Tea-Totally Dead

by Girdner, Jaqueline

  “I’ll get my purse,” I told him.

  “You’re impossible,” he muttered under his breath.

  I gave him a big smile. “Aren’t you glad?” I asked.

  The corners of his mouth twitched upwards for an instant, but only for an instant before he seemed to remember why he wasn’t smiling that day. His eyes looked stricken, and then he was glaring again.

  I grabbed my purse and we headed out the front door.

  The Old Burl Cafe stuck out from the bottom story of the Redwood Grove Inn like an open drawer. There wasn’t a living redwood in sight outside the cafe. And the wood grain inside the restaurant looked more like pine than redwood. But there was plenty of greenery. Potted ferns hung everywhere. A smiling hostess walked up to greet us.

  “Lunch,” she inquired. “For two?”

  “Kate, Wayne. Over here!” Lori called out before I could answer.

  Three tables had been pushed together to accommodate the Skeritt family. The tables were covered with red-checked cloths whose cheeriness contrasted dramatically with most of the faces floating above them.

  Bill was wearing his usual, vague smile. And Dru greeted us brightly as we sat down between her and Ace, but her face didn’t retain that brightness once she had spoken. Even Lori’s effort at her usual positive-thinking grin looked strained. The rest of the crew looked like survivors of a train wreck. Or maybe that makes them sound too happy.

  I shot a friendly smile across the table at Ingrid. She whispered back a “hello,” the tail end of which was lost in a sniffle. Her eyes were swollen nearly shut. Mandy sat on Ingrid’s left, watching her grandmother with obvious concern in her chocolate-brown eyes. Trent sat on Ingrid’s right, ignoring everyone as he frowned down at the red-checked tablecloth. I turned to greet Ace and Eric on Wayne’s other side, but gave up the effort. Both of them were lost in thought, not happy thoughts either, judging by their expressions. Gail didn’t look any more unhappy than usual, though, as she studied us through her glasses.

  The table was as quiet as a Zen retreat. And about as much fun. No one spoke a word until the waitress came. And even she seemed anxious, standing a good yard away to take our orders, and handing us our plates fifteen minutes later with the wariness of a novice zoo keeper feeding the bears. I had just bitten into my California BLT on whole wheat, hold the bacon—the California element presumably being the avocado—when Wayne broke the silence.

  “I believe my mother was murdered,” he announced quietly.

  Damn. I wished he had warned me. By the time I looked up from my sandwich, all the faces at the table seemed to be wearing the same expressions of open-mouthed surprise. Except for Gail, who stared as usual. Then the mouths began to move.

  “Murdered?”

  “It couldn’t be!”

  “I thought it was her heart.”

  “Someone killed Vesta?”

  Gail was the first to react with coherence. She bent forward and scrutinized Wayne, a trace of a smile on her plain face.

  “Very interesting,” she observed. “I wondered if you would allow yourself to consider the possibility. The rest of us are pretending everything is fine.”

  “Oh, you’re just teasing,” said Dru. It wasn’t clear whether she was speaking to Wayne or to Gail. She giggled nervously. “Vesta had a heart condition. We all know that. Don’t we, dear?” she appealed to her husband.

  Bill nodded graciously “There, you see,” she concluded brightly. “She had a heart attack.”

  “Oh, Mother,” Gail protested. “Why must you always deny any—”

  “My mother didn’t have a heart condition,” Wayne interrupted. He spoke slowly, his deep, quiet voice taking on the sound of absolute truth.

  “Not any heart condition that you knew about, perhaps,” Trent suggested a few beats later.

  Wayne scowled in his direction.

  Trent ignored the scowl and continued in a resonant voice that rivaled Wayne’s for authority.

  “You must realize that your mother was mentally unbalanced,” he said. “Have you asked yourself yet if she might have committed suicide?”

  “My mother didn’t commit suicide,” Wayne growled.

  Trent sighed and shook his head slowly. He turned to Gail for support.

  “Isn’t it true that suicidal people often become manic immediately before they…” He paused tastefully. “Before they do away with themselves?”

  Gail shrugged her shoulders. “It’s possible, but I—”

  “Someone killed Vessie?” Ace asked wonderingly before Gail could finish her sentence. From the sound of his voice it appeared that Wayne’s words had only now seeped through to his consciousness. He looked around the table, staring at each of us in turn. I wondered what he was looking for.

  Ace’s eyes came to Ingrid. She let out a long sob and buried her face in her handkerchief. He continued to stare as the big woman stood and dropped her napkin onto her untouched salad. She pushed her chair back. It crashed to the floor.

  “Excuse me,” she whispered. Then she turned and ran awkwardly in the direction of the rest rooms.

  Mandy jumped up and loped after her.

  “Mama?” said Lori, her bracelets jangling as she rose and straightened her mother’s chair. She turned and glared at her father for a moment before following her mother and daughter out of the room.

  And then miraculously, Bill spoke.

  “I’ll have another beer,” he said to the waitress, who had appeared sometime during the commotion.

  I looked into his face. His bland smile widened. I looked away with a shiver. Was he laughing at all of us?

  “You know what?” Eric said into the ensuing silence. “I thought Aunt Vesta might have been murdered. I mean, this is totally awesome. We could figure it out and then—”

  “Are you sure?” Ace broke in. At first I thought he was speaking to Eric, but then I saw that his eyes were on Wayne.

  Wayne nodded his head slowly. Ace’s eyes creased into a glare.

  “You know what else?” Eric said. “We could like—”

  “This is all getting too silly,” Dru interrupted, her high voice shrill now. She laughed unconvincingly. “No one has been murdered—”

  “But they have, Aunt Dru,” Eric insisted. His eyes glittered with excitement behind his glasses. “Don’t worry. It’s totally cool. We can do tests and take fingerprints and—”

  “Be quiet, Eric,” Ace commanded in a stern voice.

  Eric turned to his grandfather, apparently shocked by his tone of voice. I could see why. Ace was acting nothing like the amiable clown I had met last night.

  “But—” Eric tried again.

  “Quiet,” Ace repeated.

  By the time Ingrid, Lori and Mandy returned from the rest room, the table was completely silent. Some of us were still eating. Some of us had never started. Wayne and Ace ignored their untouched sandwiches. And Dru, who had just moved a french fry from one side of her plate to the other, was now moving it back. But all of us were watching each other, staring directly or glancing furtively, but watching all the same. When Ingrid sat down, our eyes traveled to her blotchy, ravaged face. Mandy took her seat by her grandmother’s side and picked up a fork. Lori sat next to her daughter and frowned.

  “Wayne,” said Lori quietly. “I had an intuition.” Some of the usual animation returned to her voice as she continued. “Actually, I was doing a healing meditation, and my higher self spoke to me—or maybe it was channeled—but anyway, the voice said ‘harmony,’ and I realized what it meant.” She waved one hand in the air excitedly, flashing scarlet nails. “At first I thought it was advice—you know, like I needed more harmony in my life—but then I realized it might mean Harmony, Vesta’s friend. That she was the murderer.”

  You could see relief ripple around the table. Heads lifted. Eyes lit up.

  “I’ll bet you’re right,” Dru trilled with a bright smile. “That girl is out of her head. If anyone killed Vesta, she’d have been the one t
o do it.”

  Trent nodded sagely.

  “What do you think, honey?” Dru asked, turning to Gail.

  “It’s always easier to blame an outsider, isn’t it?” Gail replied.

  She sure knew how to kill a conversation. The people at the table went back to eating and watching in silence.

  But some spirits are irrepressible. A few minutes later, Eric spoke again.

  “You know what?” he said, craning his head toward his grandfather hopefully. “I think we oughta go to Mount Tamalpais after lunch. It’d be totally cool.”

  Ace looked at Wayne.

  “Fine with me,” Wayne muttered.

  So we went to Mount Tamalpais. All of us.

  Most of the Skeritts decided to ride in Uncle Ace’s van. It could seat seven comfortably, or eight a little less comfortably. Nine was pushing it. So I invited Eric to ride with Wayne and me in the Jaguar. I had plans for him. He accepted without objection.

  Ten minutes later, Wayne was guiding our car up Highway 1 toward the mountaintop. I was feeling carsick. Or maybe my California BLT hadn’t set too well on top of fear and suspicion. But Eric chattered easily from the back seat, even reading to us from a Marin guidebook as we went.

  “… all kinds of totally famous people have visited,” he was saying. “Sir Arthur Conan Doyle—you know, he’s the Sherlock Holmes dude—visited Mount Tamalpais in 1923, it says here. And—”

  I took a deep breath to combat my nausea, and then interrupted him.

  “I’ll bet you know where everyone in your family lives and what kind of cars they’re driving,” I said, with as much audible enthusiasm as I could muster. I took another breath. “Information like that might be important to the murder investigation,” I went on.

  “Really?” he squeaked, his high voice even higher with excitement.

  “Really,” I assured him.

  “Wow,” he breathed. “You know what? I know all about everyone….”

  By the time we turned onto Panoramic, Eric had told me that he and his grandfather both lived in the Los Angeles area. They’d traveled to the reunion in Ace’s big beige Volkswagen van. Trent and Ingrid lived north of them, in Paso Robles. They’d driven up in their blue Volvo station wagon, picking up Lori and Mandy in Santa Cruz on the way. Dru, Bill and Gail had flown down together from Oregon and were sharing a white Toyota rental car.

  I wasn’t sure if any of this was actually important, but the question of access to poison had brought the further question of transportation to mind. And even if it wasn’t important, it was worth it to see Eric happily reeling off everything he had observed and more.

  “They’re all like totally weird,” he said as we passed a lookout point and saw the San Francisco skyline below us, partially shrouded in fog. “Even Grampy is acting weird. He’s totally grouchy. And he usually isn’t. He used to be a professional wrestler, you know.” He paused to look out the window. “My dad’s a stuntman…” he continued.

  My mind tuned out as I focused on not throwing up.

  “… and you know what else?” he was saying for the fortieth time as we turned into the parking area. “When they do a scene where a guy jumps through a window, it’s really spun sugar. Isn’t that totally cool?”

  I agreed that it was totally cool as Wayne parked the Jaguar in the lot just below the mountain summit. Then I stepped queasily out the door and breathed in the wind-chilled air, waiting for my stomach to realize we weren’t moving anymore. I took a few steps to the edge of the lot to look out at the panoramic view of San Francisco and the coastline below it. Not many parking lots have such a view. Or such a wind.

  A gust filled my jacket, flapping back its sides. I grabbed the cloth and zipped it up before I could be borne away like the flying nun. I turned and saw Wayne, digging his hands into his pockets as he leaned into the gale.

  “Oh boy, is this totally cool or what!” Eric shouted over the wind.

  I nodded and put my hand up to shield my eyes. The wind had whipped up a dust cloud that looked sneaky enough to slip grit into my eyes. It gathered momentum, whirling leaves and discarded food wrappers into its center.

  Ace’s van pulled into a space next to the Jaguar as the dust cloud moved on and a new symphony of gusts took its place. The van door slid open and Skeritts poured out. Mandy looked as sick as I had felt a moment ago. But Lori was grinning as she jumped from the van.

  “Can’t you just feel the healing power?” she asked of no one in particular. She spread her arms and twirled in the wind, her long blond braid streaming out behind her. “Mandy, my love,” she called. “Let’s fly with the spirits of the air.”

  Mandy rolled her eyes but followed her mother as she trotted toward a manzanita-and oak-covered slope with her arms outstretched.

  “My, isn’t this lovely?” Dru called out a moment later. She rubbed her arms, inadequately protected in a silky lavender blouse, and looked out toward the city. Bill stood beside her, treating the view to the same bland stare he gave everything else.

  Ingrid emerged next. And Trent.

  “… come for a walk,” Trent was saying. “It’ll do you good. Ace tells me there’s a short trail that leads around the mountain.”

  Ingrid shook her head. “I’ll stay here,” she told him, her swollen eyes forlorn. She shuffled to one of the redwood benches that looked out from the parking lot and sat down, her back to the panoramic view. “I can watch everyone’s things!” she shouted.

  Dru was quick to take Ingrid up on her offer. She handed Ingrid her purse, then grabbed Bill’s hand and headed off in the direction of the visitors’ center. I could hear the tinkle of her voice on the air as she went, but I couldn’t make out her words.

  Trent took one look back at Ingrid and stomped off in a different direction, his hands clasped stiffly behind his back. As I watched, I felt a nip of pity for the man. He was a petty tyrant in my opinion, but he seemed to be a lonely one.

  “Better than TV, hmm?” a voice commented in my ear.

  I jerked my head around and saw Gail’s watchful eyes all too close to mine. I could have licked her glasses at this distance. She had a near smile on her face. I made an effort to return it, shivering in the cold wind.

  The van door slid shut with a loud clunk. Ace locked it and made his way over to Wayne. I was glad to see Ace put his arm around his nephew’s shoulder. He said something to Wayne that I couldn’t hear. Wayne turned to look at me.

  “Kate?” he began. “Okay if…”

  The rest of his words were swallowed by a new dust cloud whirling by. But I nodded and waved. The two men lumbered away together like a pair of bears.

  Then it was just the four of us: Gail, Eric, Ingrid and me.

  I turned back to Ingrid. Her eyes were puffy and bleak as she stared out at the parking lot.

  I motioned Eric over. He trotted to my side eagerly.

  “Do you think you can cheer your Aunt Ingrid up?” I asked him.

  “Sure!” he shouted.

  “Go for it,” I told him and patted his back.

  “Aunt Ingrid, you know what?” he said. “Mount Tarn…”

  “See you guys later,” I called out with a quick farewell glance in Gail’s direction.

  I dropped my purse by Dru’s, at Ingrid’s feet, and hoofed it down to the beginning of the loop trail. I was alone, with only the wind for company. Finally.

  - Eight -

  The loop trail is my kind of trail: gorgeous, paved and short. Located within a Frisbee’s toss of the mountain’s summit, the trail circles Mount Tamalpais in less than a mile. And the views are spectacular all the way around. I trudged off into the wind, stopping at each break in the manzanita to let my gaze wander greedily over the ridged Marin hills, across the Bay Bridge to Oakland and back, and into San Francisco. I could see the elongated Transamerica pyramid among the more conservative rectangles of the downtown San Francisco skyline. I could even pick out one orange tower of the Golden Gate Bridge, the green of Golden Gate Park an
d the white of the houses on the avenues below, which stretched all the way to the fog-covered Pacific Ocean.

  It was heaven. Not only the views, but the escape from the tendrils of emotion that seemed to reach out from each and every member of the Skeritt family. The whole damn family was crazy, I decided uncharitably. A gust of wind slapped the side of my face, as if in reprimand. Except for Wayne, of course, I amended silently. I could feel my chest loosening for the first time that day as I strolled and studied the greens and browns of the Tiburon Peninsula. Even the wind seemed to whistle a happier tune as it blew past me. Heaven was short-lived, though. I heard voices coming my way, and tensed.

  “Goddamn wind got me again,” someone sputtered. Then, “Ow! Stop for a minute. I gotta take my contacts out.”

  “We’re almost to the end,” another voice cajoled.

  The owners of the voices came into view, walking toward me from around the curve of the mountain. A suntanned young man in khaki shorts held one hand cupped below his eye as he pulled at his eyelid with the index finger of his other hand. An even tanner young woman looked on. I smiled and took a long, cleansing breath of cool air, relieved that I wasn’t looking at anyone connected with the Skeritt family.

  “Oh, hello,” the young woman greeted me belatedly. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?”

  “Gorgeous,” I agreed and passed around them carefully, crowding up against the guardrail as the young man probed his eye with his finger. Ugh.

  The view changed color as I trudged on. There was more blue at first, the blue of the San Francisco Bay. And then more shades of green and beige, with a sprinkling of white and terra-cotta rooftops sparkling in the sun. It was calmer on this side of the mountain, the fierce wind just a memory.

  Then the rooftops disappeared and all I could see was the green of the hills and the blue of Bon Tempe Lake. There was no guardrail here, nothing but me and the land. And a lone hawk floating on the updraft. Alone like this, I could almost imagine Marin as it must have been before people. I leaned my head back and let the sun warm my face for a few moments.

  Then, from somewhere behind me, I heard a rock skittering off the side of the mountain. And something else. Was that the scuffling of footsteps?