Anything Goes

Not officially,“ Sissy said, looking around for Claude to return.
    “Then let’s have a toast to making it official,“ Robert said. “Perhaps some champagne in the sitting room?”
    Even Major Winslow, who had eventually returned to the table looking pale and a little wobbly, seemed grateful for the invitation to leave the table. But his wife exclaimed, “We haven’t had dessert yet.”
    There were several almost imperceptible groans. “Perhaps later, Mummy,“ Sissy said, still sullen. “I wonder where Claude has gone?”
    Lily smiled to herself, wondering if Claude had made a break for it. She pleaded a terrible headache as soon as everybody had enjoyed one fine glass of champagne, which allowed Robert to become very solicitous of his sister and insist on taking her home immediately.
    They drove back in miserable silence. “Worst meal I’ve ever had,“ Robert muttered.
    “Robert, we need to talk. But I’m too tired tonight. I think we should consider discussing what Mimi told us with Jack Summer. Maybe he could fill in the blanks.“
    “In what way?“
    “Let us know, for example, if this horrible Billy went around telling other people in town his belief that Mimi was Uncle Horatio’s heir.“
    “Let’s talk about it tomorrow. I need to take to my bed and forget this evening ever happened.”
    Lily said, “I’m going to starve before morning. Wasn’t there an ice cream shop in town?“
    “If there was, I didn’t notice it,“ Robert said. “But it’s a nice evening for a drive. We’ll go see.”
    There had been an ice cream shop in Voorburg, but it was closed. Permanently. Another victim of the economic bad times. They gave up and went back home. Robert dropped her at the front door and went to park the automobile. The house was dark and Lily realized that it was later than she had thought. Everyone had gone to bed. She staggered upstairs, her stomach growling, and put on her nightgown. But before she could even turn down her bed, she realized there was no way she was going to get to sleep with her stomach roaring.
    She put on a dressing gown and crept downstairs to the kitchen, stepped into the room, and turned on the overhead light.
    Lying in the middle of the kitchen floor was a body with a butcher knife sticking out of its chest and Lily’s missing scarf around its neck.
    Lily screamed.
     

Chapter 16
     
    Jack Summer was sitting in his tiny boardinghouse room, reading some old issues of the Voorburg Times that he’d borrowed from the newspaper morgue. He had the window wide open next to his small desk because the whole house always reeked of cabbage, even though it wasn’t served very often. He’d have a roomful of moths, but the fresh air was great. He wondered idly whether the smell was ancestral, having permeated the building for so long that it was part of it.
    He’d been looking through the old issues of the paper, trying to find any mention of Horatio Brewster or the other people on the ill-fated boat. He thought there might be some clue to their background or motives, but so far, he’d found nothing useful.
    There was a sudden pounding on the door and his second cousin Ralph, the part-time deputy, burst into the room. “Jack, hurry up. I just got a call that your girlfriend has apparently murdered somebody. I’ve got my motorbike outside and I’ll take you along.“
    “What girlfriend?“
    “That rich girl up at the mansion you’ve been asking about.“
    “Lily Brewster? She wouldn’t murder anyone!“ Jack said, desperately cramming his bare feet into his shoes.
    “Maybe not, but the chief says he got a call from someone up at Honeysuckle Cottage that she’d screamed the house down about a murder in the kitchen. Took a while to get it straight because whoever called said it was called something else. Gracie something. The chief told me to come up and guard the doors to keep nosy neighbors out and the people at the house in. Get a move on!”
    The motorbike ride was harrowing. Ralph was in such a hurry to get to the actual scene of his first crime that he made no effort to avoid the potholes in the road. Jack, bounced like a dried pea in a can in the sidecar, was horrified both by the ride and Ralph’s extraordinary news. Lily Brewster kill someone? Ralph was pretty much of an idiot, but how could he have gotten something that wrong? When they reached the house, Robert was standing at the front door.
    Jack crawled, shaky-legged, out of the sidecar and Ralph