“You mean the one you almost hit?”
“I mean the one that almost hit me!” Susan responded. “That huge car …”
“Antique roadster, Mrs. Henshaw. Don’t see too many like that anymore.”
“Okay, that antique roadster almost smashed into me. If I hadn’t turned quickly—”
“And smashed into the post.”
“And smashed into the post, I would have run into that … that man.”
“That man is your daughter’s future father-in-law. I guess that makes him your future … ah … your future in-law, too.”
“The driver of that car was, uh … Bob Canfield?” Susan asked.
“Canfield, yes. Bob, no. Let’s see, what did he tell me to call him? Something kind of interesting, if you know what I mean.”
She didn’t. And she didn’t care right now. “Do you have any idea where he was taking my daughter in such a rush?”
“Said something about a jewelry store downtown …”
“Starr’s?” Susan asked, naming a popular store, while she put her car in reverse.
“Yes, but don’t be in such a hurry. Seems to me he also mentioned the Yacht Club, the Presbyterian church, and that little Italian bar on the river. Seems to me they just had a drink inside the clubhouse. Would be a sad thing if a nice young girl like your daughter married into a family of alcoholics.”
“Giovanni’s? They mentioned going to Giovanni’s?” Susan asked. Was her daughter being escorted around town by a drunken driver on the day before her wedding?
“Yes. And maybe they were going to meet Mrs. Canfield there. What’s her name again?”
Not wishing the world to know that she wasn’t aware of how her future in-laws wished to be addressed, Susan ignored the question. Besides, if Chrissy and Mr. Canfield were planning on meeting Mrs. Canfield, didn’t that imply that Mrs. Canfield wasn’t the victim—unless they didn’t know she was dead.… It was too confusing. “I’d better go find them,” was all she said.
“I’ll make sure the bill for the repairs is put on your monthly statement.” He looked at the pillar with a frown on his face. “The last man to rebuild that pillar retired and moved to Florida. Going to be hard to find workmen to do that type of work. Probably costs a lot these days.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Susan assured him through clenched teeth as she drove off, leaving a spurt of gravel in her wake. It really didn’t matter—if Jed were right, they were going to have to declare bankruptcy immediately after the wedding anyway.
She was busy considering the layout of Hancock and didn’t notice when she ran over the stone she had just dislodged from the wall. The church was nearby and that would be her first stop. Then the Yacht Club. If she hadn’t caught up with them by that time, she would corner them at Giovanni’s. She turned her car in the direction of the church, glancing at the gold Rolex on her wrist.
She had almost an hour and a half before her guests were to arrive, but she was due for tea with Claire in … She slammed on her brakes, taking a deep breath and praying she was in time to avoid hitting the white sedan of the chief of police.
She only fully recognized the vehicle as she gently smashed its bumper. Both cars came to a full stop, still touching, and Brett Fortesque hopped out of his car.
“Susan, are you all right?”
“Yes. I’m fine. Ahh … I’m in a hurry, Brett.”
“Susan, I could see that. You came around that corner like … well, too damn fast. You could have been in a serious accident.”
“I have to find Chrissy. She’s with Stephen’s father. They’re on their way to the church—or the Yacht Club—and maybe that little Italian bar downtown.” She knew she sounded like an idiot, but she really didn’t have time to stop and chat. “Brett …”
“Look, I’ll escort you to the church if you want. Or we could split up and I could go to the Yacht Club while you go to the church. We’ll both look for Chrissy. But you have to slow down. You don’t want to have an accident—another accident—and ruin Chrissy’s wedding day.”
Susan tried not to think about the body that was just waiting to ruin Chrissy’s wedding day. Brett wouldn’t ignore that the way he was choosing to ignore the connection between their cars. “Thanks for the offer, but I can manage,” she lied.
“Well, it shouldn’t be difficult to find them. Chrissy sure is marrying into an interesting family, isn’t she?” he said, heading back to his own car.
“She sure is,” Susan agreed, starting up her car and wondering if she was going to even meet these people before they became intimate with everyone else in town.
But that wasn’t her problem now. Her problem was to head off Chrissy and Mr. Canfield before they started to wonder where Mrs. Canfield was. Not that she had any idea at all what she would say when she ran into them. Glancing in the rearview mirror at Brett’s car receding in the distance, she pressed firmly on the accelerator.
“Get Me to the Church on Time” is what she would have sung if she had been in the mood to sing. But she wasn’t.
In the mood to sing, or on time.
The Presbyterian Church of Hancock was a large brick colonial that occupied a spacious block in a residential area of the town. It was surrounded by discreet landscaping and lots of macadam for the parking convenience of its membership. There were a half dozen cars in the lot. None of them was the extravagant roadster that had passed by her at the club. Susan frowned and gently pressed on the brake. Maybe she should just take a few moments to see if everything was ready for the rehearsal tonight.
The appearance of Erika in the open doorway at the rear of the church made up her mind for her. Susan turned into the lot and drove over to the doorway. Erika came out to greet her.
“I’ve done lots of weddings over the years, and you win the Best Mother prize—you’re organized and you check out every little detail. There are people in the business of putting on weddings who don’t do it as well as you do. Come on in and look around. Chrissy’s planned something wonderful—I don’t think it will ruin the surprise if you see it a few hours early.”
She couldn’t resist. What difference would a few minutes make? She parked her car and hurried into the church.
The interior of the church was as austere as its exterior. The cream walls and white woodwork were accented by golden chestnut rails around the pews that matched the wood of the pews themselves. Brass organ pipes rose behind the altar and pulpit. Windows of bubble glass marched along the walls. There was a U-shaped balcony across the back of the room. Sunday’s decorations usually consisted of a large floral arrangement on the altar. At Christmas and Easter this was augmented by bouquets placed on windowsills. Many brides also chose to decorate the panels on the ends of the pews. Chrissy, on the other hand, had had other ideas.
Each of the dozen windows was topped by an arch of flowering white lilacs. Each sill was covered with green moss from which tall white Japanese irises sprang toward the light. Copper candelabra displayed thick flaxen beeswax candles in the middle of each sill. The altar was decorated in a similar manner, except that purple irises and dozens of candles had been added to the mix. The ends of the pews were hung with bunches of deep purple peonies. Large copper cauldrons of mixed peonies stood at the rear of the room, ready to be put into place after the rehearsal ended. And, finally, the balcony was draped with boughs of lilac.
It was incredibly elegant; Susan could hardly believe her eyes. And she had a question. “Erika, I don’t think we paid you enough for all of this. I don’t want to take advantage of our friendship.…”
“Don’t think about it for a second. Chrissy and I designed this together and I’m thrilled by the way it’s turned out. You just paid for the raw materials. The rest is gratis—it’s going to be the centerpiece of my book. Chrissy will even get her first professional designing credit.”
“That’s right, I’d forgotten you were working on a book.”
“The photographer is coming to watch the rehearsal
. And as soon as Chrissy and her party practice their walk down the aisle, he’ll set up the lights and we’ll start taking photos. I hired someone local—I hope he knows what he’s doing,” Erika said, picking a stray leaf off the floor. “We’re going to be here half the night as it is. I probably won’t get a chance to do more than take a nap before starting to get myself presentable for the wedding tomorrow. Fortunately, I don’t have to go back to town. We have permission to leave the vans in the lot until we clean this all out tomorrow evening.”
“This is the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen,” Susan said, feeling tears well up in her eyes. “Erika, thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. That’s one talented daughter you have. I just hope she doesn’t give up her art work when she gets married.”
“So do I.” Brought back to reality by thoughts of the future, Susan realized she couldn’t hang around here anymore. She had to find her daughter—and her daughter’s dress—and her future in-laws—and in less than half an hour she was to meet Claire at the new tea shop downtown. “I’d better get going,” she muttered, but Erika had detected a problem with one of the arches and was urging an employee up a ladder to fix it. Susan hurried back to her car.
The Yacht Club was only about ten minutes from the church. Susan figured she could make it in six—or seven—easily.
Unless she was stopped for speeding. Cursing under her breath at being caught in the speed trap near the high school that every single person in town knew would be there on warm days, she pulled over and forced her lips into a smile.
Which faded when she realized the face of the officer walking up to her car was not at all familiar.
“Was I speeding, Officer?” As though she didn’t know it!
“I’m afraid so.”
“You know, I’m a good friend of Brett Fortesque,” she began.
“Lady, ask any cop. Everyone who speeds is a personal friend of the chief of police. Everyone.”
“But it’s true!”
“Still gonna cost you seventy-nine dollars—unless you’re close personal friends with the judge. Can I see your license?”
Susan broke another nail while opening her wallet. “Damn it!” She handed him her license.
He glanced at the photo. “Doing your hair a little different these days, aren’t you?”
Finally, someone noticed.
“This photo must have been taken quite a few years ago—”
“Three months!”
“Really?”
Susan got the impression that he considered her at least a pathological liar, if not a serial killer. “Really. Could we just get on with this? I’m in a hurry.”
She wouldn’t have thought it was possible for him to move any slower, but the man had hidden talents. She gritted her teeth and clenched her fists—and broke another nail. “Damn it!”
“You know there are laws about abusing an officer.”
“What’s going on here, Officer Setzer?”
Susan breathed a sigh of relief. Brett Fortesque was better than the Mounties any day. “Brett …”
“You really do know the chief of police?”
“Well, someone has to, Officer Setzer,” Brett reminded the young man, a smile flickering across his handsome face.
“So you want me to tear up this ticket?” The policeman looked down at the pad in his hand.
“I think, in this case, a stern talking-to will do,” Brett said.
“I thought that was protocol just for teenagers.”
“Wayward teens and Mrs. Henshaw. It’s my fault. I probably forgot to brief you on some of the idiosyncrasies of life here in Hancock. We try not to give tickets to the mother of the bride until after the ceremony.”
“Look, I appreciate all this,” Susan said impatiently. “But, Brett, I really have to go to the Yacht Club.”
“Fine. I’ll give you a police escort. I got a call about two minutes ago. I was just on my way there.”
And she thought she’d had problems a few minutes ago. “You got a call to go to the Yacht Club? Do you know what the call was about?” she asked.
“Not really. Some sort of emergency, was all I was told,” Brett said, heading back to his car.
What sort of emergency, Susan wondered to herself, was a dead body?
EIGHT
Susan drove with her fingers crossed all the way to the Yacht Club, her head whirling with questions. Had someone found the body? Who had found the body? What was going to happen now that someone had found the body? Was it possible to proceed with the wedding even though Mrs. Canfield was dead? Was she dead? Was there some sort of place she could go to have a nice quiet nervous breakdown? And why, if someone had discovered the dead woman, wasn’t the Yacht Club surrounded by police cars? She swung her car around and parked out front, just tapping (she told herself) the minivan already there.
“Good thing Jeeps and minivans have the same height bumpers,” Brett commented, joining her on the sidewalk in front of the club.
“I barely touched it!” Susan protested.
Brett just raised his eyebrows and accompanied her into the building.
“Mrs. Henshaw, am I glad to see you!” The young man who had been setting up on the third floor was sitting on the stairs, a cell phone in his hands. “We’ve got a problem.…”
Susan took a deep breath and braced herself. Here it came.
“I called the plumber about that stopped-up toilet upstairs and he won’t come out until he knows who’s paying—you or the guy who owns the building.”
“Stopped-up toilet?” Brett repeated the words.
“Yeah, we were supposed to check out the entire floor before we took our lunch break—late, but, you know, we’re busy—and so I went into the ladies’ room and one of the cubicles … booths … whatever you call the places where the toilets are … Anyway, it has an out of order sign on the door, and Erika said to make sure everything was perfect. So I called the plumber that my parents use. And he said—”
“Did you go into the stall to see what the problem was?” Brett asked.
“No, I …”
“Why don’t you go back and see just what the problem is. Maybe it won’t take a plumber to fix it,” Brett suggested.
“No! No, Brett. I … I was up there earlier and checked out everything!” Susan realized she sounded a little hysterical and tried to lower her voice. “Believe me, it won’t help anything if you go into that stall.” Well, that much was true. “And why don’t I just call the plumber Jed and I use? He can do the work and then bill us.” And, with luck, he would be as late in coming as he usually was, and she wouldn’t have to worry about the body being found until the end of the week—at the earliest.
“You’ll have to pay weekend rates,” Brett reminded her. “And keeping the fixtures in order probably is the responsibility of the owner of this place.”
“Brett, with what we’ve spent in the past few months, it won’t even be noticed,” Susan said truthfully.
“Why don’t I just go up and take a look—”
“Brett! No!”
“Why not, Susan? I’m a cop. There’s nothing in that bathroom that I haven’t seen before.”
“But, Brett …”
Saved by the bell. Brett’s two-way radio started to squawk, and he responded quickly. “Yeah.”
Susan held her breath.
“Okay. I’m on my way. The emergency here was a false alarm.”
Thank heavens. “Thanks for all the help. I’ll just call my plumber,” Susan added to the young man. “You don’t even have to go back in there—just leave everything to me.” She didn’t wait for his reply, running up the stairs two at a time.
“Mothers,” she heard the young man say disparagingly to someone. “They get so upset about everything. You’d think no one had ever gotten married before.”
Susan ran into the ladies’ room and headed right for the occupied stall. She pulled the door open and breathed a sigh of relief. The body was still th
ere. But not, she decided, for long. Her heart wouldn’t survive another panic like the one she had just experienced. She had to move the body. But where? She looked around the room as though expecting to discover some new hiding place she and Kathleen had overlooked.
No such luck. She had no choice. She was going to have to get it—her—out of here. But then what? Much as she would like to dump the woman in Long Island Sound and forget about her, she knew she couldn’t possibly do that. She wasn’t a large woman, but the box was bulky, and there was no way it would fit in the back of Susan’s Cherokee. She peered out the small window down at the street. Three Stems and Twigs vans were still lined up at the curb. What was it Erika had said about leaving them parked in the lot by the church and not cleaning them out until after the wedding? The rear doors of two vans stood open, and Susan could see they were both filled with plastic garbage bags and odds and ends left over from the arrangements.
She leaned away from the window and straightened her shoulders. If she were going to do it, she might as well get it over with. She marched back to the toilet stall. Summoning all her strength, she yanked the box to the floor, hoping it was sturdy enough to withstand its next trip. She slid it along the floor toward the doorway, where she stopped, took a few deep breaths, opened the door, and peeked out. She was alone on the third floor. She knew that if she thought about it, she would lose her courage, so she shoved the body out the door, across the large room, and down the stairway.
Her luck held; no one was in sight. Most of the employees of Stems and Twigs had finished their afternoon’s work here and had gone on to the church. Fabulous Food sounded like it was having some sort of private party in the basement; loud laughter floated up the stairs. Great, now no one would hear her. Saying a silent apology to the dead woman, hoping she was a mother who would understand the necessity of what was happening to her, Susan tugged the box down the stairs.
Weddings Are Murder Page 6
