Chapter Thirty-One
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
From the front hall, where I’m wiggling my feet out of my wet shoes, I can see that Amity and Wyatt have been busy.
The murder bulletin board is well populated.
In the middle is a photo of Tracy, from which red string fans out to photos of Gordon Penny, Dinda Roost, Lady Blanders, and Bert Lott.
The black question mark, Wyatt informs me before I head upstairs to change into dry clothes, is for the mystery man who may or may not have had a haircut and shave after Lady Blanders left the salon and may or may not be the same person who hid himself behind an umbrella when leaving the scene of the crime.
After changing into dry clothes, I watch from the couch as Wyatt and Amity add more photographs to the bulletin board—the salon chair with the extra-large black robe, the plastic face shield, the appointment calendar, the organic products, and, of course, Tracy herself, sprawled out on the floor as a corpse.
Wyatt tells me that Lady Blanders’s alibi checked out. Not only was she at the King George for dinner with her friend, but the ma?tre d’ even confirmed that she had snails.
“Apparently, she went to the loo during dinner and was in there for so long that they were all in a panic that the snails had gone off. He was hugely relieved that she was fine and that they hadn’t given food poisoning to the village’s most prominent resident.”
I tell them what I learned from Bert’s daughter.
Wyatt says, “Nice work, Watson,” and moves Bert’s picture closer to the center of the board. Arms folded, he stares at his handiwork as though if he looks hard enough, the solution is going to make itself known.
“So far we’ve got three people with possible motives and opportunity,” he says. “Gordon Penny is dependent on his ex-wife for money, is apparently still in her will, and stands to come into a nice bundle if she dies.”
“And he has a key to the building, as well as a wobbly alibi, being home alone,” Amity says.
“Next up,” Wyatt continues, “is Bert Lott, who seems to have been trying to evict Tracy in order to give the space to his daughter.”
“He’s also got a key to her place,” Amity says.
“And no alibi,” I say. “In fact, he lied, which seems very incriminating.”
“And finally, there’s Dinda Roost, who also has access to the salon and a motive to kill Tracy,” Wyatt says. “We shouldn’t eliminate her only because she’s not the sharpest tool in the box.”
“Right, and then there’s Dev,” Amity says. “Shouldn’t he be on the board too?”
“Yeah, put him on,” I say. “I don’t know if he has a motive, but he was cagey about his alibi. Said he was showering.”
And there I am imagining things again, this time Dev all sudsy in the shower. I’ve got to stop.
“When were you with Dev?” Wyatt asks.
I tell them about taking Dev’s mother home.
“You were in his house?” Amity says.
“We had tea.”
“You don’t like tea,” Wyatt says.
“But she likes Dev,” Amity says.
“Anyway, he said he showered and then went to work at the bar,” I say. “Which I suppose seems likely.”
“He easily could have slipped out of the bar for a little while, couldn’t he?” Wyatt says.
I know for a fact that he could. No one seemed bothered when he stepped out to walk me home.
“I can question him further.” I tell them about my plans to go with Dev to Stanage Edge the next day.
“Scrummy,” Wyatt says.
“This is an excellent subplot,” Amity says.
They both look at me, waiting for me to tell them more.
“It’s a hike, not a date.”
“Get a photo at least,” Wyatt says. “We want pinup boy on the board.”
Amity reminds me to be back from Hathersage in time for our turn in Tracy’s flat. We’re the last group to get in, which seems unfair, but Amity is not deterred.
“I’m sure we’re going to find answers there,” she says. “Unless we’ve all overlooked something dreadfully obvious, that’s where the key to this case is going to be.”
I assume we’re done for now and get up from the couch to go upstairs.
But Wyatt says, “Not so fast, young lady.” He flips around a second bulletin board, which was resting against the wall.
Smack in the middle is a photograph of me that one of them must have taken on the way to Hadley Hall.
It’s a bit blurry and not particularly flattering.
My hair is swooping up behind me on a gust of wind and I look tired and hungover.
Maybe because of the unusual angle, I see my mother in my face, which is rare.
Unlike me, she was fair and petite. But in this picture, I can see our wide-set eyes, short straight nose, and what I like to think of as our “gentle chin.” The unexpected resemblance lets me imagine her walking through this countryside with her quick strides, following a footpath across a meadow and striking up conversations with farmers and other walkers.
If she were here, she’d ask so many questions in her usual quest to charm everyone that she’d probably solve the fake crime without even trying.
Wyatt takes out a pile of index cards.
“Now what was in the story your mother used to tell you?”
Amity speaks up before I can answer. “Swans. Bluebells. Church with a crooked spire. Kippers.”
“Again, kippers were not in the story,” I say.
“Again, they’re English, so they stay,” Amity says.
She writes each thing on a card and tacks them all onto the board. She adds another that says “Searching for someone. Male? Female?” And she tacks on photographs of Gordon Penny and Bert Lott. When she sees my face, she shrugs and says, “We have to consider everything.”
“It’s not much,” Wyatt says. “Is there anything else here that’s reminded you of your mother?”
I think back over the day.
“It’s not really about my mother, but I bought an old book.” I show them Summer Term at Melling and explain why I purchased it.
“Your mother gave you an English book?” Wyatt says.
“She gave me old books all the time.”
“Nevertheless.” Wyatt writes “Melling School Book” and tacks it to the board. All the cards make this quest seem important, like we’re going to figure it out, but they add up to so little that it’s hard to take it seriously.
It’s still raining hard, so we decide to stay in for dinner and order pizza, which we agree is the best kind of savory pie. We drink a bottle of wine and come up with elaborate scenarios for Amity’s next romance novel.
“A beautiful bird-watcher leading a campaign to ban hunting in her country town goes head-to-head with the area’s best marksman, who turns out to be a soulful and bookish artist who’s been hunting since he was a kid and only kills what he’s going to eat,” Wyatt says. “Can she love an animal killer?”
“Soulful hunter sounds like an oxymoron,” Amity says.
“How about this,” I say. “A lonely female optician pines for the shy, distracted manager of the pet shop next door, whose only friend is the ancient boa constrictor that no one wants to buy. But when he realizes he needs glasses, he gets them from the optician next door. When he puts on his spectacles, he really sees the optician for the first time and falls madly in love.”
Amity laughs. “And he abandons the boa? That could be problematic. Animal lovers will cry foul, and everyone else will be creeped out by a protagonist with a snake fetish.”
“Do you ever write things from your own life?” I ask.
“Not really,” Amity says. “Whenever I write something real, it ends up sounding like bad fiction. The first time I wrote a romance, I tried using Douglas’s marriage proposal. Total flop.”
“It was a bad proposal?” I say.
“Not at all, it was very good.”
“Go on,” Wyatt says. “Please?”
Amity laughs.
“We were in Florida visiting Doug’s parents, and we fled to a Publix supermarket for some space and to escape the heat.
We were in the cereal aisle having a silly conversation about which of the eight billion cereals to choose.
There were so many things to consider: Does the bran in Raisin Bran make up for the excessive sugar around the raisins?
Why isn’t Lucky Charms in the candy aisle?
What’s so special about K? ” Amity touches the base of her neck like she’s fiddling with a necklace that used to be there.
“I was prattling on when Douglas took my hand and said he knew which one he wanted. ‘Say Grape-Nuts,’ I told him, ‘and you’ll break my heart.’ And he said, ‘I want only you, Amity, for all time.’ He pretended to slip a ring on my finger and there we were, kissing and crying in aisle five. ”
“Wow,” I say.
“Golly,” Wyatt says.
“But that,” Amity says, “was a long time ago.”
We sit in silence for a few moments, and then Wyatt says, “I think Douglas is a wanker.”
Amity puts a hand to her mouth, like she can’t believe what Wyatt said. But then she giggles and says, “Complete and total wanker.”
When I finally go upstairs to bed, I’m too wired to sleep.
I consider downloading one of Amity’s novels, but I’ve never been drawn to reading straight-up romance.
I’ve always figured they offer a false sense of what’s possible.
Also, they’re supposed to be an escape, but what about the letdown when you close the book and come back to reality?
I toss and turn and listen to the rain on the roof.
I wonder if it sounds the same from inside Dev’s cottage.
I can’t deny it, I liked being in his kitchen and talking to him.
Who knew a conversation could feel easy, sincere, and sexy at the same time?
I hope I didn’t overdo it, blabbing on about my mother.
But he wasn’t judgy at all, either of her for leaving or me for having been left.
I’m usually not drawn to people who seem entirely well-adjusted and stable, but there’s nothing boring about Dev, nothing at all.
I still can’t sleep, so I pick up my phone. There’s an email from Kim from our office account:
Cheerio, Cath, I hope all is well in merry England.
First things first, the display cases were installed and they don’t look crowded at all.
More important, I couldn’t bring myself to make lentil soup (it’s so gross) so I cooked up a batch of spicy Thai shrimp soup for Mr. G.
He was skeptical but said it was very interesting. So that’s good, right?
There’s also an email from Mr. Groberg.
Dearest Cath, I hope all is well and that the week will fly by, not only because that will be an indication that you are having fun (time flies when, you know) but because it will mean you’ll be home soon.
I don’t think I can survive another of Kim’s meals.
Thai soup for an old man? My mouth is still aflame.
Kim is entertaining (so much energy), but maybe not wise?
In other words, you are missed. And not only for your cooking.
I write them back, giving each a brief account of the murder and everyone I’ve met. It’s so many people, after only three days. It makes me realize how small my circle is at home and how little happens in a typical day.
I flip through the Melling School book, which is comfortably nostalgic, but I’m not in the mood to read about girls away at school. Finally, I turn to Murder Afoot.
The first chapter begins with Cuddy Claptrop, “stooped of back, bent of finger, and sly of expression” in his blacksmith shop, tidying his tools after his latest disaster of an apprentice left behind a mess.
Cuddy, muttering about the “indolent youth” who is more trouble than he’s worth, begins to put his things away.
This gives Roland Wingford an apparently irresistible opportunity to display the results of his extensive research into the art of forging.
Tools are named and described in excruciating detail.
Ball-peen hammers for spreading rivet heads, splitting punches for making swelled holes, flatters, and anvils.
Each has a purpose and a place. The effect is undeniably dull, but also pleasantly numbing.
As I read about chisels and drifts, I start to feel drowsy.
Murder Afoot may not be a page-turner, but it’s as good as a Xanax.