Dead as a Scone
Authors: Ron Benrey,Janet Benrey
Tags: #Mystery, #tea, #Tunbridge Wells, #cozy mystery, #Suspense, #English mystery
Contents
The Royal Tunbridge Wells Tea Museum
DEAD AS A SCONE
By Ron & Janet Benrey
A Note From the Authors
This book is a novel, but Royal Tunbridge Wells is quite real. We have tried to faithfully describe many of the town’s well-known locales. As it happens, Janet grew up on the very patch of land where we located the “Royal Tunbridge Wells Tea Museum.” The museum is fictional—although it has become a living, breathing institution to us.
In fact, it even has its own website. Please visit:
www.teamuseum.org
Ron and Janet Benrey
The Royal Tunbridge Wells Tea Museum
One
What does the old dear have up her sleeve?
Nigel Owen tried not to frown in bewilderment as he considered the odd request just proposed to him. Nigel looked across his desk at the plump, rosy-cheeked, elegantly coiffed woman sitting in his visitor’s chair. Elspeth Hawker was eighty-four years old but appeared—and sounded—fifteen years younger. This morning, her usually placid face seemed filled with a curious determination.
“Let me understand you, Dame Elspeth,” Nigel said. “You want to speak at the end of our trustees’ meeting this afternoon, but you don’t want me to announce your intentions to the other trustees until the very last moment—is that correct?”
She nodded slowly. “Indeed. You will not mention me until the rest of our program is finished.”
“Is it someone’s birthday?” Nigel asked. “Do you plan to reveal that one of the trustees won an award?”
“No. It’s nothing like that.” She gazed down at the tops of her hands. “I know that I am imposing on our friendship, Nigel, but I ask your indulgence as a personal favor.”
“Won’t you at least tell me what you plan to talk about?” Nigel asked.
“If I do, will you promise to add me to the agenda without any further questions?”
He nodded. “Absolutely!”
Elspeth hesitated for several seconds. “I recently made a painful discovery,” she finally said. “We have a thief in our midst—an exceedingly clever thief, I might add. I feel it my duty to explain the circumstances to the other trustees.”
The pen Nigel had been holding slipped from his hand. “Dame Elspeth! You surely are not suggesting that one of the trustees of the Royal Tunbridge Wells Tea Museum is a criminal.”
“I have led a sheltered, pampered life—so perhaps I am overly surprised at the willingness of people to repay evil with evil.”
“Evil?
I don’t understand what you mean.”
Nigel noted that Elspeth no longer was looking his way. She seemed to be staring at the wall behind his head. “When a thief is caught, he must pay back double,” she said softly.
“Double?” Nigel felt wholly bewildered at Elspeth’s rapid change of subject.
Elspeth peered at him once again with her alert blue eyes. “That rule is from the Bible, you know. Exodus 22:7.”
“No, I didn’t know. But, getting back to your—
ah
—explanation to the trustees.”
Elspeth refused to be steered. “Paying back double is the right thing to do under normal circumstances. But this is a museum. Our circumstances are special. Paying back single will have to suffice. I must explain that to the other trustees.”
Nigel tried again. “
Who
is this thief?
What
was stolen?
What
do you intend to say to the other trustees? I am quite at a loss.”
“You see, this is why I don’t want a formal place on the program. The other trustees are certain to ask me the very same questions.” She sighed. “It is all so complicated. I prefer to tell my wretched tale only once today.”
Nigel changed his approach.
“Dame Elspeth, as acting director of this museum, I have to rely on the absolute integrity of our trustees. You have broached the topic of thievery—I really must ask you to share your suspicions with me.”
“And so I shall, at the end of our meeting this afternoon.” She reached across the desk and patted Nigel’s hand. “The other trustees think me a foolish old woman. Permit me to behave like one today. What is the harm in that?”
Nigel thought a moment.
Probably no harm at all.
His momentary surge of concern vanished as he realized that Elspeth’s “thief in our midst” could not be anything more than a colorful exaggeration. Serious thievery from the Royal Tunbridge Wells Tea Museum was impossible. An impenetrable electronic security system protected the artifacts on display, and the museum’s state-of-the-art financial software would rapidly detect any significant embezzling of money.
Nigel felt himself smile. Dame Elspeth must have uncovered a case of minor pilferage from the gift shop or the Duchess of Bedford Tearoom. If she wanted to present her discovery to the trustees—well, she certainly was entitled to have her way. Hawker money, after all, built and stocked the museum. Moreover, her out-of-the-blue “explanation” would liven up what promised to be an especially dull trustees’ meeting.