Aunt Bessie's Holiday (18 page)

Andrew smiled and slipped the paper into a
pocket.
 
“I think I’ll need to
recover from this holiday before I’m ready for another,” he said quietly.

“You two didn’t get very far,” Doona called
to them from the path around the lake.

“We just stopped here to admire the view,”
Bessie told her.
 

“And eat our ice cream,” Andrew added.

“You had ice cream?” Doona asked,
frowning.
 
“I didn’t get any ice
cream.”

“You should have stopped at the little stand
by the village centre,” Bessie told her.
 
“They have excellent ice cream.”

“Maybe I’ll just go back over and get some
now,” Doona mused.

“It must be dinner time,” Bessie
argued.
 
“Are we eating back there
tonight?”

“I thought maybe Italian,” Doona said.

“That sounds wonderful,” Bessie agreed
quickly.

“Andrew, you’re welcome to join us,” Doona
told the man.

“I wish I could,” he replied, sounding
sincere.
 
“But I haven’t seen the
family in a few hours.
 
I’m going to
have to have dinner with them.”

Bessie and Doona both chuckled.

“I suppose we should stop back at the cabin
and freshen up before dinner,” Bessie said, getting slowly to her feet.

“I definitely need to do that,” Doona
agreed.
 
“I think I’ll change as
well.
 
I feel as if I’m covered in
pencil dust.”

“I’ll walk back with you then, ladies,”
Andrew said, getting up from his bench.
 
“I’m supposed to meet everyone in about half an hour at the Chinese
restaurant, so I have time to freshen up as well.”
 

He looked at Bessie and winked.
 
“And by freshen up, I mean grab a quick
shot of whiskey,” he whispered.

Bessie laughed again and then the two joined
Doona on the path back to their temporary home.

“How did your drawing come out in the end?”
Bessie asked her friend.

“I’m really pleased with it,” Doona told
her.
 
“It’s much better than I expected
to be able to do.”

“Maybe I’ll have more luck with
watercolours,” Bessie muttered.

“Maybe I should sign up for the watercolour
class,” Andrew said thoughtfully.

“It’s all just a bit of fun,” Doona
said.
 
“I won’t be quitting my day
job to become an artist or anything.”

“I think you should take some classes at the
college at home, though,” Bessie told her.
 
“You have real talent.”

Doona shrugged.
 
“I was thinking about taking some
classes,” she told her friend.
 
“Although I was thinking about taking things that would be useful for
work, rather than art classes.”

“No reason why you can’t do both,” Andrew
said.

“No, I suppose there isn’t,” Doona replied
pensively.

“I have a class of my own coming up soon,”
Bessie said.
 
“You’re welcome to
join in, but I’m not sure paleography is for you.”

“Is that reading old handwriting?” Doona
asked.
 
“It isn’t for me, although
it would be useful if someone would offer a class in reading my own
handwriting.”

“I know what you mean,” Bessie said with a
laugh.
 
“I write shopping lists all
the time and then, when I get to ShopFast, I can’t read what it was that I
actually needed.”

“When is the paleography class?” Doona
asked.
 
“I remember you mentioned it
a while back.”

“It’s the weekend after we get back,” Bessie
told her.
 
“It’s just the one day,
the Saturday, at the museum.”

“May I ask why you need to read old
handwriting?” Andrew asked.

“I do a lot of research for the Manx
Museum,” Bessie replied.
 
“I’m
strictly an amateur, but I enjoy it.
 
I’ve been working on wills, and the museum has a large collection of
them, but they’d really like someone to go through the very oldest ones.
 
In order for me to be able to do that, I
need some training in how to read the handwriting of the time.”

By the time Bessie finished her explanation,
they had arrived back at Foxglove Close.
 
There was a small bench right on the corner of the road and Bessie was
surprised to see people sitting on it.
 
As the little group took a few steps forward, the two people on the
bench stood up.

“Miss Cubbon, Mrs. Moore, I’ve been waiting
for you,” Margaret Hopkins said.
 
“We need to talk.”

Chapter Nine

Bessie felt her heart sink as she forced
herself to smile at the woman.
 
“We
were just going to get some dinner,” she said, aware that she sounded nervous.
 
“Can it wait until after that?”

The inspector shook her head.
 
“I’m sorry,” she said, not sounding
sorry in the slightest.
 
“But it
really can’t.
 
If you’d like to wait
out here with Constable Smith, I’d like to start with Mrs. Moore.”

Bessie looked at Doona, who shrugged.
 
“I suppose we don’t have a choice,”
Bessie muttered, crossing to the bench and sitting down.

“Mrs. Moore, we can talk in your lodge, if
that’s okay,” the inspector said.

“Margaret, is there anything I can do to
help?” Andrew asked.

“I don’t think so, but thanks,” the woman
replied.

Bessie frowned at the friendly
exchange.
 
Andrew had said he would
help her and Doona, but now he was offering to help Margaret instead.
 
As Doona and Margaret disappeared
towards the cabin, Andrew crossed to Bessie.

“I can stay with you, if you’d like,” he
offered, earning a frown from the young constable sitting next to Bessie.

“No, you go and have dinner with your
family,” Bessie told him.
 
“I’m sure
this is just more routine questioning.”

Andrew looked as if he wanted to argue, but
after a moment he nodded.
 
“You have
my number,” he reminded her.
 
“Ring
me if you need me.”

Bessie nodded and then watched him walk
away, suddenly feeling very alone in a strange place.
 
“So,” she said to the young man opposite
her.
 
“What made you want to become
a policeman?”

When Margaret came to collect Bessie an hour
later, she and the young policeman had become very well acquainted.
  

“I really don’t think going back to school
is ever a bad idea,” Bessie was telling him.
 
“I’m sure I can’t imagine how difficult
it would be for you, with a full-time job and a baby at home, but even if you
just take one class at a time, you’ll end up with a degree eventually.”

The young man nodded and then suddenly
snapped to attention when he spotted the inspector.
 
“We were just chatting,” he said
quickly.
 

“So I hear,” Margaret said.
 
“Now it’s my turn for a chat with Miss
Cubbon.”

“Yes, inspector,” the man said.
 
He turned to Bessie.
 
“Thank you,” he said sincerely.
 
“You’ve given me a lot to think about.”

“Where’s Doona?” Bessie asked as she and the
inspector headed towards the cabin.

“She’s lying down in her room,” the woman
told her.
 
“I hope I won’t need much
of your time and then you two can go and get something to eat.”

Bessie really wanted to check on her friend,
but she didn’t think the inspector would approve.
 
Instead, once they were inside the building,
she followed the other woman out onto the patio.
 
Margaret slid the door into the cabin
shut.

“That should prevent our disturbing Mrs.
Moore,” she said.
 
She sat down and
gestured to the chair opposite hers.
 
“Do sit down.”

Bessie slid into the chair and forced
herself to sit back and try to get comfortable.
 
Every instinct wanted her to perch on
the very edge of her seat, but she didn’t want the inspector to notice her
disquiet.

“After some preliminary investigating, I
have a series of new questions for you,” Margaret said.
 
“Some of my questions may lead you to
certain conclusions about things that may or may not be correct.
 
I have to ask you to not repeat any of
the things we discuss or any conclusions you may draw from our conversation.”

Bessie frowned.
 
“I’m not sure I can agree,” she said
after a moment.
 
“Doona is my best
friend and she’s clearly involved in this mess.”

Margaret nodded.
 
“I should have been more clear,” she said.
 
“You can discuss things with Doona, but
no one else.
 
I’ve raised the same
issues with her already.”

“That’s fine, then,” Bessie said, pushing
thoughts of John Rockwell and Andrew out of her head.
 
She could keep secrets from them if she
needed to.

“You were coming to Lakeview for a
self-catering holiday, weren’t you?” the inspector asked.

Bessie shook her head, confused by the
question.
 
“We were coming for a
holiday where the accommodation made self-catering an option,” she
replied.
 
“But as all of our meals
were included in the prize that Doona won, we didn’t plan on doing much in the
way of cooking.”

“What did you bring with you to facilitate
any cooking or food preparation that you might have wanted to do?”

“Nothing,” Bessie said.
 
“I brought clothes and toiletries and
nothing else.
 
I’m pretty sure that
Doona didn’t bring anything, either.
 
We simply didn’t need to.”

“So neither of you brought a knife of any
kind?” Margaret asked.

Bessie took a deep breath.
 
So that was what the questions were about,
the
murder weapon
.
 
“I didn’t bring anything of the kind and
I’m fairly certain that Doona didn’t either,” Bessie said.
 
“We were told that our accommodation would
have everything we could possibly need for food preparation, so even if we’d
planned to cook, we wouldn’t have needed to bring a knife.”

Margaret nodded.
 
“So, did your accommodation come with
any knives?”

“I suppose so,” Bessie said, thinking
hard.
 
“We had meat and cheese and
bread for lunch the other day.
 
We
used knives for that, of course.”

“And that was the only time you or Mrs.
Moore used any knives for anything?” Margaret asked.

Bessie sat back and closed her eyes.
 
The question felt important and she
didn’t want to get the answer wrong.
 
“Give me a minute,” she muttered as she took herself backwards through
their stay.
 
She couldn’t recall
anything other than the meal the previous day and was just about to say so when
the memory suddenly flooded back.

“The boxes of books,” she exclaimed, sitting
up suddenly.

Margaret smiled.
 
“What boxes of books?” she asked,
looking as if she already knew the answer.

“We signed up for the book club session on
Saturday,” Bessie explained.
 
“When
we arrived, we each had a box of books for us to read before the session.
 
The boxes were taped shut and Doona had
to cut them open.”

“And she used a knife from the kitchen here
to do so?”

“Yes, one she found in the drawer, I imagine,”
Bessie said.
 
“She cut through the
tape on both boxes for us.”

“And what did she do with the knife after
she was done opening the boxes?”

Bessie shook her head.
 
“I don’t remember her doing anything
with it,” she said after a moment.
 
“We were both tired after the reception and dinner.
 
I think she may have just left it on the
table out here.”

“So who moved it next, and where did they
put it?” Margaret asked.

“I don’t know,” Bessie said.
 
“Or rather, I didn’t move it.
 
Now that I think about it, the knife
wasn’t on the table out here the next morning, but at the time, I didn’t even
give it a thought.”

“Did you ever touch the knife?”

Bessie thought for moment.
 
“I don’t think so, but I may have.
 
It simply didn’t matter, you see.”

“I want you to look at some photos,”
Margaret said now.
 
“See if you can
pick out the knife that Mrs. Moore used to open the boxes.”

She handed Bessie a pile of photos.
 
Bessie shuffled through them quickly and
pulled out three.
 
Those three she
studied for a short while, and then she sighed.
 
“I’m sorry,” she said.
 
“I think it’s one of these three, but I
can’t be sure.
 
I didn’t pay that
much attention to it at the time.
 
I
didn’t think it was important.”

“You’re an excellent witness,” Margaret
said.
 
“Most people would simply
choose the one they thought was closest rather than admit they weren’t sure.”

“I’m not sure a murder investigation is any
place for guessing,” Bessie replied.

“I would have to agree with that,” Margaret
said.
 
“But now I’m going to ask you
to do just that.
 
If you had to pick
one of those three, which one would you choose?”

Bessie went back through the three pictures
a third time.
 
“This one,” she said
eventually.
 
“But it’s only a guess.
 
The actual knife had our cottage address
on it, of course.”

“That’s fine,” Margaret assured her.
 
“And it’s very helpful.”

“Was there anything else?” Bessie asked.

“Did you hear anyone moving around inside or
just outside the cabin after you went to bed that first night?” the woman
asked.

“I heard all sorts of strange noises,”
Bessie told her.
 
“I can’t tell you
for sure whether they were inside the cabin or outside.
 
I was asleep off and on, of course, as
well.
 
Doona told me she went out
for a walk and I didn’t realise that at the time.
 
There seemed to be doors opening and
closing most of the night, somewhere in the neighbourhood, but I can’t tell you
where.
 
The lodges are much closer
together than my nearest neighbours at home and I’m not used to hearing other
people coming and going.”

“I’m surprised it’s so noisy out here.
 
I would have thought it would be
peaceful and quiet in the woods.”

Bessie shrugged.
 
“It’s either been a lot quieter since
that first night or I’ve slept much better.
 
I certainly haven’t heard as much coming
and going since then.”

Margaret nodded.
 
“I’m going to stop there for tonight,”
she said.
 
“I’ll remind you that you
and Mrs. Moore are not to leave Lakeview for any reason.
 
Your Torver Castle excursion is fine,
but that’s not until Friday and I hope to have everything wrapped up by then,
anyway.”

“I hope you do,” Bessie said fervently.
 
She walked the inspector to the door.

“Thank you for your time tonight.
 
Enjoy your evening,” Margaret said in
the doorway.

Bessie watched her walk away, a sick feeling
in the pit of her stomach.
 
Everything the inspector had said seemed to suggest that the knife from
their cabin had been used to kill Charles.
 
The only way that was possible was if the murderer was on their patio
while Bessie was sleeping.
 
She
shuddered.
 
Right now all she wanted
to do was go home.

She shut the door and then walked over to
Doona’s bedroom.
 
She tapped
lightly, and then, when she didn’t get a response, more loudly.
 
When there was still no reply, Bessie
tried the handle.
 
The door opened
and she cautiously peeked inside.
 
Her friend was lying on the bed.

“Doona?
 
Are you okay?”

“Has the inspector gone?” Doona asked in a
low voice.

“She has.”

“I thought she was going to arrest me,”
Doona told Bessie.
 

Bessie walked into the room and sat down on
the edge of the bed.
 
“I wouldn’t
have let her,” she said.

“You couldn’t have stopped her,” Doona replied
sadly.
 
“I think the murderer used
the knife from our cabin to kill Charles.
 
They must have found my fingerprints on it.
 
I can’t imagine why I haven’t been
arrested, actually.”

“Clearly the inspector is smart enough to
know you didn’t do it,” Bessie said.
 

Doona smiled weakly.
 
“Thank you, but I don’t think the
inspector has as much faith in me as you do.”