by Lucy Ness
“Just because we went to the movie together,” he sputtered, “that doesn’t mean I killed Muriel. Not that I wouldn’t have liked to,” he admitted with a grunt. “The woman was impossible. She’d always been impossible.” His teeth clenched, he shot a laser look around the ballroom. “Yeah, like any of you could say anything else about her. Anything nice. You know what an awful person she was. How’d you like to live with her? No. Nobody.” He emphasized the word with a slash of one hand. “Nobody could blame me for seeing Agnes here on the side. I always knew . . .” His voice choked over his words. “I always knew Agnes was the girl for me. Should have listened to my heart way back when, instead of to my family. Should have married Agnes like I wanted to. So yes!” He pulled back his shoulders and stood as straight and as tall as a soldier. “We were at the movies together.”
I managed to keep my cool. “An affair, huh? Sounds like the perfect motive for murder.”
Tab’s neck got red. His face shot through with fire. He stepped back and pointed a finger in my direction. “Oh no. You can’t say that. You don’t have one bit of proof. You know I was at the movie.”
“I know you have a ticket stub from the movie,” I answered. “That doesn’t mean you were there the whole time.”
“I sure was.” When he shot me a look, he narrowed his eyes. His mouth twisted with fury. “I was there, all right.”
It seemed cruel to smile, but I wasn’t sure what else to do, how else to cover for the fact that my insides were churning and my blood was racing and my knees felt like rubber. “But were you there the entire time?” I asked Tab.
He sputtered words that included, “How dare you?” and he would have kept right on sputtering if Oz didn’t stroll up the aisle.
“You left the movie early,” he told Tab and I’m not exactly sure how, since we hadn’t discussed it, but with those words, I knew we were on the same page and the realization made me feel bolder, stronger. Just like me, Oz was trying to tease information out of Tab. “You came here to the club, murdered your wife, and—”
“No! No!” Tab’s eyes bulged. “I didn’t leave early.”
Oz is a canny one. He unhooked his handcuffs from his belt.
That was all Tab needed to see to know he was in serious trouble. He swung around to point a finger at Agnes. “She came to the movie late. And when she did, she was nervous, out of breath. Sweaty.”
Which explained that crumpled movie ticket I’d found in Agnes’s office.
Before I had a chance to point it out, Agnes’s silvery laugh cut through the tension. “That’s crazy, Tab, and you know it. Why on earth would I want to kill Muriel?”
“Funny you should ask,” I said. I set down the portfolio on an empty chair, took out that sheet of paper we’d found, and waved it in the air. “I think I finally figured it out.” I cleared my throat, and I didn’t read from the paper—not word for word—anyway, but I did home in on the pertinent details. “It’s your birth certificate,” I told Agnes and when she came at me, eager to snatch the paper out of my hand, I held it up higher where she couldn’t reach it. “Your birth certificate, Agnes, that proves that Margaret Yarborough is not your biological mother.”
The gasp from the crowd didn’t surprise me. Margaret’s low-throated chuckle did. “It’s about time somebody figured it out,” she said. “Come on, ladies, were you that blind? Or did you just not want to see the truth? I never could have children of my own. So when my stupid husband got that slut Dodie Hillenbrand pregnant, we made a deal. We sent Dodie away and paid for her silence. And I got to keep the baby I always wanted. Except the baby I always wanted . . .” She sneered at Agnes. “Always reminded me of my cheating creep of a husband.”
Another gasp drowned out the rest of Margaret’s story and I waited until it died down. “So that’s what Muriel had on you,” I told Agnes. “That’s why you dropped out of the last election. She somehow found out about your parentage and she threatened to tell the world you didn’t have the pedigree you pretended to have.”
“And promised me she’d hand over that birth certificate if I let her win the election,” Agnes grumbled. “She lied. Of course, she lied. That’s what Muriel did. That’s the kind of person Muriel was. She gave me one birth certificate and I thought that was that. Then she said she had others stashed away here at the club, in the books in Marigold.”
Gracie popped out of her seat. “You started that fire on purpose! You wanted to destroy the books.”
“Not the books,” I corrected her. “Just any copies of the birth certificate that might be tucked inside them. It’s the same reason Agnes broke into your house, Gracie. The same reason she tried to get into Jack’s. She was so upset that Margaret wasn’t her mother—”
The last thing I expected was a hoot of a laugh out of Agnes. “Upset that she wasn’t my mother? You’re kidding me, aren’t you? Margaret never gave me the time of day. I wasn’t upset she wasn’t my mother. In fact, I was pretty relieved when I found out. I was upset that someone might find out that my biological mother was nothing but a cook.” Her lip curled. “Nothing but a low-class kitchen worker.”
“Watch what you say!” Geneva called out from the back of the room.
I ignored her and kept my eyes on Agnes. “You wanted to keep a secret. That’s it. That’s why you killed Muriel.”
“She should have kept out of my way,” Agnes growled. “She should have kept her mouth shut.”
“And now . . .” Oz stepped forward. I’ve seen enough cop shows on TV to know he was about to read Agnes her rights, and I bet he would have done it, too.
If all the lights in the club didn’t choose that exact moment to go out.
* * *
* * *
A couple people screamed, which would have been pretty silly, really, if it was just because the lights went out. But at the same time they did, Agnes must have realized this was her only chance to escape. She knocked the podium over, flung an empty chair out of the way. She grabbed the leather portfolio with the charter inside it and hurled it at Oz.
Then she took off running.
It was hard to focus on everyone and everything in the room in the weird half dark. People were out of their chairs, clamoring and shuffling toward the doors. Someone knocked over a tall stand with a flower arrangement on it, and glass shattered and water drenched the nearest guests. Patricia raced past me, the Finkinator at her best, but I couldn’t take the chances of letting her get to Agnes before I did. Agnes was desperate. She’d killed before, and I had no doubt she’d do it again.
I pushed my way into the crowd just as Margaret Yarborough called out, “You go get her! That nobody doesn’t deserve to be president of this club!” A couple potted palms had been overturned in the doorway between the ballroom and the hallway, and I jumped over them. No sign of Agnes.
But I did hear the sound of footsteps running up on the second floor.
I ran to the stairway and I was already at the top when I realized Oz was right behind me. Together, we raced from room to room, but wherever Agnes had gone, wherever she was headed, we couldn’t find her.
“Upstairs!” Clemmie poofed up out of thin air and pointed to the stairway to the third floor.
“Upstairs,” I told Oz and bless his law-enforcing heart, he didn’t question it. He led the way and by the time we both got to the third floor, we were breathing hard.
“Ms. Yarborough!” He stepped into the hallway with its line of closed doors. Linen Room. Ironing Room. Shoe Polishing Room. All was quiet.
“Attic,” Clemmie whispered in my ear.
“Attic,” I told Oz.
“But why would she . . .” He looked at the closed door that led into the vast attic space. “There’s no way out of the attic. How could she possibly think she could escape?”
My heart bumped. “Maybe that’s not the kind of escape she’s thinking about.”
Oz pushed open the door, and though he tried to warn me back, one arm out, I knew right away that I didn’t have to worry. Not for my safety, anyway.
Agnes had thrown open the large window at the end of the attic, and she stood on the sill, her knuckles white where she clutched the window frame.
“You don’t want to do this,” Oz said. He took a couple steps closer. “It won’t help anything.”
“It will help me.” Agnes voice was heavy with tears. “It will save me the shame. The mortification of having to face everyone here at the club now that they know the awful truth.”
“I honestly don’t think they’ll care who your biological mother is,” I told her. “Fifty years ago, maybe. These days, it’s like Patricia says, it’s time to open up the club to the twenty-first century. People don’t look down on cooks anymore. We’re over that kind of class system.”
Agnes managed a laugh. “Maybe you’re over it. But you’re not a member of the club, are you, Avery? You’d never be a member of this club. You’re just a nobody from nowhere, just like Dodie was. You’ll never understand how your betters live.”
“I do understand that jumping out the window isn’t going to help.” I, too, took a few steps closer. “And Agnes, it’s going to hurt like hell.”
She hesitated, then tensed, and right then and there, I knew what was going to happen.
At least I thought I did.
The next thing I knew, there was a flash outside the window, right in front of Agnes. It wasn’t so much a full-body apparition, not the Clemmie I was used to seeing when we passed the time together, or tried on clothes, or talked about men. This was an impression more than a clear image, a face, a body, a burst of luminosity like lightning, and it came along with a booming, good old-fashioned “Boo!”
Agnes screamed and fell back. She landed on her butt on the attic floor.
At the same time Oz raced over to make sure she was okay, he got out his cuffs. He put her hands behind her and secured her wrists before he dared a look at me.
“Did you see that?” he asked.
“I . . . uh . . .” I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to say. What I was supposed to do. “What did you see?”
He looked at the window, empty now. “I thought I saw . . . It looked a whole lot like . . . I mean, it seems to me it was . . .” After he helped Agnes to her feet, he shook his head. “I think I need some time to process this.”
He got it. His backup arrived and they took Agnes away, and they left other cops in the ballroom who took each guest there, one by one, and got a statement from every one of them.
By the time it was all over, the sun was about to slip below the horizon.
Oz rubbed the back of his neck with one hand. “You can tell everyone to go,” he said. “We’ve got contact information. If we need to call them, we will.”
“Except . . .” I looked at the chilled champagne, the uneaten food, our guests who’d been patient and waiting forever. “We might as well feed everyone, and Quentin tells me the band that was supposed to play after the swearing-in ceremony is in the kitchen eating us out of house and home. Union rules, we’ve got to pay them. They might as well play.”
“They might as well,” he said, and before I went to notify to the band, I stopped and talked to Clemmie, who was watching the action from the doorway of the Carnation Room.
“Good work,” I told her. “Except I need one more thing from you.”
* * *
* * *
By the time the band set up and the food got reheated, we’d all had a couple glasses of champagne and everyone was in a better mood. I’d told the band which song I wanted them to play first and they didn’t object.
Champagne flute in hand, I stood and listened to the first notes of “Bye Bye Blackbird.” It sounded good. Once Clemmie joined the band on stage and started singing, it sounded great.
Since he was still working, Oz had opted for coffee. He took a sip and nodded his approval. “Nice touch to add the recording of the voice to the music,” he said.
I kept my gaze on the stage and the singer only I could see. Clemmie just about glowed with excitement. Her feet tapped out the rhythm of the song, and those big bows on her shoes jumped up and down to the beat. “You think?”
He kept his gaze on the band. “Something you want to tell me?”
“Not right now.”
“Something that will explain what I saw up in the attic?”
“Maybe.”
He set down his coffee, stretched his back. “I’ve got to get to the office and wrap this thing up. But not until—” He grabbed my hand and led me out on the dance floor and before he put his arm around me and swung me into the dance, I had just enough time to give Clemmie the thumbs-up.
She was the monkey’s eyebrows.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
When it comes to plotting, writing, and getting a book onto bookstore and cyber shelves, there are always people to thank.
My gratitude goes out to Stephanie Cole, Serena Miller, and Emilie Richards, my incredibly talented and supportive brainstorming buddies.
To the staff at Berkley, thank you for giving me the chance to tell a fun tale, and to my agent, Gail Fortune . . . well, you know how much I love a good ghost story! Thank you for seizing on an opportunity to make this one come alive.
Mary Ellis and Peggy Svoboda are always willing to listen to ideas and offer advice, and I’m grateful for that.
My husband, David, puts up with my interest in all things paranormal. I can count how many times he’s visited old cemeteries with me and gone on ghost hunting expeditions, too.
It’s appropriate that this book is being published in conjunction with the time that Prohibition was enacted in the United States. Those years, of course, are the stuff of legend. Good guys and bad guys, folks just trying to eke out a living while others took advantage of every chance to make—or break—their fortunes. Before Prohibition became the law of the land, David’s grandfather owned the largest bar in Ohio. And after? The man was a bootlegger who was arrested numerous times and even did a stretch in a federal prison. Someday maybe I’ll have the opportunity to tell his story, too. For now, I’ll just raise a glass in a toast to his memory—and his chutzpah!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lucy Ness is an established mystery author. She has written the League of Literary Ladies Mystery series and the Button Box Mystery series.
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