I followed them to the owner’s quarters, a cozy suite with a window overlooking the ocean. It was in a rounded turret and had a cute sitting area in the round part. The neutral shades of mocha and heather were soothing. I loved retreating here at the end of the day.
Millie had left quite a few of the antiques that decorated the room, but it also had some modern touches like a comfy microsuede sectional. I settled onto the couch and the cats jumped up beside me, looking expectantly from me to the cheese.
“I did promise you some, didn’t I?” I took the two small pieces and broke them up some more, then held one out to Nero, who sniffed it for what seemed like an hour before gently taking it.
“And you?” I held one out to Marlowe. She glanced at Nero who was still busy daintily eating, then sniffed twice and grabbed it.
I nibbled my piece and thought about the day. I was a bit disturbed by the conversation I’d overheard in the hallway. I certainly hoped people weren’t going to start spreading rumors about a murderous ghost. All the more reason to find the killer pronto.
But the murder investigation wasn’t the only thing I had on my plate. I had to juggle that along with my responsibilities for the town celebration. I had the ingredients for the loaf cake I planned to make all ready to go and I’d do another test run tomorrow morning. The pamphlets were already on the table. I just needed that book about the Oyster Cove Guesthouse history. Millie said that should be up here, so I put my snack down and went over to the antique oak bookcase in the turret part of the room.
Meow!
Nero hopped on top of the bookshelf and peered down at me.
“Where’s the book, buddy?” I waited for him to indicate the general location but all he did was stare at me.
“Okay…” I ran my fingers along the leather-bound spines of the books. Poetry.Uncle Tom’s Cabin. An Audubon Anthology. My fingers stopped at a large book.“Oyster Cove Town History. This must be it.”
Merooo… Marlowe stared at me from the back of the couch.
“Right, I thought so.” I took the book and flopped down on the couch. Nero trotted over. Both he and Marlowe seemed overly interested in the book, sniffing at it and putting their paws on it.
“You want to see what’s inside? I do too.” I opened the book, inhaling the vanilla scent of age-old paper. Inside were pictures of the guesthouse back in Jed’s day. It had been a large house but not nearly as large as it was now. Jed stood in front alongside a woman in a black dress with a voluminous skirt.
I pointed the woman out.“I guess this is Mrs. Jed.”
Nero smacked his paw on the page right above the description. Yep, Helena Biddeford. It was his wife.
“Maybe she’s the one who put him in the wall. What do you guys think?”
Meroo.
Marlowe pushed the edge of the book and it flipped to the next page.
“Going too slow for you?”
I flipped through, marveling at the old photos of the guesthouse and the town. Things had changed a lot over the centuries. There was a picture of a realistic drawing of Jedediah Biddeford with his family and household staff. He had his hand on a cane, the ring found on the skeleton clearly evident on his finger.
“I wonder which one of these children is Doris’s ancestor?” Doris hadn’t mentioned the name of the ancestor at the top of the Biddeford tree, but I looked at the inscription under the image anyway.
A familiar name caught my eye. Thomas Remington. Was that Myron’s ancestor?
I pulled the book closer to my face. He kind of looked like Myron. But this guy wasn’t a wealthy banker, he was a servant.
“Looks like Myron’s ancestor was Jedediah Biddeford’s butler,” I said out loud to the cats, who both were staring at me. “Funny how things work out, huh? He’s always boasting how his family was one of the first in Oyster Cove, but he makes it sound like they were part of the upper class.”
Meroo. Nero’s paw shot out and he riffled the pages, losing my place in the book.
“Yeah, I agree Myron sure is uppity considering where he came from.” I flipped back to the page just to double-check.
Meyawl! Marlowe whacked the cover of the book and I caught the pages before it snapped shut.
“Hey, I can’t read if—” Wait. Was their behavior an indication that I was on to something? They did have an uncanny way of knowing what was going on and it had seemed like they had helped me out during the last investigation, though I didn’t want to admit it at the time. Now that I’d spent more time with them, I was more inclined to consider that they might be smarter than everyone thought.
I broke off two more small pieces of cheese as a reward. I didn’t want to give them too much lest it upset their delicate systems. “I think you guys are trying to tell me something, aren’t you? Is this why Myron lied about being here last night? Does he have something to do with this?”
Meroo.
Merow.
The cats looked at me funny as if they didn’t understand what the reward was about, but they weren’t about to pass up cheese because they gobbled it down before head-butting my hand and practically shutting the book in their zeal to be petted.
Shutting the book wasn’t a bad idea. I didn’t need to read further. I was pretty sure I was onto something. Myron’s ancestor was the butler to Jedediah, and butlers always knew all their masters’ secrets. What if one of those secrets was the location of the treasure? And what if that location got passed down through the generations?
But if it had, wouldn’t someone have dug it up by now? Why would Myron wait so long and why was he over by the gazebo, which would be the least likely place for Jedediah to have buried it? Not to mention that Bob had been killed at the pond, which was very far from the gazebo. What if it was Myron who found the treasure and Bob who caught him and tried to take it? And did that mean there really was treasure after all?
Some of this didn’t add up, but one thing was fishy. Myron had lied about being here and if that didn’t indicate guilt about something, I didn’t know what did!
I might have to do some digging, but I knew one thing for sure—I was finally starting to understand what the cats were trying to tell me!
Nineteen
“Josie still does not quite understand what we are trying to tell her,” Marlowe said from her perch near the pantry the next morning as they watched Josie heat up the quiche in the oven.
“But at least she is open to the fact that we are trying to tell hersomething. She needs more work, but this is a start,” said Nero.
“Start schmart, she needs to listen to us now or she’s going to end up in trouble just like she did with the last murder.” Marlowe eyed the countertop where the dishes were drying. “We may need to do something drastic.”
Nero sighed.“I know. Unfortunately, she is going down the wrong path. She totally misinterpreted our hints about that history book. There are much more interesting suspects to pursue than Myron Remington.”
“True. Though it is interesting that his family was connected with the Biddefords. I thought I smelled something familiar on him too,” Marlowe said.
Nero glanced at the tortie as she strutted over to the countertop. Had Marlowe really developed such a keen sense of smell or was she just saying that to make herself seem smart? It was true Myron had smelled familiar, but it wasn’t because some ancestor had once worked in the house. No, Nero suspected there was an entirely different reason and he needed to clue Josie in on it.
“What are you kitties up to?” Josie stood hands on hips watching them. “Do you need a treat for all your good work last night?”
Nero gave her his most adorable head tilt.
Meow.
Josie opened the fridge and Marlowe hopped up onto the countertop and started batting at the dishes. Josie backed out of the fridge with a plate in her hand then scowled at Marlowe.“No, don’t do that. Especially not that Yale mug. Carla will have a fit.”
Josie picked Marlowe up and placed her on the floor then put down a small dish with some little bite-sized tidbits of steak inside.