Most of the snapshots, of course, were of elfin Gina's children. Gina's daughter was the chubby blond girl who'd danced so adoringly with Dan Forrest. Gina's two sons were wiry, short, dark, and exceptionally athletic. There were lots of photos of wrestling matches, swim meets, tennis tournaments. In contrast, her daughter was fair and plump and.usually carrying a book.
"Who the hell are you?"
I hadn't heard a sound.
I turned around calmly.
She'd come in through the back door. She stood just inside, water dripping from her apricot silk raincoat, her
bony face drawn into a furious scowl, her sleek black hair damp against her head.
She reminded me of a very small cat I'd once had. Sophie didn't weigh four pounds dripping wet. But let anything or anyone invade her domain, from a six-foot-six television repairman to a boxer dog, and she'd gather herself for combat. And mean it, all the way to her marrow.
"Mrs. Abbott?"
"You got it. This is my office. Who the hell are you and how did you get in?"
"The front door was unlocked. I didn't mean to trespass. I'm Henrietta Collins, Craig Matthews's aunt. I'm in town to try to help him. His lawyer, Desmond Marino, told me you were Patty Kay's best friend."
She yanked off her rain cap, tossed it toward a green jardiniere on a small rosewood stand.
"Oh, God. I'm sorry." She shrugged out of the raincoat. "This has been a fucking awful day." She flung the coat toward a coat tree and walked past me. Her face crumpled into lines of misery as she began to cry. She reached blindly for her chair, sank into it.
"I'm sorry. I'll come back another time…"
"No. Wait. I'm sorry." Gina snatched a handful of Kleenex, scrubbed at her face. Mascara streaked her cheekbones. "I keep saying I'm sorry. I sure am. I'm sorry as hell. For everybody. You ever been to a funeral for a fifteen-year-old?"
I felt as though I'd been carved out of ice, without a heartbeat, without a breath.
Not quite fifteen. Bobby was twelve years and four months and sixteen days old.
Some wounds never heal. Never. So yes, I understood Gina's tears, and I understood, too, the fear, the soul-deep fear, that spurred her outburst.
Because if it can happen to a friend, it can happen to you…
As it did to me.
I could see Bobby's face so clearly, even after all these years, sandy hair and laughing green eyes and a generous mouth, so much like his father's.
I couldn't answer Gina.
But she didn't give me a chance.
The words came in an anguished torrent. "Why the hell can't they tell you when something's that bad? I told my kids, 'Jesus Christ, come to me if you've got a problem. I don't care what it is-a baby, cocaine, you're gay, just for Jesus Christ's sake, tell me!'" The tears trickled down her grief-ravaged face. "It doesn't matter what it is. That's what I tell them. We can handle it. But when you die, you die." She clenched her small fists, pounded them against the desktop. "I'm so mad. So mad! I could shake Franci until her head pops off. But I can't. Because she rode her bike to the other side of the lake on Friday and walked out into the water and never came back. And do you know why?"
My heart ached at the agony in her cry.
"Because of some stupid fucking letters, that's why. That's all it was, anonymous letters telling her she was ugly, a lesbo, and everybody knew it, that she was too stupid to go to college and she had a funny smell and was a four-eyed loser. Most of it was just stupid, silly childish crap, but it got nastier and nastier. Some of it was sickening. Stuff Franci couldn't even start to understand. But she knew it was bad. And Franci was this uncertain, self-conscious, pudgy kid-and yes, dammit, she was slow-with thick braces and an awkward way of walking, up one day and down the next like most kids, and she couldn't handle it and she couldn't tell her folks because they didn't talk about things like lesbians and maybe they'd believe it since
everybody else did. That's what she told Chloe. My Chloe. And Chloe, the idiot child, didn't tell me because she promised Franci that she'd rlever say anything to anybody."
Franci Hollis, the girl they'd talked about at the beauty salon. The daughter of Patty Kay's tennis friend, Edith Hollis. The sweet-faced girl in the film of Brigit's birthday party.
Gina struggled to breathe.
I walked over to a water cooler, pulled down a paper cup, and filled it.
Gina took it gratefully. Gradually, her sobs eased.
"They're going to have counseling for all the kids who ask. Out at school. But it won't bring Franci back." Gina downed the rest of the water, crumpled the cup, and reached for the phone. She swiftly punched the numbers.
No, nothing ever brings anyone back. And there are the long, agonizing hours in the night when the refrain goes on and on in your mind. "If we hadn't driven to Cuernavaca that night on the twisting, narrow mountain road…"A rusted pickup out of control, smashing into us, and Richard and Emily and I were all right. But not Bobby. And I'd been the one who'd insisted we go. I didn't want to miss the fiesta. Oh, Christ, a fiesta. I'd insisted…
Gina kneaded her temple. "Chloe? Just thought I'd check. Are you going back to school? Look, I can close up and come home- You're sure?" The decorator's eyes looked bruised. "Honey, honey, you couldn't have known. There was no way you could've known." Her fingers closed tightly on the silver necklace at her throat. "That's right. Go on back to school. Yes. I'll see you tonight."
Replacing the receiver, she blearily focused on me. "I still can't take it in. First Franci. Then Patti Kay. And I know Craig didn't-God, I can't even say it, it's so sick. God, I feel like I'm choking." Abruptly, she reached behind,
unsnapped the necklace. The metal clinked against the desk as she flung it down. "Okay, Mrs. Collins, I'll get myself together. What do you want to talk to me about?"
It took a moment to push away the questions I'd never been able to answer-or escape-and plunge myself into
the present. Patty Kay"
"All in one week," she muttered. "Nothing like this's ever happened in Fair Haven. Never."
I understood. Patty Kay's shocking murder and a teen's tragic suicide would have the same devastating impact as the kidnapping of the Exxon executive from the driveway of his home in another exclusive suburb. A well-ordered universe was abruptly revealed as inimical, incalculable. Fair Haven had no place in its cosmology for cruel malevolence.
Gina yanked open her desk drawer, began to root around. "Oh, crap." She looked at me desperately. "You have any cigarettes?"
I'd quit more than thirty years ago. Thank God.
She answered her own question. "No, no. Damn, I know I hid some somewhere. The last time I quit." She jumped up, tugged her chair up to the shelving behind the desk. She climbed on the chair, poked her hand behind a stack of wallpaper rolls, then heaved a sigh of relief.
; Her hands were trembling when she returned to her chair, clutching a crumpled pack of Winstons. She pulled out a worn cigarette. "It'll taste awful." She lit it, pulled the smoke deep in her lungs, made a face. "All right. Where were we? Oh. Patty Kay. What can I say? It's insane. Now I'm afraid for Chloe to be home by herself after school. Maybe I ought to stay home. 1 never worried when the boys were home. They'd take care of their sister. God, that's sexist, isn't it? Chloe's as capable as anybody. But she's a girl and girls aren't strong. But it wasn't strength that mattered
for Patty Kay, was it? Somebody had a damn gun. Jesus, Craig's gun! But the idea that Craig did it is stupid. Craig hates guns. It really upset him when Patty Kay got onto the gun kick. He acted like a nun at a nudist colony." She flashed me a quick, contrite look. "I'm sorry. That's my theme song with you, isn't it? I don't mean to make fun of Craig. But I grew up with guns. My dad hunted. My husband-when I had one-he hunted. My sons hunt. I just thought Craig was a wimp. But I know he couldn't shoot anybody. But somebody did it. The thing is, how did some stranger get Craig's gun? And why would Patty Kay be in the playhouse with a stranger? I mean, she definitely wasn't born yesterday. I tell you, I'm confused as hell."
There had been no description of the kitchen in the newspaper accounts.
I described to Gina what Craig had found, what the police had seen, what I had cleaned up.
"God, that's weird. Just last week-" Her mouth snapped shut.
"Last week?"
"Nothing, nothing." She stared down at the desk.
"The limericks? At the poker party?"
She looked relieved. "Then you already know. But Craig just had too much to drink. It didn't mean a thing."
"How did you happen to hear about it?"
"Brooke told me. David's in the poker group."
I knew that. And, as I had thought, the cheesecake story had obviously had wide currency.
Gina's relief at not having to tell me about Craig's transgression faded. "But if Craig didn't shoot Patty Kay-and I know he didn't-then somebody knew about those stupid limericks and threw the cake to make it look like him." She took a last greedy puff from the cigarette, dropped it into a Coke can. "Oh, Christ. That's awful. That means…"
She wrapped her arms tightly around her body. Her tear-streaked face suddenly looked old, the bones harsh against tight skin.
"You were her best friend."
The only response was a spasm of pain on that haggard face. Her lips trembled.
"Desmond Marino said you were her best friend."
She pushed up from her chair, bent across the desk to grab the cigarette pack. She began to pace, head down, smoking, before she replied, in a staccato burst. "Yeah. He got it right. I was. I mean, I still was-even though we weren't speaking to each other. I was so damn mad at Patty Kay." She stopped, flung her head up. "Christ, she was so rich. She couldn't even begin to understand about not having money, or having to worry about money. I mean"-she whirled-"she couldn't see any side to things but her side. I've been working a deal that could mean almost a hundred thousand dollars to me. It all hinges on getting some property I own rezoned for commercial instead of residential. It's right on the edge of the historic district. This property was home to historic flophouses and, a long time ago, to Fair Haven's fancy ladies. The buildings sure as hell aren't worth saving. But Patty Kay wanted a buffer area between the historic houses and commercial development. And it's the only thing I've got that could bring in some real money and I truly need it for the kids' college expenses. My ex, the sorry asshole, is too busy with his new little brood to help the kids go to school. So it's all up to me."
She dropped into her chair again, stubbed out the cigarette, and yanked out the center desk drawer. She found a cream-colored envelope and held it out to me. "I swear to God, I could have killed her!"
I pulled out the enclosure, embossed with Patty Kay's initials, and saw that familiar, flowing, crimson script:
Dear Gina,
I wish I could support you in your efforts to have the Brewster property rezoned. But I can't. We have to stop the encroachment of commercial building within the historic district. Fair Haven must not lose its most precious heritage.
I'm surprised and disappointed by your defection. I thought we were both committed to historic preservation. Obviously, we can't be supporters one day and opponents the next. I didn't think you would succumb to financial considerations.
I hope you'll see the necessity for consistency and drop your request for rezoning.
Love, Patty Kay
"Did you tell her how much you needed the money?" "Tell her! I begged. So she offered to pay for the kids to go to college, and that was the last straw. Dammit, I don't want charity-I want to be able to pay my way." "But you were still playing tennis with her?" She flung her hands up. "Oh, yes. We just weren't speaking. Brooke was irritated with us and Edith kept trying to patch it up-and now Patty Kay's dead." Tears sparkled in her eyes. "And I can't even tell her I wasn't really mad at her. I was nuts with everything! Trying to get by on too little money, trying to get my ex to cough some up, trying to keep up appearances-God, the guttering's bad on the house and I can't afford to replace it, but you don't ever want anybody to know you're down and out. They'd avoid you like the plague."
"Okay," I said mildly. "You and Patty Kay had a quarrel. But you still knew her better than anybody else."
"Oh, yeah. I've known her forever. Since we were little
kids. Even then, she bossed me around. Patty Kay was always in charge. But she was so much fun. So damned much fun. And now you're telling me somebody she knew- somebody I know-shot her down." Again, compulsively, she reached for the cigarette pack.
"When was the last time you actually talked to her?"
Gina lit another cigarette, stared at its flaming tip.
A billboard announcement couldn't have made it clearer that she didn't want to answer.
"Recently?" I persisted. "After your quarrel over the property?"
"Well, something else came up. And I did talk to her. And it made her madder than hell."
"About?"
"Nothing that could have anything to do with-with her murder." She chose her words with enormous care. "So the last time we talked-even when we weren't talking- was pretty harsh. And I hate it." Her voice quivered. "Because no matter what, I loved her."
"Someone didn't."
She snatched another Kleenex, wiped her eyes. She didn't look at me. "I know of one person. There's this preacher-"
"The Reverend James Holman. But-"
"Yeah. I know it sounds crazy, but Holman's one of those far-right nuts. He and Patty Kay despised each other. Somebody told me he preached one Sunday and told his congregation she was visited by the devil. I think maybe it's DEVIL in capital letters." She smoothed the crumpled cellophane on the cigarette box and shook her head. "But 1 can'
t imagine how Holman could know about the cheesecake. Sure, this is a small town, but believe me, he didn't move in the same circles as Patty Kay. Not socially."
"Unless he's a remarkable specimen, he's not in the
running. He had open heart surgery Friday. He's still in intensive care."
"Oh."
I understood her disappointment. Wouldn't it be lovely to fasten the blame on someone who wasn't a part of Patty Kay's social scene?
Scandal in Fair Haven Page 15