Murder by Arrangement Read online

  “Have I caught you at a bad time?” she asked when he answered on the fifth ring.

  “No, sweetheart. I’m just sitting here reading the morning paper. How are you?”

  “I’m fine. How about you? How’s your knee?” she asked, wondering if pain or stiffness were the reason he’d taken so long to take her call, if indeed he’d simply been sitting and reading the paper.

  “Still attached.”

  “Are you walking without the cane?” She ignored his attempt at humor and evasion.

  “Not yet, but I’m getting there. Feelin’ stronger every day.”

  She wouldn’t push him for more information at the moment, realizing she’d get better answers from Matthew when she spoke with her son. Changing the subject, she said, “Who’s winning the bets?”

  He gave a short bark of laughter. “I was ahead in the category for most fish for the week, but Roger inched me out last thing yesterday. He’s now ahead by one. Matthew’s leading in size for the week, but I caught the biggest marlin of the day yesterday, so didn’t have to cook dinner or wash dishes last night.”

  “Sounds like you’ve added to your categories.”

  “Sort of. We decided on a daily contest as well as our original end-of-the-trip total. Winners for the day get waited on that evening. Leaves at least two to make drinks, cook and clean up.” He chuckled. “Ken’s become pretty good at grilling.”

  “What are your plans for today?” she asked, entertained by the thought of the men and their friendly betting. Knowing Ken, she guessed her son-in-law’s father was enjoying the role of head chef and wondered with some amusement if he were purposely losing the wagers.

  “We’re relaxing this morning. Captain Patrick has some business in town, so we’re not heading out ‘til after lunch.”

  “Are the boys there?” she said, thinking to say hello to her son and son-in-law.

  “Nope. I’m alone at the moment. Matthew and Roger went down to walk the beach and Ken’s out buying groceries.”

  Edna wondered again why Albert had chosen to stay in and was more determined than ever to get a report on his knee from her son. She thought briefly of dialing Matthew’s number when she hung up from Albert, but their son might have left his cell in the condo. If it rang and Albert answered, she’d be caught, she thought with a grimace. She knew her husband well enough to know that he wouldn’t appreciate her making a fuss over his condition.

  Giving up on the idea, she placed a call to Peppa, but the phone went unanswered. Edna next dialed Tuck.

  “Is Peppa with you?” Edna asked after the preliminary greetings were over.

  “No. Why?”

  “I just tried calling her, but there was no answer.”

  “My guess is she’s avoiding reporters. I’ve been lying low myself, but the whole town probably knows by now that she ran over Clem with that old Mercedes of hers. I imagine the papers are trying to hound her for a story.”

  “Is she speaking to you yet?” Edna mentally crossed her fingers, hoping for a positive reply, but her heart sank with Tuck’s next words.

  “Don’t know. She hasn’t phoned me, though. I thought about driving over to her house, but I don’t think I could stand to have her slam the door in my face. I’m waiting for you to give me the all clear,” Tuck said, sounding sheepish.

  Edna quietly sighed with resignation. She didn’t like being put in the middle of someone else’s quarrel, but she also didn’t want those two to be at odds. They’d been best friends far too long. “No promises, but I’ll see what I can do.”

  After ending the call with Tuck, Edna tried once more to reach Peppa. Surely, she’d have caller ID and know it was Edna who was phoning, but still there was no pick-up. Beginning to feel some concern, Edna decided to visit Peppa with the pretext of taking a casserole to her. She probably wouldn’t be in the mood to cook for herself. If Peppa wasn’t answering her phone, she probably wasn’t going to the grocery store, either.

  It was Edna’s practice to keep at least one or two frozen meals on hand for emergencies, easily done by doubling a recipe she’d be making for dinner and freezing half. This morning, she selected a chicken divan dish. Made with broccoli and lots of cheese in the basic white sauce, the result was both healthy and comforting. She was about to shut the freezer door, when she spotted a container of clam chowder and pulled that out, too. As she loaded a tote bag with the frozen food and went to the closet for her coat, she wondered again why Peppa wouldn’t be answering calls from friends. Edna suddenly felt a shiver run down her spine as she thought about the retired librarian. What must she be thinking about the death of the man whom she’d once loved and respected enough to marry? Would she be distressed enough to harm herself?

  Chapter 13

  When Edna reached Peppa’s house, all was quiet. The driveway was no longer cordoned off with crime scene tape, so she was able to pull up and park in front of the garage. There had obviously been activity in the yard. What remained of the snow had been churned into mud with bits of grass mixed in. Many boots had been tramping around the yard, littering dirt up and down the driveway, but all emergency vehicles were gone now. She was relieved also to find no reporters or TV vans crowding the narrow, residential street.

  Peppa’s Mercedes was nowhere in sight, but Edna couldn’t see into the garage. She wondered if the car were there or if it had been towed away for forensic examination. At the front door, she rang the bell, waited, knocked and waited another half minute before pressing the button again. More forcefully this time, as if additional strength could somehow prompt her friend to answer.

  As she waited on the stoop, Edna wondered if Peppa might be back at the police station for more questioning. Or had she gone to visit Tuck? Edna was about to give up and head back to her car when she became aware of barking coming from the backyard and decided to investigate. She brightened somewhat at the sound. Peppa must have been home at some point if Rufus was there, Edna thought, rounding the corner of the house. Or maybe Tuck had brought the dog back and left him in the yard, once she’d learned that Peppa wouldn’t be spending the night in jail. As Edna reached the wooden gate, she couldn’t see over the six-foot fence, but she heard the Rottweiler on the other side of the cedar slats.

  “Hey, Rufus,” she called over the racket, reaching for the latch. “It’s me, fella.” When his barking changed to a whine of expectation, she pushed through the gate, nudging the canine backwards. Rubbing his head and scratching his ears as his tail wagged his entire back end, she spoke gently to him. “There’s a good dog. Where’s your mistress?” Edna chatted and petted and made her way slowly along the side of the house to the back deck, intending to look through the window into the kitchen. She never made it that far.

  Passing the corner of the house and moving alongside the railing, she saw what looked like a quilt draped over a pile of blankets and clothing on a lawn chair in the middle of the redwood deck. Mounting the steps, she was startled by a slight motion beneath the mound which drew her attention to a red stocking cap. Between the blanket and hat, only eyes, nose and mouth could be seen. Her first instinct was to apologize and turn around to leave the way she came when the eyes flicked again in her direction. Peppa’s gray-blue eyes.

  She took a steadying breath, trying to still her hammering heart. “Hey, Peppa. What’re you doing out here?”

  “Walkin’ the dog” came the curt reply from the chair. Only Peppa’s lips moved.

  “Are you cold?” The morning air was crisp and cool. The temperature was probably in the low to mid forties, Edna estimated. Not cold enough to warrant the heavy wrappings with which Peppa had bundled herself.

  The old librarian’s head slowly moved from side to side, but she kept her eyes fixed on the backyard.

  “How long have you been sitting here?”

  Peppa shrugged, or at least that’s how it looked to Edna who noticed only a slight shifting of the quilt.

  “When you didn’t answer the door, I thought somethi
ng might have happened to you,” Edna said, explaining why she had invaded the woman’s privacy. Peppa remained silent and motionless, almost as if she hadn’t heard.

  Edna tried another tack. She held up the tote bag. “I brought a casserole and some of my world-famous chowda,” she said, trying to get a laugh out of Peppa, or a smile, at least. When that didn’t work, she gave in to an intuition. “Have you had anything to eat since yesterday morning?”

  After a brief pause, Peppa once again swiveled her head from side to side, but kept her eyes straight ahead. “Not hungry,” she muttered.

  “Have you spoken to anyone?” Edna asked, adding “besides Rufus?” as the dog went to stand beside his owner. She, in turn, slid a hand from beneath the quilt to stroke his head.

  Either the dog or the motion seemed to bring Peppa out of her catatonic state, and she finally turned her gaze on Edna who, by now, was sitting on a low, white metal table.

  Deciding to take the action as a positive sign, Edna stood and held out a hand. “Come inside, Peppa,” she encouraged. “Let me make you a nice hot cup of tea and maybe some toast. When you’ve had something to eat, we should talk.”

  Peppa stared up at Edna for nearly half a minute before she spread wide the blankets and raised a hand for Edna to help her up. Under the bedding, she wore a woolen coat, the red of which matched her cap. Her feet were clad in gray Mukluks.

  Following her friend into the house, Edna realized Peppa was suffering from emotional shock. One thing she must do is talk about her experience and feelings, whether to Edna or better yet, to her best friend in the world. Edna decided to call Tuck and get the two friends speaking again as soon as possible.

  After shedding coats and hats and leaving them on the coat tree inside the back door, the two women moved to the kitchen where Edna gently guided Peppa to a chair at the table while she herself set the kettle on to boil. She put the clam chowder and the chicken casserole into the fridge before opening the milk carton to smell that it was fresh. Eyeing a partial carton of eggs next to a wedge of cheddar, she decided to make a cheese omelet. Peppa might eat if food were placed in front of her.

  Having prepared and set the small meal before Peppa, Edna took the chair on the opposite side of the table with her own mug of tea. She sat quietly while Peppa broke off a bit of buttered toast and fed it to Rufus. She then commanded the dog to lie down, before picking up her fork and slowly beginning to eat. After the first few bites, she glanced up at Edna and nodded. “Thank you. Guess I needed this.”

  “Do you want to talk?” Edna asked, resting her forearms on the table as she held the warm mug between her hands.

  Peppa chewed, swallowed and shrugged. “Don’t know what to say.”

  Edna thought about the lean, weathered man she’d met and how kind he’d been. “I met Clem recently,” she said, hoping to spark some sort of conversation. She didn’t know what she expected to learn, but knew Peppa needed a sounding board. Edna suspected, if not pushed, her friend would bottle her emotions inside where they would fester.

  Peppa stopped eating with the fork halfway to her mouth. Lowering the utensil, she frowned at Edna. “Where?”

  “Lily Beck’s place. Last Friday afternoon. Did you know he was working for her, living above the garage?”

  “Didn’t know. Tuck knew, though.”

  Edna hadn’t meant to get drawn in to their quarrel but she had, first by Tuck and now by Peppa. “Tuck told me that she promised Clem to keep his secret. She said he was meaning to contact you, but in his own time, when he was ready.”

  After a moment’s hesitation, Peppa nodded as if that made sense. “Sounds like something he’d do … she, too, I suppose,” Peppa said and resumed eating.

  When she made no further attempt to talk and merely concentrated on the food, Edna explained how she’d driven her granddaughter and a friend down from Warwick for a visit. Mainly to fill the silence, she mentioned the coincidence that Amanda’s friend was Lily’s granddaughter and how, when Edna had arrived at the Beck house, Clem had been in the driveway, polishing a car. Edna also relayed how rude Lily had seemed to him, but how tolerant and unruffled he had remained. Edna didn’t know how Peppa felt about her ex-husband, especially now that he was dead, so other than the one observation of Lily’s behavior, she refrained from giving any other opinion. She ended her tale with Clem’s patching the tire.

  Peppa nodded again, put down her fork, and pushed the empty plate aside. Picking up the tea mug, she took a slow sip of her drink. “He was always good at fixin’ things.”

  “If you don’t mind my asking, what happened between you two?” Edna still hoped she could get Peppa to talk and shake her out of a lethargy that was not at all like the gregarious woman Edna had come to know.

  “Booze.” Peppa nearly spat the word. “More’n thirty years married when my husband decides to become an alcoholic.”

  “Certainly, you don’t think it was a decision on his part?” Edna couldn’t keep the surprise or disbelief from her tone. The ignorance in Peppa’s condemnation disturbed Edna.

  “Of course it wasn’t a decision to become addicted to alcohol, but it was his decision to let it ruin himself, his job and our marriage.” Peppa spoke harshly. “And don’t expect me to change my mind or apologize for hanging onto my anger. For five years, I watched that man transform himself from a popular professor, adored by every one of his botany students, into a pathetic street bum. I put him to bed most nights when he could hardly stand, never mind speak. When he could talk, I listened to his lies and empty promises. The day after he nearly killed an entire family, totaling his car in the process, I told him to get out and called a divorce lawyer.”

  Edna didn’t know what to say. How do you respond to such memories or the anger, she wondered, and didn’t even try. Instead, she changed the subject. “What happened Saturday night? Can you tell me about it?”

  Peppa seemed to be caught off balance by the questions. Mentally, she was probably still back in the past and steaming with renewed resentment. It took several seconds for her to say, “Don’t know.” She squinted at Edna over the mug in her hands before setting it aside next to her empty plate. With a suddenness that made Edna jump and Rufus leap up, Peppa banged the flat of her hand on the table. “What was that fool doing lying across my driveway?” Her face was red with rage, and she hardly seemed to notice Rufus push his muzzle into her lap, but as she began to stroke the massive head, she also began to calm down. “I thought he’d done his worst to me years ago, but it seems he had one more card to play.” Tears had sprung to the old librarian’s eyes and she hung her head for a minute.

  Edna remained silent, too, not knowing what to say to Peppa’s outburst or how to assuage her … what? What were the woman’s emotions? They seemed a mix of fury, guilt, remorse. Perhaps a long-lost love was in there, too, somewhere.

  After a few minutes of petting the Rottweiler, Peppa looked up and seemed to shake herself out of her blue funk, at least partially. “What have you heard? What’re people saying?”

  “I don’t know. You should ask Tuck, if you want the local gossip. Her ear’s closer to the ground than mine.” Pausing briefly to consider if her question would upset Peppa again, Edna decided the woman needed to get her emotions out. “Speaking of Tuck, when she told me that she ran into Clem last fall at Lily’s, I assumed he came back to town in order to see you again. Do you know why he hadn’t contacted you up to now?”

  “Haven’t a clue,” Peppa responded more quietly than Edna expected. “I can only guess that he wanted to establish himself, set himself up so I wouldn’t think he expected to walk right back into my life. He never was one to rush. Always took his time thinkin’ things over, plannin’ out each and every step.”

  “Do you know why he was bringing you the Christmas Rose?”

  Peppa shook her head. “He wasn’t exactly bringing me flowers. I understand he had the blossom crushed in a tight fist.”

  “Does the plant have special signif
icance for you?”

  Again, Peppa shook her head. “Can’t think of what it would be. The only thing ‘Christmas’ means to us is that it was the day he put a father, mother and baby in the hospital. I told him I was filing for divorce and kicked him out that day. I doubt he’d want to commemorate that.”

  Chapter 14

  Peppa seemed to sink back into herself after telling the story of her last battle with Clem. Shortly thereafter, she excused herself, saying she wanted to change her clothes and wash up a bit. “Stay if you want, but I don’t know why you would,” she said before leaving the room. She was beginning to sound like her old self.

  As soon as she was out of earshot, Edna went to the back door where she pulled the cell phone out of her coat pocket and dialed Tuck’s number. Her friend must have been waiting for a call because she picked up on the first ring.

  “You need to get over here,” Edna said, after briefly explaining how she’d discovered Peppa on the back deck. “I think the dam has started to crack, but you must press her to keep talking. She can’t keep all this hurt and hatred bottled up on top of the guilt she’s probably feeling.”

  Tuck rang the bell twenty minutes later. Edna opened the door at the same time Peppa came downstairs and stopped on the bottom step. She frowned at Tuck who looked anxiously back. After half a minute of silence that seemed like half an hour to Edna, Peppa moved off the staircase and opened her arms. Tuck rushed to accept the hug, and Edna released the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. Her intuition was reaffirmed. The friendship between Peppa and Tuck was too strong not to survive small bumps in the road.

  Once the ice broke and the two women began to talk, Edna didn’t stay much longer. She’d done enough and was happy with the outcome. Before she’d even left the neighborhood, her thoughts turned to two young girls. She smiled at memories of the past few days spent with Amanda. The youngster was so full of energy and enthusiasm. Edna thought with a pang of nostalgia that all too soon the little girl would be a young woman, and Edna wouldn’t see as much of her as other interests and activities occupied more of her granddaughter’s time. Edna had already experienced this coming-of-age with her older grandchildren, but the natural-enough phenomenon still tugged at her heart.