by Avery Aames
As Chip skulked away, I scanned the room for Oscar, but he had disappeared. Before I could make excuses to Jordan so I could track down Oscar, the antique entry door that the pub had purchased from a defunct Irish castle crashed open.
Quigley, the shaggy-haired reporter, barged in. “Rebe-e-e-cca!”
Visions of a drunken Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire boogied through my mind. Quigley wasn’t buff like Stanley, and he was wearing a rumpled linen jacket, not a tattered undershirt, but he was wild-eyed and looked highly unpredictable. He headed toward Rebecca and Ipo, who had taken seats at a small round table.
Ipo tried to leap to a stand, but a foot tangled in his chair. He and the chair slammed to the floor.
I raced to intervene, with Jordan at my heels, but Rebecca was swift. She bolted from the table, cut around the fallen Ipo, and smacked Quigley hard across the face.
CHAPTER
“Ouch!” Quigley scanned the pub, checking to see if anyone saw the slap. Everyone had. Jaws hung open. Quigley glanced at Rebecca, hurt filling his gaze. “Why’d you do that?”
“You … you …” Rebecca hauled back a second time.
I grabbed her arm in midair. “Cool it, Babe Ruth.”
After a long, edgy moment, Rebecca whispered, “I’m good, Charlotte. Let me go.”
I did. Instantly she swung again, the little snip.
Jordan, in a quicker-than-lightning move, pinned her arms to the side. “Chill, Rebecca. He’s not worth a lawsuit.”
Rebecca squirmed, her feet tap-dancing in front of Jordan’s, but he didn’t release her.
“I’d never sue her.” Quigley sniffled. “I love her.”
The word love burbled through the crowd.
“Out of the way, folks.” Tim, the owner of the pub, his red hair and beard matching the burnt red plaid of his shirt, lumbered through the throng. In his hand, he carried a pitcher of ice water. If a fight got out of hand, Tim wouldn’t think twice. He would douse the participants. Water required fewer stitches than a baseball bat, he had once told me.
“Darling.” Quigley dropped to the floor on one knee, emitting a grunt as he landed. He wobbled for a second, then licked his lips and said, “Will you marry me?” Fumes of alcohol drifted our way.
“For heaven’s sake.” Rebecca wriggled free of Jordan. He let her, I was pretty sure. She folded her arms across her chest. “No.”
“Why?” Quigley teetered.
“Because she’s marrying me.” Ipo broke through the pack, face flushed, chest heaving with emotion.
“We’re engaged,” Rebecca announced, and for the first time I noticed a ring on her finger—a narrow band of gold etched with hearts. When had she received that? Why hadn’t she told me? Could that have been why Ipo had looked so nervous entering the pub earlier? I could only imagine his proposal at the precinct, kneeling behind bars.
Rebecca curled into Ipo. He slung his arm around her slender back.
Quigley scrambled to his feet and tugged on the hem of his linen jacket. “But he’s a murderer.”
“No, he’s not.” Rebecca resumed her combative stance. “Take it back.”
“But the luau thingies—”
“Someone took them, don’t you get it?” Rebecca poked Quigley’s chest. “He was robbed, and he’s being set up.” She whirled in a circle, pointing at everyone who had gathered around. “Ipo is innocent, do you hear me? If one of you knows something, you’ve got to speak up. Go to the police. It’s your civic duty. And now, if you’ll excuse us, we’re leaving.” She grabbed Ipo’s hand, and as regally as she could muster, forced people to clear a path as she marched her dearly beloved out of the pub.
As the door swung shut, Quigley grazed his hair with his hands. “I don’t get it. I thought she had the hots for me.”
I shook my head. Apparently Chip wasn’t the only man missing signals on this chilly evening.
Jordan bypassed me and patted Quigley on the back. “Hey, buddy, let’s get some coffee into you.”
As Jordan guided Quigley to the bar, Tim twirled a finger in the air. In an instant, Irish music resumed and members of the lookie-loo crowd returned to their tables or stools.
“Sugar.” Tyanne tapped my elbow. “Come on back to the table. Food’s getting cold.”
As much as I wanted to assist Jordan, I had to admit that he would have better luck getting Quigley sober by himself than with me tagging along.
I returned to the booth with my friends and polished off the rest of my ciabatta appetizer. “Has anybody heard back from Jacky?”
Delilah jiggled her cell phone. “She just called. She found a sitter, but she dumped us for a date with the big guy.”
I was tickled to learn Jacky and Urso might be working out whatever their issue was. I was also delighted that Urso was no longer scouring Providence for a thief. I hadn’t had the chance to ask Jordan if they had tracked him down, but I didn’t think either man would have given up until they had.
Licking my fingers clean, I glanced around the pub. Georgia and the elderly couple had departed, their meals virtually untouched. Oscar wasn’t anywhere to be seen, either. What had he been trying to show me? Had his signal to me incited Georgia to disappear? Was there something on Chip’s iPhone that would refute Georgia’s alibi? Maybe Chip had a picture of her slipping out of the pub on the night of Kaitlyn’s death. A time stamp on the photo could be mighty incriminating. So would a confirmation from an eyewitness. I decided now was as good a time as any to investigate, and rose to my feet.
“Back in a sec,” I told my friends. I traipsed to the bar and caught up with Tim ducking under the bar’s hatch door. “Hey, bartender.”
Tim rose to his full six-foot height. “Hello, darlin’.” Tim may have been born in America, but he loved to put on an Irish brogue. It was good for tourists, he said. He hitched his head. “Looks like Jordan has come to the rescue again.”
A few stools away, Jordan sat with Quigley, a steaming cup of coffee in front of each of them. The sight of him nursing Quigley back to sober-dom made me proud. He didn’t know Quigley at all, and yet there he was, being a friend.
“Jordan’s got a way about him, don’t you think?” Tim said.
I cut a look back at him and tilted my head. Had he and Jordan known each other before Jordan moved to town? They had bonded right off the bat. If Jordan had been a restaurateur, the two knowing each other previously wasn’t outside the realm of possibility.
If? Stop it, Charlotte. You do not want to question Jordan’s story any more. Look at him. He was dealing with Quigley like a restaurant owner would. My fluttery nerves settled down, and I concentrated again on Tim.
“Got a question,” I said.
Tim slung the white towel over his shoulder and spanked the bar. “Fire away, darlin’.”
“Georgia Plachette said she was here playing darts on the night of Kaitlyn Clydesdale’s death.”
“Indeed, she was. She’s an eagle eye, that one.”
“Did she ever leave?”
Tim cocked an eyebrow. “I told Chief Urso all of this. Why’re you asking?”
“Humor me.”
Tim laughed heartily. “You are one for the books, Miz Bessette, you are. A snoop, like my mother, if ever I knew one. I couldn’t slip anything past my mom.” He tweaked his beard with his thumb and forefinger. “Okay, let me see. Georgia stopped throwing darts to go to the restroom once or twice.”
“That’s it? She didn’t leave the pub?”
“Takes a world of tries to hit the bull’s-eye. She was going for a record. She hit it nine times. The gang was counting.” He gestured to the crowd and leaned forward on his forearms. “Poor lass couldn’t get the tenth. Some of the guys were giving her guff about that, to be sure. Your pal Chip and Luigi, as well as a few others. Luigi got into an argument with her.”
“That’s what Chip said.”
Tim shook a finger. “Not wise. The poor sot was critiquing her form. She had a bit of an arc t
o the throw.” He showed me the action. “Luigi said she was cheating. She sniped. He carped back. He’d had—” Tim rocked his fingers, indicating Luigi had downed a drink or two.
I flashed on Luigi at the library with his granddaughter the other day. He had looked worse for wear and had admitted that he had drunk shots the night before.
“He’s a bit of a lightweight when it comes to alcohol.” Tim chuckled. “Say, what’s this I hear about Barton Burrell being a suspect?”
“Who told you that?”
“That delicious Tyanne.” He gazed longingly over my shoulder. “While Rebecca was talking to Quigley.”
I swiveled and caught Tyanne making eyes at Tim from where she sat in the booth. She coyly looked away, and I had to laugh. Something about February always stirred up romance. Perhaps St. Valentine’s Day truly had a way of uniting hearts, and Tyanne’s, for all intents and purposes, was available.
A clatter resounded at the end of the bar. Quigley pushed his coffee aside. He lumbered off his stool and headed my way. “Hey, you!”
Jordan tried to stop him, but Quigley eluded him.
“I heard you, O’Shea!” Quigley growled.
I felt somewhat gratified he wasn’t prepared to attack me.
Tim glanced over his shoulder and thumbed his chest. “Me?”
“Yeah, I’m talking to you.” Quigley sneered. “Who else around here is named O’Shea?”
“I can think of a dozen,” Tim quipped, not flustered in the least. “I’ve got six brothers and they’ve all got wives and a ton of kids.”
“Don’t be a smart aleck. You don’t know the half of it.”
Half of what? I wondered, not sure I wanted to know.
“Barton Burrell is a saint. Don’t go spouting bad things about him, hear me?” Quigley moved closer and banged his palm on the bar. “Barton Burrell is one of the best. He takes that wife of his back and forth. Never thinks twice.”
“Back and forth where?” I asked.
“To the hospital. Week in, week out. I saw them the other night. You know”—he snapped his fingers but they didn’t quite click—“that night what’s-her-name died. She looked white as snow.”
“Kaitlyn Clydesdale?”
“No. Emma Burrell.” Quigley brandished a finger. “You know how people look when headlights of oncoming cars hit the—” He fluttered his fingers and drew them apart, at a loss for a word.
“Windshield,” I said. Back in college, I was a master at charades.
“Yeah. I was driving the other direction. The lights made her look so pale.” He tapped the side of his head. “A journalist notices things like this, see? Rebecca doesn’t appreciate me. She goes for that … that hula dancer. Sheesh. I can hula.” He jiggled his hips and nearly toppled over.
“Whoa, buddy.” Jordan wrapped an arm around Quigley. “Let’s get you home. The coffee isn’t working its magic quickly enough.” He cast a glance over his shoulder at me. “I’m afraid I’ll miss the recital.”
Recital? In the to-do, I had nearly forgotten. Yipes. I glanced at my watch. I was late, yet again. “Tyanne!”
I thanked Tim for his input and raced to the faire, my mind reeling with ideas. Why would Barton say Emma and he had been watching television the night Kaitlyn died? Why wouldn’t he tell the truth about taking his wife to the hospital? That would provide a perfect alibi.
CHAPTER
While we were in the pub, a light snow had started to fall outside. Now, a thin layer decorated the ground. Flakes dusted my face as Tyanne and I sprinted through the Winter Wonderland tents. I dialed Urso to tell him about the new information on the Burrells. When he didn’t answer, I followed with a call to the precinct. The clerk said she wasn’t sure she could reach him. He was indisposed. Indisposed, I wanted to shout; he was with Jacky. If I wished, the clerk said she would patch me through to one of the deputies, both of whom were on non-urgent calls.
“Sugar, hear that?” Tyanne said. “The recital’s starting. We might better get a move on.”
The lilting strains of a piano sonata that my grandmother had written to herald the start of the recital filtered through the faire’s speakers.
Not wanting to arrive late to the songfest, I left a message for Urso or one of his deputies to call me, and dashed ahead.
The recital “hall” was housed in an oversized tent with a gaping entrance and white poles that held up the center peak. Rows of polished wooden benches, set in graceful arcs, faced a stage that was thirty feet wide. On the stage there was a three-tiered semicircle where the girls would stand. A combo band, consisting of an electric piano, guitar, and drums, was wedged into a tiny spot on the right of the stage.
Dusting snowflakes off my face, I hurried to the buffet that was set up against the tent wall. Tyanne followed. Grandmère trundled around the table, setting out napkins, forks, and shimmery blue paper plates. Pépère poured plastic cups of his spiced cider and set them in lines.
I pecked my grandmother hello. “The song you wrote is lovely, and the food looks yummy, Grandmère.” I reached for a cider, but she thwacked my hand.
“Shoo. No eating or drinking until after.”
“Spoilsport.”
She clucked her delight.
The table was laden with a variety of dishes. Fromagerie Bessette had supplied the pepperoni-apple quiches. Providence Patisserie had provided breads and pastries. Other locals had made casseroles and an assortment of appetizers.
“By the way,” I said, “did you catch the thief?”
“No, but Urso said not to worry. He has an idea who it is.” She touched my cheek. “You’re perspiring, chérie. Are you all right?”
“Tyanne and I ran the whole way here.” I spotted a sign in front of a Crock-Pot that read: Tyanne’s Creole Casserole, and I turned to her. “When did you have time?”
“This morning.” She twirled a finger. “Slow cookers make everything so easy. Plop the items in and switch on the heat. It’s my mama’s recipe.”
I gave her a knowing look. She had arrived at The Cheese Shop before eight, which meant she had to have made the casserole at the crack of dawn. “You’re not sleeping, are you?”
She shook her head. “I will soon.”
I drank in the scent of sausages, onions, and spices, and my stomach grumbled. Silly, I know. After eating the ciabatta appetizer at the pub, I shouldn’t have been hungry in the least, but tasty aromas always stirred my taste buds.
“Oh, there are my kids.” Tyanne waved to her children. “Thomas. Tisha. Mama’s—” She halted and dropped her arm to her side when her husband emerged through the tent opening with his Lolita-esque girlfriend.
“Are you going to be okay?” I asked.
“Fine, sugar.” Like a steel magnolia, Tyanne shook off any sign of distress and pasted on a big smile. “My little darlings need me to be a good role model. Don’t you agree?” She squeezed my arm for support, whispered, “Thanks,” and then she zigzagged through the crowd toward her children.
I admired how resilient she was. Theo would have to watch out for himself in divorce court.
“Charlotte!” Matthew called. He sat at the center of the third row of benches, flanked by Meredith and Sylvie. Their coats were piled on the bench beyond Meredith.
Sylvie, still clad in her ridiculous antebellum outfit, said, “I’ve saved you a seat right next to me, Charlotte.”
Oh, lucky day.
I scooted down the aisle. As I settled into my spot, Sylvie handed me a program. I read the list of songs that the girls would be singing and recognized many from my youth. “Meredith, did you see?” I leaned around Sylvie and pointed at a title on the program.
Meredith snickered. “Hope they can make it all the way through.” She was referring to an incident from our past.
Matthew made a face, letting me know that he remembered the event. When Meredith and I were slightly older than the twins, we had sung in the Winter Wonderland chorus. Meredith was notorious for making me laugh at
the most inconvenient times. For one rousing rendition of “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot”—a song the twins were going to sing—I had been given a solo. During my moment in the sun, Meredith, who was standing beside me, repeatedly cleared her throat, pretending she had a frog in it—imitating me, of course. I could have clocked her. Luckily neither of the twins had solos. I could only imagine what precocious Amy would have done to Clair—or vice versa.
I chuckled to myself and continued reading.
“By the way, what are you wearing, Charlotte?” Sylvie plucked the sleeve of my tweed jacket. “How tres passé.”
“Actually, I purchased it recently.” I wasn’t lying. I had found the jacket at a secondhand store in Columbus that specialized in businesswomen’s attire. I liked the neutral tone, the wing collar, and the one-button front.
“What is fashion coming to?” Sylvie sniffed. “You and Prudence Hart have a lot to learn. Speaking of Prudence, she’s so mad at your grandmother about starting a Do-Gooder chapter without inviting her. I don’t think I’ll ever hear the end—”
“Shhh. The recital is starting.”
A dozen girls in scarlet robes trotted onto the stage and formed two lines.
“There are our babies, Matthew. Amy! Clair!” Sylvie rose from the bench and waved her arms like she was guiding in a 747 airplane.
Matthew looked like he wanted to disappear into the fake green grass flooring.
The conductor, none other than my friend Octavia, strode in front of the chorale. She swept back the folds of her chorale robe and, facing the audience, took a brief bow. Then she pivoted, brushed her cornrow braids over her shoulder, and struck a baton on the music stand. The musicians began and the chorus launched into a breezy version of “Let It Snow” followed by “Big Rock Candy Mountain,” “She Loves You,” and “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.”
In between the fourth and fifth songs, Sylvie said, “Like I was saying, Prudence is so mad—”
I flicked her hoopskirt. “Sylvie, please. Wait until the songfest is over.”
