I poked my tongue out at her. I did seem to collect murder victims the way other people collected shoes.
“Mina Wilde, stop making faces at my pathologist, or I’ll haul you off to a cell again,” Hayes growled, only half-joking. I’d been close to too many murders in Argleton in recent months. I nodded in obedience and allowed Morrie to usher me to my seat. Beside me, Alice’s face was as white as a sheet. She tapped notes on her phone with lightning speed.
“Can you talk to me about what you saw?” she asked. “At last, this story got actually interesting.”
“Maybe… I don’t know.” I rubbed my head.
“Let us get through the questioning first,” Morrie told her. “We don’t want to accidentally say something the police don’t want revealed.”
Alice nodded, but she looked disappointed. I knew that as the person who found the body, I’d make a compelling source for her article, but her mercenary attitude was a little shocking. A man had just been murdered in the very same house as us, and all she was thinking about was her byline?
In an attempt to keep our spirits up, Cynthia had the band continue the music and the desserts brought out, but the party atmosphere had been shattered. Everyone huddled together in small groups, whispering in hushed voices and weeping into their handkerchiefs.
All except the Brontë society. The three goth girls stood beside the dance floor, peering over their black veils at Heathcliff and giggling to each other. Gerald scanned the length of the bar, pouring cocktails down his throat at the rate of one a minute. I noticed a smudge of red on the hem of his leather jacket. Blood?
I nudged Morrie. “Gerald’s still drinking.”
“That he is. And there’s a smudge of something dark on his coat,” Morrie squinted. “And I detect a few hairs on his cuff that appear to match the shaggy rug on the back of the good professor’s chair.”
I reached across the table to Heathcliff. “Get over there and talk to your girlfriends. We need to know Gerald’s movements over the evening.”
“No way.” Heathcliff glowered. “Thanks to the two of you abandoning me, I’ve already suffered through two marriage proposals and a catfight over which one of them has a right to use the ‘I am Heathcliff’ line as their social media status. I’m not spending another moment of my time with the ghoul girls. Besides, this case isn’t any of our concern. If the professor has been murdered, it’s up to the police to solve it, not us.”
Morrie nudged him in the direction of the bar. “Aw, go on. You know Mina was only keen on this weekend because she needed a distraction from her father’s letter. Well, solving the professor’s murder is the perfect kind of distraction, much better than shagging you in a bathroom.”
“Hey, how did you know about that?”
“Scent of hyacinth soap when Heathcliff returned to the breakfast table – the scent of which is not present in the male bathrooms – and indent of the hand dryer on the back of your shoulder. It was a simple deduction.” Morrie waved a hand. “Go on, Sir Snarkypuss, work your charms on the young Miss Hannah. If you don’t get over there soon, Gerald will have drank the place dry.”
Heathcliff folded his arms. “If I go over there now, I’m going to be cravat-deep in marriage proposals. I even heard Hannah talking to Cynthia about the possibility of holding a wedding at Baddesley Hall. If you’re so desperate,youtalk to them.”
“Fine.” I shoved my chair back and stood up.
“No, Mina.” Heathcliff reached for my hand, but I jerked it away.Morrie’s right. If I sit here and do nothing, Professor Hathaway’s face is going to haunt me all night, mixed with all my ugly thoughts about my father and his letter, and I’ll feel even worse tomorrow.
While Hayes and Wilson were otherwise occupied, I could help by getting a little information out of Gerald.
My legs still trembled as I made my way across the room, but I managed to hold my poise as I swept up to the bar, nonchalantly picking up a piña colada from the dwindling supply.
“Can you believe this?” I said to Gerald, sipping my drink as I leaned in close to him. “A real murder right here in Baddesley Hall. This never happened in Jane Austen.”
“True enough, but in Austen novels, the rakes and scoundrels always end up tamed in the end.” Gerald knocked back another cocktail. “The only way to tame a first-class git like Hathaway was to drive a sword through his gut.”
Wow, that’s harsh.“You can’t mean that. I know you had your academic differences, but that’s no reason to wish someone dead.”
“Academic differences?” Gerald scoffed. “I admired the man once. He was my advisor for my Masters’ degree. But that was before he tried to steal my girlfriend and plagiarized my work.”
“His speech over breakfast this morning indicated he’d been acquitted of that crime.”
But Gerald wasn’t listening to me. “…can you just imagine? I open the Jane Austen periodical, and what do I find but excerpts of my Masters’ thesis – rough drafts that I’d sent him for his feedback – polished and published as if he himself had written them. I complained to the university. They set up a farce of an academic trial, with a jury of his sycophants who lapped up his explanation that, in fact, it wasIwho’d copiedhim. They kicked me out of the graduate program and refused to grant me credit for the papers I’d already written.” Gerald shook his head. “Luckily, Hannah has more sense, and she’s not interested in Hathaway unless he’ll read lines fromWuthering Heightsto her while they shag. And since he probably only wanks to his own books, that was never going to happen. Unfortunately, her rejection came too late to save my career. Thanks to Hathaway, my name is mud in academia. I can’t get another university to accept me for graduate studies. But I’ll not go quietly into the dark night. I’ll get my revenge.”
Maybe you already did,I thought but didn’t say. Instead, I pointed to the stain on the hem of his jacket. “You’ve got something there.”
Gerald picked up the corner and rubbed the stain, so it disappeared. As he did, I noticed the cuff of his shirt was torn, with a triangle of fabric missing. “Oh, yes, mulled wine reduction. The food here’s a bit ostentatious.” He eyed my drink. “You going to finish that?”
I handed it to Gerald, and he knocked it back, gripping the edge of the bar to remain upright. “It’s just so distressing,” he said, his speech slurred. “Hathaway is murdered, and it looks as though this jewel thief has made off with another fine haul. That’s why I’m drinking so much. I need it to nerve my calms.”
“Of course. We’ve all had a nasty shock.”
