Quilt Trip: A Southern Quilting Mystery (9 page)

They tapped on the door to the room Miss Sissy and Posy shared. There was no welcoming “Come in,” but the door suddenly flew open and a suspicious, wizened face appeared, surrounded by the iron gray hair standing around her head like a halo.

“It’s just us, Miss Sissy,” Meadow said in her jolly voice. “Good morning!”

Miss Sissy gave a distinct growl.

“You certainly appear to be alive and kicking this morning,” Meadow said playfully.

Miss Sissy glowered at her.

“You’ve slept in kind of late, didn’t you?” Beatrice asked. “I thought you’d be downstairs helping to knock out all the breakfast food.”

“Didn’t sleep well,” Miss Sissy offered in a grouchy voice. She moved past them and hurried down the stairs, presumably to make sure there was enough breakfast left for her.

“That leaves Colton,” said Beatrice, watching the cadaverous old woman sprint down the stairs like a youngster. “I guess our track record for living guests here is pretty good. Let’s knock real quick at Colton’s door.”

They knocked and heard nothing.

Meadow frowned. “Try it again. These doors are heavy—we might not have heard him.”

Beatrice rapped again at the door, harder this time. They strained their ears listening, yet couldn’t hear anything from inside the room.

Beatrice and Meadow stared at each other.

“Maybe he’s in the bathroom?” Meadow wondered.

They peered down the hall and saw that the bathroom door was open.

“Should we just go in there?” asked Meadow.

Beatrice was already slowly opening the door and calling through the crack, “Colton? It’s Beatrice. Can we come in?”

There was no answer, so she continued to push the door open. Then she stopped short. Colton Bradshaw was lying very, very still in the tall four-poster bed. Beatrice saw his empty wineglass on the bedside table.

Meadow whispered, “Oh, no.”

Beatrice strode to the side of the bed and gently felt for a pulse on the side of Colton’s neck. She felt nothing. She turned to shake her head at Meadow.

“What do you think happened?” Meadow asked quietly. “Did he have a heart attack or something? Maybe all the stress here caused him to have a heart attack. That can happen, you know.”

Beatrice gestured to Colton’s empty wineglass. “No, I don’t think
that’s
what happened.”

Meadow gasped. “You think—the sleeping pills?”

“Yes.”

“You think he killed himself?” Meadow asked, reaching a hand to her throat. “That maybe he killed Muriel and decided to do away with himself?”

“No, I can’t see it. Colton told me he had an idea who Muriel’s murderer was. He was thinking about approaching her to get some kind of an explanation for what he’d seen or heard. It appears he was intercepted before he could do that. Somebody took those sleeping pills from Muriel’s bedroom and put them in Colton’s drink.”

Meadow’s brows knit together. “When would someone have been able to do that? We were all sitting together at supper last night. Colton had his glass with him—obviously, since he even took the glass upstairs with him. How could someone possibly have—? Oh!” Her eyes widened as a thought occurred to her. “Beatrice. When he left the room to talk with you?”

Beatrice nodded sadly. “It would have given his murderer the perfect opportunity to swipe his glass while everyone was clearing the table. She could have put the powder in the wine, stirred it up, and then put it right back on the table for Colton to find it. He might not even have realized what was happening when he fell asleep . . . He’d said he was very tired.”

Both women stared silently at the still figure on the bed.

Beatrice sighed. “I guess we need to do the same thing we did before. Secure the crime scene. Although I suppose it’s not really necessary, since it’s probable that the murderer never even entered this room. We’ll lock it behind us, though, and let the police deal with it when they come in.”

“Are you going to talk to everyone again, then?” Meadow asked.

“I’ll have to, I suppose. I think we also need to check again and make sure the phone lines haven’t been repaired. And see again if any of us can get a signal . . . even for a few seconds. All we need is to connect just long enough for us to send out a text message.”

“So you’re going to ask everyone if they did it?” Meadow said. “Well, I guess that’s not very subtle. You’ll ask everyone to retrace their movements? Something like that?”

“I’m going to ask them if they saw anyone take Colton’s drink or put Colton’s drink back. Or, I guess, if they saw someone put something in Colton’s drink . . . although I’d like to think that anybody here would have immediately said something if they’d actually seen someone tampering with his drink. I think it’s more that they might have seen someone take Colton’s glass ‘by mistake’ while they were all cleaning up and then put it back down later.”

They left, carefully locking the door and pulling it shut behind them. Beatrice stood there for a moment in the hall before heading downstairs. “You know, I really liked Colton.”

“I did, too,” Meadow said. “He was pedantic and boring sometimes—remember when he was telling us all about the endowment? I thought I might nod off in the middle of it, and I was
excited
about the endowment! But you could tell he was a very decent guy.”

“Which makes me wonder why he was so close to Muriel,” said Beatrice. “Who, from all accounts,
wasn’t
the most decent person.” She heard the sounds of the dishes being cleaned and sighed. “Let’s go on down and tell the others.”

•   •   •

There was a lot more shock registered on the faces of the quilters than there had been after Muriel’s death. Even Holly Weaver was swallowing hard, as if trying to hold back tears. But Beatrice knew that one of the women was faking her shock.

“Do you think he had a heart attack or a stroke or something?” Winnie asked, exhibiting more curiosity than she ordinarily did. She usually just sat around looking sour.

“No, I sure don’t. He seemed in excellent health to me. It’s very coincidental for him to die right after Muriel’s death,” Beatrice explained.

Alexandra shrugged and pushed a lock of black hair from her face. “He might have been in excellent shape, but he wasn’t a young man. And guess what? This is a stressful situation. Every single thing about it is stressful, Beatrice—from lack of food, lack of heat, lack of clean clothes, to the fact that there
may
be a murderer in our midst. I think Colton’s ticker gave out from the stress.”

Meadow frowned at Alexandra. “Why do you say there
may
be a murderer?”

“Because I haven’t heard a compelling case made for murder. I think my mother was an old, sick woman who passed away by natural means. Beatrice says she was smothered and that there’s evidence of that. I’m thinking for myself, that’s all. I’m not blindly accepting Beatrice’s point of view.” Alexandra gave a small smile.

“You can think what you like,” said Beatrice. “But it’s important that we treat both rooms as crime scenes to let the police decide how to handle it.”

“Agreed,” Alexandra said with a nod.

Meadow was still fired up, though. “So you think that two people just happened to die in this house while we’ve been here? While your mother was in the process of changing her will? And you don’t think that’s coincidental at all?”

Alexandra yawned. “Life is full of coincidences, Meadow. I’m saying it’s not out of the realm of possibility, that’s all. I’m not going to freak out over this,” she said, nodding pointedly at Holly, who still was on the verge of tears.

Holly turned beseechingly to Beatrice. “Are you going to check into Colton’s death, too? Because I don’t agree with Alexandra. I think that there’s something really dangerous going on here.”

Alexandra snorted derisively.

“Yes, I’m going to ask more questions,” Beatrice said quietly. “For one thing, I think I’ll go absolutely crazy trapped in this house if I can’t feel as if I’m doing something. For another, our actions are all fresh in our minds now and we can give the police a statement that’s hopefully more accurate than it would be later. And I’m convinced that neither of these deaths is natural.”

“What do you think happened to Colton?” asked Holly.

“I think that whoever took that bottle of sleeping pills ground them up and put them in Colton’s wine while he was speaking with me in the study last night,” said Beatrice. “He was probably already a little tipsy when he finished off his wine and didn’t notice if the wine tasted off to him. He was already tired, too, and turned directly into bed. He never woke up.”

They were quiet for a moment.

Holly said, “But why would someone kill Colton?”

Winnie’s mouth twisted downward with displeasure at Holly’s naïveté. “Clearly, if someone did kill Colton, it must have been because he knew who the murderer was and they were trying to prevent him from sharing that information.”

Meadow frowned. “Or maybe he really did change the will. Maybe he and Muriel made the changes and he was scared to say anything while we were all trapped here. Maybe he had an amended will in his possession and someone knew about it and killed him, not wanting the new will to be made public. Then they stashed away the new will so they could destroy it later.”

Beatrice hated to admit it, but it was an idea she hadn’t considered. It did make sense, although she wasn’t completely convinced. “Either way,” she said, “I’m sure his death wasn’t natural. And I’m going to ask for everyone’s patience again while I talk to each person here to learn more about what happened last night.”

Posy said tentatively, “What are we going to do now? Besides your interviewing suspects, I mean.”

Winnie shivered. “I’m not looking forward to going to sleep tonight. In this house, people don’t ever wake up again.”

“Is it worth searching for the sleeping pills?” asked Holly.

Beatrice took a deep breath. “I don’t think it will do much good to search for the sleeping pills. They’re probably all used up . . . To kill a grown man like Colton, the murderer likely used all of that full bottle. It would be easy to hide the bottle somewhere—I doubt anyone would keep it in their room. But if it would make everyone feel better to search for the pill bottle or any remaining pills, we could do that.”

Beatrice glanced around, but no one appeared eager to instigate a search.

Alexandra said, “Sounds like an exercise in futility to me.”

“Did anybody check on Dot?” Holly asked in a panic.

“Beatrice and I did,” said Meadow quickly. “We brought her breakfast, remember? She was doing all right. Her ankle is still bothering her, but it sounds like she was able to get a good night’s sleep.”

“Can somebody come with me to help Dot down the stairs?” asked Holly. “I’m sure she’s probably ready for a change of scenery.”

“I’ll help you,” said Posy, and the two women headed for the stairs.

Alexandra languidly walked across the room and picked up the phone on a desk in the corner. “No dial tone,” she said, dropping it back in its cradle. “We’re well and truly stuck in this dump.” She plopped irritably into a chair. “Why don’t we get this travesty of a police interview over with so I can go back to bed? There’s nothing else to do here.”

Beatrice glanced at Winnie. “Do you want to join Miss Sissy in the kitchen, maybe?”

“Not particularly,” said Winnie, making a face.

“Somebody probably should,” said Meadow, giving an easygoing laugh. “Just to keep an eye on Miss Sissy.”

“Because she might be behind all this?” Winnie asked.

“No, because she might eat all our food up,” said Meadow. “Even the condiments.” Since Winnie wasn’t in any hurry to check on the situation with Miss Sissy, Meadow left to do it herself.

“Winnie doesn’t have to leave,” said Alexandra with a roll of her eyes. “I don’t have anything to say that can’t be said in front of her. Here, I’ll do both the questions and the answers. Did I kill Colton? No. Did I kill my mother? No. Did I see anyone tampering with Colton’s drink last night? No. Have I seen any sleeping pill bottles lying around? No.” She smirked at Beatrice.

This monologue appeared to irritate Winnie, whose face grew even more pinched. “You’re not taking it seriously, Alexandra. You’re not even thinking about your answers!”

“What does it matter?” asked Alexandra. She shrugged.

“It matters because I want to get out of here alive! If we can figure out who’s behind these murders, then we can lock them up in a room and keep ourselves safe until we’re rescued,” said Winnie.

“So she’s got you believing these deaths were murders, too,” said Alexandra with a sneer. “I thought you could think for yourself, Winnie.”

“I don’t know why you’re being so stubborn. Why won’t you consider the possibility that your mother and Colton were murdered? Is it because you’re responsible? And you’re trying to persuade us not to investigate?” Winnie’s neck was splotchy red with emotion.

Alexandra gave her a chilling glare.

“Think back to supper last night,” implored Winnie. “Remember how everyone was bustling around after the meal ended? We all pitched in to clear the table.”

“I only remember that crazy old woman trying to eat the leftovers,” said Alexandra.

“Do you remember anything else? Anybody taking Colton’s drink and putting it back down again?” asked Winnie.

Beatrice stayed silent. Winnie was pushing Alexandra for answers harder than she would have herself.

“As I said before, I didn’t see anything.” Alexandra snapped her mouth shut to indicate that she was done talking.

“Did you hear anything last night?” continued Winnie.

“Last night? Last night doesn’t even matter because he was poisoned at dinner, right? If he was poisoned at all,” said Alexandra in that scornful tone.

“I guess this interview is over, then,” Beatrice quickly said before Alexandra and Winnie descended into a full-blown argument. “Winnie, could I speak with you next?”

“Fine. But I
would
like to have a private conversation with Beatrice,” she said defiantly.

Alexandra gave a put-upon sigh and stomped out of the library.

Winnie started speaking as soon as the heavy library door swung shut. “I saw something,” she said in her clipped voice. “I saw Alexandra loitering around the table last night when Colton was talking with you in the study.”

“Loitering?” asked Beatrice.

“Yes. See, the rest of us were trying to clear the table of all the glasses, plates, and silverware. Alexandra was hanging behind. She wasn’t clearing anything or washing any dishes in the kitchen. She hung back for a few minutes, then left very abruptly.”

“But you didn’t see her actually tampering with Colton’s wine?” Beatrice asked.

“No,” Winnie admitted reluctantly, then quickly added, “But Alexandra was standing right beside his glass. Why would she have been doing that?”

Beatrice had the feeling that Alexandra had something of a lazy streak. She could have simply been trying to get out of work.