by Molly Macrae
“True.”
“But.” Janet pictured the library on both evenings she’d seen it and considered the difference one day could make. “We don’t know how Florence usually is and we don’t know how the library usually looks. She and I passed a room last night that I assume was Malcolm’s. If he left it in that state, he was a bit of a slob.”
“Unless someone searched that room.”
“It’s so irritating that we don’t know what Sandra and Fergus are looking for,” Janet said. “Irritating enough that I’m going back to calling them Carmichael and Macleod. But we wouldn’t be able to tell if someone searched Malcolm’s room if he was a slob.”
“He’s as irritating as Carmichael and Macleod.”
“Florence sure feels that way. Think about this, though, Tallie—I was surprised by the disarray, but Florence wasn’t. It makes more sense that she spent time in the library doing whatever—deciding which books to throw out the window first, maybe.”
“You’re probably right, but can we trust her reactions?”
“Her brother died just two days ago. Whether or not he was antisocial, that fact alone can cover a multitude of behavioral tics. I’m sorry you lost sleep over this, dear, but it shows what a tender heart you have.”
“Or how cynical cairn terriers are. I’m still gnawing on one thing.”
“What is it?”
“If leaving the window open was Malcolm’s habit, who knew that?”
The afternoon brought dreeps, dribbles, and drouks of rain and a steady stream of customers. Tallie said no more about her worries, but Janet turned them over and over as she rang up postcards, guidebooks, and rainy-day reading. By the end of the day, Janet knew what they should do.
“We should tell Norman,” she said to Tallie as they counted down the cash register. “We don’t know that something happened or that anything is going on, but that’s what a constable is for.”
“Makes sense,” Tallie said.
“That’s settled then. We’ll tell Norman.”
“I’ve the ears of a border collie,” Christine said, coming through from Cakes and Tales. “You say there’s something we need to tell Norman? What a coincidence. There’s something I need to tell you.”
“I told you she was cooking something up,” Tallie said as she and Janet set up a card table in the living room that evening.
“You said she orchestrated our trip to see Florence.”
“She did. It was concurrent cooking and orchestrating. She invited Norman over here, for tonight, when she stepped outside with him yesterday. Then she came back in and sent us on our merry way to see Florence.”
“First one, and then the other, sounds consecutive, dear.”
“But the idea for both probably zapped her between her conniving shoulder blades like a single bolt of lightning. I’m not complaining, though. Scrabble night will be fun.”
“And she’s bringing the snacks, so there you go. And now there’s the door. I’ll get that if you’ll get the sherry. And bring the chairs from the kitchen.”
As Janet welcomed Christine, Hobbs arrived. Janet took carrier bags from Christine and showed them both where to hang their rain gear. Christine then reclaimed the carrier bags, waved Janet to the living room with Hobbs, and went to the kitchen to lay out oatcakes, cheese, and red grapes.
Tallie was in the kitchen setting out wine glasses and Christine greeted her like a coconspirator.
“The plan is coming together nicely,” Christine said quietly. “Where’s your cheese board?”
Tallie found the cheese board and handed it to her. “Are we allowed in on the details?”
“Home turf advantage,” Christine said. “Cheese knife?”
Tallie handed her the cheese knife. “How so?”
“Code word: Nana Bethia. We’ll need to rinse the grapes.”
“Will you ever let the poor guy live that down?” Tallie asked, running water over the grapes.
“Will your mother?”
“Nope.”
Tallie handed Christine a bowl.
“Thank you. I was just going to ask you for something to put the grapes in. And I’m glad you agree about Norman. He softens up when he’s here. Not because he relaxes, but because he knows we won’t let him forget his egregious overstepping of bounds by housing his grandmother here without permission or paying rent while you and your mother were unaware and displaced.”
“Shhh. We’re on your side. But don’t you think it’s interesting that he ever comes here, knowing we’ll take advantage of him?”
“That’s either atonement or hubris—he still feels guilty or he thinks he can outsmart us. Come on.”
Hobbs, sitting on the couch with Smirr on his lap, was trying to distract the kitten from wrestling a loose end of wool it had discovered at the lower edge of his sweater. He stood when Christine and Tallie came in, Smirr tucked in the crook of one arm. He flinched as Butter scaled the other to sit on his shoulder.
“Lovely jumper,” Christine said. “Did your grandmother knit it?”
“She did. Is Summer not joining us?”
Tallie carefully disengaged the kitten from the constable. “Summer had other plans, plus early morning baking. How is Nana Bethia?”
“Getting on very well.”
“Please tell her we asked after her,” Janet said.
“I will.”
“Excellent,” Christine said. “Let the game begin.”
Hobbs deposited the cat next to the kitten on the couch and joined the others at the card table. He won the draw to go first, then they all chose tiles for play and set them on their racks. Hobbs arranged and rearranged his, giving them the same serious consideration he gave any question before him.
“Are we playing in Scots, Gaelic, and English?” he asked.
“Scots, Gaelic, English, and American,” Tallie said.
“Brilliant. Any news on the books?”
“Sorry, no,” Janet said. “Florence didn’t bring them, although it certainly looks like she’s been doing some rearranging in the library. We’ll keep you posted.”
Hobbs laid his tiles on the board one by one. “DUILICH. That’s seventeen for the word—with the H receiving double points—and the whole word doubled for the opening hand, plus the fifty-point bonus for using all seven tiles. Put me down for eighty-four points, please.”
“Meaning?” Christine demanded.
“Sorry.” Hobbs drew seven more tiles then, after arranging them on his rack, glanced up to see the three women looking at him, waiting. “Ah, I see the problem. Duilich is Gaelic for sorry.”
Janet thought he looked unusually pleased with himself. Ab-norman-ly pleased. She chortled.
“What’s so funny?” Christine asked.
“Nothing,” Janet said. “Duilich. Hm. I don’t see much I can do, and I can only use three tiles, but there.” She arranged them using Hobbs’s D. “DAZE. The Z gets triple points for a total of thirty-four. Not too shabby.”
“You’ll see, Norman,” Tallie said. “We’ll give you a run for your money.” She put out four letters and spelled QUICK using the C in DUILICH, and then clinked her sherry glass against her mother’s. “Triple letters for the Q and the K. Fifty total.”
Christine’s mouth grew small for her turn. “Lousy luck and a lousier draw,” she muttered. As a mutter, she might have been talking to herself, but as mutters go it was less subtle than most. Her subsequent mutters weren’t subtle either. “I haven’t anything useful and I find games that hinge on this kind of luck irritating.” She blew out a breath. “Simply awful.” She tossed two tiles on the board and jabbed them into place to the left of the E in DAZE. “SEE for a whopping four points. The S is on a double letter square.”
“You’ve shorted yourself,” Hobbs said. “That’s a double word square, not a double letter, so you have a whopping six points.”
“You’re wonderfully accurate,” Janet said, bracing for steam to jet from Christine’s ears or nostrils.
“Three guesses,” Tallie said as she went down the back hall to answer. “And if the answer is nosy neighbor, you get the fifty-point bonus.”
Janet knew Tallie was almost certainly right. Ian only ever came to the back door. Janet had a theory about this backdoor preference that had nothing to do with Ian’s combined nosiness and sneaking ways and everything to do with the front door. She liked to think the door knocker—a lovely antique brass wolf’s head holding the knocking ring in its teeth—scared the bejeebers out of him.
They heard the door open and then the disingenuous voice of Ian Atkinson. “I say, Tallie. A braw bricht moonlicht nicht the nicht, what? Do you mind if I step in out of it? And I’d like to borrow a cup of sugar if you have such a thing. I’m making pudding. A lovely thing called spotted dick.”
Janet braced herself again, this time for an explosion at the back door. There was only a minuscule pause, though, before she heard Tallie’s curt, “Sure,” and two sets of footsteps. The lighter set went into the kitchen. The heavier tread came to the living room door.
“Evening, all,” Ian said, leaning artfully against the doorjamb. “Absolutely oorlich out there. Did I get that right, Constable? Damp and nippy?”
“Aye, brilliant.”
“Grand. Glad to have friendly neighbors. A spot of Scrabble? Jolly good.”
“Here you go, Ian.” Tallie handed him a container. “You might want to check your recipe. Pretty sure spotted dick only calls for a third of a cup.”
“Does it? Well, perhaps I’m making a triple batch. Cheerio the noo.”
After they heard the back door close behind him, Tallie went to lock it.
“Cheers,” she said when she sat back down. She held up her sherry glass and drained it. “There. I believe I’ve earned a hundred bonus points for not jabbing Ian in the nose in front of a constable.”
“The constable might deserve the bonus points for keeping the peace just by being here,” Janet said. “Or you can split it.”
“The constable has earned his own bonus,” Hobbs said. “It is my turn, is it not? In that case . . .” He laid out his tiles, working down from the first I in DUILICH. “IARRAIDH. That’s thirteen points for the word—the second A earning double points—and the word tripled to make thirty-nine points, plus the fifty-point bonus for using all seven of the tiles. Add on four for building off of Christine’s SEE to make SEER. Put me down for ninety-three points, please. Oh, and iarraidh means asking for, seeking, searching. Enquiry.”
“You know more Gaelic than you let on,” Christine said.
“A word or phrase here and there and nothing really practical. It’s not the same as knowing the language. Only enough to be dangerous.” Hobbs took out his phone and snapped a photo of the board.
“What are you doing?” Christine asked.
“I’ll send it to my sister. She’ll be chuffed.” He definitely looked chuffed.
Christine, meanwhile, had cut a few slices of the cheese she’d brought. She put some on an oatcake for herself and then passed the board. “Cheese, Norman? It’s Janet’s favorite—Isle of Mull Cheddar.”
While Janet waited for the cheese board to come to her, she saw Christine glance at the cats on the couch. And then, ever so slyly, Christine broke off a corner of her cheddar and dropped her left hand below the edge of the table. Her upper arm remained almost stationary but not quite. Janet watched that upper arm as it moved ever so slightly left and right and left again, and she had a hunch that if she looked under the table, she would see Christine trailing her hand back and forth. Janet heard the telltale thump of Smirr jumping down from the couch and, sure enough, there he, and then Butter, came, sniffing toward Christine.
Christine moved the tiles on her rack and seemed wholly unaware she’d lured two interested parties to her cheese hand. Tallie and Hobbs, enjoying their cheese and oatcakes, were more believably unaware. Janet saw Christine’s verifying sidelong glances.
Tallie passed the cheese board to Janet. Janet—seeing Christine casually bring her left hand, still with cheese, up onto the table—guessed it would be prudent to hold the cheese board up off the table. Her prudence was immediately rewarded. Smirr leaped nimbly into the middle of the table. Butter scrambled after, upsetting Hobbs’s tile rack. (Or was that a flick of Christine’s hand?)
“Oh, for Heaven’s—here, you two,” Janet said. “Get down, darlings.”
“Is the smaller one playing football with the tiles?” Hobbs asked. “Or maybe they’ve taken up curling and the older one is brushing the ice with his tail.”
“Either way, it looks like the game is over,” Christine said. “And just when it was going so well. What a shame. Have you got a nice treat for the moggies, Tallie?”
“Mingin’ Mackerel Morsels,” Tallie said. “They’re crunchy, fishy, and extremely smelly, so they must be good. Come along, laddies,” she called and went to the kitchen.
Christine scooped up Butter and followed Tallie, leaving clean-up of the Scrabble tiles to Janet and Hobbs.
“Did you see that?” she asked Tallie when they were in the kitchen.
“What? You teaching the cats to jump up on tables after food?”
“Havers. I could never teach such a good kitten bad manners.” Christine kissed Butter on the head and set him down next to Smirr at their food dishes. “Did you see the way our plan is going? Norman is completely lulled now that we’ve let him have a taste of winning. But it’s payback time.”
“Please remember,” Tallie said, pointing at herself. “Still a licensed attorney. You aren’t planning to bend a law and compromise a constable, are you?”
“We’ll be fine. Just follow my lead.” Christine patted Tallie’s cheek and turned to go.
“Hold on. What about him?”
“I’ll merely offer suggestions. He’s bright enough. He’ll pick up on them. I’m not sure it’s humanly possible for him to live long enough to ever live down the Incident of the Undisclosed Nana, but don’t worry, he’ll be fine, too.”
12
Hobbs had replaced the tiles on the game board.
“It was easy enough to re-create,” Janet said when Tallie and Christine returned to the living room. “We weren’t that far into the game and Norman has the picture he snapped.”
Hobbs held up his phone. “No doubt there’s mention of such catastrophes in the official rules and how to deal with them,” he said.
“No doubt,” Christine echoed.
“We thought it would be fair if we all draw tiles again,” he continued. “And may I wish better luck in your draw this time, Mrs. Robertson.”
“Always nice to have a bit of excitement, though,” Tallie said.
“The Case of the Mysterious Moggie Mayhem,” Janet murmured as she chose her tiles.
Christine pushed her rack away and sat back. “But my heart’s not in it. I’m that worried about Florence.”
“She’s right, Norman,” Janet said. “We’re all worried about her. And you’re right not to spread gossip, but—”
“But we’re not asking you to spread gossip,” Christine said. “We’re asking you to listen to our impressions of her situation and her state of mind.”
“What you call her state of mind might be the way she processes death,” Hobbs said. He looked with some regret at the tiles he’d chosen and then pushed his rack aside, too.
“We realize that,” Christine said. “And we appreciate you taking us seriously. Did you follow up on her claim that Malcolm came home after the ride and then went out again?”
“It’s the determination of the Road Policing Unit that he died earlier in the day and that he could not have returned home as his sister says. In her distress over his death, she might have fabricated his return.”
“Is their determination based on autopsy results?” Tallie asked. She watched his face. “Or autopsy results among other things?”
Janet saw the least bit o
f a nod at Tallie’s second question. She asked Hobbs, “Have you heard anything more about what they thought I might have picked up or moved?”
“My experience was similar to yours—they were not forthcoming.”
“Do you think it’s something they expected to find but didn’t?” she asked.
“If they knew how conscientious you are about trying to do your public duty, I’m sure they would appreciate it,” Hobbs said. “But if you didn’t pick up or move anything, then there’s no further need for you to worry about it. Is there perhaps a wee bit more sherry?”
Which obviously means we’ve reached the end of that conversational thread, Janet thought. She was glad when Tallie picked up the sherry bottle and picked at another thread.
“Did we tell you that Florence says she won’t mourn Malcolm?” Tallie asked as she refilled their glasses. “She said ‘good riddance.’ That seems to contradict the idea that in her distress she imagined him coming home.”
“She might just be putting up a good front,” Hobbs said. “Trying to be tougher than she is. Another thought—fabrications aren’t always the result of happy memories.”
“That’s part of what worries us,” Christine said.
Hobbs’s phone buzzed with a text. They watched as he read it, made a barely audible “tsk,” and slid the phone back in his pocket.
“Nothing urgent?” Tallie asked.
“Lachlann Mòr overdid it. Mòr meaning big,” Hobbs said to Janet and Tallie. “It isn’t his name, but it’s what he’s called—Big Lachlann—and it’s how he does things.”
“Like drinking too much?” Christine asked. “Is he blootered?”
“I shouldn’t think so. That would not be like him.”
“Aren’t you curious?” Janet asked. “You can step into the kitchen for privacy if want to phone.”
“It’ll keep. His wife gets in a state from time to time. Premonitions, as she calls them. Best to ignore.”
“Is this gossip, Norman?” Christine asked. “Shall I be aghast?”