Aunt Dimity Digs In (19 page)

“Stop whispering,” I said. “You’re giving me the creeps.” Bill laughed, then spoke in his normal voice. “While Christine and Grog skedaddle for the pub, Katrina moves toward the vicarage. Sally waits in the dip while Katrina—Brother Florin—circles the vicarage, checking for lights.”

“And when she’s sure the Buntings are safely tucked in bed,” I continued, “she darts into the library, snatches the Gladwell pamphlet from the vicar’s desk, and returns, trophy in hand, to the dip. She and Sally do a victory dance—Miranda’s moon-worship ritual—and crush the grass beneath their feet. Voilà—the landing site of the alien invaders.”

I rested for a moment, stunned by the elegance of our recital, then turned to Bill. “Well?”

“One thing,” he said. “Wouldn’t Katrina object to continuing a dig that might land her boss in hot water? It won’t help Adrian’s reputation to be accused of perpetrating a fraud.”

I thought for a moment. “Katrina might not know about the fraud,” I said. “Sally could have told her that the
pamphlet
was a hoax, something cooked up by Peggy and Mr. Taxman—like those flyers—to fool the Buntings, Adrian, everyone.”

“It’s plausible,” Bill allowed. “Katrina had already had one run-in with Peggy by the time she met Sally. She must have thought Peggy capable of anything.”

“Katrina thought Peggy was crazy,” I stated firmly. “She told me so, the first time I met her.” I got to my feet. “I’m positive that Katrina Graham and Sally Pyne stole the Gladwell pamphlet. All we have to do is prove it.”

“It’d be helpful to prove it before Sunday comes around,” Bill reminded me. “Sally’ll be less likely to throw eggs if she’s already got ’em all over her face.”

 

Emma added a new and unwelcome wrinkle to my theory when she showed up on my doorstep an hour later, bearing a briefcase full of computer printouts.

“Sally took my undergardener off to find a party dress,” she announced, “and since I promised Rainey I wouldn’t plant a seed without her, I’ve given myself a half holiday.”

“Come on in,” I said.

Emma was the only person I knew who didn’t demand to see the boys the minute she stepped into the cottage. I found it quite refreshing.

“Rainey’s been a Trojan,” she told me, as we settled on the couch in the living room. “I wish I had her energy.”

“Don’t we all,” I said.

“She’s a trouper,” said Emma. “She carted flowerpots up and down the library steps all morning, without a single squawk—and she seems to thrive on dirt. She’s so different from Nell that it makes me wonder if they’re from the same planet.”

I recalled Nell Harris’s sense of style, her air of sophistication, and nodded my agreement. “Night and day,” I said.

“I’ve brought a present for Reginald,” Emma said. “Nell sent it from Paris, on Bertie’s behalf.”

Bertie was a chocolate-brown teddy bear. Nell carried him with her everywhere, without apology or explanation. Bertie and Reginald were cousins, of a sort, both having sprung from Dimity’s sewing needle, and Bertie never failed to remember Reg during his travels abroad.

Emma opened her briefcase and removed a box wrapped in gold foil. “Marrons glacés,” she said. “Straight from the Champs-Elysées.”

I looked toward the playpen, where Rob and Will were chewing contentedly on their toes. “I don’t think Reg’ll mind if we open his present for him. I’m sure he’d
want
us to enjoy . . .” My words trailed off as I strolled over to scrounge through the stuffed menagerie that kept the boys company. “ That’s odd,” I said, straightening. “I could’ve sworn I put Reg in the playpen before I went into the village this morning. Francesca?” I called, heading for the kitchen. “Have you seen Reginald?”

Francesca looked up from the bread dough she was kneading. “He’s in the playpen, isn’t he?”

“Not anymore,” I said. “I thought you might have moved him.”

She gazed at me, perplexed. Then her dark eyes sparked with sudden illumination. “The sneak,” she whispered. Flour flew as she gave the dough an angry punch. “ The underhanded, conniving—” She caught my eye and clamped her mouth shut, then turned to the sink to rinse her hands. “Will it be all right if I slip out for a bit?”

“Sure,” I said. “I’ll be home for the rest of the day.” I had a vague suspicion who the sneak might be, but I wasn’t going to be the first to mention his name.

“May I use the Mini?” she asked, stripping off her apron.

“ Take the Mercedes,” I said, following her to the front door. “You know where the keys are.”

“Grazie. I won’t be long.” Francesca took the keys from the hall drawer. She paused before the mirror to brush a smudge of flour from her chin, then marched outside. The Mercedes’s engine roared and its tires spat gravel as Francesca spun out of the drive.

“Brrr . . .” I said, shivering theatrically. “I wouldn’t want to be in Adrian’s shoes when Francesca catches up with him.”

“What’s going on?” asked Emma.

“I’m not sure,” I admitted, returning to the couch, “but I suspect that Dr. Culver came a’courtin’ this morning, and left with Reginald in his rucksack.”

“Don’t be silly,” said Emma. “Why would he take Reginald?”

“I didn’t say he
took
Reginald. Not on purpose, anyway. Not consciously.” I looked over at the playpen. “My guess is that Reg just sort of accidentally
fell
into Adrian’s rucksack.”

Emma looked as though she thought I’d lost my mind.

“Oh, come on, Emma,” I said. “You know what a sucker Dimity is when it comes to true love. I’ll bet she’s using Reg for a spot of matchmaking. She’s done it before.”

Emma bit her lip and stared down at her briefcase. “I hate to say it, but I think Dimity may be backing the wrong horse this time.”

My smile faded. “What do you mean?”

“You remember the on-line search you asked me to do, regarding the Culver Institute?” Emma reached into her briefcase and produced a sheaf of computer printouts. “ This is what I found.”

“You’re kidding,” I said.

“I’m serious.” She shuffled through the printouts. “I was able to retrieve a set of E-mail follow-ups to surface-mail solicitations asking people to support the Culver Institute.” She looked up uncertainly. “You don’t seem very pleased.”

“I’m not,” I said as a wave of disappointment washed through me. “Adrian seems like such a nice guy. You should have seen him the other night, when he showed up here with Reg. He was so cute, like a little kid spiffed up for a school dance. He behaved impeccably when Bill came home, drunk as a skunk, and he didn’t lose his temper when he found out that Peggy had tricked him into signing her petition.” I sighed. “He just laughed and said she’d make a great prime minister. And he’s such a
goop
when he’s around Francesca. I can’t help liking him, Emma.”

“No one ever said nice guys can’t be ambitious,” Emma pointed out.

“But nice guys don’t lie,” I said, shaking my head sadly. “And Adrian’s lied to everyone—to me, to the Buntings, to his staff, maybe even to the bishop. He’s got everyone believing that he has no long-range plans for Finch. But these”—I tapped the printouts—“prove otherwise. They confirm what Francesca told me about the cache of letters Sally found in Katrina’s room.”

“In that case,” said Emma, “I guess we have to face facts. Adrian’s got more at stake in Finch than we realized.”

“Which puts him at the top of my list of suspects,” I said, “because he’s got more to lose than anyone else. His museum will go down in flames if his backers find out about the Gladwell pamphlet.” I buried my face in my hands and groaned. “The arrogance! To foist a fake on his unsuspecting backers and think he can get away with it!”

Emma listened sympathetically while I recounted my thrill-filled morning. If she smiled over Christine’s aliens or my role as Peggy’s poster child in the upcoming rally, she had the decency to do so when I wasn’t looking. She also pointed out, quite sensibly, that Adrian’s inclusion on the suspect list didn’t necessarily exclude Sally Pyne or Katrina Graham.

“Adrian could have told Katrina and Sally about the pamphlet after he’d learned about it from the vicar,” Emma reasoned. “ They may have planned the burglary together, or he may have talked them into it, then sat back and watched while they did the dirty work. He should have known that others would be watching, too.”

“Nothing goes unnoticed in a village,” I murmured, sick at heart.

“I know what I’d like to do next,” Emma said. “I’d like to break into the schoolhouse to see if I can find a hooded raincoat, or copies of the solicitation letters, or, best of all, the missing pamphlet.”

“You?”
I said, thunderstruck. “When did the keyboard bandit turn into an action heroine? Rainey’s energy
has
rubbed off on you, my friend.”

“Hey,” Emma protested, “Finch is my village, too. I don’t want to see this civil war get any bigger.”

“Okay,” I said doubtfully, “but you’ll have to come up with another plan. Crime—even a piddling little crime like the burglary—has too many unintended consequences.” I thought of the vicar, sitting in his darkened library, and of George Wetherhead’s futile enthusiasm. Most of all I thought of Christine Peacock, yearning for her son, hoping to coax him home with a scheme that wouldn’t have entered her mind but for a chance encounter with the burglars. I wondered if Adrian had ever stopped to consider the hidden costs of building a monument to his ego.

“Then how about this?” Emma proposed. “I’ll talk Simon into giving Derek and me a tour of the schoolhouse tomorrow. A really
thorough
tour.”

“What’ll I be doing while you’re ransacking the cupboards?” I asked dryly.

Emma thought a moment. “You’ll be taking Dr. Culver up on his invitation to visit Scrag End field. And you’ll keep him and Katrina there until my tour is finished.”

I looked over at the playpen and nodded. “Rob, Will, and I should be able to keep Katrina out of your hair for quite a while.” I turned my gaze to Emma’s briefcase and smiled grimly. “I’ll leave Adrian to Francesca.”

18.

Will and Rob watched from their bouncy chairs as I shut the study door and reached for the blue journal. Emma had departed and Francesca had not yet returned, so the boys and I had the cottage to ourselves. It seemed a good time to give Dimity some pointers on the delicate art of matchmaking. If I had to lose my nanny, I didn’t want to lose her to a two-faced, puffed-up popinjay like Adrian Culver.

I gave the boys’ chairs a jiggle before I settled into an armchair, and they gurgled with unabashed delight. An hour with my bambinos did me more good than a whole week of Bill’s backrubs. I jiggled their chairs again, to show my gratitude, then sat back and opened the blue journal. Before I could say a word, Aunt Dimity’s looping scrawl began to fill the page.

“That’s one way of looking at it,” I said, leaning my chin on my fist.

“If you can figure out a way to trade places with me, Dimity, I’ll be only too glad to . . .” I fell silent as the implications of Dimity’s comments filtered through. “Wait a minute,” I said. “Peggy and Sally didn’t move to Finch until after you . . . departed.” I winced at the euphemism but continued doggedly. “How did you manage to witness
any
of their confrontations?”

“In those days . . .” I repeated slowly. “Dimity, are you saying that Mrs. Pyne, Mr. Barlow, and Mr. Taxman were brought to Finch as children, because of the blitz? Were they evacuees, like Peggy Kitchen?”

“Kind to whom?” I asked.

I closed my eyes, bruised by the sudden revelation. Peggy and Sally weren’t simply two strong-willed women angling for dominance in a small community. They were lifelong enemies. They’d hated each other for more than forty years, and now, the day after tomorrow, on the square in Finch, their long-running feud would come to a head. Would the rotten eggs turn into stones? I wondered. Would sly theft give way to open warfare?

I looked down at the journal. “Did Jasper Taxman and Billy Barlow get involved?”

“It didn’t get him anywhere,” I pointed out. “In the end, Peggy became Mrs. Kitchen, not Mrs. Taxman.”

My eyes widened. “Jasper moved back to Finch in hopes of marrying his childhood sweetheart? Golly. That’s potent puppy love, all right. I wonder why the others came back.”