“My oldest son is looking at colleges with a friend, my youngest is on a trip with his grandmother, Katie'sat work, and my mom's visiting a friend," Jane reeled off, proud of resisting the urge to elaborate on these domestic arrangements. Now that she'd decided to give up trying to impress him, she felt much more comfortable around him.
“So tell me about the people at the dinner." So much for small talk.
Jane quickly summarized the discussion she'd had earlier in the day with Shelley and Missy. "We don't know anything about her family, of course. Or about the maid."
“We've done some checking," he said, unwrapping plastic forks and handing one to her. "According to the maid, there's only one child still living, a son who was in plumbing fixtures who's retired to Arizona. The two daughters, both deceased, each left children and grandchildren. They're scattered all over the country. There was a safe in the house. Presumably a will in it, but we haven't found the combination yet. We're hoping that the obit notice in the paper will bring out a lawyer. The maid didn't know who that might be, and she's not well enough to question thoroughly. There was a checkbook in the desk showing a balance of close to twenty thousand dollars, so there might be money involved."
“What about the maid?"
“She's in pretty bad shape. Not much question of poisoning herself, although it's possible. She could have misjudged a dosage." At Jane's surprised look, he said, "We do think of these things, too."
“What about the poison? What was it?"
“We don't know yet. The path lab is doing tests for the usual—arsenic, strychnine, digitalis. But these tests take longer than anyone likes to admit, and they haven't come up with anything yet. There are about a thousand weird things that are poisonous, and it takes a while to test for each one. And it's complicated by the fact that Mrs. Pryce was so old. At her age, a lot of systems have failed or are failing on their own. Also, it could have taken a virtually indetectable amount of some poisons to push her and the maid over. Maria Espinoza says she's seventy-nine and Pryce was eighty-seven, and they both had bad hearts. It could have been something that would only make you and me a little bit sick, but was deadly to them."
“But the murderer must have known that. Doesn't that narrow the field to people who knew them well enough to gauge the dosage?"
“Not necessarily. The killer could have just used something at hand and hoped like hell that it would work. Maybe it wasn't even meant to kill her. Just to make her sick as a 'punishment.' "
“Could it have been in her house? In a prescription?"
“Unlikely. A lot of things that are poisonous in large amounts are used in minute portions for medication. But you'd have to eat a bowlful of pills. It was in the quiche or the tea. More accurately, in Mrs. Pryce's quiche or tea. The maid didn't serve herself, she just ate and drank what was left of her employer's food. I guess it was a habit of hers. She says she had a bite or two of the quiche, but thought it tasted strange and left the rest. Unfortunately, she'd already put all the plates in the dishwasher and run them through by the time we got there."
“Why didn't Pryce taste it?"
“I don't know, except the pathologist says some elderly people lose their sense of taste. Or maybe she was just a glutton who didn't care."
“Oh, she cared. She made nasty remarks about every dish in front of her. She said there was too much mayonnaise in the potato salad and too much oil on the green salad, and Missy's cake was too dry. But those are texture things, not taste, I guess. And it seemed she put away a lot of food in spite of her complaints."
“Run through what she'd come down on everybody about again, would you?" Mel said. "Aren't you going to eat that sandwich?”
He'd managed to wolf down his share of the dainty edibles. "I'll give you half," Jane said. While she wasn't very hungry, she'd heard great things about the caterer he'd gotten this stuff from, and didn't want to miss her chance to at least taste their work. "Let's see—she accused my mother of being an embassy hanger-on, which Is a really nasty remark from an insider. She called Desiree a drunk and Grady an embezzler and Missy a pornographer. She wouldn't sit by Naomi Smith because she was afraid Naomi would give her some disease, and at the end she made a crack about Bob Neufield being too depraved to serve his country.”
Mel was taking notes with one hand and eating with the other. "Uh-huh. So she didn't go after you or your friend Shelley or Ruth Rogers."
“Yet, you mean?" Jane asked, thinking about Shelley's theory that they were better suspects because they might have killed her to keep her from getting around to them.
“Not exactly," he said around the last bite of her pasta salad, which he'd liberated without her noticing. "I'm just trying to get a relative fix on this. Em‑ bezzlement's a pretty strong accusation. Thinking somebody's going to give you a cold is nothing."
“Oh, but it's not a cold. Mrs. Pryce accused Naomi of having cancer and asked her to move. Ruth Rogers came tearing in and told her off. Said her sister had a rare blood disease that wasn't contagious."
“Still, it's rude as hell, but not really damaging. Not like accusing the mayor of stealing the city's money."
“I agree, but when you get to know Grady, you'll know how crazy the accusation is. He's a really nice man.”
He looked at her pityingly. "Jane, really nice people have embezzled money. The two are not mutually exclusive."
“But I don't want it to be Grady—or anybody in the class!" Jane said.
“No? But it was, and I don't want anybody to get away with it. Do you?”
It was a stupid question and it made her mad. "Why did you ask me out yesterday?" Jane asked, surprising him with the question only slightly more than she surprised herself.
“Why . ? I don't know. To apologize for disappearing. To see how you were. To thank you for Christmas dinner—"
“Out of duty?" she asked.
“No!" he snapped. He started gathering up the paraphernalia of lunch and stuffing it into an empty sack. "But I've got a duty right now, and I better get back to it. Are you through?" His voice was cold and formal.
“It appears I am," she said, taking a bite of the sandwich she'd managed to save from his cleanup. It was so trendily wholesome that it tasted like' sawdustwith a little basil. It was probably just as well that he'd hogged hers.
They got in the car and rode silently. As Mel pulled into her driveway, he said, "Sorry about that. I'm tired, and murder pisses me off. Do I get another chance? How about a late dinner tonight after your class?"
“On two conditions."
“Yeah? What are they?" he asked suspiciously. "You take a nap first, and you keep your greedy hands off my food.”
Mel grinned.
Jane stood in the driveway and watched as he drove off, thinking that he'd said something profound. Murder pissed her off, too. On the surface of her life, she'd taken Mrs. Pryce's death rather lightly. Partly because Pryce was such a dreadful person; partly because Jane herself was so preoccupied with her mother's visit and the story she was working on about Priscilla. But underneath, she was extremely distressed.
Murder was wrong; there was no provocation sufficient to justify it. And Jane was of the belief that killing someone was one of those horrible hurdles that, once taken, became easier. For the first time, she consciously realized that someone in the class was dangerous to all of them for that reason. But when the class was over in a few days, they'd all go their separate ways, meeting only casually at the dry cleaner's and the grocery store. And if that person had gotten away with murder, it would be harder to unravel the truth.
This crime would be much easier to figure out now rather than later. Mel and the police weren't making any progress, for all their technical inventory. This wasn't one of those cases where there were blood samples and fingerprints to analyze. This was very personal; a neighborhood crime that would have to be solved in the neighborhood, not in a crime lab.
11
When Jane came in the door, the phone was r
inging. It was Ruth Rogers. "Jane, your mother seems such a lovely, interesting person, and there's never much time to visit with each other in class. Might the two of you be free this afternoon for tea?"
“Ruth, how nice. I'd love it, but I'll have to check that Mom doesn't have any plans.”
Cecily had just come into the kitchen with a towel on her head. "Sounds great," she said when Jane explained.
“Why don't you come by around three?" Ruth said.
This arranged, Jane hung up. "I didn't know you were here," she said to Cecily. "How was lunch with your friend?"
“Fine, except that I'm getting to the age that my contemporaries all want to talk about who's died lately. It's depressing. I resisted telling her about Mrs. Pryce's death. Harriet didn't know her and wouldn't have appreciated the justice in it. I put your car in the garage and the keys on the dining room table." Cecily gave her hair a final rub, took the towel to the guest bath just off the kitchen, and came back, running her fingers through her damp curls. Jane felt a surge of feminine resentment that this was all her mother had to do to look smashing. She mentioned this.
Cecily sat down at the kitchen table, smiling. "I've always been sorry that you girls got your father's hair. But then, you got my strong teeth and my feet. We have adorable little feet, don't we? You could have inherited his feet and had to wear gunboats for shoes. That was the detective you were out with, wasn't it? Do the police know any more yet?"
“Not much." She told her mother what he'd said about the difficulty of determining what the poison was. "Mainly he asked me about the people in the class."
“It's such a shame that it happened like it did. I don't suppose there's a shred of a chance that it was someone outside that small group."
“I don't see how. The maid got sick from eating what was left on Mrs. Pryce's plate, so her food had to contain the poison. And since it was the same food we all had, someone had to have put it on her plate while we were all milling around, trying to get served and seated—or while the search for Grady's contact lens was going on."
“But who? Everybody there seems like perfectly ordinary, nice people. How well do you know all of them?"
“Most of them between slightly and fairly well. I only know Bob Neufield by sight. I don't know a thing about him except that he's an occasional Friend of the Library volunteer. He lets himself get pressed into service when there are cartons of books to haul to the mall for the annual Friends Book Sale. As for Grady, I've met him several times at neighborhood picnics and city council things. He has a company that makes playing cards, and he's always makingcommemorative ones for people and giving them away. Anniversaries, birthdays, the town's founding. He's very generous and well liked. He's single. Rumor has it that he was married once, but his wife died young.”
Cecily nodded. "What about the exotic gal in the caftan and sandals?"
“Desiree Loftus. I run into her every month or so someplace. She seems to have a lot of money from some mysterious source. Always indulging herself in weird causes and trying to preach them to anybody who'll listen. Cryogenics. Miracle diets. Nudism. Stuff like that."
“What about the ladies we're having tea with?"
“Ruth Rogers is a fixture here. Been around forever. She used to baby-sit the kids sometimes when they were babies. Wouldn't let me pay her. Said she loved little children. She used to be a nursery school teacher, she said, and missed it."
“What about her sister?"
“Naomi's lived here for a couple years. I haven't seen much of her; she's sick a lot of the time. She was taken off in an ambulance about six months ago—you can just see the end of their driveway from my kitchen window. She's had a very hard life, I understand. They found each other through some lost relative bureau. I think they're both widowed. Somebody told me Naomi has an impressive cookbook collection. Valuable antique ones, I mean. Or maybe it's Ruth with the collection. I'm not sure."
“What about the teacher? Missy," Cecily asked. "Every time I look at her, she reminds me of somebody, and for the life of me, I can't figure out who."
“John Cleese?”
Cecily's eyes opened very wide and she started laughing. "God! You're right. I'm sorry you told me!"
“Don't worry. She knows it. I understand she can sometimes be persuaded to do the 'Dead Parrot' routine at parties. Missy's a terrific person. She has a husband somewhere. She once said they hadn't seen each other for ten years, but never got divorced because they both felt one marriage was more than enough. At least, that's what she said. I believe she's Catholic, so maybe that's the real reason they didn't divorce. She used to write textbooks for English classes, but writes romance novels now. She says it pays better.”
Willard had laid his head on Cecily's leg and was giving her longing looks. Cecily got up, gave him a treat from his plastic box on the counter, and let him out the kitchen door.
“Still, if we can assume you and I and Shelley are innocent," she said, "it means one of those nice people killed Mrs. Pryce and nearly killed her maid," she said.
"Come in, come in," Ruth Rogers said. She'd dressed for tea in a pale blue dress with flowing sleeves and the inevitable ruffles. She wore what Jane's mother often called "daytime pearls." Jane was glad that her instinct had told her to dress up in a skirt and ruffled white blouse for Ruth's tea party. "I'm so glad you could take time from your visit to come by. Mrs. Grant—may I call you Cecily? I feel I know you from your class project."
“Yes, please," Cecily replied.
“And I'm Ruth. My sister and I have so much enjoyed reading the first chapters of the autobiographies. Especially yours. What a very interesting life you've had. Jane, aren't you writing your life?"
“No, I've invented one, but I haven't let anybody but Missy see it."
“What a splendid idea! Naomi will be down in a moment. She's feeling a little puny today and just woke from a nap. Would you like to see the garden? It's hot out, but we wouldn't be long."
“You and Mother go. I'd just be eaten up with jealousy," Jane said. "I've got my first garden, and between the pets and the bugs, it's a pitiful thing."
“Organic pest control. That's the key. I'll send some articles home with you. Now, Cecily, I've got some daylilies I want you to see....”
Their voices trailed off. Jane looked around the room. It was extremely feminine without being fussy. Most of the furniture was ornate but delicate antiques; little piecrust tables, a pair of Empire love seats with tapestry upholstery by the fireplace. Jane thought the color of the fabric was probably ashes of roses, a description that had always fascinated her. In front of the fireplace was a lovely peacock feather fan. Off the living room was a room that looked as if it had once been a porch, but was now enclosed to form a combination sun room/greenhouse. Light streamed in the windows that completely surrounded it. There were lush African violets on the windowsills and airy ferns hanging from the ceiling. The furniture was fresh white wicker with plump floral cushions. It was definitely a woman's house. Jane wondered if it had been like this when Ruth's husband was living or whether Ruth and Naomi had gradually made it over to suit their tastes.
Naomi came in the room as Jane was studying a china shepherdess on the mantel. "Oh, Jane. I didn't hear you come in. Ruth should have told me. Is she showing off the garden?"
“Yes, to my mother. Is that your cookbook collection?" Jane asked, gesturing toward a bookshelf of old books next to the fireplace.
“Why, yes. I've made scones for our tea from one of them. Would you like to see some of my favorites?”
Some of the books weren't even really books anymore, just sets of loose pages with ribbons and strings keeping them together. Others were so formidably bound that Jane found herself wondering about the strength of the women who'd first acquired them. Most were published works, but some of the oldest were handmade to pass from mother to daughter, often with drawings and sketches to illustrate methods of preparing and cooking. Naomi not only collected the books, she tried most of
the recipes to the best of her ability—given directions like "churn until curdled" and "take a two-month-old piglet . ." She promised to copy down some of the best recipes for Jane.
“My very favorite is a recipe for relish from a Victorian-era book. The author says to season until `it's as sharp as a mother-in-law's tongue, and use in very small portions,' " Naomi said with a laugh. Jane liked the way Naomi handled the fragile old books—with care, but not fanatic care. In her hands, they weren't just objects of historical merit, but old friends.
“Oh, you've shown off your books without Cecily here," Ruth chided, coming back into the room with Jane's mother in tow. "Now you'll have to do it again. Ladies, do sit down while I get the tea.”
Naomi ran through a few of the high points andhad just retold the relish story when Ruth backed through the kitchen door, balancing a huge silver tray. Naomi tried to help her, but Ruth said the tray was far too heavy for her. She set it down on a low coffee table.
Jane's eyes nearly bulged at the sight of the food on the tray. There was a plate of tiny sandwiches cut in fancy shapes with a cookie cutter and sprinkled with a dusting of parsley, another piled high with scones, a bowl of what she later learned was sweet clotted cream. The tea steaming in a small silver tea urn was strong Earl Grey. It was accompanied by tiny bowls of colored sugar. To finish, there were fragrant puff pastries with crushed nuts in a gooey candied syrup over the tops. And tucked among all the dishes were sprigs of rosemary and several tiny glass vials with delicate brilliant yellow flowers and fragile, pungent foliage. "Dahlberg daisies," Ruth explained. "They grow like weeds, and most people don't even know about them.”
Jane could hardly speak. The look, the smell—heaven! While they ate, Ruth and Naomi frankly bragged on each other, Ruth complimenting Naomi's cooking, and Naomi boasting about Ruth's gardening, particularly an iris that Ruth had developed and named for her late husband. When Ruth referred to Naomi as her "little sister," Jane was surprised. Naomi, frail and ill, looked a good ten years older than the robust, tanned Ruth.
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