a dark and stormy business

It was a dark and stormy night, and Edgar Gaunt had been standing on the doorstep, rain pelting down the back of his jacket, for seven and a half minutes. While he tended to appreciate rain as an aesthetic kind of weather, he did not appreciate the cold rivulets currently running between his shoulder blades and down toward a particularly sensitive area just that side of his dark brown Hugo Boss belt.

There was also the issue of a rather insistent feline perched at his feet, yowling horribly through the storm and looking pitifully up at him as it dripped onto his oxfords. And the fact that he had knocked nearly eight minutes ago now, only to be greeted with a chipper, if flustered, “Oh, just a minute, love!” had not, in fact, made his mood better.

Finally, finally, there were footsteps near the door and he straightened his posture, which in turn allowed more rainwater to cascade down his spine and agitated the cat.

“Oh, God, I’m so sorry about this,” the voice inside said, far too cheerily as keys and locks jangled and moved.

“Not at all,” Edgar said, having suffered for any moment of impoliteness a sharply delivered monologue about manners by his often-too-polite mother.

As the door swung open, the cat darted forward and left Edgar alone on the doorstep facing the resident of his carefully chosen address as she said, “Oh, Fortuna, there you are.”

And she was… unexpected. Not that he had actually imagined what she would be like. But he hadn’t thought she would be quite so… young. Or… pretty. Or… disarmingly charming.

“So sorry again,” she said with a bright smile and quirked hip. “You caught me in the middle of a rather messy baking project. Had to get the dough off my fingers. How can I help you?”

While he was waiting in the rain, Edgar had come up with several possible introductions to use, most of them eloquent, all polite, and a few quite amusing.

But what he said was, “You really shouldn’t open your door to strangers, Margaret Appleby.”

“Sorry, have we met?” she asked, tilting herself practically diagonally across her doorway.

Edgar, whose shoes were now probably ruined and certainly waterlogged, had not been expecting that question delivered in that particular tone. “Um…”

“Only it’s my mum who tends to call me Margaret when she’s cross with me. Everyone else calls me Maggie. So I doubt we’ve actually met.”

“I thought… I mean… I assumed you knew that,” Edgar stammered, which put him just as off-kilter as her question because Edgar Mortimer Gaunt never stammered. “Because I said…”

“Why precisely are you here?” Margaret-called-Maggie continued, crossing her arms and staring him down.

Edgar barely kept himself from apologizing as he pulled the neat black business card from his pocket and handed it to her.

“‘Edgar Gaunt,’” she read aloud, brow furrowing as she continued, “‘The Lesser of Two Evils.’ Oh! Oh, dear. I think you’d better come in, Edgar.”

And so he was left on the doorstep, stunned and watching the sway of her hips as she rushed back inside. After several seconds of not moving, she called again for him to come inside and despite his growing apprehension, he stepped inside.

Margaret Appleby’s house was, in a word, charming. Painted with light, warm neutrals, every surface covered with vases of flowers or potted plants, books – open, closed, bookmarked, dogeared – scattered everywhere, a hallway slightly cluttered by muddy boots kicked off with cheerful impatience.

Edgar felt slightly ill.

“Go through to the kitchen,” Margaret called from somewhere to his left. “I’ll put some tea on.”

“Really, I…”

“And feel free to take off your shoes. You must be drenched.”

He was, and the quiet dripping from his sleeves convinced him to not only slip off his shoes and line them neatly along the baseboard, but also to remove his jacket and hang it on the nearby coatrack which seemed unused to housing coats but held all manner of other assorted hanging things. Edgar cautiously moved forward, assuming the kitchen to be at the back of the house, and received two consecutive shocks when both feline and owner popped out of a doorway within seconds of each other.

He clutched at his chest and stared at the cat, which patently ignored him as it cleaned its paw, as Margaret said, “Oh, yes. Just through there. And help yourself to a biscuit. I’ll be just a moment.”

When he entered the kitchen, the sick feeling in Edgar’s stomach had begun climbing his throat. This was not at all going to plan. In fact, this was as far from his plan as he could get. She was not supposed to be pretty. She was not supposed to be kind. And she was not supposed to invite him in for tea and biscuits.

Yet here he was, sitting at a small table with a plate of warm biscuits as Margaret bustled around in another room. He was considering the biscuits when the cat leapt up beside him and gave him one curious look before collapsing onto its side and purring. Hesitantly, Edgar reached out and stroked the top of the cat’s head. The purring grew louder and the cat closed its eyes as he continued to pet it.

“Fortuna doesn’t usually take to strangers.”

Edgar looked up to find Margaret in the doorway again. “Fortuna?”

Margaret hummed and nodded at the cat. “Fortuna Major. She’s a bit particular.”

“Oh.”

“You should take one,” she added, pointing to the plate. “They’re fresh. The loaf is proving just now, so I can’t offer you bread and butter.”

“Quite alright,” Edgar said.

“I really do have something to show you,” Margaret added. “I just can’t find it at the moment. Oh! I forgot the tea!”

Edgar simply sat and continued his attention to Fortuna, who purred deeper and leaned into his hand. Sooner than he expected, the kettle went off and the cat’s ears perked up as Margaret opened the fridge and pulled out the milk.

“Is Tips alright?”

“Fine, thank you.”

“Milk and sugar?”

“Please.”

He couldn’t help but glance up as he heard the cupboard door open and found himself studying the line of her figure as she stretched on tiptoes to reach what he could only assume were the nice cups. As she sank back down, he hurried to look away, oddly embarrassed. Fortuna watched him as he avoided looking at Margaret, and they both jumped when she set their cups in front of them. Edgar couldn't help but be amused by Fortuna's neatly presented milk and appreciate the perfect color of his own drink.

"Drink up," Margaret said, waving her hands at him before taking a sip from her cup, setting it down again, and hurrying from the room.

So Edgar did. He drank his tea. He ate a biscuit. He pet the cat. He ate another biscuit. He looked around the kitchen and allowed himself a small smile as he studied the photos stuck on the front of the fridge and the collection of plants along the windowsill. There were several clunks and clangs and muttered curses from wherever Margaret was now, but eventually she reemerged with a large purse in hand.

"It's got to be here somewhere," she said, setting the purse on the table opposite Edgar to sift through the contents. "I know I saw it this week..."

Edgar watched, eyes widening, as the purse slowly emptied onto the table -- a wallet, chapstick, a notebook, five pens, three hair ties, a tea bag, a single earring, two sets of keys, a container of aspirin, a pair of sunglasses, a handful of tampons (at that, he felt his cheeks go hot), a nail file, and 54 pence.

"Honestly," she huffed, slamming down a small paperback copy of Shirley Jackson stories before turning the purse upside down and shaking it. Crumbs and the odd crumpled receipt fell out, but she shook her head. "It's got to be... ah ha!"

Fortuna rolled her luminescent eyes and got up, stretching in front of Edgar's cup, leaping down to the floor, and sauntering out of the kitchen. Edgar watched Margaret struggle with something stuck in the seams of the purse, wondering what could possibly be so important that she had gone through all of this. When she pulled her hand out, she was holding...

... another business card?

"I'm so sorry about all this," she said, eyes soft as she picked up Edgar's card in her other hand. "It's just I know why you've come here, but I don't think... well, I think you've made a mistake."

"And why would you think that?" Edgar asked, meaning to sound much more ominous than he felt.

"Because..."

She hesitated, handed back his card, then held out the other. Edgar's vision went a little fuzzy as he stared at the letters, willing them to mean something else, knowing that Margaret was saying something to him and Fortuna was meowing from the doorway, but unable to tear his eyes away from the card. It couldn't be. But apparently it was.

Margaret Elizabeth Appleby, The Greater of Two Evils

And with that, Edgar Mortimer Gaunt tipped over in his chair and passed out cold on the floor.