Raining Cats & Dogs (A Melanie Travis Mystery)

by Laurien Berenson

  Her handling skills might have been lacking, but Kelly was cute and perky. It was hard not to want to like her. Mark immediately angled himself in her direction, but Julie spoke up first.

  “Yes, we were,” she said. “There’s a memorial service for his aunt on Saturday.”

  “I know. I read about it in the paper.”

  So far, the Greenwich Time had gotten several days’ worth of front page stories out of the murder. Greenwich was no longer a small town, but, thankfully, violent crime was still rare. The police were investigating Mary Livingston’s death. According to the paper, they had yet to come up with any leads.

  “Several of us are thinking about going,” said Mark. “We’d like to offer a show of support for Paul.”

  “How very nice of you,” Kelly said.

  She did not, I noted, offer to join us.

  Stacey shook her head sadly. “I only wish there was more we could do.”

  “About what?” asked Steve, walking up to stand beside Kelly.

  She greeted him with a small smile, then turned back to the group. Boss, I was interested to see, didn’t react to Steve’s intrusion upon their space. Akitas tend to be very protective of their people. Boss’s failure to challenge the situation led me to think he was probably accustomed to seeing Kelly and Steve together.

  “Paul,” Julie was saying. “We all feel terrible about what happened. Even more so, I suppose, because we were there at the time.”

  “That’s what’s so hard for me to understand,” said Mark. “It was the middle of a Sunday afternoon in a semiprivate facility. We certainly weren’t the only visitors; there were plenty of people around. Nurses, administrators, you name it. People were all over that building. How could someone have been murdered without anyone noticing?”

  I’d been wondering the same thing myself. Under the circumstances—with all of us being so close to the situation—it was hard not to contemplate what might have been done differently.

  “It had to have been a crime of opportunity,” I said. “Paul’s aunt must have been taken by surprise. Mark is right, the place was full of people. If she’d struggled or cried out, surely someone would have heard.”

  “Who says someone didn’t notice?” asked Julie.

  “That’s a gruesome thought.” Kelly let a hand drift down to rest on her dog’s broad head. “And no one’s come forward with any information. Don’t you think someone would have if they knew something?”

  “Not if they were afraid,” said Julie.

  We all turned and looked at her.

  “Afraid of what?” asked Steve.

  “You know, like those reports you see on the news about abuse of the elderly that takes place in nursing homes. What if something like that is going on and the murder happened as a cover-up?”

  An interesting possibility, I thought. Stacey disagreed.

  “I don’t buy it,” she said. “We’ve all been inside Winston Pumpernill any number of times, and it seems like an exemplary facility. Besides, most of those stories are about neglect as much as abuse. Older people who are alone in the world and don’t have relatives to check up on them and serve as their advocates. Mary wasn’t alone, and she certainly wasn’t helpless. Paul would have done anything for her. All she would have had to do was ask.”

  “She may not have asked for help,” said Mark, “but she obviously needed it. Otherwise, she wouldn’t be dead now. What a shame for Paul that it had to happen during our visit. I think it would have been easier on him, and less shocking certainly, if he hadn’t been on the premises at the time.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that,” I said. “And it wouldn’t surprise me if the reason the murder happened was precisely because we were there.”

  Now it was my turn to draw stares from the rest of the group. Steve and Stacey looked surprised, but Julie stiffened visibly. Even Jack felt her sudden anger. He pushed himself up off the floor and stood by her side. Automatically, her hand dropped to the middle of the Doberman’s back, soothing him with a touch.

  “Are you accusing one of us of being involved in Mary Livingston’s murder?” she asked.

  “Not necessarily.” Not being a big believer in coincidence, however, it wasn’t as though the thought hadn’t crossed my mind.

  Kelly crossed her slender arms over her chest. “Then what exactly are you saying?”

  “The same thing I mentioned a minute ago. That this was most likely a crime of opportunity. And that our being there was what gave the murderer his chance to act.”

  Several years earlier at a dog show, I’d confronted a killer in the handlers’ tent, a place where exhibitors prepare their dogs to be shown, and one that is normally teeming with activity. I’d had the bad luck, however, to encounter the murderer while Best in Show was being judged. There had been several hundred people on the dog show grounds, many within shouting distance. But their attention had all been focused elsewhere, and I’d nearly lost my life as a result. It was obvious to me that there were certain similarities between my misadventure and the event that had taken Mary’s life.

  “Think about it,” I said. “Not only were many of the residents and much of the Sunday staff in the sunroom because of our scheduled visit, but once Minnie and Coach began to perform, even more people came into the room to watch. Areas of the building that would normally have had staff on duty, like the residential hallway where Mary’s room was located, were probably pretty empty. Certainly emptier than usual. Our presence gave the killer the opening he was looking for.”

  “I hadn’t thought about it that way,” Minnie said. She and her Schnauzer were standing behind me and off to the right; I hadn’t realized she’d drifted back to join the group. “I guess that makes me feel better and worse.”

  “I can understand the worse part,” said Stacey. “But how on earth can anything make you feel better about our role in what happened?”

  Minnie gazed around the circle of faces. “Coach and I were the ones out in the middle of the room putting on a show. Everyone was watching us. If that isn’t an ironclad alibi, I don’t know what is.”

  Kelly gasped softly. Maybe it hadn’t occurred to her until right that moment that any of us might need an alibi. Actually, I found myself wondering why Minnie had been so quick to think of it herself.

  “Hold on, Minerva,” said Steve. “Before you start thinking you’re off the hook, you might want to wait to see what the police come up with as a time of death. A few minutes earlier or a few minutes later and you could be as likely a suspect as any of us.” He paused to send her a meaningful stare. “Or, perhaps, even more so, if you think about it.”

  Minnie’s lips stretched into a smile, but behind them her teeth were gritted. For a moment, tension zinged between the two of them like a wire drawn tight. Then Mark cleared his throat loudly and stepped into the breach.

  “You seem to have given things quite a bit of thought,” he said to me. “You’re not in law enforcement by any chance, are you?”

  “No.” I laughed self-consciously. “I’m a private-school teacher.”

  “One who solves mysteries on the side,” said Steve. “Isn’t that right?”

  I stared at him in surprise. Where had that come from?

  Steve looked rather pleased with himself. “We have a small class here. In fact, most of us have been together so long, it almost feels like an extension of family. So I imagine I can be forgiven for checking out the backgrounds of the people who want to join us.”

  “You did a background check on me?” I asked, incredulous.

  “Oh, nothing so formal as that. I got on the Internet and ran a Google search. I was surprised to see how many times your name had appeared in the local papers.”

  Well, yes, I thought glumly. There was that.

  “So you’re some sort of amateur detective?” Julie didn’t sound impressed.

  “Only by default,” I admitted. “It’s more like I seem to have a knack for being in the wrong place at the wrong tim
e.”

  “I guess that explains it,” said Mark.

  “What?”

  “We’ve been visiting Winston Pumpernill for months now, and nothing terrible has ever happened before.”

  Stacey nodded. “You said we were responsible for Mary’s death. And it looks like we were, since we’re the ones who took you there with us.”

  “Hey, people,” Steve said sternly. “I don’t like the direction this conversation is heading.”

  That made two of us, I thought. And things wouldn’t have gone that way at all if he hadn’t brought the topic up in the first place.

  “Rather than believing the worst of Melanie, I think we ought to be grateful that she’s here.”

  Grateful? That couldn’t be a good sign.

  “Who better to get on the case,” Steve continued triumphantly, “than a member of our very own class?”

  “The police,” I answered quickly before anyone else had a chance to chime in. “They’re exactly the right people for a situation like this.”

  “They are when they can get the job done,” said Kelly. “But it doesn’t always happen. Look at the Martha Moxley case. It took the Greenwich police more than twenty-five years to solve that one.”

  “That’s right,” Julie agreed, but at least she seemed to be teasing. “I doubt Paul will want to wait that long.”

  “For what?” asked Paul.

  We’d all been so wrapped up in our conversation that none of us had noticed him and Cora entering the room. Even the dogs seemed surprised.

  “It turns out that Melanie’s a detective,” Minnie announced. “She’s going to solve your aunt’s murder. Isn’t that great?”

  Paul shot me a startled look, for which I could hardly blame him.

  I shrugged helplessly.

  Great indeed, I thought.

  10

  “It’s not like you didn’t deserve that,” Sam said. “A blind man could have seen it coming.”

  It was Friday evening, and Sam and I had invited Aunt Peg over for dinner. Davey was spending the night with his father; he’d taken Faith with him for company. That reduced the number of Poodles in the house to four, which meant they still outnumbered the humans. Par for the course around here.

  We’d had salmon and asparagus, a meal healthy enough that none of us had really minded that Peg showed up carrying a torte from the St. Moritz Bakery. Sam and I were having coffee with our dessert; Aunt Peg drank her usual tea.

  She was also currently enjoying a good laugh at my expense. Sam’s comment had come in response to my admission that the members of the South Avenue Obedience Club seemed to believe that I was going to be solving Mary Livingston’s murder.

  “I think it’s your karma,” Aunt Peg said.

  “Don’t you start, too,” I warned her. “You’re the one who got me involved in solving mysteries to begin with.”

  “Just once,” she said—a bald-faced lie if ever I’d heard one. “I needed your help. Who knew you’d keep it up?”

  “It’s not like I’ve had a choice.”

  “Sure you have,” said Sam. Part of the reason it had taken us so long to get married was because he disapproved of my propensity to get involved in things that weren’t any of my business. “All you have to do is say no.”

  “I do say no. But nobody ever believes me.”

  “That’s because you’re not firm enough,” Aunt Peg said. This was obviously not a character trait she herself had ever been accused of possessing. “But listen to this. Something interesting occurred to me after the last time we spoke. I might have been acquainted with Mary Livingston’s family when I was younger. Tell me a little about her. Had she lived in Greenwich her whole life? Did she grow up on Clapboard Ridge Road?”

  “I don’t know. I only met her the one time, and we didn’t talk about her background. Mostly we talked about dogs.”

  “Perfectly understandable.” Peg nodded, helping herself to another slice of torte. “Mary would have been a good bit older than me, of course, but I believe I went to school with several of her nieces. Where’s today’s paper? There must be a notice about the memorial service. That would tell me what I need to know.”

  Sam stepped over the Poodles sleeping at our feet and left the room. He returned several minutes later with the Greenwich paper; pages folded back to the information Aunt Peg wanted. She put on her reading glasses and skimmed quickly through the listing.

  “Just as I thought,” she said with satisfaction. “Paul’s mother and I went to primary school together. First through eighth, right here in town.”

  “What are the chances of that?” I wondered aloud.

  “It’s not as unexpected as you might think. Back in those days, Greenwich really was a small town. Everyone went to the same schools and belonged to the same clubs. It wasn’t unusual for families’ lives to be intertwined. I remember Sylvia Livingston quite well. Of course, she’d be Sylvia Lennox now. I wonder if she would remember me as well.”

  “No doubt,” Sam said. “You’re pretty unforgettable.”

  Aunt Peg narrowed a glance in his direction. “I’ll take that as a compliment. And if that wasn’t the way you were heading, you’d do better not to admit it.”

  Sam merely grinned and admitted nothing. He could get away with things that would land me in all sorts of trouble.

  “Now that I realize there’s a connection,” Peg said to me, “I expect I had better accompany you to the memorial service.”

  “Who said I was going?”

  “Of course you’re going. Where else do you intend to begin asking questions?”

  “I’m not sure I do.”

  I glanced over at Sam. He seemed to be paying an inordinate amount of attention to the crumbs on his plate, all that remained of the large piece of pastry he’d been served earlier.

  “Do I?” I prompted after a moment of silence.

  Sam lifted his eyes. “Don’t look at me,” he said.

  As if there was anywhere else to look.

  “You’re my husband,” I said. “That entitles you to an opinion. Do you want me to say no?”

  “I want you to do whatever makes you happy.”

  “That’s not an answer.”

  Aunt Peg pushed back her chair and stood. “Maybe the two of you should discuss this in private.”

  “No,” Sam and I said together. I was happy to see we could agree on something.

  Peg sat back down. Just as I’d suspected, she was only bluffing. Trust me, it would take a steam shovel to remove her from a room where two people she cared about were arguing.

  “I think you should go to the memorial service,” she said. “It would be a nice gesture on your part. We can go together. After that, you can decide what you want to do next.”

  “Fine,” I said. “If nobody wants to object.”

  Aunt Peg and I both looked at Sam. His expression was carefully neutral. I couldn’t tell whether he was happy about the way things had turned out.

  Then his gaze lifted, and he looked past me into the kitchen. Though all the Poodles were inside the house, I’d left the outdoor lights on. When I turned in my seat to see what he was looking at, I saw Amber from next door waving at us through the window.

  Before I could react, Sam was already up out of his seat and heading her way. It fell to me to shush the Poodles when he opened the back door. Hearing that, they naturally assumed that something exciting was about to happen. All four jumped up to see what that might be.

  As I tried to convince the pack not to make a fuss, Sam invited Amber inside. To the Poodles’ way of thinking, that confirmed what they’d suspected all along. Something exciting was happening: they had a visitor.

  The four big black dogs scooted past me and burst through the doorway into the kitchen. Quickly, I followed behind, arriving just in time to see Amber scream, leap up in the air, and try to hide behind Sam. Her slender arms circled his neck in a stranglehold as she attempted to wedge herself between him and the counter. S
he looked like she might be seriously contemplating climbing up on his back.

  Sam, who appeared to be thoroughly amused by the situation, was no help.

  Luckily, Aunt Peg had gone out to the kitchen with him. Now she tried to run interference. “They’re only trying to be friendly,” she said. “They won’t hurt you.”

  “My God, they’re enormous!” Amber’s voice was shrill. Her feet hopped up and down in place as the Poodles, mostly blocked by Sam and Peg, eddied around her legs. “They look like a pack of wolves!”

  The Poodles seem to understand most things, but thankfully, they didn’t understand that. I’m sure they would have been highly insulted if they had.

  “And what on earth,” Amber said, pointing at Tar and Eve, “is the matter with those two?”

  “They’re show dogs,” Aunt Peg replied, beating Sam and me to it. Anyone who has ever owned—and shown—a Poodle is well accustomed to explaining why their dogs look the way they do. “The trim they’re wearing is called a continental. Maybe you’ve watched the Westminster Dog Show on TV and seen the Poodles in the Non-Sporting and Toy groups?”

  “No,” Amber said flatly.

  “It’s a traditional German hunting clip,” I said. “In the show ring, most of that long hair you see is loose. But at home, the topknot and ear fringes would get in the dog’s way. That’s why we have it wrapped and rubber banded like that.”

  I didn’t think my explanation had been inordinately long, but Amber was already looking bored. Now that the Poodles had calmed down, and she’d stopped fearing for her life, she had lost all interest in them.

  She was, however, still pressed pretty up tightly against my husband.

  My thoughts must have been easy to read, because Sam caught my look and grinned. Reaching up, he unwound Amber’s arms from his neck and stepped forward out of her embrace.

  “We’re having coffee,” he said. “Would you like to join us?”

  “Thank you, but no. I only stopped by to see if either one of you had seen Felix recently. He seems to have disappeared.”

  “Felix is your dog?” Aunt Peg was instantly sympathetic.