“Better early than never, that’s what I say!” Brimming with mischief, Tricks bounded over the threshold, Indian draperies floating from her shoulders like a dozen or more print scarves, pudgy hands flapping. Today she had moussed down her hair so that it clung like a bathing cap. But otherwise it was the same Tricks. The moment the front door closed she remembered she had left the bag of vegetables she had brought for show-and-tell in the taxi. A desperate ringing of the bell produced the cabbie who had delivered my in-laws into my hands a few long days ago.
“Here!” He shoved a bag at me. It bulged with balloon-faced tomatoes that appeared to have been force-fed to bring them to maximum obesity in the shortest possible time.
Shutting the door on his indignant back, I discovered that Mum had also made good her escape. Who could blame her, in the face of her rival’s apparent absence of remorse?
“What a cute pussycat!” Tricks had spied Tobias, sitting licking his chops, on the trestle table. “I’m nuts about all animals! That’s why I can’t eat them. Live and let live is what I say.”
“That’s a lovely attitude,” I replied even as I thought about Goldilocks, who got poached by mistake.
As if reading my mind, Tricks did her best to look downcast when saying, “Young Dawn is still horribly cross with her old gran for that mix-up with the saucepans yesterday. She told me I’d better sleep with one eye open in the future. Teenagers! I had to laugh at her! The child will learn fast enough that life is too short for fretting and fussing. And I only wish dear old Mags would finally get the good news.” Tricks watched
me trying not to drop the bag of tomatoes. “Talking of my best friend, wasn’t she here a minute ago?”
“She’ll be back.”
“Goodness! I hope she hasn’t gone off to pout. They say pouting is worse than smoking when it comes to causing wrinkles. A smile on your face keeps the doctor away has always been my thinking.”
“I must remember that.” I was about to suggest we head into the drawing room and see if Mum was playing lady-in-waiting, when—as if she had heard the magic mention of cigarettes—Bridget Spike appeared in the glass panel beside the door and thumbed the bell. In she came like a breath of Irish morning, her wrinkles unabashedly displayed, her parrot nose in full command of her face, and her shaggy hair making no apologies for scorning the comb.
“If it isn’t grand to see you looking fresh as the daisy, Mrs. Haskell!” The fog rising up off the bogs was in her voice, and even more welcome than a pot of gold was the jar of marmalade she set down on the trestle table.
“How kind of you! And please, call me Ellie!”
“And who will this be”—she shifted her handbag up her arm as she turned to Tricks—“is it Lady Kitty Pomeroy or Beatrix Taffer I have the pleasure of meeting?”
After making the necessary introductions, I led the way to the drawing room. There we found Mum. The good news was that she wasn’t hiding out behind the curtains, the bad news was that she had decked herself out with so many bead necklaces and bracelets, she resembled a refugee trying to escape with all her worldly goods. Another time after getting her ready for a social engagement I must remember to check her pockets.
“Don’t get up, Mags my love.” Scooting across the room, Tricks planted a kiss on the cheek of stone. “You stand there growing good and the rest of us will be our naughty selves.”
Before Mum could start chewing on her beads and spitting them out, however, Bridget went up to her. “If it isn’t a rare treat to meet you, Mrs. Haskell may never set foot again in Ireland. And is it you my daughter-in-law, Eudorie, tells me is such a marvel with the crochet hook?”
While Mum thawed visibly, I set down my burden of home-grown veggies on the table in front of the window, where they could soak up the sun and do some more growing. In refusing to leave me in the lurch, Mrs. Pickle had left the Hoover on the hearth rug and a dust rag draped over a lampshade, but what did that matter? Eudora and Frizzy had their afternoons to themselves and were hopefully making the most of every mad moment.
“Sure and away, Ellie,” gushed Bridget, “it’s a kind thing you did inviting me to your wee tea party.”
“It won’t be all that ‘wee.’ ” Mum reacted immediately to the suggestion that there was anything cheeseparing about the company. “We are expecting more people.”
“That’s right; we have Lady Kitty coming and who knows who else will show up?” Given the uncertainties of this life, I did not feel I was telling a bald-faced lie.
“And isn’t it exciting—all of us getting together to talk about our exhibits in the summer fête!” Tricks plopped down in a chair, her legs flying almost over her head, in a flurry of Indian muslin that revealed a tempting display of dimpled thigh. “I lie awake nights dreaming of one of my marrows being awarded the first-place ribbon. Me, Beatrix Taffer, famous in my old age.”
“I’d say you’ve already made quite a name for yourself.” Mum retreated to the chair farthest away from her friend while, seemingly unaware of any nasty undercurrents, Bridget placidly sat on one of the ivory sofas that faced each other in front of the fireplace.
“Would you be having an ashtray, Ellie, anywhere abouts?” Bridget was reaching into her handbag as she
spoke. “We had a wee bit of a fire last night at the vicarage and Eudorie—who’s a grand girl sure enough—is after me not to smoke in her house. It’s to be banished I am to the outdoors, so it would be a splendid thing to light up here and suck all that good old muck into me lungs.”
One hesitates to refuse a visitor lured into one’s parlour, but Mum fortunately was not blessed with my social cowardice.
“My son, Bentley”—Magdalene exercised the force of his full name—“does not permit smoking in this house.”
“Ah, it’s a blessing—that it is, we don’t all think alike.” Bridget had barely finished making this equable reply, when the doorbell jarred me into action. In the hall I met Mrs. Pickle going as slow as her legs would carry her to open up. Sending her off to fetch the tea tray and scones, I did the honours.
“Lady Kitty!” I ushered her inside.
“You need to change your bell, dear.” Her ladyship fixed me with a pained smile. “It doesn’t go with the house at all. Has a very lower-class ring.”
“I’ll see to it,” I stammered, having been promptly brought in line when confronted by her fierce fur coat and the voice that sounded as though she had a mouthful of plum pudding. On a brighter note, the cloth-covered dish she carried appeared to contain, if not a pud, a pie. When it came to anything with sugar and spice, I was always humbly grateful.
“You haven’t done a bad job with the hall.” Lady Kitty cast her eagle gaze over the swoop of banisters and the grandfather clock. “Of course, if it were me, I’d take up those flagstones and put down a nice, serviceable linoleum. And I’d get rid of those suits of armour; that sort of thing is considered nouveau riche these days.” She prowled the area, making further inspection, then swivelled suddenly to face me. “I’m happy to give you these pointers, Ellie, because you’re a girl who does her best.”
“Thank you.”
“My daughter Pamela is a different story. Would you believe she tried to talk me out of your suggestion that I exhibit some of my pies at this year’s fête?” Lady Kitty tapped the cloth-covered dish with a forceful finger. “My life isn’t easy, Ellie, but thanks to you I now see I was mistaken in not having set the standard years ago for the pie-baking community.”
Before I could answer, she continued. “Don’t think I’m not happy to stand here and listen to you chat, dear, but I’m afraid we’ll have to save this for another time. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s you can’t run a village standing around twiddling your thumbs. Now, Ellie, why don’t you take this delicious apple pie into the kitchen and cut it into nice neat slices, while I go in and get the meeting started?”
Duly dismissed, I retreated to the kitchen to find Mrs. Pickle stacking teacups and saucers in slow motion on a tray designed to hold at most one egg cup.
“Was that Lady Kitty?” Mrs. P. raised her head an inch at a time to look at me.
“Yes, and look what she brought!” I set the pie dish down on the table and raised the cloth to reveal a perfectly proportioned golden-brown crust. “If this tastes half as good as it looks and smells, she should be a shoo-in to win first-place honours in her category at the fête.”
“As like as not, Mrs. Haskell.”
“Oh, bother!” I exclaimed. “There goes the phone.”
“That’s the trouble with them things, make more work than they’re worth, they do.” Mrs. Pickle wiped her hands laboriously on her apron as she shuffled for the hall door. “That’s why I’ve never had one put in my house for all Roxie Malloy keeps telling me I’m out of touch.”
“You carry on here, I’ll go and see who it is.” My heart did not race along with my feet as I hurried to
pick up the receiver, even though I had the feeling it would be Ben on the line. This would not be a case of his feeling an irresistible urge to whisper sweet nothings in my ear. He would be ringing to tell me about his talk with Dad.
“Hello,” I said.
“Is this Mrs. Ellie Haskell?”
“Very funny, Ben,” I said in response to the silly muffled voice, “but unfortunately I don’t have time for fun and games.”
“Then you’d better make time, hadn’t you, Mrs, Haskell?”
“Who is this?” I was still thinking that someone, if not Ben, was tweaking my horn.
“Someone who wishes you well and would like to spare you any unpleasantness.”
“Such as?” A chill was creeping down my spine.
“Oh, we do know how to play dumb, don’t we?” The caller gave a hollow chuckle. “I’m talking about your chitchat at the Dark Horse and how you spent the evening plotting up ways to murder your mother-in-law.”
“That was a joke!”
“Try telling that to the police, Mrs. Haskell.”
“You’re not scaring me.” By now I was holding on to the phone with both hands to prevent it sliding out from my slippery palms.
“Aren’t we brave? And I don’t suppose you’d mind your hubby finding out what you have planned for his dear old mum. You could say I’m a pessimist by nature, Mrs. Haskell, but it strikes me he won’t see the funny side. Could be he’d start to look at you different, out the corner of his eye, if you know what I mean.”
“What exactly do you want?” I shrilled.
“Nothing a lady living in a swanky big house like yours can’t afford. Why don’t we say two hundred pounds? That’s just a drop in the bucket.” Again that nasty chuckle. “You’re to leave it, sometime tomorrow,
in the hollow tree at the end of the lane that leads up to Pomeroy Hall. Do I make myself clear?”
“Perfectly,” I said numbly, and heard the phone go dead.
This couldn’t be happening! I must be out of my mind to even consider the possibility of submitting to blackmail. The only sane—safe—thing to do was to make a clean breast of my sins and take the consequences. How bad could they be? Knees buckling, eyes squeezed shut against the sunlight breaking through the windows to point its accusing golden fingers at me, I saw Mum’s wounded face rise up before me. All hope of establishing a better relationship with my mother-in-law would be doomed if she found out. She would think I hated her. And she was already in such a vulnerable state. Poor little sparrow.
Two hundred pounds wouldn’t ruin me. But what about Frizzy, Eudora, or Pamela? Would they be hard-pressed to meet the blackmailer’s demands if he played fair and put the squeeze on them too? Suddenly I found myself recalling that morning’s telephone conversation with Pamela. What were her words when she thought she was talking to her husband Allan?
Did you come up with the money?
Her hasty explanation of wanting to go out on a shopping spree had not rung true.
And now a really ugly suspicion entered my head. What if Pamela—desperately short of cash, for whatever reason—were herself the blackmailer? The disguised voice of my caller could have been male or female. And was it pure coincidence that Pamela had mentioned the hollow tree in connection with her father-in-law, Bobsie Cat? No, I couldn’t—
wouldn’t
—believe it. There had to be someone else, some dark, tormented soul who had been made privy to that ill-advised conversation at the Dark Horse.
My heart stopped, then started up again with a hop, skip, and a jump. Heaven help me! I remembered fiddling with Peter Savage’s tape recorder before placing
it on the floor beside our table. That morning I had returned it to him—and perhaps when he turned it on he got an earful that suggested an easier way to make a living than busking for loose change. Oh, surely I was being ridiculous. The man was a slave to his art. Besides which, he had been vehement in professing his profound admiration for me.
Aha!
jeered a little voice inside my head.
Do you really need more evidence that he is a dangerous crackpot?
“Mrs. Haskell!”
“Yes, Mrs. Pickle?” I came down to earth with a thud after jumping three feet in the air.
“I was wondering”—she was peering around the kitchen door—“if it would be an idea for Jonas to help me out with bringing in the tea, seeing as how there’s more scones than I can carry in three loads.”
“He’s resting,” I said, “so could you try and manage?” The wicked life I led was making me hard, I thought sadly as I went into the drawing room. Mum and Tricks were talking to each other under cover of a diatribe from Lady Kitty on the ready-made pies offered for purchase in the frozen section of supermarkets. Only Bridget paid any attention to my return.
“If it isn’t herself come to join the company! Sure and away, I was picturing you like poor Martha in the Bible—slaving away at the cooker while her sister Mary sat buttering up to Jesus.…”
It was Mrs. Pickle who gasped. She had opened the door smack into my back and, with more speed than I had ever seen her exercise, dropped the tray of scones. Admittedly she would have made more of a statement if she had brought in the teapot and crockery, but she certainly caught the attention of one of those present. Lady Kitty did not descend from the raised hearth which comprised her podium. But she did stop talking—making it possible to hear what Tricks was saying to Mum.