The Christie Caper - Carolyn Hart [116]
Her eyes alight, her fox-sharp nose quivering with excitement, Henny bolted ahead. “Come on, you two. Let’s see what’s happening.”
Which was easier said than done.
The terrace was jammed with people. Everyone seemed to be looking toward one of the walls that provided a barrier of privacy for ground-floor rooms in the wings. At the far end of the wall, Laurel sat cross-legged, quite fetching in lime-green linen slacks and a raspberry blouse. Only on Laurel would the combination have been so attractive. She looked like a summer confection, good enough to eat. She saw them and gestured energetically for them to join her.
Annie reluctantly followed Henny and Max—dammit, why did everyone always respond to Laurel as if she were a queen—while searching for the dogs. The triumphant baying apparently was coming from about the center of the wall.
It took all of Max’s tact and Henny’s determination to edge their way past the thickest clumps of watchers to the end of the wall.
Laurel cooed, “My dears, so interesting. To and fro, to and fro. And with such élan.”
Henny stood on the toes of her sleek black patent-leather pumps. “I can’t see a thing,” she groused.
Max grinned, scooped Henny up in his arms, and placed her on the wall, next to Laurel. They were a perfect foil for each other, Annie thought grumpily, elegance in sports attire and elegance in dress attire. Max turned to give Annie a hand. She ignored him, scrambling up by herself. He grinned and pulled himself up to join her. Even from this vantage point, there wasn’t much to see. Three droopy-eared, slick-coated, abysmally homely hounds continued to bay, but the object of their attention was an apparently unremarkable spot of ground at the center of the wall upon which the quartet of observers sat.
“Exactly,” Henny observed.
Annie looked at her expectantly.
Henny merely nodded importantly.
Laurel clapped her hands. “So perceptive of you, dear. Just like Miss Marple when bird-watching in St. Mary Mead.”
Annie gritted her teeth. Someday Laurel was going to go too far, and that day might be imminent. As for Henny, this was maddening. Obviously, to discover what Henny meant, Annie was going to have to ask outright, thereby revealing that she hadn’t the faintest idea what was interesting or why.
Annie’s eyes slitted.
It could be a bluff.
If Annie asked and Henny had truly deduced something from the hounds’ puzzling behavior, Annie lost face. (Shades of dear old Charlie Chan, a face-saver in the grand tradition.)
On the other hand, if Annie asked and Henny’s Holmes-like behavior was shown to be a sham, Henny lost face in a big way.
“Exactly what?” Annie inquired in a dulcet tone.
“The hounds have traced the killer’s route to that spot,” Henny announced confidently.
Laurel beamed her approval. “Oh, my dears, such excitement.” She turned to Annie. “I did hate to miss the meeting, but I felt sure Lady Gwendolyn would prevail.”
Annie fought off an attack of apoplexy. So Lady Gwendolyn’s appearance on the platform was not fortuitous. Somehow that made it worse. What gall. What arrogance. What infuriating chutzpah. And Laurel had connived in the treasonous plot!
Oblivious to Annie’s mounting displeasure, Laurel chattered on. Even more displeasing, Henny and Max hung on her every word.
“… overheard Mr. Posey ordering the dogs. I awaited their arrival and followed their progress. Circumspectly, of course.”
Oh, certainly, Annie thought. Nothing could possibly be more circumspect than an elegant blonde in a raspberry-lime combo atop a wall.
Suddenly authoritative, Laurel reported crisply, “During the early morning search by investigators, while we were restricted to our rooms, two items of especial interest were found, a pair of soft brown cotton men’s gardening gloves, which unfortunately will not yield fingerprints, and—” here she paused for effect “—a twenty-two pistol.”
“Where?” Annie demanded. So much for her resolution not to feed Laurel’s pampered ego.
Laurel pointed over the heads of the crowd toward