by Maia Chance
“Maybe she stole it for Roy. She certainly seems gullible enough to be taken in by a murderer—I mean, what of that Slipperyback nonsense?”
I wouldn’t mention how spooked I still was about Slipperyback. Berta would scoff.
“We must speak with Maynard Coburn,” Berta said. “He is far more enmeshed with the Goddard family than we previously supposed.”
“That makes his little argument with Patience Yarker at the inn all the more suspect, doesn’t it?” Not to mention the possible pea-in-pod.
We waited for a few minutes more, straining our ears to hear voices or footsteps upstairs.
Nothing.
A grandfather clock ticked the seconds. Cedric drifted off to sleep in my lap.
“Perhaps we could just pop upstairs and have a word with Aunt Daphne,” I whispered.
“She is abed, and hungover.”
“I could mix up a hangover cure—do you suppose there’s any Worcestershire sauce in the pantry?”
“Ugh. Mrs. Woodby, such cures do not work. Nothing is better for a hangover than a strong cup of coffee and the hair of the dog.”
I looked at Berta’s capacious black handbag, sitting primly on her lap. “I don’t suppose you have your flask in there?”
“Of course I do, Mrs. Woodby. It is wintertime. Come along. Let us make some coffee.”
We stole to the kitchen, which was scrubbed clean of all traces of last night’s dinner party. By some miracle, I found a little lukewarm coffee in the stovetop percolator. Berta and I quickly put together a tray—cup of coffee, pitcher of cream, sugar bowl, spoon, napkin (“What a lot of nice silver they have in this house,” Berta said, admiring the spoon)—and, keeping our ears pricked for Hester’s footfalls, tiptoed upstairs via a back staircase.
“Now what?” I whispered, readjusting the tray in my hands. Berta was carrying Cedric.
“Now you must begin knocking,” Berta said.
“I must? I’m carrying the tray!” The upstairs hallway was broad, richly wallpapered, and lined with a demoralizing number of doors.
“My hands are full. Use an elbow. Use your boot.”
I knocked on the first door with my elbow. My feet were too sore for kicking.
No answer. I knocked on another door, and another. The coffee cup rattled against the cream pitcher.
“What if Fenton answers one of these doors?” I whispered with a sinking belly.
“He is merely a frail youth, Mrs. Woodby.”
“But he hangs around in the cellar!” I bonked my elbow on a fourth door. Ouch.
Rustles within. Then, the fluting voice of Aunt Daphne. “Enter!”
“You go in,” Berta whispered. “I will stand guard. Oh—I very nearly forgot.” She set Cedric on the floor, unbuckled her handbag, pulled out her flask, and placed it on the tray.
I entered Aunt Daphne’s room. Berta shut the door.
The room was dim and overly warm, and smelled of talcum powder, rose perfume, and cigarette smoke. On the bed lay a small, meat loaf–shaped figure beneath a quilted pink eiderdown.
“Oh,” Aunt Daphne said. “My pretty friend from the country club. Good morning.”
“Good morning, Mrs. Lyle,” I said, carrying the tray over. “I’ve brought you some coffee.”
“Oh! Wonderful. I have the most wretched headache, you know.” She struggled upright against a mound of pillows. “Too much champagne. Now, where are my cigarettes? Ah. Be a darling and pass those over.”
I settled the tray on the bed beside Aunt Daphne and found a cigarette case, a holder, and a lighter on the bedside table.
“Something horrid occurred last night.” She blinked blearily as she corked a cigarette into the holder and lit it. “What was it?”
“Your niece Judith died,” I said gently.
“Ah, yes. Someone finally worked up the nerve to do it.” She cackled, smoke spurting from her nostrils.
“Would you like cream in your coffee?” I asked. “Sugar? Something stronger?”
“All three, please.”
I was bursting with questions for her, but I first doctored her coffee—cream, sugar, a glug from Berta’s flask (smelled like gin)—and passed the cup over.
Aunt Daphne slurped greedily.
“I wonder if you could tell me from whom you stole that ruby ring in the summer of 1919,” I said, attempting to strike a light tone.
“Did I say that?”
“Yes,” I said. “You did.”
Aunt Daphne took another slurp of coffee, and then a long pull from her cigarette holder. “Now I recall. Yes. I stole it from Judith.”
My breath caught. “Are you certain?”
“Helped myself to it, right out of her jewelry box, to spite her, you see, for cheating at bridge. She was always such a cheat. I didn’t even desire the ring, you know, but it was the most valuable bauble in the box, so on my finger it went! Alas, it was too small. I don’t know how I ever got it on.”
Judith Goddard had been Anonymous. She had invited us here to steal the ruby ring. Perhaps she had wanted to wear it as her engagement ring, since Maynard Coburn probably couldn’t afford to put a lima bean on her finger. It had nothing to do with her murder. Yet here Berta and I were embroiled in her death, all the same.
Aunt Daphne said, “Judith and I didn’t mingle, you know. I have my own circle in Cleveland, and she had hers. She was from my side of the family—she was my late sister Diana’s daughter—but when she married Elmer Goddard, she made her bed. He was new money, you know.”
“Why did you come here to the family gathering, if you didn’t mingle with Judith?”
“Rosemary telephoned and begged me to. Blithered on about family traditions and all that sort of garbage. My friend Lydia invited me to her place on Lake Champlain for Christmas, so I thought I may as well swing by Maple Hill on the way and see what my hideous family had been up to lately. I’ll be on my way to Lydia’s this afternoon. I won’t stay for the funeral—it is to be here in Maple Hill, Rosemary tells me, the day after tomorrow. Funerals are so dispiriting.”
“And Judith’s will is to be read the day after tomorrow, too?”
“I believe so.”
Mental note: Be a fly on the wall when that will is read.
“Who do you suppose poisoned Judith?”
“Roy,” Aunt Daphne said without hesitation.
“Roy! Her own brother? But why?”
“Because he did not wish to baby-mind Fenton for several months while Judith and that swaggering Maynard Coburn went away on their honeymoon.”
That did not sound at all like a good motive for murder to me, and I said as much.
Aunt Daphne’s cigarette end crackled. “Ah, but Roy is a selfish slug, and he has already spent every penny he inherited from his parents.”
“But his greeting cards—he is rather successful, and he surely has an income from those.”
“Oh, he has an income from those, but it is a moderate income, dear, and Roy’s tastes are not at all moderate.”
I thought of his richly appointed cottage, his sumptuous brocade robe, his plushy motorcar.
Aunt Daphne continued, “His style of living entirely depends upon living in that caretaker’s cottage, free of charge. That allows him to spend all his income on the little luxuries—eau de cologne, French wine, antique furniture, foppish clothing—that he cannot seem to do without.”
“But to kill to preserve his style of living…?”
“Ah, well, Roy is, as I said, hoggishly self-centered, and—just between you and me—he drinks too much. It’ll all come clear when the will is read, but to my mind, Roy must have been sure that Judith left him that cottage in her will. It all adds up, doesn’t it?”
It did, actually.
“Do you know what Roy might keep down in his cellar?” I asked.
“His cellar? Didn’t even know he had one. Top me up, won’t you?” Aunt Daphne held out her coffee cup.
I unscrewed the flask and splashed more
gin into the cup.
“Ah, thank you,” she murmured, sinking back upon her pillows. “Oh, my poor head.” Her crepey eyelids sank shut as she sipped.
“Could I fetch you some aspirin?”
“No, dear. I’ll just rest.” She sipped again without opening her eyes.
I crept out.
* * *
Berta and Cedric were waiting, bright-eyed, in the corridor.
“Judith was Anonymous,” I whispered excitedly. “She sent that invitation! I suspect she wanted the ring back to wear as her engagement ring. Judith invited Aunt Daphne up here to Goddard Farm simply to get that ring—and Aunt Daphne is leaving this afternoon.”
“If Judith was Anonymous, then the ring should still be in the breadbox,” Berta said.
“It should, shouldn’t it?” I looked up and down the corridor. Empty. “Let’s go and check.”
I picked up Cedric, and we hurried down the back stairs into the kitchen. I went straight to the green metal breadbox on the counter. I lifted the lid.
No ring inside. Only crumbs.
“It’s gone!” I whispered. “I don’t believe it!”
“Perhaps one of the family moved it to a more secure place. We made no secret that we placed it in there.”
I swung the breadbox lid back down. “And since we know that the ring isn’t related to Judith’s death, it’s a closed book.” I hesitated. “Before we go…”
“You wish to speak with Fenton?”
“I suppose we should, but also…”
“Surely you are not thinking of the cellar, Mrs. Woodby?”
“Why not?” Yes, a foray to the cellar sounded creepy as billyo. On the other hand, I was itching to see what was down there. “The door to the cellar is in the kitchen, Roy said.”
“That must be it.” Berta was already toddling toward a mysterious door.
I joined her.
Hinges creaked as she pulled it open. Darkness yawned, and a moldy smell wafted up on a breath of cold air.
“On second thought—” I said.
“This was your idea, Mrs. Woodby,” Berta whispered back. “We do not have all day.” She pressed a switch on the stairwell wall, and a feeble electric light flashed on. “Come on.” She went down the steps.
I took one last look over my shoulder—the coast was clear—snuggled Cedric more securely in my arms, and followed her downward.
9
Shuddery wooden steps led down to a wide-open space with a stone floor and a low, raftered ceiling. Barrels, crates, and boxes cast dense shadows. The lone lightbulb was too weak to illuminate the margins of the cellar.
A mouse streaked past my feet. Cedric growled and lurched in my arms, but I restrained him. The mouse vanished.
“I see no evidence of anyone doing much of anything down here,” I whispered. “Except for the spiders.” Cobwebs netted the ceiling and the high-up windows. “The spiders have been awfully busy.”
“But we have heard from more than one person that Fenton spends time down here,” Berta said. “Let us search a bit.”
We walked slowly between wooden support pillars. We came upon a door standing ajar, but when we peeked through, it proved to contain nothing but dusty shelves of pickles and fruit preserves.
We came to another door.
“Padlocked,” I whispered. “This could be Fenton’s lair!”
“It is a good thing it is padlocked, so we may be certain he is not inside.” Berta removed her hat and pulled a hairpin out of her bun. “I do not think my nerves could bear—”
Somewhere upstairs, there was a gentle thud.
“Get a wiggle on,” I whispered.
“Do not hurry me, Mrs. Woodby.” Berta bent, took the padlock in her hand, and poked around in the keyhole with the hairpin.
“How come you’re so good at picking locks?” I whispered.
“Shush. I must focus.”
“Did Jimmy the Ant teach you?”
“One must have something to talk about besides tommy guns and peach orchards.” Click. “There.” The padlock fell open. Berta slid the hairpin back in her bun and replaced her hat.
I removed the padlock gently, took a deep breath, and pushed open the door.
Shadows inside. And that smell—a weird, tangy, nostril-shriveling potpourri.
“Is there a light?” I patted the walls with my free hand.
“I do not know. Oh, what is that awful odor?”
“Here.” I felt a dangling string, and I gave it a yank.
Dim red light washed a room barely bigger than a closet, with shelves cluttered with bottles, a porcelain sink, tables arrayed with trays, and—clothespinned to lines strung from end to end—photographs.
“It’s a darkroom,” I whispered. “Fenton must be a photographer.” I stepped forward to study the string of photographs closest to me.
One photograph showed Mrs. Goddard on the telephone, her face turned away. Another photograph showed Rosemary in an apron with a wooden spoon stuck in a mixing bowl, scowling at the camera. Yet another captured what I was sure was Titus (you know, of the milk bottles and the heavy lifting in Roy’s cellar). Titus was shown skiing past a smudge of trees and boulders with what appeared to be a bulky knapsack on his back.
Berta was peering at photographs on another line. “Oh my,” she breathed. “Oh my, my, my, my, my.”
“What is it?” I whispered, going over to her side.
“It seems that Fenton is a photographic Peeping Tom. And his brother, George … oh, goodness.”
A grainy photograph depicted a man and a woman, wearing coats and hats and standing in a snowy forest, locked in a passionate kiss.
“That’s certainly George Goddard,” I said.
Berta nodded. “His eyebrows and forehead are clear. And the woman—something about her is familiar…”
“It’s Patience Yarker.”
“Patience! Truly?”
“She was wearing the same checked coat today when I saw her through the window.” I shook my head. “Patience Yarker canoodling with George Goddard? Although, I suppose it isn’t truly surprising to see the dashing young scion of the local moneybags clan smooching the prettiest girl in the village. But in the light of Patience’s apparent argument with Maynard Coburn—”
“Spies!” someone shrieked.
Berta and I spun around to see Fenton lurching into the darkroom. His hair was lank, his eyes wild in the red light, and a camera swung from a leather strap around his neck. His outstretched hands clawed the air.
Cedric paddled his paws so hard, I lost my grip on him, and he catapulted himself to the floor. Yapping shrilly, he bounded forward.
“Get out!” Fenton screamed. “Get out of here! How dare y— Ow!”
Cedric had sunk his teeth into Fenton’s ankle.
“Get off me, you vicious cur!” Fenton kicked his foot—with Cedric attached—in the air.
Cedric held on for a few kicks, and then flew off, hit the bottom of the shelves, and sprawled.
I screamed.
Glass bottles rattled, and one toppled onto the floor beside Cedric. Somehow, it didn’t shatter.
“You monster!” I shouted at Fenton. I dived to my knees and gathered Cedric up in my arms. “Poor little peanut. Mommy’s here. Are you hurt?”
“Get out of here before I telephone the police. Your dog bit me!” Fenton, panting through his teeth, bent to massage his ankle. “Look! He drew blood! He’s vicious! He ought to be taken out behind the stables and shot.”
My eyes fell on the bottle that had hit the floor. The light wasn’t good, but I easily read the label:
KODAK
POTASSIUM FERRICYANIDE
POISON
And a skull and crossbones.
I floundered to my feet, hugging Cedric close. “I’m sorry about the bite. He thought you were attacking me.” I dodged past Fenton to the door through which Berta was just going. “Anyway,” I said over my shoulder, “I’ve been bitten by him before while playing.
It’s like being bitten by a hamster.”
Fenton gave a garbled howl of outrage.
Berta and I half ran across the expanse of basement, up the stairs, across the kitchen, and out the door into the blinding white, blessedly pure air.
“To the village?” I said, clattering down the porch steps.
“Unquestionably.”
The door crashed open behind us.
Without stopping, I looked over my shoulder to see Hester Albans on the porch, waving a copper dustpan.
“I’ll telephone the police!” she shouted. “You’re upsetting the peace in this village!”
“I suppose this means Hester doesn’t like us anymore,” I said breathlessly as Berta and I kept going.
“I suppose not,” Berta replied, equally breathless.
“Have you ever noticed we always get blamed for upsetting the domestic peace when there’s a murder?”
“People must have someone to blame, or their self-delusions will be shattered. And if that occurs … one may as well play about with gasoline and a box of matches.”
* * *
We didn’t speak again until we were out of sight of Goddard Farm, hoofing it down the steep, tree-edged road upon which we had driven last night. Cedric trotted along beside us, looking immensely proud of himself. His hackles still fanned up from under the collar of his sweater.
“Did you see the bottle?” I asked Berta.
“What bottle? There were dozens of bottles.”
“Well, sure, but the one that fell on the floor was potassium ferricyanide. Potassium cyanide.”
Berta gasped. “Are you certain?”
“Labeled clear as day.”
“But why—?”
“The bottle also said ‘Kodak.’ We should make certain, but I suspect cyanide is one of the chemicals used to develop photographic film.”
“I shall telephone dear Myrtle. She will be able to research that quite easily.” Myrtle was a librarian at the Main Branch of the New York Public Library. She pawed through the card catalogs and periodical indices as deftly as a concert pianist on a Steinway. She had proved to be an indispensable fact-checker for our agency.