Moving Can Be Murder

by Susan Santangelo

  “As if!” I said, laughing. “I’m here because I have to talk to Nancy. I know this is where she always starts her day.”

  “You’ll be surprised who else starts her day working out,” said Jenny, eyeing my baggy sweatshirt and jeans with a critical eye. “I’ll bet those pants have an elastic waist. If you exercised properly, you wouldn’t have to wear things like that.”

  “I like these pants,” I said defensively. “They’re comfortable.”

  Jenny laughed and held the gym door open for me. My ears were immediately assaulted by pulsating music coming from an interior room.

  “I’m going to get changed for my yoga class,” said Jenny. “Sit here and wait for Nancy.” She thrust a multi-colored brochure into my hands. “You might as well read this while you wait. Maybe it’ll give you a nudge in the right direction.”

  Hmm. I put on my bifocals and quickly scanned the sheet. Apparently the loud music was coming from a class called “Mature Women’s Aerobics.” I wondered if the gym also offered one for “Immature Women.”

  The door opened and about 30 women spilled out of the room,

  towels around their necks, water bottles in their hands. I had no trouble spotting Nancy. She was the only one who looked fresh as the proverbial daisy, while the rest were, well, sweaty.

  She waved when she saw me and mouthed, “Going to take a quick shower. Wait here for me.”

  Good grief. Was that my hairdresser Deanna in the crowd? Now, that was a surprise. I thought the only thing she ever exercised was a comb and brush. I shrunk down in my chair so she wouldn’t notice me and scold me for trimming my bangs again.

  Too late. She saw me, all right. And made a scissor-like motion across her brow, followed by shaking her right index finger at me.

  “I’ll come see you later this week,” I yelled.

  “You better. Your bangs are all uneven.” Then she disappeared into the locker room.

  The last two stragglers came into view, deep in conversation.

  “I can’t believe what you’ve been through, dear,” said my neighbor Phyllis Stevens.

  “It’s an absolute nightmare,” said Sara Miller. “I will always believe that neglected old wreck of a house was responsible for poor Jack’s death. Our family has been completely shattered by the shock.”

  My family isn’t doing too well, either, I wanted to respond. But, coward that I am, instead I shrank down in my chair and prayed they wouldn’t notice me. I didn’t want a confrontation.

  They walked right by me into the locker room, Phyllis’s arm around Sara’s shoulder.

  Good grief.

  “I think you’re overreacting again,” Nancy said. “Nobody’s accusing you of a crime, for heaven’s sake.”

  “Oh, yeah?” I shot back. “Sara told Phyllis that the reason Jack died was because we hadn’t taken proper care of our house. That sounded like an accusation to me.”

  We sat in silence for a few minutes. I had suggested getting take-out coffee and driving to Fairport Beach. Looking at Long Island Sound and hearing the soothing sounds of waves as they rippled onto the sand never failed to calm me.

  Except this time.

  “Listen, sweetie,” Nancy finally said, “I know you’re still very upset about this situation, and you have a perfect right to be. It’s terrible, I agree. But I’ve told you, and please believe that I know what I’m talking about, that your house was – is – in excellent condition. If there had been anything wrong, the inspection would have shown it. And it didn’t.

  Because there isn’t. Sara is just grasping at straws, trying to find someone or something to blame for Jack’s death. And, unfortunately, you and the house are the logical culprits. We’ll do the show house, people will flock to see it, you’ll get a full-price cash offer, sell the house, and move to your dream house at Eden’s Grove. With two master bedroom suites.”

  “Well, Nance, I’ve got news for you.” Tears pricked my eyes. “Jim and I are not moving to Eden’s Grove because the damned homeowners’ association has decided they don’t want us there. Because of the notoriety about our old house. We may be in that small box of an apartment until we’re carried out feet first.”

  Nancy, Realtor extraordinaire, immediately swung into professional gear. Just as I hoped she would.

  “Listen, Carol, this may be a blessing in disguise. I’ll find you and Jim the perfect property. Forget those snobs at Eden’s Grove.” Her eyes narrowed. “You are getting your deposit back, aren’t you?”

  “In full,” I said. “But I feel like Jim and I are damaged goods. Second-class citizens. Do you know what I mean?”

  “Believe it or not, I do,” Nancy replied. “On a whole other level. I’ve been spending some time volunteering at Sally’s Place, and some of the stories I’ve heard from the women there are just unbelievable. Too many of them feel like they caused the abusive behavior, rather than being the victim of it.” She shook her head. “It’s tragic. That’s one reason why I feel so strongly about doing this show house, to help them and all the other families who will benefit from the program in the future.”

  “Nancy, you didn’t tell me you were volunteering there. When did you start?”

  “Believe it or not, I don’t tell you everything, Carol.” She gave my hand a squeeze. “Just almost everything. And, of course, there was the Sister Rose factor. I knew you’d freak when you found out she was involved.”

  I had to laugh. “Well, my friend, I did freak when I walked into their thrift shop and saw her for the first time in umpteen years. I haven’t had a chance to talk to you about that, with everything else going on.

  “Was that your plan? Not to warn me in advance? Just suggest, every so casually, that I drop in to Sally’s Closet and check out the bargains?”

  Nancy took another sip of her coffee before she answered me.

  “I admit, I took the coward’s way out. She scared me to death in high school, too, though not nearly as much as she did you. I figured you’d never go for the show house idea if you found out in advance she’d be involved, no matter how desperate you and Jim are to sell your house.

  “Forgive me, please.”

  Well, what could I say? Of course, Nancy was absolutely right.

  “As a matter of fact, once the initial shock of reconnecting with her has worn off, I’m finding out that Sister Rose isn’t such a bad egg after all,” I said. “I saw her again yesterday in the supermarket, and we ended up having coffee together, believe it or not. And had quite a nice conversation. I don’t know which one of us was the more surprised about that.”

  Talking about my coffee date brought back the ugly suspicions I’d been harboring about Mary Alice. I wondered if I could trust Nancy to keep her mouth shut if I probed a little about Jack Cartwright.

  What the heck. I’d be subtle.

  “I’m getting excited about the show house,” I said, “although I still can’t get beyond the shock of finding Jack. I realized last night that, even though he was buying our house, Jim and I didn’t know very much about him. Except for the fact that he was married to Sara Miller’s daughter Alyssa.

  “Was he from Fairfield County originally?”

  Nancy looked at me hard. “I know what you’re getting at, Carol. You figured out who Jack was, right?”

  Huh?

  “You knew who Jack was and didn’t say anything to me?” I couldn’t believe this.

  “I didn’t recognize him,” Nancy responded.

  “Mary Alice did.”

  Chapter 25

  Dust bunnies make ideal pets.

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

  “Do you mean to tell me,” I said, “that Mary Alice knew who Jack was all along? And you did, too? And neither one of you said a single word to Jim or me about it?”

  I was shaking with rage.

  “How could you do this? Why did you, for God’s sake?”

  “Take it easy, Carol,” Nancy said. “And let me explain what happened. Believe me
, please, that we kept the truth about Jack from you and Jim with the best of intentions. In fact…”

  She stopped herself.

  “In fact, what?” I prompted her. “What?”

  “Well, I guess I’m the one who’s really to blame about this. Mary Alice wanted you to know. But I was a selfish bitch. I was afraid that if you knew who Jack was, you’d call off the house sale. And I needed the commission. You know how hard the real estate market is these days.”

  She turned her face away from me and whimpered, “I’m sorry, Carol. I’m truly sorry.

  “And I guess the Good Lord had the last laugh on me, because the house deal is off, anyway.”

  I can be a little slow on the uptake sometimes. I admit that.

  Sometimes I only hear half of what’s been said and immediately react, before I hear the whole story. I admit that.

  And I do tend to speak before I think about what I’m saying. I admit that, too.

  This time, I exercised as much self-control as I could and willed my mouth to stay shut. I wanted to take Nancy and shake her. I don’t think I’ve ever been as angry with her before in our forty-plus year friendship. Even the time that she started dating Richie Russo during freshman year of high school, though she knew I had a major crush on him and used to pray each night before I went to bed that he’d call and ask me out.

  I wanted to be sure I understood exactly what Nancy had told me.

  “Let’s go over this again,” I said, using my most adult voice. “You’re admitting that both you and Mary Alice knew Jack Cartwright was the person driving the car that caused Brian’s death. Mary Alice recognized him first, then told you. When, pray tell, did this happen?”

  “It was at the St. Patrick’s Day Open House,” Nancy said. “Mary Alice had volunteered to help greet people, so I’d be free to show prospective buyers around the house and do what I was supposed to do – sell your house. She didn’t tell me right away about Jack, because I guess she wasn’t sure. It had been so many years since she’d seen him. And he went by ‘Johnny’ back then, not Jack.

  “By the time she was positive ‘Jack’ and ‘Johnny’ were the same person, you and the Cartwrights had already signed the preliminary papers to sell them your house.

  “You know Mary Alice,” Nancy went on.

  Well, I thought I did.

  “She knew how much you and Jim wanted to sell up and move to Eden’s Grove. And she figured, probably correctly, that if you found out who Jack was, you might cancel the deal out of loyalty to her. Well, I guess I have to take the blame for that suggestion. But she agreed with me. We decided not to tell you. ”

  “I don’t see how you planned to keep all of this a secret, not just from Jim and me, but from everybody else. Fairport is a pretty small town. Word was bound to leak out.

  “And how could Mary Alice bear the thought that she could see the man who ruined her life shopping at the CVS on any given day? She was bound to run into him sometime.”

  “Mary Alice had a solution for that. She was going to contact him and suggest they meet. So she could put the past behind her, once and for all.

  “They planned to meet at your house the night before the closing.”

  Ouch. Could this get any worse?

  “Nancy,” I said with extreme patience, “what you’re saying is that Mary Alice had both motive, and opportunity to put Jack out of her life once and for all. Don’t you get it?”

  “I’m not stupid, Carol,” Nancy snapped back at me. “Of course I know what this could look like to someone who doesn’t know Mary Alice. But you and I know she doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. She’s a nurse, for crying out loud. She’s trained to save people, not hurt them. Or worse.”

  “Why didn’t Mary Alice tell me herself?” I asked. “It’s been a few days since Jack died, and she knows that the house deal is definitely off. She even admitted to the police that she was at my house that night. She had some nutty story about waiting for me to come so we could hide something of mine there. So there’d always be a part of me in the house. I don’t remember that conversation at all. I wonder if she made the whole thing up, so that if someone had seen her there late at night, she’d have an explanation. Even though it was a lame one.

  “This makes absolutely no sense to me.”

  Nancy held out her cell phone to me.

  “There’s only one way to find out. Call her and tell her we’re coming over.”

  She cranked the engine. “You talk, and I’ll drive.”

  The phone rang and rang at Mary Alice’s. She didn’t answer.

  “Maybe she’s not home,” I said to Nancy as we sped up Beach Road toward Mary Alice’s condo.

  “She’s home,” Nancy said. “I talked to her this morning, before I left for the gym.” She pressed her foot down on the accelerator and I held onto my seat belt for dear life. “Nancy, slow down. All we need now is a speeding ticket!”

  “You’re right, Carol,” Nancy said, easing her foot back off the pedal just a little. “I’m just anxious to see Mary Alice. I don’t know about you, but I’ll feel a little better when the three of us talk this out and figure out a plan.”

  “A plan?” I asked. “What kind of a plan?”

  “A plan to keep Mary Alice out of jail if it turns out Jack was murdered.”

  “You look like hell,” said Nancy, never one to mince words. I had to agree with her assessment. Mary Alice’s eyes were red and puffy, and she had the kind of dark circles below them that indicated sleep had not visited her for quite a while.

  “I feel like hell, too,” she said. “Or like I’m in the middle

  of it.

  “How are you doing, Carol?”

  Nancy cut to the chase. “She knows, Mary Alice. I told her that you recognized Jack Cartwright.”

  Mary Alice started to cry. I think that, in all the years I’ve known her, I’d never seen her cry before.

  Wordlessly, I put my arms around her and held her. That seemed to make the situation even worse.

  “This is like going through Brian’s death all over again. It’s all my fault,” Mary Alice said, sobbing into my shoulder.

  “Sweetie, how could this be your fault?” Nancy asked, leading a still weeping Mary Alice to the living room sofa.

  “I should have told Carol and Jim who Jack was. Even if it meant they called off the house sale.” She glared at Nancy. “Come to think of it, not telling them was your idea, not mine. I never should have listened to you.”

  Nancy, for once, looked truly penitent. “I’ve already told Carol that I gave you bad advice. You’re right. It really is my fault. But now, what are we going to do?”

  “You know what the ironic thing is?” Mary Alice asked. “I chickened out and never contacted Jack. When I thought about it some more, I realized it was a very bad idea. I figured I’d just take my chances. If I ran into him anywhere around Fairport, I could just walk the other way.”

  She shuddered. “When I think of Jack lying there inside, dying, I feel so terrible. I would have helped him, if only I’d known he was there. I wonder if anyone will believe that.

  “Oh, God, what a mess this is.”

  I had had enough of Mary Alice’s tears and Nancy’s guilt. I know that sounds harsh, particularly due to my overindulgence in the same behaviors myself.

  Well, tough.

  What I wanted now were answers. Because I had plenty of questions.

  “OK, kids. Let’s get everything out in the open. No more secrets. Mary Alice, did you and I really agree to meet at my house the night before the closing, or did you just say that to the police in case somebody saw you there? You know my memory isn’t very dependable these days.”

  Mary Alice looked hurt. “Why don’t you remember? You loved the idea of hiding a trinket in the house before the closing, and asked me to come with you. You didn’t want Jim to know because he’d think we were crazy.”

  “I still don’t remember,” I said. “I’ve had a few other thi
ngs on my mind, you know. But why in the world did you tell the police about it?” I asked. “Didn’t you realize being at our house that night could make you look guilty?”

  “Guilty? Of what? I had no idea Jack was inside your house.”

  Huh? Just a second ago Mary Alice was blaming herself for Jack’s death.

  “Anyway,” Mary Alice continued, “besides the three of us, who’s going to know about my connection to Jack? And I know you guys won’t say anything.”

  “Of course we won’t, sweetie,” Nancy said, patting her hand.

  I looked at the two of them. What a pair. I wondered if they both lived in Fantasyland instead of Fairport.

  “I hate to burst your bubble,” I said, “but this is bound to come out. I’m betting that Jack’s family knew, for one. That includes Sara Miller, whom I saw getting very cozy with that blabbermouth Phyllis Stevens at the gym this morning. If Sara said something to Phyllis, it’ll be all over town in a heartbeat.

  “And as long as we’re sharing secrets, I found out about your connection to Jack on my own, Mary Alice. I just didn’t know how to talk to you about it.”

  I proceeded to share my unpacking story with Nancy and Mary Alice. And my discovery of the incriminating newspaper article. When I got to the part about Lucy and Ethel’s “disposal” of the article, I must have painted quite a vivid picture, because all three of us howled with laughter for a good five minutes.

  “I guess we all needed that,” Nancy said. “There’s nothing like a good laugh to clear out the brain and put things into proper perspective.

  “Now, we have some other things to figure out. Like the preview party for the show house. Remember, we talked about that, Carol?”

  What? I’d forgotten something else?

  “Nance, I have no clue what you’re talking about. What’s a preview party? And shouldn’t we be coming up with a plan to help Mary Alice?”

  “I don’t know yet if I need help,” said Mary Alice. “And to tell you the truth, I’m sick of thinking and worrying about Jack. Just talking to you both has been so therapeutic. No more secrets. No more guilt. We’re on the same wave length again, and that’s all that matters.