Larkspur

by Sheila Simonson

  The early phone call had been a false lead on Miguel. A gray Mercedes 300 had surfaced in Medford, Oregon--stolen. Mercedes appeared to be the vehicle of choice for car thieves. I reminded myself not to buy one.

  Jay had spent the day in the courthouse digging for background on the suspects while Kevin supervised the ongoing search for Miguel. The state lab report came, verifying the toxicologist's opinion. Jay wasn't very forthcoming about his own discoveries. It was just gossip, he said rather irritably, when I pressed him for more detail.

  The long-term relationship between Llewellyn and his friend Hal had begun shortly after Dennis's birth and had had ups and downs. Both men had had flings outside the "marriage" but they had always come back together. Jay was trying to track down the flingees.

  Denise had never married, nor had she taken another long-term lover after Dennis's birth, though she had been seen in fashionable places with a variety of leading men. Jay thought he would find evidence that Llewellyn supported her. She had not danced professionally in fifteen years, though she taught master classes at the prestigious Wayne Studio until she was fifty-five.

  Dennis had attended public schools in San Francisco, and Humboldt State. He had worked for the Forest Service summers while he was still in school and permanently after that. Single-minded, our Dennis. He had spent two years in Alaska and the rest of the time in northern California. He had had girl friends but had never married. (Poor Ginger.) Everybody thought he was a nice guy. Nobody thought he would amount to much.

  The Huffs were slightly more colorful than Dennis. Bill's father, who inherited the paper from his father, had built a reputation as a crusty eccentric. Bill attended Muir, majored in journalism, and landed a job as a reporter for the Chronicle after three years with the Navy. He covered the police beat for awhile and did sports, married Janey's mother, and sired two daughters. When his father died of a heart attack, Bill moved the family to Monte and took over the paper. They had seemed a model family. The divorce came as a big surprise to everybody, including, apparently, Bill's wife. Bill and Lydia got acquainted at meetings of the county arts council. When they met, Lydia was already widowed, no children.

  Lydia had grown up in the Midwest, the daughter of a hardware store owner with a fondness for hot cars. She went to college in Iowa and was still famous at her sorority for daredevil pranks and speeding tickets, but her marriage to an insurance broker had seemed sedate enough.

  When he died in a plane crash, she moved west and tried her hand at several small, craftsy businesses. That was during the seventies when craftsy businesses sprang up all over California like magic mushrooms. Lydia had managed to avoid bankruptcy, no mean feat, but had never made a killing. Her interest in paper-making and book-binding was the key to her connection with Bill Huff, and from then on it was love's middle-aged dream. Both Huffs were popular locally, and Lydia had a reputation for public service. She was on the library board.

  The Huff Press had been expanded ten years before. It enjoyed a growing reputation for excellence, both in the quality of the writers represented and in the workmanship of the books. It was not particularly profitable, but it broke even. The paper, by contrast, produced solid profit margins every year, probably because it was the only newspaper in the county. It carried the book publishing end.

  As far as Jay could find out, Janey Huff was squeaky clean. Her mother had taken the daughters north to Portland after the divorce. The mother had eventually remarried and now ran three successful newsletters out of her home. Janey's sister was a graduate student at the University of Oregon. Janey had attended the University of Washington. Neither girl was married. Dull stuff, I thought.

  Jay was close-mouthed about Winton D'Angelo. D'Angelo had a Ph.D. from Stanford and had begun his academic career on the tenure track at Presteign, a small, very exclusive liberal arts college. He had married at twenty-five, the year he took the job at Presteign, and divorced at thirty, the year he came to Monte. Two sons. Was known as a man-about-town. Skied. That was as much as Jay was going to give me. I accused him of holding back.

  He sighed. "D'Angelo's holding back. I don't know what. Why don't we watch It Happened One Night on cable and forget about the damned case? I don't want to think about it any more. How's Ginger?"

  I told him about that, and we watched half the film and went to bed.

  Chapter VII

  "Poor darlings." Lydia gave the tall stalk of delphinium a delicate pat. "They don't like the heat."

  I had not wanted another garden tour, but the charcoal briquets had proved balky and the steaks weren't yet done. We had already endured a tour of Bill's gun room--lots of hunting rifles. A deer-head had stared down at us from above Bill's desk. I do not like guns. In a spirit of contrariness I had asked to see larkspur when Lydia offered to show me her flower garden. She didn't bat an eye, though Janey made a small, strangled noise and D'Angelo winced.

  We were waist-deep in Delphinium elatum, and they were a trifle droopy. All of Lydia's larkspur were blue perennials.

  "The wrong kind for the murder," Janey muttered.

  Lydia gave me a matey wink. "But so pretty. They're good in bouquets. Delphinium and white glads with a puff of white or yellow mums at the base make a striking formal arrangement."

  "I'd get bored with blue." D'Angelo had carried his scotch with him from the patio. He took a swallow. "They're a bit leggy, Lydia. What do you use on them, steer manure?"

  "I try not to over-feed them." Lydia picked her way back to the flagstone path. We all followed. "They need a lot of water in this dry heat. I hope the boy remembers to soak them Friday morning." She bent and broke a dead blossom from something I couldn't identify. "Maybe I'll try the annuals next year, with daisies and cosmos. What do you think, Win?"

  "Too tall." D'Angelo swatted at a bee and the ice clinked in his glass. We had interrupted the bees. "Get Denise to give you cuttings of her grandiflorum."

  "I do like that color." Lydia turned back to me. "It's a Chinese variety, very deep blue. Also a perennial."

  "There's a native California annual," D'Angelo said. "It has scarlet blossoms, though. Grows wild around here. Larkspur like high altitude."

  Janey said flatly, "I think you're all horrid."

  "Lydia!" Bill was flipping the steaks.

  "Coming," Lydia called. "Mind that patch of mud, Lark. No point in ruining your sandals."

  I trod carefully.

  "Well, you are," Janey insisted when nobody responded to her.

  D'Angelo took another gulp of scotch. "People tend to be horrid. Especially when they're relieved they won't be hauled off to the pokey and charged with murder."

  We looked at him, Janey red-faced.

  "When I heard that kid had run off with the Mercedes," he went on, dispassionate, "I felt the purest relief and gratitude."

  "Gratitude! He killed Dai!"

  Lydia said, "Don't be obtuse, Janey. All Win means is that he's glad we can get on with our lives. Mourn Dai properly," she added, lest Janey imagine she meant business as usual. "A police investigation is apt to be unpleasant, darling. None of us was looking forward to the intrusion into our private lives."

  "Or to being pilloried in the press," I said sweetly.

  We reached the round, wrought-iron patio table. Its striped umbrella fluttered in the evening sea-breeze.

  "Ready?" Bill roared. "T-bones coming up." He flopped three steaks onto a platter and handed it to Lydia. "Ladies first, eh, Win?" He moved the other two steaks to the center of the grill. The fat sizzled and smoked.

  D'Angelo finished his scotch.

  "Do have another drink, Win." Lydia pried the top steak off the heap onto my dinner plate, helped herself, and passed the platter to Janey.

  "I was about to." He made for the wet bar.

  The steaks were large. I wondered if Lydia gave out doggie bags.

  "Make me another, Win. Splash of soda." Bill looked around. "Damn it, Lydia, where's the platter?"

  Lydia rose and too
k the platter to him.

  "That's the ticket. Where are those drinks? Ah, good. Put on the feedbag, Win. Chow down." He laughed heartily. Bill was in high good humor, somewhat exaggerated by alcohol. He patted Lydia's hand-woven skirt as she turned to come back to the table.

  I took a sip of wine, red this time--pinot noir, very nice with steak. Lydia sat.

  Bill trundled over with the platter, forked the steaks onto the plates, laid the platter on the serving cart and sat down. The table wobbled. I steadied my wine.

  "Where the hell's the Worcestershire sauce?"

  D'Angelo turned back to the bar and retrieved a bottle of Lea and Perrins. He let Bill pluck it and one of the scotches from his right hand, then sat with his own drink.

  "My kind of meal," Bill said unnecessarily. He shook Worcestershire sauce over his steak and slathered butter on his baked potato. "Sour cream anybody?"

  We ate. As Bill beat his steak into submission and defeated the potato, he told us his sensations when he saw his byline on the lead story in the Sunday Chronicle. The acme of journalistic achievement.

  I listened to Bill, wondering at the existence of the Huff Press, given his clear predilection for news. Not just news, news with punch and screamer headlines. How frustrated he must have been all those years writing editorials about sewer bond elections. And publishing slim volumes of confessional poetry.

  The steak was tender. I ate about half of mine and some salad nicoise, and sipped wine. Janey was listening to her father and picking olives out of the salad. Win D'Angelo pulled steadily on his scotch. Lydia chewed. Finally, Bill wound down.

  "I'm sure you read Bill's story, Lark." Lydia smiled at me. "What did you think?"

  About halfway between USA Today and the National Enquirer.

  "It was fine," I lied.

  Bill beamed. "Doing another follow-up on the Montez boy for the Sacramento Bee. Something has to be done about all these Mexicans flooding the state."

  "Miguel has a green card," I said coldly.

  D'Angelo was watching me over his scotch. He had matched Bill drink for drink but he seemed cold sober. "Dodge talked to Miguel a lot that evening. What did they say?"

  "I don't speak Spanish."

  "Dodge had the kid save the wine glass." D'Angelo cut a bite of steak. "He must've suspected poisoning all along."

  That was obvious. I didn't respond.

  Lydia said briskly, "Let's not keep hashing over the past, Win. Do you want a ride to the airport?"

  "No, thanks. I'll drive down myself."

  "We'll have a couple of hours to kill afterwards, Lydia." Bill speared a forkful of salad. "I'm going to drop by the paper."

  "All right." Lydia glanced at me. "Your mother is coming, isn't she, Lark?"

  I nodded. "She'll fly back with me afterwards. She wants to meet Win."

  "She wants to go through Dai's journal and letters," D'Angelo muttered. He swallowed scotch.

  Janey was mushing her baked potato.

  Lydia said brightly, "How exciting. Will you be doing a book together?"

  "No!" D'Angelo bit his lip. "Sorry, Lydia, but that's silly. We're both going to be too busy."

  "Ah, of course, the Foundation..."

  "Congratulations," I interposed. "It sounds exciting, a West Coast Bread Loaf."

  "What bread loaf?" Bill blinked over his scotch glass.

  "Oh, Daddy, the writer's colony," Janey muttered.

  "Will you resign your job at the college?" I asked.

  D'Angelo drew a deep breath. "I already have."

  That was news. All three Huffs looked at him.

  "It'll take a year for the will to be probated." Lydia leaned forward, eyes keen. "That's what the lawyer told me."

  "That's right."

  "What are you going to live on?"

  "My wife." D'Angelo began to laugh. "God, that's funny."

  "Wife?"

  "I'm getting married." He laughed on a cough and wiped his face with his napkin. "Sorry."

  "Good heavens, congratulations!" Lydia beamed at him. "Who's the lucky girl?"

  "Martha Finn."

  Everybody looked as blank as I felt.

  Janey drew a breath. "Oh, the actress?"

  "That's right."

  "Well, well, this is a surprise." Lydia raised her wineglass in a half-toast. "Martha Finn."

  Bill looked from D'Angelo to his wife with an expression of glazed bewilderment. "Who's Martha Finn?"

  "She runs that repertory company out on the coast." Lydia set her glass down and began stacking plates. "Wasn't she with the Shakespeare Festival for a while?"

  "Five years." D'Angelo set his salad bowl on his mostly uneaten steak. "That's where we met."

  "You've been very secretive."

  "Yes." He smiled at her like the shark in the Threepenny Opera. "That's one thing I've learned as a result of my long association with Dai Llewellyn--circumspection. Martha and I are going to spend the winter in Italy. We leave as soon after Labor Day as she can wind up her accounts. When we come back I'll start setting up the writer's colony, and she'll go into production at San Patricio. You can print that, Bill."

  "Huh?" Bill was half asleep.

  I got up to help Lydia clear the table.

  "I envy you," Lydia said lightly. "Italy in winter."

  "When all the tourists have gone home. I have been looking forward to it," D'Angelo finished his scotch, "all of my life."

  "Where are you staying, Florence?" I liked the thought of Italy myself.

  "We'll gypsy around." He got to his feet. "And now, friends, I am going to ask the delightful and steel-nerved Miss Dailey to follow me home. I have imbibed more scotch than is strictly legal, but I don't see any other way to get my car to my apartment."

  "I'll drive your car over in the morning," Janey muttered. "I can run back. I need the exercise." D'Angelo's apartment complex lay a couple of miles closer to town.

  D'Angelo blinked. "Ah. Well, if you don't mind. I do have to leave for the airport by five-thirty in the morning."

  "It'll be there."

  He gave her a wide, sweet smile. He was a good-looking man in a grizzled middle-aged way.

  Janey blushed.

  "Thanks." He fished in his pocket. "Here are the keys. No, I'll need the key to the apartment." He detached the car key from the ring and handed it to Janey. "There."

  "Can I interest anyone in coffee?" Lydia was losing control of the situation and looked as if she didn't like the idea. She probably had black bottom pie waiting in the pantry.

  "No, thanks," I murmured. "I ought to try for an early night, too, Lydia. And you'll be wanting to pack. It was a nice dinner. Thanks." I grabbed my handbag.

  Lydia gave in gracefully and followed us out to my car.

  We had turned the first corner and were just out of sight of the house when D'Angelo said, without preamble, "I want to talk to Dodge. Is he at the courthouse?"

  I had strayed over the center line in my surprise. I pulled back in the right lane. "What is it, eight-thirty?" The clock on my dashboard didn't work. Never had.

  "Ten to nine."

  "He may be, or he may be at my apartment. Won't it keep?" I negotiated the bridge across Beale Creek, a dry boulder-strewn streak of gravel at that season.

  "'It' will keep but my resolution won't. I'm going to make a confession. They say it's good for the soul."

  I clutched the wheel and drove very very carefully. I did my best to beat back my imagination, but I had never believed Miguel guilty of Llewellyn's death, and there was a murderer at large. If the murderer was Winton D'Angelo, I wasn't going to do or say anything to trigger him off.

  Fortunately there wasn't much traffic on the road. D'Angelo appeared to be drowsing. His eyes were closed. I entered Monte on the old highway, which turns into Main Street at the first set of traffic lights. My apartment was closer than the courthouse, so I drove slowly around back. Jay's Blazer was in the bank vice-president's slot and there were lights above.

&nbs
p; "He's home." Oh, the relief.

  D'Angelo gave a slight start and straightened up. "Yet once more unto the breach..."

  I parked. "I'm going to take you up the back way. The press has been camping on my doorstep." In fact, I was no longer besieged by reporters.

  "Circumspection called for." He giggled. "I'm a Doctor of Circumspection." He sounded more drunk than he had at the Huffs. However, he followed me up the back stairs quietly.

  Jay was sitting on my couch reading a sheaf of papers. He was wearing his favorite off-duty outfit--cutoffs and a tee shirt. He looked freshly showered to me. I don't know how he looked to D'Angelo. Unkempt, probably. D'Angelo was a natty dresser.

  "You're home early..." Jay's voice trailed when he looked up and saw D'Angelo. He set the papers on the coffee table and got to his feet.

  "Win has a confession to make," I said in what I hoped was a neutral voice.

  Jay met D'Angelo's eyes for a long unsmiling moment. "I think it's more likely Professor D'Angelo has something to add to his statement." He looked at me. "Coffee?"

  "Good idea." I tossed my handbag at the couch and went into the kitchen. As I loaded up the automatic brewer I could hear Jay and D'Angelo exchanging courtesies. The little light came on, the machine burped, and coffee began to trickle into the pot. I went back into the living room.

  "...if you have a recorder," D'Angelo was saying.

  "Is it going to be necessary?"

  Jay had seated D'Angelo on my grandma's platform rocker, the most comfortable chair I own.

  D'Angelo ran a hand through his hair. "Well, I thought ..."

  "Why don't you just give me your explanation? We can worry about the formalities later." Jay sat on the couch. I slid in beside him.

  "If that's all right..."

  "Sure."

  D'Angelo cleared his throat then looked away, giving a tight little laugh. "Jesus, this is not easy." He drew a breath. "I wouldn't tell you at all if I thought I had a chance of getting away with it, but Mary Dailey is coming. She'll bring Dai's papers with her--we will, because we'll meet the lawyers and get the stuff from the townhouse together. That was her suggestion."

  Jay said nothing. He looked casual, relaxed even, but I could feel his coiled spring tension.