Died in the Wool

by Mary Kruger

  “Twenty-four, weren’t you?”

  “Yes, but he was a jerk, dear.”

  Ari rolled her eyes. Privately, she agreed that her uncle Mike wasn’t exactly personable or intelligent. Laura, on the other hand, was both gregarious and devious. “Laura, what’s on your mind?” she demanded.

  “I just want to see you happy, dear,” Laura said, giving Ari her most innocent look.

  “Bullsh—baloney.” Ari’s eyes narrowed. “You want me to try to find out what’s happening in the investigation.”

  “Of course I do. Don’t you want to know?”

  Of course she did, especially after Diane’s visit. Thank God her aunt didn’t know of her agreement with Josh, or she’d want in. Ari already had enough of Laura’s well-meaning meddling in her life. “Were there a lot of people at the funeral?”

  “Yes, more than I expected.” Laura hung her coat on the metal rack. “Herb put on a luncheon at the Century House afterward. You were missed, dear,” she added.

  Ari doubted that. She did suspect, however, that she’d been a topic of conversation. “I’m sure I was,” she said dryly.

  “It was actually sadder than I thought it would be.”

  “Well, it’s about time people take Edith’s death seriously. I know she wasn’t well liked, but still.”

  “Yes,” Laura agreed. “Everyone’s been concentrating on what’s been happening since.”

  “As well as the sensationalism of it. I hope that will die down soon.”

  Laura went into the front room. “I’m tired of working on this sweater,” she said. “I was thinking about making another scarf to put on display. Something cheery for winter, but simple. What do you think about the garnet eyelash yarn?”

  Stripe it with pink and white and it will be perfect, Ari thought involuntarily. “Why don’t you make a red beret to go with the purple scarf first? You can knit in spangles to make it fancy. Your friends in the Red Hat group will love it.”

  “That’s an idea. Red mohair?”

  “Yes. I put some aside this morning,” Ari said. “You’ll have to thread the spangles on the yarn first.”

  Laura made a face. “I hate doing that. I think I’ll start from the top of the beret and work down. If I put the spangles only on the bottom, I won’t have to use too many.”

  “However you want to do it. You’ll be the one wearing it.”

  “Yes, I will, won’t I? Now, where are those size-seven circular needles?”

  “Here,” Ari said, taking them from a lower shelf on the sales counter. She kept needles aside for the use of her staff, so that they didn’t have to open packages that were meant for sale. “And some double-pointed ones, too.”

  “And the mohair?”

  “Why don’t you bring it home?” Ari suggested. “It’s nearly time to close up.”

  Laura looked up. “With Detective Pierce coming?”

  “He’ll be too busy, after being out at Diane’s.”

  “Maybe not, dear. Here he is.”

  Ari cursed silently as the door opened. She wasn’t sure how much she could take. It had already been a difficult, emotional day, considering her two conversations with Diane. “You look tired,” she said, surprising herself.

  Josh nodded. “I am.”

  “Did you find anything?”

  He looked from her to Laura. “You know I can’t say.”

  “Ah. Then you did,” Laura said.

  Ari studied him. There was more than tiredness in his eyes, but she didn’t know what it was. “I think you should go home and get some rest.”

  He shook his head. “I still have work to do.”

  Ari walked him to the door. “I imagine we’ll be hearing the results, anyway.”

  “Probably. Listen, Ari. Lock up tight.”

  She frowned. “Why?”

  Again he shrugged. “Just a feeling. Don’t take risks.”

  “I won’t,” she said, perplexed, and watched as he crossed the street to his car.

  “And you say you’re not involved with him, dear,” Laura said behind her.

  “I’m not.”

  “Then what was that about?”

  Ari shrugged. Like Josh, that was something she couldn’t answer.

  She didn’t see Josh again until the next day. She was studying the packing list for a new shipment of yarn when she heard the door open. “Oh!” She whipped off the half glasses she hated to admit she needed for reading. “Josh.”

  “Hi.” He ambled into the room, looking better than he had the day before, though just as serious. The familiar blue cooler swung from his left hand. He glanced at Laura, relaxed in the rocking chair Ari kept for her customers’ comfort, her needles flying. “How do you do that?”

  Laura held up the red hat, which was far enough along and had enough stitches that she was now using the circular needles, and beamed at him. “Easy. Look.” She waited until he was bending over her. “Right-hand needle through the stitch on the left-hand needle, but behind it. Loop the yarn over the right needle, pull the needle back from the yarn, and pull the stitch off the left needle. Simple knitting stitch, Detective.”

  “I see.”

  “Knit and purl. All knitting comes from those two stitches.”

  “I thought you used straight needles.”

  “Oh, no, not always. I’m knitting in the round so the hat will have no seams.”

  “Oh.” He pulled at his ear.

  “Doesn’t your mother knit, Detective?”

  “My mother’s an accountant,” he said, as if that explained everything.

  “Ah.” Laura nodded. “Left-brained.”

  “I suppose.” He turned to Ari. “Ready?”

  “For what?” she asked.

  “Lunch.” He held up the cooler.

  Somehow she kept from glaring at her aunt, who, she was certain, was behind Josh’s visit. She doubted Laura’s help would be needed much longer. “Lunch? Are you kidding?”

  “No.”

  She stared at him consideringly. Something else was going on besides Laura’s attempt at matchmaking. “All right. Where?”

  “I thought the bandstand again.”

  “Okay,” she said after a moment, and walked out of the shop with him.

  “You know,” she said, after they’d walked for a few minutes in silence along Union Street toward the water, “Laura’s starting to figure out what we’re doing.”

  He didn’t answer right away. “I guess it was too much to hope that she wouldn’t.”

  “She’s not the only one. Diane thinks you’re telling me things, too.”

  He gave her a sharp look. “You didn’t tell her anything, did you?”

  This time, Ari hesitated. “No, but it was hard. I think I’ve lost her friendship.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for that to happen.”

  She nodded. “I know. Everyone else thinks we’re dating.”

  “We expected that.”

  “Yes, it’s probably because of these romantic lunches by the water.”

  “Romantic.” He smiled briefly. “Not quite.”

  “No,” she agreed, though she didn’t know why that made her feel just a little bit down.

  “We both know why we’re in this,” he went on. “It bothers me more that people have guessed about that.”

  “I’m not going to be in it much longer, though, am I?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “Well, I don’t know what more I’ll be hearing, or what I can ask about. Diane has an alibi.”

  “Yes.”

  Ari looked down at her feet, shuffling through the first of autumn’s fallen leaves. Soon the maples along Freeport’s streets would be ablaze with color. “You don’t sound so sure.”

  “Ari, it’s getting to the point when I can’t tell you much more.”

  “You know you can trust me,” she said as they reached the bandstand.

  “I do,” he agreed. “But it’s what you just said. People are starting to figur
e out what you’re doing. I don’t want someone getting the wrong idea.”

  She looked at him sharply. “You don’t think Diane did it.”

  “Don’t know.”

  “Do you really think someone will come after me?”

  “I don’t know. We still don’t know why your shop was chosen. A body in a yarn shop.” He snorted. “Sounds like a bad mystery novel.”

  “You and Laura. She said the same thing.” She huffed out her breath. “Why isn’t anyone taking Edith’s death seriously?”

  “Believe me, I’m taking it extremely seriously,” he said, voice tight.

  “As a case,” she persisted, as they neared the bandstand. “No one seems to care about her.”

  “Well, she wasn’t too well liked, was she?”

  Ari sat down on the top step of the bandstand, her arms around her knees, and stared at him. “Are you that used to death?”

  Josh was opening the cooler and taking out sandwiches. “No.”

  “You can’t let yourself care, can you?”

  He shrugged yet again. “A cop sees everything, especially in a big city. Too many drive-by shootings, with innocent victims getting hit. Too many homeless people freezing to death. Too many husbands beating up their wives.” He took a deep breath. “Freeport’s different.”

  “Is that why you came here?”

  “Partly,” he said, without elaborating.

  “We have our share of problems, you know.”

  “Yeah. Nothing in comparison, though.”

  “Doesn’t a body in a yarn shop qualify?”

  “No, that’s unique. You don’t come across something like that too often.”

  “No.” Like him, she stared out at the water, and then sighed. Last week’s events had affected her mood. “What did you bring today?” she asked, forcing herself into brightness.

  The sandwiches turned out to be smoked turkey with cranberry chutney on whole-grain bread, with the inevitable Cape Cod potato chips and Diet Coke. The day was overcast and uncomfortably humid, and the breeze off the water was a welcome relief. “I hate this out-of-season heat.”

  “Isn’t anyone buying yarn?”

  “Besides that.” For a few minutes, they ate together in a silence that was once again companionable, each gazing out at the harbor. No fishing boats were out there today. “Diane told me what you found.”

  He paused in the act of taking a bite of his sandwich. “Did she?”

  “Yes. You’re not going to tell me, are you?”

  “No.”

  After all she’d helped him with, that struck her as wrong. “That’s not fair.”

  “Don’t act like a kid, Ari. You know I can’t always talk about things.”

  “You found a piece of wood,” she said flatly. “A broken window stop.”

  “Yup,” he said after a moment.

  “Does it match up with the ones the yarn was tied around?”

  “Don’t know yet. It’s at the state police lab.”

  “But does it look like it?”

  Once again, he didn’t answer right away. “Yes.”

  “Oh, damn.” Ari put her face in her hands for a moment, and then looked up. “Isn’t that kind of stupid, keeping something that could link her to the murder where anyone could find it?”

  “Not just anywhere. We had to search a shed, and a barn,” he said glumly.

  “Oh, really?” Ari asked with a certain malicious relish. She was well acquainted with the Camachos’ shed. “Joe’s father used to be a dealer at a flea market. Diane used to complain because he usually came home with more than he’d sold. She took me through there once.” She grinned. “There’s a lot of baby furniture and old flying saucer sleds.”

  “And old auto parts. Greasy auto parts,” he added.

  “Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without,” she said lightly, quoting the old New England axiom for saving money. “It makes sense on a farm with old equipment.”

  He gave her a sour look. “We actually found the window stop in the barn,” he said, bringing the conversation back to business. “Not buried too deep, either.” He looked at her. “Do you happen to know if they’ve done any work on their windows lately?”

  Ari hesitated. For once, she didn’t want to share any information with him. “Why?”

  “I think you know why. You said Diane told you about it.”

  Ari took a deep breath. If she answered him, she’d be getting Diane into deeper trouble. Why had she ever gotten herself into this? “They replaced the sash weights and ropes last fall.”

  “Ah. I see.”

  “Wouldn’t it be stupid of them to use the scrap?”

  “Criminals do stupid things.”

  “They’re not criminals!” Ari flared.

  He looked at her. “What do you mean, ‘they’?”

  “I don’t know. I guess I mean Joe, too. Oh, Lord.” A thought struck her, and she straightened, cheerful again. This might redeem what she’d just said. “Diane doesn’t have a motive.”

  “Sure, she has.”

  “Nope. Not from what she told me.”

  “What is it?”

  “Did you know that Eric Hall inherited the Drift Road land?”

  “Yeah, we did know that.”

  He hadn’t told her, she noted. “He’s not going to develop it.”

  Josh went still, and then continued chewing. “Now that’s interesting. Where’d you hear that?”

  Ari recounted the conversation she’d had with Eric. “So you see,” she said when she’d finished, “Diane doesn’t have a motive.” Not counting the fact that Edith had wanted to buy the Camacho farm, she added silently.

  “Why didn’t you tell me this last week?”

  “Things got in the way,” she said a little guiltily. Megan’s problems had pushed other things from her mind.

  “Hall didn’t control the land when Edith was killed.”

  “Still,” she argued, “he was here. He had a motive.”

  “He couldn’t get into your shop.”

  Ari fell silent. “Damn it,” she said. “This stinks.”

  “You shouldn’t have gotten involved,” he said, almost gently.

  “Josh, she has an alibi,” she said earnestly. “And she wouldn’t have abused her yarn like that.”

  “Joe might have.”

  “I don’t believe it. Yes, I know he hates her spinning, but he loves her.” Her sandwich forgotten, she dropped her head in her hands. “How can I get her out of this?”

  “I’m not sure you can.”

  “This stinks,” she repeated.

  “Yeah.” He balled up the waxed paper he’d used for wrapping the sandwiches and stuffed it into the cooler. “It usually does.”

  “How do you stand it?”

  “Someone’s got to do the job.”

  “I know.”

  Josh closed the cooler and stood up. “I’ve got to be getting back.”

  “So do I.” Ari dusted off the back of her olive linen pants and looked up at Josh as they started back toward the center of town. “Will you let me know what you find out?”

  “You’ll be hearing about it,” he said obliquely.

  Which meant she wouldn’t know anything before everyone else did, not until Diane was arrested. Huh. Not if she could help it.

  They parted cordially enough at the door of the yarn shop, and she went inside, thoughtful. Diane was in deep trouble. The hell of it was, Ari thought, she didn’t know how she could help.

  The piece of the window stop that had been sent to the state police crime lab was indeed a match for the two pieces used in Edith’s murder. Josh contemplated the report, which detailed that fact at length. The paint didn’t match the windows at the Camacho house, though; it had lead in it, while the paint chip Josh had taken from the house was latex. There were, however, fingerprints on the board, though there hadn’t been on the other two pieces. Josh wasn’t surprised. Even the most intelligent criminals sometimes overlooked t
he simple precaution of wiping weapons clean.

  Ari had said something that bothered him, though. It had been stupid of either Camacho to keep that board in the barn, unless their intention had been to hide it in plain sight. Whatever else Edith’s murder had been, it was not a stupid one. Someone had put some planning into it and chosen a place and a weapon that would implicate several people. Someone had come prepared to make a weapon. That she—or he—had done so while Edith was there showed a cool kind of nerve. So did the fact that he—or she—had probably wiped the narrow boards clean while they were still attached to a body. He didn’t know if either Diane or Joe could have done it, but finding the broken board in the barn was strong evidence, apparent proof that that part of the weapon had been made there. It showed nerve, too, but a different kind. A kind of nose-thumbing, a belief that the police almost certainly wouldn’t find it. It was stupid, and neither one struck him as being stupid.

  Josh pulled at his earlobe. He was tired. The clamor to arrest Diane was as strong as it once had been against Ari. There were differences, though. The evidence was stronger, and so was the motive. The only problem was that both Joe and Diane had alibis. Unless he broke those somehow, there’d be no arrest. In the meantime, the trail Edith’s killer had left was growing colder. The only thing he could do was to keep on digging.

  Glancing out the window, he grimaced. The weather had turned, and the gray drizzle matched his mood. Shrugging into a windbreaker, he went out and drove to Marty’s to get something to eat at his desk. For once he decided to forsake his more adventurous tastes for a favorite from his younger days, pastrami drenched in messy Russian dressing on rye bread. Comfort food, his mother would call it, reminding him of his old eating habits. That and potato chips.

  “Hey, Joe,” a hearty voice boomed near his ear. Startled, Josh turned to see an older man, burly with a thick shock of white hair. He was dressed in the baggy green work pants and sweatshirt that were the apparent uniform of the working man in this area. “Where you been hiding?”

  “Nowhere,” the other man mumbled, and Josh took a second look. Joe Camacho. Their eyes met for a moment. Joe’s were hostile. Josh nodded and turned away to face the deli case, his every sense on alert.

  “Stopped by to see you the other day,” the big man went on.