Bones & Boxes: a Hetty Fox Cozy Mystery (Hetty Fox Cozy Mysteries Book 1) by Anna Drake Page A

lampshade on his brass lamp was the usual banker’s green. The office smelled musty, and I thought of Andrew’s comments about the man spending most of his time pouring through dry financial records.
    “I hope you’re finding Hendricksville to you satisfaction,” he said, waving toward a chair in front of his desk.
    “Yes. I’m very pleased to be here.”
    “Of course it doesn’t hurt that your daughter lives here, too.”
    “Exactly.”
    “I wish my mother would have been as open minded as you.”
    “She wouldn’t move?”
    “Not an inch. Anyway, what can I help you with?”
    I whipped out my checkbook and led him through some of my financial information. As long as I was here, I didn’t think it would hurt to seek his advice. As we were wrapping up that discussion I slipped Mrs. Whitcomb into the conversation.
    “Megan tells me you followed in her footsteps here.”
    “Yes, I was named her replacement.” His face flushed slightly. “Her death was such a sad business.”
    “I can imagine.”
    “She left behind large shoes to fill.”
    “So the people in my knitting group mentioned.”
    Hubbard smiled. “Mrs. Whitcomb was well liked around town.”
    “It’s so sad about her housekeeper.”
    Hubbard’s brow wrinkled in confusion.
    “Carrie Flynt,” I said. “The woman who was murdered recently?”
    “Ah, yes,” he said, as realization dawned. “I didn’t know her personally, but all deaths are sad.”
    “And now her nephew. He’s been murdered, too.”
    Really, if Hubbard were innocent of the murder, he was going to think I was the most ghoulish person alive. But these questions needed to be asked, his reactions checked.
    “Her nephew?” he asked.
    “Yes, it made the news yesterday. He came here to clean out her home and was apparently killed for his efforts.”
    “Good grief.”
    “You didn’t know?”
    “I don’t follow the news much. I did hear about his aunt’s death, but I didn’t know about the nephew.”
    I swallowed a sigh. Hubbard appeared not to know much about either death. And worse yet, I had the feeling his responses were honest. George Pratt was beginning to look better and better to me, but maybe only as a matter of convenience. He was handy. He was here. He was on Oberton’s short list.

FOURTEEN
     
     
    W hen he rushed into the examination room the next day, the good Doctor Barstow looked terribly pressed. His hair was a mess, his collar askew. I almost regretted having lied my way into this appointment.
    But I reminded myself that I was chasing leads on two murders. I couldn’t afford to be overly kind.
    Besides, I’d risked life and limb on the twenty-minute drive to Weaverton. The roads had been brutal, slicked up by a three-inch overnight snowfall.
    So how’s that sore throat now?” Barstow asked, stopping to pick up a tongue depressor on his way over to me.
    “It’s much better. I really shouldn’t have  bothered you with it.”
    “Let me be the judge of that, please.” He snapped on a pair of latex gloves. “Open wide.”
    He slipped a tongue depressor into my mouth. It seemed a fitting punishment for the fib that had earned me a place in his busy schedule.
    “Well, you certainly appear to be much better.” He stripped off the gloves. After depositing them in the trash, he poked and prodded my glands. “Any fever?”
    “None.”
    “How’s your appetite?”
    “Fine.”
    He slid a stethoscope onto my back and ordered me to breathe.
    Once we finished up that routine, I undertook my shaky plan. “How is my blood pressure? I’ve been so worried about it lately.” I sighed.
    He checked my chart. His nurse had hooked me up to the blood pressure machine when I first came into the examination room. Now, he studied what I assumed was her report. “Your numbers look fine. Why did you think they might not be?”
    “I don’t know. Life’s been a little unsettled recently.”
    “Why?”
    “It’s the murders, I guess.”
    “You mustn’t worry.