Arsenic with Austen (19 page)

*   *   *

Marguerite arrived just in time for tea. She left her Peugeot in the drive, doors open, as she hefted a cat carrier in each hand. She set the carriers down in the hall to embrace Emily in continental fashion with a kiss on each cheek. “
Chérie,
you did not tell me you were living in a château!
C'est magnifique!
”

Emily knelt to release Levin and Kitty from their prisons. They blinked up at her and let out welcoming mews. First Levin, then Kitty stepped cautiously out, and the two began to sniff their way around the hall.

Emily wondered if these could really be her own cats. “How on Earth did you keep them so calm? I thought they'd be basket cases after that drive.”

“A little pheromone spray works wonders. And I put their blankets in the carriers to smell like home. You should take them out and put them wherever you want
les chats
to sleep.”

“I'm sure they'll end up in bed with me, but let's put the blankets in the library for now. That's where I spend most of my waking time.”

They set the blankets side by side on the window seat where the afternoon sun streamed in. Levin and Kitty, however, were still occupied in exploring the parlor, whiskers twitching as the cats crept around the perimeter of the room and checked out each piece of furniture. Emily and Marguerite stood in the open double doorway to the library and watched them until Levin, who had taken the shorter route, emerged from behind a sofa to face the door.

He stopped, nostrils working frantically. Then his hackles rose, and he backed up behind the sofa again. “He must smell Bustopher,” Emily said. “Bustopher used to sleep in here a lot, though he's been holed up in the kitchen since Agnes—” She stopped, seeing again that indelible picture of Agnes sprawled at the bottom of the stairs.

“Pick Levin up and bring him in. Show him it is safe,” Marguerite said. She did the same with Kitty, who had reached the door with similar results.

The cats quivered in the women's arms as Emily and Marguerite carried them around the room. “It's all right, Levin, see? Nobody here but us,” Emily crooned, scratching the sleek gray fur in Levin's favorite place behind his ear. She gave Bustopher's chair a wide berth as she moved toward the window seat and deposited Levin on his blanket. Marguerite set Kitty down on hers. The two circled their respective beds, then sat and began grooming each other with intense concentration.

“They will do for now,” Marguerite said. “Let us see to this Bustopher Jones in white spats.”

But just then Katie came in with a trolley loaded with tea set, sandwiches, petit fours, and scones. “That can wait till after tea,” Emily said. “Katie, how did you manage all this so quickly?”

“Well, I did find the scones and petit fours in the pantry. They were wrapped up tight. I hope they're not too stale.”

Emily spoke sternly but silently to the lump in her throat, reminding it that Agnes had not died of poison, and even if she had, she would hardly have put it in her own scones. “I'm sure they'll be fine.”

Over tea, Emily updated Marguerite on recent events.

“Mais, chérie, quelle aventure!”
Marguerite exclaimed. “Fate snaps its fingers, so, and you have wealth and romance and mystery all
d'un seul coup
. If I could be in your shoes!”

Emily grimaced. “I wish you were. You might find they pinch a bit. Any one of those things alone would be as much as I care to cope with. It's no joke, Margot—the wealth is a huge responsibility; most of the town depends on me in one way or another. You'd think the romance would be all good, but you can't imagine how it's shaken me, knowing what really happened back then. And as for the mystery”—she put down her half-eaten scone and pushed her plate away—“more people's lives could be at stake. We don't know for sure why Beatrice and Agnes were killed, and therefore we don't know how many other people the killer might think are in his way.” She rattled her teacup into its saucer. “Me, for instance.”

At last Marguerite's pixie face registered concern. “You,
chérie
? But why? You have had no time to make enemies.”

“I've stepped into Beatrice's place, and I've let it be known I intend to carry on in her tradition. Whatever motive led to her death—unless it was something strictly personal, like with Billy, which I really can't swallow—could equally well apply to me.”

Marguerite waved an elegant hand. “Bah! I do not believe it. He would not be so bold. These two old ladies, he makes it look like an accident,
non
? Like natural. They are old; old people die, no one thinks twice. But you,
chérie,
in the prime of your life, with you it would not be so easy. And besides, now he is on his guard; he knows he has not fooled
les gendarmes
with this second murder.”

“But that's just it. Unless it's one of the people Luke's already questioned, he might not know. Luke's letting the public think Agnes's death was an accident. And nobody knows we're suspicious about Beatrice.”

Marguerite threw up her hands. “So we tell the world! We drop a few discreet hints, and soon the whole town knows. Is not that the way of it in a little village like Stony Beach?”

“We can't do that! I'm sure Luke has his reasons. He knows his job, Margot. I'm not going to work against him.”

“Phoo, you are too compliant.” She reached for another petit four. “Where is the excitement in a romance if you always do what your lover tells you to do?”

“In this case, he's not my lover; he's the law.” Emily felt her face catch fire. “And anyway, he's not my lover at all. Not now.”

“I speak in the old sense, like your revered Jane Austen. A lover is one who loves.”

One who loves.
The words traveled through Emily's veins and warmed her from head to foot.
One who loves.
Present tense. Just when she'd thought everything good and joyful and promising lay in her past, buried along with old secrets. Secrets she'd yet to share with Luke.

But the present wasn't entirely rosy by any means. It held a number of problems, the least of which—but perhaps the most manageable—was Bustopher Jones. “If you're finished, maybe we should go take a look at Bustopher.”

Marguerite popped the rest of her petit four into her mouth and licked her fingers sensuously, her pink tongue flicking out to grab the last crumbs and then the whole finger drawn slowly through pursed red lips, her eyes closed in mock ecstasy. Really, it was a pity no man was around to watch. “
Bon
. Lead me to this so-morose cat. We shall see if we can snap him out of his depression.”

 

nineteen

“There are two odious young men who have been staring at me this half hour.… They are not coming this way, are they? I hope they are not so impertinent as to follow us.… And which way are they gone? One was a very good-looking young man.”

—Isabella Thorpe to Catherine Morland,
Northanger Abbey

Katie was working in the kitchen, Lizzie asleep in a sling on her back. Bustopher still crouched under the table, paws invisible beneath him. He shot them a baleful glare from unblinking eyes. A slice of chicken and a mound of tuna lay untouched in his bowl.

“I've tried offering him treats, but he's not interested,” Katie said. “He growls if I get close. I guess he needs some time to get used to me.”

“He would tolerate you better in any other room but this one,” Marguerite told her. “He associates this room with his old mistress. You are an interloper. He may even blame you for her absence.”

Seeing Katie's stricken look, Emily put in hastily, “I doubt that. Katie didn't show up until the day after Agnes died. Bustopher was already pretty much catatonic by then.”

Marguerite shrugged. “Well, no matter, we will soon put him right.” She knelt, poked her head under the table, and waggled her fingers. “
Allo,
Bustopher Jones.
Moi, je suis Marguerite, l'amie de tous les chats. Voici ce que j'ais pour toi.
” From her pocket she pulled a mouse toy complete with fur and a long leather tail.
“C'est un souris de cataire. Tu aimes beaucoup la cataire, n'est-ce pas?”

Over her shoulder she said to Emily, “
Les chats
always respond best to
le français
. And to catnip.”

She dangled the mouse in front of Bustopher. His nose twitched, but he didn't move. She moved the toy closer, and his whiskers went into a frantic dance. His agony was palpable, as his longing to pounce warred against his firm resolve to play dead with these Wrong Humans.

Marguerite crooned to him.
“Tu sais que tu le veux,
Bustopher.
La cataire, c'est fraîche comme un souris nouveau-né.”
She pulled the mouse back a few inches.
“Saute-toi,
Bustopher
! Avant qu'il s'échappe!”

At last the catnip won. Bustopher pounced, all claws extended, and tore the mouse from Marguerite's fingers, narrowly missing tearing her flesh as well. Emily watched, amazed and rather alarmed, while the cat fought the toy as though it were a living mouse. At one point the mouse shot across the floor toward the doorway. With all four paws, Bustopher leapt onto it and carried the battle into the hall, then into the dining room.

Marguerite brushed her hands together. “You see, he responds, he is out of the kitchen. He will go crazy for a while until the catnip loses its freshness, then he will be himself again.”

Emily quailed to think what that would mean for her own cats. “Maybe we'd better shut him in the dining room for the time being. I don't want him meeting Levin and Kitty in this condition.”

*   *   *

Luke phoned as Emily was helping Marguerite get settled in the guest room. (“
Mais c'est charmant, chérie!
All it needs is a little furniture more light, more delicate. Louis Quinze,
peut-être
. You can afford that now,
n'est-ce pas
?”)

Emily took the call in Beatrice's room and stopped Katie with a raised palm as she was about to head back downstairs.

“Hey there, beautiful.” Luke sounded just like his teenage self, using his old name for her. “Got some news for you.”

“Just a sec.” She covered the mouthpiece and whispered to Katie, “Can we handle another person for dinner?”

Katie's eyebrows shot up, but she nodded.

Emily spoke into the phone. “Come tell it to me over dinner. I've got a friend here I want you to meet.” As soon as she said that, she regretted it. What was she thinking, introducing her beloved to the most accomplished seductress she knew? But Luke wasn't Marguerite's type. She liked her men suave and continental. More like Brock—or at least like Brock's facade.

“I'd love to come to dinner, but my news is kinda confidential—you know, about the case.”

“I'm afraid I've already told Marguerite about the case. I didn't see how it could hurt—she's from Portland. She doesn't know any of the people involved. Except me, of course.”

Luke gave an exaggerated huff. “Some assistant! I can't leave you alone for a second without you going blabbing to the first stranger who walks in.”

Emily bit back the self-justification that sprang to her lips. If Luke were standing in front of her, she'd see the teasing light in his eyes, the quirk at the corner of his mouth. “You left me alone for most of a day. I had to talk to somebody.”

“Well, shame on me. I guess I should be thankful your friend's a woman. But I have been pretty busy. Tell you when I get there.”

Marguerite was waiting on the landing when Emily hung up. “That was the lover,
non
? It is written all over your face. When do I get to meet this man who can make my old friend light up like a bride?”

“He's coming to dinner. And none of your tricks, understand?”

“Moi?”
Marguerite laid her hand over her heart. “I will be more innocent than a child of ten.”

“I'll believe that when I see it. I'm going to change.”

Emily fixed herself up as well as she could without seeming overdressed for a dinner at home, praying Marguerite would dress discreetly. But when they met downstairs, Emily's heart sank at the sight of Marguerite in a knee-length, boat-necked, form-fitting black silk sheath with a string of pearls, looking far more like Audrey Hepburn than any middle-aged woman had any right to look. Luke would have to be love-blind indeed not to notice how far Emily was outclassed.

“Innocent, you said. A child of ten, you said.”

Marguerite spread her hands. “
Mais, chérie,
what did you expect, the pigtails and the pinafore? This is the most innocent dress I have.”

That was probably true. Inwardly, Emily cursed the impulse that had led her to invite Marguerite into the vicinity of this fragile relationship, so new and uncertain although it was so old. But she couldn't get out of it now.

Luke arrived punctually at seven, dressed in a crisp dress shirt and jeans, bearing a bouquet of yellow roses. Emily opened the door to him herself so they could have a moment before she introduced Marguerite.

Looking into his eyes was like seeing love spark there for the first time so long ago. She put up her face to be kissed, and came to only when a thorn pricked her arm.

“We're squishing the flowers,” he murmured into her ear.

She buried her face in the blooms and inhaled. “You remembered.” Yellow roses had always been her favorite.

“I remember everything.” The look he gave her boosted her confidence that it could be safe to introduce him to Marguerite after all. She took his arm and led him into the library.

She watched him carefully as she made the introductions. He certainly noticed Marguerite—he was a man, after all—but his glance didn't linger. He turned back to Emily as soon as courtesy allowed.