"Is that a psychic revelation or a hunch?" I meant to be funny.
"Neither." She turned to face me. "You're the detective. I don't even know why I said anything. So, who's having the big New Year's Eve party in the circle of Daddy's Girls?"
I let the conversation drift, and we gossiped aimlessly for a few minutes. Brianna's name came up, and I told her of my recent discovery of Harold's assignation, doing my best to play it off as an amusing tidbit. As Tammy refilled the tea glasses, she didn't bother to hide her scrutiny of me.
"What's wrong with you?" she asked as she sat down across from me, finally holding my gaze. "You're not in love with Harold. You had a chance, and you picked Hamilton."
True. But facts had nothing to do with this. "She'll eat him alive."
Tammy arched her eyebrows. "That's not your concern, Sarah Booth."
True again, dang her. "I thought the future was your forte, not the present."
Tammy gave me a long look. "Now, that's a statement worthy of a Daddy's Girl."
Thrice true. "Ouch!" I rolled my eyes. "Accept my apology and let me tell you about my dream."
Jitty would have been impossible to explain, so I substituted myself in her role. Tammy listened attentively, asking a few questions about the color of the sunlight—pale yellow; the color of the men's hair—all darkened by a hair cream and combed back from the forehead; the arrangement of the room—very balanced, six men on each side of the table and Jitty in the center.
"The religious implications aren't lost on you, are they?" she asked. "Twelve disciples."
I shook my head. "I got the feeling that at any moment the entire cast might jump up and do a Broadway dance number. Not religious in tone."
She put her hand over mine. "Just testing, Sarah Booth." She grinned. "It's really pretty simple. There's an aspect of you that's trying to conduct your emotional life like a corporate board meeting. You dress your men in success, line them up, and then try to pick one like you would a stock. The sense of waiting is exactly that—once you choose, you think life will start. The dance will begin, and what a glorious number it will be. The band will swing, and you'll know all the dance steps." She squeezed my hand. "But the sunglasses mean that you're blind, as are the men. But this blindness is deliberate, self-imposed." Her grip tightened. "Be careful, Sarah Booth. Be wise with your heart and your body."
Wisdom is a passing thing, especially for a female Delaney. Tammy could counsel me all she wanted, but when I left her house I was no closer to an emotional or investigative conclusion than I had been before I arrived.
I was getting out of my car at Dahlia House when I heard the approach of another vehicle. Willem was coming down the drive, promptly at two, wearing his ten-million-dollar smile. It made me regret that I wasn't wearing something other than jeans and a sweater. I had the cutest red wool miniskirt. Willem was the kind of man who made me think of wearing such things.
"Hola," he said, getting out of the car. He came straight to me and lifted my hand for a kiss.
"Hola to you." I was glad to see him. Harold's defection to Brianna had left a wound that needed the balm that Willem was a master at applying.
"Shall we drive?" He crooked his arm.
"We shall," I said, putting my hand on the bend of his elbow and allowing him to escort me to my seat. Ah, the sins that can be forgiven for the pleasure of good manners.
It was a luxury to sink back into the car seat and let Willem assume command. This is a sensation wasted on young girls, or true Daddy's Girls. These females live under the guardianship of a male. They can never fully appreciate the release involved with dropping the torch of independence, even for the brief interlude of a drive.
We headed out between the crisp fields of snow. The afternoon sun was already melting it in patches, but for long vistas there was only sparkling white so bright that it made my eyes ache. Far in the distance the snow picked up the lighter blue shadings of the sky so that the horizon was indistinguishable.
"Tell me, Miss Delaney, how someone of your beauty became an investigator. You have to admit, the image is usually one of sharp-eyed men with the shadow of a beard."
It was blatant flattery and I loved it. "Circumstance and a genetic predisposition to nosiness."
"Have you discovered any evidence in the matter of Lawrence?"
"Nothing concrete." I had no desire to discuss my suspicions.
"I really must find that manuscript."
The veneer of manners had slipped, revealing firm determination. I glanced over at him. "You and everyone else. Where do you suppose it is?" I baited him.
"I was hoping you could help me there."
I shook my head. "Lawrence didn't confide in me."
"And Mrs. Bell? She's offered no hint?"
"Even if she had, I couldn't divulge such information." I glanced out the window, wondering how to pump Willem about his secrets. It was at that moment that the car slowed and I realized we were turning down the drive to Lawrence's cottage at Magnolia Place. So much for yielding the helm of the ship to a man. I knew better than to disturb a crime scene.
"Will you help me find that manuscript?" Willem asked. "I have no one else to turn to but you, Sarah Booth. I'm desperate. Please help me."
I couldn't help but be turned on by his twinkling eyes or feel deeply touched by his words. Willem was a man who knew the right buttons to punch. But I was also older and wiser than I'd been a holiday before. "This isn't a good idea."
He stopped the car in front of Lawrence's cottage. The yellow crime scene tape fluttered around the front porch in the breeze and he turned to me, waiting. "I must see what he's written. The manuscript has to be inside the cottage, unless someone else took it. Lawrence was going to show it to me."
I hadn't ruled Willem out as a suspect, but he was rather convincing in his talk of searching for the manuscript. It stood to reason that if he'd murdered Lawrence, he would have it.
He got out of the car and walked around to open my door, as if I were waiting on him to perform the male duty. It was reluctance, not manners, that kept me in the leather seat.
"You have some official capacity, Sarah Booth. If you're caught, no one will punish you. I'm a foreigner. Worse, a Latino." He leaned so close his lips brushed my hair. "A former soldier for socialism. A Sandinista." There were just enough Ss in the sentence, whispered against my ear in that Spanish rhythm, that I couldn't control the chill bumps. My God, if he could achieve this effect with talk of politics, what could he do to me with compliments?
"Coleman will put me in jail as fast as he would you if I disturb a crime scene." True enough, and I didn't want to go inside and confront the scene of Lawrence's death.
"If you find the manuscript, you can solve the murder." He arched his eyebrows. "I'm certain those memoirs are the basis for his murder. Lawrence made it clear he intended to reveal secrets. He just didn't understand how dangerous that could be."
"If I find the manuscript, you'll try to take it."
He shook his head. "Lawrence wasn't a cruel man, and as an artist, I respect his right to tell his story. But I have to be certain of what he knew, what he said. I won't try to take it. I simply have to know."
He was the epitome of sincerity. I wanted to believe him, but I needed more. "What are you afraid he wrote?"
He looked down the drive, focusing on the beautiful oaks still frosted with a dazzle of snow. "My father assumed the name Arquillo. He was not Nicaraguan."
I remembered the spiteful comment at the dinner party. "He had a past to hide."
He nodded. "He started a new life in Nicaragua with my mother. He was very young during the war, a young man. Mistakes were made, but nothing so terrible. Still, my mother is alive. To have the secrets of the past printed ... If they are in the book, I must prepare her. That's all I ask."
"Why would Lawrence include such things in his book?" This spoke to the heart of the matter. I'd watched Lawrence and Willem together. There seemed to be a genuine fondnes
s. Lawrence had been instrumental in getting Willem's work accepted in several big galleries. He had, in fact, championed the artist.
"I don't believe he did, but I can't risk it. I came here expressly to ask Lawrence about this. My mother is dying." His eyes narrowed. "Sometimes death comes as a friend. Other times it is a goad, a stick that beats a person hard. When it is this way, the reaction can be fear and a desire to lash out." He turned abruptly. "Such things I've witnessed with my own eyes. My mother is terrified. She is obsessed with this book. I must do this for her to die in peace."
Never in my wildest dreams had I thought to feel pity for Willem Arquillo. Yet I did.
"What if we find the manuscript and you discover that Lawrence has written something . . . about your father?"
"Then I will prepare her for it. We can prepare together." He walked up to the crime tape and touched it. "Do not think me uncaring when I say that she may die before the manuscript is published. There are times when the gods show a moment of kindness."
"You won't feel compelled to try and change what Lawrence has written?"
He turned back to face me, the whiteness of the snow all around him contrasting with the golden tan of his complexion. "If Lawrence has written about my family, he has put down only the truth. You must understand that it is death which has caused my mother to lose her nerve, to want to tidy up a past that is not agreeable to neatness. I learned, long ago, never to fear the past. Once you do, it becomes a hobgoblin that grows larger with each passing night."
His eyes were the most striking color of gray and his gaze held me, making sure I understood. I nodded slowly. "If the manuscript is in the cottage, you'll read it and then give it to me?" Of course, Harold would have to be contacted. As executor of the estate, he would determine the ultimate fate of the biography. But it wouldn't hurt one whit if we looked at it.
"I want to know what to prepare for."
"Okay." I ducked under the crime tape and signaled for him to follow. Willem had touched my soft side, but there was one irrefutable fact. If I found the manuscript, I had an excellent chance of catching Lawrence's killer.
The front door opened at my touch. I noticed then, for the first time, that the lock was broken. When I'd found Lawrence's body, the door had been unlocked, but intact. We stepped into the room and I stopped. There was movement in the kitchen, and I put out a hand to halt Willem. It was an unnecessary precaution. He, too, had seen something.
Stepping in front of me, he moved toward the kitchen. I reached out to halt him, but he was already five paces across the room, moving with a speed and stealth that made me think of James Bond. Willem had not lied when he'd said he had been a soldier. The training showed.
A scuttling sound came from the kitchen, and I almost cried out when the small creature rushed out toward us.
Willem scooped the cat into his arms in a fluid motion. "Ah, Apollo," he whispered to the cat, chuckling softly. "You stole at least a year of my life." He came toward me with the cat in his arms. "Lawrence's favorite terrorist cat."
"Apollo," I whispered, unwilling to speak aloud. I scratched the cat's ears and was rewarded with a purr. "Madame said that the cats weren't allowed in the cottage. She said the sheriff put them out." The others were nowhere in sight.
"I heard that Lillian Sparks came and took them. She couldn't find this one." Willem transferred him into my arms. "I know he misses Lawrence."
It was an unexpected sentiment. I held the cat as I turned slowly about, examining the room.
"What is it?" Willem was staring at me.
"It's just that this place is so empty. All of the paintings, the books. Everything that was once so vivid. It's all fading."
"Lawrence is gone." He stepped away from me. "Where do you think the manuscript might be?"
I gently put Apollo on the floor. "Let's try his study. If it's there, it shouldn't be hard to find."
"I disagree. If it were easy, Brianna would already have it."
"Why are you so positive it was her?"
"Of all of us, she has the most to lose. And like it or not, her celebrity and her father's wealth give her a certain privileged status. Do you really think a local sheriff could stop her?"
That was a point I didn't want to argue. Coleman Peters, the sheriff, didn't seem the type to be cowed by Brianna's fame. But I'd seen too many other men fold beneath her demands. Instead of replying, I led the way into the study. We had to pass the hallway where the chalk outline of Lawrence's body was still on the floor. Mercifully, someone had cleaned up the blood. Willem stopped to look at the outline. "He deserved death with dignity. Not an ending as he scrabbled for the telephone."
Once again, Willem's sensitivity surprised me, but the reality of what we were doing had begun to set in. I wanted only to conduct the search and get out. It was as if I was peeping into a private place.
I found two boxes of manuscripts, most of them sent to Lawrence by other writers for him to review or edit. In a smaller plastic container were poems and plays, riddles, and the beginnings of three novels. There was no sign of the manuscript. If it had ever been in the cottage, someone else had taken it.
I stopped my work long enough to find Willem, who was poking through the pigeonholes of an old desk.
"It would be hard to hide a manuscript in that small a place," I noted.
He shut a small drawer. "Yes, a paper manuscript. But what if Lawrence had put it on computer disk?"
"There's no computer. Just an old electric."
Willem restacked a bundle of magazines. "Lawrence hated the idea of computers. It took him decades to use an electric typewriter. Only after arthritis began to hurt his fingers. But he wasn't a fool. He didn't want to learn new technology, but since no one has found his manuscript, I suspect he may have paid someone to put it on a computer disk for him." He opened another small drawer and poked through it with his finger before shutting it. "Even so, I don't believe it's here."
We'd worked in our coats and gloves because the cottage heat had been turned off. He pulled off his gloves and beat them against his leg to knock off the dust.
"I'm sorry," I said, as disappointed as he was.
"We tried." He lifted my gloved hand to his face, leaning into the palm. "I owe you, Sarah Booth."
"Don't be silly. I wanted to find it as much as you."
"I always repay my debts. It's a matter of honor."
He was so serious. "I like a man who talks of honor." I tried to lighten his mood.
"I should get you home. It's getting late."
Indeed it was. The light in the cottage had gradually dimmed as the sun had begun to fall below the oaks. We put everything back as we'd found it and started out of the house.
"Meow." Apollo called to us from the kitchen.
"We can't leave him," I said. The cat would starve in the cottage, and the idea of him being there, alone, waiting for Lawrence to return, was too sad to bear. I felt tears sting.
"Will you take him?" Willem asked.
"I have a dog."
"Yes, I recall." He bent to pick up the cat. Apollo arched his back and spit, one front paw striking out with lightning speed. Willem drew back his hand with a cry of surprise.
"Willem!" I grabbed the injured hand. The cat's claws had raked the back. He was bleeding. "Let me put something on that."
He shook his hand, pulling a handkerchief out of his pocket and binding the wound. "It's nothing. Let's get the cat and get out of here."
But when we tried to find Apollo, he was gone. Vanished. And darkness was falling.
"I'll come back for him tomorrow," I said. "We should go."
Willem took my arm and together we left the cottage, taking care to close the door behind us.
On the drive back to Dahlia House we were mostly silent, but it was not uncomfortable. Willem was deep in thought, his attention focused on some inner landscape.
"I'll call you tomorrow," he said as he stopped the car in front of the house. "Forgive me for not wa
lking you inside."
He waited until I was up the stairs and opening the front door before he drove away. Thank goodness he missed the sight of Sweetie Pie rushing out of the house with such vehemence that she almost flattened me with the door.
"Sweetie," I called after her, but she was gone, vanishing into the darkness. There were several excited yelps, and I knew she was out for the evening. Ah, foolish youth. I would have to wait up for her. Alone. I decided to employ the long hours by working on the case.
Madame was right about one thing. I didn't know Lawrence. The best way to narrow the field of suspects was to get to know him a little better.
My mother had been an avid reader, adding her own books to the established library of the Delaney clan. I trotted into the library, and because it was so cold, I gathered up an armload of Lawrence's books and took them back to the parlor, where I immediately lit a fire and put on some Mozart. The cover of Weevil Dance caught my eye and I opened it to the title page.
"To Rosalyn, who taught me the lessons of life." The dedication didn't surprise me, but the publication year did: 1942. Lawrence had been a very young man.
It was with a tingle of anticipation that I discovered that the setting of the book was Moon Lake, the very real locale where Lawrence, Madame, and several others had spent a summer.
After that initial observation, I was swept up in the story. The record player stopped, the fire burned low until I buried my body beneath the comforter on the sofa, and yet I read on. Lawrence transported me back in time to a lodge on the edge of a resort lake where illegal gambling was the order of the night and where four youths lost their innocence in a series of events that seemed to foretell the future.
It was four in the morning when I finished and knew with dead certainty that Lawrence Ambrose had been murdered.
11
I struggled out of a dark sleep with the sound of baying outside the parlor window. It was full light, and as I blinked myself slowly awake, the copy of Weevil Dance fell off my chest and onto the floor. For those few seconds of waking, I was not in the parlor of Dahlia House but caught in the glamour of a beautiful, secluded lake and the impetuousness of youth during the summer of 1940 when the world was radically changing. Lawrence had so vividly created the setting of Lula, Mississippi, the last gasp of the Great Depression, and the magic of a lost time, a desperate time, that I had dwelt there in my sleep. Lingering with me still were the consequences of an action taken in innocence. That it had all happened in the pages of his novel didn't matter. The characters were alive in my brain, and though I knew on some level that the crying I heard was my own Sweetie Pie, it was somehow confused with the characters of Lawrence's book.
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