How to Murder the Man of Your Dreams (33 page)

“You had a little time to prepare before coming face-to-face with Mrs. Swabucher.” I floundered around, hoping to make him feel better without implying he was being a crybaby. “She must have been thrown for a loop when you showed up at the library. We had talked about you quite a bit that evening as ‘the brigadier,’ but I don’t know that your surname was ever mentioned. Please don’t make too much out of it if she looked blank for the first few seconds when you spoke to her. I’m sure that was from shock, not because she couldn’t …”

“Exactly place where she had seen me before?” Brigadier Lester-Smith’s attempt at sounding matter-of-fact failed miserably. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Haskell, if I’m not taking this on the chin, but—and this is what I rang to say—I don’t think I can be at Miss Bunch’s benefit today. I’m
ashamed to admit this, but I’m not sure I could conduct myself as an officer and a gentleman.”

“You’re understandably upset.”

“What I am”—the brigadier sounded surprised—“is, if you’ll pardon the language, bloody annoyed. It occurs to me, Mrs. Haskell, that if I had behaved like a wild boar on our wedding night instead of minding my P’s and Q’s, Evangeline might have had an easier time remembering that she had met me at the altar.”

“I think you’re making a mistake in not coming to the benefit.” My heart ached for him. “For one thing, none of the other Library League members knows how to handle the coffee percolator the way you do and, more important, I believe you need to see Mrs. Swabucher again in order to work through your feelings. Promise me you’ll at least reconsider?”

Saying a quick good-bye so that the brigadier would not think I was trying to pressure him, I hung up. My timing proved excellent because, before I could start down the stairs, Mrs. Swabucher came out of her bedroom wearing a powder-pink dressing gown and a matching hairnet. Truth be told, I hadn’t been feeling particularly kindly towards her, even before the brigadier’s anguished phone call; but she had dark circles under her eyes, indicating she hadn’t slept well. And she looked older without any makeup except a scrape of lipstick. So I caved in and acted like a hostess first and a friend to the wounded second.

“Did the phone wake you?” I asked.

“The ringing made me realize, Giselle, that it was time for this lazybones to crawl out of bed.” Mrs. Swabucher looked down at her fluffy pink slippers. “I’m sure Karisma will want me to go to church with him on this lovely morning.”

“What a pity,” I said as the ice re-formed in my veins, “that the vicar’s husband, Gladstone Spike, won’t be in church this morning. And I really don’t think”—looking her squarely on the top of her head because she was still looking squarely at her slippers—“that it would do any good for you to abandon the backhanded approach and pay Gladstone an official visit. He’s busy today, very busy.”

“Giselle”—Mrs. Swabucher looked every bit as fluttery
as if she had been wearing her feather boa—“how did you find out about my little ruse?”

“Why don’t we just call a scam a scam?” I managed to keep my voice steady by wrapping my hands around the throat of the banister knob and squeezing hard. “Gladstone’s wife told me all about
A Knight to Remember
. She’s a friend of mine, which is why you used me and Ben in hopes of weaseling Karisma into the author’s”—hysterical edge to my laugh—“good books, isn’t it?”

“I’m sorry, Giselle.” Mrs. Swabucher sounded appropriately stricken. “I’m fond of you and I really don’t enjoy the cutthroat side of this business. As Brigadier Lester-Smith could tell you, I’m fragile by nature. I respond to situations instinctively rather than acting upon them in a cool-headed fashion.”

“Fascinating,” I said.

“That’s been both my strength and my weakness in business dealings. It’s what told me after meeting you for five minutes that you and Ben were perfect for one another. A Cinderella story come to life if ever there was one. And you must see that in this instance my first obligation was to my darling boy. If he is done out of this assignment, some other upcoming cover model may eclipse him by being signed up as the Starfire Man for the new Moonstruck line. Even so, Karisma, bless his heart”—Mrs. Swabucher’s eyes grew misty—“had qualms about my course of action.”

“I’m sure you’re being truthful about that.” My voice rose and I couldn’t drag it back down because my hands were still squeezing the life out of the banister. “Karisma wouldn’t be the man of every woman’s dreams if he were not the epitome of exquisite sensitivity under that phenomenal male exterior.”

“You have to look at it from both sides, Giselle dear.” Mrs. Swabucher was recovering command of herself. “It’s true I hoped your friendship with the Spikes would pave the way, in a seemingly natural and congenial fashion, to reopen negotiations with Zinnia Parrish. But it most certainly was not all take and no give. Karisma squeezed this fund-raiser into his extremely busy schedule because he was deeply moved when I told him about how your little
community wanted to raise money for a statue to commemorate a librarian who died on the job.”

“And because it seemed like an excellent way to put pressure on Gladstone Spike to reconsider his position.”

“That’s not kind, Giselle.”

“No, I don’t suppose it is.”

“And I don’t see why, now that I’ve explained matters”—Mrs. Swabucher’s tone was briskly chiding—“you can’t put in a good word for Karisma with the author.”

“It wouldn’t do any good. Gladstone knows what Karisma looks like and,” I said bravely, “his wife told me he has his heart set on someone else for the cover.”

Mrs. Swabucher’s face flushed a darker shade than her dressing gown. “Who?” she demanded.

“An unknown.” I drew a ragged breath. “Does this mean Karisma will be backing out from his appearance at the library?” My heart quaked at the thought, but Gladstone was not expendable, and if Miss Bunch were not to be cast in bronze for posterity, so be it. The woman who had never caved in when it came to collecting library fines from people who claimed she was forcing them into the gutter would understand.

“Karisma will fulfill his commitment.” Mrs. Swabucher now wore her hairnet like a crown. The thought crossed my mind that she was counting on Gladstone being at the library and, knowing that he would be otherwise engaged with his editor, Ben, and Vanessa, I felt sufficient compassion to back off from my righteous resentment for the moment.

“If you’re worried about meeting Brigadier Lester-Smith, that was him on the phone a few minutes ago and, although he may change his mind, he was saying he didn’t plan to be at the benefit.”

“That would make things easier, Giselle. When I saw how time had taken away all his good looks and turned him into a walking briefcase, I was so shocked”—Mrs. Swabucher brought her hands up to her shoulders—“that I dropped my feather boa and didn’t remember to pick it up when we left the library.”

“I’m sure it’s still in the meeting room.” I didn’t add that the new resident dragon might exact a heavy fine in exchange for its return. Hoping that Brigadier Lester-Smith
did not change his mind about the meeting on my account, I mumbled something semi-coherent about needing to check on the twins and left Mrs. Swabucher to get ready to face the downstairs world.

Entering the kitchen, I found the dragon who could have taught the one at the library a thing or two installed at the table, having a cuppa.

“Good morning, Mrs. H.” She turned her head in the sequined hat and gave me the once up, twice down. “Or should I say good afternoon?”

“Where’s everybody else, Mrs. Malloy?”

“A spaceship landed on the cooker not two minutes ago.” She stood up and smoothed down her crushed-velvet hips. “Without a word of good-bye George climbed aboard with the kiddies, and wouldn’t you know, Karisma, Mr. Wonderful himself, had to go tagging along? It was all so quick, Mrs. H., by the time I blinked they was gone in a puff of green smoke.”

“Is that tea you’re drinking?”

“I was trying to spare your feelings.”

“Why?” I grabbed the back of a chair. “Is something wrong with Tam or Abbey?”

“Only that you scared them half out of their little wits.” Mrs. Malloy looked at me severely from under her neon lids. “Shouting at the top of your lungs like you was doing at whoever you had it in for upstairs.”

“I was not shouting.”

“Well, you wasn’t whispering, that’s for sure. I told the two men to take the kiddies outside before the plates came down off the Welsh dresser and somebody got hurt. Who was it”—enticing smile—“set you off like that, Mrs. H.? Don’t tell me it was my George’s Nessie; I’ve got right fond of the girl since she promised to give me her last year’s fur coat. Seems she gone right off mink. And I don’t like to think of you having words with your hubby. Men get their feelings bruised so easy. Can you believe it, Karisma got all embarrassed when I caught him looking at himself in the toaster and I told him it wouldn’t cost him a train fare to go and look in the hall mirror.”

“I was having words, as you call it,” I said stiffly, “with Mrs. Swabucher.”

“What about, ducky?” The purple lips positively
quivered with interest; but before I could decide whether or not to satisfy Mrs. Malloy’s unwholesome curiosity, her son came in through the garden door. His ruddy face made his hair pale to ginger in comparison as he posed an intriguing question.

“Either of you two ladies want to come out and watch the duel?”

“The what?”

“It’s all just a bit of fun between him and Karisma.” His mother beamed at him with fatuous pride. “They’re going to put on a bit of a show, like you see in Errol Flynn films, for the kiddies. No harm in that, is there? I was telling George last night about the set of swords—”

“They’re called foils, Mum.”

Mrs. Malloy nudged me in the ribs. “That’s education for you. No doubt about it, my sonny boy’s got brains to spare.”

“You won’t think that,” I said crossly, “when he misses his step and gets them sliced out.”

“Rubbish!” Mrs. Malloy was very much on her high heels. “As I was saying”—she gave me a quelling look—“I was talking to George about the foils—”

“You was rinsing off some carrots in the colander at the time, Mum,” supplied the child of her substantial bosom.

“That’s right, I was.” Mrs. M.’s inflection gave warning that maternal pride drew the line at interruptions when she was talking. “It got me to thinking about them mesh fencing masks Mr. H. bought at St. Anselm’s fête along with the foils. You remember, we was discussing them the other day, Mrs. H. Anyway, the long and the short of it is, when Karisma came downstairs this morning, I said it was a shame for two young lads to be cooped up on such a nice morning and why didn’t they go outdoors and play pirates.”

“You told me,” I said frostily, “that everybody went outside just now for a bit of peace and quiet.”

“And never was a truer word spoken.” Mrs. Malloy hustled her son out the garden door with promises that Mummy would be out to watch in a minute. “All I left out was the bit about George and Karisma taking the swords and the other gear with them. And I was going to get
round to that,” she added with a virtuous purse of the lips, “when you got over your tiff with Mrs. Swabucher and stopped looking like you was sorry you hadn’t murdered the woman.”

“Talking about unhealthy impulses”—I strode over to the window and peered outside without getting a view of the swordsmen or my children—“are you sure you didn’t come up with this bright idea in hopes that George will pink Karisma where it hurts most as a means for your son to get his jealousy of a supposed rival for Vanessa’s affections out of his system?”

“The thought never crossed me mind.” Mrs. Malloy succeeded in looking outraged. “I’m not one to harbour a grudge, leastways not against a man who makes me quiver in unmentionable places.”

Her voice followed me out into the courtyard and a second later she was close on my heels. The sky was very blue—showing its false colours was my interpretation, because this was definitely not a good morning. It hadn’t begun well and now I was weighed down by the feeling that something unspeakable was about to happen. The oppression I had felt on my picnic with Ben or in the garden of Tall Chimneys was nothing compared to this. I wished that black clouds would roll in and put an end to the cruel mockery of all that unrelenting blue.

Abbey and Tam came toddling towards me across the flagstones, and I would have scooped them both up in my arms if Mrs. Malloy hadn’t done the honours with my daughter. What a rotten mother I was in not immediately rushing to them! Who knew if George planned to fight to the death in defending his beloved Nessie’s honour! And two men doing the washing up, let alone on the brink of a duel, could not be trusted to keep a proper eye on my children. And there was the moat to consider. There wasn’t any danger of my darlings drowning because we had put in drains before they were born. And being the ornamental variety of moat, there wasn’t a horrendous drop. But even so, the thought of one of them tumbling over the stone rim was enough for me to clutch Tam’s sturdy little body close to my palpitating heart.

Clearly Mrs. Malloy did not share my fears. Seating herself on a sarcophagus-style bench with Abbey on her
knees, she offered up the observation, “A sight for sore eyes, if ever there was one, Mrs. H.” She wasn’t talking about the glories of nature, the sun in its heaven, the heady perfume of the flowers, or the green haze of the trees. Her eyes were focused on the two men standing with crossed sword blades at the far end of the courtyard. One born to dance the deadly minuet, invincible in his heroic good looks, his hair lifting around him in a triumphal banner before a blow was yet struck. The other, an uncouth yokel doomed to be speared like an over-ripe tomato and brandished on high by his opponent before being tossed through the air into the arms of his disappointed mother.

“What do you think, Mum?” George shouted. “Isn’t it time to say ready, set, go?”

“Mrs. Haskell, will you do me the immense honour of acting as my second?” Karisma bowed with masterful grace over his sword.

“This is silly.” My words were muffled by Tam’s hair.

“Oh, get on with it, do,” Mrs. Malloy instructed the combatants.