"Put a chain around my neck and lead me anywhere; oh let me be your teddy bear." If you insist.

Chapter Eight: Three Little Indians, Walking in the Zoo

By now Jennifer was fairly certain that she was getting paranoid. At every little moan of the wind she jumped as if the whole of the British Navy was after her. Nothing she told herself or recited aloud could make her feel any less uneasy. She was back to knitting in the sitting room again. Usually the steady tap-click of the needles was calming.

Usually. This was, she reminded herself, most certainly not usual circumstances. Usually she didn't have a psycho killer living down the hall from her. Usually she wasn't trapped on an island with no way to get help. Usually she wouldn't be worried that someone would try stealing her witness testimony. Usually she could walk into the kitchen and find some cooked food.

Virtually nothing about Manse Island was usual for Jennifer Morley.

She found herself thinking back on that Carruthers girl. If she had learned anything from that incident it was that murder was easy. Easy to perform, easy to cover up, easy to keep concealed. Perhaps that was the problem. If murder was easy, then all of these killings were simple for Owen! Then and there she vowed to herself that her murder, when it came time, would not be easy.

Oh, no, she smiled to herself. Jennifer's killing would be most difficult once Owen say how she could fight back.

oOo

This was such a crooked house, Velma thought as she crossed off Marianne's motive from her list. Murder and deception and such all made it so very crooked. She supposed it wasn't really the house's fault. The house couldn't decide what the people who owned it did. Own. She furrowed her brow and sounded it aloud. "Own. Ow-en. Own. The unknown Owen owns – what?" Nothing seemed to fit the tongue twister, so she let it be. The unknown Owen owns.

Owns the house.

The victims.

Death itself, if you will.

The unknown Owen owns everything, she acknowledged grimly. Owns everything, sees everything, knows everything, it would seem. She shook her head to rid it of the thought. Silly girl, get back to work.

Yes, Mother.

I'm not your mother.

I know. But you're her voice.

In your head?

"Yes." The pencil lead broke again. She scowled down at it. "What, do you just feel the need to break every time I really start having a good conversation with myself? That's all I'm doing. Plenty of normal people talk to themselves I'm told." Under her breath she muttered, "Unfortunately the definition of normal in today's society seems to border on slightly mad, so I technically qualify as just as insane as the next person."

She couldn't come up with a motive for Daphne. She just seemed so nice. Nice people didn't generate motives the same way that un-nice people did. Then again, nice people also didn't shove their boyfriends out the door of a car onto a highway. Ah well. She'd just have to figure something out.

She'd have to figure something out, before Owen struck again, she corrected. That was the hard part. If it really was Daphne, and she didn't come up with a solid motive before either she or Jennifer ended up on the receiving end of a killer bear hug, there was a good possibility she would wind up both dead and clueless as to why. And isn't that a pretty situation, she thought wryly. Who wouldn't want to be dead with no idea why they'd been killed?

"Pfft. Get back on track, Velma," she ordered herself. "A big bear hugged one. What kind of bear?" If Sylvester was still around she would be tempted to consider him as the 'big bear' due to his, er, largeness, but since he wasn't…? She definitely didn't have a teddy bear and seriously doubted either Jennifer or Daphne had one. The mental image of straight-backed, frowning Miss Morley hugging a teddy bear made her snicker. That would be a sight worth photographing.

Her conclusion so far was that there were no actual bears on the island, it couldn't be Sylvester because he was dead, and there were no teddy bears (although how a teddy bear would kill someone she wasn't even going to try imagining), which left her mind blank. How on earth would a bear fit into the picture? Maybe there was a bear-shaped knick-knack on the mantel or in one of the rooms. She hadn't seen any of those children's zoo play-sets, but it would be just odd enough that Owen would probably think of it.

She started in the sitting room. Nothing of interest on the mantel, which was both a relief and a disappointment. She did notice the excessive amount of – "ah-ah-wahh-CHOO!" – dust. Dorothy must not have been able to dust up there. That or dust just gathered very easily when there were dead people in the house.

Don't think about that. Dead people aren't related to looking for bears in the house. At least, not directly. Something under the pool table caught her eye. "Another business card?" she mused, crawling underneath to pick it up.

'Please don't touch this card. I've left it here for the Curly Sewing Iron crew to investigate. Perhaps they'll figure out who I am. Perhaps not. You haven't.'

"Curly Sewing Iron crew?" That was new. "Too late for not touching," she sing-songed to herself. "Well. Ms. Owen can just make a new one." She wished she'd kept the last one about the cellar. Maybe something on there in the wording would be useful in figuring out this little mystery. Mystery, she smiled. She'd always liked reading mysteries. Who would have thought Velma Dinkley would be living one?

Curly Sewing Iron crew…the words were meaningless. What – no, why were they chosen? What they meant could be figured out after she knew why. Why was always important. If one knew the why, she believed, one could master anything. Curly Sewing Iron crew. It was something to think about. Velma tucked the card into the pocket of her skirt. No harm in taking it if she'd end up dead anyway. Owen could just take it from her pocket after killing her and put it back.

Suddenly the phrase 'over my dead body' had an entirely new meaning.

Crawling back out from under the pool table, she hurriedly made sure the other two weren't around before slipping into the library. She was pretty sure there were absolutely no bears in the library, but it gave her an excuse to be in there with the smell of old books.

Besides, she needed something new to read tonight after she finished What the Circle Encircled. Maybe she could find something else by Sarah Kell. She could use all the mystery help she could get.

oOo

Daphne was getting frustrated. Pacing her room didn't help her think. Why didn't the motion help? Motion always helped. Except now. Maybe it was that Marianne's room was on one side of hers and Velma's was on the other. Jennifer being two doors across the hall didn't help either.

They were all so close. And yet, no three people could have been further apart. Jennifer, the stern and strait-laced older woman with a penchant for hypocrisy. Velma, the seemingly quiet, bookish, …mentally unbalanced girl. Daphne, the subtly fashionable girl with absolutely no emotion thanks to the killer on the loose. Yes, they were definitely all supposed to be there, but if they weren't? No three social classes could be further. She guessed that there might have been a way she could have been friends with Velma, in another life, but frankly that was a very big 'might' with a substantial 'maybe' added in there for good measure.

Finally fed up with the futility of pacing, the redhead flung herself across the bed. "I am going to die," she whispered out loud. "Someone is going to kill me. Daphne Blake will be no more."

It didn't sound so bad if she thought about it in a distanced, third-person sort of way.

"I am going to die. I will die. I am going to die today or tomorrow morning, possibly even tonight. I am going to die."

Now, in a more direct and first-person approach to the thought, it was a little bit less acceptable-sounding.

"Daphne, you are going to die. You are going to die soon."

Taking a second-person, in the face look at this was even less acceptable to the point of being very, very bad. She decided she'd rather think about it in the third-person sort of way.

Or better yet, not have to die at all.

There was a light tap at the door. "Who is it?" She sat up, hearing the tense panic in her own voice.

A pause. "Just me. Can I come in?"

Velma. What did she want? Daphne scurried to the door and peeked out. She didn't look like she was carrying anything dangerous, and there wasn't anything to do with bears around. "Alright. Come in." The door squeaked on its way to the wall.

"Thank you." Politeness was useless in the face of death, she wanted to tell the other girl, but kept her mouth closed. Velma's brown eyes darted around the room. Behind her glasses the motion made her look slightly scared. Although, she allowed herself, there was good reason to be scared if she wasn't Owen and good reason to act scared if she was. Her eyes seemed to stop on something behind Daphne, but then she forced a smile and returned her gaze to the redhead. "I was just wondering if…you were hungry…?"

Come to think of it, she was a little bit. "Not particularly," she answered instead. A flicker of disappointment crossed Velma's face, but she quickly regained her composure.

"A-alright. I just thought that since, you know, it's almost suppertime and…oh, never mind." She backed out of the room and was gone before Daphne could blink.

What, she wondered, was that all about?

oOo

Velma could have thrown the chair she was standing on out the window. Daphne had a bear-shaped clock in her room. But what motive, she wanted to scream.

Standing on this chair, she could just reach the ceiling. She wanted to make sure there wasn't a hook of any sort on the ceilings. Her room was fine, and she hadn't spotted anything on Daphne's ceiling, but she couldn't be sure it wasn't just small. Glasses fixed most of her eyesight problems, but they couldn't guarantee she'd see everything. That included hooks or other protrusions for tying a noose on the ceilings.

She blew at her bangs as she jumped off the chair. Nothing on Jennifer's ceiling either. She didn't want to admit it, but she was dreading having to check the deceased's rooms. Maybe she could just let it slide. No, she mentally sighed, if she wanted to stay alive she'd have to check. She dragged the chair from Jennifer's room into Marianne's room, hoping Daphne wouldn't hear the 'shkkkk' of the chair's feet on the carpeted hall. The door didn't open in any case, she reassured herself.

Marianne's room. It felt strange to be in here so soon after the death had taken place. Carefully she steadied the chair, then climbed onto it and began searching the ceiling. Please, please, let there be something somewhere that helps point me in the right direction.

Who are you talking to?

I was talking to God…is that a problem, Mother?

I told you, I'm not your mother. Fine, I'm her voice. But I'm not your mother.

I don't care. You sound like her and you're in my head. I can call you whatever I like.

You'd better stop and focus on that ceiling again if you want to figure anything out!

She snapped her eyes open. How long had she been just standing there? There wasn't anything here. She took a step backwards off the chair to reposition it in a new part of the room. Hopefully neither of the others were dead or she might have to add 'continually zones out when deaths take place' to her own motive list. She really didn't like having a motive list for herself, but it was another way of looking at the jigsaw. Not much to do but take it objectively rather than subjectively. If she could.

oOo

Now that she thought about it, she really could use something to eat. She was getting hungry and that offer of suppertime sounded pretty good to Daphne right then. "Oh, what the heck," she griped. "It's just food. It's not as though she poisoned it or anything because that has absolutely nothing to do with bears of any sort that I can think of." Keeping this in mind, she yanked the door open and started down the stairs. A thud like that of someone jumping onto the ground from a bed or other piece of furniture came from behind her, but she paid it no mind. Probably one of the bodies falling out of their beds with the post-death muscle spasms. "Jeepers, if I can think that calmly…" She shook her head and continued on her way down the stairs.

Cautiously peeking around the door to the dining room, she was relieved to see that no one was there. Good. That meant she could eat in peace. She started in, humming a merry tune, when the music died on her lips.

There were only two little Indians left.

Slowly she turned to look behind her. No dead bodies on the floor. Slowly she turned again and peeped over the table. No dead bodies there. A nervous laugh sprang out. Owen had just made a fluke, that's all. She did take a quick look under the table to make sure Jennifer or Velma wasn't hiding there to kill her. "Okay, okay, it's okay, breathe, Daphne, breathe. It's okay."

Upon opening the door to the kitchen though she saw that it was very much not okay.

Food was strewn everywhere, all over the floor and swept from the cabinets. A few doors of the cabinets were hanging slightly crooked on their hinges, as if a person had grabbed onto them and let their feet dangle off the ground. One chair from the servants' table was knocked to the ground, and there, on the floor in the middle of all the mess, was the little Indian who had been hugged by a bear.

Jennifer Morley.

Now, in situations like this, when one has just found a second dead body after finding another so recently, the rational thing to do is to not panic or scream or any of those things, but to decide whether or not it is safe to stay in the situation. As leaving wasn't an option, Daphne went with the less rational choice and screamed.

She kept screaming until the door to the kitchen banged open and Velma said, "Would you stop tha-! Oh…"

Jennifer's face was contorted into what Daphne would have called a grin on anyone else, but on Jennifer it just looked horribly out of place and altogether wrong so she settled on a grimace. Her hands were limply over her shoulders, as if she had been clawing at her attacker, but her arms were crossed in an additional jab at the rhyme – she was hugging herself. Around her neck was rigidly tied a handkerchief-thin scarf embroidered with little dancing bears. This section of the scarf was carefully folded over the front of her neck as to be plainly visible.

She was, indubitably, dead.

"Um." Daphne was trying to breathe normally now and had almost forgotten the other live person in the room. Now she looked at Velma while gulping air like someone who has just returned to the surface after scuba diving on a half-empty oxygen tank. "Should we take her up to her room and then look over the body or vice versa?"

"I don't care! Just get away!" The realization had crashed down on her as Velma talked. There were only two of them left. There was no doubt who Owen was anymore. She backed out of the kitchen, feeling panic rising in her chest and making her start to hyperventilate again. "Get away from me!" she shrieked, "get away!"

Surprise was written all over the brunette's face. "What?"

"Get away!" She was screaming now as she turned and ran from the dining room, out of the hallway, out of the house. She didn't know where she was going, so long as she was away from the killer.

Death did not agree with her.

oOo

Velma stared after Daphne for a moment, then thoughtfully processed the implications of Jennifer's death. Being a more rational person, as she considered herself, she wasn't one for screaming when dead bodies were found.

Possibly laughing maniacally if she'd forgotten (conveniently or otherwise) to take that confounded medicine, but not screaming.

Jennifer's odd facial expression could have been funny if she wasn't so…dead. An unsentimental thought, even a little bit cold she supposed, but what could be expected from someone who had experienced eight deaths within the last two days? She for one wasn't planning to weep for this woman. She had her doubts that even her family members would be weeping. Jennifer Morley seemed like the kind of women whom nobody could get close enough to to learn to love, if it was actually possible to even like Jennifer.

She'd better check the Jennifer's pockets for anything 'Owen' – who was looking more and more like an alternate personality of herself since she couldn't come up with a motive for Daphne at all – might have left, such as another of those business cards. "Well," she reasoned, "can't be too hard to do. She was the one to check Marianne's. Although she did end up dead afterwards."

That was an unsettling thought. But it did have to be done. Then she could wait on Daphne's return. A thought struck her. Daphne had left the house. She could finally check the other girl's room!

For what?

A noose-hook. Or other incriminating evidence, I'm not too picky either way.

You really ought to stop zoning out like this, you know. It's a dreadfully irritating habit and someone always seems to end up dead afterwards.

Maybe she had better write that down before she discounted it for subjective reasons.