Tish looked at Reade, her face a question.
‘I don’t have anything else to discuss,’ Reade replied.
‘Neither do I. So, I’ll see you at the campground in the morning, Clemson.’
‘The campground?’ Schuyler questioned.
‘Yes, I’m delivering breakfast.’
‘Ah,’ he dismissed with a smile.
Reade, meanwhile, remained silent.
SEVEN
Despite the day’s events and Reade’s warnings of danger, Tish slept soundly – almost as if her mind and body had been pushed to their limits and were in desperate need of restoration. She awoke a few minutes before six in the morning, just before her alarm went off.
As was her habit, she went downstairs, switched the coffeemaker on, and preheated the oven for the morning bake before heading upstairs for a quick shower. Before she could make it to the top of the stairs, she heard the sound of keys jangling in the kitchen door.
Expecting to see Celestine, as the baker often stopped by for coffee and chitchat on the mornings she couldn’t sleep, Tish took a few steps back and peeked around the stairwell wall to say hello. She was greeted by the puffer-jacketed figure of Mary Jo Okensholt stepping over the threshold.
‘MJ? Are you OK?’ Tish asked as she descended the stairs.
‘Yeah … no … I’ve been up all night. Can’t sleep.’
Tish put the kettle on and placed a bag of Mary Jo’s favorite licorice tea into a mug. ‘The divorce?’
‘The bills.’ Mary Jo hung her purse and coat on a hook behind the kitchen door. ‘I don’t know how I can ever make it all work. I got a one-hundred-and-ninety-dollar gas and electric bill in the mail yesterday. One hundred and ninety! That’s almost half of what I earn in a week working part-time for you and part-time as Augusta May’s assistant.’
‘Did you try one of those switching sites where they estimate what you’d spend with other utility companies?’
Mary Jo sat down at one of the counter stools. ‘I did. The lowest estimate was one hundred and twenty. I made the switch already, but it’s still more than I can afford to spend. I spoke with the kids about conserving and they’ve been really good about things – Kayla’s been wearing sweaters instead of turning up the thermostat, and Gregory has even been timing his showers – but I don’t know what else to do. I’ve even been washing the laundry and doing the dishes with cold water, but it’s still not enough.’
‘The fair has been quite successful so far and business has improved since the cold weather set in. I can float your bill for this month.’
‘Thanks. I may need to take you up on that.’ Mary Jo frowned. ‘But it still doesn’t get to the root of the problem, which is that most of the bill is from heating a house that’s way too big for us. Glen’s office is empty, and now that my parents don’t visit, we don’t need a fourth bedroom. The three of us barely get the chance to sit together at the kitchen table, let alone use the dining room.’
‘Sounds like you need to sell the place.’ Tish’s statement was offset by the sound of a whistling kettle. ‘There’s a cute little ranch house for sale on the edge of town. Something like that would be perfect for you and the kids.’
‘I would love to move and have a fresh start, but since Glen is paying the mortgage and both our names are on the deed, I can’t sell without his consent. And his girlfriend might want to live in the place.’
‘Then let them live in it.’ Tish poured the steaming water from the kettle into the mug and then passed it to Mary Jo. ‘He can buy out your share and you can use the cash to get something smaller.’
‘And therein lies the problem. Because I haven’t held down a full-time job since before the kids were born, I don’t have enough income history to even rent a place, let alone buy one. Nor do I have credit. Even though my name was on the mortgage, everything else at the old place was in Glen’s name.’
‘Oh, MJ …’ Tish poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down beside her friend.
‘Now you know why I can’t sleep. If I pay the heat and electric bill, I may not be able to pay for groceries.’
‘Schuyler, Jules, and I would never let that happen.’
‘I know, but I just can’t see a way out of this hole I’m in.’
‘Did you speak to Glen about it? Kayla and Gregory are his children, too. He should share the responsibility for feeding them and keeping them safe and warm.’
‘I did talk to him. He’s already paying the entire mortgage and the property taxes. He’s also paying for Kayla’s horseback-riding lessons as well as all the equipment fees so that Gregory can stay on the football team. He said he can’t afford any more and still be able to maintain his and Lisa’s apartment and other living expenses.’
‘Did you mention your troubles to your attorney? He should be able to negotiate some more money when the divorce goes through.’
‘Yeah, I put a call in to him yesterday. He’ll do what he can to negotiate the best settlement possible. In the meantime, I just need to sit tight. The problem is, if the negotiations don’t work out, the divorce is delayed and so is any possible solution to my financial predicament.’ MJ sighed. ‘Oh, Tish. I really feel as though I’m at the end of my rope this time.’
Tish placed a consoling arm around her friend’s shoulder. ‘This might sound crazy, but why don’t you all stay here?’
‘What? You only have a two-bedroom apartment.’
‘You stayed here once before.’
‘For a couple of nights. Not on a permanent basis.’
‘I know, and it will be tight at first, but hear me out. Right now, I have enough beds for everyone, if you and Kayla don’t mind sharing the guest bedroom and Gregory doesn’t mind being on the sofa bed for a week or two.’
‘Just a week or two? How’s that possible?’
‘Well, you know how I’ve been wanting to convert that stock room in the back into an office? This is the perfect opportunity. I’ll invest in a storage unit to go behind the café and move all the racks out there. Then we can give the storage room a fresh coat of paint. Voila! An extra bedroom. That can be Gregory’s room for now.’
‘And when Gregory goes off to school?’
‘You can have one bedroom, Kayla can have the other, and I’ll take the sofa bed.’
‘No, we are not putting you out of your bed. That’s final.’
‘It makes sense for me to be on the sofa. I get up earlier and stay up later,’ Tish reasoned.
‘Tish, you’re a grown woman. What if you need privacy? What if you and Schuyler need privacy?’
‘Schuyler has his own place. We can hang there. As for me, the kitchen is my refuge. As long as no one’s sleeping on my countertops, all’s good. Besides, this isn’t a long-term arrangement. With you not paying rent and only paying me for the difference in utility bills, you should be able to save enough for first and last month’s rent before Gregory even graduates.’
‘If someone is willing to rent to someone without credit.’
‘This is a small town. I’m positive that someone in the community would be willing to overlook your credit rating in order to help you out of your situation. And if they don’t, then we’ll get creative. Either Jules or I will co-sign your lease. In the meantime, you and the kids will be safe and warm – if a bit cramped – and you won’t be panicking over a one-hundred-and-ninety-dollar heating bill.’
‘No, I’ll just be panicking that my kids might eat one hundred and ninety dollars’ worth of your food in one sitting.’
‘Nah,’ Tish dismissed with a smirk. ‘They could never eat that much. I buy wholesale.’
With a stomach full of seeded-sourdough avocado toast, the morning bake safely underway, and Mary Jo in a far better headspace than when she first arrived at the café, Tish showered and dressed, prepared the theater group’s breakfast order, and headed to the campground.
As she had done the previous morning, Tish deposited the insulated urn and the coffee accoutrement
s on the central folding table before delivering her breakfast orders. From the corner of her eye, she spotted Sheriff Reade talking to a uniformed police officer outside Jenny’s trailer.
Reade looked up and gave a nod in her direction. She returned the gesture before knocking on the Fentons’ door.
The morning loomed gray, overcast, and damp, with more than a hint of snow or sleet in the air. Tish shivered and hoped someone would open the door soon, so she could either get out of the cold or move on to the next delivery. Within moments, her wish was answered as the stubbly face of Ted Fenton appeared in the doorway.
‘Morning, Tish. Happy to see you haven’t been scared off by the police in our backyard. I was afraid one of us might have to walk to the gas station convenience store and see if they had some of those miniature boxes of cereal.’
She smiled. ‘I could never allow you to succumb to such a fate.’
From inside the trailer, the voice of Frances Fenton called, ‘Ted, don’t let that girl freeze out there on our doorstep. Let her in.’
Ted did as he was told and opened the door wide to allow Tish admittance. Stepping into the warm interior of the Winnebago, she was instantly greeted by Frances Fenton. Lounging on the sofa, Frances was dressed in a hot-pink chenille bathrobe and a pair of matching slippers. Her blonde hair had been piled on the top of her head so as not to interfere with the thick layer of moisturizing cream she had spread over her face. In her right hand, she held the television remote control, in her left, a Bloody Mary. ‘Come, sit.’ She pointed the remote toward the adjacent dinette. ‘Have a drink.’
‘I’d love to, but I’m afraid I’m on a tight schedule.’ Tish placed her bag of food on the dinette table, upsetting a stack of magazines in the process. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. Clearly, I’m in need of another cup of coffee.’
‘Or a Bloody Mary,’ Frances suggested with a husky laugh.
Tish flashed a polite smile and then bent down to recover the periodicals from the tiled kitchen floor. As she stacked them neatly back on the table alongside her bag, she was shocked to discover that each of the periodicals featured an antique firearm on the covers. ‘Seems you’re quite the military history buff, Ted.’
‘Buff is an understatement,’ Frances snickered. ‘He’s a fanatic. Back at home, Ted has an entire room full of guns and Revolutionary and Civil War memorabilia. He’d take over the entire house if I let him.’
Ted Fenton thrust his hands into the pockets of his plaid flannel pajama pants, which he wore with a white T-shirt that accentuated his middle-age paunch. ‘It’s a hobby. Guy needs something to fill his time when he’s not working.’
‘You could spend that time and money taking a vacation with your wife.’
‘Fran,’ he sighed, ‘we travel enough for work all year. When we finish work for the season, I don’t want to go anywhere.’
‘But you go to antique gun shows,’ she argued.
‘They’re relaxing to me. I wander around the booths and talk to other enthusiasts.’
‘You could also wander around an art gallery or a garden. Those can be relaxing, too.’
‘Maybe to you.’
‘The point is, we could choose activities where we could spend time together.’
‘We already spend time together.’
‘Yes, working time. That’s not the same as leisure and relaxation time.’ She took a swig of her Bloody Mary.
Rather than get in the middle of a marital dispute, Tish busied herself with retrieving the Fentons’ orders from the bag. What was it, she wondered, that made people open up to her about the most intimate details of their lives? She was a cook, not a therapist – a cook who needed to steer the conversation back to antique firearms.
Thankfully, Ted Fenton accommodated. ‘Gun shows and battle re-enactments are my source of leisure and relaxation.’
Tish handed Ted his breakfast. ‘Scrambled eggs, bacon (not overly crisp), sausage links (not patties), white bread toast, and a side of ketchup.’
‘Perfect. Thank you, Tish.’ Ted grinned.
‘My pleasure. You know, it’s strange I should stumble upon these magazines today.’
‘Strange, how?’
‘Well, rumor has it the gun that killed Jenny Inkpen was a Colonial rifle.’
Tish typically wouldn’t have disclosed details about the weapon just yet, but she wanted to see the Fentons’ reactions.
‘Really?’ Ted appeared intrigued by the information, but not shocked.
Frances Fenton, on the other hand, tried a bit too hard to make a joke out of the news. ‘Ted! Are you certain you left all of your collection at home?’ She laughed nervously.
‘Under lock and key,’ he affirmed.
Tish passed Frances a cinnamon bun the size of a small child’s head. ‘The Bun Also Rises,’ she announced.
‘Yum!’ Frances cried as she attacked the pastry greedily. ‘As you can see, it’s my cheat day.’
‘So where did the killer get such a rifle?’ Ted continued the conversation. ‘I find it hard to believe a collector would have done such a thing. We have respect for our weapons.’
‘The members of the fife and drum band that opened the fair were keeping their weapons and instruments in an equipment shed on the baseball field. That shed was broken into.’
‘Remarkable that the fife and drum band would have active ammunition here.’
‘They were performing rifle-loading presentations throughout the fair and brought the gunpowder and bullets for authenticity’s sake. They never intended to actually fire the rifles.’
‘Really? I had no idea such a thing was going on at the fair; otherwise I would have made time between performances to witness one of the demonstrations.’
‘Yes, it does sound as though it’s something a gun lover like yourself would enjoy.’
‘Guns, guns, guns! All the time, guns,’ Frances declared, sending tiny crumbs of cinnamon roll flying from the corners of her mouth. ‘Although, if it was one of those antique firearms that took out Jenny Inkpen, I might have found a new respect for them.’
‘Frances,’ Ted chided, ‘that’s a horrible thing to say.’
‘Well, she was a horrible person,’ Frances replied drily. ‘The six of us were tight before she came along. We were like the Fleetwood Mac of festival theater – without the drugs and partner-swapping, of course.’
‘Of course.’ Without the drugs and partner-swapping, Tish failed to see any parallel between Williamsburg Theater and the seventies music group, but she played along. ‘But there were seven of you before Jenny joined, weren’t there?’
‘Huh? Oh, you mean Bailey. Yes, er, yes, but he’s never been much of a serious actor. And he’s only been with us a few months longer than Jenny.’ At the mention of Jenny’s name, Frances seethed. ‘Oh! How Justin could have been so stupid to introduce her to the group is beyond me. Although I shouldn’t be at all surprised. That girl had all the men in the group wrapped around her finger.’ Frances’s eyes slid toward her husband. ‘All of them.’
EIGHT
Deeming it wise to leave the Fentons’ Winnebago before another spat ensued, Tish knocked on the door of Rolly’s camper. Within moments, the group’s founder appeared in the doorway, clad in a white T-shirt, a long, heavyweight terrycloth bathrobe, and a pair of flip-flops.
‘Hi, Rolly,’ Tish greeted. ‘Got your breakfast.’
‘Morning, Tish. Why don’t you come in,’ he invited, pushing open the door. ‘It’s a nasty one, isn’t it?’
‘It is. Feels like it might sleet or even snow.’ She reached into her canvas tote bag. ‘So, I have your oatmeal.’
‘Terrific.’ Rolly rubbed his hands together in anticipation and then held them out to receive his breakfast.
‘I also have a surprise.’ She placed a wax paper parcel into his waiting hands.
‘What’s this?’
‘I know you coveted Justin’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Ham breakfast sandwich yesterday, so I made you a sma
ller, lighter version using turkey bacon instead of pork, nitrite-free ham, a poached – rather than fried – egg, wholegrain mustard in place of butter, and a wholewheat seeded bun.’
‘You could have skipped all that.’ Rolly laughed. ‘I’d have eaten it regardless.’
‘Perhaps, but I wanted to minimize the guilt you might feel.’ Tish paused at her choice of words. ‘The next time you see your cardiologist,’ she quickly added and passed Rolly his bowl of Danielle Steel Cut Oats.
He put the oats aside and dove straight into the sandwich. ‘Mmm. Delicious. Thank you.’
‘Thank you for producing two terrific performances yesterday. When I heard Bailey Cassels had been taken into custody just before the afternoon show, I thought for certain the production would be lost. But it turned out brilliantly.’
‘Yes, it did. And the evening production was a triumph,’ he gloated as he plopped on to a threadbare recliner. ‘So good to feel like we’re back to normal.’
‘Yes, everyone seemed quite jubilant last night. Even Martina and Lawrence fit in quite well.’ Before Rolly could comment, Tish noted, ‘Lucky for you that Martina’s brother was available to fill in for Bailey. That must have been a frantic, last-minute phone call.’
Rolly’s mood suddenly darkened. ‘Nothing last minute or lucky about it. I asked Lawrence to come here with his sister when I phoned her about Jenny. As I told you, I was already down a lighting guy. I thought an extra pair of hands might come in handy.’
Edie Harmes emerged from the camper bedroom and joined Rolly on the sofa. She was wearing an oversized sweatshirt – presumably Rolly’s – that stretched to her knees and a pair of argyle knee socks. ‘Morning,’ she yawned. ‘What’s going on?’
Rolly’s disposition grew rosier. ‘Morning, honey. Tish and I were just discussing our understudies.’
‘Yes, I was just saying how lucky you all were to get Martina and Lawrence on such short notice,’ Tish explained as she retrieved Edie’s pesto-and-spinach-filled Green Eggs and Ham omelet from her bag.
The Christmas Fair Killer Page 7
