“He’s over here. Will he let me pick him up?”
Ah, his slightly standoffish neighbour with the pretty name. Elodie. A pretty name for a pretty woman.
“Not unless you are carrying food. Don’t worry. I am, so he’s likely to head in my direction.”
There was a scuffling noise in the undergrowth, and Stoker appeared. Hugo picked him up and started back towards his house, calling “thank you” over his shoulder. To his surprise, he heard his neighbour say, “I am a member of the Island Players. Is it true you’re writing something to open the new season?”
“Yes. Just let me put Stoker in the house, and I’ll be back.”
Hugo scampered back along the path, dropped Stoker unceremoniously inside the door, threw in a handful of fishy nibbles after him, and returned to the low fence near the chestnut trees. Elodie Ashton was standing there, holding a small basket.
“I was mushroom-hunting,” she said, “and your cat joined me. But I don’t think mushrooms are his thing.”
“No, but they are mine. I was hoping to find some on my side. I have, before, and they’re very good.”
“As long as you know what you’re doing,” said his neighbour, and then added, “I’d love to hear about your play. Forgive me for not doing the neighbourly thing when you moved in, but I had a deadline. Now that’s done, would you like to come over for a drink and tell me something about it?”
Would he like to? Elodie Ashton, so he was told by Brenda Le Huray, came from an old island family and knew everyone who was anyone. An ally on the Island Players would be a real stroke of luck.
“Love to! Just give me a moment to get out of these boots, and I’ll join you.” Hugo started to turn back to the house.
“Tell you what,” said his now far from standoffish neighbour, “I’ve found some nice mushrooms over here, and I can see some beauties on your side. Why don’t you pick them, bring them over and join me for dinner? They’ll go very well with lamb shanks — or are you a vegetarian?”
“God no! Far from it! The bloodier the better!”
For a moment Elodie Ashton seemed startled by his facetious response, then she laughed. “Lamb shanks aren’t bloody, of course.”
“Just a figure of speech. I’ll pick the mushrooms and join you in about an hour?”
“Perfect.”
A shaft of sunlight sliced across the path and through the trees, making Elodie Ashton’s red hair burst into flame.
More than perfect, he thought, as he hastened back to his house. Lamb shanks, and a pretty woman who was an island insider! Marvellous. No. Bloody miraculous.
They had needed the air-conditioning at the Beau Sejour Centre that summer, which had been hot and dry, right into September. Liz finished her exercise routine and made for the showers. Dinner with Elodie meant using the showers there, rather than waiting until she got home, her usual pattern.
As she got into the change room, Marla Maxwell was coming out of one of the shower stalls, towelling her hair and singing. Liz didn’t recognize the song, but certainly the singer could have lured any red-blooded male onto the Pea Stacks in a matter of seconds, and he would have died happy. Trouble on two nicely muscled legs, thought Liz, as the girl surveyed herself with unabashed approval in one of the long mirrors. She was tanned without tan lines, which suggested frequent use of a tanning bed. When she saw Liz’s reflection in the mirror, she turned round and fixed two startlingly blue eyes on her.
“Hiya. You’re Detective Sergeant Falla, aren’t you.”
“And you’re Marla Maxwell. Hi.”
Liz was about to pull off her sweater when Marla Maxwell said, “I’ve got a problem. Can I talk to you?” The self-satisfaction was gone, and the girl now looked worried, a frown wrinkling her pristine forehead. Liz pulled her sweater back on.
“You can, but this is not the ideal place. Why don’t you come and see me at the office? I’ll be there tomorrow morning.”
“I don’t want to be seen at the police station, because someone will tell my mother. Why not now? No one’s around.”
Marla began to put on some clothes, which Liz found helpful. Although, God help her, she only fancied men, a naked Marla did nothing to establish a professional atmosphere in this already unbusinesslike setting.
“Okay. What’s bothering you?” Resigned to her fate, Liz sat down on the bench in front of the lockers. Marla Maxwell threw her towel into her gym bag and started to tie her damp hair into a ponytail.
“Not what. Who. I’m being harassed.”
“That’s serious and we can help you. Who is doing this?”
“That’s just it. I don’t know. I’m getting these weird text messages, and they’re not from the people who they say they’re from. And someone’s following me, I’m sure of it.” Marla’s low dramatic tones began to sound like something from one of the daytime soaps.
“That’s all a bit garbled, Marla.” Liz took the padlock off her locker and started to take out her belongings. “If these things are happening, surely your parents should be the first to know.”
“No!” Marla Maxwell sounded as if she was about to burst into tears. “Because then they’d know about …and I’ll be sent to my horrid old aunt on the mainland, and if you say anything to them I’ll deny everything!” The soap opera tone had returned.
“Marla, you still live at home, don’t you? And your parents are friends of the chief officer’s. I’d have to tell them.”
“That’s why I wanted to tell you here, not at the police station.”
At this point, two women came in, chattering away, and Marla picked up her gym bag and ran past them, bumping into them in her hurry.
On her way back to Elodie and lamb shanks, Liz mulled over her change room encounter. Overly dramatic as the girl had sounded, there clearly was something bothering her, or why would she voluntarily open up a can of worms with a member of the police force? And a can of worms it was, since she was afraid of her parents finding out whatever it was she was doing — and it was easy enough to guess what that was. Sex, yes, and probably involving some youth the Gastineaus would consider undesirable. Or, rather, unacceptable.
It was a short drive to Elodie’s cottage, but by the time she got there she had decided there was nothing she could do unless the girl laid a formal complaint. She could only guess at Marla Maxwell’s age, but she suspected she was younger than she looked, still in her teens. Certainly she talked like a fifteen-year-old. She sighed, remembering herself at that age, hormones a-bubble, one minute melancholy and the next over the moon, secretive and sociable, a mass of contradictions. Come to think of it, had she really changed that much?
She was laughing as she drove up the gravel driveway alongside Elodie’s cottage, but her laughter died when she realized she had forgotten to pick up a bottle of red, as she had intended. Thinking about Marla Maxwell’s problems had driven it clean out of her mind. Ah well. Liz got out of her car, locked it, went up and knocked on the door before letting herself in. As she did so, she heard voices, Elodie’s voice, and that of a man. The scent of something delectable hung in the air. Not lamb shanks. It smelled like mushrooms cooking.
“Liz! Come on through! Into the kitchen!”
She walked into a scene of cosy domesticity. At the kitchen table, her aunt was slicing up a baguette and, at the stove stood a small, bearded man in a striped apron cooking — yes — mushrooms.
Gandalf.
As she came in,