Murder in the Cemetery: A Lady Margaret Turnbull Cozy Mystery Book (International Cozy Mystery Series 3) by C T Mitchell Read Free Book Online Page B

normally one to be shaken by such a sight, for some
reason the death of this particular girl struck Maggie as a very sad thing. 
Her insides were beginning to knot up, so she stood for a moment at the young
woman’s feet.  She took a few steps back and tried to take in more of the
scene.
    The young woman’s Italian-made shoes, which Lady Margaret
recognized in an instant as being delightfully overpriced and a status symbol
for many of the upper class women, were caked in mud.  Though her face was
beautiful, and Maggie hadn’t noticed it at first glance, her make up did appear
to be smudged from tears.
    And her lips, bright red with lipstick, were actually
bleeding.  The woman had bitten her lower  the Lismore Police Station. 
Constable Donaldson answered on the first ring, and listened to Maggie’s
discovery.  Her instructions, as always, were to wait at the scene and touch
nothing until a police officer or two could get there.
    Twenty minutes later, she had given her official statement
to Constable Donaldson and another officer of the law and was free to go home. 
Maggie walked home unnaturally slow, wishing she had something stronger than
sherry waiting on her in the cabinet at home.  A shot of whiskey to ease her
shaky nerves wouldn’t be out of the question, today.  She couldn’t quite figure
out why the image of the young woman had upset her so, but she didn’t care for
it.

Chapter 3
    Maggie poured some cooking sherry into a tea class and
sipped it as she strolled through the kitchen of her sprawling colonial home. 
She could still hear the sounds of the large family reunion out on the verandah
and she shook her head a few times to clear the noise from it.
    “Why was the woman smiling?  Why did she look like she was
having a good time?” Maggie asked herself.  There was no way in hell that girl
was having a good time being stabbed in the heart.  Something was amiss.
    By the fourth time the image of the girl’s laughing face
haunted Maggie’s mind, she heard someone knock at her door.  It was Detective
Tom Sullivan, the man who was always reluctant to admit what a huge help she
was in solving cases, but always seemed to keep coming back for more.
    This time, though, Maggie secretly wished he would ask her
to stay out of it.  This time, she would listen.  Tom took his usual cup of tea
when she offered it to him, and he made a mental note of the way her hands
shook when she handed it to him.
    “You okay, Lady Margaret?” He asked, taking a sip.  She
nodded but said nothing.  “Okay then,” he said hesitantly.  “Well, we’ve found
out that your victim is named Valerie Chambers.  Ready for the run down?”
    Chills ran down Maggie’s spine, but she nodded because she
knew that’s what she normally would have done.  At the moment, she was acting
on instinct, and her instinct told her that she should be interested…so she
faked it.
    Tom opened his small notebook with a flick of his wrist and
began reading.  “Thirty eight years old at the time of her death. Single. Lived
in Clunes, New South Wales.  Owned and managed a spa and beauty parlor for the
past ten years.
    This, however, is exactly where her story stops, if you’ll
believe it.  No one at the Station has been able to find a trace of her
existence before she moved to Clunes….which I find very strange.”
    Maggie nodded.  “Strange, indeed.”  Her silence afterward
told Tom to continue.  When he started to, she raised up her finger to stop
him.  “No wait…why would a beautiful, well dressed woman wander into the
Bangalow cemetery in the middle of the night?
    “Perhaps she came with whoever killed her to look at a
tomb?  To look at the tomb she was found in, maybe?  Maybe she was forced into
it.  Who knows?”  Tom shrugged when Maggie didn’t say anything else, and then
continued on with more theories.  “Maybe she came to Bangalow to re-kindle an
old friendship, and then things took a turn for the