“I guess they make do. They don’t have a lot of bills; they own their house, their rent on the bait shop is minimal . . . they get by.” She stood and tugged down her sweater. “That’s all I got, kiddo. I’d better get back to work. I’ve got five scripts coming in from doctors this afternoon that I’ll need to start filling!” She took Jaymie’s mug.
“And I’d better get doing something,” Jaymie said, standing and setting Hoppy down gently. “I’m playing hooky from about five things this afternoon.”
“Wish I could join you playing hooky, but illegible prescriptions for unpronounceable drugs wait for no woman. At least I have the weekend off. Hey, I heard that Thrifty Dan’s in Wolverhampton is closing down after Christmas.”
“Really? Aw, I always loved Dan. Next time I’m in town I’ll stop in and get the scoop. If he’s having a sale we can go together.”
Jaymie avoided her sister and brother-in-law’s antique store, though she knew Georgina had seen her with Valetta, and headed to the Queensville Inn, straight to Mrs. Stubbs’s room. She tapped, heard “Come in” and entered, letting Hoppy off his leash inside the door.
What she saw took a moment to make sense of. Mrs. Stubbs was in her wheelchair in front of her new smart TV, and she wore pink boxing gloves. She was watching a video and following boxing moves, right cross, left cross, defend! She briefly greeted Jaymie, then went on with her video until it was over a few moments later. The woman pulled off her gloves, turned off the TV and wheeled toward her sitting area by the window. Her son owned the Queensville Inn and had given her the last room on the main floor, which looked out on a patio terrace. Jaymie followed, but Hoppy was busy sniffing around the perimeter of the room, then disappeared into the en suite bathroom.
“So . . . you’re training for the next Olympics?” Jaymie asked.
Mrs. Stubbs chuckled, a dry-as-dust sound. “I’ve been exercising, as you know. Cynthia is still coming for wheelchair yoga workouts, which I’d prefer without the relentless chirpy monologue from her, but I know she means well. After I came back from Wolverhampton this morning I felt the need to pretend to pummel someone in the face.”
“Uh-oh. Who angered you?”
“You’ll want to hear this. But first . . . tea.”
Jaymie groaned inwardly. More tea? After coffee with Kevin and tea with Valetta she was ready to float. However, tea it was. She crossed to the little kitchenette area, a long counter with a bar fridge, hot plate, tiny sink and cupboards, made it, poured, and sat down with her friend at the table in front of the window with sun pouring in, lighting the tops of fresh flowers.
“So, this morning, at the hospital, that lawyer and Morgan Perry Wallace,” Mrs. Stubbs said with a grim expression. “Do you want to know what that was all about?”
“I do.”
Her voice trembling with anger, restlessly pushing and pulling her tea mug, sloshing hot tea over the edge, Mrs. Stubbs said, “While Lois was groggy and in pain, bruised and beaten and almost dead, Morgan was trying to bully her into signing a power of attorney so she could do whatever she damned well pleased with Lois’s property!”
Ten
STUNNED, JAYMIE BLURTED, “No, really? Did Miss Perry sign it?”
“Over my dead body she would have signed it.” Mrs. Stubbs took in a long breath and let it out, moving her shoulders. “That smarmy lawyer had the papers out, and I was about to speak up when a lady police detective came in to ask Lois some questions. She was poker-faced, but she strongly advised Morgan not to prod Lois into signing anything while she was in pain and drugged up. Said it wouldn’t stand up in a court, and that she herself would have to testify that Lois was in no state to sign anything so serious.”
“Wow, that’s . . . unusual.”
“My thoughts exactly. I never imagined the police would take that step, advising someone in that position.”
“I’m impressed,” Jaymie admitted. “It may be an important step in combating elder abuse. How did Morgan take it?”
Mrs. Stubbs mopped up the tea she had spilt using a tissue. “She was startled, but she seemed fine about it, I’ll give her that. Said the power of attorney was so she could take care of things, if need be.”
“As long as she doesn’t have the lawyer come back later, after the detective is gone,” Jaymie said.
“I think the warning was for the lawyer, too, and he seemed to understand.”
“Sure. Parker Bastion has a good reputation. But I hope Morgan doesn’t go to court to have Miss Perry declared incompetent to handle her affairs. That’s another way to get power of attorney, isn’t it?”
“Actually it’s more likely to be legal guardianship, if Lois was already considered incapacitated. I don’t think that’s going to happen with Morgan. At least, I hope it won’t. I’d fight her on it myself because Lois will bounce back; she’s just medicated right now.”
Jaymie longed to ask about Morgan and Fergus Baird, but she was uncomfortable sharing what she had seen, even though Mrs. Stubbs wouldn’t say a word. “What is Morgan’s deal? What about her marriage?”
“Saunders Wallace is a prig, obsessed with his clothes and car and lifestyle. Even at the wedding I thought that man was only marrying her because she was a Perry.”
“So no love lost between you two.”
“I don’t see them much, just at family gatherings once a year or so, but no, I don’t like him and he doesn’t like me.”
“I understand he’s not from around here. Morgan said his family is all in Scotland. Isn’t it odd that they wouldn’t come to his wedding?”
Taking a deep breath, calmer after her outburst, Mrs. Stubbs said, “Not all families are close. Folks have their own lives. For all we know it’s his third wedding and they decided to wait a while to see if this one sticks.”
Jaymie snorted with laughter, thinking of Joel; he had been married and engaged to three . . . no, four, counting this latest, women over the last two years. And Becca! Her own dear sister was on her fourth husband, after a few youthful miscalculations. Not everyone was fortunate enough to find the right one the first time, as she had.
“He’s a phony,” Mrs. Stubbs added. “You only have to have seen his TV ads for that. The Wallace Cheese,” she added with a disparaging grunt. “His smile isn’t cheesy, it’s fake, as phony as processed cheese food and his red hair.”
“As long as Morgan loves him, right?” Jaymie said, thinking of his worried look as he semi-comforted his wife.
“Morgan has been good to Lois but . . .” She sighed and shook her head. “Something is wrong, I don’t know what, something about Morgan. I can’t put my finger on it. Just a feeling, I guess.” She grimaced and flexed her knotted fingers. “Or maybe it’s the arthritis.”
“Did you stay while the detective talked to Lois?”
“No. It was getting crowded and Edith came for me. I felt Lois was safe with Detective Vestry there and the lawyer leaving.”
Without access to the police through Chief Ledbetter, Jaymie felt like her arm was cut off. She couldn’t ask Bernie for info; it wouldn’t be fair to infringe on a friendship that way, and Bernie wouldn’t tell her anything anyway. Even finding Lois injured and perhaps saving her life didn’t make it her business.
No matter how much she kept saying that to herself, it didn’t help.
• • •
AFTER DUMPING HER TEA AND USING THE WASHROOM, with Hoppy staring at her in an unnerving manner, she headed out, carrying her little dog through the foyer and past the café. She looked in as she was passing and stopped dead. Fergus Baird—dressed in his usual eye-catching pastels, mauve and yellow this time, with white leather tasseled loafers—was sitting having lunch with a woman. Well, he wasn’t married, so far as she knew, and a man could have lunch with any woman he wanted to without anything sinister going on, unlike what some folks thought.
However, she did want to talk to him. No time like the present. She asked Edith, Mrs. Stubbs’s significant-other-in-law, as she calle
d it—her son’s live-in girlfriend and co-manager of the inn—to look after Hoppy, and the woman agreed with alacrity. As Jaymie strode away, Edith was coochy-cooing her little dog as if he was a baby.
Baird was still there, and the lunch had taken a more intimate look, with the woman touching his hand, his silvery hair glinting in the soft light as he leaned across the table, speaking to her in hushed tones. Awkward to barge in, but when had that ever stopped her in the past? She was known as nosy and had decided not to fight the reputation.
She approached the table. “Mr. Baird?” she said as the woman snatched her hand away from his. He admitted his identity. Jaymie glanced at his luncheon companion, trying to place her. She looked familiar, an attractive plump woman in her fifties, wearing a wrap top in fall florals and figure-hugging dark gold leggings, with high heels on dainty feet. Or one dainty foot anyway; the other was encapsulated in the kind of boot used when one breaks a leg. Jaymie smiled at her and nodded.
“Can I help you with something?” Baird asked.
“Yes, I . . .” But distracted from her mission, she glanced at the woman again. Something about her was naggingly familiar. She looked again, trying not to stare, but the blonde hair, piled high, with fetching curls dangling, her round cherubic face, right now holding an annoyed expression . . .
“And you are . . . ? I’m sorry, I don’t think we know each other,” Baird said impatiently, though the chilly look in his eyes warned that he did remember her from Wolverhampton.
“We have a couple of mutual friends,” she said, her attention back on Baird. “We met out at the heritage house when you were speaking with Haskell Lockland. And you know Morgan Perry Wallace. You’re . . . friends with her, correct?”
Baird, his tanned, oddly smooth face devoid of emotion, answered, “Yes, we know each other. We both belong to the Wolverhampton Country Club, as does Haskell.”
“And Morgan’s aunt owns the dockside buildings: the feed shop and . . . oh!” She turned to the woman. “The bait shop! You’re Beverly Hastings, right?” Mrs. Hastings was so differently dressed from the last time she had seen her it was no wonder Jaymie hadn’t recognized her. “You and your husband run the bait shop.”
She nodded.
“May I help you with something?” Baird asked, his tone edging from impatience to irritation. “Mrs. Hastings and I happened to run into each other and are having lunch. If you have something to say I’d appreciate it if you got on with it.”
Since Jaymie hadn’t asked why they were together—it was odd he felt the need to explain—she didn’t reply to that. “I won’t keep you. I wondered if you had heard that Miss Perry was in the hospital?”
“The poor dear!” Bev Hastings said, her voice warm. “I was so upset when I heard what happened! I’m sure you were too, Fergie?”
Fergie?
“I was appalled,” he said, his tone hard with anger. “I heard it was one of those hoodlum kids that have been trespassing all over the place. I had to chase a couple of them away from my house in Wolverhampton.”
“We’ve had to add an alarm system at the bait shop,” Bev said. “Imagine that, an alarm system where we sell worms and minnows!”
Jaymie did not think that some supposed hoodlum kids broke into Miss Perry’s home and strung a trap for her, but she was not about to expose how much she knew about the incident. “By the way, Mrs. Hastings, are you okay? Have you done something to your leg?” She indicated the boot.
“Oh, yes, well, it was actually at the shop. That old boardwalk by the marina is falling apart. I was walking toward the bait shop and my foot went right through a board. It’s not a break, fortunately, but it is a severe strain.”
“I’m so sorry!” Jaymie said, shocked. “Someone should do something if the boardwalk is in such bad shape.”
She shook her head. “As much as I love her, I’ve been telling Miss Perry for years that repairs are needed.”
“Someone is going to be badly hurt,” Baird said. “Now you see why I want to buy those buildings! Ownership of such public property requires someone who understands building maintenance.”
Jaymie was about to ask what he meant by that, when his real idea was to wipe out the buildings and construct condos, but that was not the most politic thing, with a co-owner of the bait shop sitting right there. Instead she said, “Miss Perry is going to be fine, I believe. My friend Mrs. Stubbs is her cousin. And I’m sure Morgan, her niece, will make sure she has help once she’s out of the hospital,” Jaymie said, watching Baird’s face for any sign of recognition when she said Morgan’s name.
“She’s fortunate to have family nearby,” he said.
“I’ll leave you to your lunch,” Jaymie said. They said goodbye, and she headed back to get Hoppy before he ended up dressed in a bonnet in a stroller, completely possible with Edith.
“He’s such a sweetie,” Edith said affectionately as she handed him across the reservations desk to Jaymie.
The little dog reached up and licked Jaymie’s mouth, and she laughed. “He is that! Hey, Edith, I spoke with Fergus Baird in the dining room. I guess he ran into Bev Hastings and they ended up sitting together?”
“Well, not exactly,” Edith said, sitting back down behind the desk, drawing herself close to her computer. “I take reservations for the restaurant. Bev reserved a table for lunch and said to tell Fergus she’d be a little late if he arrived before her.”
That was odd. Why would Baird lie about something like that? Of course, some people lie about anything and everything. The phone rang, releasing Jaymie from lengthy goodbyes. She waved as Edith took the call, and departed, sitting in her SUV for a few minutes with her trusty notebook. A bunch of things were worrying her, and it always helped to write them down physically, which she did as Hoppy propped himself up at the open window, barking at passers-by.
Some of it was what she had been pondering for days, some was new.
One: Who tried to kill Lois Perry?
It had to be someone with access to the house, which limited the number of people, but Jaymie didn’t know enough about Lois to know who would be included in that group. And one had to allow for additional folks, like someone pretending to check the smoke alarm for her, or deliver a package, or who knew what else?
Two: Was Morgan in on it? And was that why she was now trying to get her aunt to sign a POA, or did Lois’s “accident” make her realize she would need the POA if her aunt was incapacitated or unconscious for long?
Actually, it was surprising a POA wasn’t already in place. It was a necessity of life. Becca had power of attorney for their Grandma Leighton so she could take care of things if something happened. Not everything had a sinister origin, and she mustn’t demonize Morgan or assign murderous motives because she appeared to be cheating on her husband. No one knew the inside of a marriage unless they were one of the partners.
Three: Was the silver set that Bev Hastings sold to Queensville Fine Antiques truly Lois Perry’s? And if it was, how did she get it?
How many people in the world owned a full set of Savoy by Buccellati sterling silver flatware worth upward of ten thousand dollars? Maybe it was unfair to speculate that the set was Lois Perry’s stolen silver, but still . . . if it was, how did Mrs. Hastings get it? Jaymie couldn’t see her throwing a rock at Miss Perry’s back window and climbing in past the jagged glass. Had someone else done it, and she was merely the fence?
Four: Why were Bev Hastings and Fergus Baird, two people with apparently little in common and contrary goals, having a scheduled lunch together? And why did Fergus Baird feel the need to lie about it, passing it off as a chance meeting?
Hmmm . . . another affair? Bev Hastings and Morgan Perry Wallace, despite a twenty-year age difference, did have a few things in common, including a curvy figure, nice taste in clothes, and blonde hair. And both were married. Maybe Baird was having an affair with both, or maybe it was happenstance that he was having lunch with Bev Hastings.
Or . . . perhaps Bev
and Jon Hastings were thinking about selling the business to Fergus so he could open his proposed tea shop. She rolled her eyes at her own attempt to be fair and impartial. She already knew that Baird’s plans for the land, should he acquire it, had nothing to do with tea shops and boutiques and everything to do with water views and condo HOAs.
• • •
DINNER, COOKED BY JAKOB, was lasagna made with spinach and zucchini—surprisingly delicious, if a little watery. Gently she suggested that next time, should he choose to repeat the recipe, he cut the zucchini and let it drain in a colander over a bowl to get rid of the excess moisture. Jocie’s suggestion, given with a wrinkled nose, was that he replace the zucchini with almost anything else.
After dinner, Jakob went out to take care of some business while Jaymie did dishes with Jocie, who stood on a stool to dry, though she was often distracted by Hoppy and Lilibet; Hoppy would entice Jocie with sharp yips of excitement, then lead her to where the kitten was hiding. A mad dash about the living room would ensue, Hoppy’s yipping and Jocie’s squeals of laughter echoing. But finally the three were worn out. After dishes, Jaymie sat with her laptop at the long trestle table in the kitchen, yellow light spilling on it from the fixture over the window, and worked on her vintage column and cookbook while Jocie wrote, in longhand, her Poky Little Puppy fan fiction.
Jakob, who had taken the information Jaymie had obtained about zoning for the farmland they proposed buying over to Helmut, returned. He threw aside his jacket and wearily stretched his back out as he strolled over to see what his two girls were working on. Jocie was at the illustration stage of her book, tongue stuck out a little ways, pencil crayons spilled in a bright array over the wood surface. He sat down and read her work.
“That’s very good, Jocie!” he said approvingly. “But it’s a school night, kiddo. Time for bed. Put away your pencils.”
No Grater Danger Page 12
