‘Jude? I don’t mean to worry you, but I collected the cash from the shop and café this evening to take to the bank and it was just under eighty pounds short according to the till records. Elliot isn’t there, neither are his belongings, and the shop was locked up – not that I’m accusing anyone of anything but… any idea what’s happened there?’
I gape at Jowan, utterly lost for words. Bovis, Minty’s estate manager, who has overheard the entire thing, exchanges pointed looks with Jowan before reaching into his pocket for his phone and silently leaving the bar.
Chapter Twenty-Four
‘It’s my fault, it has to be,’ I say, close to sobbing, standing over the open till the next morning, a bright and mild Tuesday, the twenty-fourth of August. Daniel left an hour ago to catch his train for Land’s End, and Jowan met me at the bookshop.
‘What do you mean?’ Jowan says, his mouth crumpling beneath his neat sandy whiskers.
‘I don’t really tell people, and I was never diagnosed or anything – I don’t even know how I’d go about getting a diagnosis – but I’ve always struggled with numbers and money, and that sort of thing. And I’ve read about dyscalculia online and always thought some of the signs sounded exactly like me and my experiences.’
He’s not saying anything and he’s not looking at me like I’ve lost my mind, so I carry on. ‘And I can never work out my share of the bill in a café if we’re going Dutch, and I can’t really get to grips with percentages, and what the hell evenarefractions and long division? I never got any maths qualifications at school…’ My shoulders slump. ‘But I’ve never made such a big mistake before.’
‘Nobody’s blaming you,’ Jowan’s saying. ‘And anyone can make a mistake counting out change.’
‘Seventy-eight quid, Jowan? That’s too much to just hand over and not notice. And look, I wrote down the price of every book I sold…’
‘I know, I know. Don’t panic. It’s not the money that’s the problem so much as the fact that Elliot disappeared at the same time as the money. It doesn’t look all that good for him, you see?’
He’s right, of course. It wouldn’t take Agatha Christie to put two and two together and make Elliot a criminal. But somehow that feels like utterly the wrong conclusion.
‘Elliot, a thief? He can’t be.’
‘That’s what they all say,’ Minty butts in. The news must be all round Clove Lore by now because she came bounding through the door a moment ago like a hound chasing down a vixen. ‘You can’t stray two foot from a murderer or a kidnapper but you’ll find a neighbour or an old school friend only too willing to insist upon what a nice, unassuming person they were, and how they simply can’t believe it.’
She’s got a point. ‘So what do we do now?’ I say.
‘I don’t think we need to involve the police, not until we’re sure of what’s happened,’ says Jowan, his eyes crinkling in a kind, sympathetic smile. It’s a smile that tells me he has an inkling of what’s been going on between me and Elliot. I don’t mention the call from the CPS last week. That would definitely have Jowan dialling 999, even with all his kindness and understanding.
‘He might only have gone for a run?’ I say, desperately, but who takes all their clothes in a backpack and goes for an overnight run? ‘Or… maybe he’s with Anjali? They did spend some time together last week after Aldous’s operation?’ The very idea makes my stomach hurt. ‘He could walk through that door any second.’
‘That’s right, we have to give people the benefit of the doubt, don’t we?’ he says.
‘Pfft!’ Minty scoffs. ‘What about that pair who stole those valuable first editions the day they checked out? Remember them? You never saw hide nor hair of that money, and would you involve the authorities? No, you would not!’
Jowan nods, but he’s giving Minty pretty short shrift this morning. ‘We don’t know about people’s personal circumstances. Maybe they needed the money? Maybe they thought they’d paid for them, but they’d forgotten to?’
Another tut from Minty who’s got a fiery look in her eyes that says Jowan’s utterly soft and soppy and she’d happily set her dogs on Elliot’s tracks and smoke him out of hiding for them to rip him apart.
‘Could a volunteer have taken it in return for helping out?’ I say, feebly, running through the options.
There’s Mrs Crocombe and her laundry expenses, or Izaak and his… what exactly does he do to help out? Come to think of it, he hasn’t been in the shop for days.
Jowan shakes his head. ‘No, if any expenses are incurred helping our booksellers, the charity covers it. It wouldn’t come from the till. It’s more of a bartering system than a cash-based type of thing round here. Izaak keeps an occasional eye on the bookshop guests for me in return for some of my home brew and some bits and bobs from my veg patch. Minty brings books to the shop in return for help with the Christmas harbour light display, that sort of thing.’
I sigh in resignation. That’s all my ideas for getting Elliot off the hook used up.
‘I’ll take over at the café today, Jude,’ Jowan says, softly. ‘If you feel up to running the shop?’
I agree and thank him, glancing at the till, its drawer gaping open at me, only a few pound coins and some coppers left of the float now that Jowan’s cleared away the remaining notes – the ones that haven’t mysteriously disappeared.
We’d taken the drawer apart in case the cash had been shoved behind it somehow but there was nothing to be found and I’d scoured the shop floor and behind the desk in case somehow it had been dropped, but there was no sign of the missing money.
Elliot’s rich, or at least he’s posh and comes from a rich family, and he’s got a good job – or he did have, I’m still not sure what happened there – and he’s got some pretty serious qualifications. Why would he need to steal? It doesn’t add up.
I can’t shake the guilty feeling that it was my error to blame, or a series of errors since I started cashing up alone. Could I have routinely undercharged customers? Or handed back twenties when I thought they were tens? I hate to think it, but that all sounds chronically like me.
Minty bustles off after reminding me about my baking commission for Friday – as if I could forget – and Jowan seems to put the disappointment of the missing money behind him and I hear him chatting happily with customers and locals all day long in the café.
