The Pea Soup Poisonings

by Nancy Means Wright

  But when they arrived at Spence’s house, his mother was so thrilled to find her son alive and well that he could have lost both shoes. She smothered Spence with tears and hugs. “Dinner is vegetable lasagna with lots of cheddar cheese,” she told him, “and cherry pie with whipped cream. And you’re all invited.”

  “We’re running out of time,” Zoe reminded Spence.

  He swallowed hard. “Sure. But for now I have to do what Mom tells me,” he said. He winked at Zoe. “You know.”

  “Sure, I know,” she said, winking back. “But when you’ve finished stuffing yourself and sleeping ten hours, you can meet me at Tiny Alice’s. Time is running out and I’ve got to find who did kill Alice’s granny.”

  When she arrived at her own house, and her parents hugged and kissed her until she cried for release, Kelby was waiting. Seeing his grinning face, she couldn’t understand why she had actually missed him when she was in captivity.

  “Tomorrow night at midnight,” croaked Kelby, “your time is up. And you know what that means.”

  She did know. It meant that she had only one day left to solve the crime.

  Could she do it?

  Chapter Twenty-four

  A Surprise in the Basement

  “Where’s Miss Thelma?” Zoe asked the next noon, after submitting herself to a hundred embraces from the Bagley sisters. She had never been so hugged and kissed in her whole life! It was exhausting, to tell the truth.

  But enough was enough. And she had work to do, evidence to find. Why had she slept so late?

  “Miss Thelma?” she repeated, surveying the doughnuts, cookies, and pastries Miss Maud had heaped in front of her.

  “Why, she’s gone,” said Miss Gertie. “As soon as your parents called that you and the boy were safe and the kidnappers caught, she went back home.”

  “Oh no!” said Zoe, pushing away a plate of doughnuts. “She may still be in danger. I mean we don’t know that the kidnappers acted alone, do we?”

  “Oh dear, we didn’t think of that,” said Miss Maud. “But who on earth could have helped them?”

  “I don’t know, but I’m going to try and find out.” Zoe dashed across the road to Thelma Fairweather’s house and drew a big breath of relief to find the old lady alone in the kitchen, preparing a lunch of pasta and veggies.

  “It was lovely staying with the Bagleys,” Thelma said, “but I must admit I’m awfully sick of soup. Asparagus soup, lentil soup, pea soup.”

  Zoe had to agree. In fact she’d like nothing more than a nice apple crisp right now, the kind her mother made with Northern Spy apples and sugar and lots of cinnamon.

  “No, thank you,” she said to the pasta and veggies. She would wait for the apple crisp. Each fall her mom stored quarts of it in the freezer.

  She warned Thelma not to let in any strangers – or anyone slightly suspicious for that matter, and ran next door to see Tiny Alice. It was time to look in the grandmother’s boxes. There might be a clue hidden inside one of them. The Clue in Grandmother’s Box, she would call a mystery novel if she ever decided to write one. And she might.

  Tiny Alice was in the kitchen, baking, with her mother. A delicious aroma of chocolate filled the room. Madeline Fairweather seemed surprised to see Zoe. Then she tried to hug her, but Zoe pulled away. She’d had enough embraces for one day.

  “We get to lick the frosting pan,” said Alice.

  “Mmm,” said Zoe. “But first,” she whispered while Mrs. Fairweather was in the pantry, “I want to look into your granny’s boxes.”

  “Madeline,” said Alice, “Zoe and I are going down in the basement to look for something.”

  “Look for what, dear?” said Mrs. Fairweather, her gray eyes questioning. She seemed nervous today. She was twisting her wedding ring round and round on her finger. Of course it had been hard for her, Zoe realized, with the grandmother murdered and then Miss Thelma kidnapped.

  “For my cross country skis,” Alice fibbed. “We’re going out for the ski team next winter. I want to see if they’re big enough for me. They were a present from Dad.”

  “I’m afraid they’ll have to do,” said Mrs. Fairweather. “At this point we simply can’t afford to buy you a new pair. And things – well, things just haven’t worked out the way I’d hoped for you and me. Though one day, when you inherit that farm…”

  Seeing Zoe’s watchful eyes on her, she changed the subject. “Well, go ahead down then. I want to finish this cake.”

  The cellar was moldy. Zoe sneezed three times and used up four tissues. But she had to see what was in those boxes. There were six stored high on a basement shelf. Her dad had made those shelves, Alice said, “before he died.”

  This time Zoe handed Alice a tissue to wipe her eyes.

  They went quickly through the boxes, pulling out shoes and nighties, scarves and blouses, old photos and yellowy newspaper clippings, and a hundred other bits of memorabilia. Alice got weepy again, looking at an old photo of her grandmother sitting on a porch swing with Alice’s dad. Beside him sat a pretty young woman with long red hair.

  “Who’s that?” Zoe asked, and Alice said, “Oh that’s my mother. It was taken the year before I was born.”

  When Zoe looked at her, questioning, Alice explained: “My mother left us when I was two years old, and then Dad married Madeline.”

  Zoe was amazed. “Then where is your real mother now?”

  “Somewhere in California, I think. She was trying to get into films. She sends me presents on my birthday, but I haven’t seen her since she left.” Alice looked sad, and Zoe felt sad for her. Secretly, she told herself that her mother would never have left like that. But she didn’t say it out loud.

  Another photo was of Madeline Fairweather, looking fifteen years younger and quite carefree, the way she’d flung one arm up over her head. Standing beside her was a dark-haired woman in a red dress. She looked strangely familiar, but Zoe couldn’t place her.

  Alice didn’t know either. “Just one of Madeline’s friends, I guess.”

  But Zoe couldn’t stop looking at the photo. Lighten up the woman’s dark hair, she thought, and it could be – why, it could be Chloe! Was Chloe a friend of Madeline Fairweather’s? What could it mean, anyway?

  “I don’t know,” Zoe said, sneezing again, her nose filling up. “I don’ dow how I goin’ probe anyting. I bean who kill your granny.” She blew her nose again.

  “What? Oh. But you said the kidnappers’ car was here the afternoon my grandmother died.”

  “That’s just circumstantial evidence. It doesn’t prove anything.”

  “Cir-cum-stan-stan...,” said Alice, trying her tongue around the word. Giving up, she sank down on a box. Then she brightened. “What about the tape recorder? I couldn’t find it in Aunt Thelma’s house.”

  “It must still be in that closet. But I heard everything the kidnappers said. They didn’t say anything about your grandmother.”

  Upstairs a door banged shut and the girls quickly piled the boxes back up on the shelf. A few things fell on the floor while they were doing it, but Alice said she’d clean up later.

  The boxes had been Zoe’s last hope. It looked now like she’d never solve the crime.

  The kitchen was empty; Madeline Fairweather had evidently gone out. “We could at least have a piece of chocolate cake,” said Alice, and Zoe thought that might be a good idea.

  The cake was there on the counter. A large piece was missing. “I guess she’s taken it over to Thelma,” Alice said.

  “Thelma!” Zoe cried, thinking of that banging door. Was that where Alice’s mother – no, stepmother – had gone? To take the piece of cake to Thelma? Could Madeline have put something in the frosting? Something that would make Thelma sick, or worse?

  “Call the police if I signal and warn them we might be coming with a poisoned cake,” she told Alice.

  “What? Oh, no! Poisoned?” cried Alice. “Why would she do that? But-but what signal? How will I know?”

  Zoe knew
where Thelma kept her flashlight. “I’ll flash it three times. From the living room window. Then you can run over to the Bagley’s and have Miss Gertie get the car out, ready to take me and Thelma’s cake to the police.”

  “B-but you and I were going to eat it! Would Madeline poison us, too? I get mad at her, but she took care of me when my mother couldn’t. I think, I do think she really cares about me.”

  “Not you, I don’t think. The poison was probably in the frosting of that one piece.”

  Zoe found Miss Thelma in the kitchen finishing up her pasta and veggies. A large hunk of chocolate cake sat enticingly on a blue plate on the kitchen table.

  “It does look delectable,” said Thelma, pulling it toward her.

  “Though I might wait a bit. I’m so full right now from the pasta.” She smiled at Zoe, her pink cheeks dimpling.

  “Oh, come on. You know you love chocolate,” Madeline Fairweather urged. She pushed it closer so that Thelma could smell the aroma. Zoe noticed that Madeline’s hands were shaking.

  “It’s an awfully big piece,” said Zoe, pulling up a chair, although the stepmother frowned at her. “Why don’t you two share it? I’ll get another plate.”

  Madeline smiled grimly at Zoe. She ran a shaky hand over her perspiring forehead. “Look, I’ve plenty more at home. I brought this for Thelma. A homecoming present.” She softened her voice.

  “Where’s Alice?” she asked Zoe. “You and I must go back and see what she’s up to.”

  “In a minute. I’ll just get a napkin for Miss Thelma,” said Zoe. She grabbed a paper napkin from the counter top, scribbled DON’T EAT THE CAKE, and placed it on Thelma’s lap.

  Thelma smiled at her, but she didn’t look down. She pulled the plate toward her.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Running Out of Time

  “Oh look,” said Zoe. “You dropped some crumbs on your napkin.”

  Thelma looked down, squinted, and held the napkin to her lips. Her eyes widened at Zoe, her left eyebrow questioned. But she had read the note. “I’ll love it, I know,” she told Madeline. “I’ll eat it while I watch the evening news. You go ahead now, Madeline. And thank you so much for bringing it over.”

  “You’ll be glad to hear that they caught those kidnappers,” Zoe told Mrs. Fairweather. “I’m sure they’ll make them talk. Did you know that they were trying to turn Miss Thelma’s farm into a game farm for wild animals?”

  “Oh, dear,” said Madeline Fairweather, turning three shades of pink. “Really? I didn’t know. Well, I...I really must be heading out.” She dashed out the door.

  “Now what on earth was that all about?” Miss Thelma said. “What you wrote on my napkin, Zoe? Why shouldn’t I have eaten the cake?”

  Zoe told Thelma about her suspicions and the old lady gasped and shoved away the plate. Then she wrapped the piece of cake in foil while Zoe went to the living room window to signal Tiny Alice. She saw Alice scurry out of the house and start across the road. Moments later Zoe followed with the cake.

  “Please,” she told Miss Gertie. “We have to go to the police station. Right this minute.”

  When Miss Gertie raised an eyebrow, she said, “To solve a murder. And prevent another one.”

  But when Zoe arrived in his office, the police chief looked skeptical. He sniffed the cake. It smelled perfectly all right to him, he said. “In fact, it smells delicious. We can go too far with all this, you know. Suspecting housewives who bake a cake for their friends.”

  He sniffed it again. He looked as though he might take a bite. But then he stuck a tongue in his cheek, and thought better of it.

  “Test it, please,” said Zoe. “Mrs. Fairweather might be in cahoots with those kidnappers. She’s a friend of Chloe’s; I saw them together in a photo. She wants Miss Thelma’s farm. She needs money. Alice says they have a drawerful of unpaid bills. The kidnappers probably promised her a share of the game park. Alice would be next in line to inherit, you know. And Madeline would be right there with her.” Zoe was out of breath with that long speech.

  “Game park?” inquired the chief, who hadn’t yet heard about the scheme.

  “Officer O’Hare can explain that,” said Zoe, pulling up a breath. “Anyway, can you test the frosting right away, please?”

  “Sorry, young lady, I can’t do that,” said the chief, smiling down at Zoe. “It has to go to the forensics lab up in Burlington. No one there can test it at this hour. It’ll have to wait until tomorrow morning. And even then it may take time a week or so.”

  “But I can’t wait that long!” cried Zoe. “I only have – ” she looked at her watch; it read one-thirty-two. “Eleven hours left. That’s all my brother will allow me. And he’s president of the Spy Club.”

  The chief looked sympathetic. “I’m sorry, miss, but you’ll have to wait. It can’t be done today.” His weary sigh said that he doubted they’d find anything, anyway.

  Zoe went back to the car, hanging her head.

  “What’s the matter, dear? They didn’t find anything?” said Miss Gertie.

  “Not yet. Not in time anyway,” said Zoe. “So I’ve lost. I’ll never get into the Northern Spy club. I’ve just plain lost.”

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Another Disappearance

  “Too bad,” said Spence, looking sympathetic, “but you and I can start our own club, can’t we? We can call it the Outsiders’ Detective Agency.”

  Spence was still rubbing his belly after a huge late lunch that ended with his favorite strawberry-apple-rhubarb whipped cream pie. He thought he wouldn’t mind getting himself kidnapped again if his mother would make another meal like that.

  “I don’t want to be an outsider,” said Zoe. “I want to belong to the Spy Club. I can quit later if I want, but at least I’ll have earned that badge. And now...” She slumped down on Spence’s porch step.

  “Why don’t you talk to your brother? I mean, ask for an extension? I asked for an extension on a book report I had to write last spring and Ms. Hopgood gave it to me. You just have to act sincere and upset, that’s all. Like you’d die if you couldn’t get that extension. I mean, you know who the killer is, right, Zoe?”

  “Not really, I don’t. Not for absolutely positively sure. And Kelby will never give me an extension.”

  “You can try. Come on, we’ll talk to him. He’s not a monster. Is he?’

  “No, he’s not a monster. Not quite. He has his good points. But he’s loud. And stubborn. And he loves to play tricks. I mean, he’s my brother! But, well, okay, I guess it won’t do any harm. We’ll go talk to him.”

  Kelby was in his room, a room crammed with hockey sticks, baseball bats, golf clubs, basketballs – there wasn’t a sport that Kelby didn’t play, or want to play, or try to play. Sports were his whole occupation in life, except, of course, for the Northern Spy Club.

  He was lying back on his bed, reading Sports Illustrated. He peered at Zoe and Spence over the top of the magazine. Then he lowered it, a broad smile on his face, as though he’d been expecting them.

  “You’re here to surrender,” he said, like he was some Civil War general. He made a tsking sound with his tongue.

  “No, I’m not here to surrender,” said Zoe. She took a stand in front of the bed, her hands folded tightly across her chest. “I’ve already found the kidnappers. And I’m pretty sure that Madeline Fairweather poisoned Alice’s granny. We think she laced Thelma’s chocolate frosting with that insecticide! We’re waiting right now for the forensics report.”

  “Oh yeah?” said Kelby. He looked a little uncomfortable. He waggled his shoulders back and forth. “You have only – ” he glanced at his sports watch where the hands ticked across a Red Sox player’s face – ”eight and a half hours. There’s not enough time for any forensics report. You’ve lost. Let’s face it.” He relaxed back onto his pillow again.

  “You can give her an extension,” said Spence, coming bravely forward. “She already solved three kidnapping crimes. You can at least g
ive her till tomorrow noon to solve this one. I mean she’s solved it. She just needs the final proof.”

  “Cello-boy,” said Kelby, who never called Spence by his real name, “those crimes aren’t the ones she was supposed to solve. The crime she was supposed to solve was Who Killed Alice’s Granny. That was the one she was supposed to solve.”

  He smiled sorrowfully, closed his eyes as if he were about to go to sleep.

  “Just till tomorrow noon?” Spence pleaded. “Zoe’s your younger sister”

  Kelby looked pained. “I know that,” he said. “That’s why I know she won’t be able to solve the crime. Or,” he added, “walk the beam.”

  “I can walk the beam right now,” Zoe shouted, rushing at her brother, pummeling his arm with her fists. “But Dad won’t let us in the barn. Find me another beam and I’ll walk it.”

  “Okay. Okay,” said Kelby, warding her off with a hand. “I’m a nice guy. I’ll let you off the hook to walk the beam until tomorrow at one-thirty. Dad has to go to some meeting in Rutland. I’ll call a couple of the other kids and we’ll let you try and walk it.”

  He lay back on the pillow again. His Northern Spy Club badge glittered in the overhead light.

  “Hey, thanks,” said Spence. “Hear that, Zoe?”

  Zoe knew there’d be a catch. And there was.

  Kelby held up a finger. “But that’s only if you can prove – I repeat prove – by midnight tonight exactly who killed Alice’s granny.” He folded his arms again, peered at his sister through slitted eyes.

  Zoe’s eyes filled. She fought back the tears. “How can I do that, Kelby? We won’t have that forensics report till tomorrow. If then. And even then – ”

  “Even then,” Spence added, “it won’t prove that she killed Alice’s granny. I mean, unless she confesses. Do you really think she’s going to do that?” He gave a self-satisfied smile.