The Postman Always Purls Twice

by Anne Canadeo

  Maggie watched from the window at the front of her shop. A few early morning shoppers, joggers, and dog walkers were about, but there didn’t appear to be any fans or media following the actress. Maybe that group was already camped out at the hospital, waiting to pounce on Jennifer there.

  As Maggie went back to work, she was once again thankful for her own anonymous, relatively drama-free life.

  Just as she expected, Maggie’s friends converged at the shop around noon. Dana came in from a yoga class first and Suzanne arrived soon after, taking a break between appointments. They’d brought their lunch and knitting, and Maggie found them working busily on both when she walked up to the front of the shop after a morning class let out.

  “Where’s Lucy?” Suzanne asked between bites of a roll-up sandwich. She was suited up to run an open house in a black linen blazer, gray pants, and pale blue wrap sweater she had knit for herself.

  She held her sandwich at arm’s length, big gold bangles slipping down her arms as she avoided splattering juicy bits on her good clothes. Maggie wasn’t sure what was in it—turkey and a refrigerator full of other ingredients. It looked like it might explode.

  “She’s at the police station, giving her statement. I just sent a text and told her we were here.” Dana held a tall plastic cup with thick green liquid inside. Alternating sips between stitches.

  “That looks healthy,” Phoebe said.

  “It should be. There’s probably a bushel of vegetables in one glass of this stuff,” Dana replied with a laugh. “I get one every Saturday at the farmer’s market.”

  “I admire your courage. After watching Nick Pullman poisoned the other night, I’m sticking to my own homemade soup for a while.” Maggie picked up her spoon and showed the others her humble lunch. “Good old chicken vegetable.”

  “Don’t be silly.” Dana swallowed another mouthful. “I don’t think Nick’s poisoning was a random act. I think it was carefully planned and directed at him.”

  “Most likely,” Maggie conceded. “But you never know.”

  Dana smiled and put her cup down. “But you do . . . the police do anyway.” Maggie could tell from her smile that she’d already heard something interesting about the case.

  Dana’s husband, Jack, was an attorney in town, but had once been a police detective for the county and still maintained close ties with the force. Dana was often privy to inside information on interesting cases, and though she really wasn’t supposed to tell her friends, she usually couldn’t help it.

  Suzanne had put her amazingly sloppy sandwich aside and now held her hands out as she cleaned them with a wad of napkins.

  “Spill it, pal. Did the police find evidence in Maggie’s shop . . . or maybe in Nick’s trailer? Or his hotel room? They must be searching everywhere for clues.”

  “They are,” Dana confirmed. “And they’re pretty certain they found the bottle that held the poisoned liquid—”

  “Out in the trash next to my shop?” Maggie cut in, recalling what Charles had told her.

  “You’re warm. They found it in some trash collected at the park on the harbor. The label was torn off. But they’re pretty certain it’s the right bottle. There was a tiny, microscopic hole where a syringe must have been used to inject the poison into the drink, without disturbing the seal on the cap. Then the hole was sealed with a swipe of superglue. Ingenious, right? They’re checking for Nick’s DNA and anyone else’s.”

  “How in the world did they pick that bottle out from the tons of trash generated by this town?” Suzanne asked with amazement.

  “Good, old-fashioned, boots-on-the-ground—or rather, in the dump—police work,” Dana replied. “They sent an army of officers to pick through the garbage, bit by bit.”

  “Charles said this is a very high-profile case and there’s a lot of pressure on the Essex County Police Department not to flub it up and look amateur,” Maggie said. “I think this is an amazing break. Don’t you?”

  “It is a good break,” Dana replied. “But they were smart and methodical. They knew what type of bottle they were looking for and the time frame of when it would have been dumped. Jack told me they collected over a thousand bottles that exact size and shape, then had to narrow it down,” she added.

  Suzanne nodded her approval. “I always say, the harder I work, the luckier I get.”

  “Just think of all the plastic bottles we use and throw away . . . it’s totally polluting the planet,” Phoebe said sadly.

  “Phoebe has a good point. I try to use my own containers whenever I can,” Maggie told her friends. “But you can see why a traveling crew like this finds that inconvenient. If Nick drank the poison on the set, doesn’t that mean it had to be someone in the cast or crew who poisoned the drink?”

  “I’m sticking with the crazy-fan theory. Hell hath no fury like an old boyfriend scorned,” Suzanne cut in. “He’s obviously lurking around town. He could have planted the bottle on the set somehow.”

  “For instance?” Phoebe challenged her.

  “I bet the crew and cast has stuff delivered all the time. I’ve seen pizza boxes, Chinese takeout, and UPS deliveries around the set. Haven’t you?” she asked the others.

  “Okay, so Crazy Fan disguises himself as a delivery guy. That’s possible,” Maggie conceded. “Then what?”

  “He’s outside with the fans when Nick gets poisoned. Waits for the trash to be put out by the crew, then finds the bottle and dumps it in the nearest public place, where there is always a lot of people and trash. Hey”—her eyes lit up—“maybe he was hanging around the inn, waiting for Jennifer to come back from the hospital. That park is right across from the Lord Charles. He could have been sitting there, doing his stalking thing, and that’s why he dumped the bottle in one of those cans.”

  “Couldn’t this crazy fan be a member of the crew and Jennifer’s stalker?” Phoebe asked. “Maybe he isn’t a local. Maybe this person was on the set all the time, and after Nick drank the poison, he or she picked up the bottle and just put it in their pocket or something. Then walked down to the harbor and dumped it. We were there, the place was insane and the lights were off for a while,” she added. “Everyone was so focused on Nick, the culprit could have easily picked up the bottle and walked off with it.”

  “That’s true,” Maggie agreed. “It’s certainly possible.”

  “But Jennifer said the attention intensified once she got to Plum Harbor. I have a strong feeling, too, that the stalker is someone she grew up with, or went to school with,” Dana said.

  Maggie had finished her soup and set up the yarn swift on the little tea table. A class was coming in at two and she had to finish rolling their yarn.

  “What if the crew had taken their trash? I think they were supposed to do that according to the contract I signed,” Maggie recalled.

  “He probably would have followed them to see what happened to the bags. They had to throw it out somewhere.” Dana shrugged and picked up her knitting.

  “Very true . . . and not even relevant, really. They did throw the trash out here, and it’s very dark in that driveway if the light by the side door isn’t on,” Maggie added. “Charles told me that police officers were sent to watch the shop, in case anyone came back. He was especially concerned about the trash,” she added with a smile, thinking that was clever of him. Or just showed his experience.

  “But the police didn’t know Nick was poisoned until at least an hour or two after he left in the ambulance. The doctors in the ER had to figure it out. Then report it. That would have given Crazy Fan plenty of time to dig the bottle out of the trash,” Dana calculated.

  “You’d think he would have thought of something a little sneakier than just dumping it in a public place.” Phoebe gazed around at her friends. “He could have hid it somewhere, buried it . . . melted it—”

  “Maybe he panicked and just wanted to get rid of it,” Maggie cut in before Phoebe could go further. She did have a point, and the possibilities for disposing of the bott
le were endless. “It’s practically a murder weapon. Or maybe he thought removing the label was enough to render it useless as evidence?”

  “It does seem too simple. But sometimes people have an unconscious wish to get caught,” Dana said. “I’m just wondering who else stands to gain from Nick Pullman’s death?”

  But before anyone could offer their theory, Lucy walked in. She was smiling widely. Too widely, Maggie thought, for someone who had just been sitting in a dingy police station.

  “Hi, Lucy, how did it go?” Phoebe was the first to greet her.

  Phoebe had not gone yet to give her statement. She was the straggler, hoping a uniformed police officer would come to the shop to take a statement from her. A few weeks ago, during the investigation surrounding her friend Charlotte, Phoebe had spent many hours at the station, and understandably had an aversion to the building.

  Lucy shrugged. “Surprisingly painless. Depressing decor, but the officer who took my statement was polite.”

  “Was he cute? There’s a really cute one that has a desk in the front of the squad room, right after you get buzzed in,” Phoebe recalled. “He was nice, too . . . for an authority figure.”

  Suzanne slid over on the love seat and made a space for Lucy. “We tried to wait for you, but we had to rush ahead and figure out who poisoned Nick Pullman.”

  “That’s all right. I knew you couldn’t resist. Did you break the case yet?” Lucy unwrapped a yogurt and fruit parfait. Probably also purchased at the farmer’s market, Maggie guessed. But she held her tongue. She didn’t have to make everyone nutty and neurotic about eating prepared foods . . . the way she was now.

  “We’ve squeezed every drop from the crazy-fan theory,” Suzanne replied. “My personal favorite.”

  “But Dana said the plastic bottle from the poisoned drink was found in a bag of trash that came from the park at the harbor,” Maggie added, catching Lucy up. “So CF—Crazy Fan—would have needed to come back to the shop to find it after the movie crew left. Then dump it down there.”

  “Or, this person could have been on the set and pocketed the bottle when no one was looking,” Phoebe added.

  “Now we’re just wondering who else stands to benefit if the movie project is abandoned because Nick is out of the picture . . . no pun intended,” Suzanne said.

  “But the project won’t be abandoned. A new director is arriving from California. Jennifer told me this morning, though she wasn’t able to say who it is,” Maggie said.

  “This is where I come in.” Lucy leaned forward as everyone turned her way. “I was leaving the police station when I noticed a lot of excitement out in the parking lot. A bunch of reporters with cameras and all that. Your friend, Charles”—Lucy said the word with special emphasis as she glanced at Maggie—“was leading a group of celebs inside, to take their statements, I guess. I recognized Trina and Heath, of course, but there was another man. He looked pretty cozy with Trina, her arm tucked into his and all that.”

  “A lot of men look cozy with Trina,” Maggie noted.

  “Very true. But this looked serious. There was another woman, too. Sort of severe looking, but well preserved, midfifties, I’d guess. And a guy with slick hair, a real expensive suit, and a briefcase.”

  “Obviously a lawyer,” Dana noted.

  “Yes, probably,” Maggie agreed. “And maybe Trina’s companion is the new director?”

  “Ding . . . Maggie wins round one. I asked one of the reporters and they told me the guy with Trina is a director, Sam Drummond. And the woman is—”

  “Regina Thurston, the film’s executive producer?” Maggie guessed again.

  “Ding. Two for Maggie.”

  “And Sam Drummond is Trina’s boyfriend . . . Ding for me.” Suzanne’s tone was smug and satisfied. She whipped her knitting out of her tote with a flourish.

  “I knew that,” Phoebe mumbled. “My buzzer isn’t working that well today.”

  “Let’s see what the celebrity gossip experts are saying online. They must be blogging off their gel manicures over this story.” Lucy picked up Maggie’s laptop, which was sitting on the oval tea table, and tapped in a few words to search. “Here it is . . . posted an hour ago on Hollywood Buzz. ‘Drummond to the Rescue,’ ” she said, reading the headline out loud. “And there’s a nice photo of Trina greeting her honey at Logan Airport with a lip-locking smooch.”

  Lucy set the laptop down on the table so everyone could see. Then read aloud: “ ‘Hollywood’s hottest young director, Sam Drummond, landed in Boston this morning to replace Nick Pullman on the ailing film project Love Knots. Pullman was rushed to Harbor Medical Center Thursday night while filming the movie on location in Plum Harbor, Massachusetts. Reportedly, he is suffering from pulmonary and kidney damage, due to a near-fatal poisoning caused by ingesting a tainted beverage.

  “ ‘While local police investigate the attempt on Pullman’s life, Drummond has been hired in a hurry to direct the rest of the filming. The movie stars Jennifer Todd, Heath O’Hara, and Trina Hardwick, who has been dating Drummond since they met last October in London. Trina told Hollywood Buzz, “Despite being united under these sad circumstances, Sammy and I are thrilled to be working together. He’s a brilliant director and I know he’ll bring a special vision to this project.” ’ ”

  Lucy looked up at her friends. “Did you ever notice how everyone in Hollywood is brilliant? What are the odds of that?”

  “Must be something in the water,” Maggie said.

  “Or the smoothies.” Phoebe squinched her face, knowing she’d made a very bad joke. Her friends groaned in unison.

  “You don’t have to be a Hollywood reporter to see that Trina stands to gain big time by this switch. Wasn’t Alicia telling us that she would do anything to get more time on screen, to see her role given more importance?” Suzanne reminded them. “Her significant other is the perfect person to do that for her.”

  “That’s all very true, but is she so desperate that she’d poison Nick Pullman and risk having the movie sidelined for months, or maybe never finished? That doesn’t make sense to me,” Lucy replied, answering her own question.

  “Jennifer told me that putting the movie aside was not an option. They were bound by their contracts to find a new director and finish it,” Maggie said. She worked the swift quickly, creating small balls of yarn and snipping the thread every few minutes. She liked to see them piling up in the basket. It gave her a feeling of accomplishment.

  “I guess we’ll have to see if more physical evidence turns up. I’m sure the police are looking for Jennifer’s rabid fan. He’d be my first choice, before Trina,” Dana said. “No matter how ambitious she is.”

  “I have to agree,” Maggie said. “I still wonder about the other events, though. Could the fan have caused the light fixture to fall, or set the fire in Heath’s trailer? Were either of those events actually aimed at Nick? But he wasn’t where the fan expected him to be, so he kept trying?”

  “That would suggest that the person who poisoned Nick is close to the crew and cast . . . if not part of that group. Like Phoebe just said,” Dana added.

  “It does suggest that,” Maggie agreed. “I don’t know . . . maybe they were all random events. Just accidents. When you look at it logically, the light nearly hurt Jennifer and the fire could have hurt Heath. It would be a stretch to say Nick was the intended target in either of those situations.”

  “It would be a stretch,” Lucy said around a spoonful of yogurt. “But it still seems odd that all these dangerous accidents have happened in such a short period of time. I think it’s more than coincidence. But I can’t see how the pieces fit.”

  Dana put her knitting down and placed tips on the needles, preparing to leave. “It’s always fun to speculate with you guys. But I’m still glad we have the professionals to figure it out.”

  Maggie had to admit she felt the same.

  She was even happier later that afternoon to learn that one of the professionals on the case
was not obliged to work on the puzzle Saturday night, and was available for their date after all.

  “Guess what, I don’t have to work a double,” Charles told her over the phone. “But I will be here late. What do you think? Do you still want to get together, have a late dinner or something?”

  Maggie thought about it for only a moment. “Why don’t I fix something for us at my house. That way we don’t have to worry about being on time for a reservation. I’m sure you’re tired and would like to relax.”

  “You got that right.” Charles sounded happy but weary. “I’ll bring some wine. Red or white?”

  “White would be just right. I’m thinking fish.”

  “Sounds good to me,” he said happily.

  They set a time and Maggie planned the dinner. She was thinking fish, but was not even sure if Charles liked fish. Maybe he was just being polite. Though odds were, since he’d grown up in New England as she had, he did like it and ate all kinds without complaint.

  Maggie wasn’t sure what had come over her, offering the impulsive invitation. He’d been to her house, but she’d hadn’t cooked for him yet. This would be the first time.

  Weren’t you supposed to fret and fuss a lot more over this dating milestone? Maggie hadn’t dated all that much since her husband, Bill, had passed away. She did know she felt very relaxed with Charles, as if she didn’t have to go out of her way to impress him. He always made her feel as if everything she did or said was absolutely charming . . . or at least intelligent. She felt as if he liked her just the way she was, no improvements or enhancements necessary. Maggie didn’t need to date a parade of other men to know this was a special and rare thing.

  Charles arrived a few minutes after nine. It looked as if he’d come straight from the office. With a brief stop at a wine shop. He opened the bottle and they sat down in the living room for appetizers—olives, cheese, and a fresh rosemary baguette, with a little bowl of herbed olive oil for dipping. Maggie had gone out of her way to pick up the bread at a special bakery, but it was well worth the trip and the calories.