Mrs. Jeffries Speaks Her Mind Read Online Free PDF Page A

glanced to his left and caught the gaze of a lone, gaunt-looking man lifting a glass of gin to his lips. He tried a friendly smile but the fellow just knocked back his drink and turned his head. No gossip to be had there.
    Wiggins eased closer to the two women standing next to him and cocked his head toward their conversation.
    “I’m not surprised someone finally did her in,” the older of the ladies said. She was a portly woman wearing a long gray coat and a black knitted cap. “Considering the way she treated poor Elsa, God rest her soul, she’s not one that anyone will be shedding any tears over.”
    The barman slid a pint under Wiggins’ nose and he absently nodded his thanks. He made eye contact with Smythe and gave a small shake of his head toward the ladies.
    “She wasn’t a nice person,” the younger lady, a tall redhead, replied. “But she didn’t deserve to be hacked up in her own garden.”
    “She weren’t hacked up, she were shot,” a workman in a flat cap said from the other side of the women.
    “Was someone killed?” Wiggins asked innocently.
    The two women and the man looked at him. He smiled shyly. “Sorry, I couldn’t ’elp overhearin’.”
    “The woman that owns that big house across the way got herself shot,” the man said. “Her name’s Olive Kettering and she’s a spinster lady.”
    “Did they catch who did it?” Smythe leaned forward over the bar.
    “I doubt it; she were only killed this mornin’,” the redhead said. “So they’re not likely to know much, now, are they?”
    “Cor blimey, that’s terrible. The poor lady,” Wiggins added.
    “Poor lady my foot,” the older one put in. “I’m not one for speakin’ ill of the dead, but Olive Kettering was a mean-spirited old cow and I don’t much care who hears me say it. She was so miserable to her servants she wouldn’t even let them take a few hours off to go to the doctor and now look what’s happened. Elsa Grant is dead.”
    “Someone else is dead?” Wiggins exclaimed.
    “Yes, but she wasn’t murdered.” The man reached for his glass. “Elsa Grant was the cook at the Kettering house. She died and her funeral is today.”
    “We don’t know that she wasn’t done in.” The redhead glared at the workman.
    “She died of natural causes,” he protested. “She had something wrong with her stomach. God knows she’d been complainin’ about it for months.”
    “He’s right,” the older woman added. “She’d been feelin’ poorly for months. Dr. Hilton thinks she probably had the cancer, leastways that’s what he told my Ned when he was there putting in those fancy new lamps in the surgery.”
    “Yes, but she didn’t get to see Dr. Hilton until it was too late, did she?” the redhead argued. “So he don’t know what it was that killed her. It might have been something simple that he could have cured if she’d been allowed to go see him. But Olive Kettering wouldn’t give her time off, would she?”
    “Elsa had an afternoon out, just like everyone else in the household,” the man pointed out. “She’s the one who didn’t want to waste her time going to a doctor until it was too late.”
    “But the Kettering woman wouldn’t let her go then, would she?” the redhead snapped. “She knew how sick Elsa was and she wouldn’t let her off to see a doctor and didn’t call one to the house until it was too late. Seems to me Olive Kettering got exactly what she deserved.”
     
    The flat over the carriage house was large, airy, and spacious. Witherspoon had noticed the small but modern kitchen they’d passed as Mrs. Fox had led them down the short corridor to the drawing room. It was quite an impressive room, with tall windows draped with blue and cream silk curtains and a polished wooden floor laid out in an intricate diamond pattern. The walls were painted a pale rose cream and topped with carved white crown moldings. A cut-glass chandelier hung from the ceiling and all the French Regency