Read Online Closer to Death in a Garden (Pitkirtly Mysteries Book 10) by Cecilia Peartree - Free Book Online Page B

was strange to think of a woman being high up in the police force, but that was progress, of course.
    ‘Sarah Ramsay,’ said the woman helpfully, holding out a hand. ‘Chief Inspector. And you know Keith, I’m sure.’
    They went into the front room. The Chief Inspector glanced at Jemima’s family tree chart on the wall.
    ‘I heard you were keen on family history,’ she commented. ‘That’s quite impressive.’
    ‘I had help from some other people in the family,’ said Jemima. ‘I have a lot of cousins.’
    ‘Just not as many as you had at one time,’ said Dave, laughing.
    ‘It’s nothing to joke about,’ Jemima snapped. Several of her cousins had been murdered a few years before. Although she hadn’t known most of them up until then, it had still been a shock, particularly when the murderer turned his attention in her direction. She shivered suddenly.
    Dave put his arm round her shoulders and she moved away and sat down.
    ‘Would you like a cup of coffee?’ said Dave to the others.
    Neither of them wanted anything. It sounded very much as if they were going to treat this as a very official occasion. Jemima sat up straighter.
    ‘Sorry to hear you’ve both been in hospital,’ said Sarah Ramsay. ‘We just need to ask you a few questions about the garden centre. We’ll be as quick as we can.’
    Keith took out a notebook. He seemed to be acting as the Chief Inspector’s assistant in this case. Jemima wondered how he felt about that. But then, he had endured a spell working as Charlie Smith’s dogsbody, so he must be used to it.
    ‘When did you begin to feel ill, Mr Douglas?’ asked the Chief Inspector. After Dave replied, she added, ‘Can you run through the sequence of events? As far as you can remember, anyway. I understand you were only semi-conscious some of the time.’
    ‘I was a wee bit out of things,’ Dave admitted. ‘But I still gave those paramedics a good run for their money.’
    Jemima sighed. She didn’t want to remember Dave’s escape attempt. It had just been embarrassing. But at least it was a further sign, if that were needed, that he had never really been at death’s door in the first place. Maybe it was just as well they had taken him to hospital after all. At least he had more or less got a clean bill of health out of it. But she hoped it wouldn’t stop him from taking his blood pressure pills.
    She became conscious of a silence around her, and glanced up.
    Chief Inspector Ramsay was looking at her expectantly.
    ‘Sorry,’ said Jemima. ‘I must have missed a bit. Were you asking me something?’
    ‘Yes – I wonder if you could run through events as you remember them. In case there’s something your husband didn’t notice, or has forgotten.’
    ‘Well, we went round the side of the garden centre building,’ said Jemima. ‘There was a very rude man there – Mr Anderson. I didn’t think he had any need to say what he said...’
    Sarah Ramsay took her back over the account again, this time asking her to talk about the alpacas and the woman with them, and then she sat back in her chair and asked, trying to appear casual, ‘And when did Amaryllis Peebles come along?’
    Jemima wasn’t convinced by the casual air. She had the feeling this had been what the Chief Inspector had been leading up to all the time, and that all the previous questions had been designed to mislead them about her true purpose in interviewing them.
    ‘Oh, not until much later,’ she said. ‘It was when Dave was in the ambulance. She drove me to the hospital, you know. I don’t know what we would have done without her. She drove us home again the next day too.’
    ‘Hmm. Do you know why she came to the garden centre in the first place?’
    Jemima glanced between Keith and his superior in surprise. ‘I thought she heard about what had happened from Keith, and wanted to help.’
    ‘Yes,’ said Sarah Ramsay. ‘That’s what she’d like everyone to think.’
    ‘Amaryllis doesn’t lie