TO THE MANOR DEAD   The Queensville Heritage Society is restoring the once-grand Dumpe Manor. While Dumpe relatives and society members use the occasion to dust off old grudges, Jaymie Leighton prefers to adorn the kitchen with authentic Depression Era furnishings. A collection of vintage wooden mallets found in the house is a perfect addition to her display, but one also offers a late-night intruder the perfect weapon to knock Jaymie unconscious before escaping.   Though the attack has everyone on edge, nothing is missing from the house. Perhaps it was merely a vagrant who thought the place was still abandoned. But when Dumpe Manor’s resident historian is murdered with a mallet from the same collection, it’s time for Jaymie to turn up the heat on the investigation before someone else becomes history. Includes recipes! Praise for the Vintage Kitchen Mysteries “A chilling whodunit.”— Richmond Times-Dispatch   “Jaymie is a great character . . . She is inquisitive and full of surprises . . . I’m giving this one 5 out of 5 apples from my book bag!”— Debbie’s Book Bag “Well-plotted with several unexpected twists and more developed characters.”— The Mystery Reader “Smartly written and successfully plotted.”— Library Journal   As Victoria Hamilton, Donna Lee Simpson is the national bestselling author of the Vintage Kitchen Mysteries as well as the Merry Muffin Mysteries and is also a collector of vintage cookware and recipes.   ACKNOWLEDGMENTS One “I LOVE OLD JUNK as much as the next gal—and probably more, if the next gal is your sister, Becca—but I just don’t understand how you could get so excited over a bunch of old wooden hammers,” Valetta Nibley said. Jaymie Leighton, sitting with Valetta in the middle of the black-and-white-tiled Dumpe Manor kitchen floor, sighed as she turned each one over and checked it against a catalog of antique and vintage kitchen utensils. “They are not hammers, they’re kitchen mallets. These are antique and vintage, and several are in perfect condition. I have never seen such an oddball collection all in one place!” She held up one with a long spindle-like handle that was round in shape but flat on the bottom. “Look at this; it’s beautiful! According to my research so far, with the flat bottom, it probably dates from the end of the 1800s or early 1900s.” “It’s still just a wooden hammer.” Jaymie sighed and shook her head. “ Et tu , Valetta? Et tu? Besides, they’re not even all mallets. This one is a pestle, and this one a muddle.” She held up one with a rounded bottom, and another that was flat. “Muddle, mallet, it’s all the same. They are wooden hammer thingies.” Valetta scrambled to her feet, and Hoppy, Jaymie’s three-legged Yorkie-Poo, danced around begging for attention. Valetta picked him up and cuddled him. “Even Hoppy thinks you’re wasting your time. He wants to go for walkies!” Jaymie looked up at her, serious in her concentration. “You know how important this is to the Queensville Heritage Society, Valetta. They’ve entrusted me to take care of the kitchen display, and I’m going to do it right!” Her friend looked down with a smile on her face, her glasses glinting in the late day sunlight that streamed in the uncurtained window. She looked around the shabby kitchen: worn countertop, battered cupboards, water-stained walls. “You’d need to be an explosives expert to do this kitchen right, kiddo.” Jaymie surveyed the space. Valetta had a point. Dumpe Manor had deteriorated over the years from the stylish Queen Anne manse it had begun life as, to a sad, crumbling boardinghouse that was eventually abandoned as too big to be practical. There were problems with it, but still . . . the Queensville Heritage Society had bought it inexpensively, using some of the money from the sale of the Button Gwinnett letter it had been given—the letter was extremely valuable because Gwinnett was a Declaration of Independence signer. But before the purchase the group had had an accredited structural engineer look it over, and he had pronounced both the foundation and the structure itself sound. “It just needs some love,” Jaymie said softly. “So do I, but at least I don’t look like a hobo squatter’s dream,” Valetta joked. She put Hoppy down and the little dog climbed into Jaymie’s lap. “I have to go. Brock has an open house tomorrow he has to set up,” she said, referring to her real estate agent brother. “So I’m looking after my niece and nephew.” “Evil and Wicked?” Jaymie asked with a laugh, using her nicknames for Eva and William. “They’re not that bad—no worse than you were at that age, and don’t you forget it!” Valetta, about the same age as Jaymie’s older sister, Becca, was fifteen years Jaymie’s senior and had babysat her as a kid, but over the last few years they had developed a more equal friendship. “You going to be okay here alone?” she asked, looking around the pitiful kitchen and shuddering. “I’ll be fine. I have my trusty attack dog, Hoppy,” Jaymie joked. “Right, a frien