A Tale of Two Biddies (League of Literary Ladies)

by Logan, Kylie

  I wasn’t hungry. But there are times when sugar is a very good thing. Especially when it comes to sweetening a sour mood. “What flavor?” I asked her before I made up my mind.

  Chandra grinned. “You don’t go to the candy shop much, do you? The chocolate fudge comes in a blue bag, the vanilla fudge comes in red, the peanut butter fudge comes in green, and so on. It’s a system Glenda over at the shop came up with so her summer workers at the cash registers would know how much to charge for what the workers behind the counter packed.”

  Chocolate then. I dug right in and Chandra passed the bag around.

  “So that Burke guy was nothing but a two-bit thief.” Luella munched and shook her head.

  “Only something tells me two-bit has nothing to do with it,” I said. In my months on the island, I had been virtuous and avoided the candy shop completely. Darn, one bite of the chocolate fudge studded with pecans and I knew the next time I walked by, my resolve would poof away completely and I’d load up on more fudge. “I bet that drawing’s worth a fortune. Wait until Margaret and Alice find out! They were talking about refinancing the building, right? If they sold the drawing, they probably wouldn’t need to. Heck, they might be able to retire someplace nice and warm and live like queens.”

  “That will be quite a relief to Margaret.” Luella finished her piece of fudge and reached for one of the paper napkins in the holder at the center of the table. “Not having to refinance, I mean. She’s never been as dedicated to the knitting shop as Alice is, you know. A couple weeks ago, when I talked to Margaret about the refinancing . . . well, she wasn’t exactly enthusiastic. Said she’d rather go back to Florida than stay here and have to listen to Alice criticize her knitting skills.”

  “Something tells me she might change her tune when she finds out that picture she didn’t want Alice to buy is worth a mint.” Pinot grigio after chocolate is not the best idea, so I took one sip of wine to wash away the fudgy flavor, and another to make sure it stayed gone. “I wouldn’t be surprised if this story gets the twins plenty of publicity and a lot of attention from the media. It’s like something right out of an Indiana Jones movie.”

  “And wait until the newspapers find out how much you had to do with figuring it out.” Chandra offered another piece of fudge and I declined.

  Good fudge.

  Bad idea.

  I’d have to make sure to stay far, far away from any publicity Alice and Margaret might garner thanks to the Phiz drawing.

  As if the ideas racketing around in it were too heavy to be held upright, Chandra tipped her head to one side. “Mason Burke and the missing picture.” She nibbled chocolate fudge. “It’s terrific, really, how you figured it out, Bea. But here’s what I don’t get.” She shimmied forward in her seat, planted her elbows on the table, and glanced around at each of us.

  “What does what just happened with Mason Burke have to do with Richie’s murder?”

  Good question. I plumped back in my chair and admitted to them what I didn’t even want to admit to myself. “I have absolutely no idea.”

  • • •

  The idea struck in the middle of the night, as so many ideas so often do.

  Not that I’m complaining or anything. I wasn’t sleeping, anyway, and thinking about murder beats thinking about stolen kisses and the resulting disses.

  After a week of taking care of guests, I was alone in the house, and I’d drifted off on the couch in the parlor, a book open on my lap. When I sat up like a shot, the book slapped against the floor. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes, checked the tall case floor clock in the corner, and cursed whatever muse it was who was responsible for the idea—and the bad timing.

  Two forty-five.

  Too early to call Kate, who never got out of bed until the sun was up.

  Too late to call Chandra, who kept night owl hours but never this late.

  Too rude to call Luella, who I knew was recovering from a week’s worth of fishing charters.

  Too crazy to call Hank, who, for all I knew, was at Chandra’s anyway. Besides, I’d need more information before I presented my theory to him.

  I had no choice but to wait for the sun to peep over the horizon, and when it did, I planned to be ready with as many dates, times, places, and incidents as I could remember.

  Once I had my facts lined up, then—and only then—would it be time to call the League of Literary Ladies to action.

  18

  “What are you doing here?”

  Okay, so it wasn’t the most gracious way to greet Levi first thing the next morning, but it’s not like I could help myself. Just as the sun came up, I called Hank and told him what was on my mind. And Hank? Well, he didn’t exactly buy right into the theory. Maybe he hadn’t had a cup of coffee yet. Maybe he wasn’t a morning person. Maybe he was too much of a cop, and I had read too many books with convoluted plots and seen too many shows on TV where the truth had been staring people in the face—literally—and it was so plain and so simple and so apparent, no one ever figured it out.

  Maybe that’s why I was so discombobulated when I saw Levi waiting for me outside his bar, where I’d arranged to meet with Hank.

  Or maybe it was something else.

  “Got an official invite from our friend Hank,” Levi said. It was obvious that unlike Hank, Levi was a morning person. This early, Put-in-Bay was nearly deserted, and the cardinals and robins were trying out their songs, but he was as bright as a new penny. Jeans, blue golf shirt the exact shade as his eyes, cocky smile. If I’d known what I’d be dealing with, I would have had a second cup of coffee just to fortify myself.

  Sans more coffee, I had to rely on my own brainpower. “I don’t know why Hank would want you in on this,” I said.

  “Maybe he’s just looking for an impartial witness.”

  “Because he thinks I’m nuts.”

  Levi’s smile inched up. “Do you think you’re nuts?”

  “He told you, didn’t he? Hank told you what I’ve been thinking.”

  Levi leaned back against the closed front door of the bar. “He mentioned you had a theory.”

  “And he said the theory was a little out there. No, he said it was a lot out there.”

  His one-shoulder shrug made it hard to know if Levi agreed with Hank or not.

  “It is a lot out there,” I admitted, my voice teetering on the edge, just as my composure was. But hey, I hadn’t gotten much sleep. That was one excuse. Levi was excuse number two. And number three?

  “I’ve been over and over it, Levi. I made long lists last night.” To prove it, I waved the legal pad I carried in front of his face. “I went over times and dates and incidents. I hate what I came up with.” My voice caught on a sudden knot of emotion in my throat. “I really hate it.”

  “I know.” He pushed away from the door and stepped forward, and I knew if I gave him the slightest encouragement, he’d give me a hug.

  I needed the hug.

  But not the hugger.

  I held the legal pad to my chest like a shield and forced the tremor of emotion out of my voice. “Hank is picking up the FBI agent from Cleveland?”

  Levi checked the time on his phone. “He’s at the airport even as we speak. They won’t know anything definitively—”

  I knew this. Of course I knew this. That’s why I cut him off with a shake of my head. “Not until they can study the drawing. They’ll start by testing the paper so they know how old it is, and the ink, too. They’ll look at that Phiz signature a few gazillion times to determine if it’s authentic. Even with the FBI art experts involved, it will take a while.”

  “You know a few things about art forgery.”

  I did, for a lot of reasons I didn’t want to explain to Levi. It was simpler to say, “If you were Chandra or Kate or Luella, I’d tell you it was because of my late husband, Martin. You know, the antiques dealer.”

  “The one who never existed.” I can’t say for sure, but I think Levi found this amusing. That would explain that da
rned blue glint in his eyes. “You should be honest with your friends,” he said.

  “As honest as you are with yours?” Oh yes, this was a low blow, but I figured he deserved it. We were friends. Sort of. And he had left me hanging with that stinging comment about how kissing me had been a mistake.

  “I’d like to be,” he said.

  “So would I,” I shot back.

  “So we each have our own reasons, and our reasons are—”

  “Our reasons.”

  Thank goodness I saw Hank’s SUV turn onto the street or we might have gone on this way even longer. Hank and the FBI representative were here and it was time to get down to business. If my brain hadn’t told me that, the funny, fluttering feeling in my stomach would have.

  We met them in front of the knitting shop and Hank introduced us to Special Agent Sheila Rafferty, a middle-aged woman with short-cropped hair and a no-nonsense attitude. I let them lead the way into the shop.

  “Well, good morning!” I saw that Hank had done as I’d asked and called the Defarge sisters so the shop would be open. Alice came around the counter and her bright smiled dimmed when she realized Hank had brought reinforcements. She looked from one of us to the other, but her gaze stopped on me. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “You know about Mason Burke and the break-in.” I knew the local cops had interviewed her the day before, so this was a given. “We just need to tie up a few loose ends.”

  “Yes, of course.” There was a steaming mug of tea on the counter and Alice went over to retrieve it and offered to make coffee. We all declined. I couldn’t speak for anyone else, but I wasn’t in the mood. Not with what I knew I had to say.

  “The police explained to you about the drawing, didn’t they, ma’am?” Special Agent Rafferty asked. “There’s a chance that the one you have hanging here on your wall is—”

  “An original!” Alice clasped her hands together. “Whoever would have thought! And my goodness, to think I bought it at a garage sale!”

  “It’s too bad you didn’t know more about the drawing before you and Margaret decided to refinance,” I mentioned.

  Alice’s smile froze. This was something she hadn’t considered. “You mean, it might be worth—”

  “Millions.” Honestly, I doubted the drawing would fetch that much at auction, but I threw out the figure, anyway, just to watch Alice’s reaction.

  It was predictable.

  When she set down her cup, the tea sloshed out on the counter. Alice didn’t bother to blot it up. “My goodness.” Like her hands, her voice trembled. So did her smile. She swallowed hard. “Wait until I tell Margaret. She’ll be so surprised and so sorry she made fun of me for paying five dollars for the picture.”

  “Except you paid seven, right?” I looked toward Hank, who gave me the go-ahead with a barely perceptible nod, and I took a few steps closer to Alice. “You lied to Margaret about the picture. But then, that’s not the only thing you’ve been lying about, is it, Alice?”

  Her eyelids fluttered and her chin quivered. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  I brandished my legal pad. “Exactly what I thought you were going to say. That’s why I made a list.”

  “Really, Hank!” Alice turned an earnest little-old-lady look in his direction. “I’m sure I don’t know what Bea’s getting at, but whatever it is—”

  “Whatever it is . . .” Hank planted his feet and crossed his arms over his chest. “We need to hear her out.”

  I had the floor, so I adjusted my glasses on the bridge of my nose and consulted my notes. “I honestly thought Gordon was our guy,” I said. “Because he’s been smuggling cigarettes over to Canada and—”

  “What?” Levi stepped forward.

  “I’m on it. Bea and I have already talked all about this,” Hank assured him. “Go on, Bea.”

  “The day Richie damaged Gordon’s boat, he helped Gordon offload what was on it. You told us about that, Alice. As it turns out, what was on it was a load of cigarettes bound for Canada. Hank’s already gotten a confession out of Gordon.” Hank nodded. “But Gordon insists what Richie saw had nothing to do with Richie getting murdered. He swears he didn’t do it.”

  “Well of course he didn’t.” Alice tisked. “Gordon is a nice man.”

  “That’s just it, isn’t it?” I asked no one in particular. “When people are nice, we don’t suspect them. We take them at face value, and we never stop to think that it’s the nice that’s fooling us. That’s what it all comes down to. Nice. And A Tale of Two Cities, of course.”

  Alice glanced at the wall behind the front counter. “Certainly you can’t think my picture had anything to do with Richie’s murder,” she said.

  “It didn’t,” I admitted. “But in A Tale of Two Cities, there are two men, Sydney Carton and Charles Darnay. And they look enough alike to fool a lot of people. You know, just like twins do.”

  Alice went as still as if she’d been flash frozen. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Maybe Margaret will.” I strolled toward the back door. “How ’bout we get her in here.”

  “Hank!” Alice appealed to him again. “I don’t know what this girl is getting at, but she’s not making any sense. She’s not even from around here. She’s from New York. They’re all crazy in New York. She doesn’t know us. Not like you do, Hank. I’ve known you . . . Margaret and I, we’ve known you all your life.”

  “You knew Richie all his life, too,” I said. “After his parents died, you tried to make him part of your family. Look.” I’d tucked that photograph of Margaret, Alice, and Richie that I found at Richie’s place into the back of the legal pad, and I pulled it out and showed it to Alice.

  “Easter,” Alice said. “I remember we went to church with Richie and his parents, and then Margaret and I hosted a brunch. He kept it all these years. Poor Richie. If only he could have let down his guard a little and let us get past that wall he’d built around himself.”

  “Oh, I think he did let down his guard.” I flipped over the photo to show Alice what was written on the other side, and since Levi and Special Agent Rafferty couldn’t see it from where they stood, I read the words written in purple Sharpie out loud. “Chocolate Alice and Vanilla Margaret. That’s how everyone on the island’s known both of you for years, right, Alice?”

  “Well, yes. Of course.” She let go a long breath. “But what does that have to do with poor Richie? Dear boy,” she said with a glance toward Agent Rafferty to explain. “He had a big heart, but not much of a brain.”

  “I don’t know about that!” Since I knew he would need it as evidence, I passed the photograph over to Hank. “See, as it turns out, Richie had plenty of brains. In fact, he once wrote a song that would have made him famous if someone else didn’t steal the song and claim it as his own. Richie was no dummy. That’s why he pulled out this old picture of you and Margaret. That’s why he wrote on it in purple Sharpie. Chocolate Alice and Vanilla Margaret. When did he figure it out, Alice, one day when he was selling ice cream?”

  She clutched her hands at her waist. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  I’d made a quick stop at Chandra’s before I got downtown that morning. Chandra, of course, was dying to know what was up, and I swore I’d tell all later. What I needed, I told her, was to borrow something, and I pulled that something out of my back pocket.

  It was a blue bag from the candy shop.

  “The chocolate fudge comes in the blue bag,” I said.

  Alice fluttered. “Of course it does. Everyone knows that.”

  “Just like everyone knows that Margaret hates chocolate with a fiery passion.”

  “Well, of course,” she twittered.

  “Except on Sunday during the parade, I saw Margaret eating fudge out of a blue bag,” I said.

  “That isn’t possible!” Alice insisted.

  “Why?” I countered. “Because Margaret hates chocolate so much? Or because that wasn’
t Margaret I saw?”

  Alice’s jaw went slack. So did her shoulders. She would have crumpled to the floor if Levi didn’t rush forward to loop an arm around her shoulders. Agent Rafferty reached over and dragged the rocking chair closer, and when Levi piloted Alice into it, she dropped her face in her hands.

  “You can’t know,” she whimpered. “No. No. There’s no way you can know.”

  “But you did know!” This was from Levi, and call me crazy (go ahead and try and see what happens when a Manhattanite is called names), but I think there was more admiration than there was doubt in his question. “How, Bea?”

  I’d explained it all to Hank in that way-too-early phone call, but I went through it again, anyway. “It’s been staring us in the face all this week,” I said. “And I should have thought of it, I mean, what with reading about Sydney Carton and Charles Darnay. You see, Alice and Margaret look alike, too, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized that all this week, though I’d seen each of them plenty of times, I’d never seen Margaret and Alice together.”

  “That doesn’t mean anything,” Alice insisted. “Just because we’re twins doesn’t mean we’re joined at the hip.”

  “It sure doesn’t. In fact, Margaret even got married and moved away for a while. And when her husband died and she came back, that’s when you started talking about refinancing, wasn’t it, Alice? And that’s when Margaret—”

  “Margaret!” Alice popped out of the chair, high color in her cheeks. “She never loved the shop. Not like I do. She never cared what happened here. She wanted to sell it. Hank!” Her eyes wide, she turned to her old friend. “Hank, she actually wanted to sell the shop. She said she had every right to do it since she owned half the place. She was going to take her share of the money and go back to Florida. And where would that leave me? What did she expect me to do?”

  “What you did was get rid of her, and all you needed to do was wait a couple weeks until the refinancing papers went through, right, Alice? Then my guess is you’d tell everyone that Margaret had left the island and gone back to Florida and no one would have been the wiser. But then Richie got in the way. You see, Richie,” I said for Agent Rafferty’s sake, “told me that he was going to have a lot of money very soon, and when he did, he was going to leave the island and never come back. And I found myself wondering where he was going to get that money. He already had a down payment on it, didn’t he, Alice? Twelve thousand dollars. You would have been better off using that money to start your renovations than caving in to Richie’s blackmail.”