Daisy Dalrymple Omnibus (Books 1-4) by Carola Dunn

Author:Carola Dunn
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781780339733
Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group

CHAPTER 17

‘Good heavens,’ said Daisy, waving the letter that had arrived by the early post. ‘Mothers come through for once.’

‘Come through?’ Bobbie asked. ‘I say, Dodo, don’t hog the toast, you brute. Bastie, is that the marmalade lurking by your elbow?’

‘No, plum jam.’

Daisy passed the marmalade. ‘She says her gardener’s about ready to retire and she’ll employ Owen Morgan. Isn’t it spiffing? Sir Reginald promised to give him a good reference. I’d better go and phone Mr. Fletcher to see when he’ll be released.’

‘Ask him when we’ll be released,’ said Sebastian.

‘I will,’ she promised.

As she went to the telephone she had a brilliant idea. She and Phillip could take Owen to Worcestershire on their way to London – well, not quite on their way, but with a bit of a detour. Owen wasn’t large and wouldn’t mind squeezing into the dickey. She could stay the night at the Dower House, which would please Mother, and Phillip could go over to Malvern to spend a night with his family.

Mrs. Chiver answered the Cheshire Cheese telephone.

‘Chief Inspector Fletcher, please,’ Daisy requested.

‘He’s just this minute stepped out, miss,’ said the landlady. ‘Going to the smithy, I heard him say. Shall I call him back?’

‘No, thanks. I’ll meet him there.’ Surely among all that rubbish there must be a spot from which she could observe the interview with Stan Moss without being seen, if she hurried.

Luckily, she was wearing a warm tweed costume and country shoes. Not stopping for a coat, she sped from the house and down the path towards the village. As she passed the Winter Garden, she wondered for the hundredth time who could have been such an idiot as to hide a body where it would so certainly be discovered.

For the first time she found an answer: someone whose garden was paved over and grew nothing but rusty metal.

No – Stan Moss couldn’t have killed his own daughter! It was unthinkable, unbearable. And even the blacksmith, a countryman however mechanically minded, must be aware that without careful replanting the excavated soil would grow no flowers.

Of course he knew, Daisy realized with horror. That was what he wanted. He loathed Lady Valeria, and what could cause his enemy more trouble than the discovery of a murdered servant buried in her garden?

She couldn’t bear to believe the murder was premeditated. It was almost as bad, though, to cynically make use of his daughter’s body after hitting out at her in a burst of violent anger. Sebastian had expressed surprise that Moss and his mother had never come to blows; Bobbie had said he had a filthy temper; Daisy herself had heard him threaten Owen.

And Alec was on his way to ask questions which could not help but arouse that temper.

Daisy ran. Even when she remembered he’d have Tom Tring with him, she went on running. Down the path, through the wicket, across the lane, panting round the end of the ramshackle cottage . . .

As she reached the corner, she heard a wordless roar.

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