The Final Crumpet (34 page)

“How do you suppose ‘Anonymous Bystander’ knew where to find us?” Nigel asked.

“I presume that you were followed yesterday when you left the museum. Did you notice any suspicious persons or vehicles?”

“In truth, Conan, we had our minds on other things.”

Flick bit her tongue. Nigel often displayed a magnificent sense of British understatement. On the way to Nathanial Swithin’s home, they’d been recovering from Polly Reid’s lecture; on the way back, they’d been sorting out Swithin’s revelations and the implications of a kiss. Going or coming, neither of them would have noticed a volcano erupt on the Broadwater Down.

After breakfast, Flick returned to her office and began to think about the kind of presentation they could prepare for Wescott Bank. It was all very tricky. What facts would satisfy Sir James Boyer, and what details would scare him off? Would he be outraged to learn that the museum had served as a “cover” for MI6? Or would he be delighted to know that Etienne Makepeace apparently served as a frontline Cold Warrior?

Flick found these questions irritating as well as difficult to answer. She happily set them aside when Hannah Kerrigan came into her office toting a sheaf of photographs.

“You got stuck working on a lovely Saturday, too, I see,” Flick said.

“I wanted to finish the cat analysis and also catch up on the new Web page. The mountain of photo retouching I did this week threw my schedule off.”

“Ah—did you figure out which cat is Lapsang and which is Souchong?”

Hannah shook her head forlornly. “It can’t be done,” she said. “At least, not by me.”

“It can’t?”

She spread more than twenty pictures of British Shorthairs across the top of Flick’s desk.

“I tried all the tricks in the Photoshop manual,” Hannah said, “plus a few that I invented for the occasion. I studied my new cat photographs in every conceivable way. I manipulated the images until Lapsang and Souchong resembled dogs. I still couldn’t match them with the kitten snapshots.”

It would seem that our feline are lost in an irreversible muddle.”

“I’m afraid so. What do we do now?” Hannah giggled. “Don’t say ‘ask the cats,’ because I already tried that.”

“We make a command decision that the past shall not be allowed to impact the future. Henceforth, the larger cat is Lapsang and the smaller is Souchong. And thus it shall be forever. The chief curator of the Royal Tunbridge Wells Tea Museum has spoken.”

“Do you think people will mind?”

“No one will mind, because no one will know. Your study—and my command decision—shall remain our secrets. Forever!”

“Imagine that! I’m only twenty-two and already part of a high-level conspiracy designed to mislead the public.” Hannah gathered up the photographs. “Do you want to tell the cats about their permanent names, or shall I?”

“Consider that your next assignment.”

“I knew this would be a fun place to work,” Hannah said as she left.

Flick was pondering a return to the irritating questions she needed to answer when her mobile phone rang.
Rats! It’s in my handbag, clear across the room.
She got hold of it at the start of the fifth ring—an instant before her voice mail would have answered the call.

A familiar voice said, “Good morning, Dr. Adams, it’s me.”

“DI Pennyman! Are you still in Scotland?”

“No. I’m back in Kent.” He went on immediately, “Have you had any further contact from ‘Anonymous Bystander’?”

Flick hesitated before she finally said, “Yes. A childish threat. The green Ford Transit minivan sped past us with his left-side wheels on the curb and forced us into the bushes.”

“You seem reluctant to describe the encounter.”

“I am reluctant. We don’t want any further awkward publicity. Any suggestion that the museum is the target of threats could seriously affect our future. The bank that will fund our purchase of the Hawker antiquities is exceptionally risk-averse.”

There’s no need to tell him we’re lying low in the museum.

Pennyman’s tone became sharper. “Some might describe a motor vehicle operated that way as attempted murder. It’s a serious crime.”

“We don’t think the driver meant to kill us.”

“Ah. Then what did he mean to accomplish?”

“He wants us to stop poking around in Makepeace’s past. We’re required to let sleeping dogs lie.”

“If memory serves, that was the content of the message you received in the Crescent Road Car Park.”

“Yup. Except yesterday’s message was more pointed.”

“The implication is that you ignored his first warning.”

Flick paused again. She needed a few seconds to find the right words. “Some rather unusual information about Etienne Makepeace has come to our attention—by that, I mean it was brought to our attention. We are fairly confident that Makepeace was a fraud who did not write most of the things he took credit for.”

“Extraordinary! Makepeace displays the unpleasant characteristics of a dead fish too long in the sun. The closer one gets, the worse he smells.” He added, “What does ‘fairly confident’ mean?”

“We have a stack of journals and magazines, published during the 1950s, that were plagiarized by Makepeace. They contain articles virtually identical to the works he supposedly authored.”

“In short, you found the smoking gun, as you Americans are fond of saying.”

“I’m afraid so.” Flick’s mind raced. Should she tell Pennyman about the possible MI6 connection? Not yet, she decided. Not until they had additional confirmation, and certainly not without Nathanial Swithin’s permission.

“Do you suppose that any of his ethical lapses as England’s Tea Sage could be linked to Makepeace’s murder?” Pennyman asked.

“It’s hard to see how. I’m still a fan of the jealous husband hypothesis.”

Pennyman made a soft groan. “You and most of the police establishment of the United Kingdom. To use your words, the authorities are fairly confident that Makepeace’s killer has been identified.” His voice sharpened again. “You must not repeat what I’m about to tell you to anyone. Agreed?”

“Agreed.”

“The presumed jealous husband is a man named Hugh Doyle. Well, that was his name before he relocated from Tunbridge Wells to Glasgow in 1966. Once in Scotland, he became Hubert Daugherty and led a quiet, modestly successful life as a greengrocer. He died in 1995.”

“I take it he wasn’t a grocer when he lived in the Wells.”

“In fact, Hugh made his living as a villain who specialized in truck hijacking and smuggling. Along the way, he may have murdered three people.”

“My goodness. What connection would a man like that have with our tea museum?”

“Now that’s an interesting question—I asked the very same thing. It seems that Doyle had a day job. When the pickings from crime were off, he worked as a bricklayer. He was part of the crew who built your building and also the brick wall that surrounds the tea garden.”

“I get it. Doyle obviously knew his way around the museum.

When he shot Makepeace, he was able to break in and dispose of the body.”

“So goes the theory.”

“Does Doyle have a barmaid wife?”

“Indubitably. Clara Doyle died in 1998. However, in 1966 she was a fortyish, rather shapely blond who worked as a barmaid at The Horse and Garter, a small pub on the London Road that was demolished decades ago. We have evidence that Makepeace often frequented the pub, and we have a photograph that shows him chatting up Clara in the Pantiles.”

Flick gave little cough to mask the surprise she felt. That must be the same photo—one of the four provided by Dorothy McAndrews—that was taped to the wall of their Incident Room.

“You seem reluctant to accept the story,” she said.

“I become suspicious when comprehensive solutions to forty-year-old mysteries fall into my lap. Of course, I’m a voice in the wilderness. My masters love Hugh Doyle as the prime suspect. He seems to answer every thorny question we skeptics raise.”

“Let me another raise one. Where would Hugh Doyle have acquired a Russian pistol?”

“From a shipment of smuggled arms and ammunition that Hugh Doyle, wearing his criminal hat, helped transport from France to England. The conjecture goes that he skimmed a few weapons off the top for himself before the arms left England for Central America.” He sighed. “It’s possible, I suppose.”

“Why is Hugh Doyle still a secret?”

“The circumstantial evidence against Doyle is obviously quite strong, but we still lack compelling proof that links him directly to the murder. A large task force of investigators is searching for the missing pieces. Given the notoriety of this murder, there’s great reluctance in the higher ranks to name the killer until we’ve built an ironclad case against him.”

“I shan’t say a word, without your okay.”

Pennyman grunted. “By the by, where are you today? I had planned to visit you at your flat, but obviously you weren’t there when I called.”

“I’m at the museum.” She hid another gust of surprise by sounding cheerful. “Saturday is a busy day for us. I often spend the day here.”

“You must leave for work deucedly early. I phoned you at seven fifteen this morning.”

“Yes, well, we’re working very hard to prepare for the acquisition of the Hawker antiquities,” Flick said. In a way, it was perfectly true. “The best way to contact me is to call my mobile phone. It’s always switched on.”

She rang off.

Note for future reference: Don’t talk to a smart, skeptical cop when you don’t plan to tell him the whole truth.

Flick left her office at a quarter to eleven and walked downstairs to the ground floor, and then through the Duchess of Bedford Tearoom to the museum’s greenhouse. It was likely that Nate would use the rear door—the door closest to the staff car park—because he would know that the front and side “public” entrances were closed until eleven. She found that Nigel had had the same idea.

“I thought someone should welcome them to the museum,” he said. “They’re honored guests, after all—our former director and a senior staff member from the Hawker Foundation.”

“We seem to think alike.”

“Definitely a promising sign.”

“I agree.” She moved closer to him and lowered her voice.

“I had an interesting chat with DI Pennyman. I can tell you some of what he said, but not the nitty-gritty details.” She gave a little shrug. “He swore me to secrecy.”

“Hmm. You know, of course, that I will strive to get even with you. Just you wait until I know something that you don’t.”

“I can’t imagine that ever happening.”

“Ooh.
Cheeky monkey!”

Flick saw his hand move toward her, but she couldn’t twist aside in time. Nigel tickled her ribs; she began to laugh. She was still laughing—and dodging Nigel’s fingers—when she noted, out of the corner of her eye, that Nathanial Swithin and a tall, gray-haired woman were walking toward them.

Flick said the first thing that entered her mind: “Oh my, Nathanial—I’m so sorry. We never act this way when the museum is open to the public.”

“It might increase attendance if you did,” he said with a smile, “although I grant that the trustees are likely to object.”

The gray-haired woman chimed in. “This is hardly fair. Where is my dashing young man? I want to be chased around the museum, too.”

Nigel offered a courtly bow. “Fear not, ma’am, I’m here to serve. Would you like a head start?”

“That won’t be necessary. I intend to let you catch me.” She extended her hand. “Hello, Nigel, I’m Gwen Sturgis.” And then to Flick. “Nate warned me that I’m not to call you Felicity. I promptly explained to him that because my obnoxious cousin called herself”—she began to spell—”F-L-I-C-K, I have stricken the nickname from my vocabulary. I do hope you will understand.”

Flick knew straightaway that she would like Gwen Sturgis. She was an unusually tall woman, probably four inches taller than herself, Flick estimated. She was in her midsixties, quite attractive, with a small, upturned nose, a lovely complexion, and short, fashionably cut gray hair. She wore a well-tailored tweed skirt of mixed somber hues, a tan cashmere sweater, a hiker’s mountain jacket, and—most surprising of all—a compact backpack. Flick glanced at Gwen’s shoes: good-quality leather walking boots. She was clearly a hale and hardy woman who enjoyed traveling on foot. Flick conjured up an image of her tramping across the Scottish Highlands.

“Let’s go up to my office,” Nigel said. “I’ve asked the tearoom to prepare a cart of refreshments for us.”

Flick had talked briefly with Nigel after breakfast about the wisest way to interview Gwen. “You take the lead again,” he had said. “That strategy worked superbly with Nathanial, so why not with his ‘bird.’ ” Flick had chuckled at Nigel’s use of the somewhat-dated British term for girlfriend, but now it seemed to fit Gwen. Her long-legged walk, the graceful way she moved, both appeared birdlike.

Flick led the way to the museum’s compact service elevator. They rode up to the third floor smiling at each other and found the teacart waiting for them alongside Nigel’s desk. He dispensed the tea and coffee; Flick served scones and crumpets.