For Whom the Book Tolls

by Laura Gail Black

  “Sure.” Rita gestured toward a nearby cabinet. “Pick what tea you want.”

  I opened the cabinet door to an array of boxes and tins. Herbal teas, black teas, and green teas sat neatly arranged on the shelves. “Wow. That’s a lot of tea.” I scanned the boxes for something that looked familiar, but no Lipton or Red Diamond tea sat among the many boxes.

  Rita chuckled and stepped up beside me. “Sorry. I forget sometimes that not everyone drinks tea.” She reached past me to grab a box of jasmine green tea. “You’ll like this one.”

  She flipped open the box and pulled out a couple of tea bags, dropping them into lavender mugs before pouring boiling water over them. Once the tea was steeping, we moved to the couch.

  “I’m sorry about your uncle. He was a good man.” Rita picked up her mug and dunked her tea bag a few times.

  “Thanks. I hadn’t seen him in a long time.” I blew across the top of my mug. “Uncle Paul was married to my mother’s older sister. We visited a few times when I was little, but they usually came to our house in Charlotte for holidays before Aunt Irene died.”

  “What do you do in Charlotte?” Rita propped her feet on the coffee table and crossed her ankles.

  My stomach tightened, and I clenched my fists around the steaming mug, oblivious to the heat. I took a deep breath and internally counted to ten, forcing my voice into a polite tone. She must not have seen the news. “Nothing right now. I worked for a marketing company in the finance department until recently.”

  Rita grimaced. “I saw the news story.”

  There went that theory. “Oh.” I dunked my tea bag, giving my hands something to do while I tried to come up with a polite response.

  “Did you do it?” Her soft question didn’t hold the accusatory tone I had become accustomed to hearing.

  I looked up into green eyes that held compassion and openness. “No. I didn’t. Not in Charlotte, and not here.”

  She held me in her intense gaze for a few moments, then nodded once. “Good enough for me.”

  My chest squeezed. Other than my parents, this was the first person who had seemed to completely believe me, and she was a veritable stranger. “It’s that simple?”

  A wide grin crossed her face. “It’s that simple. I have a good instinct for people, and my gut tells me you’re one of the good ones.”

  Tears filled my eyes, and she held out the tissue box. Frustrated that I was becoming a regular waterworks, I set my mug down and gratefully took one, wiping my eyes and blowing my nose before wadding the tissue into my hand and picking up my mug.

  “When you’re ready to talk about it, I’ll be here. I’ve been told I’m a good listener.” She smiled at me again.

  “Thanks.” I nodded. “Right now, I don’t want to discuss it. Maybe one day.”

  Rita stood. “Then you shouldn’t have to. I’m going to get another mug of tea. Want one?”

  I hadn’t even sipped the one I had, as it hadn’t yet cooled enough to drink. She must have sucked down the boiling-hot liquid while I stared moodily into my own mug.

  “No thanks. I’m still good.”

  When she returned, she plopped down on the couch and again propped her feet on the coffee table. “Maybe you could try your hand at selling books. Paul’s store, messy as it is, has always been successful.”

  “I’m considering it.” I swallowed the lump that had risen in the back of my throat and returned the smile, hoping it looked more genuine than it felt. “But I’m not sure how well I’d do, considering I’ve now been painted as a murderess who came here to kill my uncle.”

  Rita chuckled. “Honestly, I think the people here might surprise you. Give them time. It’ll be a lot easier once they figure out what happened and, if he was murdered, catch the person who did it.”

  “Maybe.” I glanced around the neat apartment and changed the subject, heading off any more discussion about my notoriety. “Did these apartments come furnished? It looks a lot like what Uncle Paul has—had—in his apartment.”

  A trill of laughter echoed in the large space. “What you see here is my lack of decorating creativity. I saw what Irene had done, and I copied the style. I’ve always liked retro, although it wasn’t retro when Irene picked theirs out.” Rita took her tea bag out and placed it on a small saucer. “She had an incredible eye. When she passed, Paul never changed anything. I don’t think she meant for it to all stay the same, but Paul always had excuses. Time, money, or simply that he just liked it and didn’t feel like changing.”

  “Sort of a memorial to her, I guess.” I sipped my tea and scorched my tongue. How had she already finished off a mug this hot? I blew on it more, letting the repetitive breathing settle my nerves.

  “Exactly.” Rita put down her mug. “He really loved her. He did date some, but he never remarried. Although I think he might have, if he had found someone who could measure up to what he and Irene had together.”

  A soft smile tugged at the corners of my mouth. “I remember them. Aunt Irene was really kooky sometimes, but she was also very sweet. She and Uncle Paul were always hugging or kissing or holding hands. It seemed really sappy.” I blew across the tea again.

  Rita tucked her feet under her. “How old were you when your aunt passed away?”

  “Seventeen. It was the summer before my senior year in high school.”

  “And you didn’t see Paul after that?”

  “No. He needed to get past the pain of losing Aunt Irene, and seeing Mom, who looked so much like her, was too much. It took a couple of years before he visited again. By that time, I was in college and was too busy to come home regularly. After college, life got in the way. I kept putting off making time to come see him. Now it’s too late.” I stared into my tea mug, lost in regret.

  “I’m sure it meant a lot to him that you came to see him now.”

  I shook my head. “I never got to see him.” That familiar lump rose in my throat again, and I took another scorching swig of tea to push it down.

  “What happened?” Rita blew her nose and tossed the tissue into the wastebasket under the end table.

  “After everything in Charlotte, I had nowhere to go.” I leaned forward, planting my elbows on my knees and ducking my head. “Uncle Paul emailed me a few days ago and offered for me to come stay with him for a while. He even joked that I couldn’t use being busy at work as an excuse this time.”

  Rita laughed loudly. “Yep, that sounds like Paul. So, what happened?”

  I shrugged. “He’d told me where the key was, and when I got into town around two AM, I let myself in and went to bed. I found him the next morning.”

  A low whistle left her lips. “That’s rough.”

  “Yeah.” I shuddered at the memory of the distorted body at the bottom of the spiral stairs. “I never got to fully reconnect with him. Now I’ll never get to.”

  Rita leaned over and touched my shoulder. “It seems that didn’t matter to him after all. You were still obviously important to him.”

  “Yes,” I agreed softly. “I guess you’re right.” I drew a ragged breath. “He left me everything in some sort of trust, and I can’t even say thank-you.”

  Rita scooted closer and put her arm around my shoulders for a quick side squeeze, and I realized that hug was the best hug I’d had in a long time. Maybe the only hug I’d had for months. It was heavenly.

  Before the maudlin-mixed-with-grateful thoughts could bring the frustrating lump back to my throat, I sucked down more tea, scorching myself again. At this rate, I wouldn’t have much of a throat left.

  “It’s nice you can remember them, though. I only knew Irene through Paul’s stories.” Rita scooted back to her end of the couch, picked up her mug, and sipped her tea with a faraway look. She must be one of those people who could pour coffee straight out of a pot and guzzle it. Ouch!

  “You sound like you knew Uncle Paul pretty well,” I ventured.

  “Yes, Paul and I dated for a bit about four years ago.” Rita finished off her
tea and set the mug on the table. “We got along wonderfully when we weren’t dating. But after we started to go out, it became apparent to us both that we didn’t suit each other.”

  “Why not?” I ignored my mother’s voice in my head admonishing me for prying. I figured I was allowed to pry a bit in order to gain information about Uncle Paul and his possible murder. At least I tried to convince myself that was my reason.

  “First, he was much older than I was. I know age shouldn’t matter, but I was forty-six, and he was sixty. When you get older, you start to slow down a bit, and Paul wanted to be a lot slower than I did. I wanted to go and do and see, and Paul wanted to sit and talk and play games and work puzzles. Second, Paul wanted a homebody like his Irene. I’m simply not that person. I love to travel and learn new things, and I only garden and do housework when absolutely necessary.”

  I laughed. “We’ll definitely get along. I hate housework too, much to my mother’s disappointment. I think she secretly channels Martha Stewart.”

  My tea had finally cooled enough to drink comfortably, and I swallowed the last of it, got up, put my mug in the kitchen sink, and returned to the living room. “I should probably leave. I need to take care of a few things next door.” I didn’t really. I just dreaded walking into Uncle Paul’s space, knowing he would never greet me there. But I didn’t want to overstay my welcome at my new neighbor’s house.

  Rita followed me to the front door. “Where are you staying?”

  I tilted my head in the direction of the other unit. “Right next door. It makes better sense to stay there than in a hotel, since I own it now.”

  Rita opened her door. “Well, good to know. I would’ve worried, seeing a stranger going in and out without knowing you were supposed to be there.”

  I stepped out the door. “Now you won’t have to call nine-one-one.” I plastered what I hoped looked like a relaxed smile on my face as she closed the door. No need to make her worry about my state of mind.

  The rain had stopped during our visit, and I took the chance to grab my bags from the car. The trek to the parking lot gave me a few minutes to gather my emotions over entering Uncle Paul’s loft. I had avoidance down to an art form these days.

  Knowing I would be given the keys to the business and loft when I met with Horace Grimes, I had checked out of the motel and loaded everything into my car. It didn’t make sense to waste money on an uncomfortable motel bed when I now owned a home. I slung both bags over my shoulders, grabbed my jacket from the back seat, and draped my favorite blanket over my arm. Taking a deep, steadying breath, I locked the car, turned, and marched toward the apartment, determined not to chicken out and head back to the motel.

  Tamping down the feelings of grief, I strode into the apartment and stopped. I looked toward Uncle Paul’s room. A lump rose in my throat again. I gritted my teeth. This was what Uncle Paul wanted for me. I wasn’t an interloper, thief, bottom-feeder, or any of the other derogatory names my stressed-out brain tried to paint on my back. I swallowed the lump and walked to the spare bedroom. It was just too soon to take over the master.

  My bags dropped onto the bed, and I unzipped them, ready to unpack and at least attempt to feel like I belonged here. Without allowing any time to second-guess myself, I strode to the dresser and pulled out a drawer. Empty. A relieved sigh pushed from my chest. I tucked my “delicates,” as my mother would call them, into one drawer and a couple of sweaters into another. I’d already spied hangers in the closet for my jeans and shirts. As I checked the rest of the drawers to assess space, I discovered a cache of old photo albums. Unable to resist, I pulled several out and moved to the bed. Sitting cross-legged, I laid the first one across my lap and gently opened it, careful with the aging book.

  Pictures of my mother and Aunt Irene, obviously much younger, covered the page. Dad, not a gray hair on his head, smiled in several, and Uncle Paul made a few appearances, his arms always linked with or encircling Aunt Irene. Toward the end of the album, an infant showed up on the glossy squares, and I chuckled to realize the baby was me. I closed the album and chose another.

  Aunt Irene stood serenely in a long white dress, a veil draping down her back. Their wedding. My grandparents stood with them, and Mom, about thirteen years younger than Irene, stood holding her flower-girl basket as if it made her a queen. Other pictures were filled with people I didn’t know. Through every photo, Aunt Irene’s adoring looks and Uncle Paul’s need to constantly touch her, hold her hand, hug her, made it blatantly obvious how besotted they were with each other. I smiled a sappy smile at the happy couple in the photos.

  Album after album held more pictures of Uncle Paul and Aunt Irene’s life together. Trips, vacations, family gatherings with Mom, Dad, and me. Everything was chronicled, eventually to be hidden away in a drawer as if too precious to get rid of but too painful to display.

  I opened the cover of a slightly newer album and gasped. Memorialized were moments from my own life. Tears began to flow unchecked as I flipped through pages that held my high school graduation announcement, a copy of a photo I’d sent Mom from the beach I’d taken while on my senior trip after graduation, birthday pictures Mom must have sent him, a photo of me with my first car, my college graduation announcement, and a photo of me holding my degree while still dressed in cap and gown. Toward the back, I found clippings of my arrest and the subsequent news stories that had followed my recent struggles. I closed the book, deeply touched that Uncle Paul would keep pictures of my life. My heart broke that there were none of him and me together.

  I went to the bathroom, wiped my eyes on a tissue, and blew my nose before returning to pick up the last album.

  This album was the newest of them all. Inside, I discovered pictures of Rita and Paul together at various functions interspersed with impromptu photos, some printed on regular paper, as if from a mobile phone.

  So, Rita and Uncle Paul really used to be an item. If she knew him so well, maybe Rita knew more about Uncle Paul’s death than she had revealed. What if she’d been the one who … I shook my head. I had to start trusting someone at some point. She’d been incredibly gracious to me, and I couldn’t live the rest of my life looking for reasons to push people away.

  My stomach rumbled, pulling my attention away from the past into the very immediate future. I hadn’t considered cooking when I thought up my plan to live in the apartment. I walked out of the bedroom, startled to see how dark it was. I hadn’t realized just how long I’d been in there looking at photos.

  In the kitchen, I assessed the pantry and cupboards, locating appropriate cookware and dishes. While I had enough to eat for tonight, it didn’t seem Uncle Paul had been much of a foodie. A few cans of Campbell’s soup sat with cereal, coffee, chips, and bread. A trip to the grocery store was definitely in order.

  As I spooned down bites of chicken noodle soup, I made a list of things I’d need over the next couple of weeks while I looked into Uncle Paul’s murder.

  Chapter Seven

  I awoke the next morning, pulled out of a sweet dream of playing with the Cheshire Cat while drinking scorching tea out of lavender mugs. As my brain registered the ringing was actually a phone and not a signal that the Red Queen was coming, I fumbled on my nightstand for the offending instrument. “Hello?”

  “Good morning,” came Horace Grimes’s cheerful tones through the line. “I hope I didn’t wake you.”

  I looked at the time on my phone. Eight thirty. I sat up, realizing I’d slept a lot later than I’d intended. Darn this windowless room. But then again, what did I have to get up early for? “No, I’m awake. What’s up?” I ran my fingers through tangled waves of hair, brushing it away from my face.

  “I took the liberty of setting up an appointment for you to meet with someone from Jergins and Associates to go over the property. By reputation, they are the best appraisers in the area, and they’re also a realty company. They’ve been in Hokes Folly for years and might know of a few possible buyers. Someone will meet with you th
is afternoon at one. I hope that’s convenient.”

  I mentally checked my schedule. Nope, I was free. “That would be fine. I don’t have too much planned for this afternoon.”

  “Fantastic. They’ll help you figure out what the store and loft are truly worth and might be able to advise you on ways to fix it up and increase the value if you choose to have them list it for you.”

  “Kind of a one-stop-shopping thing, is it?” I chuckled.

  “I guess you could put it that way. I did ask them to meet you in the loft, to make it more convenient for you.” The sound of shuffling papers came over the line. “I also suggest you take time today to go by the power, water, gas, and cable companies to move the accounts into your name. I’ve already paved the way for you. I took the liberty to provide each of them with a copy of Paul’s death certificate and proof you’re the new owner. All you need to do is show up, show ID, and sign the paperwork.”

  After thanking him profusely and saying goodbye, I showered, dressed, and fixed a meager breakfast. While the coffee hit the spot, Uncle Paul’s taste in cereal and mine were not the same. However, with enough sugar spooned into it, I could get through a bowl of plain Wheaties. At least I’d be more regular.

  While I crunched, interspersed with sips of fresh coffee to fortify the workings of my frazzled brain, I made a grocery list. If I remembered correctly, I’d seen a small grocery store near the historic district, and once I’d cleaned up my breakfast dishes, I headed in that direction as fast as I could legally drive. I preferred not to give the local police another reason to hassle me yet.

  I found the remembered store a few blocks away, and as I got out of my car, I noticed a group of people with clipboards milling around near the entrance. A blonde woman, her rather ample bust crammed into a too-small pink sweater, detached herself from the group and made a beeline for me. I rushed, almost breaking into a run in an attempt to get into the store, but it was useless.

  “Sign the petition to get a new indoor shopping mall built in town?” The woman looked as if she couldn’t imagine anyone saying no to her.