After lunch, Tatania followed Grace to the library. With some effort, Tatania knocked a book off the shelf. Then she rolled around it. Grace looked at the title and trembled.
An American Tragedy. Based on a true story of a man killing a girlfriend with an inconvenient pregnancy. It became a best seller despite what critics were calling Theodore Dreiser’s tortured prose. In the novel, and the true story, a man killed his pregnant girlfriend by pushing her out of a boat on the lake, and waiting for her to drown. Or maybe he turned the boat over on purpose. Grace thought of all the boats on Glorietta Bay and felt queasy.
He could have drowned her. She’d become certain the skeleton was a her. And then, if the body had come ashore, he could have buried her on the land, thinking it would go undetected.
Jack popped his head in the library.
“Miss Morton, can we look at newspapers from 1916?”
“Call me Gabrielle,” she said, taking off her glasses.
“Why 1916?” Grace asked.
“I think the coke bottle is from that era. That was before Coca Cola made its bottle shapely. Like a woman. And sent it off to the Great War for the soldiers.”
They split up the newspapers and began reading the story of Molly Mansfield, who disappeared from her home in New York. She was last seen at the train station in San Diego. The newspapers were calling her beautiful blonde. Judging from her picture, for obvious reasons.
A beautiful blonde couldn’t go unnoticed on a cross country train trip if she tried. And by all accounts, Molly had tried, sticking to her compartment, rarely venturing out to the dining car for meals. She always wore white. Beautiful Edwardian dresses cinched at the waist. Her parents were frantic. And they traveled to San Diego, leaving their prosperous farm to trace her journey from the day she disappeared. The trail went cold in San Diego. Some reported seeing a beautiful blonde woman in Coronado but people kept saying when you talk about Coronado, you need to be more specific than that. She hadn’t checked into a hotel in San Diego. They’d specifically checked the Hotel del Coronado and there weren’t any records of her. A ten thousand dollar reward for information offered by her parents brought a lot of attention but not Molly.
The San Diego Union and Coronado Journal devoured the beautiful blonde’s disappearance. And finally someone noticed her resemblance to the Mansfield family that had stayed at the Hotel del Coronado recently. Speculation became rampant. Was she returning to join someone? Her parents scoffed at the idea. Molly’s dance card was always full but there wasn’t a steady.
Her parents produced another picture of her, in a white dress with rose details, arms slightly back, showing off a feminine figure without being flagrantly sexual.
“Classic aristocratic pose, and a hint of a smile, but you can’t be certain what the smile is about,” Grace said.
Grace thought of the description that was building of Carlos, “Carlos was such a ladies man in those days. Even after marriage. Then something seemed to die in him. He lost vitality. Though he still has some good looks.” The newspaper quoted an anonymous source. Carlos was repeatedly described as the handsome polo player that used to frequent Coronado’s Polo Playing Field.
Grace didn’t need anything else to make her feel like she would jump out of her skin.
“Don’t worry. Tatania never sheds.” Grace assured the librarian. They watched Tatania roll around on a Sears Roebuck catalogue open to the maternity section.
“I know. She’s been a customer longer than you.”
Tatania rolled over again and reached a front paw up towards the librarian, melting her heart.
Carlos Varela smiled on the front page of the San Diego Union. They looked at a picture of him with Charity before they were married. He held a Coca Cola bottle in one hand and a trophy in another. Charity smiled, one hand on the trophy, and one hand on Carlos.
“That does look like the Coca Cola bottle we found. It’s not a 1920s Coca Cola bottle. It’s old fashioned.” Grace pointed at the picture. Jack picked up her hand and kissed it.
“Don’t worry.” He stared up at her with the mesmerizing green eyes that commanded her senses to attention.
“What if we’re building on sacred ground? Who was buried there?”
“Darling, you know nothing is sacred to me. Except us.” Jack smiled.
“Bees knees.”
Chapter Nine
After the library, Tatanis sharpened her claws on a tree outside the Hotel del Coronado.
“Do you want to get a manicure too?” Jack asked.
“I’m still looking for what I want to get my claws into, Jack,” Grace said.
Tatania led the way into Olga, the Palmist’s tent. Olga reached down to pet Tatania. She’d found a platinum blonde shade that was nearly as white as Tatania to go with her latest perm wave.
Tatania liked Olga, a lady who kept salmon in the ice box for her. Olga opened her icebox and began slicing a few bites from her fresh salmon for Tatania.
“I’ve seen her with the black and white cat with the little pink nose before,” Olga the Palmist said, “he’s the cutest little thing.”
“He’s missing. It’s unbearable. And the worst part is he took off running because the plane noise scared him. I wanted to jump out and get him. Jack doesn’t understand. He loves the cats. Especially Tatania. But she’s not afraid of planes. And he doesn’t feel guilty that Zeus was so scared. I feel like I should have done something.”
“He wanted to follow you and he did. Cats make up their own minds.”
“We just found a skeleton.”
“Where?”
“On our land. Someone thought it would be fun to do a moonlight ground breaking ceremony.” She looked at Jack.
“And then we took off for La Jolla and Zeus ran off because the plane noise scared him.”
Olga looked steadily at Grace.
“He’ll return. He’s off on an adventure. Tomcats are like that.”
Grace sank into one of the cushions Olga kept strewn around her cottage—perhaps in an attempt to create a more exotic look than chairs.
Annie Knickerbocker came in. “I’ll never be an early riser like my husband,” she explained. “I’m a late sleeper.”
“Olga, do you remember the Molly Mansfield case?” Grace asked.
Olga shuddered. “She was a beautiful girl. She came her to have her hand read. I had a feeling of foreboding. I knew she’d fall in love. Anyone could have seen the girl looked radiant. But I knew it would end terribly.”
“What did you tell her?” Grace leaned forward.
“Only that she would fall in love,” Olga said. “Molly smiled like a cat lapping cream. Tragic, beautiful girl.”
“If you think of anything else about her, stop by the cottage,” Jack said.
“Why? Do you think the skeleton is Molly?”
Jack nodded yes.
Chapter Ten
Jack’s place was steps away from the Palmist’s and Grace began calling for Zeus again.
She looked inside Jack’s cottage in case he’d returned on his own. He and Tatania had a way of appearing when they least expected. Grace, Jack and Annie looked around as if he’d surprise them from beneath the bed or chair.
“Dear, of course she already knows. A smart woman knows when she’s married to a philanderer. And while you could credibly call Charity a lot of things, dumb isn’t one of them. So if I said anything, even though we were once good friends, I’d just be the woman who knows that she knows she’s married to a philanderer and she’d hate me for it,” Annie said.
“Because she wants to pretend no one knows she knows most of all,” Grace said.
Annie shook her head.
“I shouldn’t start a sentence with because—”
“—I hope you never lose your Finishing School charm, Grace.” Annie puffed a cigarette encased in a crystal holder.
“Poor Charity,” Grace said.
“For you, French champagne.” Jack poured a glass for Grace
and for Annie.
“Bees Knees,” Grace said.
“I feel sorry for people who don’t drink. When they wake up in the morning, that’s the best they’re going to feel all day,” Annie said.
Tatania pushed one diamond earring on the floor, paused, stared at it, and then pushed the other one off, deciding it would look better on the floor too.
“Is there anyone Carlos hasn’t impregnated?” Jack asked.
Grace and Annie raised their hands.
“That’s a relief.”
Annie’s gorgeous grey striped tabby appeared and tapped noses with Tatania.
“How sweet, she’s making friends. Fluffy isn’t usually social.” Annie sipped her drink
“Zeus,” Grace called again at the cottage door.
“When are you going to stop calling him?”
“When he stays home forever.” Grace saw a small moving shape. Her heart lept and then sank, as a Tabby went into the cottage across the way.
Tatania meowed.
“Meow Baby,” Grace stroked the white cat’s ears and wished it was enough to have her. Tatania was a perfect cat. Their home still felt incomplete without Zeus.
“I love one thing in this world. And it’s Zeus. And now he’s gone.” Grace threw a bowl across the room.
Jack and Tatania looked at her reproachfully.
“You know what I mean.”
They just stared.
“Obviously, I love both of you. It’s just that with Zeus every morning felt like Christmas morning. And now it feels like Christmas might never come again. I loved coming home—”
“—and now you don’t?” Jack asked.
“Don’t you notice the difference? Don’t you miss him?”
“He’s a nice cat. He’s a formal feral. Tomcats wander.”
“He didn’t wander out of my heart. I want him home.” Grace opened the window again.
“We’ll leave the window open at night. The door to the cottage ajar. Maybe he’ll find his way back. He’s a smart cat.”
Tatania meowed as if to note she didn’t think Zeus was as smart as her.
“If ignorance is bliss,” Annie said, “wives of philanderers must be some of the happiest people in the world.”
Champagne in hand, Annie flicked the cigarette ash out the window. “You can’t get drunk on champagne,” she claimed.
“I discovered that I don’t get drunk on Champagne in Paris. At the height of the fashion season. I don’t get drunk on it. I just feel great.”
“I loved bopping over to Paris when I was at Finishing School in London. Except for actually crossing the Channel. That was rocky. Do you think everything is happening in Paris now?” Grace looked at Jack.
“Not while we’re here.” Jack smiled.
She looked gratefully at him for making her feel better and then turned to Annie.
“I think you put us on the right track in our investigation. Thanks.”
“Of course.”
“Charity seems nice. Why would Carlos….” Grace looked away, voice trailing.
“Have affairs? Men aren’t that complicated, Dear. Young, healthy. They get an opportunity to be with a doll. And they go for it.” Annie frowned.
“It gets worse,” Annie said, “Charity and I go way back. She married Carlos. I went to the wedding. He made a pass at me at the reception. And the worst part? He told me that Charity encouraged him to spend time with me to convince me that there are nice guys out there. So what could I ever say to Charity?”
“Ugh. Carlos.”
“The funny thing is he still has his charming moments. And I feel badly for Charity because she must know on some level. But I also know it would be worse if I said something to her. If she knew that I knew.”
“She seems happy.” Grace stared at Tatania rolling around on the chair and felt a pang for Zeus. She hoped he was okay. She couldn’t bear to think about the last sight of him, running in fear from the airplane. Would it keep him away forever?
“I hope someone is feeding Zeus.” Grace said.
Tatania put her paws up like a baby for Grace to pick up. Human females loved that.
“He’ll be back. Don’t worry.” Jack kissed Grace’s forehead.
She thought of her little boy cat with a pink nose and white toes. She imagined him climbing a tree somewhere. She wanted him home.
“Why didn’t we think of the plane noise scaring him?”
“Even if we had, it’s not like we could prevent him from following us.”
“Zeus,” she called again.
Tatania thought Zeus was nice if sometimes unseemly. But she wasn’t missing him. What was the human female’s problem. If she was lucky enough to have Tatania, she was lucky enough.
Tatania paused in the doorway to Jack’s cottage and mulled over the clues. She did some of her best mystery solving in doorways. A dog started barking in the cottage next to Jack’s. The idiots in the cottage next to him thought the way to handle a dog barking is to pound on the wall. As if that will let the dog know to knock it off. Of course the dog barked louder.
“Jack, the skeleton was a female. And I know she was pregnant. Tatania kept rolling around on An American Tragedy and the Sears Roebuck catalogue while it was open to the maternity section.”
Tatania rolled around again for emphasis. Then she sat up and flicked her fluffy white tail across the Sears Roebuck catalogue at Jack’s cottage.
“Do you think Zeus is okay?” Grace asked.
Tatania looked annoyed.
“Good kitty,” Grace said.
The radio gave them an update of Lindbergh, still waiting in the New York storm to take off to Paris. And Babe Ruth hit another home run. That was as certain as the sun rising.
“And everyone was ready to write Babe Ruth off a couple years ago.”
“I remember reading that he was washed up in 1925.” Grace picked Tatania up and stroked the side of her chin the way she liked it. Amazing. She could pet Tatania in her black gloves without picking up any white fur. Magical cat.
Like Grace, Annie Knickerbocker wore matching black opera gloves, wrist purse, and Mary Jane pumps. Annie smoked with a black onyx cigarette holder that matched her black onyx earrings.
“There’s an interesting story behind finding that skeleton,” she said again, drawing on her cigarette.
Grace couldn’t imagine a dull story about finding a skeleton on one’s property but she waited for Annie to talk again.
“Strange things happening on your Uncle’s yacht one night years ago. Of course it was Charity and Carlos’ yacht then. There was a full moon just like this. My beau had left for Army training in the south. I hoped he wouldn’t go to war but even then, it looked like Wilson would get us in it. I was lonely and I went to Mexico—”
“—I can’t believe Charity from Revolutionary Colonial Daughters used to own my Uncle Charles’ yacht?” Grace had been surprised to learn that her late Uncle Charles even had a yacht. She’d discovered his mistress, Julia, and their baby, Charlotte, living on it when she investigated her Uncle’s death and met Jack.
“Yes, do you know her very well?”
Grace shook her head. “We’ve sat next to each other at lunch. She seemed nice at first. Very well dressed. And she even ordered food that matched the colors of her outfit.”
Annie laughed. A deep throaty, smoky sound that made Grace think of speakeasies.
“I went to Mexico. My Dad had just given me a Packard convertible. It felt like driving a large boat in a bumpy sea. The roads were even worse than they are now if that’s possible. One tequila led to another. And then the third tequila led to Jose. He was a waiter in the bar. And we began talking—”
“—you speak Spanish?”
“—No Dear, I took French. We managed to communicate in the limited way that tourists and waiters communicate everywhere in the world. Drink. Kiss. And the next thing I knew, I was taking him across the border in my new Packard with a pancho and blankets covering him in
the back.”
“Didn’t the border agents say anything?”
“No. I looked like a well heeled young lady who’d spent the day shopping and dining. No one expected me to bring back one of the waiters.”
“You adventuress.”
“I liked to have fun. You girls in the twenties didn’t invent it.”
“What did you do when you got him back here?”
“My parents were away. I kept him in the house for a couple weeks. We had a great time. Then I felt guilty. My boyfriend was coming back after training. I gave Jose a little money and sent him on his way up North.”
Tatania held her paws up to Grace.
“Bees knees. I love this cat. But I miss Zeus.”
“He’s adorable,” Annie agreed, remembering the black cat with white toes and a pink nose. A small white stripe on his tail, and eyes greener than a Christmas tree that looked at you with complete trust.
“We were out on the sleeping porch,” Annie said.
“Not sleeping.”
“Right,” Annie laughed again, “and we saw something we wished we hadn’t seen.” She paused again, smoking, it looked like her hand was shaking slightly.
“Someone lowered a lifeboat from the yacht. It was called The Charity in those days. Now, I know it’s The Julia. It looked like someone put a dead body in the life boat.”
“Seriously?”
“We thought it had to be something else. But it sure looked like a body. But even with a full moon, at night, you can’t be certain you’re seeing a body. At first, you just notice a large, bulky object. Then we saw someone row the boat to the lot you own now and bury the large bulky object.”
“Did you say anything?”
“What was I going to say? I still didn’t know for certain what had been buried. And I sure didn’t want anyone questioning me closely about what I was doing and with whom. You’re the only people I’ve ever told. Martin and my parents don’t have a clue. Martin came back safely from the war. We got married. Until tonight, I’d forgotten the whole thing.”
“Why would someone want to bury something on my Uncle’s lot?”
“Remember your Uncle didn’t own it then. Charity and Carlos owned it. Or maybe just Charity. She keeps some things in her own name. Carlos was going to see your Uncle for legal advice. He didn’t have any money. I think Charity met him at a stable in Peru. Your Uncle took the yacht and the lot in legal fees instead of cash.”
Magical Cool Cats Mysteries Boxed Set Vol 2(Books 4,5,6 & 7) Page 3