Yule Log Murder

by Leslie Meier

  “So you don’t give away any Bûche de Noël anymore because—”

  “They’re dead,” she answered. “All dead. Every one of them.” She said it with neither sadness nor bitterness. In fact, I thought I detected a bit of relish. She took the whisk from the mixture and put it in the sink. Then she handed me the hand beater with a cheery “Get to it.” I turned the handle while she fed twelve tablespoons of softened butter into the mixture, one tablespoon at a time, not putting the next one in until the previous was completely blended. At least the motion required by the beater was different from the one for the whisk.

  As I worked, I thought about all Mrs. St. Onge’s dead relatives. How she hadn’t had a nice word to say about any of them. And how the Woodwards had gotten sick after they ate the Yule log cake. I hadn’t been inclined to believe Mr. Woodward that the cake had been the cause of their illness, but after Mrs. St. Onge’s stories about the relatives and all the cakes, I was having second thoughts. Yesterday the ingredients had been in sealed packages, since I’d just brought them from Hannaford. But today we’d used the sugar from the box opened the day before. What if it had rat poison in it, or some other deadly substance?

  “Keep going,” Mrs. St. Onge said when the last tablespoon of butter had been absorbed into the mixture. I turned the beaters around so I could power them with my other hand and did as she said. I reminded myself that the old woman wasn’t making a cake for my family. She was showing me how to make a cake for my family. They weren’t going to eat this one. Then I shook myself—literally—to loosen my constricted shoulder muscles. What was I thinking? Mrs. St. Onge was a harmless old lady. Not a nice old lady, but a harmless one, I was sure. Sheesh.

  After five more minutes Mrs. St. Onge said, “Stop,” and I did. She lifted the cooled chocolate off the stove and stirred it into the mixture. “We’ll set this aside for now,” she pronounced. “We don’t want to fill the cake too long before we eat it, or it will get soggy. Come back tomorrow morning. We’ll make the icing and fill the cake then.”

  For the first time in my life, I had no desire to lick the beaters.

  I did the dishes we’d dirtied and then asked her as I had the day before, “Is there anything else I can do?”

  Her brow creased, adding vertical wrinkles to her already prominent horizontal ones. “I’ve noticed a lot of Christmas lights on the street. Even your mother’s house is all lit up. She never used to do that.”

  I explained about the Illuminations show at the botanical garden and the town’s efforts to light a cheerful path from the gardens into the harbor.

  Mrs. St. Onge was silent for a few moments after I finished, taking it all in. “There are some old Christmas lights and things in the cellar,” she said. “Will you bring them up?”

  “Sure. Where in the basement?”

  She led me across the kitchen to the cellar door. “In the front room,” she said. “Somewhere over near the washer. Look there.” When I’d opened the door and stood with my foot hovering in the air over the top step, she grabbed my arm. “Look in the front room,” she repeated. “They’ll be somewhere there. Don’t go in the coal bin. No need of that. Nothing of value stored in there.”

  I nodded to show I understood and flipped the light switch at the top of the stairs. The glow that came from below was faint.

  The basement wasn’t as scary as I expected. It was relatively warm and dry. The furnace was an old octopus of a thing, with arms going out everywhere, no doubt covered with asbestos. My parents had the same one when we were little. It had long since been replaced. While I stared at the old beast, it rumbled to life.

  A tiny puddle of water had collected on the concrete floor in front of the washer. A drip fell slowly from the brittle black hose connecting the machine to the faucet. I turned the cranky handle and shut off the water.

  Rummaging through the boxes piled next to the ancient washing machine and dryer, I found one filled with holiday candles with old orange light bulbs, and a few other light strands of the same vintage. I pulled the box toward me and set it on the floor, carefully avoiding the puddle.

  On the way back to the stairs, I looked at the wooden wall that divided the basement, reserving about a quarter of it for the old coal bin. I was dying to peek inside, if only because Mrs. St. Onge had asked me not to, but I summoned up as much self-discipline as I could and marched back up the stairs instead.

  Mrs. St. Onge was at the top, one hand on her cane, the other on her hip, waiting for me. “Ah, good. You found them.”

  “There’s a slow leak in your washer hose. I shut the water off.”

  “Mr. Eames will take care of it the next time he comes. He’ll be working in the cellar anyway.”

  I pointed at the box of lights. “Shall we put them up?”

  “Tomorrow. We’ve done enough for today.”

  Once again I was dismissed.

  * * *

  As I made my way across the lawn to my mother’s house, my thoughts ping-ponged through the stories of the relatives, suddenly dead at the holidays. Good grief. No wonder Gwyneth Hillyer and Bradley Woodward had fled without saying good-bye, and immediately after Thanksgiving. They’d been in fear for their lives.

  I didn’t really believe tiny Mrs. St. Onge was responsible for all those deaths, did I? Of course not.

  But still, Gwyn Hillyer’s sudden departure was odd. As a professional caregiver, Gwyneth would be used to cantankerous old people, and she’d probably been in creepier houses. At least Mrs. St. Onge’s was tidy.

  Despite the rigors of the morning, I had several hours before I had to be at Gus’s Too. I decided to pay Gwyneth’s parents a visit.

  They were the only Hillyers who popped up in an online directory. They lived on Holly Hill Farm Road, about midway up the peninsula. I’d never heard of the street, but my GPS found it, no problem.

  The road was long and winding, taking me far from our two-lane highway past a couple of houses and then to a sign—HOLLY HILL FARM. My Subaru bumped up the rutted road to the top of a hill, where the view of Townsend Bay spread out before me. The farm was big by coastal Maine standards, with pastures of brown grass and the stubble of harvested hayfields that rolled down to the water. I stopped in front of a white outbuilding with a sign that said HOLLY HILL FIBRES ARTES. On the door was a lush wreath and another sign that said, OPEN. PUBLIC WELCOME. It seemed like the place to start.

  There was a large red barn, a little way off, and when I got out of the car, I could hear, and smell, the presence of sheep. On the other side of the white outbuilding stood a charming cottage. I almost lost my nerve as I approached the fiber shop. What was I going to say to these people? In for a penny, in for a pound. I pushed the door open.

  Inside the building the walls were washed white and the room was bright. A woman worked at a spinning wheel and another at a loom, while three others sat knitting. Along the walls were displays of knitted and woven goods and yarns in the most luscious colors—deep pinks, purples, blues, and greens.

  “Merry Solstice!” A woman rose from the loom. She had beautiful high cheekbones and long white hair. She wore a loose, ankle-length dress, the vanilla color of fine wool. “I’m Holly Hillyer.” She had the same fine-boned build I’d observed Gwyn had as she walked in and out of Mrs. Onge’s house all those mornings. “What can I help you with today? A gift for someone special, perhaps?”

  I stared at the shelves of yarns and handmade goods. “Handmade by Holly Hill!” The light had finally dawned. “You’re famous.”

  She beamed. “Not as famous as all that.”

  But she was. Through a doorway I hadn’t spotted before, I saw three more women packing boxes that would be sent all over North America and even farther, holiday gifts for knitters and fans of handmade gifts.

  I extended my hand. “Mrs. Hillyer, I’m Julia Snowden. I’ve come about your daughter.”

  Holly Hillyer looked around the room. All conversation had ceased and the other women looked at us with point
ed curiosity. “Of course, of course. I’m always happy to meet Gwyneth’s friends. Let’s go someplace where we can talk more privately.” She threw a cranberry red shawl around her shoulders and headed for the door. Outside she turned not toward the charming house, but toward the red barn.

  Inside the barn smelled of wool, hay, and manure. There were dozens of sheep, most wearing capelike garments, which made me smile. Some were tall and rangy, with long strands of curls peeking out beneath their capes. Others were short and fat like little clouds, with tight frizz across their foreheads. There were white sheep, beige sheep, chocolate-brown sheep, two goats, and an alpaca.

  Mrs. Hillyer caught me smiling at the sheeps’ capes. “They keep the fleece clean until we shear it in the spring.” She greeted each sheep. “Hi, Lulu. Hi, Jane. Hi, Cora, Flora, and Dora.” She smiled at a group of the cloud-shaped ewes that were huddled together.

  “Do they all have names?”

  “Every one. Names and genealogies and personalities, believe it or not.”

  At the back of the barn, the big door was open, looking out over the dead grass and hayfields.

  “Beautiful, isn’t it?” she asked.

  “Yes, but also a little sad. So brown and dead. It must be gorgeous in the summer.”

  “Winter isn’t the season of death,” she corrected gently. “It’s the season of life, when the sheep grow their fleece and little lambs in their wombs.”

  “That’s an interesting way to see it.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  I looked up at the barn loft, filled with bales. “All this hay comes from your fields?”

  “That’s what farming sustainably means. We keep our flock to a size that the farm can feed them, grazing in the warm weather and hay in the cold.”

  A mountain of a man entered the barn, six foot six, at least, and big. He had a trimmed white beard and long, wiry white hair barely controlled by a ponytail. He wore tall rubber boots and a large brown coat. “Joyous Yule!” he boomed, making his way over to us.

  “Julia, this is my husband, Odin. Odin, Julia is a friend of Gwyn’s.”

  I didn’t correct her.

  “Always happy to meet a friend of our Gwynnie’s.” He pumped my hand with his enormous, gloved one. “What brings you out?”

  “I’m trying to get in touch with Gwyn. Is she here?”

  “She’s visiting a school friend in Portland.” Mrs. Hillyer held her hand beside her mouth, miming a whisper. “She’s had a bad breakup,” she confided. “Perhaps you’ve heard?”

  “No,” I answered honestly. “We haven’t been in touch.”

  “She needed a little R and R,” her father said.

  “So she quit her job?” It seemed like an extreme reaction.

  “Why would you ask that?” Mrs. Hillyer was clearly surprised.

  “Because I stopped at elder services—”

  Mr. Hillyer cut me off, thank goodness, since I didn’t know where I was going to go from there. “No, no. She’s taking a break. She’ll be back to it in a few weeks.”

  “She’s had a bad breakup,” I repeated, absorbing the information.

  “Yes. She and Tree have been together since they were children,” Mrs. Hillyer told me. “They were homeschooled right here at the farm. We thought they’d always be together. It was written in the stars.” She looked so downcast, I thought she might cry.

  Mr. Hillyer covered her delicate hand with his gloved paw. “Now, love. You don’t know they won’t get back together.”

  Mrs. Hillyer shook her head. “I don’t think so. This is really it. Gwynnie was devastated. Devastated.”

  “So you didn’t call the elder services office for her to give her notice?” I said.

  “By the goddess, no!” she exclaimed.

  I didn’t know where to go from there. They’d told quite a different story than the one I’d been told by Mrs. St. Onge and by the woman at elder services. I didn’t want to alarm them unnecessarily. I thought they’d been lied to, probably by their daughter. “Can I call Gwyneth?”

  “She’s taking a connectivity cleanse,” her mother said. “She took her cell phone with her, but she turned it off. She needs to heal while she’s away.”

  “You haven’t heard from her since she’s been gone?”

  “Just the once,” Mr. Hillyer said. “To let us know she’d arrived okay and was turning off her phone.”

  There didn’t seem much more to say. Holly walked me back to my Subaru. It was midafternoon, and I could already feel the chill that would come with sunset. “Almost Solstice,” she said brightly. “In a few days the sun will start its trip back to us, bringing light and warmth. My Gwynnie will be back too, bringing light and warmth with her as well.”

  I nodded. “Yes, of course. Happy holidays.”

  “Happy holidays to you and yours,” she said, and waved good-bye.

  Chapter Six

  The restaurant was quiet when I walked in. Gus had almost finished cleaning up for the day. But he took one look at my face and fixed a cheese sandwich to heat on the grill.

  “Thank you, Gus,” I said, sitting at the counter.

  “You look like you could use it. Coffee?”

  The coffeemaker was clean, the pots empty. I didn’t want him to make a new one for me.

  “No trouble to make it,” he said, as if reading my thoughts. He put a filter in the machine and filled it with coffee. Then he took one of the pots to the sink to fill it.

  “Trouble in paradise?” he asked when he returned.

  “What?” It took me a moment to realize he was asking about Chris and me. “No. No trouble there. Well, a little. His whole family is coming for Christmas, so I’m nervous about that.”

  “No reason to be nervous. You’re a catch. They’ll figure that out pretty quick.” He pulled the grilled cheese sandwich off the grill and cut it in half with a quick crack of the knife. He put it on a plate in front of me and then fetched us both steaming mugs of coffee. He stood across the counter from me. Gus rarely sat down in his own place. “So if it’s not your love life, what is it?”

  “You know my mother’s next-door neighbor?” I started.

  “The Carters?”

  “Other side.”

  He nodded. “Odile St. Onge.”

  “Yes, her.” I gathered my thoughts. “She’s been teaching me to make a Bûche de Noël.”

  “A what de what?”

  “A classic French Yule log cake.”

  “Oh. Like the ones she used to bring to the Festival of Trees celebration.”

  “Exactly. Anyway, I’m concerned she’s gotten a little isolated. She had a caregiver checking her from elder services, but that woman’s recently quit . . . or gone on vacation, or something. And she had a grandnephew who also came by. But he’s on a business trip . . . or something.”

  “So you’re worried she’s alone? You think she can’t take care of herself.” His great white eyebrows swept over his nose in a challenging squint.

  “Er.” I was treading on thin ice. No one knew how old Gus was, except Mrs. Gus. They had a son in Arizona and a daughter in California, both with families of their own. He opened his restaurant at five every morning for the lobstermen and fishermen, seven days a week, every month of the year except February, when he and Mrs. Gus visited their kids out west. If anyone from elder services or anywhere else tried to check on him, I didn’t want to think about the consequences. “Well, you know, she’s a widow, she’s alone,” I stuttered.

  “A widow?” Gus’s squint deepened. “She tell you that?”

  “No, I always heard—”

  “She’s no widow, at least that I ever heard. That miserable Albert took himself off one night. Disappeared.”

  “Really? When was this? What happened?”

  “Long time ago.” Gus took a swallow of coffee. “A couple of years before your parents bought their place. There’s not a lot to tell. One day Albert was there—being rude to customers at his job at Gleason�
��s Hardware. Living in that ugly house. And the next day he was gone.” Gus stared off in the middle distance, remembering. “Around this time of year, it was. The holidays.”

  Another disappearance around the holidays? “There must have been some speculation around town about what happened to him.”

  “Some said he had a girlfriend in Rockland, he’d run off with her.”

  “Did you believe them?”

  Gus shook his head. “Nah. I never did. A mean old bird like Albert. It was hard to believe he’d gotten one woman, let alone two. I was more in the camp that thought that miserable jerk had finally crossed the wrong person and skedaddled out of town. But it’s all gossip and guesswork. No one knows. Except possibly Odile.” He looked up and saw my questioning expression. “I assume she took care of it, one way or another, though whether she divorced him or had him declared dead, or something else, I don’t know. People around town started referring to her as a widow, and she never bothered to correct them. That’s probably why your family thought she was. Either way, he’s never been back. I’ve never heard tell that anyone saw him again. Good riddance, I say. She’s better off without him.”

  “And those were the only rumors? He ran off with another woman, or he was being chased by bad guys?” No one ever suggested his wife killed him, with a cake, for example?

  “Most I ever heard, and I hear a lot in here.” Gus looked me in the eyes. “Did that help at all? My best advice is, if you’re worried about Odile St. Onge, don’t be. That lady can take care of herself.”

  That’s what I was beginning to worry about. Was she taking care of herself with terrible consequences to the people who crossed her?

  I swallowed the last bite of sandwich and chased it with the last sip of coffee. “Thanks, Gus. If Chris arrives while you’re still here, can you tell him I’ll be right back? There’s something I want to do real quick.”

  “Sure thing, Julia. I hope I’ve set your mind at ease about Odile St. Onge.”

  * * *

  I fast-walked over the harbor hill to Busman’s Harbor’s ugly brick town-hall-police-station-firehouse complex. In the off-season we had so few officers working, they were always out answering calls or on patrol. But I knew from experience the best time to catch my friend Jamie Dawes was at shift change at three o’clock. If he’d worked days, he’d probably still be finishing up reports. If he was working evenings, he might not have gone out yet.