The Spring Cleaning Murders (14 page)

“I get the point.” Freddy stood up, stretching until his fingertips almost brushed the ceiling and yawning half his scraggy face off. “You don’t like Madrid Miller and she isn’t coming to your birthday party even if she does promise to bring you a balloon, so there! Nothing wrong with that!”

“You are saying?”

“That the nasty crackpots are the ones to whom we can’t relate because they espouse viewpoints that conflict with our own.”

“Did you get that out of Dr. Johnson’s dictionary?”

“My point,” Freddy explained gently, “is that sometimes it’s personal. You and I, coz, would put Mrs. Barrow high on the unlovable wackos list, because she went and picketed Abigail’s, instead of toting her placard over to that dress shop you told me about on Lost Sixpenny Road, the one where they don’t sell anything above a size two.”

“Agreed.” I wiped my soapy hands on his sweater.

“Could it be, Ellie”—still the avuncular approach— “that you’re not being a hundred percent fair to Madrid Miller about this business of the doggies? Because she didn’t overtake her sister in a race down the hall to let you out of that pantry?”

I folded my arms and looked him straight in the eye. “Tell me, Freddy, what’s going on in that maggoty brain of yours? Why do you care so much what I think of a woman you’ve never even met?”

“Okay.” Now he was the one looking me straight in the eye. “I’m concerned you’ll take the leap from not liking Madrid Miller to deciding it’s entirely possible that she pushed Mrs. Large off that ladder. Bother the motive! That can always be figured out later.”

“Of all the cheek!” I flared. “I seem to remember your suggesting on the day of the funeral that it might not have been an accident. And that being the case, the Miller sisters were the most likely suspects, because it happened at their house.”

“Mea culpa.” He pressed a hand to his chest. “I admit I’m the last one to talk. It’s fun poking around, playing at Sherlock Holmes, but I just don’t think this is the time, Ellie. You’ve got other things going on. You keep talking about getting all this spring cleaning done...” Freddy paused to stand scratching at his beard.

“And there’s the restaurant.” I stopped being cross with him. “Have Mrs. Barrow and her troops returned with their picket signs?”

“No, all’s quiet on the western front.” He cocked a questioning eyebrow. “Or does Abigail’s face east? Never mind. Ben seems quite chipper, so I wouldn’t get into a wifely tizzy about him, coz. He’s not going to chuck in the towel.”

“I told him I thought he should.”

“Well, he won’t. Your husband’s not cut out to be a lovable eccentric whiling away his productive years living in a tree thinking he’d like to be a teakettle. The one I think we should all be worried about is Jonas.” Freddy took another scratch at his beard.

“Why do you say that?” I asked, heart starting to thump.

“Ellie, have you taken a good look at the old boy lately?”

“Of course I have.”

“And you don’t think he’s getting awfully frail?” My cousin looked as truly concerned as I’d ever seen him. “Maybe I’m overreacting, but I hate to see him going downhill when maybe something could be done to perk him up.”

“You’ve seen me try to get him to eat,” I said. “Still, I’m glad you brought this up, Freddy.” I gave him a hug and a tweak of the earring. “I suppose I’ve been trying to kid myself Jonas was just feeling the effects of winter and would get back to his old self now that spring is here. But I’ll talk to Dr. Solomon again. The last time we spoke, he assured me that apart from the bronchitis Jonas is fit as a fiddle for a man his age. And that older people often take a while regaining their energy after a bad bout, like the one Jonas had before Christmas.”

“I’m not suggesting you don’t take great care of him, and I don’t want to come off acting like I’m the old boy’s mother.” Freddy, who never got embarrassed, looked and sounded flustered. “It’s just that he’s a great mate in his way, and I suppose I... I’m fond of him.”

“Actually,” I said, sounding like Tam, “you love him, but I promise never to tell. There’s no reason to.” I gave the earring another tug. “Jonas knows. And he feels just the same. You and Ben are the grandsons he never had. So try not to worry.” Advice as much for myself as him. “I’ll go and see Dr. Solomon. There’s no point in trying to do this over the phone. And I want to have my say before having him come out to give Jonas a thorough going-over.”

“You’ll do that today?” Freddy was already looking more cheerful.

“Dr. Solomon’s not going to be in the surgery for the next couple of days. I found that out when I took Abbey in with that earache on Friday. We had to see one of the other doctors. But with Jonas I really think it’s best to wait until Wednesday or Thursday to talk to Dr. Solomon himself.”

The man under discussion opened the door and scuffled into the kitchen in a pair of old plaid slippers, which he refused to give up even though he had at least two new pairs. He was wearing an equally ancient dressing gown over striped pajamas. But as is often the way after picturing someone at death’s door, he looked livelier than usual. What hair he had was standing up in wisps and his moustache needed a good trim, but there was a sparkle in his eyes. A malevolent sparkle perhaps, but that was our Jonas.

“I thought as how I’d come down and meet this new woman you’ve got coming in, Ellie. Make her feel at home like.” He gave an amused grunt before planting himself at the table.

“Hoping she’s your type, mate?” Freddy gave him a man-to-man wink.

“If she is,” I said, getting the kettle going for another pot of tea and popping more bread into the toaster, “he’s too late. Trina McKinnley already has a boyfriend, one of those mucho macho types, who makes the two of you look like a couple of choirboys. But by all means be as charming to her as you like. We haven’t had much luck recently keeping help. And I count myself more than lucky to have her one morning every other week.”

“Be warned, Jonas.” Freddy was actually buttering the toast for me. “If this Trina doesn’t stick the course, you and I will each be given a pinny with our name embroidered on it and told to heave-ho with the Hoover.”

“I’ve got to be getting out in the garden.” Jonas eyed the window, although it didn’t give much of a view outside, except for the old copper beech tree. “Those lawns be needing mowing, and I ain’t even started bedding out, nor tidying up the tulips and daffs as they die off.”

“You’ve had other things to do,” I told him, scooping a poached egg out of the saucepan with a slotted spoon. “I’m always asking you to keep the twins amused while I’m doing something else.” I glanced up at the clock. “Which reminds me, I’d better get them up and dressed so they can be finished with breakfast by eight. That way I’ll be able to get them to play school and be back in plenty of time before Trina arrives at nine.”

“I’ll take them for you,” offered Freddy. “Ben’s an easygoing boss, but he does like me to toddle into work at least half an hour before I clear off for the day. So I have to leave shortly anyway. But what about the car? Are you going to be left stuck if I keep it for the rest of the morning?”

“Not if you could also bring them home.”

“No problem,” replied Freddy the Fantastic, “although if you’d only be a sport and let them ride on the back of my motorbike, you wouldn’t have to do without the car.”

“I don’t want the car,” I told him firmly. “I want to stay at home and bond with Trina McKinnley. The minute you leave with the twins I’m going to have a race round trying to make the place look halfway presentable so she doesn’t take fright and do a bunk before I even take her upstairs.”

Luckily it was one of those mornings when my children decided to be reasonably cooperative. Abbey put her frock on backwards, but that was quickly rectified. Tam remembered it was show-and-tell that day, so there was a scramble to find his Paddington Bear. After hugs for me and Jonas, they went happily off with Freddy a good ten minutes ahead of schedule. All very promising, I thought, until I turned back from the door to face the kitchen.

Jonas, clearly afraid I would attempt to tidy him up too, abandoned his cup of tea and went off to get dressed. The hall door closed behind him, leaving me trying to outstare the kitchen in hope that it would squirm with embarrassment at having got into such a muddle. And offer—no, beg—to be allowed to clean itself up. Talk about ingratitude, I thought, shoveling crockery into the sink. After all I’d done for this kitchen! Taking down the horrid green wall tiles and replacing them with a wheat sheaf-patterned paper, remodeling the fireplace, installing the greenhouse window above the new sinks, and as a final treat, presenting the kitchen with a lovely Aga cooker.

Rolling up my sleeves I finished clearing off the table and wiping it down. But it was impossible to stay cross. I loved this house too much. It had a way of wrapping its arms around me, making me feel securely tied to the past, the present, and the future. The breakfast china I was now washing up had belonged to Abigail Grantham. Her hands had dried this cup, had put away this plate. One day perhaps it would be Abbey’s or Tam’s wife’s turn to stand here, looking out the window to see the sun rise and listen to the birds singing, as if it were all happening for the first time.

When putting away the last cup, I noticed Mrs. Malloy’s china poodle staring out at me from the cupboard shelf. It was more than time I put it on display, yet for a moment or two I stood doing battle with my baser self. The temptation to put that poodle on the toilet tank in the downstairs loo was almost overwhelming, but I did not succumb. Marching into the drawing room I set Fifi on the mantelpiece next to one of a pair of Chinese vases on either side of the Buehl clock. There was no denying poor Fifi destroyed the artistic integrity of my entire decorating scheme. Everything else had been selected with an eye for harmony and good taste—
my
taste.

I slumped down on the sofa. But it only took a couple of glances around the room to make me realize I was kidding myself. True, I loved the furniture, but I hadn’t selected it. All I’d done was rescue it from the attic. Yes, I’d bought those Chinese vases and a couple of table lamps. But in the years since my marriage various other items had pretty much made their own way into this room. There was the misshapen bowl that my aunt Lulu had made at a pottery class. A picture painted by Freddy when he thought he wanted to be an artist. And cushions embroidered industriously, if inexpertly, by an old friend.

In fact, I spotted quite a few other knickknacks that would never have won my heart on a shopping spree. At one time I must have regarded them as eyesores, just as I now did Mrs. Malloy’s Fifi. But over time they had settled in, had become those touches that make a house a home. Picking up one of the cushions to give it a fluff, I noticed the small dots of dried blood that were the result of repeated jabs with the embroidery needle and thought about Abigail’s book of household hints. What had she said to do about blood? And would it work if the blood was already dry? It came to me as I returned to the kitchen--starch and water mixed into a thin paste. Simple, and definitely worth a try. I would have to pick up a box of starch, because all I had in the house was the spray kind. And there was something else I needed to do. Get the glass replaced in Jonas’s mirror.

There was a knock at the garden door. For a foolish moment I was swept back to the days when it would have been Mrs. Malloy standing outside wearing one of her fur coats whatever the season, and not the least affected by the disapproval of those such as Mrs. Barrow. As Freddy had once kindly informed Mrs. M., it wasn’t as though any of her furs came from animals likely to be categorized as an endangered species. In fact the National Society of Exterminators probably felt extremely beholden to her.

My eyes were misty as I opened the door to Trina McKinnley.

“Well, here I am,” she said, unbuttoning her jacket and hanging it with speedy efficiency on a peg in the alcove. “It’s not bad getting here. The Cliff Road bus stops just around the corner from where I live.” Setting her bag down on the table, she looked the kitchen over, her snapping dark eyes missing nothing, neither the crumbs by the toaster nor the cobweb that had defiantly grown back in the corner since I began spring cleaning. I found myself comparing Trina McKinnley’s professional-looking white uniform with Mrs. Malloy’s work outfits, which had run the gamut from cocktail frocks to the miniskirts she had taken to wearing after she became a grandmother.

“I’ve got a bit behind,” I apologized, spotting a place where one of the twins had scribbled on the wallpaper.

“I can see that, Ellie. Makes it easier using first names, doesn’t it?” She was now prowling the room, to the obvious annoyance of Tobias, who hissed at her from the rocking chair before leaping from the table to the edge of the sink and up onto the window ledge.

“Oh, yes,” I said, “much easier.”

“Well, I’m sure you don’t want to be calling me Miss McKinnley, and we’re not living in the Dark Ages, are we?” She was now trailing a finger through the dust on the Welsh dresser and eyeing the double row of plates. “Poole pottery, right?” She gave a jerk of her curly head before turning back to face me. “My granny collected it, and that juice jug by the sink is Edinburgh crystal.” She pointed a knowing finger. For the first time I noticed she was wearing a small black bow in her curly hair, just above her right ear.

Fingering it, she explained: “This is for Gertrude Large. Betty Nettle wanted us—her, Winifred Smalley, and me to wear black armbands. I ask you! In this day and age. But when Winifred suggested the bows, I gave in. The only reason I’m in the organization is because of her.” Trina flashed me one of her black-eyed looks. “I expect you’ve heard all about the C.F.C.W.A. from Roxie Malloy.”

“Not a lot,” I replied cautiously. “I understand it’s all highly confidential.”

“Downright silly is what it is.” She shrugged her white-uniformed shoulders. “But Winifred’s always been very into it, and as I said, I go along because she’s a good old egg. Like a mum to me in lots of ways, although I hope she won’t. . .” Trina didn’t finish the sentence. She had picked up the teapot and was looking it over from handle to spout.