Any Given Sundae (Australian Amateur Sleuth Book 5) Page 7

  “Don’t worry,” Blake said. “I’m looking into the murder. I won’t let them arrest you.”

  “Thanks.” I forced a smile. “Mr. Buttons thinks it’s Dorothy.”

  Blake laughed. “Mr. Buttons always thinks it’s Dorothy.”

  I shrugged. “He could be right this time.”

  Blake leaned across the table. “Why do you say that?”

  I laughed in spite of myself. “Actually, only because it’s not me. At this point, I want the detectives to find the murderer—anyone that’s not me will suit me just fine. But seriously, Blake, do you have any suspects at all?”

  He hesitated, and I wondered at first if he was keeping something from me. “Only Sally Cavendish and Prudence Paget. The detectives really need to focus on them.”

  I nodded. “That’s for sure. I suppose you know that the detectives had a tip off that I was having an affair with Roland? Can you find out who told them that? Whoever it was would have to be the murderer.”

  Blake shook his head. “They probably invented that story.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m afraid to say that cops sometimes say stuff like that.”

  I frowned. “You mean they make it up? Invent the whole thing?”

  Blake nodded solemnly. “Yes, to see if the person will admit to it, or at least to gauge their reaction.”

  I thought it over. “Well, if it is true, then the person who gave them the tip off is the murderer—what other reason would a person have to lie like that?”

  “I’ll try to find out if there really was a tip-off.”

  “Thanks.” I fell into silence and stared blankly into the fire. I had wanted it to be a romantic dinner, but it hadn’t worked that way at all. I was miserable and feeling sorry for myself.

  Chapter 12

  “Oh, Sibyl, it’s obvious!” Mr. Buttons called out to me as he returned with a platter of cucumber sandwiches and tea. He set the meal in front of me–crusts cut off, as was his tradition–and sat down, taking a long, slow sip from his tea.

  “What’s obvious, Mr. Buttons?” I asked, opting to wait until I’d heard him out before grabbing a bite to eat. There was nothing worse than trying to have a conversation with a mouthful of food.

  “The murderer! We both know who it was,” Mr. Buttons exclaimed between large bites of his sandwich. He leaned in closely and spoke in little more than a whisper. “It was Dorothy. I bet she was the one who saw you buying the antifreeze and told the police in order to throw suspicion off herself. She’s the murderer, you mark my words.”

  I sighed audibly and leaned back in my chair. “You say this about everything, Mr. Buttons. Quite literally everything. The other day you blamed her for that time you got lost on your way out of town, despite the fact that it happened about a year before you’d actually met her. You even blame her whenever the weather turns bad.”

  “It’s nature’s way of defending itself against her,” he remarked quite seriously. I drank some of my tea and took a sandwich of my own, deciding it would be best not to argue. Dorothy was certainly hard to get along with, but that was no reason to accuse her of murder, especially when there was no evidence that she was involved. I’d normally take Mr. Buttons’ words to heart, but it was easy to tell he was being more than a little silly.

  “Imagine, Mr. Buttons, if it wasn’t Dorothy. Hypothetically, if it had been somebody else, who seems likely to you?” I asked, hoping my ploy wasn’t too obvious.

  Luckily, it seemed to have worked. Mr. Buttons leaned on the table and stroked his chin, clearly thinking. “Well, we know it wasn’t us, since we weren’t at the house when it all happened. And unless Cressida has taken her art to a horrible new level, we can count her out, too. Even if it wasn’t completely out of character for her, she not only doesn’t have a motive, but would be actively hurting her business if she murdered somebody here.” Mr. Buttons took another sip of his tea and picked up another sandwich. “I suppose the guests are the most likely, given that any one of them could have found out that you had invited Sally to your cottage. What about Prudence?”

  I nodded. “I think that’s a good start, yes. She’s not especially suspicious, I suppose, but then murderers rarely are.”

  “But what motive would she have?” Mr. Buttons asked. “They seemed more than a little friendly at dinner.”

  “Exactly,” I said pointedly. “Roland was married, so it’s possible that he rejected Prudence in favor of Sally.”

  “I admit to not knowing the poor man very well, but it strikes me that he wasn’t the most loyal person,” Mr. Buttons said sadly. “Are you sure that’s a good motive?”

  “I don’t think a good motive for murder truly exists, Mr. Buttons,” I said, taking a sandwich for myself. “But I do think it’s a possibility worth investigating. It’s a great idea of yours that we talk to some people at Prudence’s lecture today. It might end up revealing something we’ve missed.”

  Mr. Buttons thought for at least a full minute before replying. “Yes, I suppose.” He sighed long and hard. “If only to prove that she’s not at fault so we can get back to investigating Dorothy. I’m ready whenever you are.”

  Mr. Buttons and I left almost immediately, driving directly to the university to catch the lecture. We wanted to make sure that we arrived before it finished so we could talk to people who knew Prudence before they left. Unfortunately, we’d decided to leave around lunch time, so traffic was unusually heavy. Of course, ‘unusually heavy’ traffic in Pharmidale amounted to only a handful of extra cars, so we still made it there in decent time.

  As the town’s main—some would say only—attraction, the university was large, and was comprised of many large buildings over one hundred and fifty acres. We parked outside the Arts building and hurried up the hill and then into the building in the direction of the A4 lecture hall, hoping we weren’t too late.

  As we entered, I immediately wondered if we’d found the wrong room. There was a large, cheering crowd, and the sound of laughter echoed through the hall. As we continued down the aisle, we were greeted with the sight of Prudence standing before a brick wall, onto which various images of spotted quolls were being projected.

  There was a large crowd of students sitting in rows of seats along the hall. All of them seemed to be completely enraptured in the conversation, not at all like any student I’d ever known. Each was so invested in the lecture that not a single one turned to look as we entered the room.

  It wasn’t long before I noticed that Mr. Buttons was also intently staring at the screen. I raised my eyebrows, wondering what had him so interested. All the screen showed were several spotted quolls, and while Prudence was lecturing in an extremely animated way, motioning to the different ways quolls moved and acted, it didn’t seem like something Mr. Buttons would be interested in.

  Before I could react, he ran straight past me and directly onto the stage. Prudence turned to look at him, stopping her lecture with a stunned expression. Mr. Buttons ran straight past her and pulled a napkin out of his jacket pocket, using it to rub a tiny spot off the wall onto which the images were being projected. He calmly walked back off the stage, giving Prudence a small polite nod as he passed her.

  I didn’t think Mr. Buttons could do anything more embarrassing until he licked his finger and rubbed a small piece of food off the cheek of some poor student sitting in the front row. I clasped my hands over my face to hide it as Prudence slowly cleared her throat and resumed the lecture.

  The lecture continued, but try as I might, there was simply no way I could pay attention. I didn’t think I’d ever heard anything as boring before in my life. Prudence was halfway through describing the typical ecologies of the spotted quoll—also known as the ‘Tiger Quoll’ as I’d just learned—when Mr. Buttons turned to me and spoke in a hushed whisper.

  “This is dreadfully dull, Sibyl,” he said, glancing over at the stage. “Can we just go and do something else until it’s over? I think we passed some paint
that was drying that we could watch.”

  I nudged Mr. Buttons in the ribs to make him quiet. “We can’t just leave, because something important might come up. If she talks about her life even a little, it might give us some insight. Just be patient.”

  Almost immediately, I regretted my adamancy. We sat there for what felt like several more hours, though realistically probably wasn’t even a full fifty minutes. While we learned plenty about the quoll’s natural habitat and eating habits, we didn’t learn a thing about Prudence, much less any signs of a motive. Finally, Prudence said that tea and coffee were to be served in the staff room, and I didn’t think I’d heard sweeter words in my life. Mr. Buttons and I all but sprinted to the room and made ourselves some coffee, desperately trying to chase away the exhaustion of having listened to that entire lecture.

  “Goodness gracious, Sibyl,” Mr. Buttons said, rubbing his eyes. “I wish we hadn’t done that. We didn’t even learn anything useful.”

  I sighed, grabbing the most delicious looking cookie I could, then deciding that I might as well take a few more. “I know, I know, I’m sorry. Still, let’s talk to people here who know Prudence.” I motioned to the large crowd that was slowly pouring into the room.

  “We’re not going to find a motive, Sibyl,” Mr. Buttons said, lowering his voice. “Unless Prudence broke into your house to give Roland a lecture on quolls so he’d kill himself, I don’t think she’s responsible.”

  “I know you think it’s Dorothy, Mr. Buttons, but we have to ask around at least.”

  Mr. Buttons sighed as well, but nodded to me, indicating that he at least agreed on some level.

  “Hello, Mr. Buttons,” Prudence said with a smile. “Hi, Sibyl, I didn’t know you were in attendance today. I hope you enjoyed the lecture.”

  “Oh, yes, it was very interesting,” I lied, resisting the urge to run away in case she started talking about quolls again.

  “Well, I’m glad you enjoyed it,” Prudence said with a smile. “If you’ll excuse me, some people have been clamoring for answers to their questions. I’ll talk to you both back at the boarding house later on.” She nodded and walked into a large crowd of people who were indeed vying for her attention.

  “Let’s ask around,” I said to Mr. Buttons, who looked as if he was about to cry. “I know there’ll be more quoll talk, but if it starts heading in that direction, just bail out of the conversation.”

  “How, Sibyl?” Mr. Buttons asked. “I’m never any good at these things. If I try to excuse myself mid-conversation, I always invent some embarrassing excuse that doesn’t even make sense.”

  “Oh, Mr. Buttons, you’re being silly,” I said, putting my hands on my hips. “Go try it on that guy.” I indicated a man who was standing alone, slowly pouring himself a coffee. “Just ask him what he thinks of Prudence. If he starts to talk about quolls, just make up some normal excuse and come back here. You’ll be fine.”

  Mr. Buttons sighed and rubbed his temples, but agreed to try. I walked slightly closer to overhear the conversation.

  Mr. Buttons greeted the man cheerfully. “Hello, do you know Professor Prudence Paget very well?” he asked, clearly not one to beat around the bush. It took less than a minute before the conversation devolved entirely into the stranger excitedly talking about the nominate subspecies of quoll that can be found in the wet forests of southeastern Australia and Tasmania. I thought about coming to Mr. Buttons’ rescue, but decided he’d need to learn how to do it himself or he’d never figure it out.

  Instead, I opted to ask around for myself. Prudence was busy talking to several people, so I figured it would be safe to ask about her elsewhere in the room. Unfortunately, my experience was similar to Mr. Buttons’, and everybody I spoke to seemed to be far more interested in quolls than Prudence, and several times I found myself resisting the urge to explain that I found anything more interesting than quolls, before excusing myself.

  Mr. Buttons and I eventually rendezvoused at the snack table, each of us more exhausted than before. “How did you go?” Mr. Buttons asked me, sounding like he’d just run a marathon.

  “Not well,” I admitted, taking another cookie. “Nobody cared about Prudence, much less had anything useful on her.”

  “Well, we’re lucky that I’m such a natural conversationalist,” Mr. Buttons said with a smile. “Apparently, Prudence applied for a very large grant some years ago. I do mean a very large grant, Sibyl, to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Those grants were called ARC Large Grants, back in the day. It was going well until it was knocked back by the grants committee, a committee headed by none other than Roland Cavendish himself.”

  I raised my eyebrows, and Mr. Buttons nodded at me. “That’s a good reason for her to hate him, but why was she so friendly with him at dinner? Was that just a ruse?”

  Mr. Buttons shrugged at me, and I felt every bit as lost. What did it mean?

  Chapter 13

  I watched as yet another piece of baby spinach flew off my plate and landed on Mr. Buttons’ plate. I had long since given up trying to catch them. Perhaps I shouldn’t have ordered the pumpkin salad, because the green bits were hard to hold down in the gale force wind.

  Mr. Buttons, on the other hand, had ordered two wraps, and those were in no danger of leaving his plate.

  “Why do we have to sit outside in this freezing weather?” I asked him. “It’s blowing a gale. No one else is out here, if you hadn’t noticed.”

  Mr. Buttons leaned across the table and addressed me in a conspiratorial tone. “Exactly. I don’t want anyone to overhear what I say.”

  I looked around me once more. I had chosen a table without an umbrella, quite wisely on my part, because the umbrellas at the other tables, despite being shut, looked in immediate danger of becoming airborne. I could see the other patrons all sitting inside, no doubt enjoying the warmth of the open fire. I was just about to insist that we go inside, when a young couple walked out and took a seat at a nearby table. They tried to open one of the umbrellas, but before they managed to do so, a waitress sprinted down the pathway toward them.

  “Oh my goodness, what on earth do you think you’re doing?” she snapped at them.

  “Can we put one of the umbrellas up?” the man asked her.

  “Of course not!” she said in a raised voice. “That would be a really stupid idea!” She hurried to shut the umbrella, which was already lifting itself into the air, borne by the violent wind. The couple hurried away to another table.

  The waitress pulled the umbrella out of its holder and threw it to the ground, then stormed off in a huff. “She’s a cranky one,” Mr. Buttons said.

  I tried to part my hair, which was violently flying around my face, to look at Mr. Buttons, when another piece of baby spinach flew from my plate and landed in his hair. “I think I’ll get frostbite, maybe even hypothermia, if we stay out here,” I said as a hint.

  Mr. Buttons remained oblivious to my pleading. “Sibyl, I had a revelation last night, as I was lying in my bed and watching fly spots on the ceiling, wondering how soon I could remove them.” I sighed, but he pressed on. “You know, I have no idea why it didn’t occur to me before.” He paused for dramatic effect.

  “What do you mean? The fly spots?”

  Mr. Buttons looked disappointed. “No, Sibyl. James, James the ghost hunter. Remember him?”

  “Of course I remember him,” I said. “He did try to push me out a window.”

  Mr. Buttons shrugged. “James is Dorothy’s nephew, so of course he’ll know any dirt on the awful woman. He’ll know if there’s a connection between Dorothy and the vic!”

  Not Dorothy again, I thought. Aloud I said, “I thought we suspected Prudence Paget now? Remember how we said it was suspicious that Roland ruined her academic career, but she was so nice to him at dinner?” I put my napkin over the last piece of my baby spinach to hold it down. “Anyway, do you actually think James would talk to us?”

  “He’s a captive audience, so to speak,
” Mr. Buttons said with a giggle, just before a napkin blew into his head. “He’s in jail. We’ll go and visit him, and take bribes.”

  “Bribes?” I pulled a face. “Do you mean a chocolate cake with a file in the middle of it?”

  Mr. Buttons ignored my facetious remark, and leaned down to fetch papers from his briefcase. He put a stack of papers in front of me and handed me a pen, but at that point, an even more violent gust of wind appeared and blew the papers all over the seating area.

  It took us both a good five minutes to retrieve all the paperwork. Well, I had retrieved most of the papers, and when I finished, I looked up to see Mr. Buttons looking distastefully at a muddy piece of paper.

  “We need to go inside,” I said firmly. “Otherwise, all these papers will get dirty.” That did the trick. Mr. Buttons was happy to follow me inside, where we were lucky enough to get a seat that had just been vacated, right by the fire. The two people who were on their way to the same table shot us nasty glances.

  Mr. Buttons daintily dabbed at the mud spots on his piece of paper with a napkin. “Don’t speak too loudly,” he warned me. “You know what the locals are like.”

  I looked around me, to see all pairs of eyes on us. I had grown so accustomed to living in a small country town that I no longer noticed the attention that the locals paid each other. In the city, no one gave each other a second glance, no matter how they were acting or how strangely they were dressed. Yet here in the country, everyone stared at everyone else. It reminded me of the time that Mr. Buttons had taken me for a walk in a different direction, down a laneway between two paddocks filled with cows. The cows came to the fence and stared at us intently. It seems that both people and animals in small country towns were fascinated by other creatures.

  I moved my chair closer to the warmth and the comfort of the fire. I love the smell of burning wood, and half thought that I should ask them who their wood man was so I could suggest him to Cressida. This wood was clearly nice and old, whereas Cressida’s hadn’t been dried sufficiently. I suppressed a giggle, figuring I was becoming quite the country girl now, knowledgeable about weather patterns and wood.