A Broth of Betrayal

by Connie Archer

  If both Harry and Rowland had been murdered, then someone else was involved—someone who knew the secret Harry kept. Or had Rowland been killed only because his construction was a hated project and it had nothing to do with Harry’s murder?

  She turned and looked back at the church. The white steeple rose to the sky, startling white against gathering black clouds. A cool wind blew at her skirt. This was the very spot where she and Sophie had met Rowena, the day they delivered refreshments to the church. Rowena had been excited, planning her interview with Rowland, and then on the day of the dress rehearsal, furious and upset that Rowland had cut her short and had her removed from the site.

  A car horn tooted. Lucky looked across the Green to Broadway. Sophie was at the wheel of her car, waving to her. Lucky waved back and hurried across the Green to meet her.

  “I was just heading over to the Spoonful to see you. What are you doing here?” Sophie looked at her more carefully. “You don’t look very good.”

  “I know. Everyone keeps telling me that.”

  “Hop in. We can talk a bit.” Sophie turned off the engine as Lucky walked around to the passenger side and climbed in.

  “I took a break to come over to look for Janie’s watch. She left it at the church the other night, but really I wanted to see Pastor Wilson.” Lucky rubbed her temples. “I had very strange, confused dreams last night, and all morning I’ve felt as if there’s something nagging at me. Something I know but can’t quite remember. Something that’s right in front of me but I can’t see it.”

  “What did Reverend Mothballs have to say?”

  Lucky smiled in spite of her mood. “Not much. Harry really didn’t tell him anything definite. But it seems he did want to get something off his chest. He had come to a decision but told the Pastor he had to talk to someone else first.”

  “Like something bad Harry had done a long time ago?”

  “Maybe. But whatever Harry knew affected another person. Something definitely haunted him. And that was the impression I had when I overheard them in the church. There’s another thing—but you must not mention it to anyone. Elias confided in me. Harry was terminally ill. He had only a few months to live.”

  “And somebody killed him.” Sophie shuddered. “How horrible.”

  Lucky leaned over and rested her forehead on her knees. Sophie placed a hand on Lucky’s back. “You’re completely stressed out.”

  “I’m exhausted from frustration, even though I slept like the dead all night. When you spotted me, I was thinking about Rowena and the day we met her here.”

  Sophie wrinkled her nose. “Thinking and Rowena don’t belong in the same sentence.”

  “Seriously, it was something she said that day. She was all excited . . .”

  “She was full of herself, you mean.”

  “That too. But she was planning an interview with Richard Rowland, remember? I recall thinking that no one wanted to hear his side of the story. But then we ran into her again the day of the dress rehearsal and she was very upset.”

  “I don’t remember that.”

  “Oh. That’s right. I think you took off when you saw her heading over. Anyway, I’m trying to remember what she said. She was upset because Rowland cut short the interview. I guess she had pressed it and she was outraged that he had her thrown off the site. She said it was going very well until she mentioned the pictures.”

  “What pictures?” Sophie prompted.

  “She told him the editor was planning to run old town pictures with the interview and that’s when his mood changed. She said, ‘He couldn’t get me out of there fast enough—as soon as I mentioned the pictures.’”

  “Where are you going with this? Do you think Rowland’s murder is somehow connected to Rowena’s interview?”

  “Not with the interview. He was willing to be interviewed. It seems it was the mention of running pictures that brought it to a screeching halt. And to answer your question, I think it’s all connected, but I don’t see how.”

  “I’m just trying to understand your train of thought.”

  Lucky heaved a sigh. “That’s just it. There is no train of thought. Elizabeth goes missing as these other things occur. Come on, Sophie. This is Snowflake. Nothing like this ever happens here!”

  “A year ago, I would have agreed. Until last winter when I almost lost Sage. But now look where we are.” Sophie fell silent, tapping her fingernails on the steering wheel. “I haven’t had any luck today either. I’ve driven up and down every road in town and all around. I’ve followed dirt tracks into the woods, everything I can think of, but I haven’t found anything unusual, much less Elizabeth’s car. I know I shouldn’t have gone out alone, but I just had to do something.”

  “I’m going over to the Gazette. It’s the only thing I haven’t had a chance to explore. Do you want to come with me?”

  Sophie groaned. “Not if I have to talk to Rowena.”

  Lucky shook her head. “I’ll do all the talking, okay?”

  Chapter 33

  IT WAS CLOSE to three o’clock by the time Lucky and Sophie climbed the stairs to the office of the Gazette. The Gazette wasn’t quite a newspaper, more of a local gossip sheet that occasionally carried news of wider interest. It consisted of an editor, a typist and a reporter, namely Rowena Nash. Lucky doubted Rowena made much money, if any. Her position was probably more freelance, if not volunteer, in hopes of building a résumé so she could move on to greener pastures.

  Lucky knocked on the glass window of the door at the top of the stairs. A voice called out, “Come in.”

  Lucky stepped inside with Sophie following. Rowena was seated in front of a computer monitor. “Lucky! What are you doing here?” She completely ignored Sophie.

  “I stopped by to see you. I wanted to ask you something.”

  “Well, you’ll have to make it quick. I have to finish this piece.”

  “Remember when we met at the dress rehearsal? You mentioned your editor wanted to run some old town photos with your interview of Richard Rowland,” Lucky prompted.

  “Oh, him,” she sneered. “A very unpleasant man. No wonder someone did him in.”

  Sophie jabbed her elbow in Lucky’s side. She knew what Sophie was thinking. No matter how obnoxious Richard Rowland had been, dying in a flaming construction trailer was extreme punishment for a man who was merely unpleasant.

  Sophie cut to the chase. “We’d like to see those pictures.”

  “Why?”

  “We’re curious.” Sophie smiled insincerely.

  Rowena studied Sophie for a long moment. “Well, I don’t have them anymore.”

  “What happened to them?”

  Rowena heaved a sigh, indicating how valuable her time was. “I returned all that old junk to the library. I’m sure they’ve filed them away somewhere.”

  “Thanks, Rowena,” Lucky said. “We’ll try there.” She pulled Sophie out the door and headed down the stairs before Sophie could deliver a parting shot. When they reached the outer door at the foot of the stairs, they heard Rowena’s heels clattering across the office floor above them.

  “Lucky!” Rowena called from the top of the stairs. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing. Nothing at all. I was just curious and thought they might still be here.”

  Rowena’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Do you know something I don’t know?”

  “Of course not,” Lucky replied innocently. “If I did, I’d tell you. You know that.” Sophie snickered quietly.

  Rowena hesitated. “Okay then.” She turned and stomped back to the office.

  Sophie whispered, “Right. Like anything you tell her wouldn’t be in the next edition of the Gazette.”

  “Exactly. I’m just satisfying my curiosity about Rowland and why he had such a violent reaction to those pictures Rowena’s editor wanted to run.”

  “Sure you’re not grasping at straws?”

  “Nope. Not sure at all. I probably am grasping at straws. But what else can I do
? I want to find Elizabeth, and if I can figure anything out at all, it might help. Harry’s gone. There’s nothing we can learn from him. Even Pastor Wilson didn’t know what he had on his mind. Rowland’s been murdered. If there’s a reason Rowland got so worked up about those pictures, I want to know why. And you cannot tell me that Elizabeth’s disappearance just happens to be a coincidence. I just pray that wherever she is, she’s still alive.”

  “I wish you luck. Listen . . .” Sophie rummaged in her purse. “Take my car. I promised Sage I’d help him get some stuff ready for tomorrow. I’ll walk back to the Spoonful and cover for you.”

  “Thanks,” Lucky said, pocketing the keys. “This won’t take long. I’ll be back in a half hour. Can you let Jack know where I went? Oh,” she said, reaching into her pocket. “Give Janie her watch.”

  “I will. And try not to worry too much in the meantime.” Sophie reached over and enveloped her in a hug.

  “Easier said than done.”

  * * *

  LUCKY CLIMBED THE stairs to the small cottage that housed the Snowflake Library and town archives. It sat among tall pine trees at the end of Elm Street, and one could easily imagine it was exactly as it appeared, a charming family home. The house had been donated to the town on the condition it be used as a library. Emily Rathbone, a retired teacher like Elizabeth, was one of several volunteers who served as a librarian. One of Sophie’s missing flyers was prominently displayed in a window on the front porch, and another on the glass window of the door. Inside, a small stack stood on a hallway table.

  Lucky knocked on the door and entered. The temperature inside was as warm and humid as the outdoors. Several windows stood open to catch any possible breezes. The house was old and had never had central air-conditioning installed. Every wall was lined with bookshelves and filled with books, all organized and catalogued. The center of each room held a large table with displays of the most current offerings. The living room of the cottage was devoid of furniture except for a massive oak desk and a cabinet with many small drawers in which index cards were filed. The librarians also used an electronic database but were unwilling to eliminate the paper card catalog.

  “Hello.” Emily looked up and smiled. “You’re Lucky Jamieson, aren’t you!” she exclaimed. Emily was tall and thin and wore wire frame glasses similar to Hank Northcross. In fact, if they stood together they could have been mistaken for brother and sister. Emily’s hair was long and gray, worn in a loose braid that hung halfway down her back. She wore several home-crafted beaded necklaces and a brightly colored long skirt paired with a peasant blouse.

  “Yes, I am. I don’t believe we’ve met.”

  “Not formally. I remember you at your parents’ restaurant—before you went off to college. Can I help you with anything?”

  “Actually, you can. I understand from Rowena Nash you had loaned her some old photos for an interview.”

  “Yes. That’s right. She wanted to interview that dreadful man who was building the car wash. Whatever for, I can’t imagine.” Emily grimaced. “Of course, I wouldn’t have wished that fate on him, but I’m awfully glad the construction’s halted now—hopefully permanently. And that terrible business with Harry Hodges. I could hardly believe it!” She shook her head. “But you’re in luck; I was just getting ready to put them away. Follow me.”

  Emily led Lucky down a hallway that stretched to the rear of the house. She pushed back a sliding door to reveal a large compartment of shelves, full of storage boxes all neatly labeled. “The school photos are on this side. Years and years of Snowflake students. We have all the ‘official’ ones. You know the kind. The entire class and teacher by grade. No one ever made a determined practice of taking candid shots, but we do have quite a few.” Emily picked up a batch of photos that sat on a shelf next to one of the boxes of elementary school photos.

  “Let’s bring them out to the light so you can see better.” Emily carried them to a table by the open front window. A short gust of cool wind blew the curtains back. Lucky looked out to see dark clouds scudding across the mountaintop.

  Emily peered out. “Looks like a thunderstorm on the way. I always close and lock the cottage at night, but I sometimes forget to shut the windows. I better remember to do that tonight.”

  Lucky picked up the batch of photos and leafed through them. There were shots of young children playing in the schoolyard and ice-skating on the pond, several photos of children posing next to classroom art and the last one, three boys on a schoolyard bench.

  “These are the ones I loaned Rowena. Or at least the ones she wanted to take. There are a lot more in that box if you’d like to see them. What exactly are you looking for?” Emily asked.

  “I don’t really know. Rowena told me Richard Rowland cut his interview short. Apparently, he changed his mind when Rowena mentioned that the editor planned to run old photos with his interview. I have nothing to back this up, but I’m suspicious that Elizabeth Dove’s disappearance might somehow be connected.”

  “Oh yes,” Emily gasped. “I was stunned when I heard about it. Poor Elizabeth. Is there any news?”

  Lucky shook her head negatively. Emily’s face fell. “For a moment, I thought . . . well, never mind. I’ve volunteered time to the searches almost every day since I heard. This is my first day back to the library. You know, I knew Elizabeth very well years ago. When we were both teaching. She was my mentor, more or less, when I first came to Snowflake. She had already been teaching several years when I first arrived. She was wonderful to me. She took me under her wing. I can’t imagine why anyone would ever want to hurt her. She’s never harmed a soul.”

  “Someone has taken her, Emily. Elizabeth would never voluntarily disappear.” Lucky leafed through the photos a second time. “I was just hoping that these had something to do with the developer canceling his interview. At least it sounded that way. For whatever reason, he didn’t want any pictures appearing in the Gazette.”

  The last snapshot of the three boys huddled on a school bench caught her eye again. They sat close together smiling at the camera. One of them had an arm around another boy’s neck in jest. The boys appeared to be about eleven or twelve years old.

  Emily followed Lucky’s gaze. “Boys. Horsing around.”

  “Who are these three?” Lucky asked.

  Emily plucked the photo from her hand. “I don’t know. It should be on the back. Yes, here it is. That’s Danny Harkins on the left; he has his arm around the center boy—Harry Hodges. Richard Rowland is at the end. Well, what do you know? There’s Harry with Richard Rowland. Elizabeth knew all of them very well. They were in her class.”

  A chill ran up Lucky’s spine. She remembered the gravestone with Danny Harkins’s name at the cemetery. And the other two boys—middle-aged men—were now dead within days of each other.

  “Did you know the three of them then?”

  “Oh no,” Emily shook her head. “That was several years before my time. But I remember hearing about them.”

  “Danny Harkins. He was Maggie Harkins’s son?”

  “That’s right. He died in a car accident. It was about oh . . . twenty-five years ago now? No, more . . . twenty-seven, maybe. Amazing, isn’t it? How decades can go by in the blink of an eye? Danny was around twenty when he died. He had a bit of a . . .”—Emily leaned closer, whispering—“. . . drinking problem, or so I’ve been told.”

  Lucky nodded encouragingly. She couldn’t imagine why Emily felt it necessary to whisper. Danny was long gone and they were alone. Maybe she was superstitious about speaking ill of the dead.

  “He crashed his car late one night. They found him the next day. Terrible. So sad for his mother. But the three of them as young boys were the best of friends, and then I think Rowland’s family moved away.”

  “What happened? Why did they leave town?”

  “Now this is thirdhand, so I might not have the facts straight. Elizabeth would remember much better than I. There was some trouble about a younger boy who used t
o follow the older ones around—trying to keep up with the older kids, I guess, even though they didn’t want him around. They used to bully and try to scare the younger kid to get rid of him. Then the little boy died in a terrible accident. He was trapped in an abandoned house just outside of town and they think he was playing with matches. Anyway . . .” Emily trailed off. “He couldn’t find a way out and he died in the fire.”

  “That’s awful. But I’m confused. What did this have to do with these three?” Lucky held up the photo of Harkins, Hodges and Rowland.

  Emily heaved a sigh. “There was a lot of talk at the time—that the older boys might have caused the fire, or had something to do with that younger boy being trapped in that old, run-down building. They denied it. They admitted they sometimes played there but said they hadn’t been there the day the boy died and didn’t know anything about it.”

  “Who was the boy who died?”

  Emily shook her head. “I have no idea. I only heard the story much later and no one really wanted to dredge that terrible thing up again. It was so long ago now. So that’s why I’m not absolutely sure I have the facts straight.”

  “So people did suspect the older boys had something to do with it?”

  “I don’t really know. They wondered if the boys were sneaking cigarettes or playing with matches. Kids do dumb things like that sometimes. But nothing was ever proven.”

  Lucky flashed on a memory of walking across the Village Green with Elizabeth. She had turned and seen Maggie Harkins in the distance. Elizabeth had followed her gaze and remarked “How strange . . . to see them all here again.”

  “Are you all right?” Emily peered over her glasses.