Silent Night, Deadly Night

by Vicki Delany

  She made the call, and then we went to join the others. The women had taken seats in the living room, under the stern and watchful eye of Officer Candice Campbell. They weren’t talking, and they sat a bit straighter as we came in. Their faces were either pale or tear streaked, all of them questioning and expectant. I glanced at Vicky, and gave her a slight shake of my head. She nodded in acknowledgment.

  “I’m sorry to have to tell you this,” Simmonds said. “I received a call from the hospital. Karla died shortly after arrival.”

  Ruth’s face turned even paler. Barbara gasped. Constance said, “That’s not possible. We were having dinner less than half an hour ago.” Genevieve began to cry.

  “What was your friend’s surname?” Simmonds asked.

  “Vaughan,” Constance said. “She was Karla Hennery in college, and she took her husband’s name when they got married.”

  “Where does Mrs. Vaughan live?”

  “Northfield, Minnesota,” Barbara answered. “We’re all from out of town. We’re friends of Aline, here for the weekend.”

  Ruth stood up. “I’m going to get a glass of water. Would anyone else like one?”

  “Sit down, please,” Simmonds said. “That won’t be possible at the moment. I’m ordering the kitchen to be sealed. A crime scene team is on the way.”

  Ruth dropped into her chair with a thud.

  “Isn’t that going a bit too far?” Barbara said. “It was an accident. It had to be. Karla was allergic to peanuts, we all knew that. I can assure you, none of us used peanuts in our cooking.”

  The other women muttered their agreement.

  Constance lifted her hand and pointed one well-manicured finger directly at Vicky. “The peanuts must have been in something from her bakery. She said she didn’t use peanuts, but how do we know that’s true?”

  “Hey!” Vicky said. “It’s true because I said it’s true. I run a respectable business. I don’t lie about things like that.”

  “That’s irrelevant,” I said. “Constance, you said you bought the dessert at Vicky’s, but the cake hasn’t been touched yet.”

  “No, but she brought the cheese and crackers. Maybe something was in that.”

  “I do not—” Vicky began.

  Simmonds held up a hand. “We will be analyzing all the food served here tonight and come to our own conclusions.”

  “No one would want to murder Karla,” Ruth said. “The very idea’s preposterous. I bet she ate something earlier that had peanuts in it. We weren’t together all day.”

  “An attack like that comes on almost instantly,” Constance said. “My son has a severe peanut allergy, too. I know all the signs.”

  “Did any of you notice Mrs. Vaughan behaving strangely before dinner?” Simmonds asked. “As if she was feeling unwell?”

  We shook our heads.

  “Nothing was wrong with her appetite,” Genevieve said. “She ate most of that cheese platter single-handedly. ‘Self-control’ was not a word in Karla’s vocabulary.”

  “Says the woman with one eye on the wine bottle all night,” Barbara said.

  Genevieve threw Barbara a vicious glare, but wisely she said no more.

  Constance’s face was streaked with tears, and she spoke sharply. “That’s enough, ladies. Have some respect. Pay us no mind, Detective. We’re simply devastated at what’s happened. Genevieve’s upset. She doesn’t intend to sound mean. Karla simply . . . enjoyed life.” She wept into a tattered tissue.

  “I’d like to speak to each of you privately,” Simmonds said. “Merry, do you have a room we can use?”

  “Dad’s study. Down the hall, on the left.”

  “Sounds like we’re in a mystery novel,” Ruth said. “But one I’m very sorry to be involved in. I’ll help every way I can, Detective. But first, can I call my husband and ask him to come and pick me up?”

  “I drove here.” Barbara stood up. “I’m leaving tonight. Right now. If you still want to talk to me, you can call my office in the morning.”

  “I came on the train,” Genevieve said. “And then a bus from Rochester. I’ll never get home tonight. Can I have a lift with you, Barbara?”

  “I hope none of you are deliberately misunderstanding me,” Simmonds said. “I’m not asking anyone’s permission. I will talk to you now, in turn, and then you can go to your rooms. None of you are to leave the town of Rudolph until I say you can. Do you understand?” She looked at each of the women, one after the other.

  “You don’t think this was an accident, do you?” Ruth said.

  “I will not be jumping to any conclusions.”

  “That’s ludicrous,” Genevieve said. “Who on earth would want to kill Karla? Other than her husband, I mean. He might have wanted to kill her to stop her constant whining.”

  “I don’t think that’s at all funny,” Barbara said.

  Genevieve had the grace to duck her head.

  “Tomorrow I’d like you all to come into the police station to be fingerprinted,” Simmonds said.

  Genevieve’s head popped back up. “That’s ridiculous,” she said. “I have no intention of being treated like a common criminal.”

  “She needs them for elimination purposes,” Ruth said. “You want to be eliminated, don’t you?”

  Genevieve sputtered.

  “I could raise a legal challenge,” Barbara said.

  “You may,” Simmonds replied. “If you want to delay finding out what happened to your friend.”

  “But,” Barbara said, “in this case I won’t.”

  “I’ll speak to you first,” Simmonds said. “Where do you practice law?”

  “I’m a senior partner at Shaughnessy and Ferguson in New York City.”

  Simmonds gave Officer Campbell a nod, telling her to come with them. In turn, Candy glared at me, as though she expected me to run off into the night. I smiled at her sweetly. We had not been friends in high school. Nothing had changed on that front.

  “You know where I live, Detective,” Vicky said. “You also know I start work early. Can I go home now and give my statement in the morning?”

  “No,” Simmonds said. “I’ll talk to you in turn. I don’t want you all discussing what went on here while I’m not in the room. Can I trust you to do that?”

  No one answered.

  At that moment lights washed the front windows as a cruiser pulled up, followed by a white van. My mom got out of the police car. She walked up the path between Officer Reynolds and a short, overweight man in civilian clothes. As nothing exciting seemed to be happening, most of the neighbors had gone back to their houses and their beds.

  I hurried to get the door. Mom’s face was pale, her nose and eyes red. Most of her eye makeup had been rubbed off, leaving dark streaks behind. I wrapped her in my arms. “Did you get Dad?”

  “He’s trying to arrange a flight home. No one answered at Karla’s house, so I left a message saying it was urgent. I didn’t say why.”

  “Start in the dining room and then the kitchen,” Simmonds said to the man who’d come in with Mom. “This was a dinner party, and I want all the cooked and prepared food analyzed.”

  “You got it, Detective,” he said.

  Simmonds then turned to Reynolds. “Stay here. I don’t want any of these women talking about what went on tonight before I can interview them.”

  He grunted in acknowledgment and then he took a position in the center of the room, feet apart, arms crossed, scowl on his face. He was very young and looked, I thought, perfectly foolish, like he was playing the part of the village constable in a high school production of an Agatha Christie play.

  I took a seat on the couch next to Vicky. Mom dropped beside me, and I put my arm around her. We sat in silence. It seemed as if the women had run out of things to say, or maybe shock was beginning to settle in.

  Barb
ara and Candy were soon back. “Can I go upstairs now?” Barbara asked.

  “The detective says you can each return to your room after she’s spoken to you,” Candy said. “But you have to stay out of the kitchen and the dining room. Vicky Casey, you’re next.”

  Candy glared at me as though I’d done something more threatening than sit on the couch next to my mom. I gave the officer of the law a cheerful smile, and she turned so abruptly she was in danger of whiplash.

  Vicky stood up and followed her to Dad’s study.

  Eventually, only Mom and I were left in the living room, but we remained sitting close together on the couch. Vicky had gone home, after giving us big hugs, and one by one the other women headed upstairs after their interviews. We listened to footsteps on the stairs, water running, and floorboards creaking. In the kitchen, cupboard doors slammed and people spoke to one another. The food from the potluck, dishes and all, along with serving platters and pots and pans, were dumped into bags, labeled, and carried away.

  Simmonds dropped onto a damask-covered wingback chair next to the fireplace that now contained nothing but dying red embers. “Mrs. Wilkinson, Aline. Tell me what you know about the dead woman, Karla Vaughan.”

  Mom shook her head. “I hardly know what to say, Diane. I haven’t seen her in almost forty years. We all roomed together our first year in college; we’ve kept in touch since, and I thought a reunion would be a great idea. Obviously, I was wrong.” She took a deep breath, and I gave her hand a squeeze. “I was about to say they’ve changed so much, but now I realize they’re exactly as they were then. Some of their bad points have only consolidated, strengthened over the years. We weren’t getting on, Diane, not at all, and I was desperate for this weekend to end. But I didn’t think anyone was angry enough at anyone to kill her. Surely you’re wrong about that.”

  Simmonds said, “I won’t know what was in the food until an analysis is done, but the missing EpiPen bothers me. It bothers me a lot.”

  “Maybe she misplaced it,” Mom said. “Or she didn’t bring one on this trip.”

  “Perhaps. I’ve had her room searched. No sign of it. All the other women say they didn’t see one. Did you? Did she tell you she had one?”

  Mom shook her head. “No.”

  “So it is possible she didn’t bring one,” Simmonds said, as much to herself as to us. “Or she lost it. Did she seem scatterbrained, forgetful to you?”

  “No,” Mom said.

  “Even if she was,” I said, “that’s not something someone with such a serious allergy would forget.”

  “In what order did the women come downstairs tonight?” Simmonds asked. “Merry tells me she was last to arrive.”

  Mom closed her eyes and thought. “Karla was first down. We talked for several minutes. She talked, mostly, about how well her husband’s construction company is doing. The doorbell rang, and I answered it. It was Vicky Casey, and she and I went into the kitchen to get a serving platter for her bread and cheese. We chatted for a few minutes, I asked her for news of her family, and when we came out, all the women had gathered in the living room.”

  Which meant, I thought, any one of them could have gone into Karla’s room to steal her EpiPen before dinner.

  It was possible she didn’t carry one, but I didn’t think that likely. Her allergy was, as it should be, at the top of her mind at all times.

  “Was someone in the house all day?” Simmonds asked.

  “The guests were in and out most of the day,” Mom said. “Going for a walk, into town shopping. I can’t account for their movements. I myself went for a walk before dinner, wanting to have some alone time. Things around here have been, I’ll admit, a bit tense. Too many guests.”

  “Did you lock the house when you left?”

  “No, I didn’t. I don’t usually, not during the day, and I don’t have enough keys to give one to each of the women. You don’t think someone came in, do you? Someone who shouldn’t have been in my house?” Mom’s eyes darted to the corners.

  “I don’t think anything,” Simmonds said. “At this time, all I’m doing is asking questions. Merry, what was your impression of Karla?”

  “She was sad,” I said. “Bitter at life.”

  “Is that so? The other women said she was happily married, a loving mother and grandmother, who enjoyed the work she did for her husband’s prosperous construction firm.”

  “Maybe she opened up to me more,” I said. “She didn’t know me, so she had nothing to prove. That’s my impression of her anyway. I might be wrong.”

  “You say you haven’t seen her in forty years?” Simmonds asked Mom. She kept her tone light, chatty, but my senses pricked up. “Yet you invited her to stay in your home?”

  “I hadn’t seen her since our college years, that’s true, but we’d kept in touch. The entire group has. Letters at first, as well as Christmas cards, birth and wedding announcements, then e-mails.”

  “You’ve never been to her home, or she to yours, in all that time?”

  Mom shook her head. “She lives in Minnesota, and I’ve never had cause to go there.”

  “Visiting your old college friend wasn’t cause enough?”

  Simmonds, I knew, was subtly digging for a reason Mom might want to kill Karla.

  “What can I say,” Mom said. “Life takes over. We have our families, our careers, time passes so fast. Perhaps that’s why I wanted us to get together this weekend. A way of slowing time down, if only for a few days.”

  The detective’s eyes flicked toward me before settling on Mom once again. I breathed. If that had been a test, Mom had passed. “What about the others? Have they visited Karla since college, or she, them?”

  “I don’t know for sure, but I don’t remember anyone saying anything to that effect. Of course, they might not have told the rest of us about it. If that happened.”

  “Merry,” Simmonds asked. “What do you mean they weren’t getting on?”

  “They bickered,” I said. “All of them, all the time. I can hardly sort out who was fighting with whom. Except for Mom, she tried to make nice, but they didn’t seem to be able to help themselves.”

  “Bickered about what?” Simmonds asked.

  “Everything,” Mom said. “Status, money, family. Even looks. Karla was overweight, and Genevieve kept making digs at her. She couldn’t even stop after the woman had died, for heaven’s sake. I suspect Genevieve has her own issues with food, and she took those out on Karla. Ruth doesn’t have much money, and Constance kept offering to pay for things, but she didn’t do it in a nice way.”

  “What does that mean?” Simmonds asked.

  “Constance was showing off, using the offer of money to put Ruth down, not being generous or thoughtful. As I recall, she did that in college, too.”

  “Anything else that caused tension in the group?”

  “Karla has grandchildren, and the rest of us, except for Ruth, don’t, so Karla talked continually about how important grandchildren are. Barbara and Genevieve are divorced, although Barbara has remarried. Karla pointedly talked about her happy marriage. Barbara’s an environmental lawyer, and Karla thinks—thought—laws to protect the environment are damaging to businesses like hers. And on and on it went. It was, frankly, a horrible weekend. I couldn’t wait for it to be over. But I didn’t want it to end this way.”

  “Thank you, Aline, Merry. I’m sorry to have to keep your guests in town a while longer. It would be perfectly understandable if you asked them to go to a hotel tomorrow.”

  “I got a text from Noel a few minutes ago,” Mom said. “He’s booked on a flight getting into Rochester at ten tomorrow morning. It’ll be expensive, but he’ll catch a cab home. He should be here before noon. I’ll talk it over with him.”

  “Don’t go into Mrs. Vaughan’s room,” Simmonds said. “I’ve sealed that off. I left a message at the number you g
ave me for her house, but if you hear from her husband before I do, let me know.”

  “I will.” Mom shook her head sadly. “The poor man. They’ve been together since high school. It’s going to be hard on him.”

  “I’ll stay the night, Mom,” I said.

  “You don’t have to do that, dear,” she said.

  “I know I don’t. But I will. As all your guest rooms are full, I’ll sleep here, on the couch.” Not that I expected to get much sleep, as the police were still at work, talking in loud voices, slamming doors.

  Mom smiled at me. “I’ve a new toothbrush I haven’t opened yet. I’ll lay that and a clean towel out for you.”

  “Thanks, Mom.” I kissed her good night, and she went upstairs, her tread unnaturally heavy on the staircase.

  “Any reason you’re staying here tonight you didn’t want to share with your mother?” Simmonds said once my mom had gone.

  “If one of these women killed Karla, we don’t know why and thus we don’t know if they might be after someone else next. I’m not leaving Mom alone. Not until Dad gets here, anyway.”

  “I’ll be back first thing in the morning to talk to everyone in more detail.”

  “Did you learn anything?” I asked. “Aside from the fact that my mom had no reason to kill Karla.”

  Simmonds smiled but didn’t acknowledge my point. “None of them confessed, and none of them pointed the finger of suspicion at any of the others. They all said they were shocked and are convinced it was an accident: peanuts had somehow gotten into a food item in the store or factory. I didn’t want to tell them I’m particularly interested in the curried egg salad, but it was hard not to. They all say, including your mother, that everyone was in and out of the kitchen this morning and afternoon at different times preparing their contribution. Some dishes went in the oven and some in the fridge. No one confessed to making the curried egg salad, and no one noticed it being made or being placed into the fridge or onto the kitchen island.”