“Very cryptic. I wonder what it means.”
“I don’t know,” said Penny, “but it must be important. Barbara must have known she was gravely ill, and yet that’s what she chose to tell me, so those words must have been terribly important to her.”
Bethan opened her notebook. “Tell me again,” she said. “Tell me exactly what Barbara Vickers said when you asked her what she meant by ‘It.’”
“‘The marmalade. It wasn’t hers.’”
“I wonder where the emphasis lies,” said Bethan. “‘It wasn’t hers,’ meaning something else was hers, or ‘It wasn’t hers,’ meaning the marmalade belonged to someone else.”
“I took it to mean that the marmalade belonged to somebody else.”
Twenty
“All right,” said Bethan. “Let’s talk about the Green Bedroom itself. Of particular interest to us was the way the bedroom was blocked off. Merseyside police forensics are testing the rope and sign, of course, so we hope we’ll get something from that. You and Victoria told the officer at the scene what you saw and did, but now that you’ve had a bit of time to reflect on it, has anything else occurred to you? Anything that seemed out of place, anyone you noticed somewhere you wouldn’t have expected to see that person?”
“No,” Penny replied.
“Did you happen to see Andrea Devlin at Speke Hall? When you saw the paint drop cloths on the floor in the little hallway, did you happen to see her?”
“No. I’d heard that she might be working there, and Victoria and I even wondered if we might bump into her, but we didn’t see her.”
Bethan did not reply. And as it dawned on her what Bethan was thinking, Penny said, “Oh, you don’t think she killed Barbara Vickers, do you? What possible reason could she have to do that?”
“Andrea Devlin is a person of interest in the Gaynor Lewis murder. And you know as well as I do that the second murder is usually committed by the same person who committed the first. We’ve just been talking about that—whether Barbara saw something or someone. We have a witness who saw Andrea in Betws, arguing with Gaynor Lewis on the Friday night of the agricultural show, the night she was murdered. And quite heated that discussion was, too, by all accounts.”
Oh, that’s right, thought Penny. Heather Hughes saw them in the café.
“So you see, when a person of interest lies to the police, or withholds information, or tries to mislead us, that person becomes even more of a person of interest.”
“What did she lie to you about?” Penny asked.
“She wasn’t exactly forthcoming with us about how long she’d been in the area. She led us to believe that she only arrived here after she was notified about Gaynor’s death, but it turns out she was here before that.”
Penny processed this information.
“And there’s something else. Whoever put Barbara Vickers in the priest hole had to have had some strength.”
“Oh. Strength like a man, you mean?”
“Well, yes.”
“But surely two women could have done that. Or maybe even one woman. I mean, I managed to get her out on my own.” The tone of Penny’s voice rose a little in disagreement and frustration.
“Yes, but by the time you got Barbara out, she was considerably weakened and wasn’t fighting you off,” Bethan said gently. She folded her notebook. “Look, I can see you’re tired, you’ve been through a lot, and you’ve had enough of my questions for today. Let’s leave it there for now. We can talk again soon.” She got to her feet.
“Before you go, Bethan, there’s something I wanted to ask you. It’s personal.” Bethan sat. “About Gareth. How’s he doing?”
“I don’t really know. I haven’t heard from him, and I don’t think any of the other officers have, either. He seems to have moved on. I’m not even sure he’s around much anymore.”
“Oh, because of Fiona, you mean. Yes, well, she told us after the agricultural show banquet that he’s moving to Scotland. I was thinking, though, after the body of Gaynor Lewis was discovered, he must have felt awful. He was supposed to be in charge of security.”
“No one would have expected that to happen. He was looking after the grounds, and the animals. He wasn’t responsible for the people. He was interviewed, of course, but he couldn’t really tell us anything.”
“No, it’s only that I know what he’s like, and I hoped he wasn’t blaming himself for what happened.” Bethan gave a dismissive shrug, then rose to her feet once again. “Must go.”
Penny showed her out, then poured herself a glass of water and carried it through to her sitting room. Harrison curled up on her lap and she stroked him while she thought about her conversation with Bethan. They’d covered a lot of ground and touched on a lot of topics. The thought and accompanying image that bothered her the most was that someone had placed Barbara Vickers, still breathing, still living, still holding on, and probably begging for her life, in that horrible priest hole. Penny’s breath came quicker and she closed her eyes against the image.
And someone, or possibly two people, had had the time to lift or drag Barbara’s body into the priest hole, and then taken the time to cordon off the room and put up a WET PAINT sign before escaping. What kind of person could do that?
Penny yawned and checked the time. Bethan was right. It had been a long day, she was tired and hungry, and her head was filled with swirling, disconnected ideas and questions. She made herself a cheese and tomato sandwich and then, after checking to make sure both front and back doors were locked, scooped up Harrison and carried him upstairs to bed.
Mentally exhausted, she fell quickly into a deep, dreamless sleep, with Harrison tucked neatly in beside her. But as the heavy blackness of night lightened and lifted, giving way to the grey that would become dawn, and to the sound of birdsong from the garden below, she awoke with a sense of unease. As she remembered the events of the day before, the death of Barbara Vickers, and her conversation with Bethan Morgan, she turned over in her mind everything that had happened at the agricultural show. And the one thing that kept coming back to her was the marmalade. At first, her goal had been to discover what was behind the telephone call to Florence, so she could put Florence’s mind to rest. But now she was determined to do it to put her own mind at rest.
She checked her watch. Much too early to get up, although she enjoyed this time of day, when everything was quiet and a beautiful new day lay in front of her. She turned on her side, disturbing Harrison, who let out an indignant cry at the disruption.
And then she lay there, her mind whirling, until she realized there would be no more sleep for her that night, so she got up and made herself a cup of coffee and a piece of toast.
Twenty-one
The next morning, Penny set a pretty cardboard box from the local bakery on Rhian’s desk at the Spa. “Brought you a little something to share with Eirlys and the rest of the team to thank everybody for holding the fort yesterday while Victoria and I were off on the Women’s Guild outing.”
“Oh, thank you, Penny.” Rhian admired the pink striped box with Llanelen Bakery written in chocolate brown script across the top, and untied the matching brown ribbon. “Oh, lovely!” she exclaimed as she opened the lid, revealing half a dozen elaborately decorated cupcakes. “Do I have to share them?”
“Well, not if you don’t want to, I suppose.” Penny grinned.
“Did you have a good day?” Rhian asked, closing the lid on the cupcakes. “Enjoy yourselves, did you?”
“Well, the building was interesting, what we saw of it anyway, but unfortunately, one of the ladies on the outing, well, it seems she was attacked, and I learned last night that she died.”
Rhian’s jaw dropped. “What? That’s awful.”
“I know. It was awful.” Penny lowered her voice. “Victoria and I found the woman in one of the bedrooms.”
“Oh no! Really? What happened to her?”
“We don’t know for sure yet.”
“Oh, that’s too bad. And who w
as it? Anybody we know?”
“Barbara Vickers, her name was.”
“Oh, no, not Miss Vickers.” Rhian took a step away from her desk and her arms dropped to her side. “Really? I can’t believe it.”
“You know her?”
“Yes, I do. She’s a bookkeeper. She did the accounts at the last place I worked, and she does the books for lots of small businesses in the area. She was very good. A real stickler for detail. Her books always balanced. Never heard any complaints. In fact, if Victoria didn’t take care of the accounting for the Spa, I’d have recommended Barbara to you.”
“A bookkeeper. And a good one, too. Well, that’s very interesting.”
“It is?”
“Yes. Oh, it’s too complicated to go into here, but thanks for telling me that, Rhian. It could be very useful. And by the way, there’s something else I’ve been meaning to ask you. Do you know any of our clients who use the word pet?”
“Pet? I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Instead of saying love, for example, at the end of a sentence, as in ‘I saw you coming out of the shop, love.’ Do you know anyone who would say, ‘I saw you coming out of the shop, pet’?”
“Oh, right. I see what you mean.” Rhian placed one hand on the desk and leaned forward slightly. “I don’t think so. Not off the top of my head anyway. Let me think about it, and if anyone comes to mind, I’ll let you know.”
Penny sped off down the hall to the manicure salon in her quick, light steps and asked Eirlys the same question.
“I can’t think of anyone, Penny,” Eirlys replied. “But you might want to ask Alberto. He sees clients in his hair salon who never set foot in our manicure studio. So I’d ask Alberto, if I was you.”
“Ask Alberto what?” asked a tall man with hair just starting to grey at the temples. He stood in the doorway, carrying a chocolate cupcake on a white plate in one hand and a pink cupcake on a plate in the other. He held both plates out to Eirlys, who chose the one with the pink cupcake. “What do you want to ask me?” he repeated.
“Alberto, can you think of a client who uses the word pet? You know, like…”
“As in ‘I don’t want it too short, pet, just a nice trim to even up the ends.’”
“Yes, exactly like that.”
“No.”
Penny sighed.
“I don’t know exactly who it is. But I can point you in the right direction.” Penny perked up. “It’s either Mari Jones or the other one. I can never remember her name. They both look alike, dress alike, and wear their hair the same. Like two peas in a pod, those two. They book their appointments for the same time, and one waits while the other gets her hair done, and then they switch places.” He made a little movement across his shoulders with both hands, indicating hair all the same length. “But they only come here about once a year. It looks to me as if they cut each other’s hair the rest of the time. I know all our regular clients’ names, of course, but hers escapes me. Shouldn’t be too hard to find out what she’s called, though.”
“Oh, I know who you mean,” said Penny. “It’s Delyth Powell.”
Alberto savoured the last bite of his cupcake and turned to go. He was about to leave, taking his empty plate with him, when Eirlys reached out for it.
“Oh, give it here,” said Eirlys. “It’s my week for doing the washing-up and keeping the kitchen tidy.”
“That’s it!” exclaimed Penny. “They were doing the washing-up at the WG meeting, and Mari was on the left, and Delyth on the right. And it was Delyth who said to Mari something like, ‘You’d almost think she liked her, wouldn’t you, pet?’”
Eirlys and Alberto exchanged a slightly puzzled but amused look, and Alberto escaped to his salon across the corridor. “I have no idea what you’re on about, but if you say so, Penny,” said Eirlys, placing her empty plate on top of Alberto’s and disappearing in the direction of the staff kitchen.
Penny hurried down the corridor toward the reception area and was just about to turn down the hallway to Victoria’s office when the door opened and Inspector Bethan Morgan entered.
“Oh, Penny. Just the person. Got time for a quick word?”
“Yes, of course.” Penny led the way to the quiet room, and when they were seated, Bethan Morgan pulled a sealed plastic bag out of a dark blue tote bag with the North Wales Police logo on the side.
“We might have found Florence’s marmalade,” she said, handing Penny the plastic bag.
Twenty-two
“Where did you find this?” asked Penny, examining the glass jar with its silver lid.
“In Barbara Vickers’s kitchen. We’ve been combing through her flat, and when I saw this in the fridge, I thought I’d show it to you, just in case it’s Florence’s marmalade, the one you were on about. The stuff’s obviously homemade—there’s no commercial label on it.”
Penny turned the jar upside down and smoothed the stiff plastic of the bag over the bottom of the glass jar.
“Yes, I’m pretty sure it is Florence’s,” she said.
“How can you tell?” Bethan asked.
“Because there’s a little sticker on the bottom with a number on it, and the number is 398, which is high. This is one of the last items we took in for the agricultural show competition. If the number had been three, say, then, no, it wouldn’t be Florence’s. But there is a sure way to confirm, and that’s to compare this number against the list of entries Victoria and I logged in that evening. Barbara was the show’s secretary, and she took the lists and put them on her clipboard, so unless Joyce Devlin has the list, it’s probably somewhere in Barbara’s flat.” She held the jar, still in its plastic bag, with two hands in her lap. “When Florence entered this”—she lifted the jar slightly—“it was wearing a little red-and-white gingham topper. I guess that’s just for decoration and most people toss it when they actually start eating the contents of the jar.” She peered at it. “I can’t really tell if any’s been eaten. It looks full, but it’s hard to tell through the plastic. What will happen to it?”
Bethan reached out for it. “We’ll hang on to it, in case it needs to be tested.”
“Tested?”
“Nothing is really clear at this point. The investigation is still in its early stages, and the Merseyside police haven’t uncovered a motive yet. So it’s hard to say what’s important. Until we know what isn’t important, we’ll hang on to everything, just in case.”
“May I tell Florence we found her marmalade?”
“Best hold off on that until we know for sure. PC Chris Jones is still at the flat, so I’ll ask him to look for the clipboard with the entries. What’s the sticker number again?” She checked the bottom of the jar, then sent a text.
“Can you tell me how Barbara Vickers died?” Penny asked.
“The postmortem hasn’t been completed yet, but the hospital said she died from heart failure. The pathologist says it was likely brought on by attempted strangulation.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that. How awful for her.”
“Of course, Merseyside is still piecing the events together to determine exactly what happened.”
“And hopefully who did that to her. She was such a quiet, unassuming soul. Wouldn’t-say-boo-to-a-goose kind of woman.”
“We’ll get whoever did this. Anyway, thought you’d like to know about the marmalade. I’ll let you get on now.” As they left the room, Bethan’s phone chimed to indicate an incoming text. She read the two-word message, then showed it to Penny. Numbers match.
“I’ll let Florence know we’ve solved the mystery of her missing marmalade,” said Penny. “I’m glad you were able to check the numbers so easily.”
Check the numbers, thought Penny as Bethan left. That must have been what Barbara had meant when she said, “I checked.” For some reason, she had checked the number on the bottom of the jar against the entry documents and had realized the marmalade was Florence’s. And now we have to find out how it ended up in the kitchen of Barbara Vi
ckers.
* * *
Client appointments kept Penny busy for the rest of the morning. Finally, hungry and in desperate need of the restorative power of freshly brewed coffee, she and Victoria headed upstairs for lunch in the spacious, airy flat on the top floor that had been created for Victoria when the building that was now home to the Llanelen Spa had been renovated.
When they’d taken on the project—against the advice of just about everybody—the only things the grey, three-storey stone structure had going for it were its solid outer walls and its location. Situated on the bank of the River Conwy, with beautiful views to the richly forested hills beyond, the building was in need of much restoration. Its windows were boarded up and weeds sprouted in the mortar that barely held the place together. The abandoned rooms were filled with rubbish left behind by squatters, the plasterwork was crumbling, and the wooden window frames and sashes were rotted beyond repair.
Nevertheless, they’d seen past all that, right down to the building’s beautiful bones, and recognized the potential, not only for business possibilities but as a property investment, and they’d been right on both counts. The business they created was thriving, and the value of their real estate holding had more than doubled.
Victoria unlocked the door to her clean, uncluttered flat, decorated in soothing neutral colours, accented by splashes of bright accessories, and Penny followed her in. Schedules permitting, they tried to have lunch together in the flat at least once a week. Penny set the second box she had brought from the bakery on the kitchen worktop, and then, as she always did on every visit, she went straight to the sitting room window that overlooked the river and peered out. Victoria headed to the kitchen, and a moment later came the sound of rattling dishes and cutlery. Penny drifted back into the kitchen to see what she could do to help.
The Marmalade Murders Page 17