Read Online Christmas is Murder by C. S. Challinor - Free Book Online Page B

whacked with the candlestick, you’re the only one in the clear and the only one we could trust to check our rooms. Just don’t tell anyone what you find in ours,” he added with a chuckle.
    “I’ll be the soul of discretion,” Rex assured them all. “In the meantime, I’m going to appoint three groups to search downstairs: Charley, Helen, and Mrs. Smithings will form the first group; Anthony, Wanda, and Clifford, the second; Patrick, Yvette, and Rosie, the third. Mrs. Bellows will come with me.”
    He thought the female residents would feel less of a sense of violation if he took a woman with him while he snooped through their personal effects. “May I trouble you for a pair of rubber gloves?” he asked the cook. Her hands were almost as big as his.
    “And what exactly are we looking for?” Mrs. Smithings demanded as the cook bustled out of the room.
    “Ms. Greenbaum’s manuscript and anything else remotely suspicious.”
    “Do we get a prize for the best find?” Helen joked.
    “Aye, a kiss under the mistletoe from me.”
    Helen let out a delightful trill of laughter. “I’m game,” she told him.
    Rex was glad to see she had recovered her spirits.
    “This isn’t an Easter egg hunt, you know,” Anthony reminded them. “Miriam is lying dead in the cellar.”
    Wanda humphed. “You weren’t so concerned about her when she was alive.”
    “And I’ll regret it to my dying day.”
    “That won’t do her any good now,” Charley said pragmatically. “You should just be grateful it’s not you that got clobbered.”
    “I urge everyone to please be respectful of property,” Mrs. Smithings shrilled. “And to put everything back exactly as you found it. Where shall we start?”
    Rex divided the downstairs rooms between the three groups and coughed apologetically. “I’ll need the keys for upstairs.” He decided not to let everyone know he had a master key—it might prove a useful card up his sleeve later on.
    “I’m sharing with Rosie,” Mrs. Bellows said. “The room’s unlocked. You’ll not find much of mine there, except for the clothes I arrived in.”
    “I wouldn’t want just anyone prying into my things,” Rosie added. “But you seem like a decent sort of bloke and you are in the legal profession, which makes it all right, I suppose.”
    “My room’s a mess,” Wanda warned him, handing over her key.
    “I know this may seem highly irregular,” Rex said, “but we must get to the bottom of this for everyone’s peace of mind.”
    For the peace of mind of the innocent, at any rate, he thought wryly; for the culprit it would be a different matter.

Even if he found nothing conclusive, Rex reasoned that a search of the guest rooms might provide him with insightful character clues. Much could be revealed by a person’s possessions. As he exited the drawing room, the dog bolted after him from the direction of the kitchen.
    “What’s that dog doing here?” Mrs. Smithings demanded, her displeasure tightening the angles of her face. “I thought when I first heard about it that it was a joke.”
    Clifford shuffled forward. “Ee got loose. ’Ere, boy!”
    “Pets are not permitted in the establishment. Clifford, you of all people should know better. Whose dog is it anyway?”
    “It’s mine,” Rex confessed. “At least temporarily. I found it by the train station, and Clifford is being kind enough to keep it in the scullery until we decide what to do with it.”
    “Well, it’s not in the scullery now, is it?” Mrs. Smithings asked rhetorically. “And it’s not even a pedigree!”
    The puppy yapped, jumping up at Rex’s feet, waiting for him to produce a treat from his pocket. “I’m sorry it’s no a corgi,” he said.
    She put a hand to her temple. “Such a trying noise! As soon as Clifford has finished his part in the search, he must take that—that dog back to the scullery and keep it there.”
    Rosie crouched by the puppy and fed it a sugar lump while Mrs. Smithings