Sarah Booth Delaney

by Sarah Booth Delaney 01-06 (lit)

  I had to work hard to regulate my breathing. It felt like the box springs of the bed were pressing down on me, and the revelations that I was hearing made me want to inhale sharply.

  "Why?"

  "Lawrence was my friend. I see now he'd tried to warn me against marrying Joseph. He hinted at things, but I didn't understand. I was naive and young and so very desperate to find someone to cling to. Somewhere to go to escape my family."

  Now Tilda sounded as if she were crying. I closed my eyes, regretting that I had overheard such intimate details. Sorry that now I had reason to suspect both Tilda and my friend Cece in Lawrence's death.

  "We have to find that book," Cece said. "What did Willem tell you?"

  "He said Brianna had called him. He said she'd found the book and taken it, and that she was going to publish it and that it was filled with things that would ruin us all."

  "If Brianna's gone, then the book is probably gone, too. That bitch'll find someone to publish it and everything I've worked so hard to leave behind will be headlines again."

  "We can't give up. We have to look," Tilda insisted. "We're here, so let's look. The bastard probably has the book and Brianna. They were so cozy-cozy lately."

  They opened the door of the guest room, looked in, and moved on. I slowly exhaled after I heard their footsteps moving down the hallway. My inclination was to crawl out from under the bed and talk to them, but I held back. Based on what I'd read of Lawrence's book, a single page that would wreck at least two lives, it was highly probably that Joseph Grace and Cece, who had been Cecil while attending Ole Miss, would be served up as appetizers. If Lawrence didn't spare his childhood friends, he'd think nothing of torpedoing Cece.

  But there was the off chance that he'd left out that chapter. And if he did, I never wanted Cece to know that I knew. She'd kept her secret for so long, there was no need for her to ever worry that I might reveal it. No matter how much Joseph Grace deserved punishment for what he'd done.

  I followed their search by the flow of their sporadic conversation. When they were in the study, soon to become as absorbed by the details of Brianna's life as I had been, I slipped from beneath the bed. The study was on the far side of the house. With a little luck and good timing, I could make an escape.

  I folded the page of the book and slipped down the stairs. They'd left the window open, so my departure went without a sound. The barn was far enough from the house that when I started the car, I knew they wouldn't hear. There was an old farm road that led to the now empty pastures and I took it, trusting that since all of the horses had been sold the gates wouldn't be locked.

  I glanced back at the house once in the rearview mirror. A curtain in a third-floor room dropped quickly back in place. They'd seen me after all.

  25

  The Christmas decorations glittered in the noonday sun as I drove through the empty streets of downtown Zinnia. Without all the cars and people, it was easier to see the decorations. Lillian Sparks was right. The old tinsel and lights that were strung along the telephone lines looked tacky in the daytime. But I loved them still, and in the flutter of the silver tinsel, I hung on to Christmases past and a sense of something bigger than myself.

  The conversation I'd overheard had greatly upset me. If Joseph Grace had stepped off the curb in front of my car, I wouldn't have even tried to brake. And what I had to confront was going to be even harder.

  I took a right and headed for the Sunflower County courthouse. The stately old red-brick building was adorned with huge red ribbons on the white columns. Holiday pranksters had be-wreathed the statue of the bedraggled Johnny Reb that guarded the front entrance. I had no intention of stopping, but I wanted to see who was at the sheriff's office. Harold must have driven from Memphis with his foot on the floor. His Lexus was parked beside the jail.

  I took a couple of left turns and pulled into Madame's driveway. A leafless crape myrtle framed the porch where she sat in the swing, a plumed hat on her head, her gloves and handbag in her lap.

  My emotions had been slammed, jammed, and brutalized, and I wanted some straight answers. But just when I needed it most, my anger abandoned me. Madame looked old and tired and worried. I found myself walking up to her porch with a lump in my throat.

  It wasn't necessary to say anything. I pulled the folded page from my jeans pocket and handed it to her. She was a tough old lady. Her expression never changed as she read the page and handed it back to me.

  "I never dreamed Lawrence would actually write it," she said, "and in such a sanctimonious tone. His years in Paris, when he and Ramone Gilliard were so involved with the French Resistance. That would have been plenty for a book. It begged to be made into a movie. I honestly never thought that Lawrence would trade on his friends for a few moments of glory."

  If I'd had her check in my pocket, I would have torn it up in front of her. I wasn't angry anymore, but she had betrayed me by not telling me the truth. She was upset because Lawrence had told her secrets, and yet she hadn't hesitated to lie to and deceive me.

  "What does this mean?" I asked, lightly shaking the page. "What is Lawrence talking about?"

  The edge in my voice made her stare at me. It was a long stare, one that probed for the old weaknesses she'd tried to dance out of me.

  "Your mother would be proud of you, Sarah Booth. I thought when your parents died that you might not make it. I was afraid you'd fold. But you didn't. You've grown to be your own person, a rare luxury."

  There had been a time when I would have groveled at her feet for such words of praise. Even now they affected me, but I refused to show it. "What is Lawrence referring to here, this tragedy turned to support?"

  Very slowly she took her hat off. As she did so, she regained some of her posture. She sat up in the swing a little straighter, with a little more pride. "Hosea Archer raped me that summer at Moon Lake. It was a vicious rape that required a hysterectomy. His father paid me not to press charges." Madame's dark eyes were flinty as she laughed. "The loss of my health and innocence were of little consequence to Jebediah. What mattered was that he not come under scrutiny."

  "I was right all along. That summer at Moon Lake." The words were like a dark chant. "It all started then."

  "For the most part," she agreed.

  "Why did Jebediah kill his son?"

  "It's complicated, but time has a way of simplifying things. It all started with the rape. Lawrence was out of his mind with rage. One night Lawrence followed Hosea out on the lake. I honestly believe he planned on killing him. Instead, Lawrence learned a secret."

  "What?" Moon Lake still exerted a powerful magnetic pull on me. I was enthralled with Madame's tale.

  "That night Hosea was paddling instead of using the little outboard motor. That in itself was strange, Lawrence said, because that boy never did a lick of physical labor if he could avoid it. Lawrence followed him into a cypress cove, one of the hundreds of little inlets on the lake. Lawrence hid so they didn't see him. But he watched. Hosea met some men there. Not Germans. Americans who supported the Third Reich and wanted our country to stay out of the war. Money changed hands." She leaned back in the swing and pushed it gently with her toes. "I swore I would never tell that story. So did Lawrence. We made an oath."

  "Jebediah Archer paid for your silence. And Lawrence's, too?"

  "Oh, no. Lawrence never took a penny. He left the country and went to fight against the Axis powers. He and Ramone Gilliard were very active in the underground. Lawrence did some very brave things that no one will ever know."

  "But the senator paid you."

  "Yes, and he's continued to pay me all this time, a small monthly allowance. It's how I've managed to live."

  Very slowly I sat down on the top step. Words were inadequate, and I had sense enough to know it. So I'd learned the big secret of Madame's past, of why she'd come home to Zinnia, of why she'd never married. I suddenly thought of Jitty and the safety and repression of the decade she'd decided to embrace. What must it truly ha
ve been like for women in the forties and fifties? What had Madame and others like her suffered because they wanted to dance on a stage, to revel in movement and beauty? What would she suffer now?

  She reached her hand out for the page, and I gave it to her, watching as she read it yet again. "I simply can't believe he did this," she said. "Not Lawrence. You have no idea how he took care of me that summer, how he nursed me back from the brink of insanity." She shook her head, lowering the page to her lap. "And then Lenore. My God. We were wild. Young and wild and completely unaware how the decisions we made then would affect us in the years to come."

  "What about Lenore?" I had to ask though the words tasted of ash as they passed my lips. I didn't want to hear more secrets. I didn't want the burden of knowing.

  "She was having an affair with a married man. A prominent man. She was desperately in love."

  "Who?"

  Madame looked past me out into the street. She must have seen the Thunderbird coming, but she made no motion to indicate she saw it. "Sarah Booth, there are secrets I won't reveal. If they're in that book, then Lawrence must accept the blame for telling them. I'm an old woman, and though I'd prefer to avoid the label of blackmailer, I have only a limited number of days left to endure such censure. Long ago I gave my word. That has to mean something."

  The crunch of the tires made me turn around. Willem Arquillo got out of the Thunderbird and walked toward us. This time his million-dollar smile was missing.

  "Let me offer apologies for what I'm about to do," Willem said in that lovely voice. "I need the key to the storage vault, Miss Bell. Please give it to me now."

  "It's too late, Willem," I answered for her. "Harold knows the Pleshettes are fakes." For someone who was solving a mystery, I found no satisfaction in delivering the coup de grace.

  Willem's posture loosened, and he sat heavily on the front porch. "I know you might not believe this, but I meant to get them back before he died. I needed the money. My mother's care, the doctors ... I was careless with my own success. Lawrence never looked at his collection, never showed them to anyone. So I painted the frauds and made the switch. I've got money now. I can buy them back and replace them as I always meant to do."

  "You followed me to Moon Lake because you thought I had the key to the art storage vault."

  He didn't deny it. "I'm sorry, Sarah Booth. Give me credit that I left you, untouched. I could not deceive you to that extent."

  What should I say, thanks? I swallowed the bitter taste of disappointment.

  "Have a seat, Willem," Madame said, holding out the page to him. "You might as well give it up. Lawrence obviously finished his book and spared no one. He's known for years about the switched paintings. He told me. But he always knew you meant to make it right, and he wanted to give you the chance. That's why he invited you to Zinnia for the holidays. He was hoping you'd recover the real paintings and make the switch. That was his intention, before he was killed."

  Willem held the page but didn't read it. He looked over it at Madame. "He knew?"

  She nodded. "He just never let on. He understood, I think. And until this morning, I always believed that he forgave you. Forgave all of us our sins."

  I'd hardly known Lawrence, but I was finding it difficult to imagine how he'd sat down and written things that would destroy everyone he'd seemed to care about. Willem read the page and then slowly lowered it to his side.

  "What did he write about me and my family?"

  Silence stretched before I answered. "I found only that one page. The rest of the book is still missing."

  Willem leaned back against the pillar that supported Madame's porch roof. He tapped his beautiful head against it several times before he spoke. "There is a saying about writers. When you sleep with one you put your most intimate life on the page. I never would have believed it of Lawrence."

  "Maybe the book is truly lost," Madame said.

  "Brianna has it. I'm sure of it. She called to rub it in."

  If possible, Willem's shoulders slumped a little more. "It's pointless now. I'll be revealed for a thief and the worst kind of betrayer. Lawrence trusted me to buy the paintings for him, to spend his money on quality work. And I cheated him. I cheated my friend."

  I faced Willem. "Did you kill him?" I asked.

  Willem's dark brows slammed together. "How can you ask that? I'm a thief, not a killer."

  I stood up and looked at Madame. "Did you? The bag of rat poison had your prints on it."

  She made a sound in her throat, a soft yielding. "No," she said. "I didn't kill Lawrence. I did buy the rat poison. There were mice in the cottage, and Lawrence didn't approve of poisoning things. It was a health issue, but who will believe me? Coleman confirmed that Harold and I are the prime suspects." She gathered herself and her lips turned up in a crooked smile. "Ironic, isn't it? The woman I tried so hard to stop now has the book and the best possible method of publicizing it. Not only is Lawrence dead. He was murdered. And the woman who loved him for the past five decades will go to prison for it."

  The injustice was almost more than I could bear. "We have to find Brianna," I said, rising to my feet. "Willem, you said she called. Where was she?"

  "She didn't say." Willem was morose.

  "I'll be back," I promised as I stepped around Willem's long legs.

  "Where are you going?" Madame asked.

  "I know just the person to help me with Brianna's phone call. Keep thinking and I'll be in touch."

  Johnny Albritton was watching a ball game in his den when I knocked on his front door. If he was surprised to see me, he didn't show it. Based on the way he pushed the screen door open and invited me in, it would seem that I stopped by all the time.

  "What's shakin', Sarah Booth?" He sipped a beer and gave me his attention.

  "I need a favor. A big one. Can you trace a call?"

  "Local or long distance?"

  "I don't know." I forged ahead. "The call was made to Willem Arquillo. He's staying at Ruth Anne's bed-and-breakfast."

  He nodded as if he were considering and I felt my hopes begin to rise. "Have you asked Ruth Anne?" he asked.

  "Do I have to have her permission? It wasn't a call to her."

  "No. But she's got caller ID. Maybe if she hasn't erased it you could just check her box. Might tell you right off where the call came from. Of course that won't work if it's a cell phone or out of an area that doesn't have caller ID."

  I didn't have time to waste, but I went to him and took his hand. "Thanks, Johnny."

  "You'll get the hang of this PI business. Don't give up. And don't watch those television shows. They get it all wrong." He walked me to the door, his gaze already straying back to the television.

  Ruth Anne Welsh had gone to Zinnia High but we'd traveled in different circles, not to mention different grades. She was a bit younger.

  She was in the kitchen cooking something that smelled heavenly, a gumbo of some sort. She eyed me skeptically while I told her what I wanted. I thought I'd won her over until she put one hand on her hip and balked.

  "I'm sorry, Sarah Booth, but this sounds too much like an invasion of privacy. How do I know that Mr. Arquillo said you could do this? How do I know it's even his calls you're really interested in."

  "Because I said so?"

  She rolled her eyes. "That's exactly the sort of thing Tinkie Bellcase would say."

  "You know Tinkie?" I felt a pulse of hope.

  "She talked to her husband and helped me get the loan for this bed-and-breakfast. After Howard left me with two kids and no means of support, nobody in this damn town would give me a job or a chance. I'd done some catering for Mrs. Bellcase, and she went right down to the bank and stood at her husband's desk and told him exactly how he was going to give me the loan."

  "God bless Tinkie," I said, already moving toward the door. "I'll have Tinkie come over and explain this to you," I promised.

  "Now I'd believe Mrs. Bellcase. You just send her on. I'd like to send some of this d
uck gumbo home with her anyway. It was always one of her favorites."

  I started to ask to borrow her phone and give Tinkie a call right on the spot, but then I remembered something. I checked the wall clock in Ruth Anne's kitchen and saw it was nearly two o'clock. Lunch was over. Tinkie had sacrificed herself on the altar of her marriage in an attempt to discover where Harold Erkwell had gone—and he was sitting at Coleman's office. I'd neglected to call my partner and save her.

  "You got indigestion?" Ruth Anne asked. "You can't see my phone, but I will give you an AlkaSeltzer."

  "Not yet, but I'm going to have a terrible earache," I said as I headed back to my car.

  I felt like a worm. Most of the rules and regulations of a Daddy's Girl I'd been able to put behind me, but there was one supreme rule that I'd always revered— one Daddy's Girl never left another in a bad situation out of carelessness. It didn't matter that I was used to working alone; or that Tinkie was married to Oscar and a little nooner probably would work to Tinkie's advantage in the long run; or that I had no way of knowing Harold would call me from Memphis.

  Rationalizing would not make this right. I had done a bad thing.

  So I decided to go home and call Tinkie from there and do what I could to repair the damage—and see if I could get her to go to Ruth Anne's. I had to get that phone number.

  My home was like a beacon of safety as I left the main road and cruised onto the drive. I'd been home almost a year and still the sense of perfect wonder that came over me as I turned down the drive was as fresh and magical as it had been when I was a child. Home. It was a word that filled me with good and solid emotions.

  I coasted by the front of the house, going slow to avoid the milling crowd of dogs. Sweetie Pie had her own fan club going. I wondered if it was her gentle baying that won such devotion from her boys. My genial thoughts skidded to a halt as I saw a flash of black, russet, and tan streak down the front porch steps. She hesitated just long enough for me to recognize the fabulous square-heeled, strappy, extra-sexy shoes I was planning on wearing to the ball.