Theresa’s blood drive this year? Are you switching pews?”
“My friend Martha Stanley was doing it, but you know she’s scheduled for a hip replacement and she couldn’t—”
“Find anybody else.” Faith finished it up for her and they laughed. It was a welcome diversion.
Tom moved them back on track. Although he’d been pleased that someone not only remembered the title of one of his sermons, but had listened. Still they were ranging a bit far afield. “The point is that although we’d be hard put to come up with anyone who had a grudge against you, or Sam, you did get the letter, and the first thing we have to do is tell Charley. Do you want to call him or would you like me to?” The offending object was on the walnut coffee table in front of them, next to a clear glass vase of anemones just past their peak—elongated stems with petals splayed out in bright silk colors. A bowl of pears completed the still life. The letter looked as out of place as a porno magazine.
“You, please,” Pix said promptly, eyeing the missive with extreme distaste. “I don’t mind Charley knowing. I suppose it is a police matter, but I’d just as soon not talk about it.”
Faith thought it impolitic to mention that the moment Charley was on the scene she’d have to do a lot of talking. “How about a cup of coffee or tea while Tom is calling. Or are you hungry? Did you have lunch?”
Pix, a tall woman with a healthy appetite, looked surprised. Certainly she’d had lunch, as had the rest of Aleford—at noon when you were supposed to, but coffee sounded good. “I’d love a cup of coffee, if it’s made.”
Faith went out to start a fresh pot and put some molasses spice cookies on a plate while she was waiting for the water to get hot. Chief MacIsaac might come here rather than meet them down at the station. She added more cookies.
“Charley’s on his way,” Tom told her when she brought the tray into the living room.
Pix bit into a cookie, “Where are the kids?” she asked. She’d been so involved in her own problem that she’d forgotten about the younger Fairchilds, as much a part of the parsonage landscape as her children—and she counted the dogs—were of hers next door.
“Amy’s still taking a good long nap in the afternoon and Ben’s upstairs resting. He’s been awfully quiet, which either means he’s dropped off, too, or he’s taking apart the VCR.” At the moment with no audible sounds, Faith was letting well enough, or the opposite, alone.
The doorbell rang. Charley must have left as soon as he hung up the phone.
“So you’ve gotten one, too, Pix,” he said as he walked toward the plate of cookies.
Faith was oddly relieved. Pix wasn’t the only one.
Find the common thread linking the recipients and they’d have their noxious correspondent.
“Who else?” she asked.
“Now, Faith, you know I can’t tell you that,” Charley said, looking around for a sturdy chair. Unfortunately, the parsonage ran to spindly Hitchcocks.
He lowered himself into one of the wing chairs flanking the fireplace. He was a large man, brought up on the stick-to-your-ribs traditional fare of his native Nova Scotia. Food had been sticking to his ribs ever since, although he carried it well. As usual, he was in plain clothes, very plain clothes. His Harris tweed jacket was due for a good pressing and it was doubtful his shirt ever had.
“Let’s see it,” he said.
Tom motioned to the coffee table. “We didn’t want to add our prints; that’s why the cloth is there.”
“Hard to get good ones from paper, but we’ll try.” Faith shot a forgivably smug look at her husband.
Charley read the words slowly, looked at the envelope, and, using the cloth, put them in a plastic bag he’d pulled from his pocket.
“They were mailed from Boston—Post Office Square, to be precise—and at the same time—Thursday afternoon. The miracle is that they all arrived yesterday or today and didn’t take several weeks as usual.
Maybe we should be looking for a postal worker.” Charley was not above a little government-employee chauvinism.
“Post Office Square is in the business district. Who do you know who works there, Pix?” Faith asked.
“Could also be that our writer has a sense of humor,” Charley interjected, on a roll. “Post Office Square, poison-pen letters—get it?”
They did.
“Every lawyer, CPA—all those kinds of people—not working here in town works there, as far as I know. Including Sam.” Pix was depressed.
Faith forgot that Sam’s law offices were on Congress Street. Yet surely he’d have no reason to mail a letter like this to his wife. Plus, he’d been out of town.
Somebody in his office? But was there anyone who was familiar enough with Aleford to send the others, hoping maybe to divert attention from the intended target, if indeed Pix, or Sam himself, was it? It seemed unlikely.
“Does anyone else from town work with Sam?” she asked Pix.
“Only Ellen Phyfe—you know, Morris’s wife.
She’s been the office manager for years. They moved to Aleford because she’d heard such good things about it from Sam.”
Faith’s mind began to work furiously. Could Ellen have something against her boss? Faith had to know who else had received letters, and if Charley wasn’t going to tell her, she’d have to find out some other way. It looked like Tom was going to be avoiding cow patties on his own this afternoon at Drumlin Farm.
She planned to make some parish calls.
“If you got permission from the others to reveal their names, it might help to meet and establish some common ground,” Tom sensibly pointed out to Charley.
“Exactly what I’ve been doing. Okay with you, Pix?” Faith had finally put a mug of coffee into his waiting hand. He took another cookie. “I plan to get all of you together . . . by yourselves—sorry, Faith—later this afternoon.”
Faith didn’t think he looked very sorry.
Pix’s face assumed a determined look. She’d been running her hands through her short, thick brown hair and one piece in front stood straight up like a visor.
“Of course you can include me. Anything that will help to figure this out.”
Charley stayed a little longer, finished his coffee, and managed to tantalize Faith further with references to the other letters. It was Pix who broke things up.
“I have to pick Samantha up at softball practice and take Danny to that skateboard place in Cambridge for a birthday party. And,” she added, “I don’t want the kids to hear anything about this. It was bad enough the last time, the Cindy time.”
“Bad enough” was putting it mildly, but Pix did not tend to histrionics. In any case, “bad enough” in Aleford was generally understood to suggest major tragedy.
She left and Charley followed. Faith and Tom sat facing each other on the couch. Amy was beginning to call from her crib and they could hear Ben go into his sister’s room. It was extremely unlikely that he had thoughts of brotherly love in mind. His idea of play with Amy consisted of making her animals “fly.”
“So,” Tom said, poised for intervention.
“So,” said his wife. “We’ve got to get this settled. I know Pix seemed calm when she left, but that’s for Samantha and Danny’s benefit. Thank goodness she’s got them to worry about.”
Tom had never been enamored of his wife’s investigative involvements, but for once he thought she ought to see what she could discover. These were the Millers—parishioners and their dearest friends.
“The first thing we have to do is call Sam. See if he can come back earlier. Pix said he was staying at the Fairmont in San Francisco.”
“Good idea. You do that while I get the kids ready for the farm.” She looked at Tom’s shoes. “You’d better put your wellies on, too.”
Tom assumed a forlorn look, “And where are you going to be while I’m having all this fun?”
“At Millicent’s, of course—at least to start.” Faith was surprised he’d had to ask.
Millicent
Revere McKinley answered her door immediately, confirming that Millicent had been at her usual post, an armchair perfectly angled in the bay window so as to afford the occupant a view of Main Street and the green. Millicent’s muslin curtains provided just enough cover so that passersby could not be absolutely certain they were being observed. Millicent spent whatever leisure time she had ensconced in the chair, knitting enough sweaters, socks, and mit-tens to keep not only her own Congregational Church bazaars supplied but one or two others, as well. And she never looked down.
Leading the way into the parlor, she did not ask Faith the nature of her call. All in good time.
“Lovely day, isn’t it?” she asked, not pausing for an answer. “Let’s hope this good weather keeps up through Patriots’ Day, although, as you may know, we have never had to cancel due to an inclemency.”
“Yes, it has been a lovely spring.” Now that Faith was there, her clever opening gambits slipped completely from her mind, as usual, and she felt herself rapidly falling under Millicent’s control. She pulled herself together and sat down opposite Millicent’s chair, presuming the woman would want to get back to her work—a baby sweater with little teddy bears around the yoke—and her surveillance. She presumed wrong.
“Oh, don’t let’s sit there. Come here on the couch.” Recalling other visits when she literally had had to grab the arms to keep from sliding off the singularly slippery and uncomfortable horsehair, Faith defiantly chose a chair next to it. Visits to Millicent abounded in thin-ice metaphors.
“Never mind. The couch is not for everyone,” Millicent assured her. Another test failed. “Would you like some tea?”
It was a welcome reprieve. After refusing all offers of help, Millicent left Faith alone to regroup. Getting information from Aleford’s prime source was more difficult than gaining access to the Beatles’ uncen-sored FBI dossiers.
Millicent’s parlor was crammed with objects, some good, some mediocre, yet all treasured. A veritable phalanx of Hummels stood imprisoned in a china closet like so many Hansel and Gretels biding their time behind the mullioned glass before the witch would bake them. There were small tables, tilt-top tables, one large trestle table beneath another window, and chairs everywhere. Looking at the worn but good Oriental at her feet, Faith suspected the furniture served several purposes, not the least of which was to cover the threadbare patches of the Hamadan. A mourning picture on silk, two braided-hair mourning wreaths, and a reproduction of Paul Revere as a very old man gave a slightly lugubrious air to the room.
There was a fireplace, and Faith was surprised to detect a small curl of smoke. A fire in April? Had Millicent taken leave of her senses? No true New Englander burned wood out of season, no matter what the temperature outside—or storm conditions. Curious, she stood up and went over to look at what was left of the blaze. Whatever it was, it hadn’t been much. It had been a paper fire and all that remained was the charred corner of an envelope—a plain white legal-sized envelope.
So Millicent had gotten one, too.
Faith resumed her seat quickly, fully restored. She had planned to say something about POW! She’d thought of saying that she needed a clipboard to collect signatures, or some other ploy. Since Millicent was not a member of First Parish, although she interfered enough in church business to be considered at least an “inquirer,” Tom had pointed out on more than one occasion, the parish-call routine would not do.
Now she did not need subterfuge and could come straight to the point.
She let Millicent put the tray down on a wobbly Shaker-type table and waited while the older woman fiddled with a piece of cardboard shimmed under one of the legs. Finally, all was in place and Millicent was “mother,” pouring the strong tea she favored into delicate Limoges cups that she invariably mentioned were a throwback to the Reveres’—Rivoires’—French beginnings.
Teacup in hand, Faith declared, “You’ve had one of those nasty poison-pen letters.”
Millicent cast an involuntary glance at the hearth and then back, her piercing gray eyes matched by the iron Mamie Eisenhower fringe above them. Never a hostage to fashion’s whims, Millicent—and Mamie—had found a hairstyle and stuck with it.
“What makes you say that?”
Faith noticed it was not a denial.
“Because you’ve burned it in your fireplace, which was really not the best thing to do. We need all the evidence we can get to discover who’s behind this.” Millicent gave Faith a world-weary smile—Oh, the impetuousness of youth. “I had a very good reason for burning it. It was crude and I didn’t want anyone else to see it, but of course I told Charley. I described the way it was written. A cut-and-paste job from magazines and newspapers. I’m sure he knew what I was going to do.”
“Do you know who else received one?”
“Do you?” Millicent parried.
“Yes,” Faith advanced.
“All right, then, let’s try to figure it out. If the two of us can’t, I don’t know who can.” It was a major victory, and before Faith could let it go to her head, she told herself to remain steady and took out a pad and pen.
“When did yours arrive?”
“This morning—and it was mailed in Post Office Square on Thursday afternoon, like the others I know about.”
Before she could go off on the tirade against the U.S. mail that Faith had heard lo these many times before—“My dear, we used to have two deliveries a day! You could mail a letter in Aleford at night and it would arrive at its destination at breakfast. Now you’re lucky if it makes it in a week. Far simpler to hand-deliver.”—Faith quickly interjected, “What about the others? Who’s gotten them?”
“Brad has received one. He read it to me on the phone before taking it to the police. Also the Batcheldors and the Scotts. Who do you know?”
“Pix got one, also this morning. It alluded to the whole Cindy Shepherd affair and suggested that Sam had not stopped philandering.” Being with Millicent tended to make Faith use words she had hitherto seen only in print.
“Brad’s was about that Deane girl he’d been seeing several months ago, and it was rather graphic about what they may have been up to. He seemed to think the whole thing was funny, especially since they’ve parted company.”
“And the Batcheldors?”
“That was more circumspect. It just said they shouldn’t go out in the woods if they wanted to stay healthy. It was a threat. But the one the Scotts got was particularly vicious, mentioning her father.”
“Her father?”
“He was an alcoholic and hit a little girl when he was driving while intoxicated. She survived but was paralyzed from the waist down. Shortly after, he took his own life.”
“That’s terrible!”
“Yes, especially since it was so many years ago.
And to lay it at the Scotts’ doorstep! It had nothing to do with them. Louise was a girl herself at the time. I remember it well.”
And you were how old? Faith was tempted to ask, but she did not want to mar the precarious alliance.
Millicent was notoriously sensitive about her age, admitting to no more than a vague reference to sixty-something.
“Pix’s was signed ‘A friend.’ How was yours signed?”
“The same, as was everyone else’s except Brad’s.
Brad’s wasn’t signed. But that might simply mean whoever it was ran out of letters, got careless, or was in a rush.”
Faith made a note of the omission and the possible reasons.
“Such a cowardly thing to do.” Millicent’s cheeks were flushed. She preferred to meet her enemies head-on. “And I always resent it when you read that anonymous letters are a ‘woman’s crime.’ As if a man can’t cut letters out just as well.”
Faith agreed. “I don’t think we should assume it’s one or the other. And the recipients are mixed. Let’s think about that. What do you all have in common?” Millicent looked at her with pity. “Didn’t you read last week’s Chronicle?”
Faith had to a
dmit the weekly Aleford Chronicle was still in a stack of papers in a basket in the kitchen.
She knew that two children, husband, house, and career were no excuse for not keeping up with local issues, at least not to Millicent.
Millicent got up and went over to the decorative wooden canterbury next to an armchair. She plucked the newspaper from past issues of Early American Life, American Heritage, and other favored reading matter. Wordlessly, she turned the pages and pointed at one of the letters to the editor. Faith skimmed the lengthy plea to save Beecher’s Bog, which ended with the words, “First the bog, then the green!” But it was not the letter itself that drew Faith’s attention. It was the signers: Millicent, Pix, the Batcheldors, the Scotts, and Brad Hallowell.
“We wanted to create some interest for Friday night’s meeting,” Millicent explained. “You’d be amazed to know how many people aren’t aware of what Joey Madsen is trying to do.”
“Does Charley know about the letter?”
“Of course. I told him right away. Obviously, we were targets for our activity on behalf of the bog. And it’s also obvious who’s most interested in stopping us—Joseph Madsen and company.”
It certainly seemed that way.
Faith left Millicent’s full of information, yet feeling curiously hollow. She knew who had received the other letters and how, but the idea that Joey Madsen would be spending his time with scissors and Super Glue to intimidate his opposition just didn’t fit. He, like Millicent, confronted people head-on—sometimes literally.
She walked slowly by the green and almost bumped into Pix, who was striding along with two of the dogs.
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