by Mary Bowers
Maryellen took up the tale. “None of the neighbors really cared that she wasn’t around, because she’d just picked a fight with one of them over a dog and a rooster, and nobody was speaking to her.”
“The neighbors were all mad at her?” I asked.
“Everybody was always mad at her,” Maryellen said complacently. “A dog had gone after a rooster and killed it in the street, right in front of Marnie’s house, and she wanted it cleaned up by the dog’s owner. But she was so offensive about it, he ended up by telling her to get out her garden hose and do it herself. Normally, he’s a nice guy, but that’s the effect Marnie had on people.”
“I think I’m on Marnie’s side on this one,” I said uneasily. I made a mental note to check out this neighbor, then made a mental note not to get involved.
“Marnie only lived one block up and two doors over, but those of us who knew her didn’t visit her much, even Helena, and she’s a saint. Anyway, the point is, Marnie had the teacup at the time. Ozzie had finally acquired it at Ferdie’s estate sale, but he couldn’t help remembering how strange Ferdie had looked when he’d been in his shop that day, and then, of course, Ferdie had died the day after. Then Marnie bought it as soon as Ozzie put it on display, and not long after she brought it home, she died.”
“Oswald felt it was kind of strange, how determined Marnie was to get the cup,” Helena said.
But Maryellen dismissed it. “She was just a stubborn old lady, and the more Ozzie tried to talk her out of it, the more she wanted to have it. Ozzie didn’t like Marnie either, and when she tried to bargain with him, he actually upped the price, asking fifteen dollars more than what was written on the tag right under her nose. He gave her some malarkey about having just checked his catalogs and realizing it was more valuable than he first thought, but it was just because he didn’t want her to have it. Well, she double-crossed him and bought it anyway. She’d been bad-mouthing his business all over town about it ever since, but nobody put a gun to her head and made her pay too much for it.”
“Yes,” Camille said, nodding. “In a way, there was a gun to her head. She was meant to have it.”
We all looked at her but side-stepped her comment.
Maryellen glanced at the ceiling for patience and went on. “Marnie had very little family, just a nephew or something, and you guessed it, all her stuff went up for sale in the house when the nephew liquidated her estate. He never even came for a look, just told the lawyer to sell it all. And so Ozzie got it again. This time, he didn’t price it. He just locked it up in that display case and left it there.”
“If it’s not for sale, why does he have it in the showroom at all?” I asked.
“Because by now, everybody who lives here knows about it and they all want to see it,” Helena said. “He’s not happy about it, but there it is. People kept going into the shop and asking to see it, and he doesn’t even like touching it, so he put it in a locked display case so he could show them and nobody would be able to handle it, and he makes it clear that it is not for sale.”
“And,” Maryellen said to me, “if you hadn’t been clever enough to grab it out of the case while he was off his guard, I wouldn’t have it now for the cover of my book. I’m sure he wouldn’t have unlocked that cabinet for me, even though he’d already said I could borrow it. I’m very grateful to you. I’ll send you an autographed copy of my book as soon as it’s published.”
“Oh, thank you,” I said. “I’ll remember about the box of tissues.” I had already decided not to read it, though. Little Meggie was already getting real to me, and I did not want to read her death scene.
Camille was shaking her head sadly, and Maryellen cocked her head at her and said, “Go on, let’s have the crack of doom. I can see you’re just about to explode, so go ahead, let it out.”
“Laugh,” Camille said, nodding. “I knew you would. Laugh at the fates, laugh at me, laugh at God and all the saints if you want to.”
“Hey!” Maryellen said, flaring up for the first time. “Now you’re going too far.”
“It won’t change destiny, no matter what you do, you foolish woman.”
“Oh, put a sock in it, Camille. The Professor was right about you, and I’m not sorry he published that thing that embarrassed you so much. You had it coming.”
That hurt, and the fortuneteller stood up and said, “I’ve said what I came to say, even though I knew you wouldn’t listen. There. My conscience is clear. Thank you for the coffee. Taylor, I enjoyed meeting you. Nice to have seen you, Helena. Good-bye, Maryellen. You may not want to believe this, but I’ve always liked you. Loved you. You’re . . . you used to be a lot of fun.”
Overcome, she gave Maryellen a prolonged look, murmured, “Good-bye” again, pivoted, and swept herself off.
“How kind of her to give me a glimpse of my own wake,” Maryellen said when she heard the front door close behind Camille. “Like Tom Sawyer, I find it deeply moving. It’s good to know that even a nut like her will find something nice to say about me. Well, Taylor, you’ve only been in Key West for one night and you’ve already met your first eccentric. Welcome to the Conch Republic.”
I smiled feebly, thinking I’d met more than one.
Chapter 7
I turned quickly to Maryellen, before it could slip my mind, and asked, “Who’s the professor?”
Maryellen and Helena shared a bemused look.
“His name is Alexander Black, but everybody just calls him The Professor. He’s a retired English Lit teacher, and he publishes the neighborhood tabloid, such as it is.”
“Now, Maryellen, give him credit,” Helena said. She turned to me and went on. “He started doing a little weekly ad sheet with a few editorials and articles after he retired – just something for limited distribution that the neighbors could subscribe to if they wanted. He calls it The Keyster. You won’t find it in the giveaway racks on Duval Street. He hires a neighborhood kid to deliver it, like in the old days. He goes around to merchants himself to chat them up and get them to contribute coupons and ads. It’s gotten to be an underground must-have around here. His articles are a hoot, really cleverly written, and he’s always got his nose to the ground, so he knows things that we who live here want to know all about, but we don’t necessarily want the tourists to know.”
“And he published something that embarrassed Camille?” I asked.
“He began publishing prognostications from Camille,” Maryellen said. “You know the kind of stuff: ‘When Andromeda is at the elbow of Taurus, watch out for blowflies in the morning.’ The Professor gave her a column for a while. He called it “Camille Speaks,” and she used to write vague little things that seemed to get more and more specific as time went on.”
“Big mistake,” Helena said.
“So it came to pass. You know,” Maryellen went on, waxing philosophical, “the one cardinal rule of mystics should be to only predict things after they’ve already happened. Under no circumstances should they put them in print ahead of time, unless they’re writing the kind of heavy-sounding vagaries Nostradamus was so good at. Things you can interpret any way you want to, for centuries to come. Every time a bottle rocket goes off, Nostradamus predicted it; the man really had a knack for covering all the bases without really saying anything at all. But our Camille made the mistake of saying something very definite ahead of time and allowing it to be printed.”
“And it turned out to be flat-out wrong?” I asked.
“She made a real whopper,” Maryellen said deliciously. “She said no hurricanes would menace the Keys in 2017.”
“Only the gentlest of tropical storms,” Helena added, “and they would cause minimal damage.”
“Wow,” I said. “That was risky. What was she thinking?”
“Nothing at all, as usual,” Maryellen said. “She got it from a crystal ball somewhere, or maybe her tarot cards. The usual reliable sources of the self-deluded egotist. She really believes herself.”
Maryellen’s contempt fo
r Camille was getting ugly. Helena saw that, too, and tried to tone it down.
“She does get to be a bit much at times, but she means well, and I think she’s got a good heart,” Helena said. “Like just now, when you were so rude to her. She still said that she loved you. I hope the two of you aren’t going to get into a feud. At our age, it’s ridiculous. And as I learned when Big Billy and I found Marnie, any time you see someone could be the last time. Keep it nice, Maryellen, even if you have to bite your tongue.”
“You had a fight with Marnie?” Maryellen asked, zeroing in.
Helena stopped with her mouth open, caught. As a matter of fact, I did. I actually waited an extra day before I went and checked on her because of it. And when I finally did go, it was horrifying to think that maybe if I’d gone over sooner . . . .”
“The Medical Examiner said she’d been dead for days,” Maryellen said quickly. “It wouldn’t have made any difference.”
“She’d been badmouthing Oswald over the raw deal he’d given her for the teacup,” Helena said, “and she knew darn well how close he and I have become. She was doing it for spite, trying to get a rise out of me, and she got one. Afterwards, I was ashamed of myself for not just walking away, which would have been sufficient.”
“No it wouldn’t,” Maryellen said. “She was being obnoxious and you put her in her place. Don’t give us that pious attitude now. She deserved it.”
“Come on, Maryellen,” I said. “The poor woman is dead. You’re talking about your friends here. Be nice.”
She iced over and I didn’t care, but the moment didn’t last long. Even if Maryellen enjoyed a bit of scandal way too much, at least she could back down again when you called her on it. I guess you have to be a gossip hound if you’re going to write fiction.
“Well, maybe you’re right,” she said after that one icy moment. “It was a terrible way to die, no matter how much of a pain in the ass she was. May she rest in peace. In fact, I hope to hell she does rest in peace and leaves us all alone. She’d make the worst ghost I can possibly think of.”
She lifted her teacup as if she’d made a toast and took a formal sip, but neither Helena nor I followed suit.
I decided I wanted to go, but first I asked, “Have there been any victims since Marnie?”
“No,” Helena said, “but she’s only been dead for about a month. I suppose that’s why Oswald is still so jumpy about it, and why he called on your friend Ed for help.”
“I see. Well, unless you can think of something else about the harbinger of death over there, I think I’d better be going.”
I looked to both of them for any response, and Helena shifted uneasily.
“I’d just like to say that I’m not happy that you and your company are going to make a documentary about the teacup,” she said. “I’d like you to consider discouraging the project, if you can. I don’t think these superstitions should be blown out of proportion. Like that doll over in the museum. Have you heard of it? Its name is Robert, and it was owned by an artist who clung to it his whole life as a kind of security blanket.”
“Like one of those so-called comfort animals people are always dragging around,” Maryellen said dryly.
Helena frowned at her. “People really do need animals for comfort. That’s not what I mean at all.”
“Oh, well excuse me,” Maryellen murmured, giving her head a little waggle.
“I’m just using the doll as an example,” Helena went on. “Granted the doll is creepy-looking, but I don’t think it was meant to come out that way. It was handmade by a servant when the artist was a child, and it just happened to turn out looking sinister. But a whole legend has been built up about it and money is being made from it, and it’s all nonsense, using superstition to capitalize off tourists looking for reasons to think Key West is full of weirdos. The artist was just an odd man and the doll is just a doll, and I don’t like people making fun of Key West that way. It’s a wonderful island with a rich history, and there are a lot more interesting things that are real to learn out about in Key West. It’s not healthy to encourage people to believe silly things, that’s all I’m saying.”
“And I think it’s a lot of fun and life is short and you shouldn’t take things so seriously,” Maryellen said.
Helena went on as if she hadn’t heard. “And now Oswald is all upset over this teacup and I have to wonder, is he really afraid of it or is he trying to generate interest in his shop and create a legend for himself. There, I said it.” She sat back, a picture of blue-eyed, fluffy defiance.
“Oh, I don’t think Ozzie would do that,” Maryellen said, serious at last. “He’s not the type. You’ve known him all your life just as I have. Have you ever known him to be a phony?”
“No, I guess not. But really . . . a teacup?”
“Look, honey, we all have that place in the backs of our minds where fear trumps reason and belief trumps knowledge. Ozzie knew Ferdie and Marnie, and picking up their little treasures and putting them up for sale bothers him. Of course it does; he’s a sensitive man, but it’s what he does for a living and he has to do it. Still, when he acquires estate items from people he’s known, it upsets him. By the time you’re our age, you’ve lost a lot of friends. There comes a time when they begin to fall away like autumn leaves, and suddenly you’re the last one standing. Maybe he’s sublimating that angst into a fear of the teacup, using it as a focus for his feelings about his own coming death. He’s 87, you know, just like me, and deep in that cold, damp place where we keep the terrible truths, we never allow ourselves to forget it. So – blame the teacup. It’s easier than saying that it’s nobody’s fault and that’s just life.”
It was a triumph of pseudo-psychological rambling, and it left us with nothing to say except, “You may be right.”
Getting up, I thanked her for the tea and said I’d be going.
Helena was ready to go, too. She stood up and said she’d walk me over to Duval Street.
Once we were outside, I said, “I’m going back to The Sailor’s Rest, not Duval Street.”
“Okay, I’ll walk you there. I just want to walk, and I’d rather not be alone while I do. I walk alone too much as it is.”
Without saying anything out loud about Maryellen and her big mouth, I said sure, come on along with me then, and we had a nice walk to the B&B.
* * * * *
I found myself liking Helena a lot, and when we got to The Sailor’s Rest, I invited her in. I wanted to introduce her to Michael. And I guess since I was on the job, she might be somebody for Ed to meet too, given her connection to the last atrocity of the teacup. Not that I was going to let him talk to her about it that day; she was already unsettled over it, and I didn’t want him whipping out his pocket recorder and trying to interview her. I’d tell him all about it later.
She knew Arielle, of course, since she was close friends with Arielle’s uncle, and she wanted to see how the redecorating project was going, so she came in with me.
Porter greeted us, so I knew that Teddy was around somewhere. When he’s on a project, he usually keeps Porter with him, since he somehow got the idea that Porter protects him from the Great Unknown.
I guarded Helena’s frail form from a blitz attack from the bulldog and got her inside safely.
Once in the parlor, she looked around with approval and said a few nice things. Without knowing it, Helena said these things while Arielle could hear her, so my landlady came forward practically blowing kisses.
“Helena!” Arielle said, “I haven’t seen you in forever. Uncle Oswald talks about you so much I’m beginning to wonder if I’m going to be calling you Auntie one of these days.”
“Oh, Oswald and I are just good friends,” Helena said, going pink. “We’ve known one another too long to start acting like kids.”
“Kids aren’t the only ones who act like that,” Arielle said. She was watching Helena with a calculating look underneath her smile, and I wondered what her agenda was.
“We
do enjoy one another’s company,” Helena said. “But he’s got his business to run, and we both have our own houses, and neither one of us wants to give up our own turf to move onto the other’s, if you know what I mean.”
“Of course I do,” Arielle said, her eyes sharpening but her mouth still smiling. “You put a lot of your own soul into your house, and there is absolutely no reason you should have to leave it for any man. I know I’ll never be able to give this place up, especially after I’ve made it just the way I want it. Come on, let me show you what I’m doing.”
They seemed to have forgotten that I was there, but just before they left the parlor, Arielle threw a whip-like glance across the room at me. Suddenly tired, I needed my Michael. I went to see if he was in our room; since he’d gone off with Arielle and she was back, so was he.
Chapter 8
I found him sitting in a chair by the window in our room, looking contented. He was holding a book in one hand, angling it to the light, and stroking Bella with the other. He had left the door standing open, and when I got to the threshold, Bella was looking directly at me as if she’d been expecting me.
I looked into her eyes for a moment, then told Michael hello.
He shut the book without marking his place and set it aside.
“So how was tea and cookies with the grand dame of romance?”
“She’s no romantic,” I said. I put my purse on a chest of drawers and draped myself across the end of the bed. “She’s a murder mystery writer. I’ve never read any of her books, but I’m guessing her murders are all unnecessarily gruesome and her characters are all obnoxious. She thinks she’s a Patricia Wentworth, but I don’t think she can be. The venom that sloshes around in that woman’s head could never produce the wistful lovers of a Wentworth.”
“I can’t wait to meet her,” he said.
“She’s a character, all right.”
