by Nina Wright
Jenx gave the universal signal for time-out, which might have worked if Kimmi Kellum-Ramirez had not selected that moment to rush the stage on her rat-a-tat-tat five-inch heels. Stilettos make an alarming noise on solid hardwood. We all shuddered, but I shuddered more than most. Kimmi held a poster-size photo of Blitzen lying on the Rail Trail next to Vreelander’s corpse.
“That’s Mattimoe’s bike, isn’t it?” Kimmi cried. “Lots of people have seen her riding it. You expect us to believe she just happened to be on the Rail Trail when the headmaster died? Two years ago she killed a man with that bike!”
“In self-defense,” I said.
“I’m talking to the cop,” Kimmi snapped. “And I demand an explanation.”
“Yeah, we want an explanation. These are posted all over town!” Robin Wardrip shouted. Thumping toward the stage in combat boots that complemented her camouflage gear, Wardrip held up at least a half-dozen copies of the same poster. Under the photo the caption read
DO YOU RECOGNIZE THIS BIKE? CONTACT THE LANAGAN COUNTY SHERIFF.
followed by a phone number that looked even to my mind like somebody’s cell.
“That is not an official poster,” Jenx barked as she seized the papers. “And that’s not the County Sheriff’s phone number. Now step back. Way back. I’m talking to the children. You’ll get your turn later.”
Both Kimmi and Wardrip appealed to Bentwood for support, but Jenx cut them off. They huffed away, one stomping, the other clomping. Bentwood had said nothing. In fact, he had retreated a few steps during the brief confrontation, slipping into the shadows near the back of the shallow stage as if to remove himself from the conflict. Coward.
In a carefully modulated voice, Jenx was once again addressing the children.
“As I was saying, Mr. Vreelander died suddenly yesterday while he was out riding his bike. The good news is that he had no pain. That’s all we know right now,” she summarized.
“Do you mean he fell off his bike and then he died?” a small girl asked tremulously. “Can falling off your bike kill you?”
“No,” Jenx said. “Mr. Vreelander fell off his bike because he was already dead.”
Lots of little children wailed. The same older boy who spoke earlier didn’t wait to be called on this time, either.
“So the only reason it didn’t hurt when he fell was because he was already dead?”
“Yes,” Jenx said.
More children burst into sobs.
“I mean, no,” Jenx said. “That’s not why it didn’t hurt. It just plain didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt the headmaster. Right, Whiskey? I mean, Ms. Mattimoe?”
“Right,” I said, but I couldn’t hear myself above the crying children.
The older boy with the big mouth now stood on his chair as if commanding a mutiny. He addressed the whole room.
“You heard her. She said ‘whiskey’ again!” Turning on Jenx, he demanded, “What can kill you without hurting you? Unless you’re drunk?”
“You don’t have to be drunk,” Jenx fumed. “Lots of things can kill you without hurting at all.”
That response unhinged almost every kid not already bawling, and a few adults, too. By the time I signaled Jenx to shut it, her wine-red face was gleaming with flop sweat. Uh-oh. We were about to witness something that might hurt, Jenx’s special electrical talent. Unless School President Bentwood intervened, the chaos was about to intensify. Jenx and other members of her family had the gift—or curse—of geomagnetic agitation. When their anger spiked, so did electrical currents. One stage light was already flickering.
I turned to Bentwood, who stood in the shadows, arms crossed over his chest. Was he a master of detachment, an icon of calm, or a complete waste of skin? This was his student body. High time he manned up and started acting presidential. But before he could or would, someone else did. A plus-sized woman wearing an expensive suit the same color as Bentwood’s blazer heaved herself onto the stage, instantly slicing the noise quotient in half.
“I’ll handle it, George,” she announced.
I detected the distinct leer of cynicism in those few words. A resonant contralto, the woman’s voice was the tool of a seasoned school principal. Facing her audience she said, “Most of you don’t know me although I know about most of you. I am Pauline Vreelander.”
Gasps issued from a few adults, and the widow smiled. My first impression? Although ten years older than her husband and not the least bit buff, she was every inch the polished administrator. Her neatly coiffed brown hair was streaked with gray; she wore tasteful designer eyeglasses and minimal make-up. I could see no sign that she had recently wept.
“I thank Chief Jenkins for being the first to contact me last night,” she said, and I continued to marvel at the mellifluous quality of her voice. “I believe the chief when she says that my husband did not suffer. So you should believe her, too. Now, on his behalf, I have a few words for the students of The Bentwood School.”
She scanned the rows of silent youngsters before her.
“You know your headmaster always wanted you to be brave and strong and do the right thing, don’t you?”
Hundreds of small heads bobbed in agreement.
“So take a deep breath.”
The whole student body did.
“And now, in an orderly fashion, stand up, go back to your classrooms, and get on with your work. Mr. Vreelander would be very proud of you today.”
As if under a sedative spell, three hundred children who had been hysterical only moments earlier rose as one and calmly filed out of the auditorium. Mrs. Vreelander watched them go. When the School President finally stepped forward, she snapped, “Later, George,” without removing her eyes from the students. Only after every child had quietly departed did she turn her attention to the adults in the room.
“I’m glad you’re here. Even though we haven’t met, I feel I know most of you. Despite the miles between us, Mark and I were very close. He told me everything.”
She beamed a chilly smile at her audience.
“As Chief Jenkins knows, I’ve arranged to take a leave from my position at Tree Hill Academy in Dallas. I plan to stay in Magnet Springs until I get the answers I need.”
11
The assembly should have ended with Mrs. Vreelander’s stunning announcement, but George Bentwood officiously hastened to add that he had nothing to add. He urged parents to watch the school’s social media for updates, and he, Vreelander’s widow and Jenx exited stage left. A teacher’s aide ushered the rest of us from the meeting room out to the school foyer. The parents dispersed although I noticed quite a few lingering on the school lawn to gossip. About “drunken” me and my bicycle? Or about Mrs. Vreelander and her doomed husband?
Frankly, I was relieved and impressed that the widow had arrived and taken control of that scene. I couldn’t blame Jenx for not knowing what she was walking into; it was almost as if Bentwood had set her up. Why would the school president want to make the police look bad? Surely he knew, as most folks in Magnet Springs did, that if Jenx lost her temper, a geomagnetic firestorm could follow.
“A force to be reckoned with, wouldn’t you say?”
I glanced around to see who was speaking. A shapely auburn-haired woman close to age fifty smiled at me conspiratorially. She wore a simple black suit with reasonable heels.
“Pauline Vreelander, I mean,” the woman said. “Although Chief Jenkins is no doubt a force to be reckoned with, in her own way. I’m sorry, I should introduce myself. Stevie McCoy, Admissions Director of The Bentwood School.”
She extended a slim cool hand.
“Whiskey Mattimoe,” I offered in case she hadn’t witnessed the entire fracas on the stage.
Stevie McCoy nodded. “You didn’t expect the mothers to come forward with that poster, did you? You looked surprised.”
“Don’t you mean horrified?”
We shared a grin.
“Well,” Stevie said, “sometimes our PTO can be a little … ”
“Excitable? Overzealous?”
“Out of their freaking minds,” Stevie concluded. She lowered her voice. “I work with those wingnuts every day. Putting up with their melodramas is one of my job requirements. I acknowledge their emotional roller coaster, but I refuse to ride it.”
I liked this woman. She expressed my sentiments exactly.
“I sell high-end real estate, so we serve pretty much the same market,” I said. “But your PTO is like a mob of my worst clients overdosed on caffeine and estrogen.”
“That’s exactly who they are,” Stevie agreed. “It’s all about their egos and their kids, in that order. They’re vain, possessive and most of all, entitled, and it’s my job to keep ’em happy. Or at least keep ’em enrolled.”
“You said you’re the Admissions Director, so isn’t your job to bring ’em in?”
She laughed ruefully. “In a small private school, we all wear more than one hat. My real job is recruitment, retention, marketing, public relations and media relations. So, yes, first I have to bring ’em in, but then I have to make sure they don’t leave. That’s the hard part.”
“Really? Why?”
She laughed again. I was beginning to think it was some kind of defense mechanism.
“Because once they write that tuition check, they think they own the place, and when every little thing doesn’t go exactly the way they want it to, they threaten to go somewhere else. Half my parents are ‘shoppers,’ Whiskey. They change schools every couple years, if not more often. I’m supposed to keep that from happening, however.”
When she brushed a strand of dark red hair from her forehead, I realized that Stevie McCoy was probably older than I had thought, a little past the mid-century mark. She obviously took good care of herself. I noticed that she wore no wedding ring although she did have a tasteful gold necklace and matching earrings.
“How long have you worked here?”
“Since I had to,” she replied. That could have been the start of an amusing story except we were interrupted by one of Stevie’s un-amusing moms.
“What the hell is he telling Vreelander’s widow?” Robin Wardrip demanded. She stood in a defensive posture, feet planted wide apart, arms akimbo. Maybe it was the camo gear and combat boots, but that woman made me wish I was armed.
Stevie straightened her posture and flicked on a cool professional smile.
“I’m sorry, Robin. Who are you talking about?”
“You know damn well who I’m talking about. Bentwood, that horse’s ass. He can’t even control a school assembly. If he wasn’t such a wuss, we wouldn’t have had to hire Vreelander in the first place, and none of this shit would have happened.”
Stevie’s face darkened, but her smile never faltered.
“Come on. Let’s go grab a cup of coffee.”
“Do I look like I need coffee?” Wardrip asked.
“Decaf, then,” Stevie said. “Or something else. Let’s see what I can find for us in my office.”
I wondered if she meant alcohol. Or maybe horse tranquilizers? Considering it was barely nine A.M., and this was an elementary school, neither seemed likely, although Wardrip definitely required taming. With nary a backward glance, Stevie guided the disgruntled mother away from me and up an airy staircase that presumably led to second-floor offices. Wardrip’s rant, punctuated by what sounded like consoling mews from Stevie, continued long after they were out of sight. Maybe real estate wasn’t the toughest sell in town.
“Madame Mattimoe?”
The French woman from the Rail Trail was standing close to me, unnaturally close according to the culture I’d been raised in. Staring up at me with a concerned expression on her fine-lined face, she had to be at least as old as Stevie. Her short-cropped black hair sported cardinal red highlights that I had missed in the fading light.
“My name is Anouk Gagné,” she continued, her accent thick. “I believe I found your bicycle.”
“My bicycle wasn’t lost.”
“Well, I think you left it somewhere.”
“I think you put up ‘wanted’ posters all over town.”
Her frown gave way to an amused smile. “‘Wanted’ posters? This is not the Wild West.”
“Then why do you ride around with a bow and arrow? Make that lots of arrows.”
“I am an archère, Madame.”
“Yeah? Well, last night you looked like a killer.”
Her smile evaporated. “I do not know why you would say that. Last night I found my friend dead on the Rail Trail. If only he had listened—”
“Mark Vreelander was your friend?”
“Yes.”
“Why did you yell at his dead body? Why did you message pictures of it to somebody instead of dialing 9-1-1?”
As I spoke, Gagné’s face morphed into an expression of revulsion.
“You were watching me? Spying on me? Why would you do that?”
“Why would I do that? Because there was a dead body on the Rail Trail, and you looked like a crazed killer. I was trying to save myself. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m pregnant, which means I’m surviving for two now.”
“Anouk! How are you, cherie?”
I recognized Bentwood’s voice although I hadn’t heard much of it that morning. He, Jenx, and Pauline Vreelander must have adjourned their meeting, for they now stood in the school foyer, possibly en route to offices upstairs.
“George,” Anouk Gagné cried, giving his name its purred French pronunciation.
She babbled something in her native language, and he responded in kind. They embraced with a passion I considered inappropriate for public viewing, especially in a private grade school. The foot of difference between their heights may have contributed to the hug’s intense groping quality, but it didn’t explain or excuse the prolonged kiss. Didn’t Europeans peck both cheeks and move on? I sneaked a peek at the other two onlookers. Mrs. Vreelander watched the smooching duo impassively. Jenx yawned, either because she’d had a late night or because heterosexual mating rituals bored her.
When Gagné and Bentwood finally peeled themselves apart, the school president summoned the presence of mind to introduce her. He started with Pauline Vreelander, who briskly interrupted him to complete the social amenities—in French. Within seconds, the new widow and the archer were exchanging musical nasal sounds, which is how I hear French. Pauline seemed to speak like a native. When it was Jenx’s turn, the conversation reverted to English although she demonstrated a little residual high-school learning by adding, “Enchantée, Madame.”
Show-off.
“I think we met a long time ago,” the chief told Anouk. “I used to date a girl who was into archery.”
“Very likely,” Anouk agreed.
To me Jenx added, “Madame and her husband own Tir à l’Arc.”
“We divorced,” Anouk interjected. “I am now sole proprietor. I instruct archers, coach the leagues, and manage the club.”
She gave me a sideways gaze. “Madame Mattimoe seems to think that I put up those posters with her bicycle.”
“Of course you did,” I said. “I saw you take and send that photo instead of calling 9-1-1.”
“I did take the photo,” she admitted. “But I did not make the posters.”
“Who did? Who did you send the photo to?”
“I sent the photo to every archer I know.”
“Because you knew that one of them had killed him?”
“Au contraire. I knew that none of them could have killed him. He was one of us.”
“What? Are you saying that Mark Vreelander was an archer?”
“An extraordinary archer,” Anouk said.
Pauline nodded. “My husband was an alternate on the 1984 Olympic team. That’s where he met Anouk. She was one of the trainers.”
The widow and the archer smiled at Jenx, Bentwood and me, no doubt enjoying our stunned express
ions.
“One reason Mark took this position was so that he could work with Anouk again,” Pauline continued. “He hoped to convince her to teach an archery seminar at the school.”
Bentwood’s momentary blankness suggested that he hadn’t been privy to any of that. But he recovered smoothly by contributing a fact he did know.
“We’re always delighted to see Anouk at the school. She sent her son and daughter here, Class of ’05 and Class of ’07.”
Recalling Chester’s comment about the school’s steep academic decline, I did some hasty mental math. “Are they in college now?”
That hit a nerve. Bentwood coughed softly, and Anouk averted her eyes.
“My daughter is a manicurist, and my son is a professional recycler.”
I felt my customary compulsion to babble whenever I put my foot in it.
“How nice for you. My cuticles just scream ‘Help!’ And as a Realtor, I can tell you there will always be a need to get rid of trash.”
I wasn’t sure who I felt embarrassed for. Maybe it was Chester since we were discussing his future fellow alumni. Or maybe I just felt bad because my mother had raised me not to point out other people’s failures. My mother. I suddenly remembered that she was bearing down on Magnet Springs.
Jenx said, “Mrs. Gagné, I’m gonna have to question you formally about what happened last night. We can do that down at the station, but I’m on the same page as Ms. Mattimoe. Why the hell didn’t you call 9-1-1?”
“Excuse me, Chief Jenkins,” Bentwood interrupted. “Shouldn’t Mrs. Gagné have her attorney present?”
Jenx shrugged. “She can if she wants to. I’m not treating her as a suspect; I’m interviewing her for information. Mrs. Gagné was the second person at the crime scene. Ms. Mattimoe got there first, and she called 9-1-1 before she took cover, as I instructed her to do. Moments later, Mrs. Gagné arrived to find a dead body and an abandoned bicycle. I want to know why she only phoned her friends.”
“I assume,” Bentwood said officiously, “that when she saw Mrs. Mattimoe’s bicycle, Mrs. Gagné assumed that someone else had already been there and called the authorities.”