eight

“Enyon isn’t coming back tonight,” I said in a rush of words, struggling not to sound panicked as I delivered the news to Wally.

He set the plates he’d just removed from the dishwasher on the counter and grew very still as he regarded me, his complexion fading from ruddy to ashen. “Why not?”

“August has accused him of going into his room and stealing all the money he’d tucked away in his suitcase, so Constable Tredinnick has decided to hold Enyon overnight for more questioning.”

Wally stared at me, looking as if his whole life had just flashed before his eyes in a brief but painful heartbeat. “You gotta be kidding me.”

My voice rose to Alvin the Chipmunk pitch. “Do I look like I’m kidding?”

“When was this supposed to have happened?”

“After we left the inn this morning. Enyon was the only person in the house before the police arrived, and the only person with access to the guest suites, so all fingers are pointing at him.”

“How much money are we talking about?”

“Over a thousand pounds British sterling. August told Tredinnick that he and Spencer tore the room apart, but they couldn’t find any trace of it.”

“Was Spencer burglarized, too?”

I shook my head. “He’s carrying his cash in a neck wallet.”

Wally shook his head as he leaned against the sink to steady himself. “A killer isn’t bad enough? Now we’re dealing with a thief? And it’s only day two. I can hardly wait to see what’s in store for us tomorrow.” He fanned his fingers through his thinning hair before holding up his forefinger as if to activate a non-electronic version of a pause button. “Give me a minute to think.”

The door to the dining room swung open. Dick Stolee stepped inside, looking surprised to see us. “Oh, good. You’re both here. Say, I’ve been elected in a landslide vote to ask what time we eat because we’re all famished. We thought the battered sausage and cheesy chips we had for lunch would stick to our ribs, but nosiree. And the ice cream sundaes on our way back up to the bus were so dinky, I can hardly remember eating mine. So we’re hungry again. Bernice says it’s because of that lousy pie none of us could eat last night. We’re all suffering from starvation accompanied by low blood sugar, dehydration, and possible kidney failure. So when do we eat, and what’s on the menu?”

“Uhhh…” I lasered a look at Wally.

The door creaked open again. Margi poked her head inside. “Here you are.” She retreated a step to call “They’re in here!” over her shoulder before hustling across the threshold to stand beside Dick. “Caroline Goodfriend wants to know if this would be a good time for her to share the results of her genealogical search with the folks whose names she investigated.” She shot a wary look around the kitchen. “Doesn’t look like any food’s in the works yet.” She eyed the stove suspiciously. “You’re not going to serve any more of those pies, are you?”

“I promise you. No more pies.”

She smiled blissfully at my response, but I wondered how happy she’d be if she understood that an absence of pies meant an increase in the one food I knew I couldn’t ruin.

Dry cereal.

The door banged open and Dick Teig scudded into the room at the head of a human stampede. “Are we gonna have that show-and-tell thing anytime soon, Emily?” The gang crowded in around him like sticky buns in a bundt pan. “I cleaned up my ball of sea gunk and you’ll never guess what I found inside.”

“Jimmy Hoffa,” jeered Bernice.

Boos. Hisses. Razzberries.

“A chewy chocolate center?” I volunteered.

“I’m not telling you!” crowed Dick, letting loose a comically evil laugh. “I’m making everyone wait until the show-and-tell. But lemme tell you, it’s gonna wow your shorts off.”

“It better wow someone’s shorts off for the mess you left in our sink,” sniped Helen. “I’m not touching that faucet until housekeeping thoroughly scours and disinfects the basin. Speaking of which, no one cleaned our room today, Emily. The bed’s still unmade, the towels need replacing, the mugs are dirty, and there’s no mint on our pillows. For the price we’re paying to stay here, I should think we deserve at least a couple of crummy mints.”

“Our room wasn’t made up either,” confided Alice. “Is there some kind of maid’s strike going on?”

“Was anyone’s room cleaned?” asked Lucille.

“Ours was,” said Osmond. “At least, I’m pretty sure it was.” He scratched his head as he exchanged a confused look with George. “Was it?”

“Don’t look at me,” protested George. “I don’t notice stuff like that.”

“Well, I refuse to sleep in an unmade bed,” crabbed Bernice, “so if housekeeping doesn’t snap to it before I turn in this evening, someone is going to be giving me a big fat discount.” She waggled her eyebrows in my direction.

“Is there something wrong with your physical stamina that you can’t make your own bed?” quizzed Tilly.

“Yeah, there’s something wrong,” Bernice fired back. “I’m on vacation.”

“Quiet!” Dick Stolee’s voice echoed through the room. “Why did you delegate me to track Emily down if you were planning to crowd into my space and talk over me? This is supposed to be my gig.”

Tilly sighed. “Hand a man a little power and it goes right to his head. It’s rampant in every culture.”

“I’m officially withdrawing my previous vote,” said Bernice.

“Show of hands,” Osmond called out. “All those in favor of recalling Dick Stolee, raise your—”

“I’m not gonna stand here and let you conduct a recall,” griped Dick. “I quit.” Elbowing his way out of the scrum, he charged through the door, shouting behind him, “Count me out of any of your future elections. The whole system’s rigged!”

“Oh, dear,” fretted Margi. “What do we do now? Should we nominate someone else to take his place?”

George waved his hand above his head. “Someone needs to refresh my memory. What did we elect him to do?”

Shifting stares. Blank expressions. Silence.

“Dang it,” groused Osmond. “I hate when that happens.”

“Maybe we didn’t elect him to do nuthin’,” chimed Nana. “Kinda like them folks what we send to Congress.”

“Show of hands,” said Osmond. “How many people think—”

“No more voting!” I snapped. It was time to cough up a schedule, sketchy as it might be. “Okay, here’s the plan. Tell Caroline Goodfriend this would be a perfect time for her to go over your genealogies with you.” The interlude would give Wally and me time to scrounge up something for dinner. “We’ll serve dinner when she’s done, and the minute you’re through eating, we’ll have our show-and-tell. Then tomorrow it’s on to—” I fluttered my fingers, blanking out. I canted my head toward Wally. “Where are we going tomorrow?”

“To the most iconic destination in Cornwall: St. Michael’s Mount.”

Oohs. Ahhs. Nods of approval.

“So off you go.” I made a shooing motion, but they remained anchored to the spot. I rolled my eyes. “Something else?”

“Have we seen the last of the police constable,” Tilly inquired, “or will he be coming back to badger us about our whereabouts when the crime occurred?”

“I’m afraid he’ll probably be popping by on a regular basis until he solves Lance’s murder. But the good news is, you’ve all been cleared, so I’m pretty sure he won’t need to question any of you again.”

“Why not?” protested Dick Teig. “Does he think Iowans are too spineless to commit murder? Excuse me, but I take that as a personal insult.”

“Try not to be too offended,” I soothed. “You made terrible suspects. You backed up all your alibis with rather lengthy video footage.”

“That shouldn’t make a difference,” fussed Margi. “What if we lied about our alibis? What if the video was doctored? I’m with Dick. What makes the constable think that Iowans can’t be just as two-faced, deceitful, and untrustworthy as other people?”

“Yeah,” Bernice enthused.

Head bobbing. Fist bumps.

I guess it was an indication of how topsy-turvy the world had become when people would take offense that they weren’t deemed malicious enough to be included on the deadly suspects list.

I fixed my gaze on the group. “Did you lie about your alibis?”

“No,” they responded in unison, heads shaking.

“Did you doctor your videos?”

“Of course not,” Tilly spoke up. “That would be the height of dishonesty.”

“Then I hate to burst your bubbles, but before you can make a name for yourselves as deplorable human beings, you’re going to have to undergo some major behavioral modifications, so you better get cracking.”

Faces fell. Shoulders slumped. The room filled with the murmured sounds of disappointment.

“Emily, dear,” Nana tossed out, “if the constable don’t think none of us killed Lance, who’s he thinkin’ done it?”

“Well—”

“It has to be one of the bloggers,” Grace theorized. “They were the only other people in the house.”

I shook my head. “They have alibis.”

“All of them have alibis?” asked Lucille.

“All except Mason Chatsworth, but Constable Tredinnick is convinced that our amiable green-haired millennial had no motive to commit murder.”

“He must have spread his clotted cream and jam in the right order,” George reflected. “Didn’t give Lance any reason to terrorize him.”

“What if the bloggers lied about their alibis?” asked Margi.

“Then the constable will have to sniff out who was lying and why. But none of our bloggers knew each other before the trip, so I’m not sure what would compel them to lie for each other.”

“What makes you so sure they didn’t know each other?” pressed Helen.

I met her gaze, feeling slightly unsettled. “They appeared to be meeting each other for the first time at the meet and greet, so what reason would I have to think otherwise?”

“What if they were lying about not knowing each other?” suggested Margi, milking her “liar, liar, pants on fire” theme for all it was worth.

I stared at her, stunned into speechlessness. Oh. My. God. What if two of them did know each other? What if they were working as a team? Why hadn’t I considered that angle? “I…you could be right, Margi. I have no way of knowing if any of the bloggers knew each other or not.”

“Why is everyone supposing the killer was a guest at the inn?” asked George. “Is it too far-fetched to think that someone could have entered the kitchen from the outside? A neighbor? A deliveryman? Someone from the village that Lance had rubbed the wrong way one too many times?”

All eyes flew to the mudroom door as if it had just morphed into a malevolent portal through which all evil passed.

Someone from the outside? I hadn’t thought of that either. Treeve Kneebone had implied that Lance hadn’t fit in with the residents of Port Jacob. Had he created more enemies than friends while he was here? Mortal enemies? People who’d stop at nothing to get rid of him?

Uff-da. A minute ago there were no viable suspects other than Kathryn. Now I had so many potential bad guys to choose from that I felt as if my head was going to explode with the possibilities. “George raises a good point. In fact, you’ve all raised good points.”

“It’s like performing anthropological field research,” Tilly said proudly.

I offered them a thin smile. “Look, all I can tell you at the moment is that I haven’t had a chance to make an exhaustive survey of our bloggers’ posts, but should any of you feel the urge to examine their archived content for material that might link them to any of their fellow bloggers, have at it. You could uncover a clue that Constable Tredinnick might overlook. Or if you access the local newspaper online, maybe something will leap out at you about the kind of relationship Lance had with the villagers and why one of them might feel impelled to arrive here in the middle of the day to kill him.”

Nods. Excitement. Foot shuffling.

“One more thing before you go.” I held up my hand to stop them from bounding out the door. “There’s been a theft. August Lugar has had all his money stolen from his suitcase, so until we discover the culprit, I caution you to keep your cash, passports, and valuables close to your body at all times. I packed extra neck wallets if you need another.”

“Did he report the theft to the police?” asked George.

“Yup…which is the reason why Enyon won’t be rejoining us this evening. He’s no longer a suspect in the murder, but he’s being questioned about the theft. The money didn’t walk away on its own, and Enyon was the only person with access to all the rooms, so he’s having to deal with the new allegations.”

Nana shook her head, tsking her sympathy. “Seems to me if that young fella didn’t have bad luck, he wouldn’t have no luck at all.”

The kitchen door inched open to reveal Caroline Goodfriend looking a bit awkward as she stood in the doorway. “I don’t want to interfere with your meeting, but I’m all hooked up and ready to go if any of you want to hear the results of your ancestry searches.”

“Go ahead,” I encouraged. “Don’t keep Caroline waiting any longer than you already have.”

They maneuvered around each other like human bumper cars in their haste to be out the door first. When the room had cleared I turned back to Wally, who was still propped against the sink, looking more down-in-the-mouth than I’d ever seen him.

“I should have listened to my mother,” he philosophized in a faraway voice. “I should have married the girl next door, had a dog, two-and-a-half kids, bought a station wagon, and sold women’s shoes for the rest of my life.”

I circled my arm around his shoulder. “Aw, c’mon, it’s not that bad,” I lied, wishing I’d opted for the career in shoe sales myself. “We’ve been through worse.”

He peered at me with one eye. “When?”

The kitchen door banged open again and Nana shuffled in. “Don’t know what I was thinkin’. If that young fella is stuck in the pokey tonight, he won’t be here to cook us no meal.”

“Nope,” I admitted. “Tonight you get potluck. Wally and I will throw food into a pot, and with any luck, you’ll be able to eat it.”

Nana gave a loud suck on her uppers. “Get outta here, the two of you. I’ll do the cookin’. Won’t be much. Sandwiches maybe. But at least folks’ll get fed.”

Her pronouncement seemed to rouse Wally from his earlier stupor. “Can’t let you do that, Mrs. Sippel. We’re not going to assign guests to kitchen duty.”

“You’re not assignin’ me. I’m volunteerin’.” She scurried around the room, throwing open the doors of the kitchen’s two industrial-size refrigerators to check out the inventory before disappearing into the pantry. “Plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables stockpiled,” she announced when she reappeared. “Them fellas believed in surplus. Bread. Canned goods. You name it, they got it.”

“And there’s a massive freezer in the basement,” said Wally.

“You got any menus around here what shows what we was s’posed to be served tonight?”

“Absolutely not, Nana.” I twirled my forefinger in the air as an indication that she should turn around and march back through the door. “We appreciate your offer, but this is not your problem.”

“No offense, dear, but if we gotta eat your cookin’, it’s everyone’s problem.”

My mouth dropped open at the slur. I would have feigned indignation if it hadn’t been the truth. “I assume you’re referring to my recent rhubarb pie?” I said in a small voice.

“You bet.” She raised an eyebrow at Wally. “Worst concoction I ever ate in my life. My mouth stayed puckered for so long, the folks at the senior center thought I’d had one of them facelifts what went bad.”

“What was the problem with the pie?” he asked.

“I left out the sugar,” I confessed. “I kinda got distracted.”

“And there’s plenty in this place what can cause more distractions, so if you leave me alone, I’ll see about gettin’ some food on the table.”

No, no, no. She had more enjoyable things to do than whip up dinner for the masses. Besides which, I’d have a guilty conscience forever. Not to mention that Mom would kill me if she found out I’d let her elderly mother engage in unnecessary physical labor. Nana hadn’t cooked a full meal since Grampa Sippel had died. Her kitchen skills could be so rusty, her meal might taste even worse than my dry cereal option. And everyone would have an opinion. Would she be able to deal with the brutal aftermath? The mockery? The incivilities? The scathing review on August Lugar’s food blog?

I pinned her with my gaze, steel in my eyes, my decision unwavering. “Okay.”

She had this.

I’d nearly forgotten.

She spent most Sundays binge-watching the Food Network.