Aunt Bessie's Holiday (31 page)

“If he’s with another woman, I’ll kill him,”
the woman said angrily.

Before anyone could reply, a man came running
out of the castle and up into the bus.
 
His shirt was buttoned incorrectly and his face was smudged with the
same pink lipstick Jessica Howe favoured.
 
Under the makeup, his face was pale.

“I think she might be dead,” he said to
Andrea.
 
“She just stopped
breathing.
 
It wasn’t my fault.”

Chapter Fifteen

As everyone on the bus began to talk at
once, John and Andrew got to their feet and walked down the aisle.

“Ring 999,” John said to Andrea.
 
“Request an ambulance and ask for
Margaret Hopkins to be sent immediately.”

Andrea nodded.

“Tell them that there are two police
officers checking on the woman and securing the scene, but we’re both out of
our jurisdiction,” he added before turning to the man.

“Show me,” he said sternly.

The man shook his head.
 
“I’m not going back in there,” he
said.
 
“There were all sorts of
weird noises and flashing lights in every room as I came out.
 
You’ll find her.
 
She’s in the third room along on the
left side once you go up the main stairs.”

“That’s very specific,” John said.

“She asked me to meet her there,” he replied
sheepishly, glancing at his wife, who was giving him an angry look.

“Sir, I’m going to ask you to have a seat on
one of the benches in the courtyard,” John said.
 
“Doona, can you sit with him,
please?
 
I don’t want him talking to
anyone.”

“Hey, he has a lot of questions to answer,”
his wife shouted from her seat.

“He does indeed,” John said.
 
“But mine take priority in this
instance.”

The woman opened her mouth to argue, but
John was already ushering the man out.
 
Andrew and then Doona followed.
 
Bessie had to stand up to let Doona out, and she was tempted to leave
the bus as well, but she didn’t want to get in anyone’s way.
 
Herbert was still snoring and Bessie
wondered if she should wake him to tell him about his wife, but decided against
it.
 
John would probably rather
do
the telling when the time came.

It wasn’t long before the police arrived,
and an ambulance wasn’t far behind.
 
Bessie was relieved when the stretcher that finally emerged from the
castle was carrying a woman clearly getting treatment.
 
John stepped back on the bus and gave
Bessie a hint of a smile as he walked past her.

He stopped at the next seat and spoke to
Herbert.
 
“Mr. Howe?
 
Herbert?
 
Can you please wake up?”

“What?
 
Hey, what’s going on?” the man said loudly.
 
“Are we back at Lakeview, then?
 
Did my wife ever turn up?”

“She did turn up,” John said.
 
“But she seems to have fallen ill.
 
There’s an ambulance transporting her to
hospital.
 
The police have arranged
for an escort to take you as well.”

“Ill?
 
Hospital?
 
My Jessica?”
Herbert jumped up and followed John back down the aisle.
 
Bessie was surprised by the seemingly
genuine concern she’d heard in his voice.
 
Whatever problems the couple had, he seemed badly shaken by the news.

A few minutes later John, Andrew and Doona
all climbed back into the bus.
 
John
had a quiet word with Andrea and then she spoke to the driver.
 

“We’ll just get underway, then,” Andrea said
cheerfully over the tannoy.

“What about my husband?” the very angry
woman at the back shouted.

“He’s talking to the police now,” John told
her.
 
“They’ll bring him back to
Lakeview when they’ve finished speaking to him.”

“They’d better take him to his mother’s lodge,
not mine,” the woman replied.
 
“I’m
sure I don’t want him back.”

John didn’t answer; he just slid into his
seat.
 
Doona was back next to
Bessie.
 
No one spoke as they bus
made its way back to the holiday park.

“I hope you all enjoyed your visit to Torver
Castle,” Andrea said with little enthusiasm as they drove through the entrance
to the park.
 
She was first off the
bus, and stood ready to help the others as they made their way down the stairs.

Bessie gave her a small smile as she
exited.
 
“Not exactly the best
evening,” she murmured.

“I’ve actually had worse,” Andrea told
her.
 
“We had a group of guys in
their early twenties on the tour once.
 
They discovered the pub across the road as well and got unbelievably
drunk in the ninety minutes we were there.
 
Several of them got sick on the bus on the way back and two of them got
into a fight as well and started throwing punches.”

Bessie shook her head.
 
“I don’t understand people,” she said
sadly.

Andrea shrugged.
 
“And people wonder why I don’t drink,”
she said.

Bessie sat down on the nearest bench and
watched as the rest of the guests made their way off the bus.
 
John spoke for several minutes with the
woman whose husband had been with Jessica.
 
She was clearly still very angry, and Bessie didn’t blame her a
bit.
 
Doona came and joined Bessie
on the bench as they waited for John to finish.
 
After a moment Andrew crossed to them as
well.

“She’s very upset,” he commented quietly,
nodding towards the pair who
were
still talking.

“I don’t blame her,” Bessie replied.

“No, me either,” Doona said.

By the time John finished his chat, the
woman was looking less angry.
 
As he
turned to walk away, she said something that caused John to turn bright
red.
 
He shook his head and then
walked quickly over to Bessie and the others.

“What did she say at the end there?” Andrew
asked the question Bessie was too polite to put to her friend.

“She suggested it would be good for her
husband to find me keeping her company when he got back,” John said.

Something about the way he said it told
Bessie that the woman had actually suggested something rather different than
merely “keeping her company.”
  
Bessie shook her head and then got to her feet.
 
It had been a long day and she was suddenly
eager to get back to the cabin and into her bed.

She and Doona fell into step together,
neither bothering to make conversation.
 
John and Andrew followed, and Bessie could hear the low murmur of their
voices as they made their way down the path towards their little cul-de-sac.

“They were supposed to drop my bag off at
your cabin,” John told them as they reached the cabin door.
 

Doona opened the door and went inside.
 
“They did,” she yelled from the sitting
room.
 
“We just have to sort out
where you’re going to stay.”

“Andrew has suggested that I stay with him,”
John replied.
 
“He has two bedrooms
and he’s only using the one.”

Doona reappeared, carrying a small overnight
bag.
 
“Are you sure?” she asked.

“I’m sure,” Andrew answered.
 
“It will be easier for everyone.”

Bessie felt as if she should argue, but John
would be far more comfortable in the spare bedroom in Andrew’s cabin than on
the couch in theirs.
 

“I’ll be over around half seven or eight,”
John told them both.
 
“And I’ll ring
Margaret before I come over to see what news there is on Jessica.”

“I’ll probably come as well,” Andrew
said.
 
“If I’m up early, I’ll go
into the Squirrel’s Drey and get some fresh pastries.”

“I’ll plan on doing the same,” Bessie
said.
 
“You can never have too many
pastries at breakfast.”

With their plans made, John and Andrew
headed next door and Bessie and Doona went inside.

“The castle was interesting,” Bessie said as
she sank down in a chair in the sitting room.
 
“But I wonder what happened to Jessica.”

“John seemed to think she’d overdosed on
something,” Doona replied.
 
“She was
certainly drunk, anyway.”

Bessie thought of a dozen things to say, but
she was too tired.
 
“I need some
sleep,” she said.

“Me, too,” Doona said, yawning.
 
“And I’ll need coffee in the morning, I’m
sure.”

They headed to their rooms.
 
Bessie got ready quickly and then
crawled into bed.
 
She glanced at
the books on the bedside table, but she was too tired to care that she hadn’t
finished them all.
 
She was asleep
as soon as she’d switched out the light, and she slept soundly until her
internal alarm woke her at six.

There were no sounds coming from Doona’s
room after Bessie had showered and dressed, so she made herself a piece of
toast and washed it down with some orange juice.
 
Coffee or tea could wait until they were
all together sharing pastries later.
 
Bessie let herself out quietly.
 
It was too early to go to the Squirrel’s Drey for the breakfast treats,
so she headed out around the large lake for a nice long walk.

There was a definite autumnal chill in the
air, but she’d worn her jacket, so she didn’t mind.
 
As it was meant to be their last day at
the park, Bessie found herself looking around and noticing more than she had in
the last few days.
 
She watched a
red squirrel running up a tree and saw several rabbits chasing one another
around in circles.
 
When she reached
the far side of the lake, she sat down on a bench and looked back towards the
cabin that had been home for the previous week.

The lake was calm, and Bessie watched as a
member of the park staff began to open up the boat rental stand.
 
There was a small family standing
nearby, presumably waiting to hire a boat.
 
After a few minutes, Bessie got up and headed back along the path.
 
There was a second path that went off
into the woods just a few steps away.
 
Bessie had noticed it before but not paid it much attention.
 
Now she gave way to curiosity and turned
to follow it.

It wasn’t long before she found herself on
the outskirts of a large section of holiday cabins.
 
The buildings looked somewhat smaller
than the one that Bessie and Doona were sharing.
 
There were cars parked in front of
several of them, in spite of the fact that it was Saturday and no one should
have been coming or going.
 
Bessie followed
the path past several
cabins,
stopping when a door
suddenly opened and someone she knew emerged from the last house in the
row.
 
Bessie smiled and increased
her pace to say hello.

“Monique?
 
How are you?” she said as she reached
the girl’s side.

Looking startled, Monique glanced around
before she spoke.
 
“What are you
doing here?
 
This area is for staff
only,” she said.

“I didn’t see any signs,” Bessie said.
 
“So these are staff cottages?”

“Yes,” Monique replied, seemingly
reluctantly.
 
“Most of the staff
live in the area and drive back and forth every day, but some of us live on-site.”

“That’s convenient for you, since you and
Nathan keep such late hours,” Bessie said.

“Yes, I suppose so,” Monique nodded.
 
She glanced around again and then inched
closer to the car that was parked in front of the cabin, its boot open and
packed full of boxes and suitcases.

“Oh, but I’m keeping you from getting
somewhere,” Bessie said.
 
She looked
at the car.
 
“And from the suitcases
in the boot, I’m guessing you’re going away.”

Monique looked at the car and then at the
cabin before she spoke.
 
“My, um, my
father isn’t well,” she said.
 
“I’m
going home for a few days to see him.”

“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Bessie
said.
 
“I hope he gets better
quickly.”

Monique flushed.
 
“Yes, well, thank you,” she said.
 
“I must get going.”

Bessie watched as the girl shut the boot and
then jumped into the car and drove away.
 
I wonder if Inspector Hopkins knows she’s leaving?
 
Bessie thought to herself as she
continued down the path into the woods.
 

The path continued for a short while and
then stopped abruptly at a large fence.
 
Bessie could hear traffic whizzing past on the other side of the fence,
but couldn’t see the road through the trees.
 
She shrugged and turned around to
retrace her steps.
 
While she did
so, she pulled out her mobile.
 
She’d just ring John and let him know about Monique, she’d decided.