said something like, it seemed odd and might have to do with Florence’s marmalade. Oh, and then she added that she checked, whatever that means.”

  Penny ran her hand over her face and winced.

  “And then she had to go to the loo and said we’d catch up later, and Victoria and I went off to see the Hall. I was dying to know what she had to tell me. If only I’d followed Barbara, or waited for her to come back from the loo,” she said. “I can’t tell you how awful I feel.”

  “It’s all right, Penny,” Bethan said, trying to reassure her. “You weren’t to know, and besides, there’s nothing you can do about it now. So just out of curiosity, what were Florence’s entries? Besides the carrot cake, I mean. We know all about what happened to that. The forensics people tell us Gaynor Lewis must have pulled it off the table with her when she went down and that the assailant then chucked it under the table with her to get rid of the mess.”

  “Oh, poor Gaynor. It’s hard to imagine how frightened she must have been,” said Penny.

  “And Florence’s entries,” Bethan gently reminded her.

  “Yes. Well, besides the cake, Florence entered jam and marmalade in the preserves category. Her raspberry jam won first prize, but the marmalade wasn’t there on Saturday morning when we checked the entries to see how she had done. But Victoria and I logged it in ourselves the night before, so we know it was entered in the competition, fair and square.”

  “Well, I don’t know enough about how the competition works, but could Florence’s jar of marmalade have got broken? Knocked off the table, maybe, and smashed on the ground, and whoever broke it—a volunteer, a judge—didn’t know how to handle the situation or what to do, so she just cleaned up the mess and hoped the problem would go away? Maybe it was Barbara Vickers herself. Could the explanation be as simple as that?”

  Penny would have liked to agree with Bethan, but she couldn’t.

  “That theory doesn’t really fit with the phone call Florence got that seemed designed to keep her entries out of the competition. I think it more likely that somebody who really wanted to win that category saw Florence as a serious competitor and found a way to make her marmalade disappear. How, I don’t know. This is my first experience with the show, and the fierceness of the competition has been a bit of an eye-opener. I didn’t realize everyone took it so seriously. It means a tremendous amount when people win, and I’ve realized that some people will go to astonishing lengths to make sure they do.”

  “I bet. So tell me, whose marmalade won?”

  “Gaynor Lewis’s.” Bethan’s eyes drifted to a corner of the ceiling and she made a small back-and-forth movement with her index finger while she considered what she’d just been told. “Do you think it’s important?” Penny asked.

  Bethan sighed. “I don’t know. This whole case is confusing and complicated, but at this point, everything that concerns Gaynor Lewis is of interest to us. It’s hard to see, though, how Florence’s marmalade can be of any significance, and if her jar was stolen or switched or broken, it’s hardly a police m
atter. As you say, it could come down to a jealous competitor wanting to keep her entries out of the competition. And I don’t see how this connects to the death of Barbara Vickers.” She gave Penny an indulgent smile. “But by all means, if it’s that important to you, and you really want to know what happened to a jar of marmalade, keep digging.”

  “That’s the thing,” said Penny, ignoring what she could have taken as a hint of condescension in Bethan’s reply. “At first, that’s all I thought it was, too. A missing jar of marmalade. But as I thought more about it, I realized there’s something critically important to the Gaynor Lewis case attached to the marmalade.”

  “Now you’ve got my attention,” said Bethan. “What is it?”

  “The timing.”

  “Explain.”

  “It’s like this,” said Penny. “The marmalade was in the marquee just at the deadline, and shortly after that, almost everybody went home. Me, Victoria, Mrs. Lloyd, Florence, the people who had been setting up the refreshment area … as far as I know, we all left. But Joyce Devlin was still there, and according to Joyce, shortly after we left, Gaynor Lewis came rushing in with her marmalade, and Joyce Devlin entered that in the competition, even though the deadline had passed.”

  Bethan frowned as she attempted to follow Penny’s reasoning.

  “Stay with me here. Gaynor Lewis is now in the marquee, but she does not leave the marquee alive. The marmalade is in the marquee. By now, it’s getting late, and it’s getting dark. Joyce Devlin leaves the tent. And when I asked her, ‘Did Barbara leave the marquee with you?’ she said yes.”

  “So if Barbara left the marquee, she must have been in the marquee,” Bethan reasoned slowly. “She would have had to have been in the marquee to leave it.”

  “Exactly,” said Penny. “So I’m wondering if she saw or heard something while she was there, something that she didn’t realize at the time was important, and then later came to understand its real significance. And I can’t stop thinking about what she said to me when I found her in the Green Bedroom. She said, ‘It wasn’t hers. It was someone else’s.’”