But the only thing on Foster’s face was the gleam of fanaticism.
And that was just the beginning. Susan sat for over an hour listening to a tirade that seemed to go nowhere. His one and only point, repeated over and over, was that it was important to preserve historical buildings. Every time she tried to change the subject, to ask him questions about the Landmark Commission, to ask him questions about anything, he just returned to his main theme.
Finally, rude or not, she stood up and said good-bye. “Thank you for talking with me,” she continued. “I appreciate your time, but I do have to run. As you can imagine, everything is at sixes and sevens since Ivan Deakin’s death last night.”
That stopped Foster Wade. He dropped his books into his lap, leaned forward, and stared into Susan’s face. “What did you say?”
“I—I’m sorry. I guess you didn’t know. I shouldn’t have broken the news to you like that. Ivan Deakin was killed last night.”
Foster blanched to the roots of his thinning hair. “He was killed? You mean someone killed him? Or was it an automobile accident or something?”
“It was poison. Someone put poison in the water that was provided for him at the podium.”
“The podium?”
“At the Women’s Club. He was scheduled to speak at the Women’s Club last night. You know, he was going to make an announcement of his plan to solve this … all the problems over the election,” Susan ended, not wanting to mention the Landmark Commission specifically.
“What did he say?” Foster spoke slowly.
“He didn’t say anything. He died. I mean,” Susan continued, “that he died before he had a chance to make his speech.” She decided there was no reason to go into all the details about the lights and the public address system.
“That’s horrible,” the man said. “Just horrible.” He looked down at the floor and stopped speaking.
“Are you all right?” Susan asked. “Maybe I shouldn’t leave just now,” she added, although she was anxious to go.
“No, I’ll be okay. I … there are some people I should call.” He stood up and looked around as though he couldn’t remember where he had placed the telephone.
“Then I’ll say good-bye,” Susan said, edging toward the door.
He didn’t even answer, just wandered out of the living room.
Susan let herself out of the house, wondering what to make of Foster Wade.
TEN
After leaving Foster Wade’s, Susan returned to her own home and spent the evening on the phone. Chad arrived around seven, grabbed some dinner, and headed off to his room, promising to work on the pile of college applications on his desk just as soon as he made “a few calls.” Susan was yelling up the stairs at him when her husband walked in the front door, a frown on his face. It was, she decided, not the time to mention Anthony Martel’s idea that Jed move up on the ticket.
Jed refused her offer of dinner and headed straight to his study. Susan reminded herself that nagging accomplished nothing and picked up the phone to continue her calling. She found her husband asleep at his desk a little before eleven. Chad was still talking on his phone line when she urged her husband upstairs to bed.
Both of the men in the family dashed out the door early the next morning—without breakfast. Susan took the time to shower, admire her new hairstyle, and clean up her house (not that the kitchen needed much straightening) before starting out to talk with the other members of the Landmark Commission.
The Nearing couple were the next names on Susan’s list and their street, named after a hardwood tree, was almost certainly somewhere around Elm Drive, the only elm left in town after the invasion of Dutch elm disease years ago. Susan headed over to that section of Hancock and found the Nearings’ home after driving up and down Dogwood, Maple, Beech, and Birch.
Appropriately enough for a family with two members on the Landmark Commission, the Nearings lived in one of the few stone Colonials left in this part of Connecticut. Though there were lots of copies of these homes around, mostly in the wealthier parts of town, the originals could be distinguished by the fact that they were always set right next to the road, our forefathers apparently feeling a need to be as close to the lines of communication as possible in times when danger lurked in the trees and company was a welcome relief rather than an interruption.
Susan pulled her car into the gravel drive by the side of the house and stopped beside the navy Volvo parked there. Massive golden chrysanthemums lined the drive and the tiny path to the Dutch door. Beige homespun curtains hung in all the windows and little brass candles were centered on each and every windowsill. Susan mounted the steps, trying not to knock over either of the large crocks displaying bunches of dried cattails.
She could hear footsteps before her hand was off the heavy wrought-iron door knocker. She peeked through the tied-back curtains and saw a heavyset woman trodding toward the door.
The door was opened.
“Hi, I’m Susan Henshaw,” Susan said, a polite smile on her face.
“I know who you are. You try to solve murders—and your husband is running on Anthony Martel’s ticket.” The voice was completely lacking in interest.
“Yes.” What else could she say? “I was wondering if I could talk to you—just for a few minutes.”
“I didn’t think you were here to look at the flowers,” the other woman said, holding the door open so that Susan could enter. There was no sign of welcome in her manner, but Susan figured she shouldn’t quibble and she entered the doorway.
“Shoes.”
“I … Excuse me?”
“Shoes.” The woman indicated the little pine bench running along one side of the hallway. Almost a dozen pairs of shoes were lined up underneath. Susan saw that her hostess was wearing red felt moccasins.
“You’d like me to take off my shoes?”
“These floors are over two hundred years old. Chestnut.”
Susan sat down and took off her shoes. After tucking them under the bench in what seemed to be the required manner, she stood up. And almost fell back down. “Slippery,” she commented, reaching out to the wall for support.
“Those walls aren’t painted. The plaster is dyed and then applied in infinitesimally thin coats. Two men came here from Sweden just to do it—took them almost a month.”
Susan pulled her hand back and, stepping gingerly, followed her hostess down the narrow hallway that seemed to mark the center of the house. They entered a small dark room dominated by a massive brick fireplace, and Susan was allowed to sit on a painted wooden bench, its hardness unrelieved by anything like a pillow or a slab of foam rubber. The fireplace, unlike the ones in Susan’s home, didn’t smell faintly of wood smoke and charcoal, but reeked of Lysol, or possibly its colonial equivalent. Certainly it didn’t look like anyone had burned anything in it for years and years; the only thing blackening the brick was paint.
Susan had plenty of time to consider her hostess, as Rosemary Nearing no sooner sat down than she got up and began to straighten the curtains in the three windows that ran across the front of the room. Rosemary was built like and dressed like an old-fashioned German hausfrau. Her graying hair hung down her back in two lanky braids. Her bulky width was encased in a forest-green drindel with rows of rick-rack running around the hem. A ruffled white blouse emphasized her massive chest, and matching cotton tights made her plump calves resemble floury sausages. So intent was Rosemary upon making the drapes of the curtains exactly equal that Susan felt it would have been rude to interrupt with a comment. She tried to find a sitting position that would be less uncomfortable than the one she was in and, folding her hands in her lap, waited quietly.
Finally Rosemary sat down on a bench across from her guest and peered at her as if noticing her presence for the first time. “Does your husband leave everything a mess?” she surprised Susan by asking, and then looking back over her shoulder at the curtains as though expecting to see a disembodied hand pulling them out of alignment.
“Lyman is a slob.”
“Well, men …” Susan began.
“Some men are very neat. Penelope Thomas says that her late husband couldn’t sleep at night unless he knew every little thing in the house was in the correct place.”
Susan, who had begun to remember how many times her bra kept Jed’s socks company on the floor overnight, thought that sounded pretty terrible, so she just smiled.
“But you are not here to talk about the noble art of housekeeping. You are here to talk about the murder. I think Tony Martel did it.”
“Oh, well, I … You do?” The words Susan was thinking made their way out of her mouth.
“Who else?” Rosemary Nearing leaned back in her bench and crossed her hands across her ample chest.
“Bradley Chadwick? I mean, I don’t think he did it, but isn’t he as logical a choice as Anthony?”
“Not at all. Tony Martel only has a chance of winning now that Ivan is dead. Once Ivan had entered the race, it was between him and Bradley.”
“Tony Martel has some very good ideas, he’s a hard worker, and would make an excellent mayor,” Susan insisted.
Rosemary Nearing shrugged her massive shoulders. “So what? He has no sex appeal and it’s sex appeal that wins elections.”
Susan didn’t see much evidence of that. She watched her share of C-SPAN and would have absolutely no trouble distinguishing the United States Congress from the line at Chippendale’s. “You think Ivan Deakin had sex appeal?”
“Everyone knows that the man was a satyr.”
“Really?”
“Just because Erika doesn’t talk about it doesn’t mean it didn’t bother her.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever met Erika.”
Rosemary didn’t seem to have anything to say to that, so Susan changed the subject. “The Landmark Commission must be very important to you.… You obviously care so much about your house.” Susan couldn’t bring herself to call it a home. It seemed more like a museum where only the very neatest tourists were allowed to enter.
“I will tell you what I told Penelope Thomas when she asked me to work on the commission: I was honored to help such a fine cause. Honored.”
Susan was impressed; it was short, but still a paragraph. “Then you think that all the buildings built before 1939 should be under the jurisdiction of the Landmark Commission?”
“We must preserve our heritage.”
“Yes, but—”
“Some people might be surprised by how little other people care about our heritage.”
Susan had the feeling that Rosemary Nearing would put her in both categories. “Did Ivan Deakin support the Landmark Commission’s ideas?”
“That’s why Lyman attended the meeting last night. We thought it was imperative to discover the answer to that question.”
“And you stayed home?”
“Last night was ironing night.”
“You do all your ironing at one time?” Susan did, too—usually when she found an old Fred Astaire movie on TV.
“Every Tuesday night.”
“So your husband isn’t home?”
“Is the house neat? If the house is neat, he’s not here.” She looked around proudly and then back at Susan, as though daring her to find a speck of dust.
“Your house is beautiful. But I’d like to talk to your husband, if it’s possible.” Susan certainly wasn’t going to get the information she was looking for from Rosemary Nearing.
“You might find him at his job.”
“Where does he work?”
“He runs his family’s business.” Rosemary had gotten up and was peering at the top of the mantel.
“Which is?” Susan was getting the urge to grab the dust cloth from Rosemary’s hand and smack her with it.
“They make things.” Rosemary peered suspiciously at a candlestick. “Have you noticed how brass seems to attract dust?”
“Possibly a sticky residue from the polish you use,” Susan suggested rather maliciously. “Is his company located in town?”
“Stamford.” She went so far as to give Susan the address. “Just look for Nearing Rings, Incorporated. The sign is blue.”
“Thank you. I’ll just go get my shoes, unless …”
“Yes?” Rosemary asked with a loud sigh.
“I don’t mean to be rude, but I wonder if … I would love to see the rest of your house.”
“This house is not a museum.”
“I—”
“And I am not a docent.”
“Of course …” Susan could feel her cheeks getting pink. She had only made the request to be polite.
“Do you usually ask people if you can see their homes, Mrs. Henshaw?”
“I—I think I’d better just get my shoes and be on my way.” She could barely force the last few words out of her mouth. “I didn’t mean to offend you.… It’s just that this house is so unusual and …”
The change of mind was startling. “I will give you a quick tour.” Rosemary stood up more quickly than Susan would have supposed her bulk allowed. “This, of course, is the original keeping room.…” she began in her best docent voice.
The “quick tour” took over an hour, and during it Susan discovered two things. The house, in fact, was a museum. The building itself had been restored to pristine historical accuracy, and except for modern appliances and cleaning products, it was being run like it had been two hundred years ago. All fabrics were handwoven. Each and every pot was hand-thrown. The windowpanes were made by a company in England that still made glass “the old-fashioned way”—impossible to see through. The furniture was spare and uncomfortable, but authentic. Susan suspected, although she was not completely sure, that the mattresses were actually stuffed with cornhusks. She was, however, positive that the beds were shorter and narrower than anything anyone she knew slept in. Apparently dust and dirt were unknown two hundred years ago, because the entire place was spotless.
By the time Susan was returned to her shoes, she was dying to leave. The house was like an elegant prison. She thanked Rosemary as sincerely as possible and fled to her car. With the address of Nearing Rings, Inc., tucked into her jacket pocket, she decided to proceed with visits to the commission members and drive to Stamford. Besides, she realized, starting her car, she would rather visit Lyman Nearing at his workplace than return to his house.
The drive to Stamford was anything but wasted. It gave her time to sort out her thoughts and try to figure out what, if anything, she had learned from Foster Wade and Rosemary Nearing. The only conclusion she reached was that both of them were living rather strange lives in rather strange houses. Rosemary was convinced that Anthony Martel had murdered Ivan Deakin, but her ideas were based on nothing and she had not been at the Women’s Club last night. Foster Wade claimed to know nothing about the murder, but could have been lying. She wondered whom he had called after she left him alone.
Susan flicked around the radio dial, and discovering an oldies station that was in the middle of a Beatles day (she wondered if George, Paul, or Ringo was celebrating a birthday), she stopped worrying and sang along. The drive passed quickly and she was looking for Nearing Rings long before the first half of the White Album ended. She found it almost immediately. It would have been hard to miss, occupying as it did the largest building in a very large industrial park down by Long Island Sound. The sign out front was, indeed, blue. But no one had warned her about the concertina wire wound around the top of the chain-link fence that surrounded the building.
Susan had assumed Lyman Nearing’s company made rings, possibly the little silver things that were so popular among teens, or even expensive wedding bands and engagement rings, but this factory looked capable of outfitting every finger of every American alive while still doing its bit to keep up the trade balance.
Nearing Rings must be a different type of ring, she decided, slowly driving up to the woman in the guard box at the entrance gate.
“Uh, Lyman Nearing,” Susan said hesitantly. “His wife …” she began to explain her presence.
“Oh.” The guard straightened up and pressed a button that opened the gate. “Just head straight ahead and park in the empty spot by the main entrance. Someone will be out to escort you inside immediately.”
“Thanks,” Susan said, and did as she was told. A quick glance in her rearview mirror left her puzzled by the expression of interest on the guard’s face as her car passed down the road.
As promised, someone was ready and waiting to escort her into the building. Susan was thankful for the friendly-looking man who waited by the empty parking spot. The building was huge; she would never find her way around without guidance. But the smile on the young man’s face turned into a frown as she drove up.
“You are not Mrs. Nearing,” he announced as she got out of her car.
“Of course not …” Then Susan realized what had happened. “Oh, that must be what the young woman at the gate thought. I didn’t mean to confuse her. I was trying to tell her that Rosemary Nearing had sent me. To talk with her husband,” she continued when the welcoming smile refused to reappear.
The man’s frown deepened. “Then I guess you’d better see Mr. Nearing.”
And he led her into the factory.
ELEVEN
Large color photographs lined the hallway and Susan quickly realized that the rings the Nearing company produced were anything but the kind that encircled a finger. Many of the photographs featured military equipment as well as actual battlefield scenes, but she decided this wasn’t the time to ask questions. The stern look on her escort’s face was making her nervous about meeting Lyman Nearing—very nervous.
The door at the end of the hall had mr. lyman nearing printed on it in large black block letters. It swung open at their approach and a short man in a conservative gray suit appeared. He was beaming.
Elected for Death Page 8
