Murder, She Knit

by Peggy Ehrhart

  “Yes, it’s dinnertime,” she murmured, and she hurried back to the kitchen to prepare a dish of cat food.

  Out on the porch, she stepped toward the spot near the porch railing where Catrina retreated to wait for her meals. Usually the cat retreated still further as Pamela approached, and she ventured toward the dish only after Pamela had disappeared and the front door had closed securely. But tonight the cat seemed braver. As Pamela stooped to slide the dish into place, she held her ground, and she began to eat without even a glance to see whether she was alone. Pamela watched her for a minute, enjoying the enthusiasm with which the tiny creature tackled what, in comparison with her own size, must have seemed unimaginable bounty.

  She looked up to survey the street. And that was when she noticed the sleek silver Audi parked in front of her house. Bob Randolph’s car, or one very like it. Why would he park here when he lived just down the street, and in a building with a perfectly adequate parking lot? But wait—she eased her way down the front steps and partway along the walk. He—or someone—was sitting in the car. She eased a bit closer. The driver’s profile was outlined against the backdrop of Bettina’s house, which glowed faintly in the light from the streetlamp. It was the profile of a young man with smoothly groomed hair, and—as a flash of headlights from a passing car revealed—it was definitely Bob Randolph.

  It was getting on toward seven p.m. and he wasn’t at work. Did that mean his shift in the emergency room didn’t start until later? If so, he had no alibi for the night Amy was killed—whether he worked Tuesday nights or not.

  And what was he doing in front of her house now?

  Pamela retreated to the porch, ducking behind a porch column. Behind her, the cat-food dish scraped against the porch floor as Catrina pursued the last morsels. A twinge of fear tightened something inside her. Bob Randolph had made that comment about too many people in the world having nothing to do but mind other people’s business. He had sounded angry. And she had been nosy—she had to admit that. If he was the person who killed Amy, he might have decided such a nosy person was a potential danger to him—a danger that had to be eliminated.

  She peeked out from behind the column. He was still sitting in the car. As she explored the possibility that she might be in danger, new and alarming vistas opened before her. She moaned aloud. She’d left the front door ajar when she stepped out with the dish of cat food. Now she backed quickly into the house and slammed it behind her.

  It was she who had found the body hidden by the trash cans. What if Bob Randolph was responsible for that murder? Here was nosy Pamela Paterson getting involved again. Her mind bounced back and forth. Maybe he wouldn’t know she was the one who found the body. Bounce. He would though. It would be in the newspapers. Bounce. But the story wouldn’t appear until tomorrow—and he was sitting in front of her house right now.

  Oh, no—she moaned again. Mr. Gilly could have told him. Mr. Gilly was a notorious gossip, and Bob Randolph had had firsthand experience of that. “It’s never a good idea to discuss anything with him unless you want the world to know it,” he had said.

  She backed toward the chair in the corner of the entry and perched on its edge, hugging herself and shivering with fear. What could she do? Call the police and tell them a man was sitting in his car in front of her house? But the man was Bob Randolph, a respectable emergency room physician, in his silver Audi. Suppose she actually did figure out something important about Amy’s death. She’d want the police to treat her like a rational, concerned citizen, not like a nut who was scared of her own shadow.

  Pamela ventured back toward the front door and put her face up close to the lace curtain to look out. Penny would be coming soon, and Bob Randolph was still lurking in his car. Or at least his car was still there. She couldn’t quite tell from inside the house whether anyone was behind the steering wheel or not. She didn’t want to venture outside again, at least not to just stand there. As soon as a car pulled up and Penny got out, she’d rush out and hurry Penny into the house.

  The awkward angle at which she was holding her head had begun to make her neck hurt, and the curtain was dusty enough to make her nose itch. She made a mental note to add it to her next batch of laundry. The sugary smells floating in from the kitchen as the pie baked would normally have given her the sense that all was right with the world. But all wasn’t right. She strained her eyes trying to make out whether there was or was not a person sitting in the driver’s seat of Bob Randolph’s silver Audi.

  Headlights flashed on the shrubs along Bettina’s driveway, and a small car coming from the direction of the church swung in front of Bob Randolph’s car and pulled up at the curb. Both doors opened, and Penny hopped out of the passenger side. Inside the house, Pamela fumbled with the doorknob, forgetting whether she’d locked the door behind her when she retreated inside. She rushed down the front walk. A tall and sturdy young man was hefting a suitcase out of the trunk of the car.

  She glanced toward the Audi, relieved to see that Bob Randolph was no longer behind the steering wheel. Then it occurred to her that perhaps he had taken up a position in the shrubbery. He’d been waiting there to go after her with a knitting needle or some other sharp tool but had been put off by the prospect of a three-against-one struggle. Pamela thought of herself as an independent woman, but the fact that one of the three would have been a tall and sturdy young man was comforting nonetheless.

  A quick introduction made her acquainted with Penny’s friend, Kyle Logan, and the casual way Penny thanked him and said goodbye made it clear that he was indeed just a friend. He didn’t have time for coffee or a snack, he said. His own parents were waiting for him a few towns over.

  Pamela waited until he drove away to fold her daughter in a warm hug. She rolled the suitcase up the front walk, and Penny followed with a small bag. Together they boosted the suitcase up the steps.

  “It’s full of dirty laundry, Mom,” Penny explained when Pamela laughingly groaned at the weight. Then, as they stepped into the house, “Is that a pecan pie I smell?”

  “Yes! I almost forgot.” All thoughts of Bob Randolph were banished. Pamela dashed for the kitchen and jerked the oven door open. She was just in time. The scalloped rim of crust was a perfect golden brown, glazed with a buttery sheen, and the pecan-studded custard was the color of burnished copper.

  Penny had followed her to the kitchen, shedding her jacket somewhere along the way. She watched as Pamela carefully transferred the pie from the oven to a trivet on the kitchen table. Satisfied that dessert was assured for the Thanksgiving feast, she surveyed her daughter with a long gaze.

  “Do I look so different?” Penny asked with a laugh.

  No. She was still Pamela’s little girl, with the dark curls and the quick smile she’d inherited from her father. Pamela had been nearly the same height as her husband, and she’d liked the way that fact underlined the equality of their union. Pamela had friends whose children, girls as well as boys, had outstripped their mothers in height starting even in middle school. But Penny had taken after the Paterson side of the family, and Pamela was a good six inches taller than her daughter.

  Under the bright kitchen light, Penny’s face shifted from happiness to concern. “Are you okay, Mom?” she asked. “About Amy, I mean.”

  “I’m okay.” Pamela nodded. She’d have to figure out when to tell Penny that there’d been a second murder on Orchard Street. And how much to reveal about her digging into the mystery of Amy’s death.

  But first Penny had to be made comfortable in her old room, and there was a spaghetti dinner to cook. “I’ll leave that suitcase down here,” Penny called as she headed for the stairs with the small bag. “I’ve got to do laundry tomorrow, or I’ll be wearing these same jeans the whole time I’m home.” Pamela followed her up the stairs and fussed over towels while Penny retrieved pajamas and a toothbrush from her small bag.

  Back in the kitchen Pamela set water boiling for the pasta, chopped an onion for the sauce, and minced a clove
of garlic. As she was working, she remembered the last time she had made spaghetti. Bettina and Wilfred had come for dinner, bearing three bottles of red wine, and it had been a merry night. Two of the bottles had produced sufficient merriment, and, as she recalled, the third had ended up in her pantry. If today wasn’t the sort of day that should be topped off with a glass of wine, she wasn’t sure what kind of day would be.

  The wine was lurking behind the molasses, not far from where she had found the rum. She rummaged among her strainers, potato mashers, and special cooking spoons for the corkscrew. Though Pamela wasn’t a wine connoisseur, serving wine gave her the opportunity to bring out one of her favorite garage-sale finds, a delicate set of stemmed glasses with a tracing of grape vines etched around their rims.

  When Penny joined her, she was tending the sautéing onions and garlic with a big wooden spoon and sipping a glass of wine.

  “Wine, Mom?” Penny said.

  “Bettina and Wilfred brought it one night. It’s good with spaghetti.”

  Penny picked up the bottle. “How about sharing?”

  “I’m just having this one glass,” Pamela said, “and you’re—”

  “Mom . . . I’m in college.”

  Pamela laughed. “The glasses are in that cupboard to the right of the sink. And while you’re home I hope you’ll resume your duties as the salad chef.” She pushed the onions and garlic here and there, assessing whether it was time to add the ground meat. “We’ll eat in the dining room,” she added. “With candles.”

  * * *

  As it turned out, the whole bottle got drunk. Between bites of spaghetti and salad, and sips of wine, Penny filled in the picture that her phone calls and emails had only sketched. Her roommate was sweet. The professors were brilliant. The campus was beautiful. The mother in Pamela was reassured, and she tried to paint an equally reassuring picture for Penny. Yes, Amy’s murder was a horrible shock (and when would she find a way to tell Penny that there had been another horrible shock, that very day?). But the magazine was doing well, and she had plenty of work. The knitting club was lively as ever. She’d finished the Icelandic sweater and had only to sew the pieces together.

  Penny set down her wineglass and fixed her eyes on Pamela’s. In the flickering candlelight, her face was serious. “Is there any other . . . social life,” she asked, “besides the knitting club?”

  Pamela set her own glass down. “Do you mean . . . like dates?”

  “Yes, Mom. I do mean like dates.” She leaned into the candle’s glow. “It’s really okay. I want you to. Even when I was still at home, it would have been okay.”

  “No,” Pamela said. “There aren’t dates. And I’m not sure I want there to be.”

  An hour later Pamela and Penny were sitting on the sofa in the living room feeling well fed, content, and just a tiny bit tipsy. Pamela was almost dozing, her head lolling back against the sofa cushions, when Penny suddenly sat upright. “Do you hear that?” she said urgently. “That noise?”

  “What?” Pamela was jolted awake. “What kind of a noise?” She could feel her pulse as a rapid thud in her ears.

  “Listen! ” Penny whispered.

  It was coming from outside, from the street, a gurgling sound, high-pitched and musical. Threads of sound overlapped others like a chorus, then trailed off. And it was becoming louder.

  Penny jumped up. “I have to see what this is,” she said, moving toward the door.

  “No!” Pamela shouted, grabbing her arm.

  “Mom, what’s wrong with you?” Penny turned and looked at her in confusion. “It’s a funny noise in the street. That’s all.” She pulled away. “I’ll just open the door a crack,” she added soothingly.

  Pamela followed her to the entry. The sound was louder yet, and Penny was right. It was indeed a funny noise.

  Without switching the entry light on, Penny twisted the doorknob and the door creaked open. Then she screamed and jumped back in alarm. A tiny black shape streaked across the dim floor and disappeared in the direction of the kitchen. “Eeek! Mom! What was that?” Penny squealed.

  Pamela was laughing so hard she couldn’t answer for a minute. “We have a cat,” she sputtered at last. Then she gathered her daughter up in a hug.

  But the gurgling chorus was still coming from outside. Pamela kept hold of Penny’s hand as she edged toward the door. She pulled the door back a few more inches and peeked out. A curious spectacle greeted her. She drew in her breath, let the door swing back, and pulled Penny to the open doorway.

  A procession of remarkable creatures was making its way down Orchard Street. Their bodies swung from side to side, supported by pairs of spindly legs, while their tiny heads jerked this way and that on long necks. Some walked two by two. Others straggled behind in single file. They were just then passing under the streetlamp at the edge of Pamela’s driveway. The light rippled along their backs in iridescent streaks. The chorus of melodic gurgles continued.

  Penny slipped past Pamela and hurried down the steps. “They’re turkeys,” she called. “Wild turkeys. They have them in Massachusetts.”

  Pamela joined her as she walked toward the curb. “I’ve never seen them here before,” she said, “but they must come up from the woods.”

  A swath of undeveloped land to the west separated Arborville from the next town over. Deer were known to live there, and as summer wore on they sometimes ventured across busy County Road at the bottom of the block to graze on lawns kept green by sprinkler systems.

  Pamela sighed. In an odd way, the turkeys were beautiful. The air was still and cold, infused with smoke from a wood fire burning in a nearby fireplace and the soundtrack of the gurgles. They’d run outside without coats. Soon they’d have to retreat indoors.

  From the neighboring yard came a voice. “Yes,” the voice said. “They’re wild turkeys. Quite a sight, aren’t they?”

  Pamela looked over. A torso was looming over the hedge that edged her driveway.

  “I’m Richard Larkin,” the voice added. “Your new neighbor.”

  He proceeded along the hedge toward the sidewalk, then hesitated as if waiting for an invitation to step onto her driveway.

  With the streetlamp behind him and his face in shadow, Pamela couldn’t tell much about him except that he was tall—very tall—and he had a lot of hair. She tilted her head. “Hello,” she said. “I’m Pamela Paterson.”

  “I know,” he said. “The note about the garbage.”

  “Thank you for cleaning it up.”

  “I’m not used to the suburbs,” he added. “I know about wild turkeys, but not raccoons, and my job has been running me ragged.” Not too ragged to have girlfriends, said a voice in Pamela’s head. No wonder, the voice added, unbidden. He has a nice voice.

  “I wouldn’t have known they were turkeys,” Pamela said. “They don’t look like the typical Thanksgiving turkey. These ones are kind of... sleek.” She remembered the turkeys Penny had made in preschool, pine cones with construction-paper tail feathers fanning out behind and twisted red pipe cleaners for those odd dangly things turkeys had at their necks.

  “Turkeys only puff themselves up like Thanksgiving turkeys when they’re courting,” Richard Larkin said. “And only the male turkeys. This isn’t the season—at least for turkeys.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Penny had gradually moved along the curb, following the turkeys as they made their slow progress toward the lower end of the block. Pamela was starting to feel the cold, and she turned away from Richard Larkin to head back into the house. Suddenly Penny was at her side.

  “Your daughter?” Richard asked.

  Before Pamela could answer, Penny’s sweet voice cut in. “Penny Paterson,” she said, facing him, her head tipped back as if regarding a larger-than-life-sized statue. But he was still looking at Pamela.

  “You’re shivering. Would you like some coffee? Or a drink?”

  “I live right here,” Pamela said with a laugh.

  “That’s right.” He
chuckled. “We’re neighbors.”

  Pamela turned away again. “So I’ll just—”

  But Penny cut in. “Coffee sounds great.”

  “Done.” He clapped his hands together and set off up the sidewalk. Penny followed. Pamela caught up with her and whispered, “What have you done? He has girlfriends your age.”

  “Mo-o-om!” Penny stopped walking and grabbed Pamela’s arm. “He was looking at you the whole time.” The gobbling chorus of the turkeys echoed faintly from down the street.

  “How could you tell?” Pamela whispered back. “It’s dark out here.”

  * * *

  “I haven’t had a chance to do too much with the place,” Richard said as he ushered them into the living room that Pamela still thought of as Miranda Bonham’s. But gone were Miranda’s burgundy sofa and love seat, her mahogany coffee table, and the large seascape she’d hung over the fireplace. The walls were still pale peach, but the furniture was all black leather and glass and chrome. A rug that appeared to be the skin of a Holstein cow lay sprawled in the center of Miranda’s peach-colored broadloom.

  “All this pink has got to go,” he added. “And you should see the kitchen. Bright yellow.”

  “My kitchen is yellow,” Pamela murmured. “I find it cheerful in the morning.”

  He blinked a few times and clapped his hands again. “Well! I’ll make the coffee. Please sit down.”

  Pamela and Penny took seats on the black leather sofa and waited in silence as they listened to the sounds of coffee being made in the kitchen. Soon Richard stepped around the corner bearing two mugs. “Milk or sugar?” he said.

  “Just black,” Pamela said, and Penny’s voice overlapped with “Milk and sugar, please.” He returned to the kitchen.