I tracked him down at the Western Auto on Main Street in Zinnia. He was buying plumbing supplies for a new addition to his home, and he gave me a slow grin when he recognized me.
“Well, if it isn’t the private detective,” he said. “I read all about you in the newspaper.”
“Don’t believe everything you read,” I warned him. Cece had a way of exaggerating things. It worked to my benefit, but it was also a little embarrassing.
“What do you need, Sarah Booth?” he asked. “A wiretap?”
I rolled my eyes. “No, a little history.”
“Now that doesn’t sound too dangerous. Shoot.” He was examining PVC pipe fittings as we talked.
“Back in the fifties, the old hotel in town, what kind of phone system did it have?”
“It would have been a central switchboard. If I recall, it was still in use in the early seventies when it burned. Now, that was a tragedy. They don’t make buildings like that anymore.” He looked at me through a two-inch fitting. “You haven’t changed since high school, except maybe to look a little prettier.”
“You always were a smooth talker.” Johnny had been a standout on the basketball team and, though handsome, was so shy he hardly spoke to anyone. The joke around high school had been that he had to get his best friend to ask a girl for a date for him. “What would happen on the switchboard if a call came in to someone staying in the room?”
“The operator would plug in the call to the room and put it through.” He put the pipe down. “Are you asking if the operator could listen in?”
“That, and could a call be traced?”
“Yes and yes.” He braced one hand on a shelf and gave me his full attention. “What’s this all about?”
“I’m writing a book,” I told him. “I had an idea for some phone calls. Threats, you know, that kind of thing.”
“Uh-huh.” He picked up the same piece of pipe and dropped it in a basket at his feet. “There wasn’t such a thing as a private call where a switchboard was involved. The operator could listen in whenever she chose. Not much has changed today. Almost every call can be traced, if you have the right setup and enough pull with the law.”
“Thanks, Johnny.”
“You’re welcome, Sarah Booth. Let me know where I can buy this book you’re working on.”
His sarcasm pushed me down the aisle. Funny, back in high school I’d never suspected that he had wit. But I’d found out what I wanted to know. Sheriff Masters either had a good reason not to investigate Lawrence’s complaints, or he didn’t believe they were real. Or perhaps he had investigated and knew exactly who’d made the calls! John Wayne Masters was long dead or I could just ask him. That was a big problem with this case. A lot of people who had answers were six feet under.
Outside on Main Street, the sky had thickened with dark rolling clouds. It was perfect weather for watching daytime television, but I had a check for ten grand from Madame that was financial proof that she’d bought my time and energy—even if I never intended to cash it. I got in the Roadster and headed for Oxford. It was the day after Christmas, and I knew school was out for the long holiday break, but Grace had to live somewhere around the campus. He’d been in Zinnia the night before at Lawrence’s party; perhaps I could catch him before he took off to visit relatives or whatever academicians did on holiday break.
The drive to Oxford covers more than distance. It is a metaphysical journey. The Delta is left behind, and the woodlands of Mississippi rise up tall and mysterious. In the Delta, life is simpler. Or at least the parameters are. There are the rich and the poor, the privileged and those who serve. Though the stark clarity is often cruel, I preferred it to the oak-shaded avenues of that venerable old state institution. I’d spent my time at Ole Miss. I knew that intellect was touted as god, but social position was still the determining factor. The quality of education couldn’t be challenged. It was the social order that I could never accept.
I drove through the campus for old times’ sake. I had forgotten the beauty of the trees and the gracious lines of the buildings. At the Lyceum I stopped the car, thinking about the young girl I’d once been. I’d gone to college with such expectations of what I could accomplish. My mother, before her death, had led me to believe that I could be anything I wanted. Aunt LouLane had taught me the machinations to accomplish the only goal a woman should want—matrimony. I could only wonder what both of them would think of how I’d turned out. PI work certainly wasn’t a career option either would have considered.
I avoided the dormitories and made it to the English Department, which was locked tight. Everyone was on holiday. I happened upon a janitor, who unlocked the door and allowed me to snoop long enough to find Dean Grace’s home address. God bless janitors and the urge to get even with those who have three-week holiday breaks.
I stopped at campus security and asked directions. Grace’s home was out past Rowan Oaks. Long ago, on a hot summer night, I’d gone with a date to Faulkner’s home. We’d both been callow enough to think it would be romantic to spoon beneath the huge oak trees that marked the spot where the writer had created characters driven by lust and greed and the gamut of primal human emotions. Whatever we’d anticipated, the reality had been vastly different. Sitting beneath the oaks in Lamar’s convertible, I’d suffered an infusion of Satoris angst. It was not a night that added to my reputation as a hot date.
Dean Grace’s home was three miles beyond Rowan Oaks, a two-story clapboard with a porch and modest gingerbread trim. It looked bookish. Very suitable for a man of his station. Even the pea gravel in his parking lot was uniform. There were two cars in the drive, a Volvo and a Sebring convertible. I had no difficulty telling which one belonged to the missus.
If he was surprised to see me, he didn’t show it. He wore a burgundy cardigan, buttoned, with leather patches on the elbows, and a black and white checked tie. His hair was sculpted into that long sweep that bespoke his vanity even more than his natty attire. He answered the door, hesitated, then called out to his wife to make coffee.
I stepped inside the house, which smelled of cinnamon and cedar. Without looking back he led me to a living room dominated by a giant tree decorated with red ornaments and—incredibly—small blond dolls. It was the eeriest thing I’d ever seen in the annals of decorating. A hundred pairs of light, glassy, blue eyes watched me as I walked to the fireplace and warmed my legs. The little dolls were all dressed in red and green outfits, but it did nothing to detract from the feeling that they watched me with a certain malice.
“What brings you to Oxford?” Grace asked without preamble.
I detected more than a hint of hostility. “History.”
“I’m afraid you’re barking up the wrong tree.” He smiled at his colloquial acumen.
“I wasn’t barking,” I said softly. “Not yet.”
“What I meant was that my specialty is Chaucer. The Canterbury Tales,” he added, as if I needed the clarification. “History would fall more in the domain of Clarence Moore. He’s”—he checked his watch—“still at home. I’m sure he would be glad to talk with you.”
“Personal history,” I said, and saw, with gratification, that he frowned.
“Tilda and I are getting ready to leave,” he said, checking his watch again. I noticed it was a handsome sterling Rolex. He was a man with expensive taste.
“I won’t keep you long,” I assured him, casual yet determined. “It’s about Lawrence.”
“I heard he’d passed on. Excellent timing. One grand dinner party and then an exit with Hollywood attending. He couldn’t have planned it better.”
“It wasn’t a shock, then?” I asked before I grasped what he was suggesting. “You think—”
“Lawrence was many things but clumsy was never one of them. He was a realist about the publishing world. Other than getting a celebrity to write the book, which he did, his best guarantee for a big audience was to die.”
The audacity of his remark stunned me. Before I could respond,
the sound of tapping heels signaled the entrance of Tilda Grace. I recognized her from Lawrence’s party, but I was shocked to discover that she was Grace’s wife. She carried a tray laden with coffee, two cups, and handmade chocolate treats. She didn’t look at either of us as she put the tray on a table.
“Do you need anything else?” she asked.
Her accent surprised me. European. German or Swedish. I hadn’t noticed it at Lawrence’s party. She was one of those women who usually faded into a corner at a social event. I looked at her more closely and saw her ancestry in her square face and gray-blond hair. She was younger than her husband and could have been a beautiful woman. Instead, she’d chosen to subvert her looks with her hair pulled severely back in a ponytail and a gray dress that hung off thin shoulders.
“That will be all, Tilda.” Grace said. “Are you packed?”
“Yes,” she answered, casting me a nervous look.
“I won’t delay you for long,” I said to her. “Do you teach also?” She was about to flee the room, and for some reason I wanted to detain her.
“Oh, no,” she said, blushing. “I only have my bachelor’s. In printmaking. I couldn’t possibly teach.”
“Tilda is too busy to have a job.” Grace clasped his hands in front of his belt. “She has all the talent in the world, but there just doesn’t seem to be time to use any of it.”
Although I’d suspected as much, I was shocked by the cruelty. I waited for her to make some response.
“I’ll make sure there’s nothing in the refrigerator that will spoil while we’re gone.” She slid from the room, a shadow.
“If you have something specific you need, you’d better tell me.” He checked his watch again. “We’re going to be late.”
“Why did you renege on the contract with Lawrence when he returned home from Paris in 1958?” Okay, little Napoleon, let’s line up the soldiers and charge.
“Lawrence violated the terms. He led the school to believe he held a terminal degree, but he had very little formal education.” He picked up a cup of coffee and waved at me to do the same. Though I wanted to throw the cup at him, I picked it up and sipped daintily.
“Lawrence recognized that he was wrong, and we settled that dispute long ago. What makes you interested in it?”
“I’m always interested in breach of contract.”
“He signed a release, relieving me and the school of any legal repercussions.”
“Charming,” I said. “And smart. How much did it cost?”
For the first time Grace smiled. “That’s none of your business. In fact, I can’t see where any of this is your business. I have to be going. It was lovely of you to visit, Miss Delaney. Come again soon.”
It was a tacky maneuver, but one I wasn’t ashamed to employ. I let the coffee cup slip from my fingers and crash to the floor. China and coffee flew around my ankles. “How clumsy of me,” I said, bending to pick up the pieces. The cup rim was broken, and the jagged edge sliced through the tender skin between my finger and thumb. Blood spurted.
I grabbed a napkin and pressed it against the wound. When I looked at Joseph Grace, he was staring at the broken cup and the blood with pure horror.
The scene of Lawrence’s death came back to me, full force. The broken glass, the blood.
The sound of the accident brought Tilda on the ready. “Are you okay?” she asked, taking my hand and examining it. “Just a nick. See, it’s already stopped bleeding.”
“I’m fine,” I agreed, kneeling beside her as she blotted the coffee. “I’m very sorry.”
“Tilda can manage,” Grace said impatiently.
“I wouldn’t dream of leaving such a mess.” I smiled at him.
“I have some calls to make.” He stormed out of the room, a tiny field marshal thwarted.
“Have you been in Mississippi a long time?” I asked, knowing the answer as all good PIs and lawyers are supposed to do. Though her accent was foreign, it was tainted with a drawl.
“Nearly thirty years,” she said. “I was eighteen when I met Joseph. He was studying in Vienna.”
“It must have been a difficult change to come here.”
She shook her head. “Regret is for the foolish.” Her smile was tentative. “It was a decision I made long ago.”
I put the shards of the coffee cup on the tray. “Are you going to visit your children?” The doll-laden tree made me think perhaps it was done up for their grandchildren.
“We are childless,” she said, and her gaze dropped to the floor. “Not even the best doctors here could help us.”
Tilda had no way to understand that her affliction would be the highest form of womanhood if she’d been born into the circle of Southern gentility. An accident of birth had turned an asset into personal shame.
She pressed her thin body down on the towel she was using to blot the carpet, allowing the task to absorb her so completely there was almost no one left. I touched her shoulder. “I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to talk with you Christmas Eve. At Lawrence’s party.”
Her blue gaze met mine. “I don’t like such parties.”
To my further amazement, large tears welled up in her eyes and one slipped down her cheek before she could turn away. “Lawrence encouraged me in my art. He said I had talent. He was very kind to me when we met in Paris. If he had never started talking about this stupid biography.” Her voice grew lower and more powerful. “So stupid. To say that he was going to write everything.”
I rocked back on my heels, thinking fast how not to spook her away from what I wanted to know. “You knew Lawrence in Paris?”
“Oh, yes. He introduced me to Joseph. He did not expect that we would marry.” She slowly got to her feet, lifting the tray as she did so. “I have to go. Joseph doesn’t like to wait.”
“Did Lawrence talk to you about his book?” She knew something, and I realized the question was an awkward fumble when her eyes darted toward the door Grace had left through.
“To me? No. I was always on the fringes of Lawrence’s life. Just another young person who wanted to paint. He said nothing to me.” She held the tray rigidly, gaze shifting beyond me. “You must go. Joseph gets angry when his schedule is interrupted.”
There was nothing to do but leave—with more of a mystery than when I’d arrived.
“Tilda?” I hesitated. “Who would want Lawrence dead?”
Her blue eyes were clear and unflinching when she finally looked into my eyes. “The book he was working on, his biography. It would damage many people, my husband among them. But others, too. Lawrence was filled with secrets, the dark acts of others. People were afraid of what he would reveal.” She smiled the most curious of smiles before she continued. “Even me.”
She walked past me, and when I turned to watch her I saw what she’d seen the whole time—Joseph Grace’s shadow as he stood outside the door and eavesdropped on us.
8
The one thing I’d learned from my last case was that at a certain point in any investigation, everyone is a suspect. One of the things I’d learned from my undergraduate years in psychology was that given the proper motive, a person is capable of anything. My problem with this case was that it seemed the list of suspects and motives was endless.
The theft of the manuscript indicated that Lawrence had, indeed, written something damaging. But to whom? Everyone seemed to have a motive for not wanting the book to see print.
The only other component necessary for a crime was opportunity. And from what I could tell about Lawrence’s manner of living, just about anyone who happened to drive up to his home had opportunity.
Unless, of course, he had simply died from a severe cut on his hand that was accidentally inflicted. Accidents are the most common cause of death in the United States, but Doc wasn’t satisfied that Lawrence’s death was accidental. Only the autopsy would prove anything concrete.
The possibilities of the case perked and bubbled in my brain as I drove home. It was a relief to see the bare s
ycamores that marked my drive—at last I could get out of the car and away from my fruitless speculations.
I saw the first dog when I was halfway down the drive. It was a small creature that looked like a cross between a greyhound and a Brillo pad. He was sitting patiently beneath a tree and watching the front porch with such intensity that he never acknowledged the passing of my car. As I pulled around the house, I saw six more, a motley crew of shaggy and slick, big and little, black and white, and all in-between dogs. They were simply sitting, watching the back door.
I’d never seen so many dogs in one place. I got out of the car with some trepidation only to discover that whatever they were interested in, it wasn’t me. The doggy portal that Harold had sent a carpenter to install in the kitchen door burst open and Sweetie Pie bounded down the steps in one single leap.
“Sweetie,” I called out, glad for the welcome. She shot past me and headed for the pack. It took all of fifteen seconds for me to realize what was going to happen.
“No!” I rushed for the garden hose and made all efforts to run the dogs away, but Sweetie had no intention of allowing her suitors to depart. Dropping the hose, I went for the phone.
Harold, at least, had the decency to be at his desk at the bank. “I thought you had Sweetie Pie spayed,” I accused, breathless. Outside the kitchen window, every dog was having his day.
“She was,” he said.
“It wasn’t successful.” I turned my back on the orgy.
“I’ve never heard of such,” Harold said, and there was the hint of laughter in his voice. “How can you tell?”
Had I not been well trained by Aunt Loulane, I would have given him the graphic details of how I could tell. “She’s in heat,” I said. “Trust me. I recognize the condition.”
“Yes, I suspect you do.”
I felt a sudden throbbing in my thumb, and for a split second I was no longer in my kitchen in Dahlia House but beneath the oaks at Harold’s. I felt his mouth close over my thumb and the corresponding surge of desire. “You have to do something,” I said, and my voice sounded rough to my own ears.
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