Two Birds with One Stone (A Marsden-Lacey Cozy Mystery Book 1) (13 page)

“Ladies, calm yourselves. It
’
s the
police. We
’
re working to get the lights back on,”
a male voice said
firmly.

Lights flared, bringing the reception area into full
illumination. There stood Helen, Martha, and DCI Johns all with disheveled
clothes, wild hair and in the case of the two women, slightly crazed looks
beginning to melt into simple, “Oh God, what have we done”
expressions.

Four uniformed officers were stationed along the wall
attempting to maintain their composure at the Chief
’
s
ruffled appearance after being attacked by the two terrified,
toilet-brush-brandishing women. The officers busied themselves with whatever
tasks they could find.

“Take these two and put them in a nice, strong cell at the
station,”
Johns
commanded.

“What?”
Helen and Martha asked in unison.

He ignored them and pointed toward the entrance with a
jabbing gesture which indicated to his subordinates to respond to his
directions with immediacy.

A woman officer and a middle-aged male officer quickly
walked over to Helen and Martha and motioned for them to follow them outside.
Johns had already walked away towards the library.

“
Wait!
”
Martha yelled after him. “Don
’
t you want to know
what happened to us in there?”

Johns turned around and took a solid stance in the hallway.
He compressed his lips tightly in an expression of determination and focused
his eyes menacingly on Martha. “Madam, tomorrow I will discuss with you many
things, but first you will be treated to a private accommodation, a simple meal
and a lumpy cot compliments of the Marsden-Lacey Constabulary.”

And with that announcement, DCI Johns turned on his heels
and walked like a bull-dog into the library.

Once Martha and Helen were firmly ensconced in the back of a
police car and rolling toward the village and their confinement, Helen turned
to Martha and said, “Your instincts stink.”

“Yeah?”
Martha asked truculently.

“Yeah.”
Helen said firmly.

Chapter 23

MARSDEN-LACEY
’
S CONSTABULARY WAS NOT a
typical police station. It was housed in a honey-colored stone building built
in the late Georgian period. Due to the efforts of two former inmates who
needed to keep busy and recognized the desperate need to improve the aesthetics
of the place, the building
’
s facade and its surrounding
garden was a picture postcard image of English flower baskets, climbing roses
and tidy garden beds full of flowering plants and shrubs.

It hadn
’
t always been so. Four years
ago the station
’
s curb appeal had dwindled to an all-time
low and was in serious need of a pick-me-up. Along came the two aforementioned
horticultural enthusiasts, Perigrine Clarke and Alistair Turner.

While being held in connection with a counterfeiting crime
ring, Perigrine and Alistair quickly became bored sitting in their cells and
requested to be allowed to work on the garden beds around the station. Chief
Johns had them shackled and allowed them to work wherever they pleased. They
were dedicated gardeners.

Their work won them the coveted Lord Litton Village
Improvement Award in 2008 and they were allowed to attend the ceremony on a
day-out pass accompanied by Chief Johns, also a gardening enthusiast.

Only once did Perigrine and Alistair toy with the idea of
escape. Their award and their excellent behavior earned them a great deal of
freedom about the station. It was this freedom that worked on their minds. They
had conceived the plan for a new pave-stone path wrapping around the
constabulary working its way out toward the back garden. As the path was
reaching the outer limits of the garden, it was Alistair who gave voice to the
thought in both their minds: “Perry, dear, we have been toiling away on this
garden for nearly six months and I miss the outside. Lets hop the wall.”

“Not this time, Alistair.”
Perigrine lay down his spade. “I
’
ve been thinking
the same thing and I
’
m pretty sure we have both jumped on
this pave-stone idea because we were getting antsy. We can
’
t
make a run for it. I want to go straight.”

That is exactly what they did. Once their sentence was up,
they bought the garden center next door. They continued to maintain the
constabulary partly because they were community-service-minded ex-criminals but
also because it adjoined their garden center and they didn
’
t
want an eyesore to detract from their exquisitely-maintained grounds.

Fortunately for the village, most crime was limited to a few
muggings, petty thefts, shoplifting, and vandalism. The murder at The Grange
and the attack on Piers Cousins had sent the village into a tizzy of gossiping
and speculation. Everyone was enjoying themselves discussing the threats to
their lives and recounting the story until no one could have given a fair
account of the actual happenings if they had been asked. On the plus side, the
lurking, homicidal menace had actually brought people closer.

Needless to say, DCI Johns couldn
’
t go
anywhere without being asked how his investigation was going by the more polite
denizens or chided and teased by the scrappier villagers. But because most,
including the young toughs, respected their Chief Inspector, they had
confidence in his abilities and felt secure in their homes at night.

It was at this quaint and attractive police station that
Helen and Martha were incarcerated and spent an uneventful night. In fact, the
station was comfortable and homey.

Constable Waters, an extremely intelligent mother of two
young boys, had made them comfortable. She made them tea and shared some of the
homemade lemon bread she brought in that day.

Since there weren
’
t any other boarders
for the night besides Sam, Martha
’
s marketplace mugger,
Constable Waters doubled up the pillows and blankets for the girls
’
cots and loaned them some of the magazines from the front office.

At about eight the next morning there was a knock then a
rattle of the bolt on the girls’
cell doors.

“Time to wake up, ladies. DCI Johns wants to see you in
about twenty minutes. He
’
s had your breakfasts sent up
from his mother, Polly. Looks delicious,”
Constable Waters said.

The door opened
to Martha’s cell and
there stood Helen looking tidy as usual.

“I
’
m starving,”
Martha said. “I
’
ve
probably lost ten pounds since this affair began. Hmm, maybe fighting crime
works for losing weight.”

Helen was quiet so Martha thought she might still be a bit
peevish about being locked up all night.

They walked down the hall to a hopefully delicious
breakfast. Once they were alone in the interrogation room and Donna (Constable
Waters) had gone to fetch their meals, Helen, facing Martha across a small
wooden table, hurriedly said in a low voice, “Don
’
t
mention the manuscript yet, okay?”

“Why?”
Martha asked looking a bit perplexed by the necessity of withholding
such an unconnected piece of information from the Chief.

“I want a chance to look it over. Please wait and pray no
one has ransacked your car,”
Helen pleaded in a whisper.

“What do you think it is?”

“I think it is something fantastically rare and…”

Helen hesitated but Martha pushed her saying, “Yeah, you
think it’s rare? But what?”

“Well, I
wasn
’
t
sure if we should relinquish it yet.”

“
No problem,
”
Martha said. It was the least she
could do since she had thoroughly messed up last night with the instinct thing.
“We will need to explain ourselves about being in The Grange last night. Johns
is probably still absolutely furious with us.”

They didn
’
t get a chance to finish
their conversation because the door swung open and there stood DCI Johns
looking at them with a sour expression suggesting he hadn
’
t
slept much last night. Over one eye was a small adhesive bandage. Both Helen
and Martha cringed outwardly as it triggered memories of attacking the Chief.

“So, let me see,”
he said as he entered the room and placed a covered plate before each of
them, “contaminating a crime scene, assaulting an officer, removing evidence
from a crime scene, and these are just a few of the things I
’
m
charging you with as of last night.”

DCI Johns smiled and sat down, making himself comfortable on
one of the other chairs at the table. He took a bite of his breakfast, a
substantial piece of Constable Waters
’
lemon bread.

Martha put her head in her hands and moaned while Helen
’
s face was more like a stroke victim
’
s in
that she seemed completely unresponsive.

After a few long moments, Martha recovered herself and
asked, “Removing evidence? What evidence did we remove?”

“You removed a laptop from Mr. Cousins
’
house and
took it to him at the hospital. You took a piece of cloth from its location on
the garden wall. Removing it, handling it and basically contaminating the
scene, did you not?”

“Was that wrong?”
Helen asked. “We gave the cloth to you.”

“Yes, that was wrong!”
bellowed Johns. “So wrong that I
’
ve given thought
to charging you and requesting your bail be set at the highest possible limit.
Your actions may have allowed for important evidence to be lost in a homicide
case.”

Martha and Helen practically swayed in their chairs from
Johns
’
angry blast.

Martha recovered first and came back at him. “We get it but
you
’
ve got to stop yelling. My head is swirling and I can
’
t think without coffee.”

He took a few deep breaths and glared at Martha and Helen.
Then, making a noticeable effort, he continued more gently. “So, out of
curiosity, why did you take the laptop to Cousins in the hospital and why did
you go to The Grange last night?”

Helen and Martha exchanged glances.

Martha jumped in. “We picked up the laptop because Piers
requested it when we visited him at the hospital and as for being in The Grange
last night, Helen needed her briefcase with her laptop and her phone charger.
Surely, that isn
’
t a crime to retrieve things that are
rightly yours in the first place.”

“It is, Mrs. Littleword, in this instance, it most
definitely is,”
Johns
said with a touch of sarcasm in his voice. “You see, the entire area is
off-limits to anyone until we open it back up again to the public. If you had
wanted something, you should have called the station and an officer would have
been dispatched to accompany you into The Grange and help you locate your
necessary items. As for the laptop, if I remember right, there was a piece of
yellow tape across Piers Cousins
’
study door. Hmm,
that means ‘No Admittance
’
to even the simplest of minds.”

The little muscle above Martha
’
s
eyebrow twitched. Something deep inside her told her to not look up from her
tea mug. Instead she took a deep breath and fought to maintain her composure.
At that moment all she wanted to do was hit him right in the stomach but
instead she lifted her chin and gave him a square look and a thin smile.

“
Well,
”
she said quietly, “the yellow tape wasn
’
t there
when we simple folk returned to Healy.”

“Yes, that
’
s right.”
Helen joined in. “There
wasn
’
t yellow tape anywhere. Martha is right. It didn
’
t occur to us we were doing anything wrong.”

Johns stared at them for a few moments. “You must have
considered that the laptop was an important piece of evidence.”

“Then why didn
’
t you remove it the
night Piers was shot?”
Helen asked.

“We didn
’
t need to. Cousins had said
during our interview at Healy the videos could be accessed from any computer as
long as you had the web address and the password. He was supposed to come by
the station the following day but of course he was shot. Couldn
’
t
get the password until he was able to give it to us. So, the laptop was left in
situ.”

“Then what difference does it make if we took the laptop to
Piers?”
they
both asked in unison.

He stirred his tea. “Because, not everyone would have known
that last bit and might have wanted to get hold of the laptop to see if they
might manipulate the videos including Cousins.”
This last bit was said while staring into his mug. Then Johns shot a
quick look at both of the girls.

“It wasn
’
t us,”
Helen firmly stated. “And I don’t
think it was Piers either.”

“The point is, ladies, someone did. Your messing around in
this case is about to get you in legal trouble and more importantly, if you don
’
t stop, dead.”

The room became still and full of unsaid thoughts.

“You may be taken with Cousins’
charm but we needed to see from those
videos, if they were manipulated and when. Cousins is still on our list of
suspects. As for the piece of cloth you found, it’s special. It can limit the
amount of residue that remains on someone
’
s hands when
they fire a gun. Someone has thought this out. They also knew you were going to
The Grange. Who knew you were going to be there last night?”

The only two people they had told were Piers and Louis
Devry.

“You want to tell me about what happened last night?”
he asked gently.

Helen lifted the silver lid from her breakfast plate. The
steam wafted up and she took in the lovely smell of sausages, a small quiche
and a small bowl of melon. Nice meal for a jail. Martha followed suit. Johns
watched both women delicately begin to eat.

Helen put her fork down after two bites. “We wanted to get
my things from the library because…”

She stopped. Martha could tell Helen was struggling with
something. Johns was waiting. Helen took a deep breath and a quick look at
Martha. She seemed to make up her mind and began again. “Mrs. Thyme wanted us
to deliver a package to Piers but it somehow got lodged under the car seat. We
didn
’
t find it again until we got back to The Grange.
Martha recognized that it might be the envelope Devry took out of Carstons
’
hand in the video.”

“So, you
’
ve also seen the videos,”
Johns stated.

They both nodded without words.

“Then what happened?”

“Well, I realized it must be something unusual from looking
at it briefly in the car, but I needed my gloves, glasses, and laptop to better
study it. We put it back under the seat and found our way around the building.
Everything was fine until we got into the library and the lights went out. This
horrible voice came from nowhere and we panicked.”

“Horrible voice? What did it sound like?”

Martha came alive. “It sounded like someone talking into a
voice modulator. Something kids play with to make their voices sound silly or
creepy.”

“We crawled under the library table. Whoever it was had a
flashlight that kept scanning the room. Martha pushed the bookshelves over
which gave us a distraction to escape. We made our way out the side door on our
knees and in the dark. Our cell phone gave us some light and we got into the
janitorial closet where we called the station for help,”
Helen finished.

Martha looked at Johns. “How did you get there so fast?”