Downward Facing Death (21 page)

Which she hadn't done, of course. Jack had volunteered that bit of information quite freely, and the impression she had of Jack was that if he had done so, then he thought it was significant. And Jack, she was sure, was nobody's fool. As for not asking questions—well, she was certainly in no mood for Ben Taylor to tell her what to do. She shrugged her coat on and set off for Gerald's house before she could change her mind.

As she walked there, however, she wondered if she wasn't being too impulsive. Her attempts to uncover the murderer before, when she had thought it might be Raquel, had resulted in little but trouble and alerting the murderer to her interest. She would be wiser, not to mention safer, to be a bit more discreet this time. Her steps slowed as she neared Crystals and Candles. Perhaps she should just go in for a cup of chamomile with Megan and have a well-needed moan about Ben.

Crystals and Candles displayed a large
CLOSED FOR LUNCH
sign on the door. Keeley peered through the windows but saw no sign of Megan. She stood for a moment, torn between continuing to Gerald's house or returning to the café. She had the pretext of picking up the license form, but she doubted the mayor really wanted to be bothered with paperwork. In fact, she wasn't sure just exactly what a mayor did, having only a vague idea that it involved ceremonial jewelry and historic buildings. She decided to knock the door, ask for the form, casually mention Terry Smith, and see if he had the same nervous reaction that she had noticed before. That was all.

The mayor's residence was a large, white brick house with well-tended gardens, yet not so grand as she had expected. She rang the doorbell, hearing it echo inside the building. It seemed to be a long time before anyone answered, and she was about to turn away when the door creaked open a few centimeters. It wasn't Gerald but a small, thin woman with iron-colored hair in a high bun and steely eyes. She stared at Keeley, waiting for her to announce herself.

“Hello, I was wondering if Gerald was in.”

“You mean Mr. Buxby.” The woman's voice dripped with disapproval. This must be Edna, Keeley thought, the housekeeper with the terrible headaches.

“Yes. Sorry. Mr. Buxby. It's Keeley Carpenter, about the food festival. Annie, Mrs. Rowland that is, said he might have some sort of license form I need to fill out?”

The woman tutted, but held the door open for her to come in. Keeley stepped into a large hall with gleaming white walls and floors. Edna might not be much of a conversationalist, but she was clearly a good housekeeper. She went into a room, presumably to fetch Gerald.

A few framed photographs lined the walls, mainly of the mayor at various functions, and Keeley went over to look at them. Looking for a face she knew, or even, she admitted to herself, for Terry Smith. She also scanned the mayor's clothing.

“Keeley!” Gerald appeared in the doorway Edna had gone through. “Come in.”

Keeley went into a small drawing room, trying to ignore Edna's glare as she walked past her and left the room, shutting the door behind her with some force. Keeley raised her eyebrows at Gerald.

“Don't mind Edna. She's been with me for years, she's terribly protective.”

Keeley thought that was an odd comment. Why on earth should he need protecting from her? She gave Gerald a polite smile, noticing the plain, wooden buttons on the olive green waistcoat he was wearing and wondering what had happened to the cardigan.

“You wanted the forms for the festival? I've got some here.” Gerald went to a small desk and began leafing through some papers while Keeley looked around the room. More photographs lined the walls. She cleared her throat, wondering where to begin.

“I expect you get to know everyone in town, being mayor,” she began. “It must be very interesting.”

“Yes, it is,” he agreed after a moment's pause, as though he suspected she was probing for something. He produced the right form with a flourish, handing it out to her with one of those insincere, wide smiles. He must have been taking lessons from Duane, she thought.

“Did you know the man who was killed? Terry?” As she took the paper from him, their eyes locked, and there was no mistaking the flash of fear in his eyes. He let go of the forms as though he had been burned.

“Not very well, no. Why do you ask?” His tone was bordering on aggressive now, the smile gone, and for the first time, Keeley asked herself just what she thought she was doing, confronting possible criminals on her own.

“It was just a thought,” she said softly, tucking the forms into her bag and turning, ready to leave. Gerald's next words stopped her in her tracks.

“Ben Taylor been tittle-tattling, has he?”

“Excuse me?” What did Ben have to do with this? Gerald gave her a rather nasty sneer.

“The whole town knows about his little evening visits to Rose Cottage, my dear. You've hardly been discreet.”

“How dare you!” Keeley felt outraged. “Ben has been keeping an eye out for me, that's all.”

“Because you were number one suspect, weren't you? Was it you that put him on to questioning me, then, to take the heat off yourself?” The mayor had lost his anger now and seemed almost imploring. Keeley felt confused, then realized that Ben was, of course, one step ahead of her. For whatever reason, he thought the mayor was up to something too, and had been round to question him. So much for letting her in on the details of the investigation.

“If you're being questioned by the police,” Keeley pointed out in a low voice, “then I'm not the only suspect, am I?” She thought again about the button and realized this was the time to play her hand.

“What were you doing in my flat the night of the murder, Mr. Buxby?”

Gerald's face showed what appeared to be genuine surprise.

“That's preposterous,” he said, his cheeks reddening. “I was nowhere near the place. I was at a function, in fact, a very public one. As I told Detective Constable Taylor. I have witnesses who can vouch for my presence.”

Keeley faltered at that. Still, the fact of the button remained. But she could hardly ask to go searching through his wardrobe. Instead, she reached into her pocket and pulled it out, handing it out to him.

“Is this yours? From one of your cardigans, perhaps?” She watched him carefully, hoping the abruptness of her question would trip him up.

Gerald bent and peered at the gold button, his brows creasing together. Then he straightened and shook his head.

“This is what you have to go on? Those buttons are two-a-penny; the old haberdashery on the High Street used to sell them. Why, I can think of at least five of my acquaintances who have the very same ones. Would you like me to give you a list?” Sarcasm dripped from his voice; then he stalked over to the door and wrenched it open, calling for the housekeeper. She appeared with the same sour expression on her face when she looked at Keeley, which immediately softened when she turned her attention to the mayor.

“Edna, you do my laundry. Do any of my cardigans or other attire have buttons missing?”

Edna raised her chin proudly.

“Certainly not. I wash everything by hand and take the utmost care.”

Keeley put the button back into her pocket, feeling now decidedly foolish. Gerald held the door open wider and looked at Keeley as he addressed the housekeeper.

“Ms. Carpenter was just leaving. If you could show her out, Edna.”

Keeley walked out with as much dignity as she could muster.

The housekeeper didn't look at her as she let her out, only gave a clipped command: “You watch my floors, girl, I've just mopped.”

Keeley breathed a sigh of both relief and bewilderment as she walked down the path, away from the oppressive atmosphere of the house. She still felt there was definitely something going on with the mayor, even if she had been wrong about the button itself. She badly wanted to ask Ben what had prompted him to question the mayor, but it seemed Ben had no desire to talk to her whatsoever.

A fierce grip on her arm made her spin round, startled, to see Edna standing on the path, her eyes burning with hatred.

“You leave him alone, you hear me? He's a good man. Any mistakes he's made—well, it was a long time ago, you should let him be.”

Keeley was interested in spite of the woman's ferocity. Edna opened her mouth, then closed it again, cutting off whatever she may have been about to reveal. Instead she stared at Keeley for a moment, then gave her a nasty smile that reminded her unnervingly of Raquel.

“Carpenter, you said? George Carpenter's girl?”

Keeley nodded, wondering where the old woman was going with the change of subject.

“You've got some cheek, then, coming round here, trying to dig up dirt on poor Gerald.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, you should clear out the skeletons in your own closet before you go rummaging through other people's, girl.” The woman clucked her tongue in disapproval, a malicious gleam in her eye. “Everybody talks about your father as if he didn't have any secrets. A terrible thing, infidelity,” she said, and then turned on her heel and stalked into the house, slamming the front door behind her before Keeley could formulate her next question.

Infidelity? Whose? For a moment, she thought Edna was talking about Gerald, and her thoughts skittered as she tried to make sense of the woman's remarks, before a terrible conclusion took shape: Edna was talking about her family. Her father, to be specific.

Her father had been unfaithful? Keeley shook her head, dismissing the thought as soon as it came and taking a step back up the path, intending to bang on the door and demand that the woman explain the meaning behind her words. Her father had been the consummate family man, had adored both Keeley and her mother, even if to Keeley's mind, Darla went out of her way to be hard to love. That thought stopped her in her tracks.

Could that be why her mother had been that way, why she had always seemed so bitter? Because her loving husband was not so loving as he seemed? It would be just like her mother to not say a word to anyone and soldier on in silence, letting it twist her up inside.

But if Edna knew, then someone had said a word to someone, at some time.

Keeley saw a curtain twitch at one of the front windows and turned away, realizing she was still standing frozen in the middle of the path. She walked away as fast as she could without actually breaking into a jog, Edna's words whirring around in her head as she searched for a memory that might make sense of her words. If there had been such serious problems in her parents' marriage, then surely she would have known, or would have at least suspected. She wanted to come to the conclusion that the old woman was simply being nasty in retaliation for Keeley's provocation of her beloved boss, but there was something about the way she had uttered the words that rang true.

Edna, at least, believed in what she was saying. Which meant the story had come from somewhere.

Keeley picked up her pace as she turned back onto the High Street and headed toward the Tavern. It seemed she would be asking questions after all, but not about Terry Smith's murder. Not anymore.

Jack was in his usual spot, though he was alone today without Bambi, and he frowned as Keeley walked over and sat down without her usual smile and greeting.

“I need to ask you something, Jack,” she asked in a low voice, not wanting to be overheard. The old man drew his eyebrows together, causing even more lines than usual to snake their way across his forehead.

“Go on.”

“My father,” she said, and then stopped, hardly able to believe she was about to ask him this and wondering if she should just leave well alone. He was dead, and her parents' marital problems were their own business, at least now that Keeley was a grown woman and more than capable of looking after herself. But part of her needed to know, and with more urgency than she wanted to ask Gerald about his financial affairs or even uncover who had been leaving corpses in her café.

“What about him?” Jack's expression looked guarded, and Keeley had a horrible feeling that Jack knew the gist of what she was about to ask him.

“Do you know if he ever cheated on my mother?”

Jack blinked slowly and reached for his pipe, but not before Keeley saw the flash of knowledge in his eyes. He knew something.

“Now, why would you ask me something like that?”

“That's not answering my question, Jack.”

He gave a shrug.

“Seems a funny sort of question to be asking, lass, that's all. Someone said something they shouldn't, have they?”

With that, Keeley knew there was some truth to Edna's words. She felt tears sting her eyes as she understood just how much she had wanted it to be a lie. Her father had always seemed to her the very model of goodness, of decency.

“It was Edna,” Keeley said, and then gave Jack a shortened version of the whole sorry affair, trying to minimize her attempts to uncover the mayor's secrets. By Jack's skeptical look, he knew exactly what Keeley had been doing at Gerald's. She felt foolish. She had gone round there, thinking she knew something, that she was clever, driven by some kind of stupid spite at Ben, who had been one step ahead of her anyway. Keeley shook her head at her own stupidity. All of a sudden, it didn't matter that the murder was, as she had herself argued, very much her business, in that she had been swept up in events against her will. If trying to discover the perpetrator had been her attempt to try to exert some control over a scary situation, then she had failed dismally. All she had succeeded in doing was opening a can of worms that would have been better left to rot.

Jack was looking at her keenly, his old eyes sharp, but when he spoke, there was a sympathy in his voice that nearly had Keeley crying in earnest.

“It's not my place to say anything, lass. It wasn't that nasty old baggage's either. You need to ask those involved.”