by H. Y. Hanna
ITCHING POWDER
Ingredients: Mucuna pruriens
Warning: Do not use on sensitive skin.
Not suitable for children under 9 years of age.
Slowly, I picked up the tin, my mind racing. Is this what was used to tamper with the powder used on Gaz? Whose handbag is this?
I rummaged in the bag and pulled out a ladies’ wallet. Flipping it open, I stared at the photograph tucked next to the credit cards. It showed a kind-faced man with bushy eyebrows, and standing next to him, clutching his arm and smiling widely, was June Driscoll.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The evidence was there in my hands: the Old Biddies’ sweet geriatric friend was the culprit behind the malicious prank on Gaz. It was simply too much of a coincidence that she would be carrying itching powder in her bag for another reason. In fact, as I recalled the conversation I’d had with Sharon, it all clicked into place. June had been the last person that Sharon had used the powder on, before she used it on Gaz, and Sharon had even left her make-up bag with the widow while she had gone to the toilet. There would have been more than ample time for June to tamper with the powder. And it certainly seemed to have worked, I thought grimly. With Gaz out of the contest, the odds had increased in the granny band’s favour and they had nabbed one of the two coveted Finalists’ positions.
But did it go much further than that? If June had been willing to use sabotage, would she have been willing to resort to murder too? The rhinestone that had been found at the crime scene—that could easily have come from June’s Elvis costume. But what about her alibi? I thought back to the day I had found Lara’s body. When I had scanned the Waiting Area while looking for Cheryl, I’d seen the Old Biddies next to Mr Ziegler, adjusting their costumes… but had I seen June with them? As I racked my brains, trying to remember, Devlin’s words came back to me: “A few members of the cast say that they saw the granny band, but they weren’t able to identify each one individually.”
The only ones who would be able to tell me for certain were the Old Biddies themselves. They would know if June had been with them the whole time. I stuffed everything back into the bag, shoved it—together with the others—at the attendant, then hurried back to the dining room.
But when I got there, I stopped short in confusion. The Old Biddies were nowhere to be seen. Neither was June, I noted with a flicker of panic. Where have they gone? I scanned the room again, craning my neck to look above the crowd of people milling around, and noticed that a few of the other contestants were missing too, such as Gaz, Tim, and Albert, as well as Monty Gibbs himself, my mother, and Stuart Hollande. Trish and her collie weren’t there either. I relaxed slightly. Perhaps the diminutive businessman had taken a small group—including June and the Old Biddies—to another part of the manor to show them something?
Telling myself not to let my imagination run away with me, I went over to the buffet and began to fill a plate. I would simply wait for the Old Biddies to come back and then find a good moment to talk to them about June, I decided. And in the meantime, I might as well eat. But as the minutes ticked past, I found the uneasy feeling returning. Finally, I set the plate of half-eaten food down and stood up. I couldn’t just sit here—I had to go and search for them.
At that moment, Monty Gibbs marched in through a doorway on the other side of the room, followed by a small group of people, including my mother and Stuart Hollande, several contestants, and the roving camera crew.
“…and I’m plannin’ ter upgrade ter an IMAX system later this year. S’not normally installed in private residences, right, but as yer just seen, mine is bigger than most ’ome theatres and I’m ’aving a system custom-made,” Monty was saying.
There were murmurs of appreciation from those clustered around him. I scanned the faces quickly and felt the surge of alarm again as I saw that neither the Old Biddies nor June were in the group. Where were they? Was it really just a coincidence that June and the Old Biddies should have disappeared at the same time? My four elderly friends were the only ones who could confirm where June was at the time of Lara’s murder. Her alibi rested on the assumption that she had been with them the whole time on that day, and if they were gone, nobody would be able to prove or disprove that…
I walked up to my mother, who was chatting with Stuart Hollande, and waited for a lull in their conversation before saying casually:
“Mother, you haven’t seen Mabel and the others, have you?”
“Mabel? Oh, yes, I think I did see them, darling—just as we were going with Monty to see his home theatre. They were going outside.”
“Going outside?” I said, surprised. “In the dark? What on earth for?”
“I don’t know, darling. They didn’t say, although they seemed to be in quite a hurry.”
“Was their friend June Driscoll with them?”
“I’m not sure—I’m afraid I wasn’t really paying attention. She may have been with them.”
Stuart looked at me curiously. “Is something wrong?”
“Er…” I hesitated. What could I say? That I suspected a little old lady of being the murderer and I was worried she might harm her little old lady friends to protect her alibi? It sounded crazy even in my mind.
Besides, I didn’t know that the Old Biddies were in danger. For all I knew, they might have just gone off on one of their mad schemes again and I would look very silly if I sounded the alarm and sent out a search party, only to find that they were just snooping somewhere they shouldn’t.
I plastered a smile to my face. “No, no, everything’s fine… Um… excuse me—I might just pop out and have a look for them.”
“Don’t forget your coat, darling—it’s very chilly outside,” my mother called after me.
I ignored her warning and hurried out, but I hadn’t gone far when I wished that I had listened to my mother after all. The house had been heated like a furnace and I’d been feeling hot, but as I walked across the courtyard I could feel my skin cooling rapidly in the cold night air. I wrapped my arms around myself and shivered as I paused at the edge of the terrace and peered out across the lawns sloping away from the house. It was hard to make out anything beyond the faint swell of the grassy lawns and the dark blur of trees in the distance. A faint glimmer at the bottom of the slope in the distance reminded me that there was a lake down there; in fact, I could see that the path leading from the terrace curved across the lawn and wound its way down towards the water.
There were a few other people out in the courtyard, most of them braving the chill to have a smoke, and I could also see a couple, wrapped warmly in their coats and walking hand-in-hand, coming up the path from the lake—presumably having just taken a romantic stroll down to the waterfront. I was just about to approach them and ask if they’d seen any little old ladies wandering about when I heard a loud whistle, and the next moment, a furry shape came bounding out of the darkness. It was followed by a woman crossing the lawn on my right. It was Trish and Skip. The dog walker had sensibly put her coat on before going out and even had a thick woolly scarf around her neck, and she looked warm and flushed with exercise.
She saw me but made no effort at a greeting, ignoring me completely as she walked past. Skip had different ideas, however. The collie rushed over and jumped up in delight, putting muddy paws all over me.
“Down, Skip!” Trish admonished.
The collie wagged his tail and looked so happy to see me that I couldn’t help but smile.
“It’s okay,” I said, brushing the dirt off my dress. “It’s going to get dry-cleaned anyway.”
Trish looked surprised. “Oh… most people get stroppy when dogs jump up on them.”
I crouched down to make a fuss of the collie, laughing as he tried to lick my face. “Oh, he’s just gorgeous! Have you had him from a puppy?”
For a moment, I thought she wasn’t going to answer, then she said: “Yeah, from eight weeks. He was the runt of the litter.”
“Really? Who would have guessed that
he’d grow up into such a big, beautiful boy?”
Skip raised his left paw and held it out, as if asking to shake hands, and I laughed and took it.
“He’s just adorable,” I said warmly. “Some dogs are really well-trained but they’re a bit robotic, you know? But Skip is fantastically obedient and still has masses of personality.”
“Woof!” said Skip, as if agreeing with me.
I laughed and was shocked to hear Trish laughing too. It was a rusty sort of sound, more of a cough than a laugh, but it was there nevertheless. I glanced up and saw that her face had softened, and she even had a smile at the corners of her mouth. It was amazing the difference it made—she looked like a different person.
Blimey. So the way to her heart is through her dog, I thought. Slowly, I stood up again, wrapping my arms around myself as I wished again that I’d put my coat on before coming out.
Trish said suddenly: “You’re shivering. Here…” She unwrapped her scarf and handed it to me.
I was so astonished by her unexpected kind gesture that I stood looking blankly at her for a moment, before hastily taking the scarf and wrapping it around my shoulders. It was wide, thick, and woolly—more like a shawl than a scarf—and it tucked snugly around me. I pulled it close and looked at her gratefully.
“Thanks,” I said. I hesitated, then added, “By the way… I was really surprised by the results of the voting. I thought you and Skip deserved to go through to the Finals.”
She stared at me for a moment, then said gruffly, “Thank you.”
“Um… you didn’t happen to see the Old Bi—I mean, the group of old ladies from the granny band out here, did you?”
Trish shook her head and pointed around the side of the house. “No… but I took Skip down that way to do his business so I might have missed seeing them.”
I turned to look again at the path winding down the sloping lawn. “Um… Do you mind if I borrow your scarf for a bit longer? I just want to go down the path a bit to have a quick look for them.”
“Sure. Take it. I’m warm enough—I don’t need it—and I’m going back in anyway.” Trish turned towards the house and whistled to Skip, but for once the collie was disobedient, trotting instead down the sloping lawn towards the band of trees in the distance.
“Skip!” called Trish, sounding annoyed and also slightly embarrassed.
“He probably doesn’t want to go back in,” I said, laughing. “You can hardly blame him. Exploring out here is much more interesting for a dog.”
“Yeah, he was getting pretty restless in there, which is why I brought him out.” Trish made a sound of impatience, then—without another word to me—she marched off after the dog. It was an abrupt, almost rude end to our conversation, and previously I would have been offended. But I was beginning to realise that Trish’s brusque manner didn’t really mean anything—it was just the way she was. My feelings towards her mellowed. The woman might lack social graces but she wasn’t a bad person, and what I had seen as an unfriendly attitude was probably just a cover for her lack of confidence in social situations.
Turning, I pulled the warm woolly scarf tighter around my shoulders and set off down the path towards the lake.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The path was paved and well-maintained, but it was still tricky negotiating the incline in high heels. The lake also seemed to be farther away than I’d thought. I was just wondering whether to give up and go back to the house when I met someone coming up the path. It was Albert. He looked at me curiously but didn’t say anything.
“Hi Albert—have you just come up from the lakefront?”
He nodded. “I wanted to look in the boathouse that Mr Gibbs was telling us about. I heard that he’s got the new MasterCraft XStar with a 5500 GDI Ilmor Engine and a ZFT4 Tower,” he said in the wistful tone of someone who knew they could only dream of such luxuries.
“Did you happen to see the old ladies when you were down there?”
“No, but I didn’t actually look in the boathouse. I heard some voices and… um… I thought it might be a couple who were… you know…” In the dim light, I couldn’t see him blush, but I could hear it in his voice.
“You heard a man and a woman?”
“No… just female voices. Actually, one was quite loud… sort of like booming, you know? It reminded me of my old primary school teacher, Mrs Adler. She was scary. Anyway, so I didn’t go inside…”
I started down the path. “I’m going to pop down for a quick look.”
He looked uncertainly at me. “Would… would you like me to come with you?” Without waiting for me to answer, he turned around and fell into step beside me. “I’ll come… It’s dark down there and… well, you’re a woman.”
I glanced sideways at his weedy frame and thought silently that he didn’t look like he’d be much better than me in a fight. Still, I was grateful for his company and we walked in silence towards the lake. The lights and noise of the party faded away as we followed the meandering path. Albert’s longer strides meant that I had to hurry to keep up and by the time we arrived at the boathouse, I was out of breath and much warmer.
The waterside structure looked empty and silent. I hovered uncertainly outside the door as Albert went up to one of the shuttered windows and peered in.
“I think I see a light,” he muttered.
He tried the door. To my surprise, it opened easily. We stepped into a darkened hallway. There was a spiral staircase next to the door, presumably leading to the upstairs level, and then the hallway continued into the main part of the boathouse, opening into the huge vaulted space of the wet dock. Most of the area seemed to be filled with water: two large berths dominated the dock with finger piers stretching on either side between them. A gleaming speedboat was moored in one slip and a luxurious yacht in the other. The sound of water lapping, sucking, sloshing, and splashing echoed eerily everywhere.
“Hello? Mabel? Ethel? Florence? Glenda? Are you there?” I called, peering to see in the dim light.
The large double boathouse doors which faced the lake were firmly shut and the only light in the place came from a pair of round lamps fixed high on the wall. They were beautiful replicas of vintage brass ship lights, but they gave only a feeble orange light which seemed to create even more shadows.
“Can you find the light switch?” I called to Albert behind me.
“I’m trying…” he mumbled, groping along the walls.
I walked to the edge of one pier, looking around for any signs of life. Next to me, the yacht loomed, anchored by thick ropes to cleats at my feet and rocking gently in the water. Beneath me, the cold black water surged in the narrow space between the side of the pier and the hull of the yacht, sucking and swelling as if a sea monster lurked beneath.
“I don’t think anyone’s here…” I said in disappointment, turning around. “I think—Oh!”
Albert was standing very close behind me and something about his expression made the hairs prickle on the back of my neck.
“Did you find anything?” he asked.
“N-no…” I said, trying to put a bit of distance between us. I was right at the edge of the pier and if I stepped back, I would fall into the water. “Um… why don’t we go back to the house now?”
“I don’t think so,” he said pleasantly. “You might talk to that police officer again and give him more ideas.”
“What ideas? What are you talking about?”
“I don’t need you suggesting that the police start comparing things—”
“The crumbs!” I said. My heart began to pound in my chest. “I was right—they’re not from my scones. We don’t use vanilla extract in our recipe… but I’ll bet your mother uses it in hers, doesn’t she?” I stared at him as the pieces all clicked together. “That day on stage, when my mother was asking you about home-cooking, you mentioned that you’d brought some of your mother’s home-made scones with you. That’s where the crumbs came from; they didn’t fall off my clothes—they fell of
f yours, when you pushed Lara into the liquid nitrogen. You murdered her!”
“I had to,” he said, still in that eerily pleasant voice. “She deserved to die, for what she did to my mother.”
“To… to your mother?” I stared at him in bewilderment for a moment, then the remaining pieces of the jigsaw fell into place.
I thought back to the day I had walked in on Nicole and Lara fighting. The sexy singer had been boasting about her conquests and the memory of her jeering words rang in my head:
“I once had this chap leave his wife and son on Christmas Day—can you believe it? …Didn’t even say goodbye to his five-year-old son…”
And then I remembered my mother sitting with Grace Lamont, talking about the contestants:
“…That boy, Albert, for instance—he’s from a single-parent family too… his father left them for his mistress and then died in a car crash, so they were left completely alone…”
I stared at the young man in front of me. The loving son. The diligent student. The budding magician. And the avenging killer of the woman who had destroyed his family.
“Did you know Lara was coming on the show? Was that why you auditioned?”
He laughed. It was a strangely happy sound, which sounded incredibly creepy in that echoing boathouse.
“No, I had no idea! I didn’t even recognise Lara when I first saw her. And then one day, when I was passing the dressing room, I saw her undressing inside. She liked to do that, you know: leave the door open and wander around in her underclothes, so that any men who were walking past might see her. She called me in and asked me help unzip her dress. I knew she was just playing with me—it was like a game for her, to see how much she could tease you—well, anyway, when she took her dress off, I saw this tattoo on her inner thigh. It was of a naked woman with legs that, like, merged into a fish’s tail. Sort of like a mermaid… but not like any of the usual mermaid tattoos…” Albert’s eyes took on a faraway look. “And suddenly I remembered seeing that tattoo before. I was really little—about five years old, I think—and my Dad had taken me to the park for the afternoon while Mum was baking at home. And this pretty lady met us there… I remembered that Dad was kissing and cuddling her a lot and I felt very confused, because I thought he should be kissing and cuddling Mum… And the pretty lady was wearing really short shorts and I remembered seeing the tattoo on her inner thigh. When I asked her what it was, she laughed and told me it was a ‘siren’—a beautiful woman with magic powers who could make all men love her.”