Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Lily hadn’t moved when a message came through from Flynn, asking how her day was going.
It was difficult to know how to reply to that. Telling him she’d fallen out of a tree and been ravaged by every branch on the way down would raise a lot of questions.
Saying her day was going well would be a pretty juicy lie.
Fine, she wrote in the end. A definite twist of the truth, but compared to some people’s day it might seem all right. Though she’d certainly feel sorry for those poor people.
Busy? he asked.
Yeah.
Me too. Talk to you later.
She sent him a row of kisses and shoved her phone back into her pocket, wincing at the movement.
The phone vibrated again immediately, and she groaned as she pulled it out. Len’s name flashed on the screen.
“Just wanted to check in,” he said when she answered. “Any new developments in the case?”
“I keep hitting dead ends,” she said, relieved at being able to talk about it.
“What have you found out?”
“I’ve ruled out all the guests at the retreat.”
“Oh.” He sounded disappointed. “Where do we go from here then?”
She smiled at his use of ‘we’ – as though they were in it together.
“I don’t know. It seems I’ve probably been looking in the wrong place all along. Anyone could have dropped that pencil at Hilary’s place.”
“It seems odd, though. Even if lots of people have the pencils, most people wouldn’t carry them around, would they? Not unless they’d only just been given it.”
“What should I do, ask Gideon for a list of everyone he’s given them out to?”
“Good luck with that. The man is utterly chaotic. I can’t imagine he remembers who he’s given them to.”
“What do you mean he’s chaotic?”
“He’s a bit of a wool gatherer sometimes. Also, if you saw the state of his place, you’d know exactly what I mean by chaotic. Not that I’m one to talk.”
“I’ve seen it, actually.”
He gave a surprised grunt. “He doesn’t usually let anyone in.”
“I kind of barged in. I wanted to look for the stolen goods, but I didn’t get further than the hallway before he marched me out again. That’s actually the only part of the retreat I haven’t searched.” She paused. “Does he let you in there?”
“No. I just see in through the windows when I’m cleaning.”
“Oh.” She hadn’t thought about him doing the windows at that side of the house.
As she struggled to get off the floor, she let out an involuntary whimper.
“Are you okay?” Len asked.
“Yeah.” She breathed deeply through her nose until the pain subsided.
“Are you sure? It sounded as though you were crying.”
“I just… I have a slight injury but I’m fine.” She half walked, half staggered around the back of the house. “The window is open,” she stated.
“What did you say?”
“Gideon left a window open at the back.”
“You’re at his place?”
“Yes. I thought maybe Silas was stashing stolen goods in the tree, but he’s not. I was about to leave when you rang.”
“What were you saying about an open window?”
“I was thinking I could nip in and have a quick look around, but the window’s high, and I’ve done as much climbing as I can manage today. I don’t think I’ll make it up the drainpipe.”
“If only you knew a guy with a ladder,” he said mockingly.
Lily’s mind raced. With a ladder, it would be easy to get inside for a poke around.
“I assume no one is there?” Len asked.
“No, they’re painting on a beach somewhere.”
“Do you know when they’re due back?”
“From what Martha said, I guess not for an hour at least. Maybe two.”
“Plenty of time then. I’m on my way now. I’ll be five minutes.”
Lily started to speak, but the line had gone dead. She wasn’t sure what she wanted to say anyway, but she had her thoughts in order by the time Len’s van pulled onto the drive.
He got straight to work getting the ladder off the roof, then carried it on his shoulder round the back of the house while Lily limped along beside him.
“I’m not sure about this,” she said.
“I thought it was the only place you hadn’t looked.”
“It is, but climbing in through an upstairs window seems like crossing a line. Usually, when I sneak into places, it’s through unlocked doors, or onto boats and stuff. This feels like taking things too far.”
“It won’t take long. We can be in and out before anyone notices. And if Gideon happens to come back, I can say I got confused about my cleaning schedule.”
“I don’t know.” She swallowed hard while he lined his ladder up beside the open window.
With a hand on a rung, he turned to look at her and flinched.
“Blooming heck, Lily. What happened to you?”
“It’s nothing.”
“It doesn’t look like nothing. It looks as though you…”
“Fell out of a tree?” she suggested.
“That wouldn’t have been my first guess, but now that you mention it.” He smiled sympathetically. “Do you need to see a doctor? We can give up on this plan, and I’ll drive you to the medical centre.”
“No. I’m okay. I don’t know if we should break into his house, but I don’t need a doctor.”
“You might be right that we’re going too far. Did I get carried away?”
“I think so. Which is weird because it’s usually me that dives headfirst into these sorts of crazy schemes.”
He nodded repeatedly. “I think I just got caught up in the idea of catching the thief.”
“It’s probably not Gideon anyway. He has no motive for robbing locals.”
“Apart from being resentful that he has to live here and entertain wannabe artists instead of living an artist’s dream in London as he’d like to. But if you don’t consider that… and his bitterness that no one here buys his artwork… set all that aside and I can’t think of any motive whatsoever.”
“But he chose to live here. He likes the tranquillity.”
“Codswallop! He came back from London with his tail between his legs because he couldn’t make a living there. No one was interested in his art there, any more than they are here.”
“That’s not what he told me.”
“That’s hardly a surprise. Every man has his pride.” He moved to pull the ladder away from the wall. “Let’s get out of here before anyone catches us.”
Lily stopped him with a hand on the ladder. “I could have a really quick look,” she said, her foot already on the first rung. “You wait out here and keep watch.”
Ignoring the pain that throbbed along the entire right side of her body, she climbed the ladder as quickly as possible.
The large window was easy to step through, though she knocked a small cactus off the windowsill when she climbed in.
Quickly, she scooped the spilled soil back into the pot and dispersed the rest with her shoe.
She got a shock when she straightened up to find Len at the top of the ladder.
“I thought you were keeping watch,” she said, her voice instinctively quiet.
“We’ll be quicker if we both look. Besides, I don’t want you taking all the credit if it turns out that Gideon is the thief.” He flashed her a playful grin and shot across the kitchen. “You check in here. I’ll make a start on the bedroom.”
Working with an accomplice felt odd, and she didn’t love being told what to do, but she got straight to work anyway, rifling through drawers and cupboards.
Finding nothing, her gaze swept over the assorted junk in the room. The backpack shouldn’t be too difficult to spot.
With nothing obvious in the kitchen, she headed into the hallway.
“Any luck?” she whisper-hissed to Len.
“Nothing yet,” he replied.
Lily moved into the small living room and sighed at the mess. “How would you even tell if there were stolen goods?” she muttered. “At least he probably won’t notice if we leave something out of place.”
“What was that?” Len asked, appearing beside her, apparently thinking she’d been talking to him.
“I don’t even know where to start.” The piles of books and magazines were all over the place, some seeming to act as tables with a glass or mug balanced on top.
Her eyes went to the side of the couch where the sunlight reflected off a shiny object on the floor.
“Look at that,” she whispered, crouching to look at the necklace.
Len loomed beside her. “How are we supposed to know if that’s stolen property or just more of his junk?”
Lily squinted, trying to get a better look at the pendant without touching the necklace. “I think Hilary said the one taken from her place was a silver heart with a blue stone.”
“Is that a silver heart?” Len asked.
“Yes. But that doesn’t mean it’s Hilary’s.”
“Why not send her a photo and ask?”
Lily straightened up and felt another jolt of pain. “Because if she knows we found it, she’ll expect us to return it. But we can’t do that since we’re not supposed to be here.”
“What was your plan then? For if we found something?”
She rubbed the bump on her head. “I have a habit of not thinking things through that far. Hang on a second…” She paced the room while she pondered it, then she pulled out her phone.
“I’ll ask Hilary to describe the necklace.
I think she said she’d given the police a photo, so maybe she can give me that.
” The woman had talked so much that Lily hadn’t taken it all in, but she had a vague notion that she’d mentioned a photo.
“What do we do if it’s hers?”
She tapped on her phone, messaging Hilary. “Nothing for now. We leave it here, get out and don’t mention to anyone we were here. Then we’ll give the police an anonymous tip so they come and search.”
Len beamed. “You’re very good at this.”
“Thank you.” Her phone pinged, and she opened the message from Hilary, which included a photo of the stolen necklace. She zoomed in.
“It’s Hilary’s necklace,” she said after checking the one on the floor again.
“I don’t want to touch it, but I’d like to move it so Gideon doesn’t spot it…
” She nudged it with the toe of her shoe so it was a little more hidden by the stack of books.
“Gideon must have dropped it there by accident. I’m sure the rest of his stash isn’t far away.
” Her eyes darted around the room. If she could just get her hands on her backpack, she could put all this behind her.
“Time to go?” Len asked.
“Yes,” Lily replied. “I’m right behind you.” She went to the kitchen with him as though she intended to follow him right out. Instead, she waited until he was a couple of rungs down before she told him she just wanted to check something and darted back through the kitchen.
The backpack must be around somewhere. But as she scrambled through every inch of the living room and then the bedroom, she began to lose hope. Maybe there was an attic space. She couldn’t see anything obvious, though. Or perhaps there was a cellar.
“Lily!” Len hissed from outside. “Hurry up.”
“I’m coming,” she muttered dejectedly. Climbing back down felt like way more effort than going up. Partly because she was losing hope of ever finding her backpack and partly because her battered muscles were becoming stiffer by the minute.
“Sorry,” Len said when she was safely on the ground. “I thought I heard someone, but I think it was just hikers passing on the lane. Let’s get out of here. I’m getting twitchy now. I’ll drive you home.”
“I’d appreciate that,” she said, hobbling back to the van beside Len and his ladder.
“What happens now?” he asked on the drive across the island. “Should I leave everything to you?”
“Yes. Leave it to me,” she said wearily.
She whipped her head up abruptly. “I know you were joking earlier about me getting the credit, but we really can’t ever tell anyone what we just did.
It’s totally illegal. Also, it will be bad for business if people think you’ve been using your ladder to climb in people’s windows and trespass on their property. Even if Gideon is guilty.”
“Do you have any doubts about that?”
“The evidence is right there in his flat. But it won’t make any difference. Even if it was for a good cause, people won’t like what we did.”
“You’re right, of course. I’ll have to settle for being an unsung hero of this tale.”
She smiled lightly. “Sometimes that’s just the way it goes.”