Aunt Bessie Joins (An Isle of Man Cozy Mystery Book 10) (20 page)

“I live in
Laxey
,”
Bessie told her.

“I’ve been to the
Laxey
Wheel,” Laura replied.
 
“But I’m not
sure I could find it again if I had to.”

“Let’s keep things simple,” Bessie
suggested.
 
“You’re in Douglas,
right?”

“Yes, I have a flat near the museum,” Laura
replied.

Bessie named her
favourite
Italian restaurant.
 
“It’s right on
the promenade and the food is wonderful.
 
Shall we say midday on Wednesday?”

“That sounds wonderful,” Laura told
her.
 
“I’m really looking forward to
it now.”

Bessie hung up with a smile on her
face.
 
Laura seemed like a nice
woman, but moving to a new home later in life could make finding friends
difficult.
 
Bessie could only hope
that she could help, by being a friend and also by introducing Laura to others.
 
She was still making a mental list of
people she wanted to introduce to Laura when someone knocked on her door.

“
Doona
and
John?
 
This is a pleasant surprise,”
she exclaimed when she’d opened the door.
 
“Do come in.”

“Hugh’s on his way,”
Doona
told Bessie after she’d given her a hug.
 
“We thought it was time for a long conversation about what’s happening
at Castle
Rushen
.”

“You should have rung first,” Bessie
replied.
 
“I would have baked
something.”

“Hugh’s taking care of that,” John assured
her, after his own welcoming hug.
 

Before Bessie could press for more details,
Hugh was knocking on the door.
 
Bessie let him in, and once he’d set the bakery boxes on the counter, it
was his turn for a squeeze.

“What did you bring?”
Doona
asked.

“Fairy cakes, fruit tarts and a selection of
biscuits,” Hugh replied.
 
He flushed
as everyone looked at him.
 
“I was
hungry,” he said defensively.

“You’re always hungry,”
Doona
said with a laugh.

Bessie switched on the kettle and started a
pot of coffee brewing as well.
 
The
conversation was mostly about Hugh and his girlfriend, Grace, as Bessie fixed
the drinks.

“You are going to propose on Christmas,
aren’t you?” Bessie demanded.
 
“The
poor girl has waited long enough.”

“I hope so,” Hugh replied.
 
“I’ve saved up just about enough for a
nice ring, anyway.
 
I’m taking one
of Grace’s friends with me ring shopping so she can help me get something that
Grace will like.
 
Then I just have
to work up the nerve to actually ask.”

“You should ask her father first,” Bessie
said.
 
“I know it’s an old-fashioned
notion, but I think Grace would appreciate it.”

“I asked her father a long time ago,” Hugh
said, blushing.
 
“One night, when we
were across on our summer holiday.
 
I’d had a bit too much to drink, you see, just a few beers, really, but
more than I usually drink.
 
Everyone
went to bed except Mr. Christian and me, and he asked me what my plans were for
the future.
 
I just blurted out that
I wanted to marry Grace.”

“And what did he say?”
Doona
asked when Hugh stopped for a moment.

“Oh, he said he was happy to give me his
blessing,” Hugh said.
 
“I’m really
glad it happened like that, actually, because I don’t think I could work up the
nerve to ask him now.”

“Just see to it that you ask her,” Bessie
said.

“Yes, I will,”
Hugh
said, looking down at the table.

Bessie sighed.
 
The poor man was so smitten that he
wasn’t thinking straight.
 
Well, if
he didn’t ask her at Christmas, Bessie decided she’d have to give him a gentle
push.
 

“Right, are we all ready to talk about the
case, or rather cases?” John asked as they all sat down with hot drinks and
plates full of treats.

“I’d rather not,” Bessie replied.
 
“I’d rather none of it had ever
happened.”

John patted her arm.
 
“I am sorry that you’re mixed up in
another murder investigation,” he said.
 
“Maybe the new year will be better for you.”

“I certainly hope so,” Bessie said
emphatically.

“But for now, I have two dead bodies and an
act of vandalism to investigate and I can use all the help I can get,” John
added.

“I was hoping Pete would have the first case
all wrapped up by now, at least,” Bessie said.

“He’s working on it,” John said.
 
“But it isn’t as straightforward as we
might have hoped.”

“What does that mean?” Bessie demanded.

“We were hoping to find fingerprints or
fibers or something left behind by the killer, but in a hotel room like that
there is just too much of everything.
 
Besides, a number of key suspects have excuses for having been in the
room, which explains away their prints.”
 
He shook his head.
 
“We
weren’t able to get anything off the body that even hints at who killed him.”

“But it was definitely murder?” Bessie
checked.

“It was definitely murder,” John confirmed.

“So, motive, means and opportunity?” Hugh
asked.

“It seems like a lot of people had motives,”
John said.

“But not good ones,” Bessie argued.
 
“I mean, the charity volunteers at the
castle didn’t like him, but I can’t imagine any of them killing the man just
because he didn’t like their decorations.”

“Michael Beach had more reason to dislike
him than that,”
Doona
pointed out.

“Because he could make a fuss over the punch,”
Bessie said.
 
“But that still
doesn’t seem like much of a motive.”

“What about Richard or Carolyn
Teare
?” Hugh asked.

“I don’t know,” Bessie said
thoughtfully.
 
“He and Carolyn had a
fight about something, but she won’t say what.
 
It’s hard to imagine that it could have
been that serious, though.”

“Is Richard the jealous type?”
Doona
asked.

“He’s never seemed to be in the past, but I
don’t really know them well enough to be sure,” Bessie said.
 
“I think I’d suspect him over her,
though, if I had to choose one of them as the murderer.”

“Who else does that leave?” Hugh asked.

“The other committee members,” John said.

“Oh, none of us had any reason to kill him,
surely?” Bessie replied.

“He upset everyone at the castle, didn’t
he?” John asked.

“Well, yes, but Marjorie and Mary and I
didn’t really mind,” Bessie said.
 
“We just kept working on getting things ready and left Carolyn and Mark
to fight it out with Mr. Hart.”

“What if one of them decided they didn’t
like the direction Mr. Hart wanted to take the event?” Hugh asked.

“We weren’t going to let Mr. Hart and
Carolyn ruin anything,” Bessie said firmly.
 
“We told the volunteers they didn’t have
to change anything if they didn’t want to.
 
It would have all worked out in the end.”

“So you don’t suspect any of the committee
members?”
Doona
asked.

“Not at all,” Bessie said stoutly.

“What about Natasha Harper?”
Doona
suggested.

“I don’t really know much about her,” Bessie
replied.
 
“She didn’t get along with
Mr. Hart, but no one did, aside from Carolyn.
 
He accused her of stealing his clients,
but she didn’t seem upset by it.
 
If
she had a motive, I don’t know what it was.”

“She replaced Mr. Hart at the event, didn’t
she?
 
Was it worth killing for the
job and the publicity?” Hugh asked.

“I can’t imagine so,” Bessie said.
 
“She was already redoing
Thie
yn
Traie
for Mary.
 
She just helped out at ‘Christmas
at the Castle’ because she was already here.
 
I suppose she might have received a bit
of local publicity, but she works across mostly.
 
She’s only here because Mary is paying
for her to be here.”

“Maybe she fell in love with the island and
wanted to stay forever,”
Doona
said.
 
“That does happen to people.”

“But Mr. Hart wasn’t her competition over
here,” Bessie pointed out.
 
“He was
only on the island because Carolyn brought him over, and he was just meant to
be here for two days.
 
He needed to
get back to start filming a new television show, apparently.”

“I wonder who’ll be replacing him in that,”
John mused.

“I suppose, if it’s Natasha, that could be a
motive,” Bessie said.
 
“But I can’t
see how she’d be sure she’d get the job if something happened to him.”

John made a note in his notebook.
 
“I’ll see what I can find out about
that,” he said.
 
“What about the
staff at the castle?
 
Any of them
have any reason to kill the visiting designer?”

Bessie shook her head.
 
“He was horrid to Laura and upset her,
which made Henry angry, but it’s a long way from upset or angry to murder.
 
Neither Henry nor Laura would hurt a
fly.”

“In your opinion,” Hugh said.

“Laura has only been on the island for a few
months,” John said.
 
“I’m not sure
you can totally discount her.
 
We’re
looking into her background to see if she knew Mr. Hart before she moved
across.”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Bessie
said.
 
“But I still don’t think
she’s a killer.”

“What about the vandalism?” John changed the
subject.

“I can see just about anyone doing that,”
Bessie said.
 
“We all hated that
room.
 
It was pretty horrible.”

“But actually destroying the room took some
effort,” John told her.
 
“Do you
really think Mary or Marjorie did it?”

“No,” Bessie shook her head.
 
“Actually, it’s hard to imagine why
anyone did it.
 
It seems like pointless
destruction.
 
I can’t see that
anyone gained anything from it.”

“Except the room isn’t open to the public,”
Hugh pointed out.
 
“Maybe this
Natasha person didn’t want anyone to think she’d worked on such an ugly room?”

“Actually, she did a great job with the
room’s centerpiece,” Bessie said.
 
“If anything, she should have been proud of what she’d accomplished.”

“How does the vandalism tie in with the
murder?”
Doona
asked.

“If we knew that, we’d be closer to solving
both,” John told her.
 
“We aren’t
sure if they’re connected or not, although we have to believe that they are.”

“I thought Pete was pretty sure that Michael
was responsible for the vandalism,” Bessie said.

“He is,” John said.
 
“I’d feel better if we had some idea of
a motive, though.”

“He hated Mr. Hart and hated to see a
tribute to him,”
Doona
suggested.

“Possibly,” John said.

“If he hated Mr. Hart that much, it suggests
he could have killed him as well,” Bessie said.

“And now we can’t question him about it,”
Hugh said.

“What about his death?
 
Was that murder?” Bessie asked.

“We’re waiting for the autopsy results,”
John told her.
 
“At this point, I’m
not ruling anything out.”

“I can’t see any reason for anyone killing
him,” Bessie said after a moment’s thought.
 
“He was just an ordinary person.”

“I understand he was flirting with Carolyn
Teare
quite heavily,” John said.

“He was flirting with her and with Natasha,”
Bessie said.
 
“But he was quite
drunk as well.”

“We’re trying to retrace his steps from when
he disappeared the first time,” John said.
 
“And we’re talking to his friends and acquaintances on the island and
across.
 
It’s possible that his
death has nothing to do with the other incidents.”