by Maia Chance
I peeked out of the servants’ passage. Sure enough, Violet stood at the open service entrance, speaking to someone in low tones. I darted across the hallway to the broom closet, slipped inside, and shut the door most of the way. My foot plunked into something wet and gooey, and I stifled a cry. I’d stepped into a bucket of wallpaper paste. My favorite pair of Perugias, ruined.
On the positive side, I was close enough to eavesdrop on Violet. I left my foot in the bucket of paste and strained my ears.
“… took your sweet time with these, didn’t you?” Violet was saying in a harsh whisper. “Come along. Bring them inside.”
Another voice—a low-pitched woman’s or a higher-pitched man’s—said something I couldn’t make out.
Violet again: “Very well. Good Lord. You really make me do all the leg work.”
Mumbles.
Violet: “You, artistic? Hah!” Footsteps.
Violet went outside. I guessed that whoever was driving the truck had refused to help Violet unload the delivery because, bird-frail as she was, she heaved a huge, flat, paper-wrapped parcel from the back of the truck and carried it inside. Then she went out and got another one. No sooner had she slammed the truck’s rear doors than it accelerated away. Violet carried the second parcel inside.
Lillian pushed through the kitchen door. “There you are, Miss Wilbur. The maid is bringing the iced lime water to the drawing room. No cookies, however, for if I serve cookies, I’ll never be rid of Lola.”
I scowled in the darkness. The very thought! I wouldn’t hang about here simply for cookies; I’d stuff the cookies into my handbag and go.
“Good news, Miss DuFey,” Violet told her. “Your Heyligers have arrived from Amsterdam.”
“Dr. Woodby will be so pleased,” Lillian said. “May I see?”
Violet tore the brown paper diagonally, exposing a big triangle of painting. It was one of those gloomy Dutch still lifes, a lobster sprawled on a plate and surrounded by glassier-than-glass wine goblets and half-peeled lemons.
“Is that wine in those goblets?” Lillian asked. “Because Dr. Woodby is the president of the Booze Is Bilge Club—”
“Wine?” Violet laid a hand on her chest. “No, no, my dear. Grape juice, surely.”
“Oh. What a relief.”
Lillian’s best subject in school was lunch.
They set off down the hallway. “Dr. Woodby has just arrived home,” Lillian said. “I saw his motorcar through the kitchen window. I cannot say he’ll be terribly pleased to see Lola, though. She always was the black sheep of the family.”
“I understand perfectly,” Violet said. “Oh—have you an aunt Penelope, Miss DuFey?”
“No,” Lillian said. “Why do you ask?”
“No reason.”
Lillian and Violet pushed through a door, and their voices were lost to me.
Violet knew I was snooping into Muffy’s death. Rats. And Chisholm was home. Double rats.
I pried the bucket of wallpaper paste from my foot. Cold, chunky sludge oozed down my ankles and onto the closet floor. I opened the door and hopped on one foot to the service entrance and outside. Once I was on the gravel path, I hobbled around to the front of the house. Pebbles stuck to the wallpaper paste as I went, weighing me down more and more with each step.
“Why are you limping, Mrs. Woodby?” Berta called from the Duesy.
“Could you drive?” I asked, breathless. “I have a bit of a problem with my pedal foot presently.”
“I suppose so.”
“Hurry!”
Berta got out and I climbed into her place. I tossed her the keys and she got in the driver’s seat and switched on the engine.
“Lola?” I heard Chisholm’s voice call over the growl of the engine. “LOLA!”
I caught a glimpse of Chisholm standing on the front steps with his briefcase in one hand, shaking a fist. Berta laboriously turned the Duesy around and motored down the front drive toward the gates.
“Wait,” I said. “What if Mr. Egghead and that blond puppet are still waiting for us?”
“It would be my preference to contend with two thugs rather than with Dr. Woodby.”
“Mine, too. But neither would be better. Take the other gate—you know, the one behind the caretaker’s cottage? It leads to a side road. Mr. Egghead will never see us.”
“But that gate will surely be locked.”
“I think I still have the key to that gate on my key ring. I never bothered taking it off. Cross your fingers that Chisholm hasn’t changed the lock.”
Chisholm hadn’t changed the lock, and I still had the key. When we eased onto the main road, we craned our necks left and right. No black Chevrolet.
“To the yacht?” Berta asked.
“Dandy.”
“What happened to your foot?”
“I don’t want to discuss it.”
* * *
On the yacht, Berta said, “I must have a rest, Mrs. Woodby. All of this excitement with Mr. Van Hoogenband’s henchpersons has fatigued me. We might review our clues at dinner, if you are in agreement.”
“Sure,” I said. I was prying my foot from the paste-crusted shoe and stocking.
Berta disappeared belowdecks.
I chucked my ruined shoes and stockings onto the dock because the paste was so stinky. I’d find a rubbish bin later. I carried Cedric to the galley and gave him a bowl of water. He lapped thirstily, spraying water everywhere.
After that, Cedric and I retired to our cabin. I opened the porthole to let in some fresh air and finished Part One of “Hello, Darling,” which ended on a real cliff-hanger: Maude broke off her engagement with Bill Hampton, and he stalked away in a he-man sort of huff with a storm brewing on the horizon.
I checked the publication date on the magazine’s cover. The issue was eight days old, so the next issue would be on sale now. Berta wouldn’t approve, but I had to buy it. Besides, Senator Morris had coughed up a thousand bucks that morning. I could afford a little pleasure, couldn’t I?
I fell asleep, and woke up groggy after sundown. Berta was waiting for me on deck in a canvas chair. Stars dappled the blue-black dome of sky, and the town lights twinkled over the marina. A few lights glimmered in other moored yachts.
I hugged myself despite the balmy evening. “You don’t suppose Mr. Egghead and his pal know we’re here at the marina, do you?”
“I do not expect so, but they will surely have noticed your motorcar parked in town.”
I’d parked a few blocks off Main Street on a residential street, but still, the Duesy would be difficult to miss with its smashed spare tire.
“We must eat, though,” I said. “I’m starving.”
“I am as well. We will simply take our chances.”
I fed Cedric a few jars of the caviar I’d found on the yacht, watered him, gathered up my ruined shoes, and then the three of us set out. I dumped the shoes in a rubbish bin behind the bait shop. I confess I felt a pang.
The Main Street shops were still open because it was tourist season. Noisy families congregated around Betty’s Ice Cream Parlor, and several people stood at the counter inside Little Vienna Bakery.
I caught Berta glaring at the bakery.
“Let’s go in,” I said.
“Certainly not.” Berta straightened her spine. “I bake my own things as a rule.”
“But we don’t have an oven in the yacht.”
Berta didn’t answer.
We stopped by the five-and-dime, where Berta purchased a scouring pad and a can of Bon Ami cleaning powder. “That yacht is obscured beneath a layer of grime,” she said.
I fruitlessly searched the magazine shelf for the latest issue of Thrilling Romance. I asked the salesclerk about it.
“Thrilling Romance?” he said. “Naw, that sold out yesterday. Can’t keep it stocked—it’s the girls at the telephone exchange office two doors down. Addicted. Try the drugstore in Oyster Bay.”
To console myself, in addition to picking up the eve
ning newspaper, I purchased two Cadbury Dairy Milk bars and a new Coty lipstick. The lipstick was a demure pink. No more crimson smeary messes for me.
17
Berta and I made it to a corner table at the Foghorn without seeing Mr. Egghead, his pal, or his Chevrolet. Not that I felt as snug as a bug; they could’ve been watching us from the shadows.
The restaurant seemed to be short on staff, and we waited and waited for our meals. I tided myself over with a rye bran biscuit from my purse, slathered with butter. If only I’d known eating healthfully was such a cinch.
Once we were eating dinner, I told Berta how I’d hidden myself in Amberley’s broom closet and seen Violet accept a delivery of paintings.
“That is where you had your tussle with the bucket of wallpaper paste?”
I waved my fork airily. “That’s old news. Listen: the paintings were Heyligers. He’s an old master. Those are valuable paintings, and what’s more, Violet said they’d just arrived from Amsterdam.”
Berta sawed at her beef. “I see that you are lifting your eyebrows in a meaningful fashion, Mrs. Woodby, but I cannot think what I am supposed to make of Amsterdam.” She took a bite.
“Europe.”
“Ah. You are thinking of Senator Morris’s European anarchist suspicions.”
“Exactly.”
“Violet Wilbur was already connected to Europe by virtue of having been a student at Institut Alpenrose.”
“True.”
“Which reminds me: Did you gain any new knowledge regarding the schoolgirl scandal to which Miss Cotton alluded?”
“Sort of. Violet admitted there had been a scandal, but she said it was Muffy’s.”
“Indeed?” Berta’s blue eyes gleamed. “How very interesting. What do we know of Violet, aside from her books and her magazine column?”
“Not much. She’s very prim and boring. I do know that she grew up wealthy—her father founded the Gelleez factory—that boxed gelatin dessert.”
“Disgusting stuff. And she never married.”
“Not yet.” I told Berta how Violet had alluded to an impending marriage. “We should look further into this finishing school scandal,” I said. “Senator Morris might even approve of this lead, given that it could involve European anarchists. When would Muffy and Violet have been at school?”
Berta tipped her head. “In the ’90s, I suppose, because Muffy and Violet both must be about fifty years of age.”
“Why is it that fifty suddenly seems not very old anymore?” I said.
“Not very old? Mrs. Woodby, it is positively youthful.”
I snapped my fingers. “I’ve got it. Remember that shelf of photograph albums and things in Muffy’s bedroom? I’ll bet there’s an Institut Alpenrose alumni directory of some kind mixed in—I saw a country club directory and the New York Social Register.”
“But we are not expected at the Morris house until the day after tomorrow.”
“Come on, Berta. We can’t sit on our hands when there might be a hot clue just waiting for us.”
Berta made a weary sigh. “I suppose not.”
I unfolded The New York Evening Observer I’d purchased at the stationer’s. “I thought I’d look this over, just in case Ida Shanks has another … Oh. She does.”
A small headline on page three read, SECOND INCHBALD SCANDAL. The article conveyed that Inchbald & Sons, Fine Clothiers, the elegant company that had been around since the 1850s and which had made the family’s colossal fortune, had a skeleton in its closet: The company had indulged in war profiteering during the Civil War.
“This is awful!” I said. “Listen to this: ‘Inchbald and Sons manufactured uniforms for Union soldiers made of a material called “simulated wool,” composed of sawdust and horsehair mixed with pulp from old cotton rags. When the uniforms were exposed to rain or snow, they dissolved, leaving Union soldiers wet and even freezing.’”
“That is monstrous!” Berta said.
“It gets worse, too. ‘Untold illnesses and causalities among the noble Union troops resulted from this egregious slight of Inchbald and Sons. It is not known just how the company has kept this scandal hidden for well-nigh sixty years, nor is it yet known whether the American public will hear from the company head, Obadiah Inchbald, who, our source claims, was the primary decision-maker in the simulated wool scandal. Time will tell, and the Almighty will judge.’”
“It seems very much as though Miss Shanks’s source is attempting to publicly humiliate the Inchbald family,” Berta said.
“It also seems as though her source has something to do with Muffy’s death, don’t you think? Otherwise, it would be too, well, too coincidental.”
“I do agree. You must telephone Miss Shanks first thing in the morning and demand to know her source.”
“I can demand, but you can bet your boots Ida won’t sing.” My words hung heavily.
At last Berta said, “Mrs. Woodby, I am afraid you have gotten gravy on your bodice.”
* * *
We talked over our next steps. I had my appointment to call upon Hermie Inchbald in the morning—an appointment that had taken on a new urgency in light of the Inchbald & Sons scandal. For her part, Berta would endeavor to enter the Morris house tomorrow and search for an Institut Alpenrose alumni directory. After that, we would figure out a way to learn which nurse had been on duty the night Muffy died. That little question was still dangling out there like rained-on laundry. In the meantime, we would keep our heads low in case Van Hoogenband’s goons were still searching for us, and attempt to get a good night’s sleep.
We paid our tab and walked out onto the now mostly dark Main Street. Cinnamon-scented air wafted by. The source was Little Vienna Bakery, still lit and alive with customers.
“Come on, Berta, we’ve got to try it,” I said.
Berta hesitated, and then the cinnamon air must’ve hit her, too, because she grumbled, “Oh, very well.”
I picked up Cedric, and we went inside the bakery and got in line. A plump, aproned man with a large mustache stood behind the display counter, speaking to the customers with a Central European accent.
“—and the vanilla kipfels have a lighter, more, how do you say, brisk crunch. However, if it is chocolate that you desire, the Sacher torte…” His words died away. He didn’t blink.
I turned. Yes. The whisk-broom baker was looking at Berta with a sort of amazed expression. But he remembered himself and continued on with his speech.
Berta smoothed her chintz sleeve, wearing a serene and, yes, smug expression.
“Of course you’d make an instantaneous conquest of a baker,” I whispered to her.
“I cannot think what you mean, Mrs. Woodby.”
I craned my neck to see into the display cases. Most of the trays held nothing but crumbs since it was the end of the day, but hand-lettered signs read APPLE STRUDEL, JAM TURNOVERS, CREAM SLICES, SPONGE ROULADE, CHESTNUT DUMPLINGS, and on and on. My mouth watered. Only a few of the kipfels—some sort of sugar-crusted crescent cookie—and a few slices of Sacher torte and something called, improbably, marmorgugelhupf remained.
At last it was our turn to order.
“Good evening, mesdames,” the baker said, his brown eyes twinkling strictly for Berta’s benefit.
Berta made a terse nod and said, “What a pity that your sponge roulade is sold out, for I believe the true merit of a baker is revealed in his or her sponge.”
“Ah, you are a baker, madam?”
“Yes.”
“But I should have known.”
“What sort of butter do you use? Not salted, I hope?”
“Certainly not.”
“And you always bring your egg whites to room temperature?”
“Do you take me for an apprentice boy?”
“The flour from the mills upstate is best. I never rely on the rubbish from New Jersey.”
“Madam, please, wait here. I have one last sponge roulade that I set aside for Mrs. Parsons, but never mind her—it is for y
ou.” The baker disappeared through a swinging door.
“Good grief,” I said. “I didn’t know it was even possible to flirt about butter.”
“I am not flirting,” Berta said. “Oh. And do not turn around, but it seems that Van Hoogenband’s thugs have caught up with us.”
“What? Here. Take Cedric.” My fingers shook as I unclasped my handbag and brought out my face powder compact. I dabbed my nose with the puff and looked into the mirror. Mr. Egghead and his pal loitered under a streetlamp. They were looking our way.
“Holy moly,” I whispered. “Are they watching us or those chocolate cakes in the window?”
“Us.”
18
I put away my compact and took Cedric from Berta’s arms. “This is awful,” I whispered. “If they follow us to the yacht—”
“We will evade them.”
“How?”
“Return to the Foghorn, where it is busy, and attempt to shake them. Perhaps they will believe we are staying there. Ah. Here is my sponge roulade.”
The baker returned, all smiles. “Taste this,” he said, offering Berta a chunk of cake on a fork.
Berta set her paper bag on the counter, took the chunk of cake, and ate it. After she swallowed, she made an approving nod.
The baker beamed. “I have wrapped up the rest.” He slid a white paper parcel over the counter. “On the house.”
“Thank you,” Berta said in a prim voice. She tucked the cake in her handbag.
I was pretty sure Mr. Egghead & Co.’s eyes were boring holes into my back. “Time to go,” I said.
Berta and I ducked out of the bakery and made a beeline down Main Street.
“I am … so very … weary of … running,” Berta panted.
I didn’t answer. I was too busy being weary of running myself.
A block away, the Foghorn Inn glowed. I looked over my shoulder. Mr. Egghead and the blonde were striding toward us.
Clinking dishes, chatter, and a phonograph piano rag wafted from the Foghorn’s windows. I was about to shove through the lobby doors when—yes!—I noticed two uniformed policemen sitting on the porch, eating pie.