Hems & Homicide

by Elizabeth Penney

  The back door soon closed behind Ian, the room seeming a bit colder without his reassuring presence. I pressed back into my chair, uncomfortably aware that I was next to be questioned in an official investigation. This was a first for me.

  Earlier I had been numb with shock, but now the truth was sinking in. I had discovered a murder victim. Oh, Star might have died by accident, and someone, in a panic, hid her body. But that theory was farfetched. Actually, so was murder in a tiny town like this, right? I tuned back in, realizing Anton was speaking.

  “Oh, sorry. What did you say?” I glanced down, noticing that my hands were all twisted up in my skirt. I forced myself to let go and relax my fingers. Ugh. My palms were clammy.

  “Take us through your movements, please,” Anton said. “Beginning with why you went into the basement.”

  “Okay,” I said, clearing my throat. “It all started when the lights went out.” By the time I finished the morbid tale, I discovered my hand was tightly clasped in Grammie’s. She gave it a reassuring squeeze then let go.

  Now it was her turn to talk. Anton’s eyes were gentle when he asked, “And you believe you knew the deceased, Anne?”

  Poor Grammie. Although she was one of the strongest women I knew, it had to be tough talking about her friend. Cold fingers ran down my spine. Especially under such terrible circumstances.

  “If it is Star, then yes.” Grammie’s eyes had a faraway gaze. “It was so long ago … I was in my early twenties. The summer of seventy-two. A whole gang of us used to hang around together. People came and went. It’s still that way here on the coast. Transient. Some of us rented ‘pads,’ including in this building.”

  “Do you remember who rented here?” Anton gave Rhonda a significant look.

  Grammie did the pleating thing with her sweater again. “I don’t … I’ll have to give it some thought. Elliot’s father owned the building but I’m not sure if Elliot himself lived here.”

  He might not have. Elliot Parker preferred mansions, like the Eyrie Two, a grand summer cottage that had belonged to his wife’s family and which the couple now owned and lived in. In fact, our signature apron had come from an estate sale there, during one of Nancy’s periodic purges. The property abutted Grammie’s farm, and for years, Elliot had wanted to add her shorefront fields to his admittedly small lot.

  “We’ll check with Elliot,” Anton murmured to Rhonda. “See if there are any records that go that far back.”

  I wondered if anyone had informed Elliot, the owner of Parker Properties and our landlord, about the morbid discovery. I really didn’t want to make that call. Let the police do it.

  “It might be tough regarding records,” Grammie said. “Most people dealt in cash back then, and like I said, there were new people in town every week.” She paused, her brow furrowing. “I do remember that Star arrived sometime over the winter. She’d been staying at a commune, she said. Not sure where. I liked her immediately, although most people thought she was a flake. She was sweet. And caring.”

  A young man banged on the door window, pressing his face against the grimy glass with a grin. Anton strode over and made shooing motions. Once the curiosity seeker backed off, returning with raucous laughter to his group of friends, Anton asked Rhonda, “Backup on its way, I hope?”

  Rhonda checked her tablet. “Yes, they just finished clearing a fender bender in the supermarket parking lot. The state police and crime scene team are on the way too.” In Maine, the state police had jurisdiction over major crimes.

  Anton turned to Grammie. “As you were saying?”

  “Star was nice. Popular too, as I recall.” Her mouth turned down in a grimace of sorrow. “I can’t imagine who…” Now she reached to clasp my hand.

  “A boyfriend, maybe?” Rhonda said. “Was she involved with anyone?”

  Grammie’s gaze flickered, leading me to think she was hiding something. She shook her head. “I don’t remember. Back then, relationships were pretty informal.”

  “So I’ve heard,” Anton said. “Free love and all that.” Anton’s grandfather was about Grammie’s age, the owner of the Antiques Barn located out on the main road. Gary Ball’s picture would fit nicely next to the word curmudgeon in the dictionary. I could well imagine his distaste for long-haired hippies, even though he’d been their peer.

  Grammie fell silent for a moment, lost in thought. “Such a long time ago. Poor Star. I thought she’d left town. No one ever said anything different.”

  Someone else banged on the door and Anton pivoted with a scowl. But this time it was our landlord, Elliot Parker, trying to get in. He rattled the door handle, his long, patrician features twisted in annoyance. I supposed he was quite good-looking, in a rawboned, lanky New England way, even now in his seventies. But he was an arrogant ass, to put it nicely.

  “Did you call him?” Anton asked Rhonda.

  “Not I.” Her lips curved in a small smile. “Go get him, Chief.”

  Anton sighed and went to open the door. “Elliot. Come in.”

  The landlord pushed past the chief, his cold blue gaze flickering around the room. “When were you going to tell me you’d found a body?” His Maine drawl made it baa-dy.

  Under cover of Anton’s explanations, Grammie leaned close to me. “We are not giving up the storefront, okay? It’s our only chance to find out what happened to Star.”

  CHAPTER 4

  “Show me,” Elliot said, drawing himself up to his full height, over six feet. “As owner of the property, I must insist.”

  While Elliot and Anton continued to banter, I mulled over Grammie’s words. A decision to break the lease wouldn’t have been a surprise, since she’d known the deceased, and maybe even if she hadn’t. Would I ever be able to go into the basement without thinking of Star, without remembering the horrible moment I discovered the bones? With a shudder, I decided to avoid that dungeon as much as possible.

  “We’ll be right back, Rhonda,” Anton said, capitulating to the landlord’s demands. “You have to stay on the stairs,” he warned Elliot. “Or else the state police will have my head.” He made a slicing motion across his neck.

  Elliot huffed in satisfaction, his eyes gleaming. “We need to get to the bottom of this. This kind of thing affects property values, you know.”

  His callous remark drove my opinion of Elliot down another notch, if that was possible. My previous assessment of him as heartless and mercenary was unfortunately dead-on.

  “Do we need to stay?” I asked Anton. “I mean, obviously we aren’t going to get anything done here today.” I’d hoped to have the quote from Ian so we could order building materials and start the renovations. Our schedule allowed only a few weeks until the grand opening, and with Maine’s short summer, we couldn’t afford to miss many visitor days.

  Anton considered my request for a long moment. “I suppose you can go on home,” he finally said. “The state detective assigned to the case will probably want to talk to you.”

  “That’s fine.” Grammie stood. “We’ll be at the house.” She held out a hand to pull me up. I eased out of the chair, careful not to put my full weight on the injured ankle. I would be hobbling, but I could move.

  The chief put up a hand. “Another thing. I’m afraid this building will be off-limits until we release the crime scene.”

  A vision of yellow caution tape barring the doors popped into my mind. “How long do you think that will take?”

  “I really can’t say.” Anton’s brows drew together, sympathy flashing in his eyes. “It’s up to the major crimes unit. But I’ll do my best to speed things along.”

  Elliot snorted. “Good luck with that. You ever try to hurry a state worker?” He turned to us. “I’ll be over later. Got some things to discuss.”

  Was that a promise or a threat? With Elliot, one was never sure.

  * * *

  Grammie drove me to the public lot where I’d parked earlier. “Are you sure you can drive?” she asked, pulling up behind my 1963 Ford Falc
on. “We can leave your car here and get someone to bring it home.”

  “I’ll be fine. It’s my left ankle, and anyway, Beverly is an automatic.” For my twenty-first birthday gift, Papa had gone over every inch of the vintage beauty and restored her to perfection. And yes, he assigned the car a gender—and a name.

  I pulled on the door lever of the 1988 black woody Jeep Wagoneer, also restored by Papa, and slid out, careful to land on my right foot. “See you at home.” I closed the door and she drove off.

  While I unlocked the Falcon, I paused to enjoy the May sunshine, inhaling a salty onshore breeze that tossed my hair and made flags flap. This particular lot was right off Main Street, adjacent to the waterfront park and the ferry wharf. The long, wide wharf effectively sliced the harbor into working and recreation areas. Lobster and fishing boats, the lobster car, and marine businesses were to the south. To the north, a thicket of sailboat masts occupied the floating docks. Blueberry Cove was a busy harbor and, in recent years, a prosperous one.

  I eased my way into the sun-warmed car, careful not to bang my foot, and slid on a pair of new cat-eye sunglasses. Beverly started immediately, thanks to Papa’s tune-ups, and soon I was under way, edging into busy downtown traffic.

  A short distance down Main Street, my friend Bella Ricci, owner of the Mimosa Boutique, was planting geraniums and petunias in her window boxes. I honked and she waved. The Miss Blueberry Cove Diner, housed in a vintage train car, was hopping, and children played in the park. I passed the public library, the Harborview Hotel, and the Congregational Church on its triangle lot, the dividing line between downtown and the residential area.

  Of course, many of the stately Colonial sea captain’s houses and ornate Victorian cottages now housed businesses. Parker Properties was one, Elliot’s office. Others held inns or medical and law offices. It was hard to believe now that families had lived in—and heated—those huge structures, although they probably had had many children and servants too.

  A couple blocks from town, a rambling New England-style house was now called the Farmhouse Bed-and-Breakfast, owned by Ian’s parents. After Angus retired from lobster fishing and Fiona left her teaching position, the couple had bought the struggling inn. I slowed, despite the Volvo SUV with out-of-state plates riding my tail, hoping to spot Ian.

  Two young men were carrying a huge sideboard with a mirror out of the Antiques Barn van parked next to Ian’s truck. Gary Ball, Anton’s grandfather, was supervising the men, and he barked something when one stumbled and almost dropped his end onto the asphalt drive. Such a nice guy.

  Ian emerged from the inn’s side door and I honked in greeting, then sped up, face flaming and feeling like an idiot. Of course he knew it was me honking, thanks to Beverly. Owning a distinctive classic car could be both fun and a drawback.

  But seeing Gary reminded me that I should stop by the Antiques Barn soon. He might have furniture I could use in the shop to hold inventory or as decorative pieces.

  If we open. With an effort, I swallowed my fear and doubt, silenced the niggling voice that said we were doomed before we even started. No sense borrowing trouble, as Grammie always said. She also said to have faith, and boy, I needed some right now.

  Our farm was on the edge of town, past the state park and another cluster of summer homes on the shore side. The last of these, a multigabled monstrosity with stone porches and a couple of turrets, was the Eyrie Two where Nancy and Elliot lived. It bordered our land, which was all fields on that side of the road, stretching down to rocky cliffs. Fields that Elliot coveted, whether to build McMansions upon or just to hoard, I had no idea.

  On the other side of the road sat the center-hall Cape Cod built by our ancestors in the early 1800s. More fields—much less acreage than originally—surrounded the house and the quaint white barn behind it. The last full-scale use had been blueberry bushes, back in the fifties and sixties. I’d lived here since I was eight, when my parents, Roger and Ginny Buckley, were killed in a car crash during an ice storm. This place meant home to me and always would.

  I zipped up the drive and parked near the barn, next to the Wagoneer and Grammie’s other car, a sporty Saab 900S. Thank goodness for junkyards or we’d never keep these old cars running.

  When I swung open the car door, Quincy ran to greet me with a plaintive mew. He hadn’t been too happy about being left behind this morning, and he was letting me know about it. I climbed out and gathered him into my arms, careful not to lean too heavily on my injured foot.

  “Did you miss me?” I asked, burying my nose in his soft fur. His answer was a rumbling purr. “Once we get the shop open, you can come to work with me every day.” He rubbed my chin with his face, as if he understood and approved. And being a devoted cat owner, I believed he did.

  We hobbled together across the gravel drive toward the house. Between the barn and the farmhouse were tilled vegetable gardens, flower beds, and a paved patio edged by a pergola-roofed back porch. Clumps of bearded iris were blooming and the lilac bush was a mass of scented purple blossoms, a sure sign of summer finally arriving.

  Rather than go through the French doors into the kitchen, I entered the mudroom door to the left, the shortest and smoothest route for my injured ankle. Here I let Quincy down, and he went to check his dish beside the washing machine, one of his rituals.

  He glanced up at me, his green eyes wide with hope. “I’m sorry, Quincy. You have to make do with dry food until suppertime.” I swear he shrugged before turning to select and crunch a piece of kibble.

  “Is that you, Iris?” Grammie called from the kitchen. Of course it was, but she always said that.

  “It’s me,” I called back, as I always did. A rectangular plastic container sat on the dryer. Curious, I peeled open the lid to reveal a couple dozen chocolate-frosted cupcakes.

  “Don’t touch,” came the shout. “Those are for the auxiliary bake sale.”

  How did she know? Grammie and her sixth sense never ceased to amaze me. I pressed the lid down firmly, hoping she had saved a few for us. Her homemade baked goods were divine.

  Next, I popped into the half bath to wash my hands. Thinking of the spiderweb and the dirty cellar, I checked my face. All was good but I had one lingering gray strand in my hair. Ugh. I pulled it off with a tissue and put it in the trash can, then washed my hands again.

  My apron. Where did it go? After a second of panic, I pictured it right where I left it, draped over the arm of my chair at the shop. Bummer. That meant I couldn’t repair the rip until the police let us back inside.

  When I finally limped into the kitchen, Grammie was standing at the six-burner gas range, stirring a pan with a wooden spoon. She wore a lobster-print bib apron to protect her slacks and sweater. “I’m heating up leftover clam chowder for lunch. Are you hungry?”

  “Actually, I am.” As I climbed onto a stool at the butcher-block island, the clock above the farmhouse sink caught my eye. Almost noon. “Wow, this morning sure zoomed by.”

  Standing with her back to me, Grammie didn’t comment, and I felt the subject of Star and her demise hovering like a cloud over the sunny room. I’d better tread gently, I realized. She was still grieving Papa, as was I, and I didn’t want to cause her to have a setback. Although what she’d said to me at the store was intriguing. Could we, should we, try to figure out how Star had died? I wondered how successful the police would be with a forty-year-old cold case. Star Moonshine. That couldn’t have been her real name.

  Grammie reached for cobalt pottery bowls on an open shelf and placed them on the counter to be filled. The recently renovated cottage-style kitchen, with its distressed white cabinets, wide pine floors, and rack of hanging copper-bottom pots, was both stylish and functional. We spent much of our time in here, the true heart of our home.

  “I still can’t find the desk key,” she said, changing the subject. “And I’ve looked everywhere I can think of. All his pockets, the change dish on the bureau, and the console of the Wagoneer.” She was referrin
g to Papa’s antique rolltop desk in the barn workshop, man cave and project central for his many interests. He used the main part of the barn for restoring and fixing automobiles and other equipment, the cows and horses kept by my grandparents long gone.

  “Hmm. I wonder where it went,” I said.

  “Want to get us water, love?” She pointed at the fridge, where we kept a pitcher of delicious well water.

  I slid off the stool to fill tall glasses with ice cubes and water. Papa’s last weeks this winter had been rough, and verifying the whereabouts of the desk key with him had been low on the priority list. And since the desk was an antique heirloom, we didn’t want to cause damage by forcing the top up.

  “He must have put it somewhere strange,” Grammie said, ferrying the bowls to the island. “Or maybe he dropped it in a snowbank. We’ll never find it in that case.” She brought over a glass jar of oyster crackers, salt and pepper, spoons and napkins, then perched on the stool beside me. “Dig in.”

  The first swallow of Grammie’s creamy, savory chowder was always the best. I tasted hints of bacon and onion, and of course the whole clams harvested locally were fantastic, briny and rich. After satisfying my initial hunger, I said, “What do you think is in the desk?” Grammie did the finances, so the checkbooks and other important documents were in her desk, located in a nook off the kitchen.

  Grammie patted her mouth with a napkin. “I’m not exactly certain. But going by what I didn’t find here in the house, I’ve got a pretty good idea.”

  “What, a secret treasure or a stash of money?” I laughed to show I was joking. Although people hiding money rather than banking it wasn’t unheard of in remote, rural areas like Blueberry Cove. Tales of cash under mattresses, buried in coffee cans, or taped behind oil paintings abounded. But I’d never gotten the impression that Papa was the hoarding type.

  Grammie’s response floored me. “Maybe so.” She tossed a few more oyster crackers into her bowl.