“She does now. Mam says she had her heart broken in the sixties. She discovered her husband was a bigamist.” Ffion grins. “It was the talk of the town, as you can imagine.”
Around the small stone cottage are several aviaries, housing birds of different sizes. A run of hutches contains rabbits; another enclosure has small wooden hedgehog shelters. And in one of the large cages beneath the trees is something that looks worryingly like a wolf.
“Silver fox,” Angharad says when they’re sitting in her small kitchen. “Kept as a pet, then dumped when the owners got bored.”
“I was trying to get my bearings as we were driving here,” Leo says. “We’re at the tip of the lake, right? Does that put this house in Wales or England?”
“Mostly Wales, although a small part is technically in England.”
“How interesting. Which bit?”
“Tybach,” Angharad says.
“The loo,” Ffion translates with a grin.
It’s clear Leo isn’t sure if they’re joking. He looks around Angharad’s kitchen, a small room with dark beams and exposed stone walls. Narrow shelves house dozens of brown apothecary jars, each with a handwritten label.Rhus tox., Calendula, Podophyllum—
Leo reads out loud. “Belladonna?”
“Good for a fever.”
Ffion must have made a sound, because Angharad looks at her wearily.
“Ffion thinks herbal medicine is—what was it you told your mother?—aload of old bollocks.”
“No offense, Angharad, but if I’ve got a headache, I’d rather pop an ibuprofen than chew on a few petals.”
“I used arnica after I twisted my knee,” Leo says. Angharad looks smug.
Ffion has a thought. “Do you know anything about ricin?”
“Ricinus communis,” Angharad says. “It’s where castor oil comes from. The plant’s very popular. There was a spate of cuttings going around after Efan Hughes won first prize at the horticultural show. Pretty shrub. Deadly in the wrong hands, of course.”
Leo’s looking at the rows of jars, reading the labels, and Ffion knows what he’s thinking. But she’s already looked, and there’s no neatly labeledRicinon Angharad’s shelves.
“I understand you own a boat with red sails,” Leo says. “Most of the owners we’ve spoken to take their boats out of the water over winter. You don’t do the same?”
“How would I get to the village without the boat?” Angharad speaks as though the answer should have been obvious. “I don’t have a car. My boat’s with Steffan at the moment, for repairs, and I’ve had to stock up in case he has to keep her for a few days.”
“It’s damaged?” Leo says.
“My fault. I usually move her to a mooring on the lake when there’s bad weather, but a couple of days ago, I left her tied to my pontoon and the hull was damaged.”
“Where was she on New Year’s Eve?” Ffion says.
“On the lake mooring. I have a small rowboat I take out to her and tie up in her place.”
Leo looks out the window to where the lake can just be seen through the trees. “Does the boat need keys? I mean—could anyone take it out?”
“If they know how to sail. I lock the cuddy—that’s the little cabin—but she’s a sailing boat, not a pleasure cruiser. There’s a small outboard motor I rarely use.”
“Does anyone else sail her?” Ffion asks.
“No one.” Angharad looks as though she’s debating whether to share something. Ffion waits. “Before Christmas, I gave a couple of sailing lessons to a young boy from The Shore. Caleb.” She makes a smalltsksound. “I must be going soft in my old age. I’d sworn not to set foot in the place.”
“So how…” Ffion prompts when it becomes clear Angharad has finished.
“I was out fishing—this would have been sometime in October—and saw a swimmer was in trouble. I fished her out and took her back to The Shore.”