Death Overdue (Librarian Mysteries) (9 page)

“When had Caldwell left your bed?”

I closed my eyes and shook my head. “That I can’t tell you because I’m not sure. I didn’t wake up.”

“When did you first notice he was gone?”

“When I heard the loud crash.”

“So he could have been gone for some time?”

“I guess.”

“Do you know why he left the bed?”

“I would have assumed he went downstairs to get a glass
of juice—or even more probably, to pee. He does that sometimes in the night.”

“Who appeared next on the scene?”

“I think Penelope. She was right down the hall. She helped us lift the bookcase off Sally. Then Bruce came into the room, but he wasn’t much help. He kept wanting to look at the books. Brenda appeared and screamed. I think all the noise we were making awakened Alfredo, because he came stumbling out of their room, looking very sleepy.”

The inspector was taking notes. “And what is the relationship of all these people to each other?”

I was surprised he was asking me these questions—didn’t he already know the answers? But maybe he was checking what each of us said against the others. “Penelope was Sally’s sister, Alfredo was her fiancé, Brenda worked for Caldwell and had known Sally quite well, and Bruce was just a guest, a book collector who had heard of Caldwell’s collection online.”

“What about you and Mr. Perkins? Is it true that you are considering being more than business partners? Life partners, shall we say?”

“We haven’t decided. I love my job, but we have become close. I was here to see how I might fit into his life in London.”

“I expect then that Ms. Burroughs showing up might have put the kibosh on all your plans?”

I stayed steady. “Not necessarily. You’re assuming that she would have gotten what she wanted.”

“And what would you have done to prevent that?”

“Nothing untoward. We would have worked within the legal system.”

“As you might have gathered, Ms. Nash, we are beginning to suspect that Ms. Burroughs’s death was not accidental. It is looking more and more like someone purposefully pushed the bookcase over on top of her. I won’t go into the details here, but what do you think of that?”

I started to go cold in my feet. The icy feeling moved upward. I was afraid if it reached my heart, it would just stop. I found myself forced to say, “Caldwell would never do a thing like that. He is a truly gentle man.”

Blunderstone nodded and shut his folder. “But what about you, Ms. Nash? Could you have done it?”

“I
’m sure they think she’s been murdered,” I told Caldwell as soon as I walked in the door. He pulled me to him and held me tight. His warm hug was exactly what I needed. I could feel my breathing slow and my sense of the real world returning. I was where I was supposed to be.

“Yes, I got that feeling too when I was questioned,” he said after a few moments. “We’ll just have to wait for the inquest. But we have nothing to worry about as neither of us had anything to do with it.”

As he said that it occurred to me that Caldwell might suspect me of having pushed over the bookcase—like the
chief inspector had insinuated. I was the last one in the library, I was the one who was organizing everything, Caldwell wasn’t with me when the bookcase fell.

I pulled out of his arms and said, “I didn’t do it.”

He gathered me back in and said, “Of course you didn’t, Karen. I know that. You were sound asleep in our bed when it happened. Plus, why would you want to hurt Sally?”

“Oh, I can think of lots of reasons: jealousy, fear, anger, money, love.” I counted them off on my fingers. “All the usual reasons for homicide.”

He took my hands in his and tried to calm me again. “But you didn’t. You’re my logical librarian. You work things out with your intellect, not by taking action and doing violence.”

He was right. The thought of pushing a bookcase over on someone, even someone I didn’t particularly care for, did make me feel revulsion.

“If the police are looking seriously at either one of us, it’s me,” Caldwell continued. “The scorned former lover, not wanting her to have any part of the B and B, possibly even hiding some deep, dark secret she held over my head.”

“A secret?” I asked.

“I’m just surmising.”

“Where had you gone that night?” I felt it was time I asked that question as long as we were clearing the air.

“Oh, my stomach was feeling quite queasy from all the
stress of the day, so I went down to have some bicarbonate of soda water to settle it. I was in the kitchen when I heard the bookcase fall.”

“I’m sorry for even asking you that.”

“No, don’t be. We need to be truthful and clear with each other. There should be nothing we can’t tell each other.”

“Well,” I said. “I’m not sad Sally’s dead. I certainly didn’t feel any animosity toward her, although I didn’t like that she was upsetting you. But I’m so sorry it had to happen in your B and B.”

“Surprisingly, I feel rather sad, not so much for the Sally who appeared in our lives two days ago, but for the Sally I fell in love with ten years ago. She was so full of life. I guess it’s hard to imagine her completely gone.”

“I know how that feels.”

He pulled me in tight and we had a gentle kiss. Then he held me away just enough so he could look down at me and say, “Let’s get out of here. I have another shop that’s up for lease that I would like to show you. Then let’s go out to dinner. I think not Italian. How about Chinese?”

*

I went up to our room and changed my clothes, not that they were inappropriate, but I wanted to get rid of the police station smell in them. I scrubbed my face, combed my dark hair back, put on enough makeup to add some color to my
cheeks, applied a soft shade of lipstick, and then grabbed a scarf I had bought a few days ago—a Laura Ashley with a rose print on it.

When I came down the stairs, Caldwell was standing at the bottom, patiently waiting for me. “There. You look lovely. Is that a new scarf?”

“Yes, I bought it when I arrived.” I was so surprised he noticed. Truly an unusual man.

“This shop we’re going to look at today is more out of the way but very reasonable,” he told me as we climbed into his smart car.

“Where is it?” I asked.

He paused a moment, then said, “Newington Butts.”

“What a wonderful name,” I said, adding it to my growing list of weird and wonderful London place names. Spitalfields was still at the top, but Newington Butts was awfully good. “What exactly is a butt?”

“Well, I’d say it is just a stray piece of land, a corner of a field that abuts something else. Thus, the butts.”

The drive took us past Westminster Palace. We both saluted as we drove by, Caldwell mentioning that he believed Parliament was in session. Even though I knew that much of the building had been renovated in the late 1800s, the palace still seemed to have come from the Middle Ages.

“Have you ever visited Westminster?” I asked.

“Of course. Every child of London makes many school
visits. And we learn all about the rules and traditions of the place. My favorite one is that no one may eat or drink in the chamber. However, the exception to this rule is that the chancellor of the exchequer—you know, the accountant cabinet member—may have an alcoholic drink while delivering the budget.”

“As well he should. That’s one difficult job,” I said, thinking of going over the finances of the small library I worked at and what a headache it could give me. Maybe a drink was the answer.

After driving over the Westminster Bridge and swirling through a very busy roundabout with cars whizzing by us as if in a tilt-a-whirl, we arrived at the street we were looking for: Iliffe Yard, which featured an artists’ cooperative. Actually, the shop we were looking for was right around the corner and was still being run as a millinery goods shop.

When we walked into the very small storefront, I feared we would be suffocated by trim and ribbons. The walls were covered, floor to short ceiling, with boxes of buttons and rolls of fabric.

At first there appeared to be no one there, but as we moved farther back into the store, we saw a small, oldish woman perched on a high wingback chair and sewing something. Her feet didn’t touch the floor, and she swung them back and forth as she sewed.

“Hello,” I said quietly, not wanting to startle her.

“Yes, yes. Just a minute, just a minute. Let me finish this seam.”

Her face was like a well-worn chamois cloth, soft with the fuzz of old age. She made the last stitch, brought the thread up to her mouth, and snapped it off with her teeth. It hurt my mouth to see her cut the thread that way.

When she looked up from her work, her blue eyes were like jewels in her soft face. “What can I help you with today?” she asked.

Caldwell said, “Mrs. Gubbins?”

“That’s right.” She nodded.

“We’ve come to see about the shop.”

“Oh, yes. My son is forcing me to sell this place and I suppose you’re in cahoots with him.”

“Not at all. I’ve never met your son. Just spoke with him by phone. He suggested I come to see you.”

“Well, I don’t want to go.”

I looked around. I could see why she didn’t want to leave. How would it ever be possible to undo this feathered nest she had created, where she perched in the deep center like a small bird on its eggs?

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” I couldn’t stop myself from saying.

“It’s not your fault. Would you like a cup of tea?” she asked. She had to slip off the chair to let her feet touch the floor and, instead of growing taller when she stood, she actually shrank. “It’s about that time.”

I had noticed that wherever you went in England, it was almost always teatime.

“That would be lovely,” I said, even though Caldwell shot me a look.

While she went away, we turned around in a circle, taking in the crammed and cramped quarters. The place couldn’t have been much larger than the small bedroom on Caldwell’s first floor, but there was much about it I liked: the coziness, the south-facing front window, the worn wooden floor scattered with old Persian rugs.

“This won’t do,” he whispered to me.

“Let’s just see what she has to say,” I suggested. “Maybe there’s a back area. She’s obviously gone someplace.”

“Go see,” he said.

I walked back to the small door she had gone through, knocked, and waited a moment before pushing it open. I found myself in an even smaller room that was obviously the toilet. Mrs. Gubbins was heating water in a plug-in kettle. A tray with a teapot and a plate of biscuits was perched on the sink.

“Won’t be but a minute,” she said as she poured the hot water into the pot.

“Thanks,” I said as I watched her maneuver in the small space.

“Your man seems to have his head on right,” she observed.

I was glad to hear it was so obvious. “I think he does,” I told her. Then I backed out, as there was no room to turn around.

*

An hour later, we found a Chinese restaurant not far from Mrs. Gubbins’s store. The interior glowed in red and gold and smelled of soy sauce and garlic. I found I was famished.

After ordering a beer, and before ordering our food, Caldwell said, “Absolutely not. The place is simply too small.”

“But you said yourself the price was right.”

“It would take months to get her to agree to leave, then years to sort out that place. Plus, it’s considerably too small.”

I knew he was right. “I won’t argue.”

“How unlike you,” he said, and smiled.

“I know you’re right, but I just liked the feel of the place. So cozy, so intimate. But I admit, not much room for your thousands of books. And since it will be your shop, you must be comfortable with it.”

“We must be sensible,” he said, and then stopped. “However, I do think of it as
our
place.”

“Oh, Caldwell, we agreed that I would have this trip to decide about all that.”

“But you’ve been here two weeks. Even though it feels
like just a moment. Other than the horrible demise of Sally, and I know it’s hard to see around that happening, haven’t we been doing well?”

I reached out and touched his cheek. “Yes, more than well. But I won’t be rushed. My indecision really isn’t about us.”

“Then what?” he asked.

He deserved the best explanation I could give him. “I haven’t had much luck in relationships before. Maybe I’m just protecting myself, but I want to be sure that I can be happy here in London before I commit. How horrible it would be for you and for me if I came to live here, only to find that it just wouldn’t work.”

He closed his eyes.

I reached out and touched his cheek. “I couldn’t bear that to happen and neither could you.”

“Yes, I see.”

“Plus, this horrible Sally affair must be settled. You could still end up not owning all of the bed-and-breakfast.”

“That’s an awful thought.”

“But one we must face. If Sally left no will and if her legal claim turns out to be legitimate, then her half might well go to Penelope.”

“Yes, Penelope said she was checking into that. I guess there is a solicitor who their family always used. Maybe she’ll have some news for us when we get home. At the very worst,
I would only own half of it, but that should still be enough for us to move forward with our plans.”