Chapter Twelve
It was a simple misunderstanding!” said Miss Lettercross, wide-eyed and tearful.
“It was not,” Georgie said stonily. “It was, in fact, a crime that I’m half tempted to have you arrested for.
” This was not entirely true, merely because pressing charges against the Lettercrosses would draw police attention to what Georgie and Sebastian and Arthur and the Murder Tourists had been doing in Bramble-in-the-Vale that day, and she’d rather not have to answer any questions along those lines.
“With what proof?” Miss Lettercross asked, suddenly canny, and Georgie eyed her with some suspicion. Those rosy cheeks and guileless blue eyes masked a certain slyness that Georgie didn’t like in the slightest.
“I think my own testimony would provoke at least a few questions,” she shot back, and Miss Lettercross sighed.
“Miss Radcliffe, I cannot express to you what a shocking series of events this has been,” Mr. Lettercross put in at this juncture, with a stern look at his daughter.
Perhaps sensing that having the daughter of a local government official accused of kidnapping was not the best look for Bramble-in-the-Vale, he had been practically falling over himself to apologize from the moment the cellar door had been opened, and Georgie had noticed, with some uncharitable satisfaction, that despite his white, toothy smile, he had a rather weak chin that was prone to a bit of a wobble under stress.
“I’m certainly intrigued to hear you attempt to explain why Mr. Fletcher-Ford and I were drugged and left in a cellar by a member of your family,” Georgie said, smiling at him with some venom.
They were gathered in Mr. Lettercross’s office; Miss de Vere and Miss Singh occupied the two chairs that were clustered opposite the desk, whispering to each other excitedly, while Arthur was leaning against one wall, notebook and pen in hand, scribbling furiously away.
Mr. Lettercross and his daughter were behind his desk, the latter perched on the arm of the chair her father occupied, while Sebastian was looking out the window at the throngs of Murder and Not-Murder Tourists who lined Bramble-in-the-Vale’s winding streets and the grassy slopes of its quaint canals.
“It was an accident,” Miss Lettercross insisted, sounding a bit annoyed. “It wasn’t as though I was going to leave you in that cellar to rot!”
“How,” Georgie asked, “does one ‘accidentally’ drug a pot of tea?”
“And stow a couple of unconscious bodies in a cellar?” Miss de Vere added, with the confidence of a woman who has read many—perhaps too many—crime novels.
Miss Lettercross narrowed her eyes at Miss de Vere, clearly under the mistaken impression that the Murder Tourist was the sort of woman who was easily cowed.
“And why,” Arthur added, his attention still on the notebook in his hand, “did you happen to have sleeping powder so conveniently at hand?”
Georgie smiled thinly. “I believe I can answer that one. You see, one might keep such a thing around if one were planning to write an article about it.”
Arthur’s pen stilled. “Write about it?”
“Yes,” Georgie said, her attention still fixed on Miss Lettercross. “Isn’t that right, Agent Arsenic?”
Miss Lettercross dropped a glass of water onto her lap, prompting some colorful language.
Arthur glanced at Georgie, his expression startled, and she gave him a small shrug.
“You learn interesting things while trapped in a cellar.” He raised an eyebrow at her and returned his attention to his notebook, his pen now moving at lightning speed.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Miss Lettercross said, not remotely convincingly. “I suppose all those murders in your crime-ridden little village have left you seeing intrigue wherever you look—”
“I don’t have to look very hard for it,” Georgie pointed out dryly, “considering it only took me half an hour in your company to find myself unconscious in a cellar.”
Miss Lettercross deflated.
“I’m sure this, er, misunderstanding is something that we’re all eager to put behind us in… whatever way that might be possible,” Mr. Lettercross said.
Georgie regarded him stonily. “Was it a misunderstanding? Was your daughter not, perhaps, trying to create another crime worthy of reporting on, since news has been scarce of late?”
Miss Lettercross rolled her eyes. “Please. As if I’d want to report on a crime in Bramble-in-the-Vale! Our village is a peaceful respite where the tourists may return after a day of walking your grim, crime-ridden streets—”
“I think Buncombe-upon-Woolly is adorable,” Miss Singh said. “And I have never once felt unsafe!”
“Except for the time we walked into the village library right as their crime book club was meeting, and Miss Halifax was describing the effects of arsenic in too much detail,” Miss de Vere said with a shudder. “I wasn’t convinced she didn’t have some in her pocket, just to experiment with.”
Georgie cleared her throat, thinking that they were perhaps veering a bit far from the topic at hand. “If you weren’t trying to create a mystery worth writing about, then would you mind explaining why you kidnapped us?”
“I panicked, once I realized you were investigating,” Miss Lettercross said, sounding disgusted with herself.
“I was suspicious as soon as I realized who you were—and all the questions about the Dispatch set me on edge—but when I went to get tea, I waited on the other side of the door a bit to listen, and I realized you were searching my father’s office. ”
“I knew I heard footsteps,” Georgie murmured to herself, before shaking her head and saying, “And you somehow thought drugging and kidnapping us would make us less suspicious?”
“Did you miss the bit where I said that I panicked?” Miss Lettercross asked, sounding very testy indeed.
“I couldn’t simply let you prance off home—not when it seemed likely you might have worked out who I was.
” She shrugged. “It was easy enough to offer the butcher’s apprentice a pound to help me drag you down into the cellar to keep you out of sight, and I thought I’d simply ask my father what to do about you when he returned.
I thought we could attempt to reason with you somehow, after the sleeping powder wore off.
You woke up sooner than I anticipated,” she added, casting a reproachful look at Georgie and Sebastian.
Miss de Vere tutted. “Agatha Christie was right! English villages are simply full of would-be criminals!”
“I’m not a criminal,” Miss Lettercross said indignantly, shooting her a withering look. “I’m a journalist.”
“I don’t think the profession wants to claim you,” Arthur said, shaking his head.
“You’re simply jealous because I have a broader readership than you.”
“You don’t,” he shot back, looking outraged. “Besides, no one believes your articles full of wild speculation and conspiracy theories.”
“I am merely giving a voice to the eager public, ravenous for information,” Miss Lettercross said smugly.
“Where do you get your information?” Georgie asked sharply. “Not the conspiracy theories, I mean—the actual details of the crime scenes. You seem to know things that no one who wasn’t present at the time of the murders would know.”
Miss Lettercross folded her hands. “I have my sources.”
“Would you mind expanding on that?” Arthur asked. “Because, naturally, in the exposé of The Deathly Dispatch I plan to write, it would be unfortunate if I had to accuse its publisher of being a criminal….”
Miss Lettercross blanched. Next to her, Mr. Lettercross’s chest swelled with indignation.
“Now, see here, young man,” he blustered. “I will see you in court for libel if you attempt to accuse my daughter—”
“Of doing exactly what she’s actually done?” Arthur finished for him. “Somehow, I like my chances.”
“Oh, for—” Miss Lettercross began, and then broke off, shaking her head. “Detective Inspector Harriday is my source!”
“Detective Inspector Harriday,” Georgie repeated.
“Yes,” Miss Lettercross said impatiently. “We’ve been walking out together, and with a little, ahem, enticement, he told me all sorts of details about the cases.”
“He’s an old family friend,” Mr. Lettercross explained. “Grew up here in the village.” Arthur was scribbling furiously, and Mr. Lettercross cast an anxious look at him. “However, I would hate for any of this to damage his career—”
“I wonder how he’d feel if we phoned the police, and he learned that his paramour likes to engage in a bit of kidnapping in her spare time?” Georgie said thoughtfully, and both Lettercrosses looked even more alarmed.
“Or we could simply let my article do the talking,” Arthur murmured, not looking up from his notebook.
“Very true,” Georgie agreed, nodding.
“Miss Radcliffe,” Mr. Lettercross said, a note of desperation creeping into his voice, “I understand that this has been extremely distressing—especially coming on the heels of such a violent crime wave—”
“Now, now,” Sebastian interjected smoothly.
He had been silent for several minutes, leaning against the windowsill with his arms crossed across his chest. In his white suit, he looked the very picture of a wealthy tourist at ease, if one ignored the dirt on one cheekbone, and the wrinkled, smudged state of his trousers.
“In my experience, both Miss Radcliffe and Mr. Crawley are very reasonable people, and I’m sure they’d hate to spoil the reputation of an upstanding family in a friendly neighboring village.
” Both Lettercrosses looked at Sebastian now like shipwreck victims who had spotted a life raft.
“In fact, I daresay Mr. Crawley could be convinced to, ahem, ignore this little out-of-character transgression, if he were granted an interview with the one and only Agent Arsenic… who would, without revealing her identity, admit to spreading conspiracy theories, and reveal police leaking of information that was not intended to be public.”
Miss Lettercross looked flustered. “If you reveal Detective Inspector Harriday—”