“Fine,” she said. “What about Gracie?”
By this point, she and Jane knew it wasn’t Gracie in the cabin with the professor—at least not according to Zora, the proprietor of the Blue Note. And Cora was just working on that assumption.
“The missing person case is ongoing. But I’m not sure how much longer we can take our resources to continue.”
Cora knew how these things worked. The police with their limited resources could only give so much time and energy to a missing person case. And, unfortunately, with each passing day, the statistics proved there was less likelihood of finding her.
“I see,” she said. She just lost her appetite. Things were looking grim, both for Henry and for Gracie. She found herself wishing it was Gracie with the cad of a professor and wishing that she could have spoken with him. Maybe he could lead them in the right direction. Maybe he knew something they didn’t know.
“So Paul is still staying there?” Brodsky asked.
“I’d say,” she said. “He and Henry were evicted. I have all their belongings in Kildare House.”
“Not all,” he said. “We’ve got Henry’s computer.”
“Oh?”
“These days, that’s often where the most evidence lies. Kids. Their whole lives are spent on the computer and they reveal way too much to any potential predator.”
“Henry wasn’t quite a kid,” Cora said.
Detective Brodsky chuckled. “No, not to you. Listen, I’ve got to go. It’s the Saturday dinner with my wife.”
“That’s right,” she said. “Have a good time.”
Cora knew that Brodsky and his wife had a standing dinner date for Saturday nights. She thought it was so sweet.
“Will do. She hopes to come to your next retreat. Couldn’t make it this time,” he said.
“Good. I look forward to it.”
Jane had been listening to the whole conversation. “No news on Gracie?”
Cora nodded. “No.”
Jane’s eyes welled with years. “It’s just that, well, Paul really loves and trusts her. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have that kind of love in your life?”
A tear streamed down her face.
“You’re a little drunk, I think,” Cora said.
Jane blew her nose into her napkin. She nodded her head. “A little.”
“No more wine for you tonight,” Cora said, grinning.
“I should eat some more,” Jane said just as the group of crafters in the living room exploded into laughter.
“Let’s go in the living room,” Cora suggested. “Sounds like we’re missing a party.”
Jane was a bit wobbly, but she was at least able to make it into the next room. Not that drunk, then.
“Land sakes, what’s wrong?” Ruby said as she glanced over at them. A ball of yarn sat on her lap and she was wrapping it around something.
“She’s fine,” Cora said. “We were just talking with Detective Brodsky. No word on Gracie yet.”
“Poor Paul,” Liv said. She tossed a yellow pom-pom in a nearby basket. They were all making pom-poms. “On top of all this, Gracie cheated on him last year with that idiot professor.”
“Do you know him?” Cora asked.
“Oh boy, do I. All the women on campus know him. He’s a jerk. I don’t know why he hasn’t gotten fired yet. He must have some blackmail material on someone in a very high place,” Liv said.
What a cynical thought coming from a young art student, Cora thought.
“What? Are you drunk?” Ruby asked. “Just because a man can’t keep it in his pants doesn’t mean he’s a killer.”
Cora almost choked on her wine.
“Wait a minute,” Jane said. “Did the professor know Henry?”
“Probably,” Liv said. “I’m sure he knew Paul.”
“Where is this going?” Ruby said.
“I’m thinking there’s many ways of killing someone,” Jane said. “I know he was in mountain cabin off the grid when Henry was killed. But he could have hired someone.”
“True,” Cora said.
“If we could prove they knew each other and had a motive for him killing Henry . . .” Jane said.
“Well, that’s a tall order,” Ruby said, and snorted.
“I might be able to help you,” Liv said, tossing another yellow pom-pom in the basket.
All eyes were on her now.
“We’re all at the same school, have access to the same computer message boards, libraries, chat rooms, and so on. I’ll do some digging,” she said, rubbing her hands on her jeans.
“I don’t think this is a good idea,” Marianne said. “I think you should all leave this to the police.” She held up a group of pom-poms and placed them in the basket.
A basketful of pom-poms. What were they up to, Cora wondered.
“Why?” Jane said. “It wouldn’t hurt. We’re not doing anything illegal. And it might lead us to Gracie.”
“I don’t know about that. Gracie’s been gone a few days now,” Marianne said. “Don’t get me wrong. We all want to see her safe and sound. But it’s best not to get your hopes up, my friend.”
Chapter 36
Liv’s fingers moved over the keyboard like an expert musician playing a piano. She pulled up Web sites and chat rooms and dismissed this one and that one before Cora even knew what was happening.
“Okay,” Liv said. “Here’s the Tattler’s—our school newspaper’s—article about the professor and look, our friend Henry wrote a letter to the editor, defending Gracie.”
“Okay,” Jane said. “So if I was the prof, Henry would then be on my radar.”
“If he wasn’t already,” Cora said.
“But would he hate him enough to have him killed?” Cora said.
“Certainly not,” Marianne said. “Look, as a professor, you don’t hold it against your students if they have different opinions. You want that. You are hoping to educate people, not to clone yourself. Right?”
Liv snorted. “I wish you were my teacher.”
“Me too,” Marianne said.
“So let me search through this site and see if the professor ever responded.”
Cora was impressed—within moments of searching online, Liv had her answer. “It doesn’t look like he ever responded. That’s pretty typical. I mean, there was legal action.”
“Is there some kind of court or legal records we could look up?” Jane asked.
“A lot of it would be public record, I assume,” Cora said.
“Oh wait, here’s something,” Liv said. “Looks like the professor was on Henry’s committee.”
“What does that mean?” Jane asked.
“He was one of the guys who were overseeing his master’s degree. They form a committee and after Henry does all his work, he has to defend it to this committee and then he gets his degree.”
“So he was on Henry’s committee,” Marianne said. “Interesting.”
“The thing is, after Henry gave up his poetry fellowship, this committee dispersed, of course,” Liv said. “Here’s a quote from a student, a Ted Brice, ‘What I wouldn’t have given for that fellowship. It’s a smack in the face to the rest of us who are scrounging. ’ And this quote from the prof, ‘This young man has wasted this committee’s time and the docent’s money. It’s unforgivable.’”
“Unforgivable? Just because he wanted to change majors?” Cora said. “I changed majors every year.”
“This fellowship was big-time. For serious poets. There was a lot of money involved. It was a smack in the face of the school, as Ted Brice said,” Marianne said. “Not that I didn’t change my major a few times as well.” She laughed. “Some of these academics take themselves so seriously. That’s one reason I quit. I just didn’t fit in. It’s difficult for an artist to put up with this nonsense. Henry was an artist. Maybe he got tired of them telling him how to write. How to live.”
A hush came over the group.
Ruby tossed another pom-pom in the basket, which was br
imming with colorful pom-poms.
“I don’t know that name. Ted Brice?” Liv said.
The name rang a bell for Cora. But she couldn’t quite place it. Ted Brice? Who was Ted Brice?
“He left,” Marianne replied. “He was a gifted poet, too, but disgruntled. I remember that. I think he left shortly after the Henry thing.”
“What was he like?” Liv asked as she clicked across her keyboard. “According to his Facebook bio, he’s in Kentucky. Must have left for the hills.”
“Basically, he was harmless. I kind of felt sorry for him,” Marianne said. “He wanted the fellowship so badly. After Henry left, they picked someone else.”
“None of that is cause for murder, surely,” Cora said.
“But nothing really is,” Marianne said. “Everything can be solved without violence.” Her voice was even and quiet, like a poem or a prayer.
Cora’s eyes met Jane’s and looked away. Violence had a rippling effect on people. Everybody responded in different ways. Cora knew those who tried to fight back; some cowered in fear and others shut down.
“But,” Liv said, “we have established Rawlings, Henry, and Gracie knew each other, kind of intimately, and probably didn’t like one another. They are all still in the area. Ted Brice is gone. He’s in Kentucky.”
Then Cora certainly did not know him.
“It is so odd,” Jane said. “Don’t you think? All this stuff has to have a link, right?”
“What exactly do you mean?” Marianne said.
“I mean Gracie’s disappearance, Henry’s murder, and the professor running away for the hills. It can’t all be a coincidence. It has to be related,” Jane said.
“It would seem so,” Cora replied. “But it could also be completely random.”
“I don’t think so. Let’s look back at the start.”
“You mean Gracie’s disappearance.”
“Yes, but the very start was you getting that odd text message—”
“Text message?” Liv said. “What?”
“Hey,” Donna said as she walked into the sitting room with Sheila behind her. “Look what we found.”
She carried a small box full of papers and photos. Sheila carried a book in her hands.
“What’s that?” Cora said.
“This box is full of poems, remembrances, letters, including several from the professor,” Donna said.
“I’ve got Henry’s journal,” Sheila said. Her face was pale. Her eyes watery.
“What’s wrong?” Cora said.
“Henry . . .” Sheila said. “He was very troubled.”
“What do you mean?” Cora asked. The woman appeared haunted, exhausted, as if she’d fall over any minute.
“His journal is full of dark images,” Donna said. “He was manic-depressive. On some heavy medicine. There’s a lot of writing about death and suicide and love gone wrong.”
“It’s all very sad,” Sheila said, with her voice cracking. “Why didn’t anybody help the boy?”
“We tried,” came a voice from behind her. It was Paul, with his parents trailing him.
The living room was now full of crafters and Garretts.
This wasn’t exactly what Cora intended for her craft retreat. The craft classes and social succeeded. Now they were coming together about Henry and Gracie. Perhaps it didn’t matter they weren’t gathering over baskets and pottery, though that is what she would prefer.
“He was seeing a fabulous doctor,” Susan said. “I insisted. He was like a son to me. I wanted him to get help. And as far as I know he was getting help. But his creative impulses were always dark.”
“It has to come out some way,” Paul said. “I’ve told you, Mother, writing about dark things is healthy.”
“I’ll never understand that,” she said. “But what I do know is that he was a troubled young man. But I don’t think it had anything to do with his death. That was murder. Pure and simple. Totally random.”
“Murder, yes,” Liv spoke up. “Maybe not random.”
Click, click, click.
“What do you have there?” Jane said to her.
“I’ve just hacked into the campus medical records,” she said.
“What?” Susan said, horrified.
“Go on, dear girl,” her husband replied, walking over to Liv, with a wide grin and an approving glance.
“All three of them—the professor, Gracie, and Henry—were seeing the same psychiatrist and were even in a therapy group together,” she said.
“Yeah, I knew about that. So?” Paul said.
“We’ve been looking for a link,” Cora said. “I think we may have found it.”
It turned out Paul knew more than he thought he did. It was just like Brodsky had said. People often knew more than they thought—qualified investigators knew to ask the right questions.
Susan cleared her throat. “Are those pom-poms?” She walked over to the basket. “I’ve not seen or thought about them in years.” She reached into the basket and held one up to the light. Something about the light—or was it just the look of joy—but Susan Garrett appeared twenty years younger. Maybe Cora had jumped to the wrong conclusions about her.
Chapter 37
The locals had gone home, signaling that the night was getting late. Liv’s eyes were barely open as she yawned and announced she needed to get some sleep.
The group, so intent on what was going on, hadn’t realized how late it was. When Liv scampered off, they all dispersed to their own crafting corners or to bed. Cora, Jane, and Ruby gathered at Jane’s cottage. They met there because her sitter needed to leave for the night.
“I have to say, wow, what a retreat,” Jane said, after pouring both Ruby and Cora a glass of merlot.
“Well, we have gotten a lot of crafting in,” Ruby said, and sipped her wine.
“And I was thinking, as everybody was gathered talking about Henry and Gracie, that even though we were not working on a craft project together, we were all working on something together,” Cora said.
“But we really wanted to provide an escape from the real world,” Jane pointed out.
Ruby snorted. “We can try our best, but none of us have a magic wand.”
“I have one,” Cora said, and grinned.
“I should have known,” Ruby said.
“Now, if only it worked,” Jane said with a flat note in her voice.
“Gracie and Henry would still be here for starters,” Cora said. “But since they aren’t, I’d use it to find Gracie and avenge Henry. You know, find his killer.”
“So we know they were all in therapy at the school,” Ruby said. “For what?”
“Well, Liv couldn’t get into those records, but I assume it was for depression. Henry was manic-depressive,” Cora said.
“Which means Gracie was depressed, too. I’m kind of bothered by that. I mean, I left her with my daughter,” Jane said.
“Well, there was no way to know,” Ruby said. “Besides, she was a great babysitter, right?”
Jane nodded. “She was. But I’m not sure I’d have felt safe, if I knew. But then again, London adored her.” Jane shrugged.
“A lot of people are depressed,” Cora said, after sipping from her wineglass. “Depending on what kind of depression it is, the person, and the medication, they are actually quite dependable.”
“I guess babysitters don’t have to disclose that kind of information,” Ruby said.
“But I’d think nannies would. I mean, she lived in Chelsea’s house with her children,” Jane said.
“She probably knew about it but wasn’t too concerned—for some reason. Gracie seemed to have her act together. Why would she worry?” Cora said.
“But some depressives are experts at looking like they have it together,” Ruby said. “My sister Rosemary was like that. The next thing we knew . . . she killed herself. It was awful for us.”
“I had no idea about your sister,” Jane said. “How awful. I’m so sorry.”
Ruby nodde
d. “Thank you.”
“I’ve known way too many people who’ve committed suicide,” Cora said. “I’m sorry for your family.”
“I think about her every day,” Ruby said. “You know, what could have been for her. She was so young.”
Cora took another drink of her wine and mulled over the last few hours. Her thoughts turned toward the connection among Gracie, the professor, and Henry. But what did it mean? Anything? Or was it just totally random?
“So how long is Paul going to stay?” Jane asked.
Cora shrugged. “You know, I didn’t even ask. I assume just until he can find a place. That shouldn’t take too long, should it?”
“It’s difficult around here to find rentals,” Ruby said. “Especially once you’ve been evicted. Word gets around.”
“I don’t know why he should even be here much longer,” Jane said. “He was only here to be close to Gracie.”
“Once we find her—” But Cora couldn’t bring herself to finish the thought. Would they find her? Where was she? A chill traveled through her. What on earth happened to Gracie Wyke?
“I’ve been thinking,” Jane said. “Henry and Paul had been tracing Gracie’s footsteps the day before she disappeared. We could do the same thing. Maybe they have overlooked something.”
“But haven’t the cops done that?” Cora asked.
Ruby harrumphed. “Probably not. They’ve been searching the rivers and the forest with dogs.”
“Well, that’s what they do when someone has disappeared,” Cora said.
“Yeah, but these cops? They could be doing so much more,” Ruby said. “Like you, tracing her footsteps. Have they done it?”
“Seems like they would have,” Cora said. “Brodsky is a bright guy.”
“Yes, but they have such a lack of resources,” Jane said. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt for us to go over her movements that day.”
Cora yawned. “Okay. If they don’t find her by Monday, I’m in. Tomorrow is the last day of the retreat and I think we all need to focus on that.”
“Sounds good to me,” Ruby said.
Cora knew with each passing day, the chance of finding Gracie was less likely. But she wasn’t ready to give up hope—not yet.
“But what about Henry’s killer? Has the detective gotten back to you? Do we know if he’s been found?” Jane asked.
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