Muffin But Murder (A Merry Muffin Mystery) (24 page)

But . . .
really
? Did they honestly think that Les was going to play nice with so much at stake? Bob, still whimpering, dragged his chair across the floor toward the door, and Les jumped down from the desk to stop him, but he tripped and fell flat out on the floor as his gun skittered across the cement. I stood as best as I could and with one mighty swing I lifted the office chair and flung it down on him, forgetting that, because I was attached to it, that swinging motion would take me flying, too. The weight of that old steel office chair carried me with it, and I flew on top of Les, just as Virgil, my hero, burst into the deserted gas station office, gun drawn.

“Am I interrupting anything?” he asked.

Chapter Twenty

I
T
WAS
A
bit of a tangle for a while. In the confusion that followed, no one was sure who the good guys were or the bad guys. Bob, aka Cranston Higgins, got away but was caught staggering and stumbling down the highway in the storm, still attached to his chair, which was, I must say, lighter in weight than mine. Thank goodness I had the heavier one, because it had knocked Les out.

The arrest was anticlimactic, since the villain was out cold. When Virgil saw the bruise on my jaw,
his
jaw clenched, a rock-hard stubble-covered line; it seemed to me that he “helped” the paramedics by flinging Les onto the gurney with just a little more force than was needed.

Zoey’s father and Sheriff Baxter showed up about then, the whole parking lot area filled with cruisers, blue and red lights blinking, reflecting in the rain puddles on the pavement.

“Daddy!” Zoey cried, and flung herself at her dad. “Les Urquhart . . . he kept
me
captive, too, and threatened that if I didn’t go along with him, he’d hurt
you
! Oh, Daddy, I was so scared! What was I going to do?” She blubbered like a little girl.

Girl missed her calling; she should have been a soap star.

“That is a load of bull feathers,” I said to the Ridley Ridge sheriff. “She’s the one who faked an injury—you can check out the supposedly ‘off the road’ car on the Wynter Line—then held a gun to me and made me drive here. Then she let Les tie me down to the chair while she pawed through my purse and stole my silver compact, which I want back, by the way!
And
my cell phone!”

We all trundled off to the Ridley Ridge PD. It took another couple of hours to sort everything out, and I did get my compact and cell phone back. Sheriff Baxter got an earful from me about Zoey Channer, Les Urquhart, and my faux cousin, poor Chicken Bob. I told them honestly that Zoey Channer did seem scared of Les—and who wouldn’t after seeing him kill Davey Hooper? The mannequin from my party, with Hooper’s blood on it, was found at the Party Stop, I later heard, indelibly tying Les Urquhart to the murder at the castle.

“How did you find me?” I asked Virgil in a lull in the action at the Ridley Ridge PD.

“There is a waitress named Susan in a café in Ridley Ridge, and she called the cops to tell them about a car zooming through town with you at the wheel and someone holding a gun to your head.”

I would have to thank that girl. She probably saved my life, just because she decided to do something rather than ignore it. “I would have expected that would cause the police to be there sooner!” I exclaimed.

He shot a glance across the room at Baxter, who was sitting in a squeaky office chair watching one of his officers flirt with Zoey. “It took a while before anyone believed her. I heard the call on the scanner, and that’s why I got here first, even though I was fifteen miles away.”

I hugged him and kissed his cheek, and he turned a becoming shade of red.

In the days that followed, Zoey’s daddy wasn’t much use to her, since he was indicted on charges of conspiracy to commit murder in that other little trouble he had. I thought that Zoey might be spending the rest of her actual jail term in jail once her parole was revoked. I hoped she got along real well with Dinah, once that woman found out Zoey had been peripherally involved in her only other son’s death. The Hoopers had many friends in the prison system.

After a couple of days, things calmed down. I waited until Shilo and McGill were gone out to dinner one evening so I could talk to Pish. We were sitting together on the settee in the parlor, hand in hand, while Debussy’s
Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun
played. “Why didn’t you tell me you had paid Davey Hooper off? Why did you do it, Pish—pay him off, I mean? When you
knew
you hadn’t done what he accused you of.”

“Two different issues, my love. So I’ll tackle the easier one first: why I gave him money.” He sighed and let go of my hand, staring into the fire, the glow of the flames on his lean, handsome face as the lovely orchestral music flowed around us. “I had already turned him in to the jail officials at that point, on the threat he leveled at me, that I had harassed him. I don’t suppose Virgil actually followed the time line and figured that out. But then Hooper contacted me again once he got out of jail. Crafty fellow, Davey Hooper was. He could have done so much in his life if his bent wasn’t toward the criminal. But he had gotten ahold of a piece of information that was damaging, not to me, but to someone I cared about very much.”

“Who? What information?”

He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter anymore, my darling. That person is gone from my life. But I wouldn’t let Hooper destroy someone who deserved to be let alone. I gave him money, he abided by his deal, and that is the end of that story. He was, as I remember him, a different person from his mother in that way, not nearly as vindictive, nor as dangerous.”

“So . . . did you truly not remember him when you first heard his name?”

“He was going by a different name then, remember: David Isaac Smith. No, I did not remember him until Virgil told me the details. The part of his face I saw, below the Lone Ranger mask, looked vaguely familiar, but that was all.”

I told Pish what Les had said, about Hooper’s unwillingness to go after his brother’s killer, poor old Rusty Turner.

“Yes, that coincides with what I thought he was about. I have, by the way, since told Virgil all of this, and he has checked out my story. Everything is, as they say, copacetic.”

“I understand that you can’t tell me who this involves, but why not tell me the truth that you’ve shared with me now? It must have been a difficult and upsetting time.”

“My dearest darling, my problem is that you have me so high on a pedestal, and I am merely human. I am so afraid of disappointing you.”

I put my arm over his shoulders and hugged him tight. “You never need to worry about that, because you’ve got
me
on that pedestal beside you. How about we both climb down so we can be honest with each other from now on?”

We agreed on that, and I felt at peace.

The next day, as Shilo and McGill were off ordering wedding invitations and Pish was in Autumn Vale using my lovely new/old Caddy, I put on a CD, a collection of romantic music with a Spanish guitar thrumming through it, one of Miguel’s favorites. It was loud. The weather outside was cold and sleety, but beef bourguignon was bubbling in the Dutch oven down in the kitchen, and I was oddly content. I was almost broke and saddled with a gorgeous, impractical castle, true, but at least it was mine, all mine. For the time being.

I donned my painting clothes, Miguel’s oversized cargo pants and a man’s shirt, tied my hair back up in a scarf with a floppy bow in front, and climbed that twelve-foot ladder again. I was almost all the way around in the turret room, just another ten feet or so to go, uncovering the masterpiece that some long-ago painter had perfected. Working gave me a lot of satisfaction. I had looked through some of the other unused rooms and found that there were more treasures to be found under layers of wallpaper. There was furniture galore still in the attic, beautiful old bureaus and wardrobes and bedsteads, enough to furnish every bedroom, and then some.

My heart was full to bursting as I worked around, finally pulling off the last foot of wallpaper and sat, staring up at the ceiling. It was beautiful, my gorgeous turret bedroom.

“
Merry!
What the hell are you
doing
up there?”

I cried out and lost my balance at the loud voice and felt myself falling, falling . . . into Virgil’s arms. But instead of him catching me in a perfect romantic clinch, I knocked him down and ended up lying across his chest, my butt in the air in a most undignified position.

I felt him heaving and grunting, and I struggled to get off, crossly muttering, “Stay still. . . . Let me get off! What the heck did you think you were doing, startling me like that?”

When I rolled over and off him, I saw that Virgil was actually laughing, great gusty whoops of laughter that sputtered into a cough. I collapsed in laughter, too, and he turned me over onto my back, hovering above me for longer than was necessary, his handsome face and cinnamon-scented breath bathing me. I thought he was going to kiss me, I really did, and the world stopped for a moment as we stared at each other.

And then the phone rang, and the spell broke. He lumbered up off me and offered me his hand, pulling me to my feet. I ran to answer it, shouting out to Virgil that I’d make him a coffee if he’d meet me in the kitchen. I turned off the music and answered the phone in the little office off the upstairs gallery hall. The call was from a friend in LA. He had been sent photos of my castle by some mysterious person—Shilo or Pish? I wondered—and asked if he could come the next week to check it out. He was a location scout for movies and thought my castle might be a good external stand-in for a scene in a medieval drama. How much would it pay if the castle were selected? I asked. He told me. I was astounded, and as I set the phone back in the cradle, I counted up how many electric bills and how much of the property taxes even just a few days would pay.

Down in the kitchen Virgil was sitting by the fireplace. He looked awful, which I hadn’t noticed before. His nose was red and his eyes bleary. “You’ve got a cold!” I cried.

He looked up at me with a quirky half grin. “You look so beautiful,” he said.

“That is the cold meds talking, no doubt,” I said, pulling the scarf off and shaking my hair out.

“You’re always so damned perfect—perfect hair, perfect clothes, perfect makeup . . . everything perfect—and right now you’re . . .” He shook his head as if to clear it.

“Yup, cold meds. And you
drove
like this?” I made some soup and sandwiches and gave him coffee. We ate right there at the fireplace, and soon I saw him become more like himself: cautious, careful, alert.

He cleared his throat as I came back from putting the dishes in the dishwasher. “I’m sorry, Merry, for startling you like that. I rang the bell, but no one answered and the door was unlocked, so I came in.”

“I had the music pretty loud. It helps me think.” And remember my husband. “What were you coming out for?”

“I’ve got news about the case. Les Urquhart denied everything at first, but something interesting happened: he was attacked in prison, and when he was in the infirmary, he asked to talk to a detective and made a full, signed confession. Then he asked for protective custody.”

“Davey Hooper had friends inside?”

He nodded. “Not that I condone what they did in beating him up, but his confession sure saves a lot of time and money.”

“So what happens to Juniper Jones?”

“Zoey tells us that she’s not pressing charges on the assault, so Juniper is free to do whatever she wants.”

“That’s good to know. And Bob? My never-was cousin?”

“He’s wanted on so many outstanding complaints and warrants he’s going to do time for a while. By the way, did you know he had a key made to the castle?”

“So
that’s
how he kept sneaking in! I wondered.”

“That guy is not going to do well in jail. He’s pretty scared right now.”

“Poor guy,” I mused, then laughed. “I actually feel bad for him. How weird is that?”

“Don’t waste your time,” Virgil said.

“I never do,” I retorted, and eyed him. “I
never
waste my time on impossible projects.”

Chapter Twenty-one

F
IVE
WEEKS
LATER
,
after a hectic, mind-blowing schedule—Thanksgiving at Golden Acres with Gogi, Virgil, Hannah, her parents, and a whole slew of the residents, and weeks of labor to get the castle in better repair—I stood in Wynter Castle’s great hall beside Shilo and watched her and McGill marry in a tender, happy, laughing ceremony presided over by the local Methodist pastor. It was full-on winter in upstate New York. We had about six inches of snow that would, according to local wisdom, melt away, only to be followed by lots more.

The hall was filled with flowers and candles, the chandelier dimmed by swaths of draped white tulle donated by a designer friend of mine. The ballroom was set up for the reception and a professional photographer was snapping everything in sight, shadowed earnestly by Lizzie, who had volunteered to be his assistant. From the gallery above drifted the sound of a harp soloist from the Cornell University Department of Music. Gogi smiled over at me; she had been responsible for that. She had always imagined harp music from the gallery above the great hall, she’d told me the first time she visited me at the castle.

I cried buckets as they said the words, sniffing and snuffling like a fool. McGill’s honest, homely face shone with love and Shilo . . . She took my breath away. Alcina, that magical child, had made her a crown of flowers for her hair, and it sat on a blond lace veil, anchoring it. Shilo wore a vintage wedding gown given to her by McGill’s mother, who sat in the front row, smiling with tears in her eyes. She loved Shilo so much, it was a sight to behold. My dear friend deserved the happiness she had found when she had followed me to my castle.

But I sure would miss her.

Oh, she wouldn’t be leaving Autumn Vale, but she’d be living with McGill, of course, in his prudently bought-and-paid-for Autumn Vale house. And first they were going on a two-week tour of France, a gift from his mother, before coming back just in time for Christmas at the castle.

The reception went off without a hitch, and for one day I wasn’t worrying about anything. I stood with my arm through Pish’s as the dance floor was filled by Autumn Valeers. A local group provided peppy music, alternating with a classical string ensemble. It was weirdly wonderful. Hannah, in her motorized wheelchair, twirled with Zeke, her steadfast friend. Elwood Fitzhugh whirled Janice Grover, resplendent in a lovely winter white muumuu, around the dance floor. Simon Grover chewed contently on cake, happy now that it appeared that Autumn Vale Community Bank was on the track to recovery. Pish had kept me apprised of the progress made in the bank shemozzle, and it seemed that the bank manager was making a real effort to learn everything he needed to know. He just might keep his job after all. Gogi and Doc were slowly dancing, a kind of senior’s version of a waltz.

“It has all worked out,” I sighed, resting against Pish. “And thanks to the location contract,” I went on, referring to the signed contract to use the castle for one month in the spring, “I’m good for about six to eight months, which gives me time for more work on the castle.”

“My dear,” he said, patting my hand, “I have a proposal for you.”

“I
do
, my dear Pish. I’d marry you in a heartbeat.” I squeezed his arm.

He chuckled easily. “An old dog like me? No, you deserve someone young and strong, like our friend Virgil.”

I glanced across the ballroom floor to find Virgil’s gaze on me with unsettling ferocity.

“Anyway, what was your proposal?” I asked, turning to Pish with a flutter in my stomach.

“I think it is going to take a while to get this place up to snuff. Meanwhile, there are dozens of folks who would love to stay in a castle, and many who would even like to rent a suite of rooms for a time. Not just a few days here and there, but a kind of residential inn.”

“Like who?” I said, with a healthy dose of skepticism.

He had clearly thought about this a lot and was ready with an answer. “Like my darling, dotty Auntie Lush. She has been pining over Wynter Castle ever since I sent those photos to my mother. She has buckets of money, but she can’t fly to Europe anymore. Her heart and her constitution won’t stand airline travel. She owns a condo in New York in the same building as mine, but she and my mother don’t like each other much and hate having to socialize. She would
dearly
love to get out of the city for a little while, as would a couple of her friends, especially to live in elegant splendor in a real honest-to-goodness castle.”

I was silent for a moment. I knew his mother, and she hated me with a cold passion; I don’t know why. Perhaps it was that we disagreed on almost every aspect of life. “What is your aunt like?”

“Darling, my mother’s sister could not be more different than her. I know you and Mother don’t agree, but Auntie Lush is a different matter.”

I thought about it for a minute. “If she brought her friends, each one would need her own room and bathroom. Could they handle the stairs?”

“Oh yes. They’re not invalids, just elderly.”

“How much do you think I could charge?”

He named a sum, and I did some addition. It would give me almost a year to fix the place up. “I would need to hire help if I had guests,” I mused. “But I know that Emerald would love to leave her job, and I’ve been trying to help her find something else that would let her stay in Autumn Vale. Binny needs to be able to hire someone who would be better at customer service than Juniper, but she won’t ditch the girl. However . . . Juniper is a fiend about cleaning, and as long as she didn’t have to interact with the guests, she could be a kind of chambermaid, if she wanted to.” Juniper Jones had stayed on in Autumn Vale, telling Binny that it was the best home she had ever had. I had even come to appreciate her quick wits, which had been hidden by a taciturn disposition that now occasionally cracked to reveal a sweeter young woman than I would have expected.

I thought some more, then asked Pish, “When do you think I should have the ladies move in, if we go ahead with this?”

“Given that we’ll need at least three suites done up, I’d make it February or March.”

I nodded, as I noticed Virgil Grace, wearing a tuxedo—he had been McGill’s best man—making his way around the edge of the ballroom, a determined gleam in his eyes. I felt that damned flutter again. He was headed toward me, and he was going to ask me to dance. I hoped.

“Okay,” I said, a little breathless, turning to Pish. “How do I look?” I had found an off-the-shoulder gold lace brocade gown to wear as Shilo’s maid of honor, while Pish had donned a crimson jacket with velvet lapels to give Shilo away as a stand-in father of the bride.

He looked me over, a smile on his face. “My darling child, daughter of my heart, you look glorious . . . lovely, breathtaking, positively angelic.”

I made a snap decision that I hoped to heck I wouldn’t regret, but the chance to make the castle better and give myself almost a year there . . . I couldn’t refuse. And I have never suffered by taking Pish’s advice, only by ignoring it. “I’ll do it,” I said on a sigh, as Virgil approached. “Tell your auntie Lush yes.”

“Will you dance with me, Merry?” Virgil asked.

I nodded, speechless. He took me in his arms and swept me onto the floor, surprising me by being a pretty good dancer. I glanced back, and Pish was smiling with a self-satisfied look. As long as I could count on no more murders, I would be a happy camper, I thought dreamily. I was happy, since I wouldn’t have to deal with Pish’s mother, only his lovely aunt and her friends. What could possibly go wrong with three elderly ladies?

Virgil pulled me closer, his strong arms holding me with meaning and care, and as the music slowed into an old piece, “As Time Goes By,” we danced.