Aunt Dimity: Detective (23 page)

“Old Mick had lived in the boardinghouse run by Prunella Hooper's mother,” said Mr. Barlow. “He was there after the war, when Prunella befriended a pregnant girl who was staying with an aunt just up the street. Mick still remembered the girl's name—Peggy Stanton.” He nodded to Lilian. “Church records'll confirm that Stanton was Peggy Taxman's maiden name.”

Mick Shuttleworth had seen Prunella in action, stirring wasps' nests in the boardinghouse, and he knew that she would cause young Peggy grief. He'd tried to warn Peggy to steer clear of Prunella, but Peggy wouldn't hear a word said against her friend. When Prunella got wind of Mick's efforts, she forced him to leave the boardinghouse.

“Mick wouldn't say what lies she spread about him,” Mr. Barlow said grimly, “but I imagine they were along the same lines as her lies about Kit and Nell. It made the old gentleman's blood boil to think of it, all these fifty years later.”

Mick had kept an eye on Peggy even after he'd left the boardinghouse, and when she'd given birth, he'd made it his business to find out where the baby had gone in case Peggy ever came looking for her child.

“That's how I found Harry Mappin,” said Mr. Barlow. “He'd been given to a couple in Pickering. Harry knew he'd been adopted, but he was one of thousands of wartime babies whose records were shifted from pillar to post. He'd had no luck tracing his birth mother.”

Lilian looked at Mr. Barlow with a faint air of reproof. “Was it necessary to bring Mr. Mappin here?” she asked. “Mrs. Taxman might have appreciated a word of warning.”

“Harry wouldn't wait,” said Mr. Barlow. “And I can't say that I blame him.”

Lilian remained doubtful. “But to introduce him so publicly—”

“Isn't that what you wanted?” Mr. Barlow pushed himself up from his chair. “It's like you said to me before I left, Mrs. Bunting: There've been too many secrets floating around this village, too many people being hurt by half-truths. It was time to clear the air.”

A murmur of assent filled the schoolhouse, but Miranda didn't add her voice to it.

“Have we cleared it, though?” she mused aloud. “I wonder . . .”

Dick stroked his goatee. “The way I see it,” he said, “Pruneface threatened to tattle about Harry unless Peggy sided with her against us.”

“There's more to it than that, isn't there, Nicholas?” When Nicholas didn't reply, Miranda looked at me. “Were you able to confirm my suspicions, Lori? You've been poking and prying so zealously. You must have learned something by now.”

I glanced uncertainly at Nicholas. “I, uh, don't think this is the time or place to—”

“I'm sorry, Lori, but Mr. Barlow is quite right,” Lilian interrupted. “It must all come out, here and now. I would urge you to share with us whatever you and Nicky have learned.”

“I can't,” I said. “Peggy spoke to us in confidence. I won't betray her trust.”

“Nicky?” said Lilian.

“I'll leave it to Ms. Morrow,” Nicholas said softly. “Her conclusions were essentially correct.”

Miranda wasted no time in telling the others about the argument she'd overheard at the Emporium.

“The quarrel led me to believe that Mrs. Hooper wasn't paying one cent in rental fees to Peggy,” Miranda concluded, “and that Peggy was giving her money from time to time, to keep her mouth shut.”

“Now we know why,” Dick commented. “Who would've thought it of Peggy? Having a baby out of wedlock when she's always telling us to mind our morals.”

“Maybe that's why she tells us to mind our morals,” said Christine. “She's seen what happens to those who don't.”

“You're missing the point.” Sally Pyne jumped to her feet, too overcome by indignation to remain seated. “It was nobody's business but hers. Pruneface had no right to hold it over her. Poor old Peggy . . .” She ground her teeth. “It doesn't bear thinking about.”

“We must think about it, though,” Christine said gravely. “You know what I mean. If anyone had a motive to kill Pruneface, it was Peggy.”

“So what if she did?” retorted Sally.

“I'd vote to pin a medal on her,” George Wetherhead chimed in.

Mr. Barlow put two fingers in his mouth and whistled shrilly, silencing the chatter.

“Listen up,” he said. “Peggy Taxman didn't kill Pruneface Hooper.”

“How do you know?” Sally asked.

“I was there when it happened, that's how.” Mr. Barlow glanced at Nicholas. “I saw Pruneface Hooper die.”

My jaw dropped, Dick sputtered, and Sally's eyes nearly popped out of her head, but Nicholas didn't turn a hair.

“Pardon?” Christine said weakly.

“You heard me,” said Mr. Barlow. “I'm surprised you haven't been told about it already.”

Nicholas bowed his head. “Mr. Barlow,” he murmured, “if you would be so kind as to explain . . . ?”

“Very well.” Mr. Barlow waited until Sally had resumed her seat before speaking. “When I took Buster for his run that morning, I spotted Pruneface standing in her usual place, snooping on Dick. She had a curling iron in one hand, and she was holding back one of those hanging plants with the other so she could get a clearer view of the pub.” He demonstrated Mrs. Hooper's stance, then went on.

“Buster's barking must've startled her because the next thing I knew, she let go of the plant. It swung across and whacked her”—he touched the place on his head where Nicholas had touched me—“here. She went down like she'd been poleaxed.”

Christine gaped at Mr. Barlow. “Pruneface Hooper was killed by a
flowerpot?
”

“I'd say she killed herself,” Mr. Barlow opined, “but a flowerpot's what bashed her head in.”

“Why didn't you report it?” asked Sally.

“I didn't know she was dead,” said Mr. Barlow. “I thought the flowerpot had knocked her silly, but I didn't know it had killed her. I laughed when she went down.”

“I heard you,” Sally said faintly.

Mr. Barlow bent to fondle Buster's ears. “I told myself that Buster had gotten his own back on her and that she deserved a bump on the head for kicking him. That's what I told the police when they tracked me down yesterday.”

Sally put a hand to her forehead. “The police have known the truth since yesterday?”

“If they'd done their job right, they'd've known it a good deal sooner,” said Mr. Barlow. “Isn't that right, Detective-Sergeant Fox?”

A profound hush fell over the room as everyone turned to look at Nicholas.

He closed his eyes. “Yes, Mr. Barlow. If we'd done our job right, we'd have closed the case last week.”

Chapter 25

Miranda clapped her hands. “I knew it!” she exclaimed. “Auras never lie. I did invite you to bring the drug squad with you to tea, if you recall, Detective-Sergeant.”

Dick eyed me reproachfully. “You brought a copper into my pub and didn't bother to tell me?”

I sensed Nicholas's gaze on me but refused to look at him. “I didn't know he was a copper, Dick. He didn't tell me.”

Sally looked thunderstruck. “The two of you, thick as thieves, and he never told you he was a policeman? Well, I never . . .”

Christine addressed Lilian. “You must have known. He's your nephew—isn't he?”

“Don't be silly, Christine,” said Lilian. “Of course Nicky's my nephew, and I'm well aware of his profession. When he came to stay, I asked him to—” She broke off as Nicholas got to his feet and strode out of the schoolhouse. “Lori,” she said worriedly, “go after him.
Please.
”

I felt so hurt and humiliated that I was tempted to turn a deaf ear to her plea. Nicholas had lied to me, used me, and left me to face my neighbors without a word of explanation. He'd demanded the truth from everyone else, but he hadn't had the decency to tell it to me.

Worst of all, he'd made me feel stupid. I'd noted his observation skills and his polished interrogation technique—I'd even described his good cop/bad cop routine to Aunt Dimity—but I hadn't suspected for one minute that he might actually
be
a cop. He'd telegraphed his occupation in a hundred different ways, but although I'd seen the pieces, I'd been too thickheaded to see the bigger picture.

I'd trusted Nicholas, and in return he'd made a fool of me. If he hadn't left his trench coat behind, I might have climbed into my Rover and gone home to sulk.

But I couldn't ignore the lightning bolt that illuminated the schoolhouse windows. When it was followed by a crash of thunder and a sudden, heavy downpour, I let out an aggrieved sigh, snatched the black trench coat from the back of the chair, and raced out of the schoolhouse, grabbing my own jacket on the way.

I saw Nicholas at once, a solitary figure silhouetted against Miranda's hedge by a second lightning flash. He stood with his head in his hands, unmoving, despite the driving rain.

“Nicholas!” I shouted, running up Saint George's Lane. “You idiot!” I came to a halt before him, panting. “You forgot your coat.”

His arms fell to his sides, but he said nothing. Rain streamed from his face and hair, and his tweed blazer was soaked through, but he made no effort to take the trench coat from me.

I threw it around his shoulders and glared at him. “Planning to stand here all night?”

Still he said nothing.

“Are you
trying
to catch pneumonia?” I demanded truculently. “You're crazy if you think I'll let you off the hook that easily.”

He made no reply, but gazed down at me with such a look of hollow-eyed despair that my anger leached away, to be replaced by uneasiness.

“Nicholas?” I said, wiping the rain from his face. “Nicholas, come with me.”

I took his hand as if he were a child and led him into the vicarage, where I knew we wouldn't be disturbed. The vicar was spending the night with Lilian's brother, and Lilian would be fully occupied, answering questions about her nephew. If Peggy, Jasper, and Harry returned to the schoolhouse, the session might drag on for hours.

Nicholas was as docile as a lamb. I threw our wet coats onto a chair in the foyer, helped him out of his blazer, and held his arm while he slipped his shoes off. He let me take him to the green velvet sofa in the vicar's study, where I got a fire going, toweled his hair, and wrapped him in a blanket. I considered making cocoa, but I was afraid to leave him alone for too long, so I added another stick of wood to the fire and sat beside him on the sofa.

I let the silence linger before asking solemnly: “Are you dying?”

Nicholas's laugh twisted into a sob. He pulled his hands free of the blanket and wiped his eyes. “I may be having a nervous breakdown, Lori, but I don't seem to be dying.”

I looked up at him. “Are you really a policeman?”

“I don't know what I am,” he replied. “But I did at one time work undercover for the drug squad. As Ms. Morrow is so fond of pointing out, auras never lie.” He squinted vaguely at the fire. “I can't think why she didn't give me away.”

“Haven't you heard? Witches like to keep secrets.” I looked down at the threadbare Turkish carpet. “Can you tell me about this nervous breakdown?”

He hunched forward, pulling the blanket around him more closely, and stared unblinking into the fire for a long time before he spoke.

“I had . . . a partner,” he began. “His name was Alex Lay-ton. Our last case”—he swallowed hard—“ended badly.”

He was shivering. I reached over to gently stroke his back.

“It ended badly,” he repeated. His voice was barely above a whisper. “Someone slipped up, our covers were blown, and the bad guys got to us before we could pull out. They knocked me about and shot me full of dope but kept me conscious long enough to watch as they beat Alex to death.”

His sea-green eyes had lost their luster, gleaming dully beneath a glaze of tears. Lightning flashed and thunder rolled and rain crashed against the French doors, but Nicholas seemed aware of nothing but the nightmare visions he alone could see writhing in the flames.

“I awoke in hospital. I'd been rescued and revived, but no one could save Alex. The human skull is so fragile in places that even a flowerpot can break it.” He bowed his head and pressed the heel of his hand to his brow. “Imagine what a length of pipe can do.”

My heart ached for him so badly that I could scarcely breathe. I remembered how he'd jerked his hand away after showing me where Mrs. Hooper had been struck. Had he seen his partner's face for one brief moment, relived the horror of his partner's death?

“When I recovered,” he said softly, “they put me on light duties, teaching self-defense to new recruits.” He touched my leg. “It wasn't all lies.”

“It's okay,” I said. “It doesn't matter.”

He closed his eyes. “When I put my fist through one wall too many, they gave me three months' leave without the option. I spent the first month drunk, the second in counselors' offices, and the third getting myself back in shape. I came to Finch to rest up before my final meeting with the medical board.”

The doctor's appointment, I thought. He'd had to face the medical board only a few hours before he'd faced the villagers.

“When I first arrived in Finch,” he said, “Aunt Lilian asked me to look into the circumstances surrounding Mrs. Hooper's death. She told me there was bad blood in the village and that it needed to be purged.”

“Does she know about Alex?” I asked.

He shook his head. “It's not the sort of thing one tells one's aunt. It's not the sort of thing one talks about at all, if one can avoid it.”