Aunt Dimity and the Deep Blue Sea Read online

  Table of Contents

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-one

  Twenty-two

  Twenty-three

  Epilogue

  Sir Percy’s Favorite Sticky Lemon Cake

  Praise for Nancy Atherton and her Aunt Dimity series

  Aunt Dimity and the Deep Blue Sea

  “The eleventh Aunt Dimity mystery is testament to the staying power of Atherton’s cozier-than-cozy premise. . . . Rainy Sunday afternoon reading.”

  —Booklist

  “I adored it. . . . Just sit back and take a breather while immersing yourself in something a little fun.”

  —Curledup.com

  Aunt Dimity and the Next of Kin

  “Thoroughly entertaining.”

  —Booklist

  “Atherton’s series is for those who like the puzzle of a mystery minus the corpses. This is a book entirely without edge, cynicism or even rudeness, and the characters are so nice you can’t just dismiss them—this is the way life really ought to be if only we were all better behaved. Put on the teakettle and enjoy.”

  —The Rocky Mountain News

  “Fans of cozy mysteries won’t want to miss this one.”

  —The Romance Reader’s Connection

  “This is Atherton at her coziest. . . . Fans of the series will not be disappointed.”

  —Over My Dead Body! (The Mystery Magazine)

  “Cozy mystery lovers wouldn’t dream of missing an entry in this series, and for good reason. . . . The quality of this series never runs down.”

  —Kingston Observer

  “A charming mystery, filled with warmth and affection.”

  —Deadly Pleasures

  Aunt Dimity: Snowbound

  “Witty, engaging and filled with interesting detail that will make the cottage-in-the-English-countryside fanciers among us sigh. . . . a romp and a half, just the thing to veg out on when life gets too much, and you want to escape into a book.”

  —The Lincoln Journal Star

  “The perfect tale for a cold winter’s night.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Fans of this series will be delirious with joy. . . . this series is among the best of the cozies, and this book is my personal favorite. . . . what a treat!”

  —Kingston Observer

  Aunt Dimity Takes A Holiday

  “A thoroughly modern cozy . . . classic cozy elements abound. The setting is delicious. . . . A very enjoyable read.”

  —The Washington Post Book World

  “Delightful”

  —Library Journal

  “Charming”

  —Booklist

  Aunt Dimity: Detective

  “Atherton’s light-as-a-feather series . . . is an excellent example of the (cozy) genre’s traditions. . . . profoundly comforting.”

  —The Seattle Times/Post Intelligencer

  “Entertaining, comforting, and charming.”

  —Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

  Aunt Dimity Beats the Devil

  “Nancy Atherton is a simply wonderful writer. Her descriptions of the British moors are breathtaking, and her protagonist, Lori Shepherd, is appealing and sexy.”

  —The Cleveland Plain Dealer

  Aunt Dimity’s Christmas

  “Here is a rarity: a book with a Christmas theme that is an engagingly well-written literary work.”

  —The Rocky Mountain News

  Aunt Dimity Digs In

  “The coziest cozy of them all.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  Aunt Dimity’s Good Deed

  “Atherton has a whimsical, fast-paced, well-plotted style that makes this book a romantic and graceful romp.”

  —Houston Chronicle

  Aunt Dimity and the Duke

  “Nancy Atherton is the most refreshingly optimistic new storyteller to grace the shelves in years. . . . charming!”

  —Murder Ink

  Aunt Dimity’s Death

  “A book I thoroughly enjoyed in the reading and which leaves me richer for having met charming people with the courage to care; and in places we all visit, at least in dreams.”

  —Anne Perry

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Nancy Atherton is the author of eleven Aunt Dimity novels. She lives in Colorado.

  Visit the spirit of Aunt Dimity at www.aunt-dimity.com

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  Published by the Penguin Group

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  First published in the United States of America by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. 2006 Published in Penguin Books 2007

  Copyright © Nancy T. Atherton, 2006

  All rights reserved

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-16730-4

  CIP data available

  Set in Perpetua

  The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials.Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

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  For

  Jim Hudson and Diane Martin,

  cherished chums

  One

  At was far too pretty a day to contemplate violent death. Late April’s silken breezes were filled with the scents of spring. Cowslips nodded daintily in the meadow, the oak forest was awash with bluebells, and soft sunlight cast a golden glow over the honey-colored cottage my family and I called home. As I stood calf-deep in the meadow’s rippling grasses, playing cricket with my five-year-old sons, the thought of us all being strangled in our beds by a vengeful lunatic was the furthest thing from my mind.

  I use the phrase “playing cricket” loosely. Alth
ough my husband and I had lived for seven years near the small Cotswolds village of Finch, in England’s West Midlands, we were Americans born and bred, and we’d never quite grasped the rules of what was, to us, a peculiar and alien game. Our twin sons, on the other hand, had grown up in England. Cricket was their national pastime. While they took turns bowling and batting, I was good for nothing but fielding balls.

  I’d just rescued a particularly soggy specimen from the gurgling stream at the bottom of our meadow when I spotted my husband emerging from the solarium that stretched across the back of the cottage. Will and Rob were the spitting images of their father—dark-haired, brown-eyed, and, to judge by the speed with which they outgrew their clothes, destined to equal if not exceed his lofty height. Whether they would follow Bill into the family business or choose instead to strike it rich on the pro cricket tour remained to be seen.

  Bill was a high-priced and highly discreet attorney who spent much of his time drawing up wills for the extremely well-to-do. He ran the European branch of his family’s venerable law firm from an office overlooking the village square in Finch, but his work often took him away from home. He’d been in his London office for the past three days, and I hadn’t expected to see him for another two. I wondered what had brought him home early.

  Stanley, our recently adopted black cat, followed Bill into the back garden, but Bill didn’t seem to notice. He didn’t bend to stroke Stanley’s gleaming coat, or call out to me and the boys, or climb over the garden’s low stone wall to join us in the meadow. He simply stood in the shade of the old apple tree, watching us. He stared silently at the boys for a moment before lifting his gaze to scan the tree-covered hills that rose steeply beyond the meadow and the stream. When his eyes finally met mine, I felt a shiver of apprehension so powerful that the rescued ball slipped from my fingers.

  My husband looked as though he’d aged ten years since I’d last seen him. His shoulders were hunched, his face was haggard, and his mouth was drawn into a thin, grim line.When our gazes locked, I saw a flame of anger in his eyes, shadowed by bone-deep fear. The sheer intensity of his emotions struck me like a blow.

  I must have gasped, because Will and Rob glanced toward the cottage, shouted “Daddy!” and forgot, momentarily, about cricket. They dropped bat and ball, hurtled across the meadow, and bounced over the stone wall into the garden, where they slowed, paused, and finally stood stock-still, peering up at their father. As I hurried over the wall in their wake, they stepped forward and slipped their hands into Bill’s.

  “What’s wrong, Daddy?” asked Rob.

  “Is it very bad?” asked Will.

  Bill dropped to his knees and pulled the boys to him, his head bowed between theirs, his eyes squeezed shut as if he were in pain. When the twins began to squirm, he drew an unsteady breath and loosened his hold. Will and Rob stood back and regarded him anxiously.

  “Yes, it’s bad,” he answered, looking from one solemn face to the other. “But it’s nothing for you to worry about. Mummy and Daddy are going to take care of everything.”

  “We could help,” the boys chorused.

  “Of course you can.” Bill ran his fingers through their dark hair. “You can help me and Mummy by going into the cottage and doing exactly what Annelise tells you to do.”

  Annelise Sciaparelli was the twins’ inestimable nanny. She and I had flipped a coin after lunch to decide who’d pull cricket duty. She’d won.

  “There’s no need to fetch your toys,” Bill said sharply, when the boys turned back toward the meadow. “Just go into the cottage and stay with Annelise. Understand? I want you to stay indoors, with Annelise. You’re not to set foot outside of the cottage. Not one foot.”

  “Not one foot,” the boys repeated soberly.

  “Mummy and I will be in the study for a while,” Bill went on, “and we don’t want to be disturbed. I have to speak with Mummy.”

  Will and Rob exchanged looks that seemed to say, “Something’s always wrong when Daddy has to speak with Mummy,” but they trotted into the cottage without audible comment.

  Stanley, who’d been rubbing his head on Bill’s hip in a bid for attention, now stood on his hind legs and planted his front paws on Bill’s chest. Bill took the hint, picked the cat up, and stood.While Stanley flopped over his shoulder, purring happily, Bill looked down at me. At just over six feet, my husband was nearly a foot taller than I, and he was remarkably fit. His imposing stature usually made me feel secure and protected, but at that moment I felt a strong urge to tuck him into my pocket for safekeeping.

  “Bill?” I said.

  “Not here.” He turned his head to look toward the hills. “Let’s go inside.”

  We passed through the solarium and into the kitchen, where vegetable soup was simmering on the stove and a veal-and-ham pie was baking in the oven. Bill set Stanley down on the floor, near his food dishes, and the cat, satisfied that he’d been given his due, began nibbling. As Bill and I went down the hall to the study, we heard water running in the tub upstairs and Annelise’s voice asking the boys if they wanted bubbles in their bath. Everything in the cottage was completely normal, except for my husband.

  Wordlessly, Bill closed the study door behind me, turned on the lights over the mantel shelf, motioned for me to take a seat in one of the pair of tall leather armchairs that stood before the hearth, and sat opposite me. His briefcase rested on the small table beside his chair. He gave it a sidelong glance before leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped tightly together.

  “Something’s come up,” he said. “I didn’t take it seriously at first, but now I have to, because it involves you and the boys.”

  “Right,” I said. It was all I could manage, because my mouth had gone dry. Bill’s fear was contagious.

  “Over the past three weeks, I’ve received a number of ”—he hesitated, then plunged on—“a number of threatening messages. They were sent via e-mail, through a complex relay system.We’ve been unable to trace them back to their source.”

  “What kind of threatening messages?” I asked.

  Bill’s gaze drifted back to the briefcase. Then he squared his shoulders, looked me straight in the eye, and said, “Someone wants to kill me.”

  I blinked. “Death threats? You’ve been getting death threats?” My thoughts spun wildly for a moment before coming to rest on the sheer improbability of what he was saying. “Why? You’re not a criminal attorney.You don’t deal with violent thugs. You write codicils and clauses and make sure all the wherefores are in place.Why would anyone want to kill you?”

  Bill shrugged. “Revenge, apparently. The messages suggest that a former client believes I wronged him in some way. They make it quite clear that he intends to pay me back.” He tilted his head to one side and peered at me earnestly. “I would have told you sooner, Lori, but I thought it was a prank. I thought it would blow over. Instead, it’s gotten worse. Much worse.” He opened the briefcase, removed a sheet of paper, and passed it to me, saying, “This was waiting for me at my London office when I arrived this morning.”

  I examined the page. It looked like a standard printout of a routine e-mail message, but the words were those of a madman:You came like a thief in the night to cast me into the abyss.You chained me in darkness, but no earthly chains can hold me anymore. I have risen.

  Behold, I am coming soon to repay you for what you have done. All that you love will perish. I will strike your children dead and give your wife a like measure of torment and mourning. I have the keys to Death and Hades, and I will blot your name from the book of life forever.

  Your nightmare has begun. There is no waking.

  Abaddon

  I looked questioningly at Bill. “Abaddon?”

  Bill waved a hand over the note. “It’s a mishmash of quotations and misquotations from the Book of Revelations. Abaddon’s a pseudonym, of course, but an apt one. In Revelations, Abaddon is the king of the bottomless pit. His minions come to earth to torture sinners.”
>
  “It’s good to know that our guy reads his Bible,” I muttered.

  “It’s not funny, Lori,” Bill snapped.

  “I know,” I said quickly, “but it’s . . . incredible.” I reread the unholy epistle before giving it back to Bill, who returned it to the briefcase. “ ‘All that you love will perish.’ I can’t believe that anyone would hate us enough to . . . to kill us. It’s unreal.”

  “It’s real,” Bill said heavily. “Which is why you and the twins have to leave the cottage.”

  “Huh?” I said, taken aback.

  “I’ve spent most of the day with Chief Superintendent Wesley Yarborough at Scotland Yard,” Bill explained. “He agrees that we should take the threats seriously. In fact, he was rather annoyed with me for not bringing them to the Yard’s attention sooner.” Bill sighed. “Yarborough intends to search my work files for clues to Abaddon’s identity, and I have to stay in London, to help with the investigation. While I’m there, the chief superintendent and I want you and the boys to be far away from here.You’ll leave the cottage tomorrow morning and stay in a safe place until all of this is cleared up.”

  “We’re safe here,” I pointed out. “As soon as the villagers find out what’s going on, they’ll close in around us like a brick wall. If a stranger shows his face in Finch, they’ll sound the alarm. All we have to do is put the word out and Abaddon’s as good as caught.”