“And you knew right away he was Randall Jefferson’s brother?” His expression was neutral, with a hint of skepticism.
“He looked so much like Randall,” Pamela said. “His face. There’s a definite resemblance. And the clothes . . . the seersucker suit. Randall always dressed formally too, like somebody who really belonged somewhere else, somewhere fancier than Arborville.” The hint of skepticism became more pronounced. “And right here in front of Randall’s house, and the front door was open, so it seemed that, yes, he was probably Randall’s brother. Someone has it in for the whole family. That’s logical, isn’t it?” Pamela nodded, set her lips in a firm line, and looked directly into Detective Clayborn’s eyes.
“The killer’s motive is not something for you to concern yourself with,” Detective Clayborn said with a frown that made him look more like himself.
“There’s an SUV with New York plates around the corner in the driveway,” Pamela said. “But you probably noticed that already.”
“We did,” he said, and the frown deepened.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Detective Clayborn wanted to talk to Harold and Nell too, but just as he was twisting his key in the ignition to drive half a block farther down the street, one of the uniformed officers tapped on his window to summon him back to the crime scene.
“I’ll ask someone to take you home,” he said as Pamela reached for the door handle on her side.
“It’s okay,” she said, hopping out. “I left something at Nell’s, and I don’t live that far away.”
The canvas bag with the daylily tubers still lay in the corner of Nell’s entry. Pamela scooped it up as she followed Nell to the kitchen. Proceeding down the long hallway, she noted the empty hook that had held the key to Jefferson’s house, almost hidden among the masks and baskets and puppets. Apparently Nell had never noticed that the key was gone. “Detective Clayborn is coming to talk to you,” she said to Nell’s back.
“I didn’t see anything,” Nell said without turning around. “But since it was Harold who called the police, I suppose they think he’s relevant.” She continued on through the kitchen and into the mudroom, where she opened the back door and called, “Harold! The police are coming to talk to you!”
Harold followed her back to the kitchen, trailed by Joe Taylor, whose hands were covered with dirt. “I’m wrapping up for the day,” Joe said, “but it sounds like big doings down the street. I suppose the cops will ask me if I saw anything, since I was in your yard all afternoon.” He shook his head. “It’s a shame—not what you expect in a town like this.”
“Where’s that bag?” Nell said. Pamela handed it over, and Nell passed it to Joe. “Daylily tubers,” Nell said. “Whenever you have a chance to get them in the ground.”
“You got it, Mrs. B,” Joe said, and headed back the way he’d come.
Pamela convinced Nell that a second cup of tea wasn’t necessary. She was anxious to hurry back to Orchard Street and update Bettina on the latest development. But instead of walking past the crime scene, she turned in the other direction and descended the hill by the route that ended up at the edge of Arborville’s commercial district. As she made her way along Arborville Avenue, Wilfred’s ancient Mercedes pulled over to the opposite curb and he waved at her.
“Heading home?” he called. Pamela nodded and hurried across the street. Wilfred chuckled as she climbed in. “Good news,” he said. “I just spent twenty minutes in the Co-Op, and no one said anything to me about the ‘Killer Aardvark.’ I think the crisis has passed, and I came away with the makings of chili, plus crumb cake and a pound of Bettina’s favorite Stilton from the cheese counter.”
Pamela sighed. She reached over to touch Wilfred’s shoulder. “It’s starting again,” she said. “Remember how there were two missing aardvarks . . . ?”
* * *
“I guess that means we can cross Reynolds Jefferson off the list of suspects.” Bettina spread mayonnaise on whole-grain toast and added slices of avocado. She arranged the result on one of her craft-store plates and slid it in front of Pamela. “You’ll feel better if you eat something,” she said. “It’s almost noon.” Wilfred had delivered Pamela not to her own home but to Bettina’s welcome ministrations, and the three of them were sitting at the pine table in Bettina’s kitchen.
Pamela obediently bit into Bettina’s creation, but she scarcely tasted it. The image of Reynolds Jefferson lying dead under the rhododendron was still vivid in her mind. But she was equally troubled by the fact that she and Bettina were no closer to figuring out who had chosen to implicate the knitting club in his (her?) crimes by adding aardvarks to the crime scenes.
“I suppose there’s nothing new on Marcus Verteel,” Pamela said after she’d eaten half her sandwich.
“Why would he kill Randall Jefferson’s brother?” Bettina raised her hands, palms facing upwards. She twisted her lips into a puzzled knot. “The rivalry was between him and Randall.”
“True.” Pamela nodded sadly. “I suppose this new development also means that Randall wasn’t killed by a disgruntled student who made a doll of him and stuck it full of pins.”
Wilfred spoke up from his end of the table. “Unless there are two killers with two motives.”
“Both using rocks and perching aardvarks on the corpse?” Pamela’s voice was mournful.
“Copy-cat killer?” Wilfred said.
“I suppose Clayborn will want you to examine the aardvark and tell him if it’s one of ours,” Bettina said.
“I suppose so,” Pamela said.
Bettina rose and set to work at the counter, creating sandwiches for herself and Wilfred. Pamela lingered at the pine table, finishing her own sandwich and resisting Bettina’s encouragement to accept another.
* * *
Pamela stepped outside to discover a knot of reporters waiting on her driveway. She took a deep breath and crossed the street, answered their questions as quickly as she could, and gratefully took refuge in the comfort of her own house. Upstairs, she lost herself in editing three articles for Fiber Craft, and the afternoon went by with no calls from the police department. It took Catrina’s piteous meowing to bring her back to reality and notice it was dinnertime—for both cat and human.
* * *
Penny came in as Pamela slouched on the sofa, dozing with a British mystery unfolding on the screen before her and the beginnings of the ruby-red tunic resting on its needles in her lap. Catrina leapt gracefully to the floor and greeted Penny with an ankle-rub as Pamela opened her eyes and offered a groggy, “Hi.”
“Everybody’s talking about the new murder,” Penny said. She’d been to the movies with old friends from Arborville.
“Do they have any brilliant ideas about who did it?” Pamela pulled herself into a sitting position and regarded her daughter, who was dressed in the T-shirt and jeans she still favored when she wasn’t heading for work. “Probably not the person who made the Jefferson doll—at least not if the doll was the result of being mad about a bad grade. Reynolds Jefferson was an antiques dealer.”
Penny laughed. “Oh, Mom,” she said. “I know all about the doll now. The girl who made it was mad that Mr. Jefferson gave her an F—but she didn’t kill him. Lorie Hopkins’s little sister is still at Arborville High. Remember what I said about mean girls? Lorie’s sister isn’t a mean girl, but she told Lorie all about the doll. A girl named Heather made it, and one of her frenemies thought it would be funny to leave it on our porch.”
“I don’t think anybody ever really thought the person who made the Jefferson doll was the killer,” Pamela said, “but I suppose I should pass that information along to Detective Clayborn.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Focus on the positive and praise it. That had been Pamela’s philosophy in raising her daughter, and the result had been a happy and confident young woman. Now Pamela stood at her kitchen window, sipping the last of her morning coffee and watching Richard Larkin. He was wearing the torn and faded jeans that, on a
man less fit, would have looked foolish or just plain sad—but which she now realized weren’t a fashion statement but a testament to his frugality. He’d finished off the outfit with a T-shirt, equally distressed, but it clung to his torso in a way that revealed exactly how fit he was. And he was pacing along the edge of his perennial border. He bent forward, plunged a hand among the foliage, and came up with a ragged fistful of crabgrass.
This industry deserved praise if Miranda Bonham’s perennial border was to be coaxed back to its former glory. Pamela finished her coffee and rinsed the cup. In a few minutes, she was striding past Richard Larkin’s recycling bins. She stepped into his backyard just in time to greet Joe Taylor, arriving from the other direction with a wheelbarrow full of plants in plastic nursery pots.
“Foxgloves,” Joe said. “Just the thing to fill in those bare spots. Not perennials, strictly speaking, but they provide a great contrast to the lower, bushier areas.”
Richard turned around while Joe was speaking, but instead of looking at Joe, he looked at Pamela. The expression on his face was so serious Pamela wondered if she was welcome. “Oh, uh . . . hello,” he said, taking a step toward her, reaching out a hand, and then retracting it. “I didn’t know you were here. I—” He seemed to think better of his action and retreated, stumbling backwards into the perennial border and catching his balance between a peony and a stand of goldenrod.
Joe hid a smile and busied himself lifting the foxgloves out of the wheelbarrow, placing them at intervals among the other plants that made up the border.
“The garden is looking good,” Pamela said. “Very good.”
Richard’s strong features softened. “You’re all right, I hope. After yesterday. It was all in the Register this morning.”
“I’m fine,” Pamela said, “but that peony—”
With one long step, Richard was once more on the grass. “And Nell and Harold? Nell was quoted in the article, so I guess reporters were all over the place up there.”
“And I’m sure Detective Clayborn will get interested in the knitting club again.” Pamela shrugged. “But I wonder if the police will ever figure things out. They certainly hadn’t gotten anywhere with Randall Jefferson’s murder.” Joe knelt on the ground behind Richard and began digging a hole next to a patch of salvia. “Of course,” she went on, “this second murder could actually be a clue—take the focus off Randall’s role in the community and put it on the Jefferson family.”
“Did he actually have a role in the community?” Richard seemed less nervous now that there was a clear topic of conversation. “I got the impression from Wilfred that nobody much liked him.”
“People respected him,” Pamela said. “But as far as knowing him goes, Nell knew him about as well as anybody. She knew his parents too, and her children went to Arborville High with the Jefferson boys. She’s lived up in the Palisades forever, and she could probably tell a lot of tales if she wanted to.”
Joe dislodged a foxglove from its plastic pot, set it in the hole he’d dug, and patted the loose earth into place around it. He scooted along the ground to where another foxglove waited to be planted and began to dig.
“She seems too sensible to tell tales,” Richard said. “I like her—even if she wasn’t the one who brought those deviled eggs to the barbecue.”
“She’s not a gossip by any means—far from it,” Pamela said, “but Detective Clayborn can be very persistent—and I think he’s embarrassed about arresting Brad Striker and then having to let him go. I’m sure he wants to make progress now, and fast.”
“Good point.” Richard nodded. “If I was him, I’d sit down with Nell and not get up until she’d told me everything she knows about the Jeffersons. Two brothers killed within two weeks? It’s got to have something to do with family secrets.”
Pamela had gotten out of bed that morning determined not to think about Randall or Reynolds Jefferson, so she said, “Penny has really loved getting to know Laine and Sybil.”
“I’m afraid they won’t be in Arborville this weekend.” Richard stepped to the side as Joe changed position to attack his new hole from another angle. “It’s Laine’s birthday and my parents are in town. We’re all going out to dinner.”
“The whole family,” Pamela said.
Richard nodded. “The whole family.”
* * *
Back at home, Pamela found Penny, still in her nightgown and with uncombed hair, sitting at the kitchen table poring over the Register. She looked up, a worried crease marring her smooth forehead. “Did the police ask you if the aardvark was one of yours yet?”
“Not yet.”
“I always thought it was kind of a dumb mascot.” Penny frowned in mock seriousness and pounded her fists on the table. “Varks! Varks! Go, Varks, go! Why couldn’t we be the Lions or the Bears or something?”
“Laine and Sybil are staying in the city this weekend,” Pamela said.
“Dinner with their grandparents.” Penny nodded. “The whole family.” She jumped up. “Lorie and I are going to the mall,” she said, “I’ve got to get dressed.”
“Breakfast?” Pamela called after her.
“We’ll eat at the donut place in the food court,” Penny answered from halfway up the stairs.
The whole family. That couldn’t be the answer, could it? Pamela stood in the middle of the kitchen staring at nothing. But what if it was? Details of the library display drifted back to her. She reached for the phone.
Nell answered right away. Pamela pictured her in her kitchen, still lingering over her morning tea. She asked the question that had popped into her mind as she stared at nothing. Nell started to answer, but then she interrupted herself. “There’s someone at the door,” she said, “and Harold has gone to the farmers market in Newfield. Just one minute.”
Still holding the phone, Pamela ran to the window. Three foxgloves planted and three to go, but no sign of the gardener. “No, Nell!” she squealed, barely recognizing her own voice. “Don’t answer the door. Call the police.”
Pamela grabbed her keys. She wouldn’t walk—there wasn’t time. She didn’t even stop for the stop sign at the corner of Orchard Street and Arborville Avenue, only dimly aware of an amazed Mr. Gilly pausing behind his lawnmower to stare as she shot into the intersection.
* * *
He was there, at the top of the stone steps that led past the viburnums, pounding on Harold and Nell’s front door. Pamela jumped out of her car and screamed, “She’s not going to let you in, and the police are on the way.”
Joe Taylor turned and stared. “Why should the police be on the way?” he asked. “I left my big shovel here, and I need it for Rick’s yard.”
For a minute Pamela wasn’t sure what to do. Maybe he was telling the truth, and the picture that had formed in her mind when the last puzzle piece slipped into place was no more than a work of her imagination. But the look on his face told her that he was worried about more than a missing shovel.
“They were your uncles, weren’t they?” she said. “Your father was the third brother and the black sheep of the Jefferson family.”
“No!” he said. “You’re crazy!”
From down the hill came the sound of a siren, as piercing and insistent as one of Catrina’s cries in the grip of her first mating season. It rose and fell, growling, shrieking, growling again. At the top of the steps, Joe froze. He looked frantically toward Pamela, and then he looked in the direction of the siren, his handsome face distorted more by confusion than by fear.
As Joe stared toward the siren, Harold pulled into the driveway from the opposite direction. He got out of his car and opened the trunk.
The siren got closer. Joe swung around and leapt off the porch into the shrubbery. Pushing branches aside, he struggled toward the sidewalk. The bushes rustled and Harold looked up, puzzled.
“Stop him,” Pamela cried. “He’s the killer!”
Harold stood still for a minute. He stared at Joe, stared at Pamela, stared back at Joe, and gave
a resolute nod. He reached into the trunk of his car and came up with a potato, which he threw at Joe. The potato struck Joe’s forehead and bounced off. Joe staggered slightly.
“You killed Randall and Reynolds, didn’t you?” Pamela said. “I know you did it, and I think I know why. You shouldn’t have told me your lottery number.”
Harold threw another potato. It hit Joe on the cheek and he slumped back into the shrubbery. “My dad was just a guy,” Joe said, his voice breaking. “He liked football and girls and hanging out with his friends drinking beer, and when he graduated from Arborville High, he joined the Navy. He didn’t deserve to be disinherited. He never married my mother, but when she took off he raised me. And then when he died—” Joe pulled himself to his feet and lurched ahead, pushing branches out of the way. “All I wanted was a little help . . . to make something of myself. I thought my uncles would be proud that I had ambition, but they treated me like I was nobody.” He dodged around an azalea. “I’m getting out of here, and you’re not going to stop me.”
Harold threw a third potato, and then a fourth. Pamela joined him on the driveway, grabbing potatoes from a canvas bag in the trunk. For a minute or two, all that mattered was the feel of the potatoes in her hand, the tightening of muscle as she slung her arm back, the jerk and the satisfying snap of her elbow as each potato went flying. Meanwhile the siren grew louder and louder.
A police car swung around the corner and pulled up at the curb. The siren’s shriek faded to a resentful moan and then silence. Two officers sprang out. Joe Taylor leapt over an azalea and bounded along the driveway toward the sidewalk.
Nell appeared on the porch. “Stop him!” she yelled toward the officers. “He’s the killer!”
One of the officers took off after Joe. “What’s going on here?” the other asked. It was the pleasant-voiced officer who had shown up at the booth the day Pamela discovered Randall Jefferson’s body.
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