Sadie snorted. “Chief Ciders doesn’t stick his neck out for anyone.”
“Apparently Ciders feels guilty for implicating me. Small comfort if I go to prison.”
“You’re not going anywhere.” Sadie passed me a mug of hot coffee from the thermos we kept behind the counter.
I took my first sip, realizing only then that I’d had no food or drink since the Quibbler’s meeting. “So what do I tell Spencer?” I asked. “He’s going to hear about this sooner or later.”
“Then it’s best he hear it from you. When he gets home from school we’ll both sit him down and have a talk.”
“How do I tell my son I’m innocent?”
“Don’t worry, Pen. Spencer’s watched enough shows on the Intrigue Channel to know people get blamed all the time for crimes they didn’t commit.”
I sighed, took another hit of caffeine. “How are you feeling?” I asked my aunt. “The meeting last night seemed to upset you.”
Sadie shook her head. “It wasn’t the meeting. It was all those things Parker said about Poe. I just got to thinking about Peter, how bad off he was at the end, how a stupid misunderstanding set us apart all those years…”
“What misunderstanding? I don’t follow.”
“Well, I thought I had put this behind me, but…remember the night Peter died, as we were leaving his mansion? You left us alone to say goodnight…”
“I remember.”
“Peter actually asked me how ‘my husband’ was. The question took me by surprise. But Peter told me he’d read about my marriage in the Providence Journal—”
“Oh, yes! I remember that. You wrote me a letter about it while I was living in New York. The announcement said, ‘Sadie Thornton married’…Who was it?”
“Mr. Aletti, of the Quindicott Savings and Loan,” Sadie said. “The paper got the names wrong, printing my name instead of Sadie Thorners. I got ribbed about it for weeks—your friend Seymour was the worst. He’d just started his route that year. Kept saying he had a truck load of wedding gifts for the wrong bride.”
“So Peter Chesley read that announcement in the paper, and he thought—”
“He thought I was married.” Sadie shook her head. “That’s why he never contacted me again. Eventually I myself assumed that he was the one who’d found someone. I’d convinced myself he’d gotten remarried and simply decided to break all ties with me.”
Sadie brushed her cheek of a stray tear. “But the hardest part for me is…when I think back, to that time when we were so close, when were a couple, I can’t even recall what it was that broke us apart. Just squabbles and hurt feelings and misunderstandings…now it all seems so petty…so stupid. I can’t think why we didn’t try harder to work it out.”
I nodded, not knowing what to say.
“You can always tell yourself that there’s a chance, but when someone dies, when he leaves the earth…well, when that happens, it’s over. A door shuts forever. What am I saying? After what you went through in your life, Penelope, I don’t have to tell you that, do I, dear?”
I chewed my lip, knowing she was talking about Calvin, but wishing I could tell her about Jack.
“Well, it’s all water under the bridge now,” she said. “We have to focus on the here and now.”
And that’s what we did.
The store had only a few customers, so I pulled out a stack of trade magazines I’d let pile up and began to read through the book reviews, making notes in the margins. Sadie went upstairs to fix me a sandwich.
Good morning, baby.
“Hi, Jack…. I missed you.”
I’ll bet…. How was your night in stir?
“Unpleasant. And humiliating. And you were right.”
Yeah?
“I shouldn’t have gone outside. They didn’t have a warrant to enter the premises. By exiting the store, I set myself up for an arrest.”
That scam was old when I was in knee pants.
“Hard to imagine you in knee pants, Jack.”
These days, it’s hard for me to remember the day when I had knees, but at least nobody’s trying to bust them anymore. Jack paused. So…you ready to go to the mat yet?
“Huh?”
Are you ready to fight back?
“Against who? Against what?” I cried. Aloud, apparently.
“What did you say, dear?” Sadie asked. She’d returned with a plate in one hand and a full glass of milk in the other. She wore a puzzled expression.
“Sorry…nothing,” I said with a sigh. “I was just thinking out loud.”
“Have something to eat. You’ll feel better,” my aunt commanded.
When I sat down behind the counter, I saw a white envelope tucked next to the register. It had Brainert’s name on it, written in my aunt’s flowing hand.
“What’s this?” I asked between bites of my Virginia ham and Swiss cheese sandwich.
Sadie picked up the envelope and opened the flap. “Brainert and Seymour helped me pack up the chairs after the meeting last night,” she said. “A little while ago, when I was sweeping out the storage room, I found this…”
She dropped a heavy object into my palm—a quarter-inch black square of onyx with a gold crest set in the middle. I immediately recognized the coat-of-arms of St. Francis College, where Brainert was a professor.
“It must have fallen out of Brainert’s ring,” Sadie said. “You can give it to him when you visit him later.”
“Why am I visiting Brainert later?”
“He wants you to come by, after he’s had a chance to do more research on the Poe Code.”
I’d had my fill of Phelps, Poe, and the ridiculous code, but I kept silent, took a gulp of milk instead. I stared out the window a moment, at the people on the sidewalk, wondering how many of them I knew.
“I’m almost afraid to go out,” I said. “I feel like the police are watching me all the time. I’m afraid I’m going to get arrested again. Most of all, I’m worried about my reputation. Word is bound to get out.”
Sadie shook her head. “Don’t be silly, Pen. Hardly anyone knows what happened. It will be the Quibblers’ little secret.”
The chimes rang when a young man stepped through the door
“Here’s your Bulletins, ma’am,” he said, dropping a bundle of newspapers next to the door. He was delivering our store’s consignment of the Quindicott Bulletin, the town’s weekly pennysaver and local newspaper rolled into one.
“Thank you,” I called.
The youth’s friendly smile vanished when he saw me. He was out the door and down the street in a flash. Meanwhile Sadie pulled a copy from the stack, glanced at the front page, and exploded.
“Damn that Elmer Crabtree!”
“What’s wrong?” I cried. But I knew. I knew when the delivery boy gave me that look.
The main headline dealt with the beginning of the school year, including a photo of the kids arriving on the first day. The second story involved me, under the headline LOCAL STOREOWNER IMPLICATED IN THEFT.
The story was all of three paragraphs, obviously inserted just before the paper went to press this morning. Thankfully there was no mug shot. The article was factually incorrect, describing Rene Montour as a “Frenchman” who died in a “collision.” Editor Crabtree even managed to get our store’s name wrong, calling it “Buy Books Here.” Of course, he did manage to spell my name right, and give my age (not that I’m vain, but I wouldn’t want my weight or bank account information in the newspaper, either).
“I’d better have that talk with Spencer real soon,” I said.
Sadie folded the paper and tossed it into the wastecan. “Speaking of Spencer. Don’t you have a meeting with the new principal this afternoon?”
“I should cancel. I can’t leave you alone in the store—”
“Nonsense. Business is slow, Pen. And Mina is coming in an hour.”
“Mina? I thought Garfield was working today.”
Sadie shrugged. “He called me just after I opened th
e store. Said he switched days with Mina. Said it was all worked out and she would be in on time.”
I had yet to have that talk with Garfield about the missing key. Now I began to wonder if Garfield was avoiding me, or if he had something to hide.
That kid’s a gimp, for sure, said Jack. I’d peg him for a grifter, but one on a leash. If someone in the Platt family is in deep, I’d pin it on Garfield’s brother, the fish who’s fresh out of the joint.
“Just because someone went to prison doesn’t mean they’re a criminal. I was in jail last night, but I didn’t do anything wrong.”
Babe, stop living in Dimsville. Jail isn’t the same as prison. And there are two things to remember in life: people don’t change, and most of them are no damned good.
“The way I’m feeling, I won’t even argue with you.”
But you’re still not ready to go to the mat.
“I’m going to see the principal now,” I said out loud.
“That’s good, Pen,” my aunt replied. “And don’t forget to stop by Brainert’s afterwards. I can’t wait to hear what he’s discovered.”
A visit to the Casa de Egghead? Why do you want to go there, lamb chop? You just got out of jail!
CHAPTER 16
Principally Speaking
You get a smack on the snozzle in about a minute.
—Norbert Davis, “Kansas City Flash,”
Black Mask, March 1933
“I’M SORRY, MRS. McClure, Mr. Chesley should be back any minute.”
Behind the high metal counter, the school secretary, “Ms. Jane” (what Jane Wiley had been instructing kids and parents to call her since I was ten years old) checked the antique watch on a chain around her neck. She glanced out the bank of windows behind her, patted the back of her upswept, silver-threaded brown hair, then sat down at her wooden desk and began to drum a pencil against the side of her computer.
She looked up at me again, a little nervously, then quickly shifted her attention to her computer screen. The lady seemed uncomfortable. Of course, it occurred to me Ms. Jane’s real discomfort might not have been her boss’s lateness but my notorious presence. After all, how many times a day did a LOCAL STOREOWNER IMPLICATED IN THEFT walk into the Quindicott Elementary School office?
Well, baby, Jack said, if the broad introduces you as “the accused,” that’ll be your first clue.
“Thank you,” I simultaneously said to Jack and the secretary.
There was a line of empty chairs near the glass office door and I sat down in one. Whether it was my night in jail or the giant poster on the wall listing DO’S AND DON’TS OF SCHOOL CONDUCT, I suddenly felt like I’d been sent in here for a reprimand.
Jack laughed. Feeling like a bad girl, are you?
“During the six years I went to this school, I never before saw the inside of this office.”
No? You mean nice-thinking, do-right, moo juice–drinking little Penelope never got into trouble? Now there’s a headline.
“Stow it, Jack.”
There you go with that nautical talk again, and I can’t stand the navy.
I massaged my throbbing temples. “I’m charged with a felony, waiting to see the principal, and a ghost who lives in my bookstore won’t stop harassing me. What happened to my life?”
Aw, baby, now don’t go getting into a funk, ’cause the last time I checked, I ain’t no shrink, and I got no clue where the spirit of Sigmund Freud is marking time.
“I don’t need Sigmund Freud. I need a good trial lawyer. Know any?”
Sure. Abraham Lincoln. Only, like old Siggy, I don’t know where he’s located, either.
After fifteen minutes of verbally sparring with my ghost, watching teachers come in and out of the office (glancing curiously my way), and listening to the office phone ring nonstop (“Quindicott Elementary, May I help you?”), I began to pace.
“Excuse me, Ms. Jane?” I finally called.
“Yes, Mrs. McClure.” She looked up from her computer, removed the reading glasses from the tip of her nose.
“You said Mr. Chesley was ‘due back’—is he even in the building?”
Once again, Ms. Jane glanced out the window, scanned the parking lot and the long driveway leading from the road. “I’m so sorry you have to wait. He did have some personal business to take care of, but it’s been over an hour now, and he really should be back soon.”
This dame’s a back door, you know, Jack whispered through my mind.
“A back door?” I echoed.
Sure, baby, she’s a way for you to get some background on this Chesley character you’re waiting for. Use your limbo to advantage. Not that I am, by the way. I can think of a lot more stimulating places to haunt than a backwoods bookstore in a town full of hicks.
Ignoring Jack’s latest jibe, I chewed my lip and seriously considered his back door suggestion. I wasn’t a gossip at heart. I liked my own privacy and I tried to give people theirs—“Live and let live and you’ll live a lot longer,” my mom used to say. But when it came to murder, Jack was right, all bets were off.
“So…uh, Ms. Jane, I’m curious,” I said, trying to sound casual, “what can you tell me about Claymore Chesley? I mean besides what you mentioned yesterday, about his credentials.”
“Well, since you asked…” She rose from her desk and moved across the room, placing her elbows on the high counter that separated the waiting area from the rest of the office. “He’s single, never been married, and no children, as far as I know,” she said, her voice low. “I’ve overheard him talking on the phone, and it sounds to me like he came back East to help out his parents, but he’s very disappointed he couldn’t find any college-level openings right away.”
“Why does he have to help out his parents?”
“His father’s been ill. He’s in a nursing facility now, and his mother’s getting on in years. So he moved back home, took a supervisory position last spring in the school district office, ‘just to pay the bills,’ I overhead him say. With his father’s illness, they’ve likely mounted up.”
“So he’s not going to be permanently on staff here, then?”
“Oh, no! Heaven’s no. This is still Mrs. McConnell’s school. Mr. Chesley was sent here by the school district to cover for her temporarily. I spoke to Eleanor just this morning to keep her up to date on everything. She has every intention of returning after her baby’s delivered.”
Most everything else Ms. Jane knew about Clay Chesley she said she’d picked up from a memo the school district had issued to the elementary school staff, announcing his temporary appointment.
“That’s really all I know,” she said with a shrug. “Not much, since we’ve only just started working together.”
Not much? Cripes, this dame would make a hell of a professional snoop. I should hire her as my secretary.
“You can’t. You’re dead.”
Don’t get touchy, honey. Jealousy’ll give a girl wrinkles.
As Ms. Jane went back to her computer, I continued to look out the office’s back windows. Within a few minutes, a large black SUV pulled into a reserved parking slot near the building, and I found myself holding my breath, waiting for the driver to emerge.
The door opened and a tall, well-built man stepped out. He wore a tweed blazer, white shirt, brown corduroys, and a ochre tie. I couldn’t make out his facial features very well, but he had a thick head of golden hair.
Was this the principal? The man threw an overcoat over his arm and strode toward the school entrance. Less than a minute later, I had my answer. Claymore Chesley arrived in a whirlwind, sweeping through the office door without even noticing me in the anteroom.
“Jane,” the man called, snapping his fingers. “I’m back. Anything urgent?”
“Your noon appointment is here,” Jane replied, rising quickly to meet the man. She gestured in my direction.
Principal Chesley half turned, finally noticing me.
“Mrs. McClure,” he said, with a short nod. “I didn’t see
you.”
That’s when I realized two things—the man did vaguely resemble Peter Chesley and I had actually seen him before. He’d been in Buy the Book a few times. I couldn’t recall waiting on him, but I was certain he’d browsed our stacks.
“Give me one more minute,” he said.
Before I could respond, he spun around again, showing me his back as he spoke with the school secretary—some business about a substitute teacher’s paycheck. Then he asked what afternoon appointments followed mine. She ran down the list. Finally, he took a file from Ms. Jane’s hands and half turned toward me again.
“All right, Mrs. McClure, come in,” he said brusquely, waving for me to follow as he swiftly strode through his open office door.
He tossed his overcoat over a cluttered corner table and sat down behind his large desk. Immediately he began tapping on his computer keyboard; his fingers, I noticed, were sans ring—wedding or any other type. Ms. Jane was right. He wasn’t married.
The monitor sat at an angle and I could partially see the screen. He was scanning his e-mails, ignoring me.
The man hadn’t apologized for being late. Nor had he invited me to sit, but there were two chairs across from his desk, obviously meant for visitors. Both had stacks of files, books, and reports on them.
“Excuse me? May I move these?” I asked.
“Sure, just drop them anywhere,” he said waving his hand, not bothering to look up from his screen.
This Alvin’s got the manners of a goat.
“Can’t argue with you there, Jack.”
I picked up the heavy stack of books and reports and looked for a place to put them.
How about this bozo’s head?
“Easy, Jack. He looks like a very busy man. Let’s give him the benefit of the doubt.”
On the other hand, as I nearly wrenched my back bending to set the pile carefully on the floor, I couldn’t help remembering how chivalrous Peter Chesley had been when Sadie and I had visited him.
The Ghost and the Dead Man's Library Page 15