by Lea Wait
“Then you have to tell him, Maggie. He’s a big part of your life. You have to tell him now. You can’t wait until you have a referral for a child. You have to give him another chance to think about what you’re doing.”
“I will, Gussie. I promise. But not right now. This week is all about your wedding!”
That’s when Gussie’s phone rang.
Chapter 5
The Georgia Delegation in Congress. Winslow Homer wood engraving published on cover of Harper’s Weekly (The Journal of Civilization) Saturday, January 5, 1861. A montage of the faces of the Georgia delegation, by Winslow Homer, based on photographs taken by famous Civil War photographer Mathew Brady at his studio in Washington, D.C. The Georgia delegation pictured had already seceded from the Union when this newspaper was printed. 11 x 16 inches. Edges slightly uneven; otherwise, excellent condition. Price: $225.
Gussie put down her champagne, picked up her cell phone, and looked at the caller ID. “It’s Ike Irons.” She looked at Maggie. “Guess I’d better pick it up. Yes, Ike? Yes, she’s here. Just a minute.” She put her hand over the phone. “It’s for you.”
Maggie raised her eyebrows, but took the phone. “Hello? This is Maggie Summer. Yes, this afternoon, on the beach.” There was a pause. “I see. No. I told you; I didn’t touch the body. I’d be happy to come down to the station.” She looked over at Gussie. “Gussie will tell me where it is.” Gussie nodded. “I see. No. I’ll be in town until after the wedding. Thank you.” Maggie handed the phone back.
“What was that all about? I mean, I know it was about Dan Jeffrey’s body, that was clear from this end of the conversation. Did Ike forget to have you sign some paper or other?” Gussie picked up her glass again.
“No; it was more than that,” Maggie said slowly. “He just heard from the medical examiner. Dan Jeffrey didn’t drown. He was shot.”
“No,” said Gussie. “That means…”
“He was murdered. Shot in the head, before he went into the water. So now they need a more detailed statement than they did when I’d just found the body of a man who’d drowned. It seems I found a murder victim.”
“Now we have to go to see Cordelia in the morning,” said Gussie. “I guess after you make your statement. The poor woman.”
“You said she didn’t have many friends here?”
“Not that I know of. I see her at the post office, and the library. I’ve seen her more often in the past few months because she lives down the beach from our new house, but off another road. I smile and nod, and she does the same. Once last August she brought over a tray of muffins while Jim and I were talking with the contractor.”
“What about the man who was killed?”
“Jim knew him a little. He’d lived with Cordelia a couple of years, I think. He may have been her cousin, but he wasn’t at all like her. He was much rougher around the edges. You remember Jim said he drank; he’d seen him at the Lazy Lobster a few times.”
“The Lazy Lobster?”
“It’s a sports bar popular with local fishermen. Where you can hoist a draft and fill up on thick chowder or a burger while you’re watching the Pats or Sox and not worry anyone’s going to complain you smell of fish. Not the kind of place where a lot of people order champagne.” Gussie lifted her glass in Maggie’s direction.
“I’m sorry this Dan Jeffrey was murdered, Gussie, but I won’t be able to help the police. I didn’t see anything that will help their investigation. I’m here to help you and Jim with your move and your wedding. I’ve got my marching orders: pack closets, and when directed, help unpack at the new and brilliantly improved Aunt Augusta’s Attic.”
Gussie raised her arm and saluted. “Exactly!” She reached out her glass. “Is there a little more of that champagne? Between the move and the wedding, and now a murder, I think I could use another glass.”
“Filling up, Captain!” Maggie topped off both of their glasses. “And now I need to hear about that wedding. Somehow we’ve managed to put it off long enough. The happiest day in a woman’s life and all that, you know.”
“That’s what people say, don’t they?” Gussie smiled, a little lopsidedly. “Well, like I told you when I called in August to tell you the news. We planned a small wedding. After all, I’m not exactly a blushing bride. It’ll be my second wedding, and although Jim’s managed to escape the joys of matrimony so far, he’s a typical man. The simpler the better for him. We invited our friends from Winslow, of course, and you and Will, and a few of my antiques friends. Jim’s family is in Georgia and South Carolina, and he’s an only child, so we didn’t think any of them would come except his mother, and maybe a stray cousin. I have Ellen and Ben and a couple of relatives near Boston who might decide to drive down and see who I finally decided to marry. Add everyone together and we thought, maximum, maybe fifty people. Since we were sure we’d have the house fixed up by then,” here Gussie rolled her eyes, “we planned a catered reception there, sort of a combination wedding and housewarming. Then, when it was clear the house wouldn’t be in party shape, we moved the reception to the Winslow Inn. And that would be it. You and Ellen would be my attendants, and Jim’s invited Ben, and Andy Sullivan, his best friend and law partner, to stand up with him. So that covers the wedding party.”
“All sounds great so far,” said Maggie. “Just large enough. Manageable. Festive. Perfect! And how sweet of Jim to ask Ben.”
“Wasn’t it?” said Gussie. “Ben’s thrilled, of course. Now that he’s twenty-one he’s been invited to a few weddings of people he grew up with, but it’s been a little hard for him. He’s never had a girlfriend, and he talks about girls all the time. Other than that he seems happy to live at home with Ellen and work for me at the shop and at shows. Ellen and I’ve talked about whether it might be better for him if he spread his wings and lived in a halfway house, with other young people who have the same challenges he does. Maybe he’d meet a young woman who has Down’s, like he does, or find other friends.”
“Are there any group homes near here?”
“Only a few on the Cape, and those have long waiting lists.”
Maggie shook her head. “I can see the issues. Well, that’s Ben. And you’ve told me what you and Jim wanted your wedding to be like. So I assume something happened to change your plans. Talk!”
Gussie sighed. “It’s Jim’s mother. She’d met me once, about two years ago, so she knew about the PPS. Jim was worried she’d feel he shouldn’t marry someone with a disability, so he didn’t even tell her about the wedding right away. He waited until we had our plans made. He made reservations for her at the nicest B and B in town, the same place you’ll be staying after I move into the new house. Then he told her.”
“She was upset?”
“Turned out my PPS wasn’t an issue. She was delighted! Finally her baby boy—Jim’s fifty-two, Maggie—is getting married, and she’s thrilled. Jim was so relieved he didn’t see the flags flying when she started asking about my family.”
“Your family? You and Ellen?”
“That’s it. Ellen and Ben and I are about it. When Jim told her my parents had died years ago she went into overdrive. She set out to help us. She sees herself as the mother of the bride.”
“What?”
“Turns out she’s spent the last fifty years dreaming of her baby boy’s wedding day, and she’s dying to make sure it turns out just right. The way she’s always dreamed it would be. She wanted to come here in September, as soon as she heard. Jim’s held her off because of our moving. But she’s been calling Jim or me four or five times a day, always with new, helpful, ideas. And doing things, like sending the dresses, as ‘surprises’! If I hear the word ‘surprise!’ one more time…!”
Maggie tried not to laugh. She held up the bottle of champagne and poured what was left into Gussie’s glass. “Keep talking. I assume you and Jim explained to her, like the grown-ups you most assuredly are, that this was your wedding, and it was arranged the way you both wanted it.”
“Let me guess. You and Jim decided to compromise. Let her contribute a little to the wedding.”
“Exactly. It seemed the kindest thing to do. And after all, we were so tied up with the construction on the house, and the store, and moving, and Jim can’t exactly put his law practice on hold, even for a wedding. We decided to turn over some of the details to her, since most of the wedding was planned anyway. What harm could she do? We’d tell her what we’d decided, and let her make some of the minor decisions.”
“And?”
“It’s gone downhill from there.” Gussie drained her champagne glass. “You saw the dress she rented for you. She thought it was awful that I’d told you and Ellen you could wear whatever you’d like, and that I’d decided to wear a pale yellow dress. Horrors! All on her very own, believe me, she found a place in Georgia that would deliver overnight and ordered two dresses like the one you saw, for you and Ellen, and a flower girl dress, since every wedding must have a flower girl. She’s still calling around to relatives Jim didn’t even know he had trying to find one who’ll fly in and play that role. Her alternative suggestion, I swear, is for me to go to the local elementary school and find ‘a cute little miss with curls’ to fit the costume.”
“She really wanted Ellen and me to wear Gone With the Wind sorts of dresses in a New England Congregational Church in the twenty-first century?” Maggie asked, still fixated on the vision she’d seen earlier.
Gussie nodded. “Believe it. You should have seen Ellen’s expression. She took one look at her dress and asked if we were changing the date of our wedding to Halloween. And by the way, Lily even made you both dressmaker’s appointments with a woman in Provincetown. Bless the Internet.”
“But at least she left you alone? You already had a dress you’d chosen.”
Gussie chortled until the tears rolled down her face. “No, Maggie. Not a chance. She ordered a dress for me, too. Open the door of the closet in back of you.”
Maggie got up, a bit unsteadily, and threw open the door, more dramatically than she’d planned.
Inside was hanging something that appeared to be an enormous white balloon, above which was a small tight bodice. Maggie looked again. The balloon was supported by the largest hoop she’d ever seen.
She turned back to Gussie. “What is it?”
“Lily’s choice for my wedding dress,” Gussie explained. “It has a hoop, which Lily somehow felt I could wear by putting the hoop over my scooter. She also sent a veil, which Jim’s great-grandmother wore, so I could carry on a family tradition.”
Gussie and Maggie looked at each other, and looked at the dress.
“We have to burn it,” said Maggie. “Not the veil. That would be mean. But the dress? Definitely.”
Gussie started to giggle. And then they both burst into hysterical laughter.
Chapter 6
Cinnamomum Cassia Blume. Chromolithograph from Kohler’s four-volume Medizenal Pflanzen, Germany, 1887, showing a sprig of the plant and details of the flower. These four volumes picturing plants used for medical purposes (Cassia was said to relieve flatulence, vomiting, nausea, and diarrhea, and decrease the secretion of milk in nursing mothers) were considered an authority when they were published. During the nineteenth century Cassia, also called “Bastard Cinnamon” or “Chinese Cinnamon,” was also used as a substitute for Cinnamomum zeylanicum from Ceylon, which it closely resembles. The stronger flavor of the inside of its bark (where the “cinnamon” is) was preferred by chocolate makers in Germany and Russia. Cassia’s buds, similar to small cloves, were often used in potpourri. 9 x 11.5 inches. Toned edges. $55.
After a late night of talk and wine and more talk and champagne, not to speak of an almost seven-hour drive, finding a body, and hearing about both a wedding and a murder, Maggie hadn’t slept well. Her head hurt, her back ached, and her mind kept jumping from Gussie’s wedding to how and when she was going to tell Will she’d decided to adopt.
She’d hoped Gussie would be more supportive. Even her best friend sounded as though she was on Will’s side. Or at least on the side of telling him. Soon.
She hit the pillow and turned over, trying to block the sunlight coming through the cracks in the blinds in Gussie’s guest bedroom. The only piece of furniture left in the room was the bed, and it was directly in the path of those cheerful rays.
Maggie groaned and closed her eyes. It really was morning. Already.
She heard voices, and the tapping of Gussie’s walker in the hall. “Maggie? Maggie, wake up! Jim’s here. He thinks he should go with you to the police station.”
“I’m awake.” Maggie raised her head. “Just a minute.” She rummaged through the suitcase she’d left on the floor next to the bed and found clean underwear, jeans, and a red turtleneck, and managed to get a comb through her long, wavy hair. Five minutes later she was as presentable as she was going to get.
“Here,” said Gussie, handing her a Diet Pepsi. “I got in a supply, knowing you were coming.”
“Thank you. Nectar of the gods,” said Maggie, inhaling the liquid that she required the way others in the universe require coffee or tea. After a few gulps she managed to ask, “Do you have any aspirin?”
“I think there’s still a bottle in the bathroom medicine cabinet,” said Gussie.
Jim stood, bemused, sipping the cup of coffee he’d brought for himself. Gussie had a similar cup that held tea. He’d been warned Maggie would drink neither, but hadn’t seen her in action before.
She was back in a moment. “Okay. That’s all the personal restoration I can manage at the moment.”
“I assume you ladies had a late night?” said Jim, clearly trying to keep a straight face.
“The dinner you had delivered was delicious,” said Gussie. “And you were right. We had a lot to talk about.”
“So I can see,” he said, looking from one of them to the other. “Gussie told me Ike called about Dan Jeffrey. I thought I’d drive you to the police station this morning.”
“I don’t need you to do that,” said Maggie.
“I think you should have a lawyer with you.”
“A lawyer? Because I happened to be the one to find a body on the beach?”
“It won’t do any harm. In a murder investigation it never hurts to have a lawyer around.”
“This isn’t the first time I’ve been involved with a murder, Jim. I’ve never had any reason to have a lawyer.”
Gussie maneuvered her walker so she stood slightly in front of Jim. “Actually, that’s one of the reasons Jim thought it would be a good idea if he went with you, Maggie. You have a history of getting involved with murder investigations. Remember what happened at the New York State antiques show? And at the show in New Jersey? Not to speak of—”
“Okay, okay. I get it. You’re on his side. It’s not my fault I happen to be around when murders are committed. Don’t worry. I don’t live here, and I have no interest in getting involved in another murder investigation. No interest whatsoever.”
“Good to hear that, Maggie. But, even so, I’m going with you,” Jim said firmly. “After you finish at the police station I’ll drop you at the new store so you and Gussie can plan the rest of your day.”
“From there we’ll pay a condolence call on Cordelia,” Gussie put in. “We won’t stay long. Jim, would you pick up a dozen cupcakes at Josie’s Bakery that we could take? I don’t want to go to Cordelia’s empty-handed and I don’t have time to make anything.”
“No problem. So, Miss Maggie, let’s get ourselves over to Ike’s place of business. The sooner you take care of that, the sooner the rest of your visit in Winslow can start.”
Chief Ike Irons raised his eyebrows slightly when he saw Maggie was accompanied by Jim Dryden. “Good morning, Ms. Summer. Thank you for stopping in.”
“Good morning, Ike,” Jim interrupted. “Doctor Summer is happy to clarify anything she might have said yesterday, but since Dan Jeffrey’s death has now been identified as a murder, and Dr. Summer is a guest of Gussie’s and mine, I thought I’d accompany her to make sure everything went smoothly.”
“Of course you did,” said Ike. “But I assure you, Dr. Summer has no need of a lawyer. I just need her to verify the information she gave me under less formal circumstances yesterday afternoon.”
“Then we shouldn’t take up much of your time,” agreed Jim.
Maggie tried to keep a straight face as Jim and the chief squared off in what seemed familiar roles for both of them. She had the distinct feeling they’d share a beer if they met later that day, but right now they were in full male role-play. She could feel the testosterone level in the room rising.
“Doctor Summer, I apologize for not recognizing your medical credentials,” Chief Irons began.
“I’m not a medical doctor, Chief Irons. I have a doctorate,” Maggie interrupted. “Neither of you have to call me Doctor Summer, please.”
“Well, then. I had my secretary type up a statement based on our meeting yesterday afternoon.” He handed a typed statement across his desk to Maggie. “If you’d read it, make any corrections necessary and initial those, and sign the bottom, that will be all that’s necessary.”
“Before you make any marks on that paper, I’d like to look at it, Maggie,” Jim said quietly. “But go ahead and read it. Any leads in the case so far, Ike?”
“There’s hardly been time to do much now, has there? I’ll be talking to Bob Silva. He was convinced Dan was the one got his Tony into drugs. And Dan spent time at the Lazy Lobster, so Rocky Costa might have seen or heard something. I have to get one of those interpreters to help me talk with Cordelia. She was mighty upset when I saw her last night, not surprisingly. But she might have information she doesn’t know is helpful.”
Jim nodded. Maggie handed him the statement so he could read it through. “Any corrections, Maggie?”
