A Star-Spangled Murder

by Valerie Wolzien

  The two women stared at each other. Kathleen spoke first. “She’s as safe here as she could be anyplace else.”

  “That’s probably true. And I have a way of making her safer.” Susan reached for the phone. “And I’ll get to work on that as soon as I call Janet Shapiro and tell her to call off the search.”

  “I wish you had told those people they couldn’t follow us,” Tierney complained, grimacing out the back window of the Jeep at the BMW behind. “I don’t like them. I don’t know why they came to stay with us. No one likes them.”

  “Mommy and Daddy have been friends with them for a long time; they must like them,” her sister protested.

  “They don’t act like they like them. Everyone is so nervous! No one is having any fun! I thought we’d all be happy if Uncle Humphrey died, but it’s just making everything worse!”

  Susan looked at Kathleen. “I think you should be careful not to say anything like that in public,” Susan suggested carefully.

  “But it’s true!” the child protested.

  “You don’t want everyone to think you murdered him, do you, stupid! You should learn to keep your mouth shut!” Theresa spit out the words angrily.

  Susan looked in her rearview mirror at the older girl’s face. Theresa was pale, lips clenched between her teeth. It was hard to gather information with them around, but she was glad that she was able to protect these two—and now Titania—from … from what? she asked herself. Could anyone honestly believe that one of them was a murderer? She moved her mirror and saw the fury in Tierney’s face and decided that maybe she had made the right decision. “Do you think your mother or your father will come see the dancing?” she asked, keeping her tone casual.

  “They didn’t say anything about it, but maybe.” Tierney cheered up at the thought. “Are we going to be able to dance?”

  “Probably not. This is really just for people who know how to square-dance. But it’s lots of fun to watch, believe me. It’s a fairly long drive. You could take a nap, you know.”

  “I’m not tired,” Tierney insisted. She proved her lie by falling asleep in less than five minutes.

  “Had you ever met your uncle Humphrey?” Kathleen quietly asked Theresa when her sister was breathing deeply. “Before he came home from the Mideast?”

  “No. We’d heard about him, of course. My father used to tell us great stories about how when he and my uncle were boys they used to get in trouble dressing the dog in their best clothing and then walk it down the street—and how they built a raft and took it out in the middle of a river without anyone knowing, and it fell apart and they had to be rescued by the Coast Guard. Of course, Uncle Humphrey was a lot older than that when we met him.”

  “But you knew that he was in Alaska and the Mideast, didn’t you?” Susan asked.

  “I think Alaska was before we were born, but we knew about Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and all. He used to send us really neat presents for Christmas. Like belly dancer dolls that even have tiny finger cymbals on their fingers. And these wonderful little carved boxes. And funny beads—worry beads, they’re called—that are antique amber. They have real bugs embedded in them. It sounds gross, but it isn’t,” she assured the adults.

  “Did you or your parents ever visit him when he was abroad?”

  “My father did. Just once, that I can remember. It was a few years ago. Maybe four or five. It was when my grandparents died. I think Uncle Humphrey was in Egypt then. My father brought us back those funny scarves that men over there wear on their heads. And a beautiful necklace of some blue stones for my mother.”

  “Lapis lazuli,” Susan suggested.

  “That’s right!” Theresa sounded pleased. “I think it’s a really pretty name, don’t you? Exotic.”

  “This may sound like a stupid question, and I’m not trying to pry, but it might be important.…” Susan began.

  “I know. Janet Shapiro said that we should tell you anything you want to know, so it’s okay.”

  “Did you like your uncle before you found out that he was going to marry your mother? Before you were told about the divorce?”

  There was a silence while the girl thought over her answer. “I don’t think so,” she began slowly. “So much has happened that it’s a little hard to remember. I know that sounds stupid.…”

  “It doesn’t at all. And it’s not your age. Most adults would find the changes you’ve been through to be more than a little confusing. I’d like to hear about it, though, even if you can’t remember exactly.”

  “You see, we were so excited about meeting him!” the child burst out. “We’d heard about him for so many years, and then, when we found out that he was actually going to live near us after all this time, we could hardly believe it. Titania was studying the Mideast in school, and she thought she could get him to come in and talk to her class, and we thought he would tell us stories about camel rides and the pyramids—no one else that we know has an uncle who’s lived in places like that. So,” she continued, her voice changing, “I guess we were expecting too much.”

  “So you didn’t like him right away,” Susan guessed.

  “We didn’t even get to see him right away. We wanted to go to the airport to meet him, and my parents wouldn’t let us. Some dumb excuse about us having to go to a choir rehearsal at church.”

  Susan took that with a grain of salt, knowing how far children will go to get out of something that they didn’t want to do. “But he did come and stay at your house, didn’t he?” she guessed.

  “Yes, but he walked in the door and hardly had a chance to say hello—to meet us really—when my mother said that he had terrible jet lag after being on a plane for eleven hours and that he had to go to bed right away. Then he was up in the middle of the night. I heard him talking to my father.”

  Susan had always wondered why jet lag was a problem for adults and not children, but there wasn’t time to speculate on that. “But when you did get a chance to talk to him? What did you think then?”

  “He was dull! Boring! Not at all like someone who traveled all over the world, more like a businessman, just like anybody else!”

  “That must have been a disappointment,” Kathleen said, glad her smile didn’t show.

  “And he wasn’t friendly. He kept saying that getting used to his new job was keeping him busy, but he just stayed in his apartment and hardly even spent any time with us.”

  “Did he speak at Titania’s school?”

  “He said he would, but he kept putting it off and so it just didn’t happen.”

  “Did you notice that he was falling in love with your mother?” Susan asked, hating to have to inquire into something so hurtful to the girls.

  “Not at all. I didn’t even think that she liked him, but my father says that may have been something called a ploy. That means that she was trying to get everyone to think that she didn’t like him when she was falling in love. There’s a girl in my class who’s allowed to watch anything she wants on TV, and she says that happens all the time. But I didn’t think someone like my mother would do that,” she added quietly.

  “Maybe she didn’t have any choice. Sometimes adults fall in and out of love.…” Susan began, not really meaning what she was going to end up saying.

  “She had a choice. She could have stayed with my father.”

  There was no answer to that, and Susan wasn’t going to insult the girl by pretending otherwise. “Theresa, did your parents’ divorce come as a shock to you? I know Titania says that it did to her.”

  “We had no idea. They had arguments, but everybody fights. Of course, they had been fighting more and more recently, I guess. But I didn’t ever hear them talk about divorce. My mother used to have this joke about it. She’d say that she would never divorce him, but she’d kill him! Oh, I didn’t mean that! She would never kill anybody. Never!”

  “It’s an old saying, Theresa. I don’t think she meant it any more than the millions of other women who say things like that.” Susan was
afraid the child would shut up and they wouldn’t learn anything else.

  “That’s right. A lot of people say that type of thing. That’s what I told Titania, but she wouldn’t believe me.”

  “Titania?” Susan repeated quietly.

  “Yeah. Titania overheard my parents talking about how Uncle Humphrey had destroyed their life. But there’s this girl in my class whose parents got a divorce, and she told me that it was her father’s secretary’s fault. I was talking to my mother about that—this was last year before she and my father split up—and she said that outsiders don’t cause divorces. That divorce is the result of the actions of the people inside the marriage.”

  “Uh-huh.” Susan didn’t know whether she agreed or disagreed, but she certainly hoped Theresa would keep talking.

  “Titania says that Uncle Humphrey hated my father, that he wanted to destroy him, to take everything that he had—his wife, and his house, and his family. She said that we couldn’t let that happen. We weren’t going to let him have us. We were going to drive him away.”

  “And that’s what you were trying to do when you put pudding in his pockets and removed one of the cellar stairs?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you know why Titania is hiding?”

  “She said she had to. She said everything would be all right as long as she stayed away. And I’m not going to say any more.”

  “Good. Shut up,” her sister mumbled, turning over and pulling her sweater up around her ears.

  “What did you think of Humphrey when you got here? Was he like you remembered him being?”

  “Are any of us the way we were when we were young?”

  Leave it to a psychiatrist to think he was answering a question by asking a question, Susan thought. “But you judge people professionally. That’s what you’re trained to do. I just wondered what you thought about Humphrey. You knew him when you were young, didn’t you?”

  “I grew up with Ted and Humphrey, in fact. We lived about two blocks away from each other in an old-fashioned town—the type of place that just doesn’t exist anymore. Humphrey was older, of course. But he must have been very tolerant, because we spent a lot of time with him. I remember we all went camping together—the summer before I was in eighth grade. Just the three of us and that damn dog of Ted’s. It poured rain. We spent two days in a dirty, leaky four-man tent with a smelly golden retriever—and we had a wonderful time. I’ve thought of that trip a lot over the years. Children are not small adults, and don’t let anyone tell you differently. Any sane adult would have hated the experience.

  “Of course, we saw Humphrey less and less every year after he went to college. That’s usually true. The people who leave home tend to disconnect, and by the time they have their degree, they really don’t return to the fold unless there’s a real occasion—a ceremony usually. Humphrey went off to Alaska right after college. He did graduate work at the University of Alaska, as well as working, I believe. I know he was at Ted and Tricia’s wedding, but if he came home after that, it was during a time when I was away. I don’t remember seeing him again until last week.”

  “But you stayed good friends with Ted over the years?” Susan asked.

  “I hired his firm to design my first clinic. We were both surprised when we rediscovered each other. But you know how it is with old friends; we introduced our wives and started getting together when we were in the same town. Which wasn’t often back then.”

  Susan and Paul turned their attention back to the dancers who were whirling around, skirts flying, heels stomping. The annual square dance was quite a sight. Except she noticed that Paul wasn’t really watching. He was keeping an eye on his wife, who was at the other side of the large gymnasium.

  Susan glanced around the room. Kathleen had agreed to take care of the girls while Susan collected more information. She spied her yawning in a corner. Theresa was standing nearby, talking earnestly with a girl who looked the same age. Tierney was being given a private dancing lesson by a cheerful man who looked old enough to be her great-grandfather. Apparently square dancing was marvelous exercise; Susan hoped she would have as much energy when she was his age.

  “When did you meet the Harters?” She continued asking Paul questions.

  Well, that got his attention. “Why do you assume that we knew each other before arriving on the island?”

  “Your wives seem to be good friends,” she answered, pleased to think that she had gotten some reaction from him.

  “How long have you been coming to these things?”

  He seemed to be much more comfortable asking than answering questions, Susan thought. “Twenty-five years. Maybe more. They’ve been going on almost thirty, I think.”

  “Unusual event,” he commented noncommittally.

  Susan, ready to defend her traditions, opened her mouth, but shut it before leaping into an unnecessary battle. “How did you like the race today?” she asked, changing topics.

  “You didn’t hear about my disaster?” he asked, attempting to laugh.

  “No …” Susan still didn’t know if he had been the paddler who trailed with Nathan and Gillian or if that had been Ryan. Now, she thought, it looked like …

  “I capsized before the race was half-over. Stupid beginner’s mistake, which makes it more embarrassing, of course. I was helping another paddler who had gotten tangled in one of those floating boxes that the lobstermen use to store their catch, and I didn’t pay enough attention to what I was doing. Naturally, the next thing I knew, there I was in the water. I really thought I had a chance of coming in with the winners, too. I had been taking it easy, waiting to pick up speed at the end of the race.” He shook his head. “Dumb, dumb mistake. By the time I had gotten back in and pumped out my kayak—or, in this case, your kayak—I knew I wasn’t going to finish in the top half. So I just turned around and went back the other way. There were some large birds on one of the small islands we’d passed that I wanted to check out. And besides—” he laughed at his own weakness in an intentionally good-natured way “—I hate to lose. Could have ruined my whole day.

  “Would you excuse me? I think my wife wants …” He hurried off, it not being necessary to finish that sentence to civilized people.

  Susan turned away. Paul Briane might hate losing, but what Susan hated was being taken for a fool. Where was that man’s wife?

  But Judy Briane found her before Susan had even begun to search.

  “We need to talk,” the woman insisted before Susan could even offer a polite greeting. “Why don’t we go sit on those chairs over there?” She pointed. “There seems to be some privacy.”

  Susan followed the other woman across the room to where a half dozen folding chairs had been set up and then abandoned, out of the path of the dancers.

  “Does this thing last all night?” Judy Braine asked, being careful not to muss her washed-silk skirt as she sat down.

  “Yes.”

  “What? Oh, you’re kidding, aren’t you?”

  “No, I’m not. It lasts till sunrise. There will be food served soon, though.”

  “Not to me. I’m going to head back to the Taylors’ house. I don’t care if I find both Ted and Tricia dead in the middle of the living room floor. I’m too old to stay up this late.”

  “I hate to admit it, but you may be right,” Susan said, sitting down and yawning. “Do you like the Taylors?” she asked, deciding that it was too late to bother with tact.

  “Not really. And I certainly didn’t like Humphrey. What a bore,” she said, picking a piece of lint from her suede sandals. “He kept telling stories about things he and Ted did when they were young. The man had spent the past twenty-five years in fascinating parts of the world, and he talks about some small town in New Jersey. A complete bore.”

  Susan remembered how Titania had thought that Humphrey wanted her family. Maybe the poor man had been lonely all these years, she thought, realizing that no one was upset that Humphrey was dead. No one seemed to care. Even Tricia had
n’t expressed a whole lot of grief. Susan stared at the dancers. The late hours hadn’t dampened their enthusiasm!

  But Judy was continuing her story. “I’m here because of my husband, to be honest. Ted asked us here in a way that made Paul think it was important that we come—an obligation of an old friend or something. Paul is very big on relationships. He thinks they’re the backbone of the individual—sort of an extreme concept of ‘you shall be known by the friends you keep,’ or something. So when Ted called a few months ago, we put aside our plans for a few weeks in Montauk, and here we are. Wherever the hell this is. There’s some good shopping up here, though. A lot of artists seem to live in Maine. Heaven knows why.”

  Because it’s beautiful, inexpensive, tolerant of individual differences, and a whole lot of other things that you’re too dumb to see, Susan lectured silently. “I couldn’t believe the shooting this afternoon,” was what she said, hoping to get Judy’s thoughts on another topic. “I wasn’t anywhere nearby, of course. But I heard that you were actually talking with the mayor when he was wounded.”

  Judy Briane glanced across the room, where her husband was talking with Sally and Ryan (so much for his excuse to leave Susan), before answering. “I thought the popping sounds were just some more of the fireworks that children in this place seem to love so much.”

  “But when the mayor was shot,” Susan prompted.

  “To be honest, I didn’t even know then that something serious was going on. He leapt up a little and yelled ouch. I thought he’d been attacked by a blackfly or mosquito. He didn’t really get shot, you know. Just grazed actually. But, of course, when someone said there was shooting, I was scared to death. I could have been killed, for heaven’s sake. We were terrified.…”

  “We?”

  “Sally and I. We were there together. Waiting for our husbands to arrive. Sally and I are always together waiting for our husbands to arrive.”

  Not always, was what Susan thought. Not always.