Femmes Fatal (27 page)

“The new vicar of St. Anselm’s is very nice,” I babbled, and speak of coincidence, who should enter the room at that moment but the Reverend Eudora Spike and her husband.

“Thanks, sweetie.” Jacqueline looked around for an ashtray. “But Normie was Jewish.”

“Really?” I could feel myself breaking out into a cold sweat that had nothing to do with my faux pas. The Spikes were heading our way. Gladstone looked such a dear, sweet man, with his stooped shoulders and nearsighted eyes, that I felt I should beat my breast and say three mea culpas for suspecting him of trying to murder his wife in order to pick up where he left off years ago with Gladys Thorn, the woman of the hour, who had yet to make her appearance.

Before the Spikes could reach us, they collided with the Bludgetts and were inevitably trapped into conversation with the exuberant Moll.

“Smashing to see you, Reverend.”

“Our pleasure.” Eudora tucked a hand into the crook of her husband’s arm and immediately they were like a cup and saucer, separate but complete.

“Nice party!” Jock Bludgett cleared his throat and elevated it to an upper crust falsetto. “A real classy dame, this Bunty Wiseman. Not too many women’d put their hurt feelings in the old tucker bag and throw a shindig for the tomcatting husband and his bit of fluff.”

Any woman less fluffy than Gladys Thorn I could not imagine, but that was neither here nor there. Was Mr. Bludgett remembering how he had done his Moll wrong with this same femme fatale? And were the Spikes wishing themselves anywhere but in this room?

“I was surprised when Mrs. Wiseman rang and invited Gladstone and myself to the party.” Eudora accepted a glass of champagne from Mrs. Malloy who was back doing her rounds. “And even more surprised when she explained her reason for the get-together.”

“A most Christian endeavour,” interpolated her husband.

“Love at its purest.” Eudora blinked as if she had something in her eye. From where I stood, her complexion appeared as beige as her silk blouse. My heart went out to her.

“Wonder where Mrs. Wiseman is?” Mr. Bludgett chewed on his moustache.

Moll, all bounce from her head to her toes, lifted her glass. “Wherever! I say we drink a toast to Bunty Wiseman, the ultimate Fully Female woman!”

“To Bunty!” The unified shout rocked the room, then dropped to a whisper that couldn’t peter out fast enough. For standing at the entrance to the room were the lovebirds themselves. Lionel Wiseman was resplendent in a silver-grey suit that complemented his hair, while his dark tie was a perfect match for his black brows. As for his fiancée, what she lacked in beauty she made up for in maidenly modesty.

“Dear, dear friends of Chitterton Fells, this is all too much!” Drawing her black lace shawl about her sallow shoulders, Miss Thorn lowered her head so that the daisies peeked out of her mousy tresses. “My beloved Lionel never expected such a turnout to bless our union.” Choked with emotion, Miss T cast herself into Mr. Wiseman’s arms and he was holding her thus when a gasp went up from the guests.

Bunty had made her dazzling entrance.

“Hello, boys and girls!” Batting her baby blues, Bunty undulated into the room, blonde head held high,
a hand on her scarlet satin hip, her face ablaze with more light than the room. “Hello, Li, darling! And greetings to the woman you love. As guests of honour, if you would like to make yourselves comfortable on the sofa facing the mirrored screen, I am sure everyone else can find a cosy spot so that the entertainment may begin.”

“What now?” Jacqueline Diamond tapped out another cigarette.

“Isn’t this a gas?” Moll Bludgett moved up close and squeezed my arm. “Aren’t you on pins and needles with suspense?”

“Shush,” whispered Mrs. Wardle, the librarian.

As instructed, Mr. Wiseman and Miss Thorn sat, champagne glasses in hand, on the white sofa with the huge throw pillows, while Bunty held the floor. Lifting a lily-white hand, she trilled sweetly, “The scrapbooks of all our lives are filled with the memories of cherished events, special to us as individuals, and so, Gladys Thorn, on this auspicious occasion when you announce your engagement to my husband and to the world … I bring you a voice from your past because Miss Thorn: This Is Your Life!”

“Oooohhhh!” The gasp rippled round the room, while the lady of moment covered her gaping mouth with a hand on which sparkled the most enormous diamond I had ever seen. The flash made me feel quite giddy, and all at once I was overcome by an overpowering sense of doom. I wanted to shout at Bunty to stop this madness before it was too late. I wanted to dash from that room with all its false brightness and go burrowing home to Ben and the twins. But I couldn’t move a muscle, for I was hemmed in by Moll Bludgett, Jacqueline Diamond, the Spikes, and my stupid sense of decorum. Then between one breath and the next it was too late.

A sepulchral voice was emoting from the mirrored screen. “Hugs and kisses, dear Miss Thorn. Remember me, my sugar cube?”

“I don’t think I recognize …”

“Surely, O sweet delight, you recall how you danced naked in the wooded night, my nymph … omaniac.” Death-rattle laughter. “Or do I ask too much, considering I am but one of a hundred husbands you have lured into your sticky web, thou Spider Woman.”

Not a chair creaked, not an eyelash quivered, until the spell was broken by Lionel Wiseman rising to his feet in a rush that transformed him into an avenger twice his size. Thank God he was going to put a stop to this obscenity. Miss Thorn might not be a lady in the strictest sense of the word, but no one deserved to be subjected to such fiendish cruelty … except perhaps the woman who might make off with Bentley T. Haskell.

But before Lionel Wiseman could find his voice, I received the shock of the evening, if not a lifetime. The mirrored screen swayed, then steadied itself. And out stepped my cousin Freddy.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Wiseman, but I can’t go through with this! When you spoke with me this morning on the telephone, I told myself that an actor must take the parts that come his way, but I find I cannot use people’s lives as stepping stones on the path to stardom.”

“A little late to turn high-minded!” Heading over to him, I would have hurled champagne in his face, but for the fact my glass was empty.

“No talent scouts here, by any chance?” My cousin produced a grin that did nothing to calm me down. The room was in an uproar, or rather Bunty was making enough noise for the whole room. She had gone completely to pieces, pounding her fists against her husband’s chest, then clawing them free of his grasp to tear at his
hair, while off to their side stood Miss Thorn, her eyes mushrooming behind her spectacles.

“How can you leave me for that knock-kneed trollop?” Bunty screeched. “I tried to be everything you wanted. I blistered my lips reciting
How Now Brown Cow
so I could talk proper. Everywhere I turned, the world was telling me that to be a fulfilled woman I had to be a working woman. You told me, Li, you wanted me to be a contributing member of society, and look where all this got me. I taught other women how to hold on to their husbands, making life tough for the likes of Gladys Thorn.” Sobbing, Bunty staggered backwards. “Did I put the wind up you, Gladys, old girl? Did I make you see you might be better off with a husband of your own than continuing to borrow them like books from the library?”

Miss Thorn didn’t answer. She just stood there clutching her abdomen, and the next moment the question of response was moot. Bunty whirled about and made a beeline for the hall. Seconds later the front door opened and slammed shut behind her. Talk about ending a party with a bang. With hardly a word being spoken, the women began gathering up their handbags and the men, including Freddy, headed off to collect coats. As for Lionel Wiseman and his fiancée, my last glimpse was them standing by the coffee table lost in each other’s arms.

“How are you feeling, my dove?”

“Not too bad.” She crushed his hand to her lips. “Of course this sort of upset is disastrous for my digestive system, but the path to true love is paved with milk of magnesia.”

“My own brave darling!”

“Tomorrow is another day, and with Bunty gone we can think about redecorating this room.” The mushroom
eyes strayed around the white-on-white perfection. “What do you think of the boudoir look, lots of black satin and chartreuse lace?”

Terrified that Miss Thorn would catch sight of me and ask me to assist in the renovations, I scuttled out into the hall. There I caught sight of Mrs. Malloy peering around the corner of the kitchen.

“What’s all the argy-bargy?” She went back to stirring a glass of what I gathered, from the container standing on the counter, was Fully Female Formula.

“Bunty walked out.”

“What? Abandoned ship?” The expression was made for the galley-style kitchen, which like the rest of the house was white as a seaman’s uniform. Indeed, it was so compact that when Mrs. Malloy set down her glass and stood with her hands on her hips, her elbows touched the walls on either side.

“She has me worried,” I confessed.

“Bloody hell! You think she might do herself in?”

“That or something equally disastrous.”

“There’s a tide in the life of man”—Mrs. Malloy wiped her hands on her cranberry apron—“that’s naught but fuss and foam.”

“Probably,” I said. “But I think I’ll drive around and look for Bunty.”

“You do that,” she said as she set a couple of wineglasses to bob in the sink, “and after you don’t find her, perhaps you would be kind enough to come back and give me a lift home. You know me, Mrs. H, I’m not one to ask for favours, but one of these days you’ll treasure our moments together.”

Touched to the core, I went to give her a hug, but the moment was not propitious. Mrs. Malloy discovered that her Fully Female Formula had set solid.

“Now look what you’ve made me do!”

“I’ll mix you another.”

“Don’t put yourself out, Mrs. H.” With a long-suffering sigh, she plopped the glass in the sink. “Don’t ask me why, but I’m right off the stuff.”

My good intentions met with dismal failure. After driving around in circles for who knows how long, I nipped into the Dark Horse and checked out both the saloon and the public bar, but saw no sign of Bunty drowning her sorrows with a lager and lime. Why, oh, why had I even thought about drowning? I could comb miles of beach without finding a pathetic pile of clothes or spying something that might be a buoy—or a body—bobbing upon the horizon. In the end, I drove up Cliff Road to the place where Dr. Melrose had planned to unburden himself of poor Flo. But there was no sign of Bunty’s car. Swamped by a feeling of hopelessness, I turned tail lights about and drove back to the Wiseman house. Were its days as the headquarters of Fully Female over?

Walking up the marble steps to the front door, I prayed Bunty was home safe and sound. Before I could ring the bell, Mrs. Malloy, buttoned up in her fur coat, a feather hat perched on her head, opened up for me.

“No luck?” She pulled on her gloves.

I shook my head.

“Well, you did what you could. And just after you left, Mr. Wiseman went out looking for her.”

“What about Miss Thorn?”

“Taken over as Lady of the Manor from the looks of things.” Mrs. Malloy sniffed. “Went poking into the kitchen and then disappeared down the hall. What do you think, Mrs. H? Should I go up and tell her I’m leaving?”

“Well …”

“There is the little matter of payment.”

“In that case …” I stepped over the threshold and the next thing I knew I was following Mrs. Malloy down the corridor to the master bedroom, where earlier I had left my coat.

“Miss Thorn?” Mrs. Malloy beat a tattoo on the door.

No answer.

“Probably asleep,” I offered. I was all for making a quick exit, but my companion had other ideas.

“If it’s all the same with you, Mrs. H, I’d like to find her so I can get my money.” So saying she opened up the door … and promptly fell back into my arms.

Miss Thorn was lying on the bed, wrapped in a transparent plastic wrap toga, with a cherry in her navel. Even more shocking than her night attire was the fact that she wasn’t wearing her specs, giving her an obscenely naked, glassy-eyed stare that looked right through me to the doorway … of eternity.

“She’s dead!” Choking on tears and eau de toilette, I stumbled away from the bed, with its cupids and tulle canopy.

“And whose bloody fault is that?” Mrs. Malloy flashed back.

“No one’s, I hope.”

“Let anyone point the finger at me—”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake!” I pushed her down onto the bedside chair and wished I could strap her in the way I did the babies. How could she rant on in this silly way when we had no reason, other than Bunty’s threats, to suspect that Miss Thorn was the victim of foul play? That the deceased had been in fine fettle merely an hour ago meant nothing. Neither was her mode of undress evidence one way or the other. Any of us can have a heart attack any time, especially when we are subjected to the stress of too many men wanting first dibs on our bodies.

“Lord save us, she looks ’orrible!” Mrs. Malloy chomped down on a knuckle.

Uncharitable, but undeniably true. There was a snarl to Miss Thorn’s lips and a bulge to her eyes that suggested she had told the Grim Reaper what he could do to himself. To be fair, the bedroom did not set the scene for heavenly harps and celestial voices humming in the background. The white-on-white, stark modernism that pervaded the rest of the house had not set foot in here, probably because Bunty had not permitted an interior designer through the door, choosing instead to model the place on her old chorus girl dressing room. Flounces and fripperies were everywhere. But most horrible of all was the flash of mirrors parading around the walls and across the ceiling, so that everywhere I looked, the deathbed scene was blazed before my eyes like scenes from St. Anselm’s stained-glass windows. No wonder Mrs. Malloy was clutching her head and saying she didn’t feel well.