Crime Wave: Women of a Certain Age: Crime Wave, #2

By J.E. Barnard, K.L. Abrahamson, Charlotte Morganti and 13 more

WOMEN OF A CERTAIN AGE

 

"…a pitch-perfect bedside anthology."

           Loreth Anne White, bestselling author of The Patient's Secret

 

Old woman or little girl, woman in a dirigible or woman on her death bed, woman in history or the girl next door—we know them because their experiences are ours. Well, maybe not all their experiences…

 

This second anthology from members of the Canada West Chapter of Sisters in Crime finds women and girls at perilous points in their lives. From real estate agents to house cleaners, school girls to exterminators, you will find a delicious array of women, some with outrage in their hearts—and some with murder—but all of them committing or solving crimes in new and imaginative ways.

 

The sixteen short stories in Crime Wave: Women of a Certain Age range from light-hearted to heart-breaking, and from romantic to treacherous. All of them deal with courageous women of a certain age.

 

Come. Catch the Crime Wave.

 

CANADA WEST

ANTHOLOGY 2

• Language: English
• Publisher: Canada West Chapter
• Release date: Oct 19, 2022
• ISBN: 9781777246648

Book preview

1

GRACE

BY R.M. GREENAWAY

The leaves from the big maple fell like huge red and orange and yellow snowflakes, turning the world gold. I watched them fall as I ate my cereal, while Grace watched our neighbour, Mrs. BB—her real name is Mrs. Bellamy-Bridges—open her side gate and go jogging down the alley in her bright blue track suit. Mrs. BB does that at least once a day, runs to town and back, and is always gone for half an hour or more. Grace knows because she times it.

There she goes, she said, and wrote the time in her notebook. Then she snapped it shut, smiled at me, and said, Let’s go.

We finished breakfast and left for school, running like deer down the alley, kicking through the leaves, excited because we were going to be picked for parts in the year-end play, and Grace knew she was going to be the princess. But when we got to Mrs. Bellamy-Bridges’ gate, Grace stopped and told me to wait.

No, don’t, I said.

She did anyway. While I hid behind the lilacs, she went into the yard and around back of the house, then slipped along the clapboard siding so the security camera Mrs. BB has attached to the wall next to the front porch couldn’t see what she was doing. She picked up a rake and reached up and knocked the camera so it faced away from the alley—which is not really an alley but just a shared driveway going from our house at the top of the hill to Mrs. BB’s house at the bottom. Then she turned to me and beckoned.

With the camera looking at the sky, Grace ran into Mrs. BB’s garden and jumped with both feet like a crazy rabbit on the beets and carrots and onions, laughing so wildly that I wanted to do the same, and I ran over, too, and jumped up and down—though I really just stomped at the edge, where the grass was. Because I can’t even kill a vegetable.

I told Grace we were going to be late, so we left Mrs. BB’s and raced to school, with her pushing me along almost hard enough to make me fall. Grace and I are in the same school, but she’s in Grade 7 and I’m in Grade 5. All the different grades get to be in the year-end play, and after the last bell there was an assembly, where we were given our parts. That’s when we found out I was going to be the Little Princess and Grace was going to be Nurse. When Ms. Pinski read out the parts, Grace punched the air and gave a victory shout that made everyone jump. And later, as we walked home, she told me she would rather be an ugly old nurse than a stupid little princess any day.

But I knew she wasn’t happy, and I told her I would ask Ms. Pinski to switch us, because Grace would be a much better princess than me. But Grace said something about things that can never be taken back, and then knocked me into the leaves that were crisp as cornflakes and pretended she was going to stomp on me. Then she pulled me up and gave me a big hug instead, and kissed me because I was crying.

I wasn’t crying because she had knocked me into the leaves, but because I was wishing she had got the princess part.

I really wish she had been the princess.

We turned up the alley toward home and were scuffing through the leaves when Grace stopped and said, Look. She scraped with her boot at the old manhole cover next to Mrs. BB’s side gate. If we lift this, and put a piece of cardboard over it, and then a bunch of leaves, then next time she goes for a jog she’ll fall in and die.

I thought she was kidding, but I wasn’t a hundred percent sure, and I didn’t want her to laugh at me for being fooled, so I said nothing.

We’ll put spikes at the bottom, she said. Ugly old BB will be skewered and die a slow, horrible death.

Ugly old BB is what we’d called Mrs. Bellamy-Bridges ever since that day she ratted on us to Dad about the thing we stole off her porch. I can’t even remember what the thing was, but it wasn’t anything special, really, and I could tell that Mrs. BB and Dad were not too seriously mad when she was telling him about it. But Dad did give us a talking-to later about respecting other people’s property, and so Mrs. Bellamy-Bridges had been ugly old BB ever since.

Where do you get the idea that Pamela is old, anyway? Dad asked Grace after he’d heard us talking about Mrs. BB one night. And then he’d said in a cold kind of way, Not to mention ugly.

She’s all wrinkly, Grace told Dad.

"You’ll be all wrinkly, too, one day," he said.

Grace held her tongue after that. Except to me, whispering when the lights went out, She’s ancient. She’s futile. A waste of skin. Grace snarled as she said it, just like that magazine picture of a wolf that gave me the willies when I was little, and I could see her teeth in the dark.

But Dad’s right, I said. You’ll be old, too, one day. So will I.

I’ll never let you get old, she said.

Her eyes smiled across the distance between us, and that gave me the courage to say it aloud. I think Dad likes her.

"Ewww, don’t be disgusting," Grace said, and her face sideways on the pillow did that thing that makes me feel kind of sick inside, like somehow we’re leaving something beautiful far, far behind, and can never go back.

"Not like that, I told her. Not like he wants to go out with her or anything. Just like a—"

But I couldn’t say friend, which would sound like I was taking sides, like I thought Mrs. BB was nice, which she used to be, showing us the dolls from her collection she had from when she was young, and even letting us play with them. And she would tell us what all the trees around us were called, and let us help pare apples, then give us a pie to take home. I didn’t want Grace to know I was even thinking about those days before Mrs. BB ratted us out and became old and ugly in Grace’s eyes.

Old and ugly. Grace always says it together, which I guess is because you can’t have one without the other, which I didn’t know before.

Who does she think she is? she would ask me, when we’d see Mrs. BB go jogging away to town in her bright blue track suit. She’s an effing old lady, and should behave like one.

Except Grace didn’t say effing.

I don’t like it when she swears, but she makes fun of me when I use nicer words, like pooh. She tells me the right words to use, but I can’t quite say them aloud. Yet.

That night I helped her move the manhole cover, using the pry bar from Dad’s garage. The cover was super heavy and we almost gave up, but we got it pushed aside, and I looked down the hole with her. It was deep and black and wet. I watched her throw broken glass down inside—the old jars and window panes that Dad had put in a bin to take to the dump. I watched her place a sheet of cardboard over the hole, and then I helped her scatter leaves overtop.

Then when she’s down there, we’ll cover it up again, Grace told me. And nobody will ever find her.

At breakfast time I told Dad about my part in the play, only because he asked, and he was so pleased that I got the lead role, and Grace was like, Yeah, but I’m the villain, and that’s the best role of all. And I told her Nurse wasn’t the villain, she was nice because she looked after the princess—and then I wished I hadn’t. With Grace, sometimes I don’t know what’s the right thing to say. She went quiet and smiled and ate her cereal, but I heard her say to herself, Not even the villain.

I don’t know why she wants so badly to be the villain, or the princess, but nothing in between. I wish I knew.

And nothing I said helped after that. She got up from the table and threw her dishes in the sink and took off without me. And I grabbed my lunch box and ran after her. She was way down the alley, near the road, and I saw her leap over something like a deer taking a great big jump, so I knew she was okay, really, not mad, because she only jumps around like that when she’s in a good mood. And that made me want to run after her and let her hug me as she always does after a fight, and I think I felt something was wrong when she turned around, almost skidding on the leaves and gravel, and ran back toward me, shouting something. Shouting my name. I saw her face. I saw her arms stretched out, hands clawing the air like they could get to me faster that way.

And it was just when my foot hit cardboard that I remembered.

I always fuck up, Grace. Don’t I?

2

THE AIR AFFAIR

BY SHELLEY ADINA

September 3, 1895

The short-range airship to Paris, which carried only fifty passengers, was a pleasing combination of efficiency and comfort. Georgia Brunel, Lady Langford, entered the tea salon and spotted her travelling companion immediately, holding possession of a rattan tea table next to the viewing port. As Georgia crossed the teak floorboards, the deck pressed up under her kidskin boots, causing her knees to bend slightly. She checked the chronometer pinned to her lapel. The schedule had said they would lift at two o’clock, and exactly two o’clock it was.

Released from its mooring mast, the airship fell up into the clear skies over the field at Hampstead Heath. The Albion Line maintained a sterling reputation for promptness in its service, to the point where one could set one’s clocks by its passage over one’s roof. At least, that was the joke her late husband made on the rare occasions when he was in a good humour.

Georgia did not care if the packet were an hour late, or even a day. She was free. Once a wife, always a mother, now a widow. A very rich one, thanks to a positively corpulent investment account, which she considered the wages of sin. The sin of staying with him for nearly twenty years. It had been for her son’s sake, and for Millie’s as well, but oh—

Forward, not back.

She took a deep breath and seated herself opposite her travelling companion. What surprises me most about being a widow, she said, "is how very enjoyable it is."

Lady Langford, this is hardly the place to express such an opinion. Millicent Brunel, her late husband’s unmarried aunt, placed her carryall upon the floor and poured Georgia a steaming cup of tea from the waiting pot, a delightful bit of Morvoren china with a swirling silver rim that brought to mind clouds and skies. She gauged the distance to the people at the next table, then whispered, Though I must say that were I in your position, I would agree.

"And I must say—for the third time, Millie—that I am simply Georgia."

Millie flushed. It is a difficult habit to break. Your husband was the kind of man who insisted on the privileges of rank.

Too well I know it. But now I can forgive him the actresses and the bruises, since thanks to that runaway horse, he has left Teddy and me to enjoy a handsome legacy.

It is difficult to believe our lanky scapegrace is now the fifth Baron Langford, and in his first year at Oxford. Millie sighed. How time flies away. And how generous the dear boy is to you.

Her darling had funded this painting trip to the Duchy of Venice for her thirty-eighth birthday and affectionately instructed her to look forward, not back. To anticipate happiness, not grief.

And so she would. As soon as she had the knack of it again. What shall we do first once we arrive in Venice? I confess I am eager to see the bridges go up and the neighbourhoods change locations upon Leonardo da Vinci’s great clockwork gears.

But her companion had gone still as a rabbit in an open field. Georgia, exchange seats with me, please?

Certainly. Do you feel a draft?

No, but— Millie’s face had gone nearly as white as the damask tablecloth.

They switched places, so that Millie’s back was to the door. Georgia leaned toward her. What is the matter? Are you ill?

After taking a restorative, if unladylike, gulp of tea, Millie said, Do you see that woman in the royal blue travelling costume? With the puffed sleeves and soutache braid? She smoothed the stitched loops of braid on her own tailored jacket’s cuffs, as though to demonstrate. Or to calm herself.

Georgia took in the woman, whose blond hair was piled up like a soufflé to hold a hat of Olympian proportions. "The poor thing—her modiste has deceived her if she thinks that is appropriate for travel. Why, she could sail to Paris on her hat alone, if it possessed a sensible propeller instead of a dead bird. She turned back to Millie. I think I might have met her at some exhibition or other. Do you know her? But Millie did not reply, instead placing her cup in its saucer with slow precision. Despite her efforts, it rattled into place with a high, anxious sound. Millie, my dear, you are beginning to worry me."

You have met her. We—she—

Why, Baroness, came a musical voice from behind Millie as the woman sailed up to their table.

For one dreadful moment, Georgia thought her aunt-by-marriage might faint, though whether from the wave of perfume or the incorrect manner of address, Georgia could not decide.

Allow me to offer my condolences upon the passing of the baron. Such a sad loss for London society—and for your family, of course.

The newcomer’s gaze passed over Georgia’s travelling costume, with its more modest black silk skirts, its dashing double-breasted brocade waistcoat, its shirt of dove-grey linen with tiny pleats down front and sleeves, its garnet brooch between the collar points.

Thank you, Georgia said. Forgive me—we have met, have we not?

The lady gave a tinkling laugh. Yes, we have. Then, she started as though she had just realized Georgia was not alone. Why, Millicent Brunel—it is still Brunel, isn’t it?—it is you! How lovely to see you again. Won’t you remind the baroness? I’m sure her social circle is larger than either of ours. She cannot be held to account for a lapse of memory.

Lady Langford, Millie said, addressing Georgia correctly in tones as dry as husks, this is Mrs. Caroline Jannis. You met two years ago at the Turner exhibition to raise funds for St. Cecelia’s Academy for Young Ladies.

Did we, indeed? What was I doing there? Georgia could remember no connection with St. Cecelia’s, never mind an inclination to raise funds for it.

You went with me, Millie said, clearly struggling for calm. I was a student there some forty years ago.

As was I, trilled Mrs. Jannis. Millicent and I were in the same class. And now I am the Dean of Girls at Canterbury College. Who would have thought during those golden schoolgirl days that such a rise could be possible, eh, Millicent?

Golden? whispered Millie, blinking rapidly.

Is Paris your destination, your ladyship? Mrs. Jannis asked, turning back to Georgia.

No, we—

Paris. Mrs. Jannis clasped her hands in rapture. "I am on a lecture tour, you know, in support of my new book. The Highest Ideals of Womanhood: Educating Female Students in the Modern Age. Have you heard of it?"

Were those tears in Millie’s eyes? If Georgia had even the slightest desire to invite the woman to sit with them, it vanished. Since the London-to-Paris leg of the voyage was so brief, they did not have staterooms. However, Millie must be removed from this woman’s presence at once, if the latter had not the sense to see that she was unwelcome.

Georgia rose. Please excuse us, Mrs. Jannis. I do not think Miss Brunel is well. Sometimes the ascent of the airship does not agree with her. Since this was the only time to her knowledge that Millie had ever been aboard one, it could very well be true. Congratulations upon the release of your book.

Thank you, your ladyship. Again the rapturous clasp of her hands. Would you be so terribly kind as to accept a copy as a gift? Signed, of course.

Georgia was already hurrying Millie to the door. How delightful, she said over her shoulder, barely remembering to smile. If we do not see you shortly, you might leave it with the steward.

And then they were through the door, walking rapidly aft along the corridor.

Where are we going? Millie asked, struggling to change her carryall to the other hand.

To the airing deck. That woman can’t possibly follow us out there. She would either lose her hat or it would take her flying over the rail.

They had the aft airing deck to themselves, on the upper of the gondola’s two levels, and stood near the door so that the wind would not tear off their own more practical hats. Some five hundred feet below, the Channel tossed and heaved, and a few brave gulls pursued the ship in hopes of edibles being thrown their way.

Now, Georgia said, I should very much like to know what that was all about.

It is a long and boring story. Millie leaned her grey head back against the glossy teak.

She nearly brought you to tears in three sentences, dearest. That does not sound boring to me.

Millie sighed, her gaze upon the cumulus clouds that Georgia thought distinctly resembled Caroline Jannis’s piled-up hair. I was a shy, studious girl at St. Cecelia’s. The tortures Caroline and her friends inflicted upon me never occurred where there were witnesses, where retribution might be meted out in social circles beyond the school. They were too clever for that, those girls. Caroline was so beautiful that others followed her lead, as though some of her glamour might rub off on them.

Not so beautiful on the inside, I take it?

She had some good qualities, Millie admitted. With her as captain, we won all the trophies in rowing and tennis that year. When she walked onto the court, you could see our opponents wilt. As for the boys at Heathbourne…

A neighbouring school? Georgia hazarded.

Let us just say that we wallflowers exist in order to show the belles to greater advantage. Millie glanced up, her lashes wet. And sometimes because one’s dress has developed inexplicable tears in its folds, only visible once one begins to dance. Or one’s hairpins have become oddly coated with India ink. Or one’s nosegay has had stinging nettle added to the arrangement just before it was tucked into one’s bosom.

The breath backed up in Georgia’s chest from sheer indignation at the ingenious cruelty of the mind that could conceive such things. These were no pranks. They were deliberate social sabotage with real damage.

But these were mere trifles. Having once begun, Millie was rolling at a fine boil now. One hand on her hat, she advanced to the rail. So that tears might be blamed on the wind?

Georgia joined her. They were passing over Calais now. Halfway there.

The interior kind of damage was the worst, Millie said, as the French town slid away behind them. The belittling. The criticism couched as helpfulness. The manipulation of the observations of others to make one seem dishonest or self-serving or destructive. My invitations fell off. The professors no longer smiled at me in the corridors. And when I quietly attempted to compete for an academic prize, I was told that my work was not acceptable. Not below standard, mind you. But not acceptable.

What reason did they give?

I heard later there had been a report that I had plagiarized a past student’s work, hoping no one would recognize it.

Oh, my dear, that’s dreadful. Georgia was aghast. Could nothing be done in your support?

I had not the heart to fight, she said, so quietly her voice was nearly carried off by the wind.

But surely… after all this time… People do grow and change. Is it not possible that Mrs. Jannis might have done so?

"You heard her. It is still Brunel, isn’t it? Her tone rose to mimic the woman exactly, Midlands accent and all. We had not spoken in decades, until that day at the exhibition. I am no threat to her at all now, if I ever was before. And yet she noticed at once the absence of a wedding ring on my ungloved hand and pounced. It is second nature to the predator once a weakness is detected."

Georgia took a moment to hope that Mrs. Jannis had no children. And to pity the students whose characters she had been given to mould. But if she was and is so horrid, how is she able to write a book about the highest ideals for young ladies?

My dear, Millie said with a sad smile, "I am perfectly capable of observing that this airship can fly without actually knowing how it is accomplished."

Georgia had taken no notice of the remark about Millie’s name, merely believing the woman was seeking information. At nearly sixty, Millie in company was both meek and unassuming. She had led a quiet life, paying long visits to this relative and that because she could afford no home of her own. Until she had arrived at Langford.

Had she learned these habits of self-effacement, this humility that turned into ferocity only in defense of the Brunel family, at Caroline’s hands? Canterbury College was one of the best known and most admired institutions in the country. Would it give such responsibility to a cruel, unfeeling woman who shouldn’t have the care of the young?

I should like to read her book, she said to Millie. As a mother myself, I feel certain I could spot the bits of the airship that don’t work.

I should like to, as well. Her companion leaned on the rail, more relaxed now that the past had been released and carried away on the wind. And then for once in her life, I should like to see her answer for something she has done. She looked down. If that is the Seine below, we appear to be approaching Paris. To secure our signed copy, we had best be quick.

The steward had Caroline’s book, and soon after, they disembarked on the grassy expanse of the world’s largest airfield, the Champs de Mars. They were piloted in a steam landau to a neighbouring hotel, where they enjoyed a satisfying dinner and spent the evening reading parts of the book aloud to one another. Millie became quieter and quieter until it was clear the book must be put aside. Since the transcontinental airship Juno was to lift at nine o’clock the next morning, they made it an early night.

Georgia lay on her side of the bed, listening to Millie’s soft breathing and reflecting that from her book, Caroline Jannis seemed to have a good idea of what it took to instill kindness, self-reliance, and responsibility in young women. Though Millie was a spinster, Georgia had heard her espouse similar ideas, and in fact her advice had been useful when it came to managing Teddy. If these were the kinds of lessons taught at Canterbury College under Caroline’s leadership, then on the surface at least, it seemed the scions of the wealthy might be in good hands.

Had Millie, a sensitive creature, simply been too easily wounded by the slings and arrows of careless girls? Though it would take a young woman with more fortitude than Georgia herself possessed not to be upset about the slashed dresses or the nettles.

She could only hope that fate had returned those favours and taught that cruel little circle a lesson or two in adulthood.

---

September 4, 1895

In the morning there was a great fuss at the hotel when some vicomte or other mislaid his wife, who apparently preferred the company of another. The landaus did not arrive on time to collect them, and it was only by pulling rank that Georgia was able to secure a seat for Millie in one, and herself in another. Thank heaven their luggage had been transferred to Juno the night before. She could not imagine having to deal with trunks and boxes as