The Truth-Seeker's Wife Page 26

  ‘As Davy meant Meager’s body to do!’ I couldn’t help but say. I was immediately sorry I’d said it, because I saw Ben’s expression alter at the memory. I hadn’t seen that body atop the bonfire, but he had.

  ‘As Tabitha Evans and her son are both dead, the matter is closed.’ More gently, Ben added, ‘Put it all behind you, Lizzie. I don’t forget the criminals I’ve encountered and the crimes they’ve committed. But I don’t dwell on them, either. If I did, I’d not be able to do my job. We can’t rewrite the past.’

  * * *

  ‘The matter may be closed,’ began Aunt Parry. ‘But in a most unsatisfactory manner, I may say. No one has stood trial. Sir Henry’s character has been maligned and there is not a shred of evidence that anything that strange old woman said was true. I shall always remember Sir Henry as a charming gentleman.’

  It was the following afternoon and, once again, I took tea with her in Dorset Square. Things had come full circle, you might say. But clearly recent events were not closed in Aunt Parry’s mind and I was to hear about it.

  She tilted forward in a rustle of taffeta. ‘However Inspector Ross may choose to view events, none of it will ever leave my memory! Your husband’s view is formed by his experiences dealing with ruffians and criminals all the time. His finer feelings have been blunted. For a sensitive person such as myself—’

  What? She was as sensitive as an armadillo.

  ‘It remains, and always will do, a dreadful business! What particularly annoys me is that it altogether ruined my attempt to restore both my health and yours, Elizabeth, with a visit to the coast for sea air. The entire adventure has left me exhausted.’

  ‘Yes, I am sorry your plan did not work out as you hoped,’ I agreed meekly. If she suspected any irony in my reply, she did not show it. Her mind was running on a different track.

  ‘And it all came to pass because of a will,’ she went on. ‘No matter what had happened years before, the tale didn’t have to end in two murders! However you look at it, and whatever roots the story had, it was Mr Pelham’s arrival to deal with the revision of Sir Henry’s will that precipitated events.’

  ‘I dare say you’re right, Aunt Parry.’ Perhaps she was.

  ‘Of course I am right, Elizabeth.’ She sat back in her chair and gazed thoughtfully at two macaroons remaining on a plate, and sighed.

  ‘Wills cause no end of trouble,’ she went on, ‘especially when people allow themselves expectations of any sort. I remember, when I was a girl, my father had a curate. He wanted to get married. He was a nice enough young man, sincere in his beliefs and pleasant in his manner, but he had no money. The young lady he wished to wed had no money either. However!’ Aunt Parry raised a pudgy forefinger. ‘She had an aunt. The aunt was elderly, in poor health, and regarded as wealthy. She lived in a fine house and in some style. She was childless. It was generally believed that her niece, the girl the curate wanted to marry, would inherit. She had indicated several times that was her intention. So the young couple married on what little money they had, and waited for the aunt’s demise. And die she did.’

  ‘And she hadn’t left her fortune to the niece, the curate’s wife?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, yes, she had, just as she’d promised she would. But there wasn’t any fortune. The aunt had been living on credit for years, keeping up appearances by all kinds of trickery. Her jewels were paste, the originals sold years before. The house was mortgaged to the bank and it took possession of that. Other creditors were waiting in line with their demands. All that the niece received, when the will was finally settled, was a chipped dinner service and a long-case clock that didn’t work. Counting one’s chickens before they are hatched, as the saying goes, is never a sound principle. Shall we finish the macaroons? And then, perhaps, we can talk about taking a little trip later in the year. Tell me, Elizabeth, how would you fancy a tour of the Lake District?’

  About the Author

  Ann Granger is a British author of cozy crime. Born in Portsmouth, England, she went on to study at the University of London. She has written over thirty murder mysteries, including the Mitchell & Markby Mysteries, the Fran Varady Mysteries, the Lizzie Martin Mysteries and the Campbell and Carter Mysteries. Her books are set in Britain, and feature female detectives, murderous twists and characters full of humor and color.

  Also by Ann Granger

  A Campbell and Carter Mystery

  Mud, Muck and Dead Things

  Rack, Ruin and Murder

  Bricks and Mortality

  Dead in the Water

  Rooted in Evil

  An Unfinished Murder

  A Matter of Murder

  The Inspector Ben Ross Mysteries

  A Rare Interest In Corpses

  A Mortal Curiosity

  A Better Quality of Murder

  A Particular Eye for Villainy

  The Testimony of the Hanged Man

  The Dead Woman of Deptford

  The Murderer’s Apprentice

  The Truth-Seeker’s Wife

  First published in Great Britain in 2021 by Headline Publishing Group

  This edition published in the USA in 2021 by Canelo

  Canelo Digital Publishing Limited

  31 Helen Road

  Oxford OX2 0DF

  United Kingdom

  Copyright © Ann Granger, 2021

  The moral right of Ann Granger to be identified as the creator of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN 9781800325166

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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