Steamed Open

by Barbara Ross

  But nonetheless, throwing out caveats every other sentence, I stumbled through it. Betty Reynolds would have been an awful poker player. All of her emotions played across her features. Astonishment at the description of Herrickson House. Horror in response to the murder. Shock at the idea of an inheritance.

  I had no doubt that she was hearing everything I told her for the first time. She hadn’t killed Bart Frick in order to gain an inheritance. She hadn’t known who he was or a thing about it.

  “But I don’t understand how you found me. Or how you knew to come looking in the first place.” Our lemonade glasses sweated in the heat, leaving puddles on the glossy fake wood of the kitchen table.

  I talked her through the chain of how I’d found her, starting with the photo of Frank Herrickson I’d found in Lou’s desk. At that point, she excused herself. She was gone long enough I worried she was phoning the police. She returned with a black and white photo in an inexpensive brass frame.

  “Is this the one?”

  “Yes! That’s it. So you have a copy, too. Was Frank Herrickson your godfather?”

  She sat down again. “Not that I ever knew. I found this in my mother’s things when she passed. I kept it because it’s the only photo I have of me when I was a toddler. I used to tease my parents that I must be adopted because there were no baby pictures of me.” She took the image in both hands and studied it. “My granddaughter Samantha looked just like that.”

  “Does it say anything on the back?”

  “Dunno.” Betty moved the clasps, stiff with long disuse, and opened the back of the frame. The photo slid out, tan with age. There wasn’t a mark on it.

  “What do you know about your early life?” I asked.

  “My mother told me we lived in Busman’s Harbor when I was small. I don’t honestly remember it. We moved to Scarborough before I started kindergarten. I’ve stayed in town right along. I married Bill Anderson when I was eighteen, right out of high school. It turned out to be a terrible mistake. I was directionless in school and I panicked about the future and married the first man who asked.” She spread both hands out on the table. “But I did get my daughter Meredith from that marriage, so I can’t regret everything about it. After I left my husband, Meredith and I moved back in with my parents. They were getting on. I’d been used to having older parents, but their declines came so suddenly. First my father, who died from heart disease when I was thirty. Then my mother five years later. I tried to keep up the house, but it was too much. I sold it to Earl Cabot to keep the bank from foreclosing.”

  “Grammy, it’s too hot outside. Can we watch TV?”

  Betty nodded without speaking. The kids had the answer they wanted and ran off before she could change her mind.

  “A few years later, I met my second husband. Al Reynolds was everything Bill Anderson was not. He was kind, patient, a good provider. He treated me like a queen and Meredith was his little princess. Unfortunately, we didn’t know it, but he had a bad ticker. He passed five years ago. Meredith is single again, too. She and the kids live with me.” Betty looked up at me and smiled. “How am I going to tell her I’m an heiress?”

  “May be an heiress,” I emphasized.

  “My parents were never ones to dwell on the past. ‘The best day is today,’ my father used to say. I was surprised and pleased to find this baby photo.”

  “Was there anything else in your parents’ things that might help you establish your claim?”

  “I couldn’t keep much when we sold their house. I have a box of papers, that’s all.”

  “Maybe look through it to see if there’s a baptismal certificate with your godfather’s name on it,” I suggested.

  “That’s a good idea. Then what do you think I should do?”

  “Dunwitty, Moscone, Tyler and Saperstein seems like the best place to start. You can let them tell you about the Spencer Family Trust and ask how to handle making yourself known to Lou Herrickson’s attorney. If Bart Frick has heirs, they might also believe they inherit. And, the state police will want to talk to you, too.”

  She blinked. “I guess they would. You don’t think they suspect me in this murder?”

  “I don’t think so. They can’t prove you knew anything about it. But maybe check with your lawyer before you speak with them.”

  I thanked Betty for the lemonade and headed to the back door, the way I’d come in. Cartoon voices came from the television in the living room.

  At the door, she said, “Can I give you a hug?”

  “Of course.” I hugged her back. “I hope the news I’ve brought turns out to be good for you.”

  “Me, too. But even if it isn’t, you’ve still made my day. I’ll tell this story for years.”

  CHAPTER 24

  There were no cars in the driveway when I returned to Ida’s sister’s house. I knocked hard on the door, hoping Ida was home alone. When there was no answer, I knocked harder. “Ida! Are you here? I need to speak to you urgently.”

  “Julia?” The door opened a few inches. Ida’s slightly bulging eyes were red, as was her nose.

  I gave a slight push and Ida stepped back to let me in. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “You’ll think I’m a foolish old woman, crying about the past, things that can’t be changed.” She led me through the living room into the sunlit kitchen.

  “Is there anything I can do?” I cringed inwardly. I had come to have a serious talk with this woman, and to do that, I had to ask questions that would only cause more pain.

  As if she sensed my discomfort, she looked at me sharply and asked, “Why are you here?”

  “I have more questions and I’m afraid they won’t help your mood.”

  “Will they help me stay out of jail?”

  I was honest. “I don’t know, but I think they will help us fill in some blanks and may keep someone else out of trouble.”

  She hesitated, but then gestured for me to sit down at the table and sat as well.

  “Are you ready?” I asked.

  “As I’ll ever be. The past is not a happy place for me.”

  I cleared my throat. There was no delicate way forward. “You told me you went to prison for killing your husband. You didn’t tell me you had a daughter.”

  “I don’t like to think about her.” Ida plucked a napkin from the holder at the center of the table. “I don’t talk about what happened with my husband, if I can avoid it. I never talk about my baby.”

  She dabbed at her eyes with the napkin. I waited for her to be able to continue. “I married in haste, and repented in haste, too. I knew instantly it was wrong. My husband was cruel, both in words and deeds. He beat me on the second day of our honeymoon and he never stopped. Until I stopped him.”

  I reached across the table and put my hand on hers.

  “I should have left. I knew I should have left, but I was pregnant, and then I had an infant, a toddler. I took on cleaning jobs. There were a few kind people who let me bring my daughter with me when I cleaned their houses. But without a car, I couldn’t get enough jobs to earn enough to keep us.

  “I should have returned to Busman’s Harbor. I know that now. But I was too full of pride. Peg told me the first time she met Leland to stay away from him. I insisted he was a good man. But the signs were always there. I was too desperate to see them.

  “On the night I killed my husband, he had beat me without mercy. He was always careful not to hit me in the face or arms, any place that would show. But that night, he lost control. I thought he would kill me. He’d returned from clamming, not a good day, which always set him off. He was in the garage, putting away his equipment when I came out and the fight started.

  “Then, while he was hitting me, through the open window in her room, I heard my daughter cry out from her crib. He didn’t seem to notice. He never heard her cry or picked her up. The louder she got, the stronger I got, until I was beating him. The louder she wailed, the more crazed I became. I picked his clam rake off the wall and swung i
t at him. He backed way, but not far enough. I caught him in the shoulder, above the collarbone. Blood spurted out of him, so much blood, and he went down.

  “I ran to the kitchen and called for the police and the ambulance service. By the time I got back out to the garage, he was dead. When the police came, they took one look at me and sent me straight to the hospital. I yelled for them to get Frances. A policeman went into the house and carried her out. I never saw her again.”

  “Your baby’s name was Frances?”

  Ida nodded, unable to speak. She was crying in earnest by then. Great wracking sobs that were painful to hear. I couldn’t think what to say. I squeezed her hand and waited.

  “When they sentenced me to twenty years in prison, I signed the adoption papers. I didn’t want her to grow up shunted from foster family to foster family. By the time I got out, she’d be an adult.”

  “But your sister—”

  “Didn’t know I’d had a baby. I was three months pregnant when I married. I didn’t want my family to figure it out. My lawyer did mention Frances during the trial, and that was in the newspapers, but by then I’d given her up.”

  “On that particular day, what was it that set your husband off so badly?”

  “I had a plan to leave him. I was sneaking things out of the house, a little at a time. Clothes for me and the baby. Cash. A few keepsakes. I kept them in an old crate in the garage. Leland found them that afternoon.”

  “And that’s what made him so angry,” I said.

  “Yes. Mostly. But there was something he found in the crate that set him off more than anything else. A photo.”

  I already knew the answer. “A photo of Frank Herrickson.”

  She nodded.

  “Frances’ father.”

  She nodded again.

  “Leland knew Frank was my baby’s father.” She paused. “Frank was a lovely man. Truly, I was in love with him, though I knew we had no future. Old Mrs. Herrickson was a harridan. When she found out I was expecting, and Frank was the father, she was furious. She was the one who found Leland Fischer and bribed him to marry me and move me away up the coast. He clammed out on Sea Glass Beach almost every day and often sold his whole lot to the Herricksons when they threw parties.

  “I was embarrassed, ashamed, broke, without work. I thought Leland was my lifeline. Instead, he was the end of me.”

  “Were you angry Frank didn’t stand up for you, didn’t marry you himself?”

  “I never expected him to. He was a lovely man, but not a strong one, and he never had the power to stand up to his mother. It was no surprise to me he didn’t marry until after she was gone.” She dabbed her eyes again and blew her nose. “Why are you asking about this? I thought you were trying to keep me out of jail. Everything I’ve told you only makes me look more guilty.”

  I took my time with my answer. This part of the conversation was delicate, and I didn’t want to give her false information or hope. “Do you know what happened to your daughter?”

  “No. I’ve tried to find out. But those were different times. Once I signed the papers, I had no right to know anything more.”

  “After you were charged, did you ask Frank for help?”

  “I wrote to him at Herrickson House. I got a curt note back from Old Mrs. Herrickson saying he was out of the country. She said she was sorry to hear about my troubles, but she took no responsibility for them. She never asked about my child, her granddaughter.”

  “How did Frank react when you returned to Herrickson House?”

  “At first, he was reluctant. I know he didn’t want me there. I brought too many sad memories, too much guilt. But Lou found out I had worked at the house and was newly out of prison and demanded they hire me. Frank couldn’t say no to her, any more than he could to his mother. I was desperate, so I took it. In time, we found our rhythm. I was happy to be back at Herrickson House.”

  “Did Lou know about the baby?” I asked.

  Ida’s brows drew together. “I never thought so. She never treated me as though she knew. I certainly never told her. And she had her reasons to keep her past in the past, too. All of us did.”

  I leaned across the table so I could look her in the eye. “I think it was Frank who arranged for your daughter’s adoption.”

  “What?” Her big eyes blinked rapid fire.

  I pulled the photo from my tote bag. “Is this your daughter?”

  She took it from me, examining the photo through her tears. She held it to her chest, collapsing around it. “My Frances, my Frances, my Frances.”

  I waited again while she cried. “How did you get this?” she asked.

  “From under the cubbies in Lou’s desk. A woman named Betty Reynolds has the exact same photo. She lives in Scarborough. I think she was adopted when she was two by a couple named Spencer. Do you remember them?”

  “Arlen Spencer was Mrs. Herrickson’s driver. And Eve was the housekeeper,” she answered.

  “They were older parents. My guess is they couldn’t have children of their own. Frank brought them baby Frances after you signed those papers. He set up a trust fund for their family. They lived for a time in the cottage across from Herrickson House, but then they moved to Scarborough. Mr. Spencer owned a gas station and garage there.”

  “They can’t still be alive.” Ida could barely get the words out. “Does this mean you’ve met . . .” She couldn’t finish.

  “I’ve met a lovely woman named Betty Reynolds. She has a daughter and two grandchildren.”

  “She’s happy then?” There was so much tenderness, so much hope in Ida’s voice.

  I pictured the woman in the little cape house, tending to her granddaughter’s scraped elbow. “She’s had some ups and downs, like everyone. But yes, I think she’s happy.”

  Ida opened her mouth to speak, but couldn’t.

  “She’s the goddaughter,” I added, in case Ida hadn’t put it together. “She may be the one who inherits Herrickson House.” When Ida still didn’t speak, I continued. “I think Lou did know she was Frank’s daughter, and in naming her the successor heir to Bart Frick, Lou did what Frank wanted—insured that Herrickson House went to a Herrickson.”

  Ida’s sharp features scrunched together, working hard to comprehend what I’d said. It was an avalanche of information. “My Frances owns Herrickson House?”

  “Maybe. And all of Lou’s other assets, but not for sure. If Bart Frick has heirs, they may have a claim.” Binder and Flynn hadn’t turned up any heirs, but they hadn’t found Betty Reynolds, either. “And then there’s Lou’s daughter. Lou definitively cut her out of the will, but you never know. With things such a mess, she may try to horn her way back in.”

  Ida nodded. She’d caught up to the tale.

  “You lived with Lou all those years,” I said. “You’d lost a daughter, and so had she.”

  “I had no choice,” Ida protested. “Lou made a choice every month, year after year.”

  “How do you know that, since you never talked about the past?”

  “Every month, a letter arrived from Florida, addressed in the same handwriting, with the same return address. Lou had me put them in her desk. She never opened a single one.”

  I flashed on the pile of envelopes I’d seen Bart Frick examining. Binder and Flynn had taken them. They must be close to finding Lou’s daughter.

  “So you see,” Ida finished, “Lou turned her daughter away. I never stopped looking for mine.” She dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. “You realize, Julia, grateful as I am for this news, you’ve made me look more guilty. The police will say I murdered Bart Frick to get a fortune for my daughter.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. I offered to stay with her until Peg came home, but Ida said she wanted the time alone. At the front door she asked, “What should I do now? Should I call her?”

  “Give her some time,” I counseled. “I’ve only just told her about Frank. Let her go to the law firm and confirm that connection. Then you’ll know for su
re.”

  “Betty Reynolds, you said. In Scarborough.” Ida was already closing the door. She wouldn’t be following my advice, I was certain.

  CHAPTER 25

  I checked my phone has soon as I got in the Caprice. I had enough time to drop in at the police station, tell Binder and Flynn what I’d discovered, and then catch the evening cruise of the Jacquie II.

  But when I got there, the reception area was full. There were several clammers I recognized from the protest outside the beach access gate, including Will Orsolini. He sat on a bench with his wife Nikki and Duffy MacGillivray. I said hello to them, then checked in with the civilian receptionist. “The lieutenant and sergeant are in an interview. I’ll let them know you’re here when it ends. As you can see, there are several people ahead of you.”

  I sat with the clammers who waited with varying degrees of impatience. Legs jiggled, feet tapped, knuckles cracked. It was like being trapped the percussion section of a clown orchestra.

  Will, Nikki, and Duffy, on the other hand, were relaxed, laughing and joking. Nikki, in particular, had lost the drawn, tense edginess from the last time I’d seen her. As I watched her, a gear in the back of my mind started to turn. Something about Nikki when we were kids, I thought. But the gear failed to catch on anything, failed to turn the larger wheel, no matter how hard I worked it. The memory never came into focus.

  The door opened, and Binder and Flynn came out, along with Jamie and the lighthouse-loving Barnards. I’d been so bent on my mission I hadn’t noticed their RV in the parking lot, but through the double glass front doors, I spotted it, in all its lighthousey glory.

  Jamie walked them out.

  “Ms. Snowden,” Binder said.

  “She wants to talk to you,” the receptionist informed him, quite unnecessarily in my opinion. Why else would I be there?

  “Interesting. We’ll fit her in.”

  Outside, Jamie lingered with the Barnards. He shook both their hands in turn. This was the second time I’d seen him take time with them. Was he going to hug them? They were semi-adorable, at least when you got Anne in the right mood, but I was sure the police frowned on hugging witnesses, if that’s what they were.