"Oscar would never hold up a loan on our account," I said to Tinkie.
"Of course not, but she doesn't know that. You take the dresser, and I'll take the suitcases."
The only interesting thing I found in the dresser drawers was a choice in undies—white lace thongs. Tinkie hit the mother load when she went through Quentin's brown travel valise. She held the note out to me, satisfaction in her eyes. She read it aloud. "You're going to pay for dragging your family's name through the mud."
It was short, sweet, to the point, and virtually untraceable. Even I could tell it was printed on a laser printer. I held the note gingerly and finally dropped it into a plastic bag that had once held panty hose. "We'll take this to Col—Gordon." My correction had come too late. Tinkie gave me a look.
"Coleman probably won't come back to Sunflower County, Sarah Booth." There was no malice in her tone.
"I know. Just a hard habit to break." In more ways than one. "Let's take this to Gordon. He's going to be testy because we found something and he didn't, but we knew what to look for."
She nodded. "This is very good in Allison's defense."
"Allison could have planted the note," I pointed out, "but we can hope to find others in Oxford."
"And we can hope that Gordon has some technology that can trace these notes," Tinkie said. "Or fingerprints."
Always the optimist, I thought. That's why I loved Tinkie so. "Let's get out of here. I'm afraid if I stay much longer, the Wicked Witch of the West will try to steal my dog."
We were laughing as we opened the door.
Gertrude Stromm blocked the doorway. "I heard Quentin and Allison arguing," she said. "It was ugly. That young woman killed her friend, and I'm going to testify to that." She spun around and stormed back down the hallway. When she was at the end, she wheeled to face us. "For your information, Miss Sarah Booth Delaney, I don't like dogs, or cats, or any other animal."
"What a surprise," I replied, feigning shock.
Holding my second Bloody Mary of the day, I sat down at my desk to make a few notes on the Allison Tatum case. Tinkie had gone on to The Club to see her husband, and to see what new suspects she could dig up. The truth was, Tinkie would be able to function better without me tagging along. Zinnia was a small town, and everyone knew I didn't have enough money to be a member of The Club. Since returning to Zinnia the year before—an unsuccessful actress trying to save her family home from the bulldozer—my economic woes were in the public domain. My presence would be a distraction.
And I had other fish to fry. My hand reached out to pick up the phone.
"Don't you dare call that married man," Jitty said.
I looked up to find her gazing at me from behind a domino. "I have a right to call Coleman when I need some professional advice."
“You need to remember he's chosen to honor his marital obligation. If he wanted you, he'd be right here at your side."
Jitty had a way of making her point. Coleman could have divorced his loony wife and stayed in Sunflower County, but he hadn't. He'd left his job, his career, and me. All for Connie. And for his child—the child she'd deliberately conceived to hold him. I had to keep that in mind. This was all about Connie's pregnancy, and it was the choice he should have made.
I withdrew my hand and picked up my pen. "Okay, you've emotionally bludgeoned me into submission."
Jitty moved toward me on the soft rustle of petticoats and silk. "No Delaney woman has ever been desperate enough to go chasin' after a married man."
I was sufficiently shamed; no witty retort came to my rescue.
"Why don't you call Hamilton Garrett V?" she asked.
I considered it but knew I wouldn't. I'd treated Hamilton shabbily. I had my reasons, just like Coleman had his, but in the long run, it wouldn't make a difference to Hamilton. I'd chosen and he'd lost, or at least it would seem that way to him. After all, I'd left him in an airport waiting for me while I ran off to help Coleman. No, it was better to let Hamilton alone.
"There are other fish in the sea," Jitty said.
"I prefer pork."
"Your palate will change." There was a hint of softness in her tone.
I examined her outfit, complete with sumptuous jewels and what appeared to be ermine on the collar. "You're advocating an era when members of the court slept with whomever they chose, married or not, willing or not. It was a time without morals or decency. That's what brought on the French Revolution."
"Change is inevitable."
I rolled my eyes. "You're a walking advertisement for excess and out-of-control consumerism. I'm just glad no one else can see you!"
"Jealous?"
I pushed back my chair and got up. "When the guillotine drops, don't come crying to me."
She was laughing softly as I walked up to my room for my riding boots. In less than ten minutes, I had Reveler saddled and Sweetie Pie circling my legs with eager anticipation. I mounted, and we set off at a trot across the cotton fields. Soon the picked plants would be disked under, and the ground would be prepared for next year's crop.
There was something about farming that kept a person connected to the soil, and I felt myself relax as I thought about the passing of the seasons. I'd started my career as a PI last fall. In that short time I'd saved Dahlia House from the developers, found a stray dog that turned out to be a real treasure, obtained the best partner in the world, and been gifted with a horse from my friend Lee McBride. All in all, romantic train wrecks aside, it had been a good year. I had to put aside my longing for Coleman and my regrets about Hamilton. I was where I was supposed to be.
Reveler's long trot was a pleasure to ride. The wind whipped my hair across my face, and my ears were numb with cold, but it was pure bliss. Sweetie Pie bounded along beside me as we rode the edges of the fields. We could cover miles without running into a single vehicle.
The land spread out before me, a flat vista of wealth. The Mississippi Delta is some of the richest land in the world. Top soil eight feet deep. I could not imagine ever leaving it again, not even for Hamilton Garrett V.
We made a circle of the surrounding properties, and then I turned back to Dahlia House as early nightfall was drifting over me. It was only about four, but the cloud cover blocked the light. I wanted to get home before it got too dark to see.
Reveler eagerly took the canter, and I pushed aside all my negative thoughts and feelings and gave myself to the ride. When I trotted down the drive of Dahlia House, I saw a strange red Porsche in front of the house.
Slipping off Reveler's bridle, I walked him cool and left him grazing on the front lawn while I crept up the steps and into my front parlor. My mind was focused on who would enter my house without permission, and it was with relief that I found Harold sitting on Aunt Loulane's horsehair sofa, sipping a Scotch.
"I knew you were riding, so I made myself at home," he said.
"I need to take care of Reveler." I waved him to follow me. "New car?"
"Rachel encouraged me to get it. I'm selling it tomorrow as soon as the dealership opens."
"Nice color."
"I think I want a truck."
I burst out laughing. Harold was one of the most refined men I knew. He was a gourmet cook and a banker who kept a Haviland china service in his office at the bank. "Keep the Porsche. It suits you better."
"Maybe. Maybe not."
The worry in his eyes troubled me. Harold wasn't paranoid, and he didn't go around looking for something to obsess over. He occasionally paid me a visit, but not often. Perhaps it had been due to his involvement with Rachel, or perhaps it was my involvement with Coleman. It didn't matter; I was glad to see him.
I led Reveler to the barn by his mane, and Harold unsaddled him while I cleaned his hooves and poured up his ration of grain. We worked in companionable silence, but he'd come to talk with me about something important. I'd learned the art of waiting for the talkee to bring it to me.
"Allison Tatum didn't kill Quentin McGee," he said.
&n
bsp; I could hear the comb running through Reveler's mane as he worked. "I know. I think she was framed." I walked around and put my hand on Harold's arm and gave it a gentle squeeze. "But I know you didn't kill her, either, Harold."
His smile was warm. "Thank you, Sarah Booth."
"Thanks aren't necessary. I know you wouldn't harm anyone. Once Tinkie and I investigate further, we should have some viable suspects."
"I was so angry with her," he said.
I hugged him lightly. "If that were a crime, we'd all be in jail. Hey, I'm sorry about Rachel."
"Me, too. She's a great woman. I was just never comfortable with all those French hairdressers. And she wanted to travel, something I'm not free to do."
I could see on his face that he'd cared for the eccentric businesswoman who'd built an empire of beauty salons staffed by handsome French stylists. It was a mecca of Daddy's Girl fantasies—the sensual touch of a sexy, foreign man without guilt or repercussions. Rachel was a genius.
He sighed. "Just think, if I'd gone to Paris with her like she asked, I wouldn't be in this predicament."
“You aren't in a predicament," I pointed out. "No one has accused you of anything. Just wait and don't borrow trouble." Aunt Loulane's words were out of my mouth before I could bite them back.
"I can just see your aunt," he said, and this time his smile was real. "I think of you sometimes, living here alone."
"But I'm not alone," I answered. Harold's concern was one thing. His pity was another. "I have Sweetie and Reveler." And Jitty, but I wasn't about to admit to a haint.
"Let me take you to dinner, Sarah Booth."
"Okay, but let me go inside and clean up." I didn't have to look down at my stained breeches and muddy boots to know I needed a little feminine care.
"Perfect. I'll pick you up in forty-five minutes?" He waited for me to calculate the time allotment for cleaning up.
I nodded. "Where are we going?"
"It's going to be a surprise."
3
Highway 1, which topped the thirty-foot levee on the Mississippi River, was the perfect place to open up the Porsche. The road was one of my favorites. On the west side were the river breaks, small sloughs, and swamps, where wildlife flourished. On the east side were pastures filled with grazing cattle. Sometimes the pastures included part of the road. Harold left a whirlwind of leaves behind as we flew through the night. It was perfect November weather, cold with a hint of ice in the crackle of the leaves. With the top down, the wind was freezing, but also invigorating. It brought the first flush of color to Harold's pale cheeks. As we left the levee and hit the interstate to Memphis, I watched Harold's profile. He had begun to relax. I was glad, because I'd never seen him so tense.
"What's wrong, Harold? Did you have to evict some little old lady on a Sunday?"
He smiled. "You give me too much credit, Sarah Booth. You think I might worry about someone else's plight. It's my own neck I'm concerned about."
For all his bravado, Harold was a kind man. There were several elderly matrons around town who owed their homes to his gentle intervention in banking rules. "Right, Harold, I know how hard-hearted you are."
He slowed the car enough so that he could really look at me. "Why didn't we make a couple, Sarah Booth?"
It was a hard question to answer. When I'd first met Harold, with his plan to raze Dahlia House and build a shopping mall, I had good reason to dislike him. Then, things had changed. Antipathy had turned into attraction. Yet we'd never followed through. Why? I still couldn't say.
"You're just hurting over Rachel," I said, touching his arm gently. "And you know what a muddle I made of my romantic life. I have no answers for either of us."
"Coleman Peters." He said the name as if it were the title of a book.
I wisely said nothing as he pressed the accelerator and sped us through the night to a small, expensive Memphis restaurant called The French Connection.
The food was good, the wine excellent, and the creme brulee to die for. Throughout the meal, we talked about my past cases, Oscar's reaction to Tinkie's involvement in the private investigation business, and the passing of the year.
"Will you be making fruitcakes this year?" he asked.
"Tradition, Harold. It rules my life." I'd had enough wine to believe I was witty, and I was rewarded with his bold laugh. Several patrons of the restaurant turned to look at us, and not without envy.
We ordered coffee, and I watched his face change. "I need your help, Sarah Booth."
"Harold, you know that Humphrey Tatum has already hired us to help Allison. Besides, you don't have a thing to worry about. Gordon would never seriously consider you a killer."
He frowned. "I'm not so certain. I don't think Tinkie conveyed the full scene to you. Because I didn't convey it to her."
Looking into his dark eyes, I could see he was genuinely worried. Though I might not take his predicament seriously, he did. To belittle his concern was not the action of a friend. "Tell me what happened."
He leaned closer, glancing left and right as if he were about to reveal a state secret. "I was in the bar at The Club. Rachel and I had had a terrible row in the dining room. It was"—he grimaced—"tasteless and regrettable."
"You really care for her, don't you?"
He dropped his gaze, and I could read nothing on his face. When he looked up again, he was composed. "Rachel has such a gift for life. To be with her makes me feel more fully alive than I've ever felt. But it isn't fair for me to hold her back. She wants to travel, to live in Europe, to experience life. I'm happy here in Zinnia, living my dull life with the people I've grown to care about."
I swallowed, thinking of Hamilton. He'd offered me the chance of a lifetime, to live in an exotic city with a man who stopped women in their tracks, a man who loved me. For another woman, it would have been the perfect match. Somehow, though, Mississippi had gotten into my blood, and I couldn't abandon her. My roots had grown too deeply in the rich Delta soil. I understood what Harold was saying. "I just played out this scene, I'm afraid."
"I know that Hamilton offered you Paris. I'm sorry. It's hard to tear your heart in half." He picked up my hand, and I felt the weakest pulse in my thumb. It made me smile.
"We're a lot more alike than you once believed," he said.
"We are." It was an easy admission. "That's how I know you couldn't hurt Quentin. But tell me the rest of the story."
Harold released my hand and looked down at his coffee cup. "As I said, Rachel and I had had an argument. She'd given me back a ring. Not an engagement ring, but a gift I'd bought her. She left, and I went into the bar and proceeded to polish off my image as an ass."
I grinned. "So you got drunk."
"Drunker." He signaled the waiter for the check. "I don't remember everything I said or did, but Marcus Kline came up to me in the bar and started picking at me about the things Quentin had written in the book."
"I haven't read it."
"She detailed my aunt's unhappy love affair, her suicide." He shrugged. "I swung at him, but Bobby Deneff pulled me off. I was spoiling for a fight."
"That's when Quentin arrived."
"Right. She came in the bar with an attitude. She plopped a hundred down, and when Bernard Jacks couldn't change it, she acted like a little bitch. I told him to put her drink on my tab. That's when she got really nasty."
"How so?"
"She told me that I couldn't bribe her to leave my family out of her second book. She said she was going to dig up every bone I had buried and pick it to death. That's when she stood up and stumbled. Her drink flew all over me. I was furious."
"Charming," I said, hoping to take the edge off. Harold was frowning as he twirled his coffee cup in the saucer.
"She downed the remains of her drink and stalked off, and I followed her outside. I intended to tell her off. In my drunken stupor, I thought it would be better to do it outside rather than in public."
This wasn't good news. After a public argument, Harold
followed a lone woman into the night—right before someone murdered her. On a positive side, no one heard what must have been a heated exchange between them.
"So the only person who heard you was Quentin, and she won't be talking," I said, hoping to make light of the situation.
"If only that were true."
"Who heard?"
"Marcus."
"Good grief." Marcus and Harold were bitter enemies. Long ago, Harold had foreclosed on the Kline plantation. The bank can carry a debt for only so long; it was an economic fact even I understood. Rather than accept that the bank had acted in a prescribed way, Marcus found it easier to blame Harold for his personal failure.
"It gets worse. I threatened Quentin." He refused to look up at me. "She said some nasty things, and I responded by telling her if she didn't leave my family out of her books, I'd"—he finally looked up—"kill her."
"How long did it take Marcus to beat a trail to the sheriffs office?"
"He was there as soon as he heard that Quentin's body was found. Gordon came by to talk to me. I admitted the whole thing."
My exasperation with Harold made my voice sharp. "Don't you watch any television? The airwaves are filled with cop shows with the mantra 'don't talk to the police.'"
"I didn't touch Quentin."
"Neither did Allison, and look where she is."
"My point exactly. I need you and Tinkie to help me out."
I sighed. After the things Harold had done for me, I could hardly say no to him, yet I was obligated to work for Allison. When I hit on the solution, I smiled. "You're both innocent, so when Tinkie and I find the real killer, it'll clear you both."
He leaned forward and picked up my hand, his fingers stroking it gently. "You're a clever woman, Sarah Booth."
I shook my head. "Not really. But you are a good man, Harold. I can prove that."
He squeezed my hand, and my thumb tingled. Then the waiter brought the check, and we were out in the cold night, with a starry drive back to Zinnia.
Harold left me at the door with a kiss on the cheek. As I watched his taillights disappear down the drive, I felt a sense of foreboding. Gordon Walters knew that Harold wouldn't kill Quentin or anyone else, but I had a feeling this case was going to get much larger than Sunflower County and the reach of local law enforcement. I was worried about Harold.
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