by Joan Hess
Dear Miss Demeanor,
How’s this for a trick-or-treat surprise? I call somebody’s wife and tell her that her husband has a standing reservation at the Xanadu Motel every Thursday afternoon. Do you think she’d get a kick out of that?
Dear Reader,
Although Miss Demeanor promised to answer every letter in her box she must admit this motel business is becoming a bit tedious. This is clearly adult stuff. The only person who’s getting a kick out of it is you, Reader. If you call somebody’s wife, you’re likely to get another kick-in the rear. Can we just drop it, please?
FIVE
The afternoon did not skip by; it trudged in lead-lined snowshoes. At the end of the last period, the students were sent away. Several hundred of them found a reason to parade down the basement hallway, all very casual and distracted by meaningful inner dialogue. Adolescents respond to violence much the same way moths do to a candle, or iron filings to a magnet. It is not endearing.
We were not sent away. Peter set up shop in the lounge at the formica table, and each of us was called in to make a statement. My name was the last on his list, which fooled me not at all, and it was almost four o’clock before I was beckoned into his parlor.
I glanced at the chalked silhouette on the carpet and the circular stain of dampness. “Did you arrive at any brilliant deductions in the last four hours? I would have offered suggestions, but I was having too much fun in that dusty room counting flowers on the wall and cracks in the ceiling.”
He grinned at me. His curly black hair and three-piece suit gave him the appearance of either an executive or a Mafia hit man. He’s clearly a New Yorker, from the jutting nose to the jarring accent, but I had grown accustomed to his face, among other things. He has talents that are best left unspecified. At the moment, we were lovers, although it was much like making goulash with dynamite and nitroglycerine. Too much personality, and usually not in tune. However, we did certain things very well, and legal entwining was occasionally discussed. I was the one who shied away. I have tried marriage; the results were not distasteful, but I have learned to enjoy my unwedded solitude.
“I deduced,” Peter said wryly, “that this place rivals any afternoon soap opera for intrigues, gossip, and back-stabbing, to put it mildly. Do these people actually teach?”
“It does boggle the mind, doesn’t it?” I said, sitting on the mauve-and-green monster. “I’ve felt as if I had been airlifted into Peyton Place the last two days. What have you learned thus far?”
“This is an official investigation, Claire,” he said. The grin inverted itself into a frown. “I know that you haven’t paid any attention to that niggling little detail in the past, but this time I want you to stay out of it.”
“As long as Miss Parchester is out of it,” I said with a lofty expression. It never failed to irritate him.
“Emily Parchester is very much in it, for the moment. She did sneak into the building with a jar of peach compote, knowing that Weiss was especially fond of it. She, on the other hand, was not at all fond of him. The compote was laced with cyanide, possibly from inception. It’s not easy to overlook the coincidence, Claire.”
“It seems fairly easy to jump to conclusions, however. If you’d ever met her, you’d realize she’s a harmless little old lady, not some character out of Arsenic and Old Lace. She’s going to paint watercolors and ride in buses when she retires, for God’s sake.”
“Let’s hope she hasn’t already climbed aboard, then, since we don’t seem able to find her. The uniformed officers have questioned her neighbors, but no one claims to have seen her since yesterday evening, when she discretely put a sack of liquor bottles in a garbage can. A large sack. We would very much like to discuss her recipe for peach compote.”
“The entire Farberville police force can’t find one old lady?” I laughed merrily. “Perhaps she’s gone underground to escape the dragnet.” I watch old shows on television when I can’t sleep. Very old shows, I suspect, since all the characters are either black, white, or gray.
“We’ll find her,” he said, unamused by my cleverness. “We should have a report from the medical examiner’s office within twenty-four hours, but we’re operating on the premise that the poison was in the damned yellow goop. It reeked of bitter almonds, as did Weiss’s mouth. The symptoms were consistent with cyanide poisoning: nausea, cramps, mental confusion, and death within minutes. It’s a painful poison, but it is reasonably easy to get one’s hands on… and inexpensive for someone on a tight budget.”
“You don’t need to question her-just hook her up to the electric chair and throw the switch! You obviously think she’s the culprit, simply because she brought the compote to school. It was sitting in the kitchenette for half an hour. Anyone could have added the cyanide.”
“That’s what we’ll investigate. Now, I need a full statement from you so that we can get out of this place before dark.”
A minion named Jorgeson appeared to write down my words of wisdom. I reiterated my movements for the last two days, from homeroom to sixth period. Without a whimper, I might add. Jorgeson rewarded my conciseness with a smile, I signed the silly thing, and we left the building together.
Always a gentleman, Peter walked me to my car. “I guess I can’t take you to see The Massachusetts Asparagus Massacre at the drive-in tonight. After a break for hamburgers, we’re going to search the entire building for anything with cyanide in it. I suspect we’ll still be there when the homeroom bell rings Monday morning.”
“I presumed you’d be on a stakeout at Miss Parchester’s house.” I gazed up with a sweet smile. “Carpe diem, Peter.”
I drove out of the parking lot in a skimpy mist of dust, since I valued my shocks more than my desire for a grand exit. When I arrived home, I found Caron and Inez on the sofa, salivating for details.
“Oh, Mother,” Caron sighed, “were you really there at the Fateful Moment? Did he clutch his throat and accuse Miss Parchester?”
Inez clutched her throat. “My sister was in Typing 11 when Miss Hart came in to break the ghastly news to Cheryl Anne. It was awful, Mrs. Malloy. Cheryl Anne turned white. Miss Hart was white, too, and crying, then all the girls started crying. None of them could finish the time test. Cheryl Anne had to go to the nurse’s office to lie down.”
“Did they find Miss Parchester?” Caron demanded. “Did she admit that she nursed a Secret Hatred of Mr. Weiss?”
“Did the police really discover her cowering in the basement?” whispered Inez.
I considered ignoring Tweedledee and Tweedledum, and taking a cup of tea to bed. On the other hand, the two were apt to be better informed than I; FHS was not a monastery, as I well knew. It was a radio station, complete with news bulletins and in-depth commentaries.
Once I was armed with tea, I returned to the living room. “So the popular theory is that Miss Parchester did it?”
Caron shook her head. “That’s what the seniors think. The juniors think Coach Finley did it Out of Love, the sophomores are backing Mr. Timmons, and the-” She broke off with a funny expression. She has a variety of them, but this one was unfamiliar.
“And?” I prompted. I took a long drink, just in case.
Inez shot me her version of a funny expression. It was noticeably baleful, but tempered with sympathy-for Caron. “Some of the freshmen think you did it, Mrs. Malloy. Caron and I told them in no uncertain terms that you didn’t, of course.
“Thank you, Inez. Why do the freshmen harbor such ideas?”
“Because you were so upset about the Falconnaire. Everybody heard that you were livid in the teachers meeting, and snarled all sorts of threats at Mr. Weiss.”
“And then poisoned him to avoid having to supervise work on the yearbook? Don’t the freshmen find that a bit extreme?” I told myself that the question was absurd; I knew from personal experience that freshmen did indeed find things a bit extreme, including such things as life.
Caron sniffed. “Inez and I tried to tell them, Mother.
I mean, the idea is preposterous. If the police will just find Miss Parchester, they can make her confess and clear your name.” Not to mention other people who were saddled with the same name through no fault of their own.
The telephone rang. I went to answer it while I toyed with my defense. To my astonishment, Miss Emily Parchester was on the line.
“Mrs. Malloy, I was hoping you might be able to visit me sometime in the next day or two. I am quite curious about your progress in the mysterious case.”
Mysterious was a mild description. I turned my back on the audience on the sofa and whispered, “Where are you?”
“I am at a country establishment, taking a rest for a few days while I try to keep this troublesome situation from disturbing me. I have experienced some difficulty in sleeping, and felt fresh air and the presence of a well-trained staff might soothe me. Have you made any progress?”
Nothing beyond being the freshman class’s candidate for murderer, I thought bleakly. “There have been a few developments. Have the police not contacted you to discuss them?”
“Then the auditors are certain I was remiss in my accounts? Oh, Mrs. Malloy, whatever shall I do? The Judge must be rolling-”
“In his grave, on a rotisserie. Where is this establishment, Miss Parchester? I do think I’ll come by for a visit today. Immediately.”
She gave me directions, and I hung up. Caron and Inez were both flipping through magazines, competing for the title of Miss Nonchalance. I wondered what Caron found so fascinating in Bookseller’s Monthly Digest, but I didn’t ask. Instead, I said, “I’m going out for an hour or so, girls. Can you feed yourselves without burning down the kitchen?”
“Who was that on the telephone, Mother?”
“My Avon lady. The winter mascara has just arrived, and it may be my color. I’ll see you later.”
“What shall I tell Peter if he calls?” she continued, her lips pursed in great innocence as she adjusted an invisible halo.
“Tell him that I’ll test ‘Tarnished Copper’ first.”
Miss Parchester’s so-called establishment was several miles out of town. The name was vaguely familiar, and I recalled its reputation when I stopped in front of a ten-foot-high iron gate. A chain-link fence topped with concertina wire disappeared into the woods in both directions, creating a formidable enclave designed to keep out hikers and stray dogs. Happy Meadows Home was not an ordinary country inn; it catered not to vacationers, but to inmates.
A guard appeared at my window, his eyes hidden behind reflective sunglasses. “You got business here?”
I checked my lipstick in the twin reflections. “I have come to see Miss Emily Parchester.”
“You got permission from the office?”
“I was not aware I needed permission from the office,” I said, mimicking his surly tone. “is this a prison, and is Miss Parchester locked away somewhere in solitary confinement? For that matter, where are the happy meadows-and your supervisor?”
“I’ll have to call the office, lady. No one’s supposed to go in unless they got business.” He went into a gatehouse and reappeared after several minutes. “You can talk to her medical advisor, but before you go in, I’ll have to search your car and your person.”
“Don’t be silly,” I said as I rolled up the car window. When the gate remained closed, I gave up and allowed the officious goon to search my car and purse, although I rebelled when he made a move toward my person. It has never been searched thus far-at least not for weapons or whatever he feared I had stashed under my unmentionables.
He ran a professional eye over my body, shrugged, and locked the gate. Wishing I had concealed a submachine gun on my person, I drove along a winding road to the front of a stately white house. No bars that I could see, but the goon at the gate did discourage trespassers. Once inside, I stopped at the reception desk and asked for Miss Parchester’s room number.
I ended up in a claustrophobic room with a pale young man in a white coat. All he lacked was an oversized net and a hunchbacked, lisping lab assistant. “You wish to see Emily Parchester? This is highly irregular. Are you a family member or merely a friend?”
“I’m her attorney. She called me to discuss matters that are confidential.” When he paled further, I went for the jugular. “The matters concern her incarceration in a certain establishment.”
“Her stay is voluntary.”
“That remains to be determined, perhaps through the auspices of our legal system. Now, if I may see my client-“
I was told that she was on the terrace, having tea. Feeling like a red-haired Joyce Davenport, I sailed out of the room and minutes later found myself with a porcelain teacup in one hand and a mushy cucumber sandwich in the other.
Miss Parchester beamed at me. “I am absolutely thrilled by your little visit, Mrs. Malloy. Although this establishment is restful, it does get a teeny bit boring. Now, what can I do to assist your investigation?”
“I still haven’t found the accounts,” I told her, suddenly remembering my appointment for that evening with Sherwood Timmons. It was out of the question now; I hoped he would realize the police might notice the two of us creeping down the hall. “Things are rather complicated at the moment, and I don’t know when I’ll be able to try to analyze the deposit slips.”
“I’m sure you’ll do your best. You’re so kind to take on this burden for me; I don’t know what I’d do without you. I’ve been so fortunate.”
Without me, she wouldn’t have visited the journalism room and dropped off her little gift in the lounge. She wouldn’t have been accused of murder. She wouldn’t have a policeman in the bushes beside her house or a supercilious lieutenant determined to arrest her at the first opportunity. I decided not to tell her how fortunate she was until I had cleared her name, along with the Judge’s and dear mamma
“You’re more than welcome,” I murmured. “I was curious about the brandied peach compote, Miss Parchester. Did you use your normal recipe?”
“I used Aunt Eulalie’s recipe, dear. It’s been in the family for years and years. The Judge always spoke highly of it.”
“And you didn’t add anything to it?” I continued, inwardly wincing at the necessity of grilling an old lady, even if it was for her own good.
“No, I followed the recipe religiously.” The faded blue eyes narrowed. “Was there something wrong with it? A funny taste or peculiar odor? The peaches were a few days old, and of course they’re not as fresh as they were when one bought them directly from the farmer who came to the house in his wagon, but-”
I interrupted to tell her as gently as I could about the lethal consequences of the compote. Her teacup shattered on the flagstone surface as she turned ashen. A cucumber sandwich fell unnoticed in her lap, and then tumbled onto her fuzzy pink slipper.
“Surely you speak in jest, Mrs. Malloy! I’ve made hundreds of gallons of my special peach compote in my life, and no one has ever accused me-accused me of-of poisoning-murdering someone with-with-oh, dear!”
She stood up, looking frail and ill. The cucumber sandwich was smashed to a white circle as she fled inside, leaving me alone on the terrace.
I popped the last bite of sandwich in my mouth and started for my car. A grim matron stopped me at the front door.
“You’re the one who upset us, aren’t you? Who are you and what did you say to us? We’re beyond coherence, and I cannot get a word out of us. We are likely to have a relapse at any moment, just when we’re beginning to become nicely dried out and calm.”
“I told us that a certain police detective thought we might have poisoned our boss with peach compote,” I explained politely. “If we have any sense at all, we’ll keep us out of sight until this thing is cleared up. We hope that we won’t have to tell anyone that we’re at Happy Meadows, but we have a low pain threshold, and they may force us to talk.”
I left her to ponder the pronouns and went to my car. When I arrived at home, it was blessedly still. I learned from a scrawled note that Caron
and Inez had gone out, destination unspecified. I heated a Lean Cuisine, painted my toenails, ate, and tried to watch television, which wasn’t easy under the best of circumstances. I was staring at a blank screen when the doorbell rang.
Peter came in, his face lined with fatigue. I gave him a glass of wine and sat down beside him. “Did we-I mean you, find any cyanide in the building?”
“We found cyanide compounds in the journalism darkroom, in the custodian’s supply closet, in the secretary’s desk to kill roaches, and in both the biology and chemistry labs. We also found a jar of rat poison in the girls’ locker room and another in the band room. And another in the art room.
“Lots of cyanide.”
“There is enough cyanide in the high school to kill off the entire student body and most of Farberville,” Peter said, sighing. “We still have a few other rooms to search, and we’ll probably find an adequate supply for the state. I thought poisons were supposed to be kept away from children.”
“I’m very sorry the murderer didn’t use some obscure South American tree sap.” I toyed with an errant curl above his ear. It never failed to distract him, and I wanted to ease him in to a more pliable frame of mind. “Have you found Miss Parchester yet?”
“No, she hasn’t come home. One of the neighbors saw her leave in a van, but had no idea what kind of van it was. We have an officer waiting at her apartment.”
I tucked my feet under me and tried to look mildly sympathetic, as opposed to extremely curious. I did not ask if the van driver had reflective lenses and the warmth of a drill sergeant. “Did you learn anything of interest in the statements?”
“With a few exceptions, everyone seemed eager to assist us. Now I am well-informed of the bell schedule and the morning class times, the procedure with blue slips, the absentee reports, the alternate bus routes on snow days, and I know more than anyone should about computerized personal grade records. I also heard about Miss Parchester’s little problem with the journalism accounts.”