“You always know just what to say.” I put the feeder back on the bench and wrapped my arms around him. I felt tears filling my eyes and I was glad he couldn’t see my face as he hugged me back. The advantage didn’t last long. The more I tried to collect myself before he realized I was crying, the worse it got. Before long, sobs were shaking me hard enough to give me away.
“Do you remember that year when we were shopping for plants for that flower bed your grandmother wanted us to put in for Mother’s Day?” Grampa asked as he dug round in his back pocket and handed me a handkerchief. I nodded my head and scraped my face against the roughness of his coat. “I showed you that you should slide plants out of their pots in order to look at the roots before buying them. Do you remember why?”
I cleared my throat. “You said if the plant had been left in too small a pot for too long the roots would start to grow around in a circle because they didn’t have anywhere else to go.”
“And what was wrong with that?”
“You said that unless the gardener pried apart the roots and cut them a bit if necessary the plant would keep growing its roots in a circle even once planted in a hole in the ground. It wouldn’t know any other way to be.”
“Exactly. People are pretty much the same way. Your roots are important. They anchor you and support your growth but without a new pot every once in a while, you’ll end up stunted.”
“I’m already stunted.” At least that’s how it always felt when I tried to buy pants. Everything needed to be hemmed up by at least three inches or rolled so many times it looked like my ankles had spare tires.
“Not in ways that count, you aren’t, but if you stay in this small pot for too much longer I’m worried you might be.”
“So you think I was right to rent the apartment?” I pulled away and looked him in the eye.
“We all think it was the right thing to do even if it is a hard thing to get used to.”
“Thanks, Grampa. I needed to hear that.”
“Anything else I can do to set your mind at ease?” he asked. Grampa took the bird feeder from my hands and slid it back into the paper bag.
“Now that you mention it I did have something to ask you besides just whether or not you needed help with the bird feeders.”
“I thought as much. So what was it?”
“I’ve promised Tansey I’d look into what happened to the money Spooner supposedly stole.” I watched as Grampa grabbed hold of the end of his beard and started twisting it around the end of a gnarled finger the way he always does when he’s agitated. “Don’t worry, she told me all about her relationship with Spooner and what it has to do with Knowlton.”
“Well, that’s a relief. Some secrets feel like they’re just itching to get out.” Grampa dropped his beard before he managed to tie a knot in the end.
“And some don’t. Like what really happened to Spooner and to the money. Which is what I wanted to ask you. Do you remember Pastor Gifford going over the deep end during his sermon the Sunday of the festival? Something to do with Spooner trying to get too friendly with his daughter Sarah?”
“I do remember that. The pastor was all het up and your grandmother was starting to make that leaky whistling sound. You know the one she makes when she’s just about to boil over? I could hear her from my seat all the way up at the front of the church.”
I did know the sound he meant. You know how the phone ringing at three in the morning or the sound of squealing brakes from the street turns a lot of people’s blood to slush? For my family, Grandma’s whistle noise strikes that kind of fear in our hearts.
I don’t even think she’s aware she’s doing it. It starts out as a loudish sigh then morphs into hurricane-force winds pressed through a gap the size of a nostril. When you hear that sound, it is a sure sign Grandma is about to blow.
“I heard you were the only thing that saved the congregants’ Sunday dinners from turning into burnt offerings.”
“When your grandmother gets into one of those moods I’ll do just about anything to turn her around and that includes cutting short a tirade I was sure didn’t flow straight from God’s lips to the pastor’s ear. But what has that got to do with the money?”
“I was wondering if you thought the pastor was angry enough to have done something about Spooner himself.”
“You’re asking if I thought the pastor was angry enough to kill him and then hide the body?”
“Unfortunately, I am.”
“He’s far too sensible a man to lose his temper that way.”
“Are you sure? What would you have done if you thought an older man was making advances to Celadon or to me when we were in high school?” I heard a gurgling sputtering noise get stuck halfway up Grampa’s throat.
“Any man foolish enough to pull such a thing would have found himself running down the road with the seat of his britches full of rock salt.”
“People in town think well of you, too, and wouldn’t expect a man with your reputation to sink to violence. Why would the pastor be any different? He might have felt all the more responsible for ridding the community of someone he believed to be a moral blight.”
“When you put it that way, I guess I can’t say for sure whether or not he would have been tempted to violence. All I know is, speaking as a deacon who has worked closely with Pastor Gifford for years, I would be shocked if he was responsible for any of it.”
“You were a deacon at the time, too, right?”
“That’s how I happened to be near enough to him to step up and pry him off the pulpit. I was the deacon who led the opening part of the service that morning.”
“Do you happen to remember any large amounts of money showing up in the church coffers at right about that same time?”
“You know, there were several large donations made to the church collection plate starting a week or so later. It was a lot of money and there was considerable debate about the use of it. Some of the deacons thought we should use the money for the roof repair fund and others felt it would be best used on missions projects. There was talk about dividing it up or lumping it together. By the time we’d worked it all out I almost wished no one had felt the urge to be so generous.”
“How much money did it add up to?”
“It stretched over a couple of months but I think all told it added up to around six thousand dollars.”
“Did you ever find out who donated it?”
“No one ever took credit for it and it was all in cash so there was no way to track it either.”
“And no hints of any kind? Did you ever wonder if it could have come from the theft of the festival money?”
“It never occurred to me that the stolen money could be the source. Everyone, myself included, seemed to think Spooner had run off with that money. We wouldn’t have kept looking for it in Sugar Grove.”
“But thinking back now it seems like just about the right amount of money to account for what was stolen minus the checks they received.”
“Do you think someone stole it and then felt guilty and changed their mind about spending it on themselves?”
“I think it could have happened that way.”
“Do you suppose the robbery had nothing to do with Spooner after all?” Grampa asked.
“I have no idea, either about Spooner’s death or about the missing money.”
“What a sad thing to think a man has been lying dead all these years and no one ever cared about what happened to him.” Grampa shook his head.
“At this point it seems like it doesn’t matter all that much to anyone except Tansey. She took it really badly.”
“As much as I hate to say it, it kind of makes you wonder if Tansey reacted so badly to the news about Spooner’s body being found because she was the one who hid it,” Grampa said.
“I’ve never thought of Tansey as the jealous type,
but then, there haven’t been any men in her life all these years besides Knowlton.” I felt a knot tying itself up in my stomach as I thought about how Knowlton was likely to react if his mother went to prison. Tansey had spent half of Knowlton’s first grade year sitting with her legs wedged under the desk next to his so he wouldn’t sneak out of the building and run home every day. “Maybe she didn’t want to risk losing her temper that badly ever again.”
Twenty-one
Dappled Oaks perched on a rise at the outskirts of Sugar Grove. There were indeed oaks all over the property but I was pleased to see a healthy sprinkling of maples as well. As I followed the winding private road into the senior living complex I was impressed by how well maintained the buildings were and how much care had been taken to create an attractive environment.
By the time I had parked the minivan in a designated visitor space I was no longer worried I would be depressed when I went inside. As I slid out of the driver’s seat I thought about the fact that I still hadn’t received news from Byron, my mechanic about the Midget. Sooner or later I was going to have to break down and call him whether I wanted to or not. But fortunately, I had more pressing responsibilities today. The view of the lake as I made my way to the front door was worth the visit all on its own.
The smiling woman at the front desk told me I’d find Frances in her apartment on the second floor. I was glad I had brought books from Priscilla as an icebreaker. I planned to use the fifty-year commemoration booklet for the maple festival as a cover story for my visit if I needed to. I raised my fist to knock on the door numbered 208 and steeled my nerves. Frances pulled open the door before I landed the first blow.
“Were you followed?”
“I don’t think so,” I said as she wrapped her small hand around my arm, looked up and down the corridor, and tugged me inside. I guessed her age to be around eighty and since I had last seen her she seemed to have shrunk a little in height and had lost quite a bit of weight, too. She pressed the door shut behind me and turned the lock.
“Good. You can never be too careful.” Frances steered me to her kitchenette and waved me into a wooden chair. Priscilla hadn’t mentioned dementia as the reason for Frances no longer living on her own but I had to wonder if she was entirely all right. Her eyes were slightly unfocused and she didn’t seem to recognize me.
“I brought you these, from Priscilla,” I said, handing her a shopping bag full of paperbacks in large print. “And this is from me.” I presented a bouquet of delphiniums and hydrangeas I purchased from Priscilla before heading out. Priscilla mentioned those were Frances’s favorites but I wasn’t entirely certain the high cost of the flowers hadn’t been the real reason for the suggestion.
“How thoughtful of you both. Let’s have a cup of tea before you remind me why you’re here. I don’t know about you but I think best when well lubricated by Earl Grey.” She put the kettle on and had even opened a package of store-bought cookies. But they were a fancy brand.
As much as I hated to admit it, even in the dark recesses of my own mind, store cookies were virtually unknown at Greener Pastures and as such were a luxury item. Grandma even baked her own version of fig bars. The only packaged cookies we ever had were animal crackers. And those were a rare treat for special occasions. I still love to eat them.
“Sounds delicious. I appreciate you making the time to see me.”
“You look familiar. Shouldn’t I know you?” Frances settled herself in the other chair and pushed the plate of lemon cookies toward me. I felt my spit spurt. The tea was good, too. Strong, hot, and in a china cup printed with little violets all along the rim.
But overriding the pleasure of the tea was worry about how far downhill Frances had been going. It had been only about six weeks since I had last seen her. Celadon and I had spotted her at meetings frequently over the years for things connected to the historical society. With the opera house renovation project under way we had seen her even more often.
“I’m Dani Greene. My sister and I have been to see you about the opera house restoration project.”
“Oh yes, I remember now.” Frances smiled at me but her voice sounded unsure. Her eyes didn’t seem like she registered any recognition of me either. I wondered if the move to Dappled Oaks was the reason for her fuzzy-headedness, like the stress of the move had left her too overwhelmed to keep everything straight in her memory.
Even though I had come prepared with the booklet story now I felt crummy about telling her a fib. I decided one way to get information about the past might be to solicit advice on the present.
“I was hoping you could answer some questions about the maple festival and how the money should be handled. I am on the festival committee now and Tansey told me you were always so good at the bookkeeping details.” Frances smiled at that and this time the warmth of it spread all the way to her faded gray eyes.
“The festival was always my favorite part of the year. So many happy memories.”
“It is fun and I love it, too, but sometimes I’m worried about being in charge of so many details. Especially anything to do with the money. What if something were to go wrong and someone lost it or it was stolen before it got to the bank?”
“You are right to be worried. There are a lot of bad people around. Not everyone is exactly what they seem. The woman who runs bingo here used to work for the CIA, you know.”
“I didn’t know.” I decided to stop in at the desk on my way out to ask if there was someone checking on Frances regularly. Or if she was taking any medication that needed monitoring. “Did any bad people ever make trouble while you were on the festival committee?”
“Of course. There was the Realtor, Jim somebody, who really just wanted to use the festival as a way to market his new business. And there was Tansey Pringle, who was so bossy toward everyone else on the festival committee.” Unfortunately, that still sounded like the Jim and Tansey of today. But why hadn’t Frances mentioned Spooner? Surely he was the worst person to get involved with the festival over the years.
“Do you remember once, about thirty years ago, when the festival money was actually stolen?” Frances’s eyes widened and then she nodded.
“I should have mentioned that straight off. Garland Duffy, but everyone called him Spooner, was thought to have made off with all the festival earnings because he disappeared the same night as the money. But I know he didn’t leave town with the money.” Frances hugged herself tightly and began rocking slowly back and forth in her seat.
“What makes you say that?”
“He was a good man and he loved this town and everyone in it far too much to do a thing like that.”
“So I’m not crazy to be worried, am I? If the festival money went missing once it could happen again, couldn’t it?”
“I would hope not but, I suppose it’s possible.”
“It’s such a shame that people gave so much at the festival and it didn’t end up helping the way they wanted.”
“The only saving grace was the number of checks people had written.”
“I didn’t realize the festival took checks. We don’t take them now.”
“People used to use checks for everything in those days. You know, when a purchase came to more than the amount of cash they had on hand or if they needed cash later for a place that wouldn’t take a check.”
“Were there a lot of them written?”
“For anything the festival committee handled or sold you could just make out a check to the Sugar Grove Maple Festival. Probably somewhere between a third and half the money was collected in checks.”
“So, similar to how we take credit cards at the gate and for the raffles now?”
“I haven’t been to the festival in a couple of years but I would guess so. That’s not to say everyone took checks. The vendors up and down the street who sold food and souvenirs usually only took cash.”
�
��How did the number of checks end up being a good thing?”
“Because when the money was discovered missing people rushed in to put a stop payment on their checks.”
“But how did that help the festival fund-raising? Did the people who put the stop payments on the checks write out new ones to the festival?” I asked. After all, it was a matter of making an effort to do the right thing after the fact. And what about the out-of-towners that came? They would have had to have done a lot of digging to figure out where to send their donations.
“I was speaking more as a bank employee than as a festival committee member.” Frances stared off into space like there was something she was trying to remember but couldn’t quite manage. “I probably shouldn’t mention this since it is bank business but since I was on the festival committee and worked at the bank I can tell you a lot more checks were stopped than reissued. And I could tell you who they were, too, if I weren’t bound by my duty to the bank’s patrons.” Frances tipped her head to the back wall again and dropped her voice once more. “And because I don’t want them to hunt me down for what I know.”
I was definitely going to need to stop at the front desk on my way out. And I wanted to get to the end of the visit before she got even further out of touch with reality.
“Working in a bank must have burdened you with a lot of information about the folks in town.”
“It certainly did. But that festival thing was very hard to keep quiet about. I had all I could do not to yell at some people when I stood behind them in line at the grocer or when I saw them at the gas station. As far as I was concerned what they did was no better than theft.”
“I don’t think I would have been able to keep such a secret as that. I would have been too angry.”
“It was a question of trust and of loyalty. I’m sure you have secrets and burdens of your own that you carry, too,” Frances said.
I thought about confidences shared and observations made, secrets ferreted out on purpose and by chance. I thought of my brother, Loden, and how I knew for certain he was desperately in love with Piper but was just not brave enough to show it. I kept his secret even though I was sure it was doing more harm than good, so I thought I might also have been able to keep the sort of secrets Frances held if the need arose.
A Sticky Situation Page 14
