“I don’t understand,” she said, her gnarled hand moving restlessly on the antimacassar-covered arm of her chair.
I hesitated.
“Go on,” she said.
Kirk moved close to her, his hand on the wing of her chair.
Our eyes locked.
“You can’t suspect me of any of this? My God, Liz, I’m—”
“Yes, I know,” I said, staring into his baby-blue eyes.
Mother said, “Liz, don’t be ridiculous, Kirk’s a—”
“What are you talking about?” Meg demanded, stamping her foot. “He’s a what?”
Slowly, Kirk said, “A priest.” He stepped away from Mother’s chair. “One your aunt is not sure she can trust.”
“I won’t allow this in my house!” Mother said.
“I’m sorry,” I said, my face hot with embarrassment. “I just don’t know whom to trust. And Gene told me not to talk with anyone.”
He nodded, his own face red. “I can assure you I would never kill anyone, not just because I’m a priest but because—I just couldn’t, that’s all.” He brushed past me on his way to the door.
Mother called after him, “Kirk, don’t leave.”
“No,” he said, turning. “I’m sorry that Liz hasn’t got more faith in me, but if it will make it easier for her, I’ll leave. I don’t need to hear about the phone call she received. But,” his fierce gaze swung to Meg, “you’d better take every precaution to protect yourselves. If you’re not going to trust me, then don’t be stupid enough to trust anybody else!” He slammed the door behind him.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“Elizabeth Macrae, I have never been so humiliated in my life!” Mother said in a low, quivering voice. “How dare you presume to tell a guest of mine to leave?”
Meg said, “Actually, she didn’t get around to—”
“Be still!” Mother snapped. Her hands trembled. “I have never understood you, Liz, never. I have made allowances, but I warn you, if you ever—”
My hands trembled, too. I gripped the back of the couch. The acid in my voice surprised even me as I said, “I’m sorry for not trusting Kirk, but I can’t see any reason that we should.” I took a deep breath. “Both the phone calls sound as though the caller is enjoying the pain he or she is causing. Wouldn’t that person stay close to us to see the havoc they’ve wrought? And who stayed when everyone else had gone?”
“But Kirk is so nice,” Meg said, her arms folded across her chest.
“We have to protect ourselves. If the person who called you was the killer, then you both are in danger. We have no way of knowing it wasn’t Kirk,” I said.
Mother sat stiffly in her chair, her lips pinched so tightly she looked as though they’d been sewn together.
Meg said, “You haven’t told us yet about the call you got at Fran’s.”
“I couldn’t tell who it was, male or female. The person laughed when I said Fran was dead. He—she?—asked how I felt. I thought—I wanted to believe it was a mistake, someone playing a joke or drunk or—”
“But you think the caller knew it was you?” Mother asked.
I nodded.
“Why would someone want to hurt you, Aunt Liz?”
“I don’t know,” I said miserably.
Meg crossed to Mother and sat on the arm of her chair. Ordinarily Mother wouldn’t have allowed it.
“And if the person hates me so much, why not kill me? Why Andre and Fran?”
“So you would suffer and they could see it,” Mother said.
I shivered and crossed my arms over my breasts. “What have I ever done to make someone hate me so much?”
The sun slanted through the high, beveled glass windows on either side of the fireplace throwing prisms of light that died in the lap of Mother’s black dress. A lawnmower’s drone drifted in through the open front door. From the kitchen came the smell of scorching coffee.
“You should both leave town,” I said as I turned away.
“They’re after your best-loved, Liz, that hardly puts me in danger.”
I forgot the scorching coffee and stared at the grim old woman before me. I was so used to the ladylike, imperturbable mask she put on daily along with her corset that her trembling lips and the hostility shimmering in her eyes unnerved me.
I clasped my hands behind me.
“At a loss?” she prodded. “You’re usually so good with words.”
“Mother, of course I—”
She drew herself erect in her chair. “Don’t bother with a fabrication.”
I hadn’t realized I’d been holding my breath until it escaped with a hiss, and with it my temper. “You cold-hearted, self-righteous hypocrite! You want me to love you with all my heart and soul when you’ve never once been on my side or approved of anything I’ve done? Or been grateful for the sacrifices I’ve made?”
Her icy voice cut across mine, “Do you imagine I like being blamed for everything that goes wrong in your life? You’re just like your father.”
Meg had risen from the arm of Mother’s chair. She stepped back, onto the hearth.
“It’s no wonder my father left you,” I stormed. “It’s a wonder he stayed as long as he did.”
“You never tried to understand what his actions did to me.” Her brown eyes glittered with spite. “In any case, a spinster’s a fine one to talk about love. As misguided as my affections were, at least I took a chance—”
“Lucky you to have the opportunity. You didn’t have to take care of a crippled mother, did you?”
Her gnarled hands clutched the black fabric of her dress. “You let people believe you can’t marry because of me when you have no trouble at all flying hither and yon when you feel like it. Going to Mexico and Egypt and who knows where, leaving me to Jill Ferguson’s scant mercies.
“We’ll call a spade a spade: you’re the one as cold as ice. What other reason could there be for turning away a fine man like Hugh Cameron? He was so in love with you, and you tossed him aside without a thought—”
I shouted the words my mother had forbidden when I was small, “Shut up! Shut up!” Trembling, heart pounding, gasping for breath, my voice came out a harsh whisper, “Without a thought? I loved him so much I would have died for him.” I stopped, sobbing, pressing my hand to my mouth trying to shut in the words that came out anyway, “But what I wouldn’t do was marry him when I thought I’d get arthritis like you and turn ugly and short-tempered and bitter until one day he couldn’t help but hate me.”
Gene’s quiet voice came from behind me, “It smells like there’s something burning in the kitchen.”
I turned on him, furious that he’d witnessed the fight between Mother and me, furious.
He took a step back, hands raised.
I rushed down the hall to the kitchen.
The tempered-glass coffeepot sat on a burner, brown-black sludge dried on its bottom. The bitter smell of burnt coffee filled the kitchen. I picked up the pot and immediately dropped it, my hand singed. The pot exploded on the floor, and I rushed to the sink to plunge my hand under cold running water. My knees were so weak, I clung to the sink with my left hand.
Because of the water I didn’t hear his footsteps, but I felt vibrations in the old floor.
“Just go away,” I said between clenched teeth.
“I’d love to, but with two murders in town in two days, I have to stick around and talk sense into people who leave their doors wide open.”
I hunched over my hand. It stung and throbbed. My head ached. My eyes burned. I felt as shattered as the coffee pot whose shards littered the floor.
“Those handles are supposed to be heat-resistant,” he said.
I let the water run.
The floor vibrated some more, then something brushed the back of my leg. I jumped and glanced over my shoulder to see Gene sweeping the floor.
“Protect and serve?” I sneered.
“I’m cutting you some slack,” he said. “Don’t take it too far. You and y
our mother were the ones who left urgent messages that you needed me.”
I went back to watching the water bubble over my hand.
After awhile he stood next to me, gently grasped my wrist and pulled my hand from under the water. “Doesn’t look like it’s going to blister,” he said. “Good thinking, putting it under the cold water right away. Remember when we were little and our moms thought the thing to do for burns was put butter or bacon grease on them?”
I nodded.
His finger tip gently touched my palm. “That hurt?”
“I’m okay.”
“Then come on out to the parlor,” he said, “No matter how mad you are at Cousin Claire, I still need to talk to you about these phone calls, and together would be better.”
I shook my head. “I can’t.” I cleared my throat again. “I can’t take any more, Gene.” I’d been staring at his polished boots. Now I looked into his blue eyes. “Please.”
“I know you’ve been through the wringer, but—”
With a will of its own, my left hand settled on the warm, soft flannel of his sleeve. “Please.”
He sighed. “Will you stay right here?”
I said, “Thank you,” and sat in one of the chairs at the round oak table that was covered with casseroles, loaves of bread, store-bought cakes, and one frozen, home-made cherry pie the visitors had brought.
I stood up and glanced at the clock in the stove. Only 11:30, early for lunch, but I pulled some hamburger and Italian sausage out of the refrigerator and started it browning in a pan. I pulled out stuff for a salad. I got the stool and climbed up so I could reach our highest cupboard shelf for the last two jars of the spaghetti sauce we’d made last September. Pain stabbed as I remembered Fran was dead. How long would it take until it quit pouncing on me unexpectedly? How I wished Fran were here so I could talk over the fight with Mother.
A fight—the last one I could remember was the summer after Dad left when Mother made me practice the piano every day for two hours. One morning I planned to sneak out to meet my friends for a day-long bike ride, but Mother caught me and insisted I practice the piano first.
When I said I wouldn’t, Mother screamed at me, “I won’t allow you to be the hoyden your father made you.”
Her wild eyes frightened me, and I turned to run. Mother caught my ponytail and dragged me to the piano, threw me onto the bench and stood over me until I began to play a Chopin nocturne I was learning.
Mother kept me there for exactly two hours, timed by the Seth Thomas clock on the mantel. I’ve never cared for piano music since.
More than 25 years of control blown.
I’d put the spaghetti into the boiling water and was setting the table when the back door creaked open and Kirk stuck his head in. “Oh, hi, Liz.”
“Looking for Mother?”
He’d changed back into civvies and wore cutoffs that exposed strong legs thickly covered with blond hair. Topping the cutoffs was another Hawaiian shirt, mostly red, which matched his face.
“I’m sorry about earlier, Kirk. I just don’t know—”
“If I’d been through what you have, I think I’d be ready to suspect the bishop!”
I sighed. Kirk would hardly attack Mother, Meg, and me when we were all together, and surely I was wrong to suspect him anyway, and if life ever turned back to normal, I’d be seeing him in church. “Would you like to stay for lunch?”
He turned even redder. “Honestly, I don’t plan it this way.”
“It’s okay.”
“I came to tell you something. I didn’t want to say it in front of everyone, and I’m not even sure—well—I do hate gossip.”
“You’re supposed to. Come on, Kirk, spill it.” I moved to the stove and hooked a strand of spaghetti out of the boiling water to see if it was ready.
“Maybe I did see Fran’s car last night. I had to go to the hospital, the Henderson baby took another turn for the worse—”
“Those poor people.”
“Yes. It’ll be a blessing when it’s over. Anyway, I had to get gas, and I always go to Harry’s.”
I turned from the bubbling pot. Harry’s was within sight of The Bird. “You saw Fran?”
“Well, I saw her car, anyway. The way it was sitting in the middle of the lot with the lights on attracted my attention. Another car was sitting next to it so that the driver’s sides were close—I guess they were talking to each other without getting out of their cars.”
“What time was this?”
“A little after 9:30.”
“Did you recognize the other car?”
“It was a light-colored station wagon.”
“Victor’s?”
“It could have been.”
“I’ve got to tell Gene!” I said, starting for the door.
“Wait! I don’t want to seem to be accusing—”
“Gene will know what to do with the information.”
“But it might not have been Victor’s—”
The spaghetti water overflowed the pot, hissing and steaming as it hit the burners.
“Rats!” I yelled and scrambled to lift the pot off the stove. Kirk got the colander, and together we drained the spaghetti as Gene ambled back into the kitchen.
To Kirk I said, “Will you please tell Mother lunch is ready?”
When he left, Gene said in a near-whisper, “You could be a little easier on Cousin Claire.”
I snapped, “What do you know about dealing with family problems? You just keep divorcing them.”
He blinked.
We were both silent as I reached into the cupboard for plates.
Gene cleared his throat. “It’s just about impossible to get an official tap on the phone,” he said. “I could buy the equipment, though, and you could install a recorder yourselves. It wouldn’t do any good in court, but it might give us a clue.”
“Mother would never allow it.”
“Even now? I don’t want to scare you, but—”
“I’m scared enough, believe me,” I said.
“So what about a recorder on your phone?”
“I could use the memo feature on my answering machine to record. I’ll have to find the booklet—I don’t remember how. And I’ve got caller ID on the phone in my bedroom. We’d know who it was right away.”
“Depends on whether your caller has a blocked number—”
The sound of clicking claws preceded Bunny’s entrance; Meg followed. She pulled open the kitchen door for him.
I yelped, “A leash, Meg! He’ll run!”
“No, he won’t,” she said calmly, as the bang of the screened door on the porch announced that he’d nosed it open and escaped.
“If you want to keep him, you’re going to have to—”
“Aunt Liz, will you just give me a minute? You’ll see for yourself.” She went to the cupboard and pulled out the aspirin.
“Fine!” I sniffed and started piling spaghetti on plates. I concentrated on the task of spooning sauce into the nests of noodles as Kirk and Mother came into the kitchen, mother’s cane thumping. When I couldn’t put it off any longer, I turned to face Mother.
“I see you came to your senses and didn’t try to keep Kirk out any longer,” she said.
And Gene thought I didn’t know how to back off!
Meg’s voice was loud as she said, “Doesn’t this spaghetti smell great?” Her pale, moist forehead testified to the effort it cost her to be near food at the moment.
His face burning, Kirk pulled a chair out for Mother.
Gene said, “Come sit down, Liz.”
Mother said, “Liz, you’ve forgotten the parmesan cheese.”
With a sigh, I opened the refrigerator.
Meg opened the back door and went onto the porch. She called, “Bunny, come in now.”
By the time I’d put the cheese in a bowl, Meg was seated at the table with Bunny sitting on the floor between her and Kirk. “See? His problem was he thought he had to run away in order to do what he want
ed.”
“How did you convince him otherwise?” Mother asked.
Gene sat down next to her.
“I had a long talk with him out by the river yesterday. I just told him I’d let him go whenever he wanted,” Meg replied. “Actually, I was a little worried right now because Grandmother insisted I lock him in my room while we had all those people here, but he understood.” She leaned down and ruffled his beige topknot, “You’re a real gentleman, aren’t you, Bunny?”
Mother said, “Liz, sit down. Kirk, will you give the blessing?”
Like a good Episcopal lady, I sat gently in the empty chair between Kirk and Gene and bowed my head. God knows, I needed a prayer.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“Almighty and most merciful God, bless and comfort the people at this table and gather to you our departed friends Andre Noire, Annamaria Vico, and Fran Egan.”
Once again that stab in my heart. Fran. If only she were here with her casual ways and lively conversation. I’d never realized how much I relied on her.
Kirk had gone on. “—and please bring peace into this household—”
Good God, did the man spend his days with his ear pressed to our windows? Honestly!
Kirk’s blessing finally ended, and in the strained silence that followed, I passed him the salad.
Surprised that I could be hungry, I took a bite of spaghetti. The rich tomato sauce brought back the hot September day that Fran, Meg, Mother and I had spent wrapped in the steamy smell of fresh tomatoes, basil, parsley, oregano, rosemary, and thyme. We’d sung the Simon and Garfunkel song, waltzing around the tomato-spattered kitchen, barefoot and sweating, Mother laughing at the spectacle we made.
Gene cleared his throat, startling me back to reality. But the smile from the memory stayed.
Gene said, “About these phone calls—”
“Now, Gene, you know I don’t allow unpleasant subjects at my table,” Mother said.
Gene picked a baby carrot out of the salad and crunched it between his teeth.
Kirk said, “You’ve effected quite a change in Bunny’s behavior, Meg. How did you do it?”
“Oh, one of my roommates had a psychic connection with animals,” Meg explained. “So yesterday after I tracked Bunny through a million backyards, I tried it. And you know what? After I listened at him as hard as I could, he told me Barry and Andre never let him sniff around and roll in the dirt. That’s all he wanted when he ran away, just to be a real dog.”
Paula K. Perrin - Small Town Deadly Page 14