Last Scene Alive at-7

by Charlaine Harris

  "Come to think of it," I said to Robin, "she's been acting funny for days. Ever since she found out that the movie people attracted the media, and Celia came into the library and actually checked out books, Patricia's been asking questions like crazy about where the filming was going to be every day, whether the movie people would be coming to the library, like that."

  "Do you think she's running from something? Maybe she knows someone on the crew," Robin said. "Someone she didn't want to recognize her?"

  I considered. "Maybe," I said. "Or maybe she was scared she'd be noticed by one of the media people here to watch the filming and do interviews."

  "Did you say anything about the film yesterday?"

  "Nope," I said. "But she practically fainted when she saw me repairing a book. As a matter of fact, it was right after that that she left the library in a mighty big hurry."

  "What was the book?"

  "It was one Celia had checked out. You know, when she came to the library after she first got to Lawrenceton. I think she was looking for me, to have a peek at me. But she thrilled Sam by taking out a library card and checking out some books to do research for her next movie."

  "The sixties-radical movie," Robin said.

  "Right. Bell-bottoms and Bombs, or something like that."

  "Can you find the book again?"

  "Sure. Let's go to the library."

  I tracked down the book in record time. It had been reshelved. I flipped it open, Robin looking over my shoulder. I turned to the picture section and began to really examine the old pictures. Lots of Afros and jeans, dashikis and beads. Peace signs. And photographs of wires and bits of hardware that were used in the making of bombs. What an incongruous blend, the philosophy of world peace, disarmament, and the construction of bombs to blow a hole in the consciousness of middle America.

  The next picture was of a group of radicals at some rally. Right to left, read the caption, suspected bomb makers Joanne Cheney, Ralph "Coco" Defarge, his teenage sister Anita, Maxwell Brand, and Barbara "Africa" Palley.

  "Anything ring a bell?" Robin asked in my ear, making me twitch.

  "No. Yes," I said suddenly. I put my index finger on the picture of the radicals. "Look at the little sister."

  "I never met Patricia Bledsoe," Robin reminded me.

  "This is her," I said breathlessly. "Oh my God. Patricia the perfect helped her big brother make bombs in the sixties." I had to put my hands over my mouth to stifle a totally inappropriate laugh. Patricia, the rigorously traditional woman whose middle name was conservative! Patricia, who wouldn't even let her son wear Nike! "This is just going to kill Sam derrick," I said, suppressing a snort with great difficulty.

  "This is funny, how?" Robin asked.

  I tried to explain.

  "Are you going to tell someone?" he asked.

  "I have to, don't I?" I asked. "Don't I have to tell someone? She obviously picked up and ran because she thought I'd smoked her out. It couldn't have been further from the truth. If she'd just stayed put, I'd never have known."

  "All the way back in the sixties," Robin said gently.

  "Yeah, I know," I said, reluctant to debate my duty. "I have a lot of sympathy for her, even if she was the biggest pain in the patootie I've ever encountered. Except maybe Sam himself. But you know—if she did help build that bomb—I'm not trying to be Rhonda Righteous, but a security guard got killed, Robin. Besides, obviously Patricia was panicked by the idea of Celia seeing this picture and noticing the likeness, just like we did. What if Patricia somehow made her way onto the set and killed Celia, thinking Celia had spotted her and was going to tell?"

  "Can't take that lightly," he agreed. "Will you tell Sam?"

  "Oh, you bet," I said instantly. Then I reconsidered. "At least about our suspecting she's Anita Defarge."

  "Not about her connection with Celia?"

  "I know the papers this morning said it would have been easy for someone to have sneaked up to her trailer and killed her because there were a lot of people around. I just don't see it happening," I said. "Do you agree? There were a lot of people, but none of them looked or dressed like Patricia. And Celia had never talked to her, that I know of. They'd just glimpsed each other when Sam gave Celia a tour of the library. Wouldn't Celia have raised a fuss if someone she didn't know entered her trailer? She wouldn't have just sat there and waited for something bad to happen."

  "I agree, for the most part," Robin said. "Just mention the fact you're most sure of; that the picture looks like his secretary."

  "That's what I'll do," I said resolutely. I folded immediately. "In fact, maybe I'll leave calling the police up to him."

  Robin waited out in the employee break room while I went in to Sam's office and broke the news. The fluorescent lights glinted off Sam's thick glasses as he looked hopelessly down at the black-and-white picture. "She was so great," he all but whimpered. "She took all my calls. I never had to talk to anybody. She understood the paperwork. She was never late. She was never sick. Her son was respectful and quiet."

  "I'm sorry, Sam," I said as gently as I could. "I'll just leave it up to you what to do."

  "Oh, there's no doubt about what to do," he said gloomily. "She may have been on the run all these years, always looking over her shoulder. And with the boy, too—I wonder what she told him. But I have to call the FBI. That's the law, and I have to uphold the law."

  I felt like a second-class moral citizen compared to Sam's straightforward conviction. It must be wonderful to always know what was right to do.

  At the back of my mind, I kept hoping that Patricia would walk in with some explanation of where she'd been and what she'd been doing. It wouldn't take much to satisfy Sam. If she just said, "What coincidence, that girl looks like a young me," that would probably do it. But the combined evidence of the flight and the picture—well, at least that should be investigated.

  With a grim face, Sam picked up his phone to call the local police. He said, "I guess they can give me the right number to call." Then he put the phone back on its cradle. "But you know... maybe I don't have to call right now. After all, she still might show up. Maybe there's a sick relative she had to visit."

  Maybe there was an elephant in my locker. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. "Excuse me, Sam," I said. "I'll leave. You do what you think is right."

  "Aren't you supposed to come in for the afternoon?"

  "Yes."

  "Then I'll see you later."

  No "thank you," no "I appreciate it." Well, that was Sam. No people skills.

  Robin was still waiting for me. He opened his mouth to ask a question, but I lifted a finger to my lips. When we were safely out in the parking lot, I told him what had transpired. He shook his head doubtfully, but agreed that Sam should be the one to make the phone call that would set law enforcement on Patricia's—Anita's—trail.

  I had two hours before I was due back at the library, and we trailed over to Mother's office to sign some paperwork.

  Mother greeted Robin quite matter-of-factly, but she was not overwhelmingly friendly, even when he asked her to find him a modest rental. She looked relieved, but not enthralled. She'd have to have warm-up time, I guessed. I wasn't going to push it.

  My mother saw Robin as a potential threat to my peace of mind, a possible dumper of her vulnerable daughter, the potential dumpee. His fame and fortune made no difference at all to her. But a couple of the other realtors were more impressed. I thought Patty Cloud, now a partner and divorced twice, was going to come clean across her desk and tackle Robin, she was so enraptured with having a real celebrity in the office. She made a determined attempt to impress him with her attractiveness and her business acumen, and I was pleased to see that she didn't make a dent. Patty had always played one-up with me—a one-sided game, since I had never had a competitive bone in my body. I hoped Patty had gotten something out of it, because it had never made a bit of difference to me.

  "I'll be glad to take you around town, get you set up with th
e bank and a dry cleaner and so forth," she offered, her eyes gleaming. Robin reached over to take my hand, very casually. "Roe is taking care of me," he said. Patty's face was just wonderful. She could think of about twelve bitchy things to say, but she couldn't, because, after all, I was the boss's daughter.

  "Thanks," I said, when we were returning to my car.

  He knew full well what I meant, but he just smiled his crooked smile. "It was my pleasure," he said, wiggling his eyebrows, and I laughed out loud.

  He went back to his motel room to work, and I went home to make phone calls. Mother had worked it so I could move out of this house and into the house on McBride in a week. I called a company on the outskirts of Atlanta, made a definite date for them to come pack up this house on one day, and move the contents to the new place the next. It only cost me an arm and a leg and one kidney. I tried to ignore the stab of pain I felt as I thought of leaving this house empty. I tried instead to focus on the incoming family, with their son who would love living out in the country. He might make friends with my neighbor's dog Robert. Maybe Robert would stop his nighttime howling when the new family moved in. Speaking of Robert, he was doing some daytime howling now.

  As I was pulling on some nicer pants to wear to work, I thought I heard a noise downstairs. I stopped breathing to listen better, while my fingers automatically pushed the button through the hole. I took some silent steps to the top of the stairs and listened. There it was again, a step in the hall.

  I knew it was not Robin or my mother or anyone who had a reason to be there. I thought of Tracy, her angry face, and I stepped back into the bedroom and lifted the phone. I heard a familiar beep beep beep—somewhere downstairs, a receiver was off the hook. I needed my cell phone.

  It was in my purse, which was on the counter in the kitchen downstairs.

  "Aurora!" called a familiar voice from downstairs.

  My breath gushed out in a sigh of sheer relief. Catherine Quick. It was her afternoon. Oh, thank God.

  "Catherine," I called, trotting down the stairs, half-angry and half delighted, "why did you come in so quiet? You could tell I was home."

  I came into the kitchen to get yet another shock. Tracy, Robin's biggest fan, was holding a knife to Catherine's neck.

  "Oh," I said quietly. "Oh."

  Catherine's face was contorted with fear, and tears were running down her cheeks. I didn't blame her. The knife Tracy was gripping was a Swiss Army type thing, as far as I could tell—not a butcher knife, or a Bowie knife. But the blade looked plenty long enough to penetrate a vital area. It would never make it through airport security, for example, I told myself crazily. My thoughts were trying to escape from the here and now.

  "You ruined it," Tracy said. "He was just on the verge, I could tell! He was just on the verge of asking me out."

  "You're right," I said instantly. She had to be made to let go of Catherine. That Catherine should be involved in this at all was simply atrocious. Catherine was in her sixties, had high blood pressure, and should not be subjected to this deranged woman.

  Of course, I shouldn't be, either.

  My purse was on the counter, right by the side door, where I had a habit of dropping it. Tracy, her auburn hair falling in snakes around her head, was between my purse and me.

  "Did you kill Celia?" I asked, before I thought. Obviously.

  She laughed. "I hit her with the statue. She earned her own death."

  "But she was already dead," I said, compounding my error.

  "She was asleep," said Tracy, frowning. Her face was dirty. She was a far cry from the spic-and-span food provider in her spotless white, the woman I'd met such a few days ago. Could people really crumble that quickly?

  "Right," I said hastily. Tracy wanted to take credit for Celia. And if I lived, I'd be glad to tell the police she'd done her best to kill Celia. It was just that someone had beaten her to it.

  "For months, I've been planning this," Tracy said.

  "Planning... ?"

  "Meeting Robin Crusoe. Getting him to love me. Ever since I saw the picture on his Web site."

  It was news to me that Robin had a Web site. "Which picture? The picture of Robin and Celia at the Emmys?"

  "Yes, right when it first came out. Did you notice the way she was ignoring him? She didn't even care that she was out with a brilliant writer. She's a slut; there's a million actresses in the world who can do what she does. But Robin's a writer in million. I've read every single book he's ever written. Ten times apiece, I bet!" Her face was soft and dreamy, but the knife looked just as sharp. "I've got every short story, in every language. I've got every interview, on-line and in print."

  "You probably know more about Robin than I'll ever know." I was quite willing to concede that. I edged a little forward and to one side. The kitchen table was no longer between us, which I regretted, but I was a little closer to the cell phone.

  "You're damn straight I do. So what are you doing going to bed with him?"

  It was dumb to be embarrassed in front of Catherine, but I was. As if she cared, at this point. "How do you know what I'm doing?" I asked instead.

  "I was in the backyard of your new house this morning," she said, so choked with fury I was terrified all over again.

  It made me sick to think of her watching Robin and me. I also felt a little surprised she hadn't broken in on us then.

  "He wouldn't like me if he saw me kill you," she said, as if she'd heard my thoughts.

  "No, he wouldn't." Let's make that perfectly clear.

  "But then, if no one finds out, I would get to comfort him when you die."

  Okay, so this wasn't getting any better. "Don't you think Robin would know?" I asked.

  "He doesn't know about Celia." She looked smug.

  "He went to the police, to tell them he suspected you."

  I didn't know if saying that was smart or not, but to tell the truth, I needed to find something that worked, and in a hurry.

  "Did he really? But I did it for him." She looked more than a little confused. "I'm glad I didn't go back home last night. I got a room in the motel where he's staying. I couldn't get a room on the same floor, because all the movie people are taking up that floor, but I got a room right below him." She sighed. "I lay awake all night, thinking about him."

  Hoo, boy. This gal would be spending some time in the loony bin, for sure. I had eased more than a foot closer during her meanderings.

  "He's very attractive," I said sincerely, "but I'll bet you need some sleep."

  "I can't sleep," she told me, sounding peeved about it. "I just keep waking up. And I know he's there, just out of reach. I need him. I deserve him." She gestured with the knife, and Catherine made a strangled sound.

  "And I'm gonna have him," Tracy said quietly.

  Quick as a wink, she shoved Catherine to one side and lunged for me with the knife.

  Even in those few short minutes, I'd accepted a status quo, and the sudden change in threat caught me off guard. Catherine went reeling across the kitchen, and I yelled, "The phone! It's in my purse!" before Tracy grabbed me by the hair and began trying to stab me. I screamed and ducked, and she missed me with her first attempt. My scalp stung with the pull on my hair. She swung again, and this time she cut me below my shoulder. My knees folded from the shock of it.

  The blood was immediate and it distracted her long enough for me to yank away from her—leaving her in possession of a handful of my hair—and drop to the floor. I rolled under the kitchen table, knocking the chairs out of the way. She staggered a little as a chair rocked against her and then fell to the floor with a huge clatter. She was still trying to get her balance. Without any planning on my part, my hands shot out from under the table to grab Tracy's ankles, and I yanked with all my strength. Down she crashed, with a shriek of her own, and then she gave a low moan and lay still.

  After a long, shocked second of watching Tracy's blood flow onto my kitchen floor, I realized she'd fallen on her knife. I backed out from under the
table so I'd be on the other side. I pelted out of that kitchen so fast I don't think my feet hit the steps down to the walkway. Catherine was outside, already talking to the dispatcher, though she was almost incoherent with shock.

  "Where is she?" Catherine screamed.

  "She's hurt, she's on the floor!"

  "Oh my Lord! Did you hear that?" she demanded, and I heard the raised voice on the other end of the line.

  "I have to go now, she might get up," Catherine said. She turned off the phone. But she managed to tell me the cops were on the way, and she helped me scramble into her car. We locked the doors while we waited.

  We had about three minutes before the police could get there, and at first we didn't say a word to each, being occupied with important things like breathing and praying.

  Oh, and I was bleeding. Catherine grabbed a kitchen towel from a basket of wash in the backseat and folded it into a pad, and I pressed it to my wound. Finally, when our gasps were down to pants, Catherine said, "I didn't have any choice but to bring her in, Aurora. She held that knife on me, and I just thought about my kids and grandkids, and I let her in with my key."

  "I don't blame you one bit," I said sincerely. "I would have done the same thing."

  "I tried to make a little noise," Catherine said. "To warn you. As much as I could."

  "Thank you. At least I suspected something was wrong when I came down the stairs."

  "Praise God we lived through that," Catherine said, sounding surprised by the fact.

  "I don't know if she did," I said in a small voice. "I think she hurt herself pretty bad, falling on that knife."

  "I know I will have to pray God for forgiveness, but right now, I just don't give a damn."

  "Actually, I vote along with you," I said.

  "Can't you stay out of trouble?" bellowed the new sheriff as he drew his gun and eased up to the side of the house. I rolled down the window to point at the open kitchen door, as if Sheriff Coffey couldn't see it himself.