“Elizabeth? What’s happened? Isn’t the inn doing well? Is Aunt Winnie okay? Are you okay?”
“She’s fine. I’m fine,” I said, focusing on not crying. “It’s just, well, well, a man was actually murdered during the dinner show.”
“Holy shit!”
“Yeah, that about sums it up.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Afraid not.” I took a deep breath. This was ridiculous. I had to pull myself together. There was no reason for me to fall apart over Gerald Ramsey’s death. After all, it wasn’t as if he was someone I knew, or even wanted to know, for that matter. I refused to listen to the more emotional side of my brain, which told me that Gerald’s odious personality wasn’t the problem. It was the memory of his blank stare. I quickly told Bridget the rest, from the cliché-like shot in the dark to Detective Stewart and his intimidating eyebrow.
“What a nightmare!” Bridget said when I was done. “How’s Aunt Winnie?”
In the background I could hear Colin peppering Bridget with questions. “Colin,” she barked at him, “would you please shut up for half a minute! I can’t hear Elizabeth with you yelling at me! I’ll tell you in a second!”
“She’s as good as can be expected,” I said. “Actually, I think she’s doing better than the rest of us.”
“Well, that’s good. I’d be more worried if she were a mess. When are you coming home?”
“I’m not sure. The police have asked me to stay for a few more days until this is all cleared up.”
“But why? I don’t understand. Why do you have to stay? They can’t possibly think that you had anything to do with this!”
“I don’t know what they think,” I said wearily.
The sounds of a struggle floated over the phone line. Bridget yelled out angrily, “Colin, knock it off! Hey! What the hell are you doing? Give me back the phone!” The next voice I heard was Colin’s.
“Elizabeth!” he said abruptly. “What’s going on? Are you okay?”
At the sound of the concern in his voice, my eyes welled up, but I held the tears in check. “I’m fine, Colin, really. One of the guests died last night—well, he was murdered, and the police are still trying to figure out what happened.”
“Jesus,” he said. “Do you want us to come up? We could be there in a couple of hours.” I heard Bridget yell something.
“No! Please, Colin, don’t do that. I’m fine, really.” I added quickly, “I’m sure that I’ll be home in a day or so. Besides, I think the fewer people trampling around here, the better it will be for the investigation and for Aunt Winnie.”
He hesitated. “Okay, if you’re certain. But make sure you keep us posted.”
“I will,” I said. “I promise. Now go enjoy being engaged. Give Bridget a big hug for me. Don’t worry, Colin. I’ll see you soon. I’m perfectly fine.”
He hung up and I congratulated myself. Apparently, I was finally getting better at hiding the truth from people.
CHAPTER 10
That would be a good thing for them to cut on my tombstone:
Wherever she went, including here, it was
against her better judgment.
—DOROTHY PARKER
ALT HOUGH SHE WASN’T expected to provide lunch, it being a B and B, not a B and B and L, Aunt Winnie nevertheless put out a tureen of clam chowder and some chicken sandwiches for the guests. It was a bit like leaving cookies out for Santa. You never saw anything eaten, but soon there was only an empty tray with a few crumbs. Not that I was complaining. I wasn’t keen on sitting in a room and watching other people not make eye contact with me.
My conversation with Bridget and Colin reminded me that I had other phone calls to make. I would have to call my mother, sister, and boss to let them know what had happened. Unfortunately, my mother wasn’t home and I ended up speaking with George. He oozed concern for my safety—a sentiment that would have been more believable had he bothered to turn down the football game blaring in the background. My phone call to Kit was no more enjoyable. For five minutes she screamed incoherently about how this news affected her stress, which apparently had reached its zenith over the weekend. I didn’t bother to point out that had her stress indeed reached its zenith (her words), then my news could not have possibly added to it. She then proclaimed that had I joined her for New Year’s Eve “none of this would have happened” and asked if I had “even the slightest idea” of what this was doing to her blood pressure. It was on the tip of my tongue to ask how my presence at a hot tub party could have prevented a murder, but I restrained myself. As for her query about her stress and blood pressure, I refrained from calling them my old friends, having heard them mentioned with consideration for twenty years at least. She wouldn’t have caught the reference anyway and I saw no reason to waste a perfectly good line.
The only call I enjoyed was the one to my boss, Cheryl. As I had anticipated, she ranted and raved once she understood that I would be out of the office for the next several days. She demanded to know who was in charge of the case and I happily obliged her by giving her Detective Stewart’s direct line. I hoped she would call him; they deserved each other.
By midafternoon, Aunt Winnie and I had packed the food for Lauren and Polly and were on our way to their house, with the car radio blasting. When Aunt Winnie is stressed she likes to listen to country music. She says the songs are so depressing that they make her feel better in comparison. So as we drove along in her light blue ’68 Mercedes, I stared out the window, trying to ignore both the blaring music and her horrible attempts to sing along. Finally, it was too much for me and I reached over and turned the volume down. “What are you doing?” she asked.
“Do you know what happens when you play country music backward?” I replied conversationally. Without waiting for her to answer, I continued. “You get your job back, your wife comes home, your dog comes back to life, you sober up …”
“You know, some people consider country music an art form,” she countered.
“Some people feel the same way about body piercing.”
“Are you saying you prefer body piercing to country music?”
I pretended to consider the question. “Would you be singing the country music?”
She laughed. “Oh, never mind. We’re here.” Before us was a massive colonial situated a couple of hundred yards from the beach. Dusk was starting to settle by the time we pulled into the driveway, and the trees out front blazed with thousands upon thousands of tiny white lights. It was beautiful, to be sure, but in all honesty, I preferred the simple charm of Longbourn.
A somber-looking woman of indeterminate age answered the door. She briskly introduced herself as Mrs. Jenkins. She had an intelligent face, fine brown hair pulled back into a tidy bun, and neat, serviceable clothes. This, combined with her aura of cool efficiency, made her subsequent announcement that she was the Ramseys’ housekeeper superfluous. In fact, so perfectly did she fit that part I wondered briefly if she was from central casting. I didn’t think people like Mrs. Jenkins existed outside of Agatha Christie novels.
Explaining that Lauren was on the phone, Mrs. Jenkins graciously took our wicker baskets of food and led us to wait in the sitting room. I was curious to see what an actual sitting room looked like, having only read about them in books that boasted characters like Mrs. Jenkins. Sadly, the room held only standard doors, not the French-window variety that Agatha Christie’s characters were forever popping in and out of. I felt cheated.
The room was a curious blend of both Gerald’s and Lauren’s personalities. The formal atmosphere, with its brocade fabrics in red and cream and Queen Anne furniture, was clearly Gerald’s choosing. The collection of ceramic pug dogs with giant faux-sapphire eyes, however, was just as obviously Lauren’s contribution.