Maybe Lyndsey had called her mother after finding Miller on the ground. How much time had really gone by between Miller supposedly falling and Mina finding Lyndsey in the whelping room? She could have been hiding, waiting for her mother. By the time Mina found her, maybe Tracy was already skulking around the back of the house, waiting for her chance. Lyndsey knew about the servant stairs. Maybe she’d told her mother.
Charlotte sighed. She couldn’t picture Tracy parking her car out on the road and jogging to the back of the house unnoticed with that smoker’s cough.
Charlotte let herself into her house and suffered Abby’s ritual hello tackle.
“Do you think seeing me will make her confess?” said a voice.
Charlotte yelped and slapped her chest.
Peering around the corner she spotted Mariska sitting at her kitchen island drinking coffee.
“You just about gave me a heart attack. What are you doing in here?”
Mariska took a deep breath and then released it. “It’s starting to get around the neighborhood that I killed Alice.”
Charlotte rolled her eyes and emptied her phone from her pocket. “You didn’t.”
“But everyone thinks I did. And they’re never going to change their mind until we prove Crystal did it.”
Charlotte moved to the sink to wash her hands. There had been a lot of handshaking at the funeral and the last thing she needed was a cold.
“So what are you asking me?”
“Do you think if I went to see Crystal she’d confess?”
“Are you going to beat her with a bag of oranges?”
Mariska scowled. “Why would I beat her with oranges?”
Charlotte chuckled. “It’s an old rumor about how Bing Crosby supposedly beat his children to avoid leaving bruises.”
“What?”
“Never mind. The point was, how are you going to make Crystal confess?”
“Not by beating her with oranges. I’ll tell you that!”
“Forget the oranges. I’m sorry I mentioned them.”
“Bing Crosby had a beautiful voice.”
Charlotte rubbed her forehead with her hand. “Mariska, I’m super tired. Can we get to the point please and forget about Bing?”
Mariska nodded. “I think if I talk to her, she’ll feel bad about what she did and confess to me. I’d be like a mother figure for her.”
“She killed the last mother figure she had. Sure you want to do that?”
“But she’s a motherless girl, don’t you see? I can do it. I can make her confess.”
Charlotte leaned her butt against the kitchen counter and crossed her arms against her chest to think. The sound of Crystal sobbing, begging for forgiveness from Alice had been playing in her head since her time hiding beneath Crystal’s bed. She believed now, more than ever, Crystal had killed her grandmother, and the guilt weighed heavily on the girl’s mind.
Maybe Mariska’s onto something.
There was almost no way—short of a confession—anyone could prove Crystal doctored the stollen. Even with proof the loaves contained almonds, their presence could be easily disregarded as an accident. Based on the evidence alone, Mariska was as likely a suspect as Crystal, but for one thing—Crystal had motive. She wanted her grandmother’s house to herself, her grandmother’s money, and from all accounts, she’d harbored a deep resentment against the woman who raised her.
Maybe Mariska’s plan to strike at Crystal’s raw nerve while exposed could work. Something, probably guilt, had driven the girl to tears. Now was the time to push her to confess her sins. If they waited, time might ease Crystal’s regret and she’d never confess.
“So you’re going to show up on her doorstep like all three of Scrooge’s ghosts rolled into one and make her change her ways?”
“I thought I’d pretend I’m returning her sugar sifter.”
“You have her sugar sifter?”
“No, but I thought I’d lost mine and bought another and then I found the first one, so I have a spare I don’t mind giving her.”
“But even if she confesses, you need to record it or have a witness.”
“You can come with me.”
“Me?”
“You can be there as a good role model of a young lady.”
Charlotte snorted a laugh. “Oh I’m sure she’ll love that. Don’t say that out loud.”
“Will you do it? I need you there with me.”
Charlotte sighed. Even if Crystal didn’t drop to her knees begging for forgiveness, she wanted to hear everything the girl would say or imply. Maybe she’d let slip a detail that would help them prove what happened.
She glanced at her watch. “You want to do this now?”
Mariska took a final sip of her coffee and nodded. “I do. She’s usually home this time of day. and usually alone.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I’ve been planning this for days.”
“Fine. Let’s do this before I get comfy because I won’t want to do it later. I need to walk Abby first.”
“I already did.”
Charlotte cocked an eyebrow at Mariska. “You’re really not going to give me a chance to think about this a little, are you?”
Mariska shook her head. “No.”
Resigned to her fate, Charlotte filled Abby’s dinner bowl and accompanied Mariska outside so they could begin the short trek to Alice’s house.
“Be gentle with her,” suggested Charlotte. “Try to fit in everything her grandmother did for her over the years without making her sound like a saint—”
“Why can’t I make Alice sound like a saint? That woman was a saint.”
“It could make her angry. Just because she might regret killing her grandmother, doesn’t mean she’s forgiven her for years of fights and resentment. You don’t want to make her sound too perfect.”
Mariska nodded. “Okay. What else?”
“Ask her if she ever made stollen. Ask
