A Groom With a View (6 page)

Authors: Jill Churchill

Tags: #det_irony

BOOK: A Groom With a View

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“I have
not
gained weight," Kitty said with her teeth gritted.

“And I'm afraid I haven't lost any," Layla said. "Anyway, the dresses are going to be just beautiful, I'm sure. Now, where are the sandy-colored pieces that are going to be the sidewalk part of the picture? Kitty, help me find all of them."

“What a lovely brush-off," Shelley whispered to Jane.

Mrs. Crossthwait recognized it as such and wandered aimlessly toward the aunts, thinking perhaps that she'd get a better reception from them. But this hope was dashed when they saw her coming and gave two cold, unblinking stares. Still, she persisted in asking if anyone had died here lately. She felt an aura of death.

“Certainly not!" Iva exclaimed, as though dying was a breech of good taste that couldn't happen to such as the Thatcher clan.

The seamstress dropped into the nearest chair to the aunts. "You don't seem to remember me," she said.

“Are you speaking to me?" Marguerite asked haughtily.

“I made your wedding dress."

“That was a long time ago and something I don't discuss with strangers," Marguerite said. She adjusted herself in her chair so that her back was to the seamstress, indicating quite clearly that the discussion had concluded.

Mrs. Crossthwait stared at Marguerite for a long moment, then pretended an interest in her surroundings for a few minutes longer, before getting up and trudging as slowly and carefully as a condemned prisoner up the stairs to her prison.

“I should feel sorry for her," Jane said quietly to Shelley. "That was a really formidable snub. But I'm too annoyed at her dawdling to feel any sympathy. She's being paid an absolute fortune to make the dresses. She's so damned annoy- ing.”

Within the hour, another storm front moved in with thunder that shook the house, made the radio squawk, and put the lights out for a few minutes. When they came back on, they were oddly dim for a while, then went out again.

“Phooey, I almost had the sidewalk finished," Layla said in the darkness.

“I think we might as well give it up for the night. It's almost nine-thirty anyway," Eden said. "I have a flashlight in my purse and I think we all have small kerosene lamps in our rooms. Anybody want to follow me? If we still don't havepower tomorrow, we'll go into town and buy more flashlights.”

The idea of the power being out for the wedding was something that had never crossed Jane's mind. How would Mr. Willis cook? How would Livvy see her way down the stairs? It would be like having the ceremony in a cave! She leaned over to Shelley. "Do you suppose there's a church anywhere near? I need to do some heavyweight praying “

Shelley just patted her hand.

“There's a town nearby?" Kitty asked.

“Well, sort of a town," Eden said. "A motel, Wanda's Bait and Party Shoppe, a bank, and a gun shop.”

Kitty and Layla took her up on the offer to lead them into the darkness of the monks' cells hallway. The aunts had their own flashlight and followed along. Uncle Joe had disappeared into the darkness. Mr. Willis, still in the kitchen cleaning up from dinner, was cursing.

Shelley was doubled up in a chair, laughing herself silly about Wanda's Bait and Party Shoppe. "I love it! You can get your party accessories
and
your minnows without having to run all over town."

“My dears," Larkspur trilled from somewhere across the room. "What adventures we could have. This is like one of those country house mysteries, where everybody's locked up together. I do wonder who will play the victim. What if I found the body? I wonder if I'd faint?”

Somebody, Jane thought it was Uncle Joe, said, "Shut up."

“Could you make anything of the weather reports on the radio?" Jane asked Shelley around a mouthful of toothpaste when they got to their rooms.

“Too much static. But it's a typical spring storm. It'll clear off by morning.”

The wind howled and a branch broke and slithered down the roof. Jane and Shelley blindly felt their way back to their rooms. Jane shuddered and she got into her long flannel nightgown.

“Too bad there wasn't any chance of talking to Eden about the treasure," Shelley said, calling from the next room.

“We can catch her sometime tomorrow," Jane said. She took another quick glance at her notebooks and then settled in with a mystery book she'd brought along, which was a challenge to read by the flickering kerosene lamplight. She could hear Shelley puttering around in her own room. Probably cleaning things. Shelley was an inveterate cleaner-upper.

After a bit, Jane realized the temperature had dropped and it was getting really chilly. She opened her doorway to the hall. "There's a very bad draft out here. I wonder if a door's been left ajar?”

There was a low wailing sound from somewhere.

“What was
that!"
Shelley exclaimed, rushing through the bathroom to Jane's room.

Jane was wide-eyed. "I don't know. I don't hear it now."

“Open the door again," Shelley said.

The wail began again. Jane started to laugh, albeit a bit nervously. "It's the wind down this hall. I lived in a dormitory once that was like that. Get the right combinations of doors along the hall opened and a good wind outside and you get an eerie howling noise."

“You're real certain that's what it is?'

“Certain enough that I'm not going to go check it out.”

Shelley went back through the bathroom that led to her room.

A minute later, Jane called through, "I'm in charge here. I do have to check it out."

“Want me to go along?" Shelley was trying to read a magazine by the light of her small bedside kerosene lamp.

“No, of course not," Jane said, mentally pleading,
Please insist on joining me!

But Shelley took her at her word. Jane put on a robe, lighted her lamp, and opened the door again. The howling, which wasn't audible with the door shut, sounded louder and more ominous.
Don't be a big baby,
Jane told herself.
Just check that the main doors are locked and don't go all spooky and stupid.

This resolve lasted down the hallway and into the main room. As Jane approached the front door, which was open slightly, an enormous gust of rain-laden wind blew it all the way open. The heavy door crashed against the wall, and bounced back, nearly smacking Jane in the process. The wind had blown out her lamp, which she set down on the floor.

She closed the door, tested it, and discovered that the latch was old and didn't quite fit. After a bit of experimenting, she discovered that closing the door, then flinging herself against it, caused a nice snick as the bolt actually went home. Now that she'd solved the door problem, all she had to do was go back to her room.

In the dark.

Without a lamp.

Or flashlight.

But there was lightning. And if she got her bearings with each flash and took it slowly, she could return without running into anything. She stood quite still, peering blindly into the main room, ready to get a good fix on just where she was the next time there was a flash of light.

Something brushed against her ankle.

Jane screamed just as a great noisy blast of sound and light seemed to strike only feet away. Over the sound of her heart thudding, she could hear the distinct ripping sound of a big limb peeling off a tree outside the house.

There was a creature in the house. A raccoon? A possum? Or something bigger and scarier. Or, worse yet, a person! But what would a person be doing at ground level? Crawling? The thought gave her the creeps even worse.

She tried shuffling briskly in the direction shethought she needed to go, but cracked her foot against a chair leg. She was disoriented. There shouldn't have been a chair there. Dear God, why hadn't she brought along a flashlight?

Something bumped her leg again.

And meowed.

Jane nearly collapsed with relief. She'd seen the big gray tabby cat earlier in the afternoon, once when it was snoozing on an easy chair and again when it wandered up the steps just after dinner. She knelt down and said, "Kitty? Kitty?"

“Mrrreow," the cat said chummily.

She picked it up, with a loony sense of comfort.

“Now," she told it, "we're going to go back to my room. Very slowly, very carefully. You can probably see perfectly well in here, but I can't, so I'd appreciate it if you'd tell me if I'm about to run into something."

“Mrrreow." It sounded like consent to Jane in her fevered state.

Another flash of lightning. The cat and Jane both tensed, but it gave her a few more feet of movement. But when the lightning flash was over, there was the flicker of another light. Right in her eyes. Someone had turned on a flashlight, and seeing her, quickly turned it back off.

“Who's there?" she called down the length of the main room.

Her only answer was another rumble of thunder.

This was not good. There might be half a dozen reasons someone else was roaming around the house, but no good reason for not responding when spoken to.

She kept her blind gaze directed at the direction the light had come from and the next time the room was briefly illuminated by the storm, she cast a quick, thorough look around the far end of the room. But there was no sign of anyone. There was so much furniture that whoever it was could have just ducked behind a sofa or chair, waiting for Jane to leave.

Which was precisely what she intended to do. As quickly as possible.

Still holding the cat, which was purring as if nothing were wrong at all, Jane made her way, a few feet at a time, back to the door leading to the hallway where the tiny guest rooms were. She was feeling her way along the left-hand wall, trying to remember which door was hers, when the cat suddenly hissed.

Someone bumped into them and quickly fled. The footsteps were soft, perhaps made by socks or slippers or bare feet, but distinctly footsteps.

Jane, still holding onto the cat, plunged into the next doorway she came to, hoping desperately that it was her own bedroom.

It was.

“Where have you been all this time?" Shelley called. "Jane?" Shelley got out of bed and came through the bathroom. "Good Lord! You're as pale as a ghost. And what are you doing with that cat?”

Jane sat down on her bed and the cat settled inher lap. "I've had a real adventure," she said breathlessly.

She recounted to Shelley how the main door had all but attacked her, her lamp had blown out, the cat had scared her half to death, and someone who would not answer had shined a flashlight at her.

“Jane, are you quite certain your imagination hasn't just gone into overdrive?" Shelley asked.

“Yes, and I'm not finished yet. Out there in the hallway, when I was almost to my door, somebody ran into me. And I didn't imagine it because the cat hissed at him or her."

“Okay," Shelley said briskly. "We'll just get to the bottom of this right now. I'll get my flashlight. Keep the cat in here so we don't trip over him.”

Pajama'd and robed, and equipped with Shelley's powerful flashlight, they set out. There was no one in the hallway, but there was a light shining under the door to Aunt Iva's room. Jane tapped lightly on the door. There was a scuffling sound and some whispering behind the door and finally Iva said, "Who's there?"

“It's Jane Jeffry, Miss Thatcher.”

The door opened a crack. Iva's wig was badly off center. "What is it?"

“Have you been out of your room recently?”

“Of course not. Why would I be?"

“Maybe to get a snack from the kitchen?" Jane suggested. "Did you hear anyone in the hallway here?"

“I did not," Iva said, rudely shutting the door in Jane's face.

“Let's go look over the main room," Shelley said.

The room looked just as it had before the power went out earlier in the evening. At least Jane thought so. But Shelley was more observant. She directed her light along the far wall. "Something's missing.”

Jane stared. "The pictures are gone. Weren't there a couple hunting prints or something on that wall?"

“Yes," Shelley said. "And I looked at them. They were trite and worthless. Who would steal them? And why?"

“I don't know, but it explains why somebody was in here and wouldn't answer me, doesn't it?"

“Maybe," Shelley said, sounding a bit shaken now herself. She shined her light around the rest of the room. They looked behind chairs and found no sign of anyone lurking. "Let's go back to bed. This is going to all seem very silly in the morning."

“I sincerely hope so. But I don't like spooky stuff and this whole night has been spooky to the max. And I can't imagine why the person who shined the flashlight on me wouldn't answer when I called out. Somebody's up to no good here."

“Jane, you just concentrate on the wedding and quit worrying about what anybody else is up to. Everything's going to work out just fine."

“No power, no bridesmaids' dresses, a flock of squabbling old ladies, a cat burglar, and everything's going to be fine?" Jane said. "Like hell.”

SIX

Larkspur was the one to find the body. He did not faint.

He tapped quietly, but frantically, at Jane's bedroom door at seven in the morning. "Jane, I have very bad news," he said. All his artifice had dropped away and he looked ten years older. "I was up early and thought I'd look at the stairs to see if there was a way to wind some flowers around the banister—"

“You woke me up to talk about flowers?" Jane asked.

“No, no. I was just explaining how I came to find her."

“Who 'her'?"

“Mrs. Crossthwait. She's dead.”

Jane, still half asleep, just stared at him, trying to take in what he was saying. "Dead? Mrs. Crossthwait's dead?" she whispered.

“At the bottom of the staircase. She must have fallen."

“Have you called for an ambulance?" Jane asked.