Lula was slow to understand the meaning behind Frodo's question. "Who was surprised to see me come back again? You mean, you think that poor woman who was killed was meant to be me?"
"It's an idea of mine, Mrs. Tredgold. It's possible that she was murdered in mistake for you," Frodo answered. "Until last week, it'd been years since anyone in Gamwich had seen you. I daresay that most people who remembered you would recall you as a fair-haired girl just of age. If someone was expecting you to return to Gamwich to claim your inheritance and meant to stop you before you arrived, they would only know to watch for someone like that girl, but fifty years older. The dead woman fits your general description. So near as we can tell, she is about your age and she has fair hair of a shade similar to yours with some gray in it."
Lula only grew more horrified as she listened to this explanation. "But why would anybody want to kill me?" she asked.
"I don't know," Frodo admitted. "I thought it might be so that they could claim your inheritance, but your nieces and nephews are your only heirs. We can probably exclude them from suspicion--none of them except Ham were anywhere near Gamwich while you were on your journey here." Sam threw a sharp, worried glance in Frodo's direction at the mention of his eldest brother's name. "The only other person who seems to have an interest in your inheritance is Mr. Leekey."
"Mr. Leekey?" Lula repeated. "What's it got to do with him?"
"He had hopes of receiving this house from your aunt," Frodo told her, without going into the reasons for Leekey's expectations. "He might still hope to inhabit it if you never came to Gamwich. He said as much to me when I asked him. And he is the one person who definitely knew that you would return at your aunt's death, since he wrote you to come. Did you write in reply to let him know when you expected to arrive?"
"No," Lula shook her head. "When I got his letter, I started off as soon as I could pack a bag and shut up the house. The post wouldn't've got to him any quicker. But, Mr. Baggins, he wasn't surprised to see me. If he killed this other poor woman in mistake for me, he'd've been blasted like he was hit by a bolt o' lightning from the blue when I showed up here on the doorstep. He answered the door, since Glory was sitting by my aunt's bed tending to her."
"He didn't appear at all shocked or surprised?" asked Frodo.
"Not a bit of it, Mr. Baggins. The minute he saw me, he smiled and said, 'You must be Mrs. Tredgold. I was hoping you'd come before it was too late.' He meant because Aunt Edda was about to breathe her last. Then he told me who he was and took me into Auntie's room. He didn't even blink at the sight of me."
This confounded Frodo's one viable suspicion. Leekey seemed like a nervous and sensitive hobbit; he might be capable of committing a murder, but Frodo doubted he had the composure to welcome the supposedly murdered woman when she showed up alive and well after all. A fainting fit or bout of guilt-ridden hysterics was more in character. "Who was surprised then?" he asked, returning to his original question.
Lula turned to Sam. "Meaning no disrespect to him, Sam-lad, but is your gent-friend always so morbid, asking people who'd want to murder `em?"
"I'm `fraid so, Auntie," Sam answered. "He's hardly got started yet. Wait `til he starts on suspecting your nearest 'n' dearest."
"I know it's rather a grotesque thing to have to consider, Mrs. Tredgold," Frodo admitted, "but I am investigating a murder."
"That poor woman," Lula murmured.
"Yes, and this morbid line of question may help me to understand why she was killed and who did it. I hope you don't mind answering as best you can, for her sake."
"No, I don't mind," said Lula, thought the idea that the unknown woman had been killed in her place by mistake was obviously still disturbing to her, "not if it's to catch a murderer."
"You mentioned the folks that was renting the old Goodchild place," Sam prompted his aunt.
"That's right, the Peasleys," said Lula. "But they'd naught to gain from my dying. They'd stay on in their house no matter what happened to me, unless you or your brother tossed `em out."
"Who else?" asked Frodo. "Who else did you see since when you first returned to Gamwich?"
"Some of my old girl-friends. Mulda Deedle--that's Mrs. Bloomer at the Mousehole now. She saw me soon as I came to take a room there. Una Digby--she's married to one o' the Gamgees on a farm outside town. She was here shopping on the market day and we met in the square. And Nonnie Winterwell in town that day too. She married another farmer, the one who has that big orchard up the way."
At the mention of the orchard, Frodo was alert. "The Applegroves?"
"That's them. It was Old Applegrove who had the orchard when I was a girl--he's passed on long ago, but he'd be the grandfather to Nonnie's children, the family up there now. And the son Nonnie's married to must be the same young lad who was sweet on Bell when we first came to town. Sandy Applegrove. That was before Bell met Hamfast Gamgee at a dance- Oh! That must be who that feller was I saw at the funeral. Young Sandy, grown into an old hobbit. I wondered, but we didn't get a chance to talk before the vault was opened up."
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