Page 42 of And Then There Was the One
Georgie’s brows knit. “What do you mean?”
Mr. Lettercross looked uncomfortable. “I wouldn’t really wish to say, with ladies present.”
“Oh, you needn’t worry about us,” Miss de Vere said. “We’re very good eavesdroppers, and you simply wouldn’t believe the sorts of things men have said when they didn’t realize we were listening.” Next to her, Miss Singh was nodding eagerly.
“And I have personally walked into a bedroom to discover a corpse with a bloody knife still stuck in its chest. I promise, you do not need to worry about my delicate sensibilities,” Georgie added.
“The Mistletoe Murder at Radcliffe Hall!” Miss Singh whispered to Miss de Vere, looking impressed.
“That was my name for it!” Miss Lettercross said, sounding pleased to hear her work being cited.
“For Christ’s sake,” Arthur muttered.
“Penbaker was not a faithful husband!” Lettercross burst out, and then cast an apologetic look at the Murder Tourists.
“How do you know?” Georgie asked, frowning.
“Well, as I mentioned, we used to be friends,” Lettercross said a bit sullenly. “And I know that early in his marriage there was someone…. She moved away from the village and married someone else. But when I was in Buncombe-upon-Woolly last August for the cheese festival, I popped by the council offices to say hello to Bertie—pay my respects, you know, a friend and colleague—”
“He wanted to gloat,” Miss Lettercross said with an eye roll, “about Bramble-in-the-Vale being named the Cotswolds’ Most Beautiful Village for the third year in a row.”
“That’s quite enough from you, Meg,” Lettercross said, with a reproving look at his daughter.
“Don’t like it whenyou’rethe one being reported on by the journalist in the family, eh?” Sebastian observed idly. Lettercross glowered.
“My point is,” Lettercross said, “I popped in unannounced, and saw that there was no one about—too much cheese to eat!—but Bertie’s door was cracked, and I thought I might just peek inside, but he was in there with some floozy!”
“A floozy,” Georgie repeated. “I don’t suppose you’d care to elaborate?”
Lettercross shrugged. “I didn’t get a good look at her face—dark hair? Wearing a dress?”
This could describe three-quarters of the women in Buncombe-upon-Woolly, and so was not precisely helpful.
“Why are the women always called floozies in these situations?” Miss de Vere asked. “Why isn’t Mr. Penbaker a—a—”
“A man-floozy!” Miss Singh suggested, looking pleased with herself.
“I was hoping for something a bit pithier.”
“Ah.” Miss Singh deflated slightly. “You’re the one who’s good at that sort of thing, Stella.”
“I shall think about it and get back to you,” Miss de Vere informed the room, and lapsed into thoughtful silence.
“So you saw Mr. Penbaker in a compromising situation with an unnamed woman,” Georgie said; for all that she agreed with Miss de Vere’s objection regarding the phrasing, this was undeniably the best clue they’d stumbled across yet. Perhaps this trip to Bramble-in-the-Valehadn’tbeen an entirely wasted excursion.
“Yes,” Lettercross said simply. “Whereas I promise you,Ihave never been unfaithful.”
Miss Lettercross rolled her eyes again. “My mother died when I was a baby,” she said to Georgie. “So please don’t imagine that he’s had to exercise any great willpower.”
Lettercross flushed. “That’s not the point. The point is—”
“Yes, yes,” Georgie said, growing a bit weary of this entire conversation, her head aching from whatever sleeping powder Miss Lettercross had given her. “The point is, you’re an upstanding citizen and while you’re not above capitalizing on our misfortune, you certainly don’t rejoice in it.” She spoke the words a bit wryly, since she was fairly certain he would joyfully welcome another corpse materializing any day now. However, despite the initial suspicions that had brought them toBramble-in-the-Vale, she somehow couldn’t believe that he’d had anything to do with Mr. Penbaker’s death—he didn’t strike her as any sort of great criminal mind.
“Now,” she said, settling back in her seat, “I think it’s time, Miss Lettercross, that you got to talking—Mr. Crawley, after all, has an exclusive to write.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Let me be certain I understand this,” Lexington said, rubbing his fingers against his temples. “You took a couple of tourists on a jaunty little excursion to Bramble-in-the-Vale, enlisted them to deceive a member of local government, managed to get yourselves kidnapped by said local government official’s daughter, then blackmailed them into granting Crawley an exclusive interview rather than allowing the wheels of justice to operate?”
