Canapés for the Kitties (24 page)

He looked suddenly queasy and turned away to pour and gulp at a large drink for himself before serving anyone else.

They all knew too much about the inner workings of a police investigation, Lorinda recognized sadly. It did not make for comfortable conversation or thoughts when those workings were being applied to someone they had actually known.

“They … they think he was there all night,” Gemma said slowly. Her reluctance was obviously because she did not wish to think about it herself, not because she was hesitant to share the information with them. “He … he would have died of hypothermia. Exposure, we used to call it. It was the coldest night of the year so far.”

“I knew it! I knew it!” Betty began sobbing uncontrollably again. “I shouldn't have left him! I shouldn't!”

“There, there.” Professor Borley patted her shoulder ineffectually, but she broke away from him and hurled herself into a corner of the sofa, wailing incoherently.

“Pull yourself together!” Freddie had dealt with hysterics before, as evinced by the expert way she yanked Betty upright and shook her. “You are not responsible. You didn't go off and leave him lying on the ground, did you?”

“Of course not!” Betty was shocked into indignation. “I'd never do a thing like that!”

“Then where did you leave him?” Lorinda had the feeling that she already knew the answer.

“With Dorian.” Betty hiccoughed and dabbed at her eyes. “I – I'd been up there helping him pack ...”

She'd been doing all the work, she meant. It was par for the course with Dorian; he'd use his part-time secretary as valet, waitress, chief cook and bottle-washer and anything else he happened to be in need of. The thought caught Lorinda unawares.
Anything
else? She blinked and looked at Betty with a sudden question in her mind.

“Mr. Sutton ... Plantagenet ... had come up say
Bon voyage
to Dorian and ... and he'd brought a bottle of champagne with him. They ...
he
... gave me a glass,” she said defiantly, “while I was packing. We all drank the champagne – but it wasn't the first drink Plantagenet had had that night, I could tell.” She sipped at her own drink again, as heads nodded in agreement.

“Then ... then the packing was finished. Except for the last-minute bits – toothbrush, toothpaste, razor, you know – to be tossed in in the morning ... and I was ready to leave. I expected Plantagenet to come with me – we were both going back to Coffers Court and Dorian had to get up at the crack of dawn, but ... but ...”

“But you left alone.” Lorinda had done her best to sound sympathetic, but Betty was looking for criticism.

“I
did
suggest ... but I couldn't insist. And ... and Dorian said he had this special bottle he wanted Plantagenet to sample ... but that I didn't have the taste buds to appreciate it. And ... and ... he'd ring me in the morning to come up for last-minute instructions and ... and to finish his packing. I knew they ...
he ...
didn't want me around any more ... in case they had to be polite and share their precious bottle with me. Well ...” For an instant, something indescribably ugly flashed in her face. “It didn't do them any good, did it?”

She had been used and coldly dismissed until she was needed again. How typical of Dorian. And ... how unfortunate for Plantagenet Sutton.

“But I should have waited outside –”

“Don't be silly, you'd have caught pneumonia,” Freddie said sensibly. “They could have lingered over that bottle for a couple of hours – and there was no guarantee that they wouldn't have opened another one. There was nothing you could have done.”

“But – but that wasn't the worst,” Betty wailed. “When I got home, I – I unplugged my telephone. So that Dorian couldn't call me at the crack of dawn –”

“Good for you!” Karla said.

“I was going to tell him the phone was out of order. But, don't you see? If I'd gone up to do all those last-minute things, I'd have found Plantagenet hours earlier than he was found. I – I might have been in time to save him.”

“No, you wouldn't.” Freddie was still being sensible. “A couple of hours on that frozen ground would have been enough to finish him in last night's weather.”

“Sure. Once he hit the ground and didn't get up right away, he didn't have a chance.” Jack quietly topped up Betty's glass.

“And now Dorian will find out.” Betty's real terror spilled over. “Dorian will know I did it deliberately. Unplugged the phone because I didn't want him to bother me. He – he'll sack me. I'll lose my job.”

“So what?” Jack was puzzled. “He's not the only one paying you around here. The rest of us will still need you –  and your hours will be a helluva lot better.”

“But I'll lose my little home, too. I won't be able to stay in Coffers Court. It – it's a sort of a tied cottage.” She began to cry again. “Oh, I wish I'd never done it! But I was so tired ... exhausted ... I'd had all I could take. I couldn't stand even one morning more ...”

“Don't worry,” Freddie said grimly. “You'll stay in Coffers Court. The rest of us will see to that.”

“Anyway, Dorian will never know if you don't admit it,” Macho pointed out. “There's no need for you to tell all these details to the police. All that's relevant is that you finished your job and left. Plantagenet wanted to stay and keep on drinking. It isn't as if you arrived together in the first place. You couldn't be expected to leave together.”

“Will the police make Dorian come back, though? He'll be furious. And –” Betty would not be comforted. “And he'll take it out on us ... on me.”

“I doubt that the police will have any inquiries that can't be handled by a telephone call,” Lorinda said. “Given the circumstances, the verdict is sure to be ‘Misadventure.' ”

“That's right,” Freddie agreed. “Once they get a reading on the alcohol level in his blood, the only mystery will be how he managed to stagger as far as he did.”

Chapter Twenty

“I fear that my patience is becoming exhausted.” Miss Petunia aimed the spray gun at the greenfly on the roses and wielded it violently.

“You, Petunia?” Lily was incredulous. “But you're the one with all the patience. Got none myself, I know. And Marigold is too impetuous for her own good. You got the patience for all three of us. And the brains,” she acknowledged humbly. “You
can't
run out of patience, it's practically your middle name.”

“Perhaps – but I can be pushed too far. I have warned that woman!” ...
squirt ...
“I have given her every chance.” ...
squirt ...
“I've bent over backwards –” ...
squirt ...

“Oh, do be careful, Petunia.” Marigold turned worried blue eyes on her eldest sister. “You're going to wrench that spray gun apart.”

“I'll wrench
her
apart!”

“Petunia!” Marigold was scandalized.

“Action,” Lily agreed. “That's what we need. Been rusticating too long. Nothing to get our teeth into. No action except for –” She broke off and frowned, not wanting to admit the action they had been involved in, even to herself.

“Precisely!” Miss Petunia said.

“You mean ...” Marigold quavered. “That terrible dream ... nightmare ... I had last night? The rest of you had it, too?”

“Precisely!”

“It won't do,” Lily said. “Can't go on like this. Never knowing, when a perfectly innocent investigation is going to explode in our faces.”

“Precisely!” Miss Petunia took a deep breath and hurled the spray gun into the herbaceous border, something she had never done before. “The ingratitude of it all! We have fed her, clothed her, bought her a house, supported her for all these years – and now she turns on us like this!”

“Not good enough,” Lily brooded.

“My whole body aches,” Marigold said piteously. “And I'm afraid to look in the mirror for fear I'll discover I'm covered in ... in blood.”

“Got a fearful pain in the neck,” Lily agreed.

Miss Petunia rubbed her stomach reflectively and said nothing; her expression was grim.

“I feel
so
peculiar,” Marigold said. “As ... as though ... I'm fading away.”

“This cannot be allowed to go on,” Miss Petunia proclaimed.

“Quite right.” Lily nodded. “Had enough.”

“But, Petunia ...” Marigold quavered. “What can we do? We've already tried to plead our case with her.”

“Fired a warning shot across her bows,” Lily corrected.

“Neither of which she heeded.” Miss Petunia faced them implacably.

“Perhaps we should try again,” Marigold said nervously. “Surely, we can make her understand.”

“Waste of time,” Lily said.

“Quite right. The woman is obtuse!” Miss Petunia declared. “Furthermore, she is completely self-obsessed. She does not care what happens to us.”

“Thinks only of herself,” Lily said. “Bone-selfish.”

“We have established that, dear,” Miss Petunia said. “Now we must decide what to do about it.”

“Chop!” Lily looked into the distance, her mouth pursed in a soundless whistle. Her hand came up to make a slashing motion across her throat. “Give her the chop!” “Oh, no!” Marigold gasped. “No! That's too drastic!”

“She's trying to do it to us,” Lily reminded her.

“I fear dear Lily is right,” Miss Petunia said. “The time has come for decisive action. Before it is too late.”

“Too late?” Marigold's eyes widened. “Oh, Petunia, whatever can you mean? However could it be too late?”

“Only too easily, I fear,” Miss Petunia said. “Just suppose that our ... our Chronicler –” She gave the word an unpleasant sneering twist. “Our Author ... were to actually
use
one of those evil disgraceful chapters one day? Suppose that, either by accident or design, she ended the current book with it, sent it off to the publishers – and they published it?”

“Oh, Petunia!” Marigold reeled with dismay. “Surely they wouldn't do that! They'd expostulate with her, make her rewrite the ending ... Wouldn't they?”

“They might,” Miss Petunia conceded. “Then again, they might not. They might consider that the publicity she would achieve by killing us off might outweigh the disadvantages.”

“Barmy bunch, publishers,” Lily agreed. “Never can tell with them.”

“But ... all those books ...” Marigold did look as though she were fading. “All those years ...”

“Precisely,” Miss Petunia said. “They might think we'd run our course.”

“Outstayed our welcome,” Lily said. “Time for a change.”

“Precisely! Especially if Lorinda Lucas has an idea for a new series. The publicity attendant upon our demise would get it off to a flying start.”

“And she'd never look back,” Lily said.

“But ... but ...
we'd
be ... gone.” Marigold could not encompass the thought. “Of course” – She brightened –  “there are still all those previous books.”

“Much good they'd do
us,”
Lily said. “Oh, she could lean back and still collect royalties from them, but we'd be on the shelf. In our graves.”

“I fear dear Lily has put her finger on the nub of the matter.” Miss Petunia adjusted her pince-nez and gazed sadly at her sisters.

“But ...” Marigold was still unwilling to believe it. “
Has
Miss Lucas another series in mind? Surely, we'd know about it. I ... I haven't received any
intimations.
Have you?”

“That is why we must act now,” Miss Petunia said. “Before she does. Her mind is a blank on other characters at the moment, but there are pernicious influences afoot. She is being unsettled by the company of her peers and all their dissatisfactions. Things have not been the same since the fateful day she moved to Brimful Coffers!”

“Then why don't we ask her to move away again?” Marigold suggested brightly. “Then everything can be the way it was before.”

“No.” Miss Petunia shook her head gravely. Even Lily was shaking her head. “The situation is too advanced. There can be no going back.”

“No going back ...” Lily echoed grimly.

“But ...” Marigold's mood veered, now she seemed on the verge of tears. “But ... what can we do?”

“Now, Marigold,” Miss Petunia said gently. “We have discussed this before. You know the options.”

“But we can't!” Marigold wailed. “It would be too brutal ... too cruel ...”

“Too soft-hearted for her own good,” Lily snorted. “Any less brutal or less cruel than what she has been doing to us?” Miss Petunia asked bluntly.

“But ... but we have always stood for law and order.” Marigold raised tear-drenched eyes. “For justice! We ... we're the
good
guys!”

“Do it right,” Lily muttered, “and nobody will ever suspect it was us.”

“Quite right, dear,” Miss Petunia approved. “As dear Marigold has pointed out, we are the ‘good guys.' For that reason alone, no one would ever suspect us. Apart from other reasons ...” She let the thought trail off delicately.

“What other reasons?” Marigold asked innocently.

“Well, dear, we are ... after all ...” Miss Petunia tried to think of a tactful way of phrasing it.

“Fictional.” Lily had no such compunction.

“Er, yes. We
do
exist ... for the most part ... on the printed page,” Miss Petunia admitted reluctantly.

“Then ... then how are we going to
do
anything?”

“We will find a way,” Miss Petunia vowed.

“Oh ...” Marigold brightened. “You mean like ‘Love will find a way'?”