A Purrfect Alibi: A pawsitively gripping cozy mystery (The Oyster Cove Guesthouse Book 3)

Eleven

Felicity’s Fabrics was crammed with bolts of cloth—cotton, linen, taffeta, silk—in a rainbow of colors and patterns. Felicity, a woman in her sixties who had owned the store ever since I was a kid, sat at the register, her glasses perched on her nose and a colorful beaded eyeglass holder looped behind her neck.

“Millie! So good to see you again.” She leaned across the counter. “Are you here for more sheer fabric for another nightgown?”

Mom and I glanced at Millie, who at least had the modesty to blush.

“No. I’m here with a question.” She whipped out her phone and showed Felicity the picture of the buckle. “Do you have any buckles that look like this?”

Felicity pushed the glasses up her nose and scrunched up her face as she picked up the phone and held it at arm’s length from her face. “This looks like an antique.”

“Yes, but you have antique replicas here,” Millie said.

“Not like this.” Felicity handed the phone back to her.

“Are you sure? Has anyone been in asking about replicas of old buckles?” Millie persisted.

“Nope. Sorry.”

“And you’re absolutely sure?”

Felicity gestured to the side of the store where little cards hung in dozens of rows. “Look for yourself. These are all the buckles I have. You will find nothing that resembles the buckle on your phone.”

Millie bustled off toward the buckles and Mom and I followed. I shot a “thank you” over my shoulder at Felicity. A few minutes of studying the buckles proved that Felicity was correct. Nothing even close to the buckle that had been on Madame Zenda’s body was on display.

“Well, how do you like that, I thought we’d have this case solved by noon and could celebrate at the Marinara Mariner for lunch.” Millie’s shoulders slumped, the wind taken out of her sails.

Mom snapped her fingers. “Wait a minute. All is not lost. What about the antique store? I bet they have a lot of old buckles.”

Felicity nodded. “Sure they do. Lots of old stuff over there. And Agnes is doing some restoration and repurposing work, maybe she restored your buckle.”

We hustled toward the door, Millie stopping to admire a see-through pink polka-dot sheer fabric on display. I didn’t even want to try to imagine what she would make out of it. Some things were just better not to think about.

Withington’s Antique Store was across the street. Traffic was always light in Oyster Cove, so we sauntered across, admiring the colorful barrels of flowers and cheerful store awnings. The town had made sure that everything was in tip-top shape for the two hundred and fiftieth celebration a few weeks ago and the streets practically gleamed. Store windows sparkled; the cafe had put out several scrolly wrought-iron tables and chairs; and the whole thing was reminiscent of a Parisian sidewalk.

It was picturesque, especially with the cats that were trotting into the alley between the cafe and Withington’s. Wait… that looked like Nero and Marlowe. As I watched, Nero glanced back over his shoulder, his eyes catching mine. I could have sworn he nodded before turning back and continuing on his way. This wasn’t the first time I’d seen the cats downtown and it made me wonder how they even got down here. Was there some secret shortcut? If there was, I wouldn’t mind finding out so I could use it myself.

Withington’s Antiques smelled like old furniture and lemon pledge. It was crammed to the gills with oak servers, mahogany dining-room sets, crystal chandeliers and lighted glass cases full of vintage jewelry and knick-knacks. Agnes Withington had run the shop since I’d been in diapers and she had to be ninety years old. She sat behind the counter on a stool, a petite thing with a shrewd gaze.

She smiled as she recognized Mom and Millie. “Millie and Rose, what a pleasant surprise!” Her inquisitive gaze drifted to me.

Mom gestured to me. “Agnes, this is my daughter, Josie.”

Her smile widened. “Of course, she looks just like you. I heard you came back and bought the Oyster Cove Guesthouse. Plenty happening up there since you took over.”

You could say that again.

Millie whipped out her phone and slid it across the counter to Agnes. “Actually, that’s why we’re here. You might have heard there was an incident up there yesterday and we’re looking for someone who would have purchased a buckle like this.” Agnes squinted, then reached under the counter, producing a lighted magnifying glass, which she turned on to magnify the image on Millie’s phone.

While she was squinting at it and moving the magnifying glass closer and further away, Mom drifted over to a display of beautiful old pens that sat at the end of the counter. They were fountain pens and each sat in a little holder, their golden nibs pointing toward the ceiling. “These are quite unusual,” Mom said.

Agnes looked up from the photo, squinting for a few seconds as her eyes adjusted. “Oh yes, they are, aren’t they? It’s a new venture of mine. I repurpose old quill pens into newer fountain pens. Of course, I can make them into rollerball pens too, but those aren’t nearly as much fun as a good old fountain pen.”

“Nifty.” Millie tapped her finger on the phone bringing Agnes’ attention back to the buckle.

“Do you have an old pen you need repurposed? I’m having a sale. Lots of people are taking advantage of it,” Agnes said. “I’m turning Anita Pendragon’s great-great-great-grandfather’s sterling silver quill pen into a fountain pen and Leslie Bruber’s mother-in-law is having me retrofit her grandmother’s old mother of pearl pen, too.”

“No, thanks,” Millie said.

“Oh and I repurpose old buckles and buttons into jewelry as well.” Agnes beamed with pride. “I could show you some if you’d like.”

“We’d love to,” Millie said. “But not today. Today we’d like to know about this buckle. Perhaps you worked on it recently, restored it for someone, maybe?”

As Agnes stared down at the buckle again I looked at the pens. They appeared to be ancient. A few were made of horn, one looked like etched silver. My gaze fell on a purple card sticking out from the bottom of the display. It had a crystal ball on it with a Milky Way of stars swirling around it. I pulled it out further to see the name. Esther Hill! Had she been here for a buckle?

“That’s an old buckle,” Agnes said. “But this is a drawing, not a photograph, they didn’t have them back then.”

“Yes, we know.” Millie sounded impatient. “But the drawing is so realistic, we figure the artist drew the buckle exactly.”

“My guess is the buckle is from the early seventeen hundreds. You know they handmade them back then. Usually out of brass, then they would plate them with silver or gilt them with gold. This image is fuzzy and it’s hard to see the fine details, but you can see the intricate work on the top,” Agnes said.

“Yeah, we already figured all that. What we want to know is if anyone came in here and bought a buckle that looked like this,” said Millie.

Agnes put her magnifying glass down. “Nope.”

“You sound awfully certain. Don’t you want to think about it, maybe check some records?” Millie said.

“Don’t have to. I just thought about this the other day.”

“You did?”

“Yep. Anita Pendragon was in here asking all about Jedediah Biddeford and his treasure. Luckily, I already had a lot of information out on him from a few weeks ago when the skeleton was found.” Agnes pointed to a pile of papers and a book. “So, it’s fresh in my brain and I would’ve remembered if someone bought buckles just like this.”

“Anita was here asking about Jedediah?” Mom asked, her eyes widening as she nodded at Millie. Clearly this moved Anita up the suspect list.

Agnes pushed the phone toward Millie and bent down to store the magnifying glass back under the shelf. “Yeah, probably had something to do with that television producer.”

“Television producer.” This was the first I’d heard of that and the notion set my mind spinning.

Agnes nodded. “I don’t remember his name. Some muckety-muck in a suit. He came in and wanted to know about Jedediah Biddeford, too. Asked all about the Oyster Cove Guesthouse. Wanted to know all about the skeleton. He even bought a pen for my trouble. Good thing too, it’s important that these high falutin’ types realize information isn’t free.”

“He asked about the guesthouse?” This did not bode well. A movie about murders at the guesthouse would hardly bring in more guests. Or would it? One thing it would do is generate a lot of money for someone… maybe for the psychic who could talk to Jed. Had Madame Zenda known about the movie? Clearly Anita had.

“Yep, sounded like he was fixing to make a movie or a TV show or something. Kept asking about all this ghost business that you have going on over there with those psychics.”

The mention of the psychics reminded me that Esther had been here. She hadn’t been looking for a buckle, unless Agnes was lying or her memory was off, but did she know about the movie producer? I slid her card out from under the pen display and held it up. “And Esther Hill, what was she doing here?”

Agnes frowned and snatched the card out of my hand. “That there is confidential information. I don’t tell on my clients. You should know that, missy.”

All-righty then.

Mom gave me an I-raised-you-better-than-that scowl.

“Right. I was just wondering if maybe she overheard the movie producer asking about Jed’s ghost.”

Agnes shoved the card under the table. “Hard telling. Lots of people were here when that producer fellow came in and later on he was over at Annie’s clam shack making a big deal about how important he was. Half the town heard him then.” She paused for a few beats. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

“No. Thanks for the information.” Millie turned and we followed her out.

Outside in the street, Mom turned to us. “Do you really think someone is considering making the story about the skeleton into a movie? That could be quite lucrative and might even be good for business.”

Millie nodded. “And we all know that money is a prime motive for murder, but the question is… who knew about the movie?”

“Anita Pendragon did. Agnes said she was in the shop, she might have overheard and she was first on the scene with the body. She’s a reporter too and would know how to cover things up and make it look like she only discovered the body when she’s really the killer,” Mom said.

Millie started walking toward the car. “That’s probably why she was hanging around the guesthouse so she could be the first to scoop a story when one of them talked to Jed. Then she could partner with the movie producer and get her ten minutes of fame.”

“Esther knew too,” I said. “Or at least she could have known. Her card was at the antique store and Agnes was quite secretive about why it was there.”

“I still say that Pendragon and Madame Zenda were in cahoots,” Millie said. “That’s why Zenda was yelling out the window about her meeting with Jed.”

Mom nodded. “Probably knew about the movie and wanted to make sure Anita covered it so that word would get back to the producer.”

“I just hope that sourpuss Myron Remington doesn’t think the publicity would put people off from booking a room at the guesthouse,” Millie said.

I cringed. “Unfortunately Myron might be right. I got a cancellation just this morning.”

Millie stopped in her tracks. “You did? Did they say why? Maybe it had nothing to do with all the murders.”

“They didn’t say specifically but it sounded like they were making up an excuse.”

Mom patted my arm. “Don’t worry, dear. Once word gets out about a movie, people will be flocking to stay at the guesthouse. People like to see where a movie took place.”

I hoped she was right, but something in my gut said otherwise. “We don’t even know if there will be a movie and in the meantime I’ve had three murders this summer. No wonder people are getting nervous. We need to figure out who killed Madame Zenda ASAP so we can get this whole thing out of the headlines.”

“Good point,” Mom said. “People have short memories. Once this is all over then it won’t take them long to forget. Unless of course the movie producer wants to use the guesthouse as a movie set.”

What were the odds of that? Slim, I’d say. I was still hoping for a quick resolution and things to go back to pre-murder normal.

“I say the buckle is the key.” Millie walked down the sidewalk at a snail’s pace as we talked.

“Yeah, but no one was looking for a buckle,” Mom said.

Millie stopped in front of the candy store and turned to face Mom and me. “Not that we’ve found so far.” Millie’s face took on a look of determination. “We’ll just have to keep looking. Meanwhile, I think we’d better take a closer look at our suspects and figure out who had the strongest motive to kill Madame Zenda.”