After a while, another face floated into my mind—Topaz Snyder’s. Her mother had hit her, then died. Her father had hit her, then died. Had Topaz had a hand in their deaths? That was too spooky to bear thinking about.
I shifted my crouched position next to Rose. My legs were beginning to cramp.
“‘Mrs. Snyder,” I said softly. “Would you like to lie down?”
“What’s wrong with Grandma?” came an angry voice from the doorway. I started. It was Topaz.
“I’m fine,” Rose told her. “I’m just going to lie down for a minute.”
The buzzer sounded just as I helped her to stand. Barbara found the intercom and shouted instructions, then raced down the stairs. Moments later, she escorted the twins in.
Arletta was holding Opal’s hand as she came through the door. Edna strode up to Rose and wrapped an arm around her waist, then took Rose’s arm and put it over her own solid shoulder. She supported her to the couch and helped her lie down. Then she took her pulse.
“How are you feeling?” she asked brusquely.
“Just a little dizzy, I guess,” Rose answered in a nearly normal voice. She wasn’t sobbing anymore.
“Any chest pain?” demanded Edna.
Two down and one to go, I thought and turned to watch Arletta approach Topaz.
“Can you read, young lady?” Arletta asked. The tremor in her voice made her sound almost as frail as she looked.
“Of course I can,” Topaz answered impatiently.
“Oh, maybe you can help me, then,” Arletta warbled. “I have something downstairs I just can’t make out with these old eyes. Could you come and read it for me?”
“Okay,” agreed Topaz ungraciously. She followed Arletta and Opal out the door. I could hear their three high voices mingling as they descended the stair.
I looked at Barbara. She winked back. I let myself breathe a long, sweet breath.
Then the buzzer sounded again. Was that Felix? I should have known he’d show up.
“Just up the stairs, dear,” I heard Arletta call out.
The footsteps didn’t sound like Felix’s, though. Unless he was wearing high heels these days.
Alice Frazier came tip-toeing into the apartment. She was dressed as beautifully as ever in a well-cut turquoise suit, but that customary elegant look was missing. Maybe it was her swollen red eyes, her drooping body. Whatever it was, today she looked like the middle-aged, overweight woman she’d always claimed to be.
Her red eyes widened when they lit on Barbara and me.
“What are you…?” she began. But she looked away without finishing her sentence. Then she saw Rose lying on the couch.
“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Snyder!” she cried out. She took a couple of steps toward the couch.
Rose sat up slowly without speaking. She fixed her eyes on Alice. Edna turned to stare at the younger woman too.
“I got Dan out of jail this morning. He used the restaurant building as security for his bail…” Alice said hesitantly. She kept on talking when Rose didn’t reply, her speech suddenly racing as if it had gotten away from her. “After he got out, I took him to my apartment. He lay down on the couch to sleep. I made some breakfast for him in case he got hungry. Then I left to go to work.”
She stopped for a moment. “When I got back, he was dead on the couch, strangled!” she burst out.
Rose narrowed her eyes at Alice, no longer looking like Mrs. Santa Claus, even on a bad day. There was no comfort in her eyes, only pure hatred.
Alice turned her head away from Rose’s eyes.
“You weren’t at work when we visited your office,” Barbara said slowly.
Alice’s body jerked. She turned to Barbara.
“I called, and Dan didn’t answer the phone,” she explained. “So I went back home.”
When Barbara didn’t comment, Alice looked at me. I didn’t know what to say. Alice turned her eyes back to Rose Snyder.
“Believe me, Mrs. Snyder,” she pleaded. “I didn’t kill your son.”
No one spoke.
“Goddammit!” Alice screamed. “I didn’t kill him!”
TWENTY-THREE
ALICE SEARCHED OUR faces slowly, one by one in the ensuing silence. My chest tightened when she turned her swollen eyes in my direction. She looked so absolutely and sincerely miserable. I wanted to tell her that I believed her. I wanted to tell her that I knew she hadn’t killed Dan Snyder. But I didn’t know.
There were just too many points against Alice. As far as I could tell, she was the only one in the vegetarian cooking class who had known both victims previously. And she had arranged that class. Had she arranged it in order to be lost in a sea of suspects when Sheila was found dead? And Dan had been in her apartment when he was strangled. Actually, a little voice protested in my head, that was too obvious a point against her. If she had wanted to kill Dan without getting caught, why would she kill him in her own apartment?
I was about to ask her if someone else could have gotten into her apartment, but I was an instant too late.
“I didn’t!” Alice cried once more. “I didn’t kill him!” Then she turned on her high heels and ran straight out the door.
I thought I heard her stumble on the stairs, but then I heard her heels clattering again. And finally, I couldn’t even hear that anymore. She was gone.
I let out a big whoosh of breath. Rose lay back down on the couch. And Edna pulled an easy chair over to Rose’s side. I told myself I could relax now.
“We gotta talk to Meg,” Barbara whispered in my ear with all the urgency that a whisper can carry.
I glanced over at Rose. Her eyes were closed. She looked almost peaceful. Edna turned and jerked her head toward the doorway. Barbara and I took the hint and crept quietly out. I was glad to close the apartment door behind me.
Downstairs in the dining room, Topaz was reading aloud from what looked like an often-used cookbook. Opal’s eyes fluttered drowsily as she leaned against Arletta’s frail body, but Arletta herself seemed engrossed.
“Meanwhile, sauté two medium onions in one-quarter cup of oil,” Topaz vocalized ponderously. Arletta nodded in rhythm with the girl’s voice. Was this the only book she could find? “Add one-half cup of whole-wheat flour…”
No one seemed to notice Barbara and me sneaking by. It must have been a really great cookbook.
Once we were out the door, Barbara took off down the street, going as fast as she could on foot without actually running.
“Hey!” I called out. “Where are you going? The Toyota’s right here.”
“There’ll be a pay phone at the bar,” Barbara shouted back.
I jogged to catch up with her. The way we were yelling, they’d hear us at the Good Thyme.
“Why do we need a pay phone?” I asked breathlessly once I caught her.
“To call Meg,” she answered without breaking stride. “We don’t want to miss her like we did Alice.”
“Why do we need to call Meg?” I pressed. Sometimes talking to Barbara was like talking to someone from another planet.
“Because Alice is innocent,” Barbara explained briefly.
I stopped in my tracks, surprised by her assessment. Barbara’s back grew farther away. I started jogging again.
“Then why did you give Alice a hard time about not being at work this morning?” I demanded once I was even with her.
“I didn’t know she was innocent then,” Barbara replied.
There was a phone in the bar. Barbara was right about that. I still wasn’t sure if she was right about Alice’s innocence, though. Or why she now thought Alice was innocent, for that matter.
“Meg’s at home,” Barbara told me when she got off the phone. “Let’s go.”
We went. I didn’t even bother to argue. Forty minutes later, I parked in a space across from the Victorian building that housed Meg’s flat, still uncertain of our exact purpose here.
Meg had opened the door at the top of the steep stairs by the time we got there.
“Um, hello,” she greeted us. Then she sniffed.
“Allergies?” I asked.
“What?” she replied, her sea-green eyes wide in her pale face.
For a moment, I wondered if she did cocaine. She was certainly skinny enough—her slight body couldn’t have weighed more than a hundred pounds. And her mental processes seemed none too sharp today. I reminded myself that she was an artist. Artists at work could be notoriously absent-minded. Once I had forgotten three appointments in a row while immersed in a design for a new optometrist mug. And Meg was a real artist. She shifted her wide-eyed gaze to the ground as I stared at her.
“I just wondered if you had allergies,” I explained. She looked up at me blankly. “Never mind,” I told her hastily. “May we come in?”
“Um, okay,” she said.
Meg’s living room was filled with the same drawings, paintings, books and electronic gear I remembered from the last time we had visited. I averted my eyes from the writhing figures in the pen-and-ink drawings and gazed instead at the painting of the four-foot carrot still lounging on its canvas, looking as sensual as ever. I stepped forward to examine it more closely.
“Would you like some tea?” Meg asked in a near whisper.
“That would be great!” Barbara replied with far too much enthusiasm. It seemed to bowl Meg over. She blinked uncertainly for a moment, then scurried into the kitchen.
Barbara and I followed her in and took seats at her yellow Formica table as she put the kettle on the stove.
“Did you happen to see Alice at work this morning?” Barbara asked Meg casually.
“Alice?” repeated Meg, turning on the gas flame. She reached for a yellow ceramic teapot.
“Alice Frazier,” Barbara enunciated carefully as if for a deaf person. “Where you work. Did you see her this morning?”
“Let’s see,” Meg whispered hesitantly, staring up at the ceiling. “What day is this?”
“Tuesday,” Barbara replied impatiently, stiffening in her chair.
“Oh, Tuesday,” Meg said. “I must have been here all day, then.” She reached for a canister of tea. “I think so, anyway,” she added.
Barbara watched in silence as Meg stuffed the loose tea leaves into a bamboo tea ball.
“This is useless,” I whispered in Barbara’s ear. “Let’s just go.”
Barbara shook her head angrily. “I’ll get right down to it, Meg,” she said bluntly. “Do you think Alice is capable of murder?”
Meg’s mouth opened in a little O of surprise. Her eyes were even wider than before as she stared at Barbara.
“Capable of murder?” Meg repeated. Then she closed her eyes for a moment, apparently thinking. Had Barbara finally gotten her attention?
“You know Alice pretty well—” Barbara began again.
Meg straightened her shoulders as she opened her eyes. “No,” she interrupted Barbara crisply. “I don’t think Alice is capable of murder.” I felt like applauding.
“Why not?” Barbara pressed.
“Alice lacks the necessary passion to commit a murder,” Meg replied thoughtfully. “She has small enthusiasms, but none of them go very deep. Or last very long. One month she’s ready to save the homeless personally. The next month she’s forgotten all about them and wants to become a vegetarian. Next month she’ll be campaigning for a woman president.” Her eyes narrowed. “You’d do better to forget about finding Sheila Snyder’s murderer and concern yourselves with the children.”
“The children?” Barbara repeated with a frown.
“Opal and Topaz Snyder,” Meg told her. “They’ve been abused by both their parents. Don’t you wonder what that will do to their lives?”
“I know what it’ll do to their lives,” Barbara retorted, obviously stung by the question. “I was abused myself.” She paused for a moment, then spoke more calmly. “On the other hand, half the people I know have been mistreated by their parents. Like Kate’s boyfriend. He was beaten and tormented by his mother when he was a kid, and now the old witch is living with them.”
Meg turned and looked at me.
“Vesta’s not that bad,” I objected half-heartedly. My cheeks felt uncomfortably warm. These weren’t my secrets Barbara was telling. They were Wayne’s. Too late, I realized that I should never have shared the ugly details with Barbara if I hadn’t wanted them to go any further.
“Not that bad?” Barbara mimicked. “Jeez-Louise, Kate, look what she’s done to Wayne! And now she’s in your house, trying to break up your relationship.”
“Barbara,” I hissed. “Forget about Vesta, all right?”
She opened her mouth to argue with me some more. I glared back at her. She closed her mouth just as the teakettle began to sing. I certainly hoped the Snyder murders would be solved soon, if only because I needed a vacation from Barbara. A very long vacation.
“Do you mind if I take a look at your paintings?” I asked Meg abruptly.
“No,” she said with a shrug of her shoulders.
I strode back into Meg’s living room, seething with anger at Barbara. I squinted at a new abstract in bold strokes of purple and blue that sat on one of the easels. The paint was still wet. Maybe Meg had been working on it when Barbara called. No wonder she’d been so distracted when we arrived. My mind jumped back to Barbara. How in hell had I previously found her outspokenness so endearing? I turned to look at the oversized carrot again. Now that was my kind of painting—
“Hey, kiddo,” came Barbara’s voice from my side. “Do you want your tea?”
I jumped, startled, then turned to her with a curse on my lips. Meg stood behind Barbara with her arms crossed, her sea-green eyes narrowly focused now. I swallowed my curse and forced my face into a smile.
“I’m sorry,” Barbara mouthed in my direction. The expression on her face was vulnerable for a change, without a trace of brazenness. Damn. I should have known I wouldn’t be able to stay mad at her.
“It’s all right,” I told her.
Barbara smiled weakly and handed me a white ceramic mug that smelled of cinnamon.
“How much for the carrot?” I asked Meg, taking a sip of tea.
“Two thousand,” she answered. I gulped the hot tea too fast and coughed. I knew it was probably a fair price for all the work that had gone into it, but it was too much for me, and I told her so.
Meg didn’t bother to negotiate the carrot’s price. She gave us exactly enough time to finish our tea, then herded us out the door, pleading an appointment. She certainly wasn’t distracted anymore.
“Well?” I said to Barbara once we were in the car again.
“I just don’t know,” she answered, her voice low and unhappy. “Sorry, kiddo. I guess visiting Meg was a waste of time.”
“Are you all right?” I asked. Barbara without enthusiasm? I couldn’t have been more surprised if the health food store had run out of brown rice.
She shrugged her shoulders and stared at the dashboard.
I spent the rest of the drive over the Golden Gate Bridge convincing her the trip hadn’t been a waste of time. Every little bit of information counted, I told her. You’ll figure it out, I insisted. By the time we got to my house, she was talking again.
“I’ll come in with you,” she said, life in her voice once more. “We can talk strategy.”
I wondered if I had done a little too good of a job cheering her up as we climbed the stairs.
We had made it to the porch when Wayne came trotting out the doorway, pulling on his jacket as he ran.
“Kate,” he murmured and came to a dead stop. He looked down at me. For a moment, I thought I saw adoration flashing from beneath his eyebrows. Then he put his hands on my shoulders and bent down to give me a long kiss. Maybe it wasn’t adoration. Maybe it was lust. Either one was all right by me, I thought as I eagerly leaned into his embrace.
Barbara giggled behind me. Wayne and I pulled away from each other simultaneously.
“How’s Vesta?” I whispered, still
dizzy from the kiss.
He sighed. That was answer enough for me.
“So how’s everything else?” I amended. “Anything else.”
“Glad I caught you,” he told me. “Gotta run. Crisis at the downtown restaurant. I’ll be there most of the evening.” He looked into my eyes again. “Okay?” he asked softly.
“Okay,” I agreed reluctantly. I didn’t really want to spend another evening alone with Vesta. But business was business.
“Been people calling for you all day,” he continued. “Judy at the Jest Gifts warehouse says you didn’t leave her enough signed checks. Something about a C.O.D. package that the guy will come back to deliver at the end of his route.”
I groaned long and loud. Wayne’s brows went up.
“Never mind,” I said. “I’ll phone her.”
He shifted his gaze to Barbara.
“Felix wants you to call him,” he summarized. I knew it was a summary. Felix couldn’t even say his name that concisely.
Wayne reached for me one more time, limiting himself to a chaste kiss on my forehead; then he ran down the stairs.
I called the warehouse as soon as we got inside. Everything was all screwed up. Even worse than usual. Judy couldn’t find the checks. Jean couldn’t find the ambulance-chaser mugs for the Trial Lawyers of America convention. (The mug itself looked like a foreshortened ambulance; the handle, an attorney leaping onto the ambulance’s rear end, hands and feet outstretched.) And the computers were acting funny. Judy hoped she hadn’t erased anything important, but…
“I’ll be there in an hour,” I promised and hung up.
“See you later,” I told Barbara and took a step toward the door.
“Wait a sec,” she called to me. “Don’t you want to know what Felix found out?”
I looked at my watch. It was after three-thirty. I needed to go soon. But I did want to know. And Barbara knew damn well that I did.
“Make it quick,” I ordered.
Barbara saluted and dialed the phone. I sat there tapping my foot as she pried information out of Felix.
“Just tell me, Felix,” she kept repeating, her voice a little tighter each time. I could just hear Felix stringing out his tale to bargain for an exchange of information.
Fat-Free and Fatal (A Kate Jasper Mystery) Page 24