Hounded to Death

by Laurien Berenson

  “Ewww again,” said Rosalyn.

  This time everyone at the table heard her.

  “Don’t knock what you haven’t tried,” said Alana. “And let’s be clear about something. I’m not against nudity on principle. In certain situations, it can be very liberating. People tend to shed their inhibitions along with their clothing.”

  “I’d certainly like to hear more about that,” Tubby invited.

  Was there a woman at the table who hadn’t seen that coming?

  “You know,” said Alana, “like at a nude beach.”

  “Or in a hot tub,” Rosalyn added.

  That brought the conversation to a stop.

  “That’s what I heard,” she said after a weighted pause. Rosalyn looked around the table. “Charles was naked when they found him.”

  “He was,” I said.

  “That’s right, I forgot. You two were there.”

  The gossip mill had been churning all day. By now everybody knew all there was to know about the tragic happening in their midst. Or at least they thought they did.

  “Which two were where?” asked Tubby.

  “Melanie and Bertie. They were the ones who found Charles.”

  “Were you? It must have been awful.”

  Tubby didn’t sound sympathetic. Titillated was more like it. I braced myself for the inevitable questions.

  “Here’s what I want to know,” said Rosalyn. “Where were Charles’s clothes? I heard he was out there under the stars buck naked with nothing more than a skinny little towel. I’ve known Charles for years and that pompous prick would never have allowed himself to be caught out in such an undignified position. So what on earth could he have been thinking?”

  “Probably that he wasn’t going to get caught,” Tubby said. His shoulders shook with a little giggle. “Wrong again.”

  I exchanged a puzzled glance with Bertie. Neither of us had known Charles, but under the circumstances, I might have expected a little more restraint from our companions.

  “Had Charles been wrong before?” I asked.

  “Not to hear him tell it,” said Tubby. “He was like the ethics police. Always trying to tell other people how to live their lives. Not to speak ill of the dead but—”

  “But nothing,” Alana snapped. Her shoulders were rigid, her cheeks flushed with color. “Whatever your opinions of Charles may or may not have been, I’m finding this whole conversation to be entirely inappropriate. Surely we’d do better to honor his life by remembering the good things about him.”

  “Like his keynote speech?” Tubby said dryly.

  “There was nothing wrong with that speech.” Alana’s voice had grown shrill. “Charles knew his position would be unpopular and yet still he had the strength of conviction to stand up and make his feelings known. I, for one, think that he should be applauded for that.”

  “Before we go raising him up on too high a pedestal, let’s get real for a minute,” said Rosalyn. “Charles wasn’t the kind of man who ever had to worry about being unpopular. Probably not even once in his entire, charmed, frat-boy life. So delivering a talk like that wasn’t a show of bravery. More like a demonstration of arrogance. It was his way of saying, Here’s my opinion, and everyone should agree with me just because I said so.”

  “Did we even listen to the same speech?” asked Alana. She looked at Bertie and me for confirmation. “Because I didn’t hear it that way at all.”

  “Hard for me to tell what his motivation was,” Bertie said with a shrug. “I didn’t know him.”

  “Me either,” I agreed.

  “No loss,” Tubby muttered.

  He raised a hand and summoned a waiter. “We’d better order some food, don’t you think? Otherwise we’ll be sitting here all night. And let’s change the subject too. I’ll enjoy my meal a whole lot more if I don’t have to talk about Charles Evans while I’m eating.”

  As we opened our menus, Tubby pointed at me. “You. Come up with something better to talk about. Proper dinner conversation.”

  Just about anything would sound proper compared to what we’d discussed thus far: murder and naked babes.

  “I’ll do my best,” I said.

  15

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” said Aunt Peg.

  Frankly I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted to talk about it either. But here I was and there she was, and that being the case, I was determined to get to the bottom of things.

  The “it” in question was the fact that moments earlier I’d seen Aunt Peg rise from her seat across from Richard and fling her napkin down on the tabletop with the flair of a courtier throwing down a gauntlet. Then she’d left the table and stormed from the dining room.

  At the time, I’d been seated with my own group of quarrelsome dinner companions on the other side of the dining room. I had been poking at a pasta dish that had seemed more appealing when I ordered it than it did when it actually appeared in front of me. I’d also been wondering how long I had to listen to Tubby, Rosalyn, and Alana disagree about everything under the sun before I could slip away without appearing rude.

  Oh, and I’d also been passing the time by spying on Aunt Peg.

  I mean really. What fun is it to have a relative—especially one who’s friend, mentor, and bane-of-your-existence all rolled into one—dating if you can’t keep a curious eye on the proceedings?

  So when Aunt Peg stood up and stalked from the dining room, I was only a few steps behind her.

  Bertie looked at me with concern when I pushed my plate away and rose. Engrossed in the conversation at the table, she hadn’t noticed the events transpiring across the room.

  “Everything’s fine,” I said. “I’m just going to check on Peg. Finish your dinner, and I’ll see you later.”

  By the time I reached the dining room exit, Aunt Peg was halfway across the lobby on her way to the stairs. Breaking into an undignified jog, I caught her as she placed her hand on the banister.

  And was firmly rebuffed for my efforts.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” Aunt Peg said.

  “Of course you do,” I replied.

  “No. I don’t.”

  “Okay, fine.” I backed up a step or two. “Go up to your room and sulk. That will accomplish a lot.”

  Aunt Peg’s nostrils flared. “I am not going to sulk.”

  “Are you going to throw things?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Can I watch?”

  “At the rate you’re going, I might make you the target.”

  “Done,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  But of course because I was now moving up the staircase, Aunt Peg stalled at the bottom.

  “You can be a very large pain in the posterior,” she said.

  “I know.” Two steps up, I was taller than her for once. “I get that from you.”

  She sighed. Aunt Peg is a formidable woman. It was a formidable sigh.

  “You probably do,” she agreed. “So now what?”

  I hopped back down to equal footing, which, of course, made her taller than me again. Aunt Peg liked that.

  “Let’s go for a walk,” I said.

  She balked again. “Not back into the dining room.”

  “No.” I steered her the other way. “Outside.”

  “We don’t have coats.”

  “It’s not that chilly. We’ll deal.”

  Besides, I was pregnant. I’d been warm for two months.

  Outside, the weather was unseasonably balmy. So much so that several people were seated in the Adirondack chairs that lined the porch. Aunt Peg nodded a greeting but we kept moving, down the steps and across the small strip of lawn.

  “I love star gazing,” I said, looking upward. “It always makes my own problems seem so much smaller.”

  Aunt Peg harrumphed. “Your problems are small.”

  “Not always. Besides, we’re here to talk about you.”

  Aunt Peg sighed again. She folded her arms across her chest. She didn’t appear to b
e cold; it was more like she was setting up a barrier while she debated how much she wanted to reveal.

  “Now that you mention it,” she said after a minute, “I guess my problem is pretty small too.”

  “Richard isn’t as appealing in person as he seemed over the Internet?”

  “Something like that.”

  We’d been strolling along the grassy strip between the parking lot and the inn. Now we came to a corner. We had to either turn left around the building, or head off into the woods. Aunt Peg went left.

  Good choice.

  “Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “It’s not like Richard is a monster or anything. He just isn’t perfect.”

  “Did you expect him to be?”

  “Yes,” Aunt Peg said stubbornly, even though we both knew how ridiculous that sounded. “I did. After all it isn’t as though we’re just meeting for the first time. I’ve known him for months.”

  “But not in person.”

  “That shouldn’t matter. We exchanged long messages. We talked about everything under the sun. It was amazing how well we got along.”

  “By e-mail.”

  “Yes, by e-mail. But still…”

  I knew what she was thinking. E-mail, with two correspondents both pouring out their deepest thoughts and emotions, could feel like a very intimate form of communication.

  But it was also one where the participants could easily censor aspects of themselves or their lives that they didn’t wish to reveal.

  “Tonight,” I said. “What did Richard do wrong?”

  “He called me a sentimental old fool.”

  “Really?” I was shocked.

  “No, not really. At least not in so many words. But trust me, that was what he meant.”

  “And what were you being foolish about?”

  She leveled the kind of look that used to scare me. Luckily I’m pretty much immune to them by now.

  “Well?”

  “It was the dog, the German Shepherd. I mentioned that there was a stray in the area and that I was trying to befriend him.”

  “That sounds reasonable.”

  “Of course it sounds reasonable. It is reasonable.”

  “But Richard didn’t think so?”

  “He said he’d been looking for me this afternoon and wondered where I was. Apparently he’d been hoping that we might be able to spend some time together, which then didn’t happen because I was busy elsewhere trying to find a homeless dog.”

  “I take it he wasn’t pleased about that?”

  “Richard is a dog person. He should have understood. Instead he had the nerve to say that I’d gone off on a fool’s errand. You can’t save them all, he said.”

  “That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try.”

  “My thought precisely.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t the dog. Maybe he was just upset because the two of you haven’t had a chance to spend much time together.”

  Aunt Peg stopped and wheeled around so abruptly that I plowed right into her.

  “And whose fault is that?” she demanded.

  I paused and thought. After a moment the answer she obviously expected came to me.

  “Florence,” I said.

  “And by extension, Richard. I’m not the one who brought my mother to the symposium.”

  Aunt Peg resumed her walk. She has long strides. I was probably putting in two of mine for every one of hers.

  I might be able to worm information out of her, but Aunt Peg was going to make me work for it.

  We passed the opening in the hedge that led to the courtyard and hot tub. All sounded quiet within and neither of us even slowed down. Still, it was hard not to remember and give a small shudder.

  “Florence doesn’t like you,” I said.

  “Of course she doesn’t like me,” Peg said briskly. “She sees me as the competition. All these years she’s had Richard to herself and now she’s faced with having to share him.”

  “All these years…? You mean he’s never had a woman friend before?”

  “Don’t be literal, Melanie. Certainly he’s had girlfriends. He was even engaged once, though it didn’t last long. I gather Florence drove the poor woman off.”

  “She’d like to do the same to you.”

  “She can try,” said Peg.

  She drew herself up to her full height and squared her shoulders. It was an impressive sight. Interesting how the prospect of losing Richard to his mother had made her forget that she wasn’t sure she wanted him anyway.

  That’s one of the reasons why Aunt Peg has always done so well in the dog show ring. Right or wrong, she’s a competitor.

  “So you’ve been talking to Florence,” she said. “What else have you been up to?”

  “I’ve had a busy day. You wouldn’t believe all the people I ended up speaking with. It’s beginning to look as though we’re going to have to figure out who killed Charles.”

  “We?” Aunt Peg’s acting skills were improving. She managed to sound surprised. “We who?”

  “Surely you don’t expect me to do this by myself.”

  “You always have before.”

  That was not true. So not true that it was almost funny.

  Aunt Peg loves a good mystery and she loves to take charge. She can never resist getting involved and she’s a master at pulling strings from the sidelines.

  “I’m pregnant,” I said.

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake. Stop trotting out that excuse every other minute.”

  “It’s not an excuse—”

  “I don’t know what else you’d call it. So you’re incubating, regenerating, with child…whatever. Dogs do it all the time and it doesn’t slow them down. Drink a glass of milk and get on with it.”

  Aunt Peg never had children. Can you tell?

  “So, does this mean you’re not going to help?”

  “Don’t be absurd. Of course I’m going to help. You couldn’t keep me from it. There’s a murderer right here among us, how could I not be interested in something like that?”

  “Then why are we arguing?” I asked.

  “Heaven only knows. You’re probably having mood swings. Now come over here and sit down and tell me everything you’ve learned so far.”

  Cedar benches lined the walkway that we’d been following through the compound. Lights from above cast a flattering glow. It was warm enough that the thought of sitting outside for a while seemed much more appealing than rejoining the crowds in the inn.

  So we sat down and I told Aunt Peg about the conversation I’d had with Margo that afternoon.

  “That’s three people now who’ve asked for your help,” she said, ticking their names off on her fingers. “First Alana, then Caroline, and now Margo. All women. I wonder if that’s a coincidence.”

  “You mentioned earlier that you weren’t sure how happy the Evanses’ marriage was. Was Charles a ladies’ man? Had he had affairs over the years?”

  “I haven’t any idea. Which is perhaps indicative considering how quickly gossip finds its way though the dog show community. Let’s just say that if he did, he was discreet enough that it never became common knowledge.”

  “Speaking of common knowledge,” I said, “did you know that Sam and Alana…”

  My voice trailed away. I wasn’t entirely sure how I wanted to finish that sentence. Maybe I’d let Aunt Peg do it for me and see what term she used to describe my ex-husband’s relationship with the blond party girl.

  “Sam and Alana?” She repeated the words, which was no help at all.

  Aunt Peg sounded intrigued by the possibility. A tidbit of old information, but it was new to her too. “No, I never heard a thing. It must have taken place years ago and was probably over quickly, but still…Sam and Alana…together?”

  “Yes, together,” I said irritably. “Otherwise, why would I care?”

  “Why do you care anyway? In the grand scheme of things, Alana is a woman of very little consequence. Frankly I would have thought that Sam had better tast
e.”

  “I’ll ask him about that the next time we talk.”

  “Or,” said Aunt Peg. “you could try being the bigger person and let it slide.”

  Let it slide. The phrase sounded so simple. As if a potential problem could be made to merely glide away into the recesses of forgotten memory.

  “Bertie would agree with you,” I said.

  “Naturally she would. Bertie’s a very sensible girl. She doesn’t go out of her way to find trouble.”

  Which, I guess, implied that I did.

  Sheesh, I thought. Who was I kidding? Of course I did. Otherwise we wouldn’t have been sitting there having this conversation.

  “Back to Charles,” I said. I related what Tubby and Rosalyn had had to say about him.

  “You wouldn’t expect a man of Charles’s stature to be universally liked,” she said when I was finished.

  “No, but I would hardly expect him to be pilloried by his constituents before the body was even cold either.”

  Aunt Peg nodded. She agreed with that.

  “Tubby’s manners have always been lacking,” she said. “But I wonder what Charles did to Rosalyn to put such a bee in her bonnet.”

  “And there’s something else. Rosalyn brought it up and now I’ve been wondering about it myself. Where were Charles’s clothes?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Last night, when we found him—”

  “He was naked,” Aunt Peg said distastefully. “I know. I was there.”

  “So where was his clothing? The only thing I remember seeing in the vicinity of the hot tub was that one towel. Are we meant to believe that Charles decided to use the hot tub, took off all his clothes, then walked out of his room and through the inn, wearing only a bath towel?”

  “I see what you mean,” said Peg. “It does make one stop and wonder.”

  “And here’s something else to think about. Why was Charles naked? Bertie had used the hot tub earlier. It was situated in a public place and she said that participants were expected to be wearing bathing suits. So how come Charles wasn’t?”

  “Maybe he didn’t bring one with him?” Aunt Peg guessed. “Maybe the nightly swim was a spur-of-the-moment decision and he hadn’t come prepared.”

  “And so he decided to fling off his clothes and go naked?” I said incredulously. “I don’t see it. I didn’t know Charles, but everyone who did has talked about his prominence and his dignity. And behavior like that simply doesn’t jibe.”