“I’m glad you’re better,” Peggy said. Close up, I noticed that Peggy’s face had many fine lines, but her fitness and vigor made her seem much younger. Today she didn’t seem quite as lively as usual. None of us were.
“I’d apologize for your lost sleep, but there was nothing I could do about it,” I said. “The Cohens told me Lulu barked all night. I hope you and Lena weren’t too troubled?”
Peggy snorted. “Lulu barks when Deborah Cohen farts,” she said.
I was so startled I couldn’t stifle a laugh.
“I shouldn’t be crude,” she added without sounding sorry at all. “But really, that dachshund is a little yapper.”
“Are all dachshunds like that?”
“No, no! They can be nice little dogs. But they’re stubborn. They’ll do anything you let them get away with.” Peggy shook her head. “If Jonathan and Deborah just worked with Lulu, she could still be trained to be a better pet.”
And again, Peggy wasn’t talking about the murder. Well, okay. “Chaka is very well behaved,” I said. Not only was that the key to Peggy’s (and Lena’s) heart, it had the virtue of being true. “I’m sure it’s because you spend a lot of time with him.” Flattering, but also true.
“We had to do some retraining after we adopted him,” she said. “But he’s such a smart dog, it’s been easy. Mostly. His breed are naturally quiet dogs, so we started out well on that score.”
“I’ve never heard him bark before,” I said. I looked down at his sleek golden-brown head. “Can I pet him?”
“He’d love it,” Peggy said.
I reached over the fence and stroked Chaka’s head. He felt smooth as silk, and when he looked up at me, I suddenly understood why people wanted dogs. You could certainly read “adoring” into those beautiful dark eyes and the steady gaze. Chaka was big; I hadn’t realized how big until I was close to him.
“How much does he weigh?” I asked.
“About seventy-five.”
“Is he typical for a…” I groped for the breed. “A Rhodesian ridgeback?”
“Yes, he’s a healthy boy,” Peggy said, smiling at the dog. “Though he was a rescue, he’d had excellent care. It wasn’t a neglect case. I think his former owner had died. You see that line of hair on his back, the one that runs the opposite way to the rest of his coat? That’s why they call them ridgebacks.”
“So they were bred that way.” I had no idea where to go with this conversation. Sophie made a couple of wakeful noises, and I got her out of her bouncer seat and carried her back to the fence, though it was quite an effort. Sophie seemed to have gained ten pounds overnight.
However, Peggy deserved to view the wonder that was Sophie. I looked from the baby to Peggy, with a smile that invited her to share my admiration.
Inexplicably, Peggy continued talking about the rescue organization where she’d gotten the dog. It was interesting (about one drop of interesting) to learn that dachshunds were bred to hunt badgers, and ridgebacks had been used to hunt lions.
To the best of my knowledge, badgers and lions were in short supply in Georgia.
Chaka extended his neck to sniff Sophie. He couldn’t actually touch her, so I was okay with the sniffing.
“Now he knows she’s a friend,” Peggy told me. She beamed at me as though this were a great milestone in Sophie’s life.
“When did you get the little statues?” I really did not want to listen to a monologue about dogs any longer.
Peggy turned to look, as if she’d forgotten what was in her garden.
She and Lena had put in a row of huge urns around their patio. The sisters kept them filled with flowers all spring and summer. In the nearest urn, a little statue of a frog on a lily pad perched in the middle of the fading flowers. In the next a pixie (maybe) was scattering something from a basket on the flowers. In the third … well, you get the idea. Gnome, squirrel, and so on.
Peggy shook her head ruefully. “A couple of weeks ago. They were on end-of-season sale, and Lena just fell in love with them.”
Right on cue, Lena came out the back door. We went through the greeting ritual.
“I was just admiring your dog and your little statues,” I said awkwardly. I didn’t want to walk away just as she’d joined us, but Sophie was getting so heavy. My arms felt like rubber bands, rubber bands that had been stretched out of shape forever.
“We just love Chaka,” Lena said. “Best dog we ever had. I bet Peggy’s told you she wasn’t in love with these statues. They sat by the back steps for a week, but then, surprise! I just came out and found them in place.” She beamed at her twin.
Peggy looked embarrassed. “You liked ’em,” she said.
“Glad you’re back to yourself again, Chaka,” Lena said to the dog. The ridgeback went down on his belly and put his head on his paws, the very picture of contrition.
“Roe says Lulu barked and barked,” Peggy told her sister.
“Well, Chaka didn’t care for all the flashing lights,” Lena told me. “They made him anxious. He whined and went to the back door and just stood there. He was worried that someone was going to invade our yard.”
“So all the strange people going in and out upset him? You, too, I guess.” I was trying to draw the conversation to a close without being abrupt. I was reaching the end of my endurance. It was awful to be so weak.
“I can’t say we weren’t anxious, at first,” Lena said. “The police came by the house this morning, really early. But after they’d explained what had happened, we were sorry you had such a scare. I understand your husband wasn’t home?”
“No, he was in Nashville. Phillip was home, thank God.”
“Oh, the blond boy,” Lena said. “He’s your…”
“Half brother,” I supplied. “Same father.”
“We knew your father,” Peggy said unexpectedly. “We remember him well. Not a looker, but sex appeal coming out of his ears!” The sisters laughed simultaneously.
I found that not a little weird.
After a bit more chitchat about the inconvenience of a police investigation (!), I said good-bye to the sisters and the dog, and carried Sophie to the patio door.
“Roe,” someone called, and I saw Deborah Cohen standing at their fence.
I had to return Sophie to the bouncer. My arms were trembling. I knelt to strap her in, and it was a little scary to stand up. But I took a few steps over to Deborah.
Deborah looked embarrassed, but determined. “I hope you don’t mind that Jonathan told the police what he saw. It was his duty to let them know he’d seen someone going into your backyard.” Her mouth was set in a determined, righteous flat line. At least she was asking me how I felt about Jonathan’s action.
I bit my lip to keep back my first response, which was not printable. “But it wasn’t his duty to tell them it was definitely Robin,” I pointed out in a glacial voice. “Because at that moment, Robin was in Nashville getting an award in front of seven hundred people.” (Slight exaggeration for effect, okay?) “But now, because of your husband, the police are asking all kinds of questions trying to find out whether or not Robin could have made it here and back again, and I’m sure the gossip mill is working overtime.”
And then, since I absolutely could not stand up any longer, I turned my back and went into the house. With one eye on Sophie, I was relieved to see Robin. He was awake and staggering around the kitchen, and he gave me a bleary wave.
“Honey, can you come get Sophie?”
“Sure,” he said, and came out to the patio to lift her.
Phillip, red-faced and dripping sweat, came in just after Robin had put Sophie down on her play mat. He mopped his face with a towel and headed straight into the hall bathroom to shower. “I need to talk to you in a minute,” he called as he shut the door.
After Robin had finished his coffee, I said, “Jonathan Cohen told the police he saw you going into our yard by the gate. Last night. That’s why Cathy was asking you so many questions.”
My h
usband stared at me. “But that’s impossible. I wasn’t there,” he said.
“Of course you weren’t. Apparently, the police have to take an eyewitness seriously, even if he’s clearly mistaken.”
“But…” Robin was outraged.
“It’s so obvious you couldn’t have returned, killed the woman, flown back, and conferred with Jeff, only to fly to Atlanta yet again. At least you were at the banquet and the bar with lots of witnesses for a big chunk of time. I’m sure the place was packed.”
I’d only been to one previous mystery convention, but the bar had played a major role in the social aspect of the gathering.
Robin nodded. “For at least an hour. In retrospect, it was a bad time to get out of the public sight to talk to Jeff. But we were just so pumped about the plot, and how we’d work out who would do what…” His eyes went out of focus.
“Well,” I said stoutly, “I don’t know anyone who wouldn’t believe Jeff. And he’d have had to be an active collaborator in a super-elaborate plot for you to have pulled it off. If you even could have.”
“Even if I’d had Jeff cover for me, to have come home, killed a woman, and returned to Nashville only to fly back here in the middle of the night … I just don’t think it’s possible.”
“No one came to Jeff’s room while you were talking?” I asked wistfully.
Robin shook his head.
I brightened. “The cell phone records will show where you were, right? From the tower pinging, or whatever?” I’d read enough mysteries to know that was possible.
“Sure,” Robin said. “But I had my GPS tracking device turned off. It creeps me out when I get ads tailored to my location. I think it can still be done, even if they won’t be able to tell where in the hotel I was. But if I was anywhere in the hotel, I could not be here.” He turned. “I have to brush my teeth before they grow moss.”
“Of course he didn’t think about staying in the bar,” I muttered after he’d vanished. “Why would he? Just won a major award, the man of the hour, and he goes off to talk to another writer he can e-mail any day.”
The flight time from Nashville to Atlanta was just forty minutes. That was sure a short flight. Damn. But still! People can’t go through airports unobserved and unrecorded anymore. Robin would have had to pay cash for the surreptitious flight, to and from, and as Robin had remarked earlier, people using cash for a last-minute flight are conspicuous. Also, he’d have had to get from the airport to our house, which easily took as long as the flight itself, by some untraceable means.
And (simplest of all) Jeff was an upstanding citizen, and so was my husband. Robin was in the clear without a doubt … at least in my mind. I knew the police would have to (eventually) come to the same conclusion.
But I also knew how people talked. I knew the presence of two other women in our house, and the murder of one of them, would make the mere mention of Robin’s possible involvement really juicy.
I’d heard the hall shower stop moments before, and I caught a glimpse of a towel-wrapped Phillip zipping into his bedroom. In a few minutes he reappeared, fully clothed.
“How was your run?” I asked. I wanted to talk about something else besides the murder.
“A few seconds better,” Phillip said. “Sarah came to clock me.”
I felt relieved and pleased. “Her parents really aren’t put off by the…?”
“Dead woman? No, I guess not.” He seemed surprised, and I could tell he hadn’t considered Sarah’s parents’ natural aversion to having their daughter visit a house where murder had occurred. “Josh and Joss were sure excited, though. They want to know if they can come see where she was.” Joss was Josh’s twin sister. I felt surrounded by twins.
“I’m not going to run tours,” I said tartly.
Phillip was both resentful and embarrassed.
Then I realized I was a jerk. Of course they’d want to see. Human nature. I said, “But if they happen to come over here, and if you happen to take them into the backyard, it would be only natural to point the spot out. No touching the police tape. No one else, though. Seriously.”
Phillip grinned. It was like the sun coming out. With my brother’s blond hair, gorgeous blue eyes, and steadily increasing height, I didn’t believe anyone would ever pick us out of a crowd as siblings.
I was only surprised that there weren’t smitten kids lined up around the block. I had a high opinion of my little brother, though that didn’t mean I didn’t get exasperated with him at least once a week.
Over the months he’d lived with us, I’d learned Phillip’s greatest attraction was that he was not judgmental; he was truly content to let other people live their own lives as they chose, unless they hurt someone else. And he was kind. This was refreshing to find in a person of any age.
“Okay, I’ll call ’em later,” Phillip said. “Are you fixing lunch today? Or should I just scrounge?”
“Sorry, honey, you’ll have to scrounge. I’ll cook, or at least arrange, tonight.”
“No problem. Remind me to tell you about the party last night that got interrupted, Josh just told me,” Phillip said. He turned to go to his room, but then he swung around. He had the guilty air of someone who’d just forgotten to relate a major point. “Roe, you might want to try to call your mom again,” he said.
“Why?” I went on full alert.
“I’m sorry, I just started thinking about … not important. When Josh drove past your mom’s street, there was an ambulance leaving. I don’t know which house. But you might want to check with her.”
I had a flash of exasperation, deeply tinged with fear. I was tempted to let Phillip have it for not remembering to tell me earlier, but he looked appropriately unhappy, and anyway … not the most important thing right now. I waved him off as I grabbed for my phone.
My true anger was with myself. In the back of my mind, I had been wondering why I hadn’t heard from my mother, whether she’d come home or was still at the reunion. Why she hadn’t texted or called or pounded on my door, demanding to know what was happening at my house. Though I had been somewhat relieved I hadn’t had to answer her questions, I had been a little concerned. Now I was gripped with panic.
Mother answered after five rings.
“Where are you?” I asked. “There was an ambulance?”
“I’m at the hospital,” she said, her voice dull. “John’s had another heart attack.”
Chapter Eleven
In the same listless voice, Mother continued. “He was feeling bad at the reunion. We came home early, thank God. As soon as we took our bags into the house, he collapsed.”
“I’m so very sorry. Oh, Mother.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “This is really serious.” My mother, always brisk and in charge of her emotions and actions, sounded hopeless.
“I have to get Sophie situated, I can’t bring her to the hospital,” I said, thinking out loud. “She should be up in a little while. I’ll feed her and get over there.”
“John David and Avery are here. When John started feeling off-kilter, they decided to come home from the reunion early, too. They were at the house.”
These were John’s two sons by his first marriage. Melinda, Avery’s wife, was a friend of mine, though she was so busy with her kids and her community work that we didn’t see each other as often as I’d like. John David was a widower.
“I’m glad they’re there. Call me when you know something. I’ll come as soon as I can, Mother. I’m praying for you and John.” I hung up, almost in tears. Mother had married again late in life, and she and John were very happy together. Avery and John David liked Mother a lot, John’s grandkids called her GranGran, and Melinda was a sweetie.
I loved John for himself, and because he made my mother happy. Not only did I want John to stay around, I also didn’t want my mother to be grieving as I had when I’d lost my first husband, Martin, to a heart attack.
“Roe, what’s wrong?” I hadn’t heard Robin approach. He’d cleaned not just h
is teeth, but his whole self. He smelled of aftershave and soap.
I told him the bad news, having a hard time keeping my voice level.
Robin said, “How long until Sophie needs to be fed?”
I looked at the clock and estimated. “She should sleep another half hour, and then she’ll need to nurse.”
“Why don’t I go to the hospital to wait with your mom? When the baby’s fed, tell me, and we’ll switch places.”
This was another instance when Sophie’s dependence on my boobs caused a lot of complications. People had told me I’d look back on the trials of early motherhood and laugh, but for now … I heaved a deep sigh. “Thank you,” I said. “That’s the best we can do.”
“Where’s Phillip?”
“He’s in his room, probably on his laptop. He forgot to tell me he’d seen an ambulance on my mother’s street.”
“No!” Robin winced.
“Yes. But at least he told me. It’s good I called her. I don’t think she would have called me until she knew something.” I felt my shoulders sag.
“I’ll tell Phillip what’s happening.” Robin loped off, and I returned to my gloomy thoughts. He was back in a flash. “Okay, I’m off. While I’m gone, can you look for my keys? I was sure I put them in the bowl before I left. Maybe I missed them.”
“Okay. Your extra car key is in the bottom left drawer under the microwave.”
Robin grabbed the key and hurried out the door, barely taking time to pick up a jacket and a book.
I fidgeted and prayed and fidgeted after Robin left for the hospital. For once, I could hardly wait for Sophie to wake up. Phillip, passing through to assemble a cheese and cracker and soup lunch, asked me if I had any news. Phillip liked my mother well enough. But when John, who’d raised two sons, made an effort to know Phillip and include him in the family, Phillip had responded with affection.
My brother apologized all over again for dropping the ball, but then he lingered in the living room in a way that triggered an ominous feeling: obviously, Phillip had something else unpleasant to tell me.
“Spit it out,” I said wearily.
“Some kids are saying online that the dead woman was Robin’s old girlfriend,” he blurted.
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