“Noooo,” I whined. “I’ve already had surprises today. No more until next year.”
“It’s a good surprise. It’s the woman who bought the Sweet’s house. She moved in a couple of weeks ago. You’ll like her. I was thinking about inviting her to the book club. I lent her some bits on local history and promised some of my back catalogue ofWhich?magazine.”
I reluctantly got up, followed Nigella inside, and waited in her oversized extension. Her kitchen was so painfully chic I felt like I was taking money off the asking price of her house just by being there.
“Come in, come in!” I heard her say.
“I hope I’m not intruding,” the woman said as she followed Nigella back into the house.
“Not at all. Arden, this is Katrina Pettigrew, Lilbury’s newest resident. Katrina, this is Arden. Local gadabout and whoremonger,” Nigella said before I could say anything. I proffered a hand – glaring at Nigella – which Katrina took briefly.
Katrina laughed. She was a well-kempt woman of sixty-ish with short, light blond hair that was being kept from grey by expensive dye jobs. Her clothes and subtle jewellery spoke of money. Also, she’d bought Arabella’s old house, which would’ve cost a bomb. “Nice to meet you,” she said with a light burr.
“Ah, another Scot?” I asked. Just what my day needed.
“Is there more of us here? Oh, that bloke from Aberdeen you introduced me to in the pub, aye?” Katrina said to Nigella.
“Yes, Simon. Who is, we’ve found out today, about to be off the market, possibly to our next MP,” she said.
Katrina took this information in. She showed a similar reaction of pretending to care that I would expect anyone to have. “Wow, quite the bunch of movers and shakers inLilbury, aren’t you? Gosh, I’ll have to up my game if I want to fit in.”
There was a small pause in the conversation, so I jumped in. “And what brought you to Lilbury, Katrina? Is it just you?”
“Yes, my husband died last year. Stomach cancer.”
“Oh.”
“So, I sold up and moved away for a fresh start.”
I didn’t really know what to say to that. Nigella did, though. “Arden’s pretty new here as well. He moved to the village because he found his ex-boyfriend screwing an intern in their bed.”
“He’s Scottish too,” I said. “The ex. Not the intern.”
Katrina didn’t blink at this. “Right. Right, okay. So, Lilbury attracts all sorts, then?”
Nigella was about to say something when the sounds of sirens outside distracted us all. “God, those are loud,” she said. The three of us went out to the street where we saw a police car following an ambulance, both belting towards the church.
“Goodness, what’s going on?” Katrina asked. Most people had come out of their houses.
An elderly woman stumbled down the street wiping away tears. She was being half-led, half-carried by the local shopkeeper, Roz.
“Mrs Crocker?” Nigella called out. “What on earth has happened?”
Roz shook her head and answered for her as the three of us gaped. “Gella, it’s awful, poor Delia here is terribly shook up. I’m taking her back to mine to wait for the police.”
“What’s happened?” Nigella called out again this time with a lot more panic in her voice.
“The vicar,” Delia Crocker said in a strong Dorset accent. “It’s the vicar, Mr Fulford. He’s … he’s dead.”
Chapter 5
He wasn’t dead. But he was as good as. Apparently, there was a flicker of life in him, hence why half the Dorset ambulance service turned up. Nigella rang me the next morning to tell me he was on life support in Bournemouth Royal Infirmary.
“It’s fifty-fifty whether he’ll ever wake up,” Nigella said down the phone as she sniffled.
“God, I’m so sorry, Gella. I know he’s a friend.”
“It’s a lot to take in,” she said. “Thank God that Mrs Crocker forgot her reading glasses at the church the day before and went to look for them. Otherwise, he’d have died on the floor there all alone.”
