Howie Murchison, Tom Peterson, and Elmer Henry ranged themselves in front of the stool. Esther dragged Mavis unceremoniously in front of them, shoved her head forward into a bowed and penitent attitude, then spoke earnestly to her. She stepped back, raised both arms, and dropped them.
"Take One!" she shouted.
"Are they filming this?" said Edward.
"Oh, no," said Quill cheerfully. "Esther sent away for a PBS videotape on directors' techniques. The Chamber argued for months about paying for it."
"Did they pay?" asked Edward, clearly fascinated.
"No. Marge said she'd tell Esther what to do for free."
"I ACCUSE!" roared Elmer Henry suddenly.
Mrs. Hallenbeck jumped.
"It's just the play," said Quill. "There's a whole bunch of `accuses.' "
"I ACCUSE GOODY MARTIN OF THESE WILLFUL AND SATANIC ACTS !" Elmer hollered again. "THE DEATH ! OF MY GOOD MILCH COW! THE SICKENING AND DISEASE OF MY FLOCK OF HENS !"
"Crowd!" demanded Esther authoritatively. "The chorus, please!"
The crowd consisted of the eighteen Chamber members who didn't have major speaking parts. Quill noticed Keith Baumer had insinuated himself into the group.
Mumblings indicated the crowd was confused. Esther circulated briefly, issuing instructions, then stepped aside. "Take Two!"
"I ACCUSE!" roared Elmer, and recounted the death of several chickens, ducks, and sundry hogs.
"Crowd!" shouted Esther imperatively.
"Sink or swim! Sink or swim!" the crowd roared.
Mavis flung her hands over her head and fell to the ground with a thud. "As God is my witness! I'll never be hungry again!" Mavis shrieked dramatically.
Esther threw her script to the ground, hauled Mavis up by the collar of the print dress, and shook her finger in her face. "Take Three!" she said in loud disgust.
Elmer, Tom, and Howie declaimed in turn about the demise of their livestock. The crowd yelled "Sink or swim" until it was hoarse. With a defiant shake of her head at Esther, Mavis prostrated herself in front of her accusers and cried, "As God is my witness... I am innocent!"
"She got the line right this time," said Quill. , The "judge" - Gil in a black cloak, a tricorne hat, and a ruffled shirt - handed Mavis over for trial.
"Of course," Edward observed with a mischievous glance at Quill. "The French costumes. So much more attractive than those staid Pilgrims."
Screaming enthusiastically, Mavis was dragged to the ducking stool, roped in, and swung aloft. The front loader flipped forward, and Mavis slid into the pond. She emerged and swam to shore to loud applause.
"They go to the pavilion and have the trial next," said Quill.
"What happens there?" asked Edward.
"Well, she's tried. Convicted. There's this speech. Elmer comes out from behind the fence with a horse-drawn sledge and she's drawn off on it just long enough to substitute a dummy. The sledge comes back with a hooded dummy on it - they believed witches could hypnotize you to hell with their eyes. There's a procession to the foot of that statue of General Hemlock, and then a bunch of guys lower a barn door onto the dummy and the crowd piles stones on it."
"My goodness!" said Mrs. Hallenbeck. "The violence of these Pilgrims."
"Straight out of a Shirley Jackson story," muttered Edward. Gil, his arm around a laughing Mavis, broke away from the crowd at the pond and headed toward them. Keith Baumer and Marge followed them like hopeful puppies.
"You're soaking wet, Mavis," said Mrs. Hallenbeck. "You should change."
"Don't worry your little ol' head about me," said Mavis with a broad smile. "So. What d'yall think?"
"You were marvelous," said Quill promptly. "It's going beautifully. If you don't mind, I'm going to take Mrs. Hallenbeck back to the Inn. I've got a lot of work backed up."
"Oh, we'll take care of Mrs. Hallenbeck," said Gil. He swept his tricorne off his head with a flourish. "Ma'am? Mavis has told me all about you. I'm eager to make your acquaintance. Mavis here suggested we take you down to the pavilion so you can watch the rest of the play. Then we're going along to Marge's diner for a bite of supper-Keith, Marge, Mavis, and me."
Mavis batted her eyelashes at Edward. "Why don't you come along, too?" She smoothed her print dress over her hips. "I am just dyin' to hear what you think of the rest of it. And Amelia? You're going to love Gil, here. I have to tell you he reminds me a lot of your late husband, good man that he was." She smiled even more broadly at Quill. "Now, what's that worried frown for? I've been taking care of this lady for a good many years now. She's in good hands, Miss Quilliam."
Quill, walking back to the Inn alone, had begun to doubt that very much.
"It's not that I have anything to go on other than this feeling, Myles," she said to him over a late dinner. "There's just something odd about Mavis."
"What, exactly?"
"The first day she was here, she was - I don't know. I thought. This poor woman is completely under Mrs. Hallenbeck's thumb. I even thought how awful her life must be, at this dreadful old woman's beck and call. But now..." She moved the salt and pepper shakers a little closer to the sugar bowl, then back again. The dining room was quiet. Most of the staff had gone home.
"Now, what?"
"Mrs. Hallenbeck isn't dreadful - just pathetic and lonely. And I don't think it's the Valium that's making Mavis so..."
"Slutty?" suggested Myles.
"... she's just like that!"
"Sheriffl" Davey Kiddermeister rapped at the dining room door and walked in. The youngest of the uniformed officers on Myles's force, his normally ruddy face was pale. "Sheriff? Gil Gilmeister's dead. They found him drowned over to the duck pond. Where the play was on this afternoon. He and Marge and a couple of guests from the Inn were at the Croh Bar. Guess they were getting into the booze pretty good."
"Dammit!" said Myles. He rose in a single powerful movement. "Quill. You stay here, understand me? I don't want you meddling."
Quill, a little numb with shock, followed them out the door.
-5-
Davey raced ahead to set up the floodlights. Following Myles to the duck pond, Quill saw that the moon was a ghostly galleon riding the wine-dark sea. Bess, the landlord's daughter, she told herself in justification, would have been a lot better off if she'd done something rather than hanging out the Inn window fiddling with her hair.
"Myles."
Myles didn't bother to turn around, but threw over his shoulder, "Back to the Inn, Quill."
"T-lot t-lot to you, too," she muttered, jogging behind him. Then aloud, "If nothing else, I can see that the rescue team gets coffee."
The red lights of the ambulance spun wildly, bouncing off the cars and pickup trucks already jamming the small parking lot. Most of the onlookers were patrons-in-residence at the Croh Bar. Situated directly across from the Volunteer Firemens' garage, the bar acted as a kind of holding pen for rubberneckers.
There was a shout. The floodlights switched on. Quill stopped, dismayed. Gil's body lay face-down on the grass beside the pond, the ducking stool twisting slowly above him. Mavis and Marge, both soaking wet, huddled near the body. Keith Baumer was nowhere in sight. There was a short silence as Myles approached, then a babble of voices.
"Who pulled him out?" asked Myles. Davey jerked his thumb at Marge.
"Andy Bishop here?" Myles crouched by the body.
"He's on his way, Sheriff," somebody called from the crowd.
Myles took a pen from his shirt pocket and pushed Gil's rocked-up shirt collar aside. Quill peered over his shoulder. There was a gash in the back of Gil' s head. The water had washed it clean, and the purple lips gaped at Quill.
"Davey, I need a hand here." Myles grasped the body's shoulders, Davey the feet, and the two men turned Gil over.
Quill had never seen a drowning before; one look at the blue face, the foam at nostrils and mouth, and she turned quickly away. Myles cleared the area around the body with a few sharp words. Quill backed up, then walked around
the fence that concealed Harland Peterson's John Deere tractor. It crouched like a metal Arnold Schwarzenegger, arms holding the front loader extending over the top of the fence. The front loader itself hung at a sharp angle, one end dangling free of the metal arm. Quill stood on tiptoe. The heavy shovel had worked loose. Partially dried blood glistened on the edge. Quill squinted at it in the glare of the floodlights. Blood, hair, and what may have been a bit of bone.
"Gotta close this off, Ms. Quill," said Davey.
"Where's the bolt?" asked Quill.
"Ma'am?"
"The bolt that held the front loader to the tractor arm."
Davey shrugged. "Into the river, maybe? It'd be swept away for sure. Sheriff wants to know if you could see to Mrs. Collinwood and Marge."
Marge and Mavis huddled under a blanket marked "Hemlock Falls Volunteer Ambulance." Quill sat down in the grass next to them and folded her arms around 'her knees. "You guys all right?" she asked. "Can I get you some hot coffee or anything?"
Marge snorted.
"What happened?"
Mavis began to cry. Marge herself was weeping silently, and impulsively, Quill put her arm around her.
"We were just practicin'," wailed Mavis, "for the play. Just foolin' around. I swear I never dreamed this was gonna happen."
"And Gil sat in the ducking stool?"
Mavis gave a gigantic sniff. "He was saying my lines. Jus' jokin'. Hopped in the stool, and the next thing happened was that big ol' shovel came right down on his head. He fell into the pond and we went to drag him out, but we couldn't find him. Marge here kept going under water and pokin' around" - a convulsive shudder shook her - "and his arm or somethin' brushed my leg and I screamed."
"Was Keith Baumer with you?" asked Quill.
"Him," said Marge with contempt. "Took off like a scalded cat. I pulled Gil out, tried CPR. Didn't work. Mavis here called the ambulance from the pay phone."
A brand new white Corvette screamed into the parking lot and came to a screeching halt. The passenger door slammed, and a tall, skinny woman with bleached blond hair walked toward the body. Tom Peterson got out from the driver's side.
"Shit," said Marge. "Tom Peterson's brought ol' Nadine."
"Nadine is Gil's wife," said Quill in response to Mavis' bewilderment, "and Tom's her brother." And Marge is Gil's girlfriend, she said silently. "Maybe you two ought to come back to the Inn with me."
"Too late," said Marge practically. "Here she comes, and Tom with her."
Years of up-and-down dieting, combined with a permanent, free-floating discontent, had not been especially kind to Nadine Gilmeister's face. Quill noted with interest that her makeup was freshly applied, and her hair as elaborately styled as ever. It was after midnight, at a time when only innkeepers and late-night partiers were in street clothes, but Nadine had taken the time to put on a newly dry-cleaned jumpsuit. Although, Quill saw, at least she'd been upset enough to forget to remove the cleaner's tag from the collar.
Tom held Nadine's arm, greeted Quill with a nicely balanced degree of calm and concern, then said, "I was watching a videotape when I saw the ambulance light. I walked over here, and thought I'd better go get Nadine."
"Susan isn't home?" asked Quill.
"No. It's her bridge night. I think I can handle Nadine- but I may need to call on you, Quill."
"So this supposed rehearsal and business meeting was with you, Marge Schmidt," Nadine said.
"You know darn well it was, Nadine. We was both there when he called you."
"Both?"
Marge indicated the sodden Mavis. "Mavis. This is Gil's wife, Mavis."
Mavis, still crying, said, "The one runnin' the poor soul into debt?"
"How dare you!" shrieked Nadine. "And my poor Gillying there dead as a doornail."
Tom looked nervously at Quill. "A pretty well-insured doornail," said Marge. "Which is good for you, on account of he owes me a pile of money."
"Can you believe this woman?" Nadine addressed the stars. "I am standing right here and I cannot believe my ears. The man's not yet cold."
Marge glared up at her, then rose menacingly. "He'll never be as cold dead as you are living, Nadine Gilmeister." She took a deep breath.
Gil's relationship with Marge, as yet unacknowledged by either wife or girlfriend, appeared to be the next item on the agenda. Quill, sensing ill will, if not the potential for outright violence, stepped forward to take a hand.
"What is this dreadful noise!" demanded a familiar voice. "What has happened here? Mavis! Why in the world are you dressed in those wet clothes?" Mrs. Hallenbeck trotted out of the darkness, well-wrapped against the evening air in a plaid Pendleton bathrobe.
"What're you doin' here, Amelia?" asked Mavis sourly.
"If I may remind you, both our rooms overlook this view. The emergency vehicle lights wakened me. I knocked on your door. There was no answer. I deduced that you must be down here. What has happened?"
"Mrs. Hallenbeck." The authority in her own voice surprised Quill. She would have to practice more. "I want you and Mavis to come with me. Marge, I think you should check with the sheriff to see if you can go home now.
Nadine, I am so very sorry for your loss."
"Let's go, Nadine," said Tom. "You'll want to ride with... er... to the hospital."
Nadine glared at Marge. "The ambulance's waiting on me," she said. "I'll leave you to later, Marge Schmidt."
Marge took herself glumly off. Quill walked Mavis and Mrs. Hallenbeck back to the Inn.
Most of the Inn's guests had crowded into the lobby, and when Quill shepherded the widows in the front door, they volleyed questions. Meg, John, and Doreen were dressed, all three prepared to offer assistance. "But John said to stay here in case we had to evacuate or save the silver or something," said Meg. "What happened?"
Quill explained there'd been a drowning. The orthodontist's wife clutched her youngest offspring, an unprepossessing ten-year-old, and wanted to know if the Inn was all that safe for children. The orthodontist cleared his throat portentiously and said, as a medical man, he'd be glad to help if the accident had anything to do with teeth, gums specifically. Quill, engulfed in waves of tiredness from a second disturbed night's sleep, told everybody to please go to bed, and that breakfast in the morning would be on the house.
Keith Baumer, who'd apparently headed straight for the safety of the Inn's bar, volunteered to take the widows to their rooms. Edward Lancashire offered instead. Mavis, dimpling at them, said, "I swan!" with what she clearly thought was a delightful giggle. Mrs. Hallenbeck clutched Quill's arm and demanded that Quill see her to her room. "You must have some tea sent up, my dear, and we can have a nice, long talk."
"Quill's got an inn to run," said John. "I'll take you up, Mrs. Hallenbeck."
"Absolutely not!" said Mrs. Hallenbeck. "That is an intolerable suggestion! Quill, you will come up to my room at once."
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Hallenbeck," said Quill, "but I have my responsibilities here."
Keith Baumer, loud in confused explanations of why he had left the scene of the accident, escorted Mavis and Mrs. Hallenbeck upstairs.
Meg, after a close look at her sister's face, marched her into the kitchen and poured her a double brandy. John and Doreen trailed after them.
"What I don't understand is why the heck it took so long to pull Gil out of the pond," said Meg. "It's not that deep."
"Drink is the opiate of the masses;" said Doreen, apropos of nothing.
"You're mixing up Marx with the Victorians," said Meg briskly. "And what do you mean, 'drink'? If this religious stuff you've come back from vacation with is teetotal, you can just forget it. Nobody wants you charging the bar and whacking the boozers with your mop."
"If Jesus turned water into wine for the Kennedys, then he blesses those that take a nip, on occasion," said Doreen loftily. She poured a hefty belt from the brandy bottle into a coffee cup. "What I meant is, those three was down to Croh's after, eatin' at Marge's."
"Real-ly?
" said Meg with interest. "Probably to help them forget what they'd had for dinner. But were they soused, you think?"
"I saw them," John volunteered. "I'd say half the town did. They were knocking them back."
"You were at Croh's?" said Meg. "Is that what you do on your nights off? I've never seen you take a drink here, John - not in all the months you've been here."
"Meg," warned Quill, "give it a rest."
"Eternal rest," mused Doreen, "rocked in the Everlasting arms."
A Taste For Murder hf-1 Page 7