“It wouldn’t have been Ben.” Kathleen threw up her hands. “Why on earth would he come here pretending to be someone else?”
“He wouldn’t.” I smiled because it gave me something to do with my face. The vicar got up, patted his pocket, took out his book and crossed the room to the door. A moment later we heard a couple of thumps as he encountered some obstacle out in the hall. Then all was silent save for the ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece.
“Dudley’s always the same when he gets wrapped up in St. Ethelwort.” Kathleen sat back down. “If there was a man here this morning he was probably fair-haired and never said a word about a friend or divorce. No need for you to look so upset, my dear. Unless,” she said, eyeing me intently, “that problem you mentioned has to do with your marriage?”
“Ben and I had an argument last night.” I stared down at my hands. “He was very angry that I had given away all the stuff in his study. I hadn’t consulted him, you see, and I realize it was upper-handed of me. That’s why I’m here… oh, not because Ben is considering a divorce… it’s not that serious,” I squeaked out a laugh, “but I am really hoping that you will let me have everything back. You have every reason to be annoyed with me, but I am in this awful predicament.”
“You did explain to Ben that all donations go to highly worthy causes?” Kathleen could look her most fierce when not moving an inch.
Despite quaking on the inside, I answered boldly: “He knows that, but he’s pining. And I don’t want him miserable. The study is both his personal space and his workplace. I’m not sure he will be able to get anything done the way things are. He particularly hates the computer. The point, as I should have realized, is that stuff isn’t just… stuff. That old typewriter was his friend… his partner… his…” I floundered to a halt.
“I suppose I do understand,” Kathleen responded with a little more warmth in her voice. “How could I not, being married to Dudley with his obsession with St. Ethelwort. I’ll do what I can, Ellie, but I didn’t handle all the incoming and outgoing of the donations. That’s why cousin Alice was here, to help me with a job that became too much for one person. There are so many organizations in need. Some old, many of them fairly new. I couldn’t begin to list them off the top of my head. I’ll have to check through my records and Alice’s. She’s a most efficient woman.”
“That’s good.”
“Perhaps not given your situation. She may well have sent your stuff on its way without wasting time having it first unloaded here. We get very specific requests for items, and if yours fit the bill, well… you do see what I’m getting at, Ellie?”
“Could you let me know something, fairly soon?” I got dolefully to my feet. “If I had an address I could perhaps track the things down and offer to buy them back.”
“Let’s hope for the best.” Kathleen ushered me into the hall and hurried me into my raincoat. “They could well be in the church hall. We only have the overflow in the house. Now off you go,” she said, handing me my umbrella, “and try not to worry. Say a little prayer. But not to St. Ethelwort; from what I’ve read of his journals the man was frightfully long-winded, and might keep you talking all day.”
With this small sally she closed the vicarage door. Glad to see the back of me and be off to her appointment. Who could blame the poor overworked woman? I walked back along the Cliff Road heedless of the rain to enter the hall at Merlin’s Court, where Freddy appeared like a wraith at my elbow to announce that Mrs. Malloy was on the phone, sounding as though someone had just died.
Eight
“What’s wrong?” I held the receiver with one hand while struggling to get out of my raincoat with the other. I was chilled to the bone, but there was no one to notice except the twin suits of armor and neither one of them looked ready to clank across the Turkish rug with offers of a cup of tea. Freddy had disappeared into the kitchen. Seasoned eavesdropper that he was he didn’t have to be standing next to me to get the gist of my conversation with Mrs. Malloy. Whistling kettles and doors left open the merest wedge would be no deterrents if he chose to snoop. But it could be that he wasn’t in the mood to involve himself with my trials and tribulations, given his worries about his Mum.
“Never mind me.” Mrs. Malloy’s voice blasted in my ear. “What’s wrong with you? Don’t tell me that gunman found out where you live and is there this minute, threatening to shoot your head full of enough holes to turn it into a colander, if you don’t keep your trap shut? It’s alright,” she said, misinterpreting my silence, “I understand you can’t talk. Give one scream for ‘yes’ and two for ‘no’.”
“Please!” I finally managed. “Let’s not go taking last night too seriously. After talking to Freddy I’m convinced our visitor played us for a couple of idiots.”
“So that wasn’t a gun he shoved under our noses?” She laughed sarcastically. “What was it then, Mrs. H., a banana?”
“A toy one.”
“A toy banana?”
“No!” I tossed my raincoat on the floor and barely restrained myself from kicking it the length of the hall. “A toy gun.”
“Well, that makes a lot of sense, that does! But if Mr. Freddy Flatts says that’s the way things was who’m I to argue? Course, it could be said I was there and he weren’t, and it would be nice to think that you and me stood together as a team, especially now that things have taken such a nasty turn. But why should anyone consider my feelings? I’m just the woman that’s worked her fingers to the bone for you all these years, scrubbing and polishing on me poor worn-out knees.”
I didn’t remind her that she had always strictly adhered to the Chitterton Fells Charwomen’s charter (commonly referred to as the Magna-Char), which prohibited its members from performing any tasks above or below eye level. This was no time for petty bickering. “What sort of nasty turn?”
“Well, it’s like this,” she said, dropping her snotty tone, “I came down here to the office to water the plants and practice up on me typing and I wasn’t through the door when the phone rang. I picked it up all of a tremble, thinking it would be Milk ringing up to say he’d been stabbed coming out a bar.”
“And his wallet pinched by a one-legged jogger?”
“I’ll let that pass, Mrs. H., seeing it’s clear you’re having a bad day. Not made up with the hubby from the sound of it. But you’re about to feel downright ashamed of yourself.”
“I am?”
“That phone call was from the old Cottage Hospital in Mucklesby. Seems,” Mrs. M. continued with relish, “Lady Krumley was brought in last night after a car accident. I couldn’t get the gist of how bad she was because the woman phoning, some nurse I suppose, had one of those posh voices like someone talking Shakespeare.”
“What sort of an accident?” I asked stupidly.
“I just told you.”
“I mean did her ladyship collide with another vehicle or did she crash into a lamppost after being forced off the road? What I’m getting at is… was it really an accident or attempted murder?”
“So now you’re admitting it wasn’t all fun and games with that bloke last night? Change with the wind you do, Mrs. H., but I can’t stand here fussing with you all day. We’ve got to get down to that hospital. Don’t want the old girl sinking into a coma before we arrive, now do we?”
“She wants to see us?” I was struggling back into my raincoat.
“No, that nurse phoned for the weather report.” Mrs. Malloy’s sarcasm dripped through the receiver. “Her ladyship had told her to phone Jugg’s Detective Agency and keep ringing until someone answered. Poor soul! Sounds as though she’d worked herself up into a terrible state. Don’t suppose she’s meant to have visitors except for the immediate family.”