heroine. Seeing Mrs. Woolpack changed things. She made it all real, and I’m afraid that if I go on attempting to infiltrate The Widows Club, something may go wrong. Something could happen to Ben, such as his name ending up in the wrong file.”
“Oh, what a dreadful thought!” Primrose reached into her handbag. “Do have a sip of brandy.”
For the briefest moment I was distracted by the enchanting little flask with the minute silver cup chained to the stopper.
“I do urge you to reconsider,” said Hyacinth. “Thanks to Mrs. Delacorte’s death, we would seem to be on the verge of a breakthrough.”
“One would like to think that the woman is at peace, but I rather fear”-Primrose lowered her eyes-“that where she has gone, her troubles are just beginning. However, we at Flowers Detection must always feel gratitude toward her because, in dying, Mrs. Delacorte showed us how to entrap The Founder.” Her silvery curls shone in the electric light. “Is it too much to ask, dear Ellie, that you display that nobility of character which we know you to possess and act as the scapegoat?”
“Me?” I had guessed this might be coming. “I am the girl who is frightened of food, remember! Besides, my life is full enough as it is with inquests and funerals and the imminent possibility of being arrested.”
Primrose dabbed a lace hanky to her eyes. “We do have our way to make in the detective world, you know. And the lives of countless husbands are in your hands.”
Those words buzzed in my ears like a bluebottle the next few days when I wasn’t giving way to more dismal thoughts.
On the night of Ann’s murder, Ben and I arrived home within minutes of each other. He was aghast when I broke the news to him. I was aghast by the sincerity of my lies.
“My poor darling.” He cradled me in his arms. We were in the hall, still in our coats. “You go to visit a friend to see how she is surviving the death of her husband and find her dead. It’s unspeakable. Those two old ladies who came in the shop immediately after you-were they shoppers?”
I wanted to tell him everything. I wanted us to have been married for fifty years so nothing I might do could shock him. But I was afraid that the truth, the whole truth, spilling from my lips would send him thumbing through the telephone directory for the name of a solicitor specialising in divorce. Ben didn’t know the Tramwells. He couldn’t be expected to view them as anything but oddities. Dangerous oddities with whom I had been in communion for some time, without mentioning it. He would begin watching me over the rim of the morning newspaper, wondering how it was that he hadn’t recognised sooner my strong resemblance to my wacky relations. The lights glinted on Rufus’s visored face; memory came of him in Aunt Astrid’s arms, her hand on his metal thigh. And then there was Aunt Lulu pocketing ashtrays, and Uncle Maurice panting after the woman in paisley, and Freddy-the sanest of the lot-threatening to sue Sid Fowler. My fingers dug into Ben’s shoulders. I couldn’t risk giving him anything but an expurgated version of this evening’s events. My faith must be in the police; they would do a little digging and come up with a lot of skeletons. The Widows Club would come to light eventually, without my holding the torch. If the Tramwells were determined to proceed with the case, then so be it. I couldn’t put a host of anonymous, adulterous males ahead of my husband, my marriage. A good wife gets her priorities straight.
“Darling, this is bound to be rough on you.” Ben smoothed my hair. “But this time I will be with you. If the police need to speak to you again at the inquest, I’ll be there all the way.”
He was making this so hard for me.
“So, the motive was burglary, and Ann walked in on it.” Ben helped me off with my coat. “I wonder if the murderer had ever used a crossbow before. That sounds like good marksmanship to me, getting her through the heart and pinning her to the wall so she’d stay propped behind that curtain. Quite the theatrical touch.”
I pressed my fingers to my eyes, only sharpening the gruesome image, but I did feel heartened in one respect. If Ben was questioning the use of weapon, so would those trained in detection.
“I’ll get you a cup of tea.” Ben drew me toward the kitchen, where we found Magdalene and Poppa. The whole story to be gone through again! And I knew exactly what my mother-in-law would think: All the girls my son could have picked, and he marries one whose life path is strewn with bodies!
That week moved forward, as excruciatingly slow as babies in a crawling race.
On Thursday morning Ben and I went down to the police station and I read over my typed statement and signed it. No one gave me any funny looks. Afterward I insisted that Ben return to Abigail’s. As I walked into the house I was trying to cheer myself up with the thought that I was down to two unwelcome engagements. Ann’s funeral was set for Monday at 4:00 P.M., and the inquest would be as soon as the coroner’s court convened. After that, my calendar was a social vacuum.
I was passing through the hall on my way upstairs to put away my coat, wondering where Magdalene and Poppa were, when I saw Magdalene by the trestle table. Her hand was on the telephone receiver; her eyes reminded me of Ann’s-unblinking, fixed.
“What is it?” I rushed to her.
“Nothing!” She covered the receiver with both hands as though trying to hide it.
“Is telling lies a mortal or a venial sin?” I plonked her down on a chair. Poor little wispy person. “You’ve had a crank phone call. No point in denying it, I know the look. I had a similar experience once.”
She stared up at me with unseeing eyes. “I was just offering it all up for the souls in Purgatory.”
“What did this person say to you? Something vicious about the murder? About me?”
“The… the word murder was used.”
“Where’s Poppa?”
“He took your cake over to the church hall in the wheelbarrow. I couldn’t go with him, not without a special dispensation, because of it being
I had to snap her out of this. I suggested we do a little weeding in the herb garden. Reluctantly, she agreed. But I continued to worry about her; she wasn’t her usual prickly self. That evening, when I mentioned the phone occurrence to Poppa and Ben, she refused to talk about it, and when Freddy climbed through the drawing room window at a little after nine, she came out of her chair as if hooked to a spring.
“It’s only me, Maggie dear, not the Chitterton Fells murderer.” Freddy eyed the tea tray. “What, no cake! This may cease to be my favourite eating place.” He threw himself prone on the sofa. “And what’s up with you, Ellie? Been finding the last day or two deadly dull?”
“Freddy, put the gag back in your mouth.” Ben emphasized his displeasure by snatching away the dish of chocolates before my cousin got his fingers in it.
Poppa said, “You look exhausted, Mr. Flatts. Must be the short hours you young people work.”
Magdalene was silent. I said I would fetch Freddy some Madeira cake. I wasn’t being nice. I was grabbing at an excuse to get back to the kitchen and have another search for my engagement ring. Before going out to weed I had stood right by the sink and was certain (twenty percent so) that I had put it in a flowerpot saucer on the window sill. Could Tobias have gotten his paws on it and knocked it flying? I crawled around the floor. No luck. Had this happened at any other time, I would have gone to bed on a stretcher. The memory of Ben placing that ring on my finger was particularly sacred because I couldn’t remember his doing the same thing with my wedding ring. I had developed an arthritic-looking hump to that finger and had worked at becoming left-handed so as to flash that diamond shine.
But murder alters people. I was distressed, but not distraught. The ring was bound to turn up. I returned to the drawing room with the Madeira cake. Magdalene and Poppa had gone to bed. Ben and Freddy were discussing the cookery demonstration Ben was giving to the Hearthside Guild between noon and 3 P.M. on Saturday, the 16th May. Why… that was this Saturday! I had forgotten all about it, but I imagine the fortnight I had recently undergone would have put most people off schedule. Thank God, Ben had remembered.
“Really, mate, I don’t know why you are lowering yourself.” Freddy rolled over on the sofa and hung face down over the edge. “I can’t credit the gross insensitivity of those women, asking you to create a stew
