Murder Is Binding bm-1

by Lorna Barrett

  Free Spirit's home page flashed onto the little screen. No naked people. So far so good. Instead there was a cute little graphic of a squirrel named Ricky, which was apparently the site's mascot. By clicking on various links, Ricky took visitor 120,043 on a tour of the website. First up, the volleyball court, but there were no naked men and women playing the game, only the photo of a well-groomed court. The pool was Olympic-sized, with scores of white chaise longues lined up around it, each with its own clean, neatly folded white towel. That picture was also devoid of people, as was every other photograph on the website. Instead, like any other camping resort, the text stressed the clean, well-maintained facilities at every Free Spirit location.

  "It's a chain?" Mr. Everett asked.

  "Apparently so." Tricia clicked on the coming attractions page and found what she'd been looking for. "Aha. Listen to this: 'Our newest Full Moon location is scheduled to open next summer in southern New Hampshire.'"

  "You think they mean here in Stoneham?" Ginny asked.

  "It can't be." Still, there had been the rumor of a big box outfit wanting to locate in the area. No, retail was a year-round moneymaking concern while a nudist resort would, for the most part, only be seasonal.

  "There's no reason it would have to be located near here. Saying 'southern New Hampshire' is rather ambiguous. They'd probably want to be near a larger city to make it accessible for travelers," Mr. Everett said reasonably.

  "You're probably right," Tricia agreed.

  Mr. Everett stepped away from the counter. "I think I'll go back to my reading. Excuse me, ladies," he said, and off to the nook he went.

  "I think it would be cool to have a nudist resort right outside of town. Think of all the new money it would bring to the area," Ginny said wistfully. "All those people might get bored with volleyball after a while. Did you see all those lounge chairs? They'd definitely need something good to read while they whiled away the hours working on their tans."

  "One can hope," Tricia said. "But, oh, think about the mosquitoes and all the new places you could get bitten." She shuddered and Ginny laughed. "Better be on the lookout for more of these," she said, crumpled up the tract Mr. Everett had found, and tossed it into the trash.

  "Could you help me, miss?" asked the customer Ginny had abandoned only a few minutes before.

  "I'll keep an eye out for more of those advertisements," Ginny told Tricia, before skirting the counter. "Now, what can I help you find?" she asked the customer.

  Tricia clicked on the button for the website's home page once more. Ricky smiled at her with a toothy grin more appropriate to a cartoon chipmunk. Bob hadn't wanted to talk about big box stores. How eager would he be to talk about the possibility of a nudist resort-if she could even catch him at his realty office to ask?

  Tricia didn't have an opportunity to find out. Their slow start of a morning suddenly morphed into a busy afternoon of enthusiastic shoppers looking for vintage mysteries. Tricia was deep in conversation with a Mrs. Richardson, a serious collector from the Hamptons, who had already picked out more than a dozen books with authors ranging from Margery Allingham to Cornell Woolrich. She glanced up as the bell over the door jingled and a damp Mike Harris shook the drops from his raincoat onto the mat just inside the door.

  Both Ginny and Mr. Everett were also deeply involved in customer service, so Tricia gave Mike a be-with-you-when-I-can smile. He waved a no-hurry hand in response and started browsing amongst the shelves.

  The Hamptons woman spent close to seven hundred dollars and left the store a happy customer; likewise, Tricia was a very happy proprietor. A Charioteer tour bus rolled down Main Street, which would hopefully mean another influx of customers. A patient Mike had settled into the nook, thumbing through Mystery Scene Magazine. Tricia knew she only had minutes before the store would be flooded with potential customers again.

  "I'm sorry it took so long," she apologized, taking the seat opposite him.

  "No, I'm sorry. I should've called; but then I wouldn't have gotten to see you."

  Tricia felt her cheeks redden. "I wanted to thank you for your call yesterday. I didn't grab it because-"

  "If it was me, I'd have been screening my calls after that hatchet job in the Stoneham Weekly News."

  "I'm afraid that's exactly what I was doing. Unfortunately some people believed every word. A few even came here to gawk at me."

  "Don't judge the whole village by a couple of jerks." He changed the subject. "We still on for tomorrow?"

  "I wouldn't miss it. Just give me the time and place."

  "I know you need to open at noon. Is nine o'clock too early?"

  "Not at all."

  "Great." Mike pulled a piece of paper from his jacket pocket. "Here's the address. Do you need directions?"

  Tricia glanced at the paper. "No, I've driven through this neighborhood before. Very nice houses."

  Mike's smile was wistful. "Yes. It's a shame I have to sell it. But Mother's care comes first."

  Tricia nodded, remembering the pain of losing Christopher's father to dementia.

  The bell over the door jangled as a fresh wave of customers entered the shop.

  Mike stood. "I'd better make room for the onslaught." They stood for a moment, looking into each other's eyes, then Mike clasped her hands and drew her close, kissed her cheek. "See you tomorrow."

  Surprised but pleased, Tricia watched Mike depart, even going so far as to follow his progress as he crossed the street to his new office and campaign headquarters. She did, however, move away from the window in case he turned. She didn't want him to know she'd been watching him.

  At the coffee station, Ginny motioned for Tricia, then proffered the pot. "It isn't even two o'clock and this is the last of the coffee. We're already out of cookies. Want me to go get more?"

  Tricia shook her head. "Most of our sales today have been via credit card; we haven't got much cash in the till. I'll go get the supplies and be back within half an hour. Can you manage?"

  "I'd be glad to help out if you need me?" said Mr. Everett, coming up behind Tricia.

  "I can't keep imposing on you."

  "I like to feel useful," said the older gentleman.

  "Go on," Ginny encouraged. "We'll be fine."

  Tricia grabbed her purse, raincoat, and umbrella and ducked past the hoard of customers for a hasty exit. She waited for traffic to pass before crossing the street. Mr. Everett's help these last few days had been a blessing. As he was at the store on a daily basis, she wondered if she should offer him a part-time job. Her balance sheet was already in better shape than what she'd initially projected and as Ginny had Sundays off, he might be willing to help out then. Granted, it was a slow day, but she could always use his help for shelving new stock. It made perfect sense, and why hadn't she thought of it before?

  The Coffee Bean was just as busy as Haven't Got a Clue, and Tricia took a number, noting there were at least eight customers ahead of her. Stoneham was really hopping on this bleak, late-summer afternoon.

  To pass the time, Tricia distracted herself by examining the store's stock: coffee cups that ran the gamut from artful to sublimely silly, packets of gourmet cookies, petit fours, and chocolate in colorful wrappings, everything so beautifully packaged it enticed customers to spend. But she'd get her cookies from the village bakery-if they had anything left this late in the afternoon.

  As Tricia read the list of ingredients on a box of Green Mountain chocolates, she began to feel closed in. Looking up, she saw editor Russ Smith was standing well within her personal space. "Excuse me," she said, stepping aside.

  "I understand you weren't happy with my article," he said without preamble.

  "Who would be?"

  "I owe it to my readers to-"

  "Act like a tabloid journalist?"

  His eyes flashed. "That's uncalled for."

  "So was painting me as a murderer-and without even circumstantial evidence." Heads turned at her words. She lowered her voice. "I don't think this is the
place to discuss this."

  "Then how about dinner. Are you free tonight?"

  Tricia blinked. "You've got to be kidding."

  Smith's gaze was level. "No, I'm not. We could discuss the story, and perhaps a follow-up-among other things."

  Tricia replaced the box of chocolates on the shelf. "I don't think so."

  "I'm not your enemy."

  "And after what you wrote about me, you're not my friend, either."

  "Number forty-seven," the salesclerk called out.

  Tricia glanced down at the crushed ticket in her hand. "If you'll excuse me, Mr. Smith." She elbowed her way through the other customers and placed her order, all the time feeling Russ Smith's gaze on her back.

  Dodging the raindrops, Tricia clutched her bags of coffee and cookies and hurried down the sidewalk. The big, green Kelly Realty FOR RENT sign was gone from the front window of the Cookery. The door stood ajar and the lights blazed. Poking her head inside, Tricia called, "Deirdre?" A woman in a baggy red flannel shirt and dark slacks, with a blue bandana tied around her hair, turned from her perch on a ten-foot ladder. In her hand she clasped a soapy sponge. A six-foot-square patch of wall had already been scrubbed of soot, showing creamy yellow paint once again.

  "You shouldn't be doing that," Tricia admonished. A fall for a woman Deirdre's age could send her to a nursing home-or worse.

  "It's got to be done," Deirdre said, in the same no-nonsense voice as her dead sister.

  "But surely Bob Kelly ought to be paying someone to do it."

  Deirdre dropped the sponge into a bucket and carefully stepped down off the ladder. "We came to an agreement on other more important things." The hint of a smile played at her lips. Perhaps she was a harder bargainer than Doris had been, which had been the reason for Bob's sour mood the evening before.

  "How soon do you think you'll reopen?"

  "Possibly a week. Then I think I'll hold a grand reopening the first week in October. Doris had already lined up an author signing for that week. It should work out nicely."

  "But what about the smoke-damaged stock? It'll take weeks to restore them, and surely some of them won't be salvageable."

  "I've got an expert coming in on Monday. Meanwhile there're hundreds of boxes in the storeroom upstairs, which thankfully Mr. Kelly neglected to clear out, and there's a room of excess stock at Doris's house. We'll start with that and fill in with newer titles until we replenish our supply of rare and used books."

  "We?" Tricia asked.

  Deirdre frowned, her gaze dipping. "Excuse me. I can't help talking about Doris and myself as though we'll always be together. She was my twin. When we were younger we were so very close she used to swear we could read each other's minds."

  Tricia felt a pang of envy laced with guilt. She'd never felt that way about Angelica. "It sounds like you've had experience running a shop before."

  "I was an accountant until last winter, but I heard so much about the Cookery from Doris I always felt I could step into her shoes and run it at a moment's notice. And now I have." She pursed her lips and swallowed.

  Tricia considered carefully before voicing her next question. "Have you made any arrangements for Doris?"

  Deirdre's expression hardened. "There will be no service, if that's what you mean. She told me she had no friends here in Stoneham. If there's one thing she hated, it was hypocrisy. I couldn't bear to hear platitudes and regrets from people who had no time for Doris during her life."

  Ouch-that stung, but Tricia couldn't blame the woman. No doubt Deirdre would grieve for her sister in her own way and time.

  "Have you had a chance to visit with your niece?"

  Deirdre shook her head. "Her counselor doesn't seem to think it's a good idea. Doris and I looked so much alike it would only confuse her."

  "I was very surprised to hear Doris even had a child."

  "How was it you found out?" Deirdre asked.

  Again, Tricia adopted an innocent stare. "I can't for the life of me remember. It must've been hard on her-being a single mother with a special child."

  "You can call Susan retarded. It doesn't offend me, and it didn't offend Doris."

  Tricia wasn't sure what to say.

  Deirdre averted her gaze. "Being pregnant out of wedlock was one thing; keeping a Down syndrome child was another. Our family abandoned Doris. All except me," she amended. "I was the only one who cared about poor Doris. The world in general"-she turned back to Tricia-"and Stoneham in particular-always treated Doris shabbily."

  "Is that what she told you?"

  "It's what I observed. But yes, she did tell me that. We were very close."

  "I can't say as I recall seeing you here in Stoneham before this week."

  "I was not a regular visitor. We kept in touch by phone." Deirdre turned her back on Tricia, picked up her sponge, and began wiping the grimy wall once again. "Is it my imagination, or is this conversation turning into an interrogation?" She looked over her shoulder with a hard-eyed stare.

  "I'm sorry. I was merely curious." Tricia changed the subject. "Tomorrow I'll be looking at a private collection of books; the owner is eager to sell. I'd be glad to look out for any cookbooks."

  Spine still rigid, Deirdre gave a curt nod. "Thank you, Ms.-?"

  "Call me Tricia. After all, we are neighbors."

  Deirdre nodded and stepped closer to the ladder. "I must get back to work if I'm going to reopen next week. Thank you for stopping by."

  Tricia knew a dismissal when she heard it. She gave a quick "Good-bye," and headed out the door.

  Soft, mellow jazz issued from Haven't Got a Clue's speakers as Tricia reentered the store. Stationed at the sales counter, Ginny flipped the pages of a magazine, while sitting in the nook. Mr. Everett's nose was buried in a book without a dust jacket. Tricia hung up her coat, stowed her umbrella and purse, and headed for the coffee station, where she made a fresh pot and set out a new plate of cookies before heading for the sales counter.

  Ginny looked up from her reading, quickly closing the big, fat magazine and turning it over. Tricia leaned close. "What would you think about me asking Mr. Everett to come work for us?"

  Ginny's gaze slid to the closed magazine and then up again. "What a great idea. I've always felt bad about you being all by yourself here on Sundays. Business is good and he sure knows his mystery authors. Go for it."

  Tricia caught sight of the magazine's name on the spine: Bride's World. Was there a wedding in Ginny's future? She nodded and smiled at the thought, also happy Ginny approved of her decision.

  Tricia approached the elderly gent. "Mr. Everett?" He made to stand, but Tricia motioned him to stay put and took the seat opposite him. "Mr. Everett," she began again. "You've become a bit of a fixture here at Haven't Got a Clue."

  Mr. Everett's eyes widened, his mouth dropping open in alarm. "I don't mean to be a pest, Ms. Miles. I won't take any more of your coffee and cookies, I promise-"

  It was Tricia's turn to be alarmed. "Oh no-you misunderstand me. I'm not trying to throw you out. I'd like to offer you a job, Mr. Everett."

  Alarm turned to shock. "A job? Me? But what can I do?"

  "Sell books. You're very good at it. You know as much as I do-and probably a whole lot more-about our merchandise, and goodness knows you're dependable about showing up every day."

  Color flushed the old man's cheeks. "A job?" he murmured in what sounded like disbelief.

  "I won't ask you to lift heavy boxes, and your hours would be flexible, but you've already proved to be an asset to Ginny and me when the store is busy. I can't offer you a lot of money, and unfortunately I'm not in a position to give benefits of any kind, but-"

  "A job-" he repeated, as though warming to the idea.

  "I'd be glad to give you a couple of days to think it over. You wouldn't have to give me your answer until-"

  Mr. Everett suddenly stood, a fire lighting his bright eyes. "No need for that. When do you want me to start?"

  Tricia laughed. "How about a
n hour ago?"

  The old man's lips quivered, his eyes growing moist. "Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Miles." He shook himself, then his head swiveled back and forth. "What do you want me to do first? The back shelves are in a terrible state. Customers have no sense of order. They take books out and then put them back every which way. Or I could rearrange the biographies in chronological order, versus alphabetical, so that customers would have a better understanding of how the genre grew. Perhaps it should have been done long before this."

  Tricia stifled a laugh. "I'm glad you have so many good ideas. But right now I have a different kind of request. Would you be willing to go next door and make sure Ms. Gleason doesn't fall off a ladder? I don't want you to do anything that puts you in a position of getting hurt yourself, but just make sure she doesn't hurt herself in trying to get ready to reopen her sister's store."

  "I could do that," he said, sounding less than enthused.

  "Great. And tomorrow we'll figure out what your regular hours and duties will be."

  Mr. Everett held out his hand. Tricia took it. "Thank you, Ms. Miles. Thank you for making an old man feel useful again. I'll go next door right now and make sure Ms. Gleason stays safe."

  "Thank you."

  Mr. Everett started for the door, which opened, admitting Angelica, who paused in the entryway, barring Mr. Everett's escape. They did a little dance with muttered "sorry's" and "excuse me's" while they tried to maneuver out of one another's way. At last Angelica stepped over to where Tricia still stood in the nook.

  "I've never been here when the store was open," she said, without even a hello. She took in the clusters of browsing shoppers and Ginny at the register waiting on a customer with a stack of books. Angelica nodded approvingly. "You've created a nice atmosphere here, Trish. And it doesn't stink of old paper like some used bookstores do, either."

  Trust Angelica to spoil a compliment. "Thank you. I think. What brings you here so early?"

  Angelica picked up one of the well-thumbed review magazines. "I wanted to let you know I can't fix dinner tonight."

  Tricia hated to admit it, but in only three days she'd come to enjoy and look forward to one of Angelica's delicious entrées. "What's up?"