Nell knew not to scrutinize or talk about what Harold actually did. After fifty years of service to the Favazza family, Birdie felt she owed it to him and Ella to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table. And that was that.
“Turn this thing off and come inside,” Birdie said with a wave of her hand. “And I have an exquisite Pinot uncorked and waiting for us. We need to talk, to catch up.”
A half hour later Nell and Birdie were seated on the stone patio that circled out from the house on the harbor side, high above the water. Soft gaslights cast shadows across the granite floor. The two old friends sat in ocean-liner chairs, refurbished and polished until the teak arms were slippery beneath their touch. On a low iron table sat a platter of cheese, crackers, and warm rosemary herb bread, thin slices of smoked turkey, and two glasses of wine that Ella had quietly carried out.
Nell took a sip of wine, then sat back in the chair and pulled her knitting onto her lap. She looked out over the sea. “It’s a perfect night,” she murmured.
Across the harbor, flickering lights reflected off the black water like fairy dust. And where the land snaked out farther, the lights of Canary Cove art colony outlined the galleries and cafés. Music from a small combo on the deck of a bar near Ham and Jane’s traveled across the water to where they sat.
“You can see everything from here,” Nell said. And she knew Birdie did just that. A well-used telescope sat in its sturdy mounting below the patio awning.
“Margarethe and I were talking about that today. I anchor the land on the south, and Framingham Point reaches from here to forever on the north end.”
They both looked northeast, beyond Canary Cove to a chunky piece of land that jutted out into the ocean, surrounded by water on three sides. And at the end of the thumb was the magnificent Framingham home and grounds.
Nell checked her scarf and counted the stitches to be sure she hadn’t lost any. She took a bite of cheese and rested her head back against the cushions. “At times like this, sitting here beneath the sky, the world is soft and peaceful. Safe. Angie’s murder seems so very far away.”
“But nothing’s far away, of course. Everything is still here, hidden in the darkness.” Birdie pulled a shawl around her shoulders.
“I think I dislike the suspicion most of all—these are our friends and neighbors, Birdie, and one of them killed Angie.” Nell looked up at the sky. It was a bright night, with a wash of stars that swept across the blackness like a lacy knit scarf. “We are all looking at one another, wondering, trying to patch together a picture that explains Angie’s murder.”
“We both feel it—that sense of forboding?”
Nell nodded against the back of the chair. “Everything bothers me right now. Things I wouldn’t have noticed before have become ominous somehow—like Gideon and the way he lurks around Izzy’s shop. Tony’s behavior. And all this talk about Angie leaving as soon as she finished a ‘project.’ We need to find out more about what Angie was doing. She lived and walked and talked right in the middle of us, Birdie. And look how little we knew about her.”
“You’re right, Nell. My point exactly. That phone call at Harry’s for example? Now, I don’t mean this in a bad way—I don’t snoop—but there isn’t much that I don’t hear about from someone or another. And if there’d been something going on with a married man, I think I’d have known it.”
“I don’t think she was involved with anyone, Birdie. So don’t worry. Your radar is still intact. From what Harry said, someone wanted to be involved with her. Maybe was obsessed with her. But it clearly wasn’t reciprocated.”
“It’s certainly motive for murder, telling a wife.”
Nell sipped her wine. Yes, that was true. A motive wasn’t very helpful, though, not without a face or person to put it with.
“Everyone has secrets, I guess,” Birdie said. “I think Gideon has a ton of them. And Angie. Tony.” Birdie took a sliver of cheese, put it on a cracker, and handed it to Nell.
“We only know what people let us see.”
“True. Look at Margarethe. She’s as visible as Father Northcutt’s church in this town. But what do you really know about her? She’s powerful. She’s kind and generous. She’s rich.”
“And she protects her son, just like we all would.”
“But she has a past, too. Sonny knew her when she came to Sea Harbor—she was young, eighteen or so. She ran away from home, Sonny said. She told him once the only good thing that ever happened to her before she moved to Sea Harbor was a grandmother who taught her to knit. Knitting saved her life, she said. I tried to ask her about it once, but by then her past was off-limits. It wasn’t worth talking about. She preferred to live in the present with the respect her role called for.”
“She’s like Josie. And Annabelle. Women who have survived, in spite of what they were dealt.”
Birdie poured them each another inch of wine. “I talked to Tony today,” Birdie said. “I saw him go into Coffee’s so I followed him.”
Nell smiled at the image of Birdie traipsing into the coffee shop behind the Framingham heir.
“I asked him what he and Angie were talking about that night in the bookstore. He said Angie was nosing around into things that were none of her business. But the instant he said it, I could tell he wanted to take the words back.”
“So he was telling her to stop whatever she was doing.”
“Yes. He said she wasn’t going to make anything better for anyone, so why hurt people. And then he launched into a short lecture about people making saints out of the dead, no matter what they had done in life. That’s what we were doing with Angie, he said, and we didn’t know what we were talking about. ‘A damn shame,’ he said. And then he pushed back his chair and stomped off like the spoiled boy I remember from years ago.”
“I don’t think we’ve made Angie into a saint, Birdie. But it’s only natural to put the good memories in place when someone dies before you dig up the bad ones. If for no other reason, the family needs that.”
Birdie nodded. “That’s true. But, Nell, darlin’,” Birdie said, “I think Tony may have said one thing right. For good or for bad, we need to know more about what Angie did besides planning an exhibit for the Historical Museum’s fall show. Maybe the time has come to dig in the dirt.”
Chapter 17
Nell’s board meeting at the Sea Harbor Historical Society was scheduled for noon on Wednesday. The small group would have chowder and salads from Elm Tree Catering, the reminder e-mail had read. And they made wonderful chunky chowder. Sweet, with a touch of wine to brighten it up.
But chowder or not, Nell would have attended the meeting. She’d had lunch with Josie Archer on Tuesday and promised her that she’d pack up some pictures Angie had on her desk at work. And if there was anything else personal, she would take that to Josie as well.
But maybe there’d be more than pictures at the museum, she thought. There might be some answers, too.
Nell and Birdie had sat beneath the stars way too long Monday night—but the deep quiet had helped them line up the planets, as Birdie put it. Get their ducks in a row. And Birdie was right. They’d been looking all around Angie for some answers. Now it was time to look at Angie herself and see what she could tell them. And since she’d spent more time at the Historical Society than probably anywhere else, it seemed a good place to start.
Nell walked across the square, pausing at the gazebo where she half expected to see Pete Halloran sitting on a bench, feeding the pigeons while he waited for Angie to take her break from work. His absence was more striking than his presence had been, a stark reminder of recent events.
Pete was still feeling the assault of being questioned by the police, Cass had told her last night. “It’s churning around inside him like a storm,” she had said. “It will spill out eventually.”
The questioning in a stark room at a metal table had almost made that happen, Cass said. He’d been so angry. And it wasn’t because of the questioning. It was becau
se someone had murdered Angie, and no one seemed to know what to do about it.
Nell crossed the street and hurried up the steps to the Historical Society and adjacent museum. Hearing her name called, she turned and looked through her large round sunglasses into the eyes of Margarethe Framingham, dressed today in a knit suit and large hat to shield her face from the sun. The suit was knit of an expensive wool silk blend in a deep rose color. It reminded Nell of the balloon flowers that lined her neighbor’s drive on Sandswept Lane. She resisted the urge to reach out and touch the finely knit garment. Small cables, barely visible, ran up and down the fitted skirt and were repeated in the shawl-collar jacket. She had seen Margarethe working on pieces of the suit at meetings, and the finished product was a work of art.
“Hello, Margarethe,” Nell said. “You look wonderful. I’ll be distracted through the whole meeting, trying to figure out how you managed to knit that gorgeous suit.”
Margarethe smiled. “Izzy played detective to find me this yarn. I don’t know how I survived before her shop opened.” She touched the edge of her jacket. “Fine woven yarn is something to be cherished. It needs to be cared for like a fine piece of art.”
Nell looked again at the fine stitches in the suit, even and not too tight. Margarethe attacked her knitting projects the same way she did civic causes. Sometimes Nell found her energy and purpose a bit obsessive and overwhelming, but she got things done. And if she herself needed to be obsessive to knit a suit as unique as Margarethe’s, she just might consider it.
“I’ve missed a few meetings recently,” Margarethe said, “but it’s time to get back to my responsibilities. It’s been a sad time for us, but our lives go on.”
Nell nodded and followed Margarethe up the steps. Margarethe was right, she thought, but not completely. Moving on fully only came with answers; dust swept under a rug was bound to come out at a later date.
Although several men had joined the board in recent years, today’s gathering was all women, and they gathered around the oval table in the board room where papers and pencils had been neatly spaced, right next to napkins and soup spoons. Beatrice Scaglia sat at one side and, noticing an empty chair next to her, Nell walked around the table and sat down.
The first half hour was routine, the reading of minutes and the treasurer’s report, an update from Nancy Hughes, the director of the museum. It was only after those so inclined had filled their bowls a second time with clam chowder and a platter of lemon bars was passed around the table and emptied in record time that Nancy brought up new business.
Nell cleared her place of food remnants and took out her knitting, scooping up the long tail of her scarf and settling it into her lap. She reached for the second needle and then settled in to listen. The scarf was coming along nicely—nearly four feet of lovely knit sea yarn. A few more feet and she’d be able to wrap it around her neck, as Izzy suggested, and let it flow down across her dress.
“It’s lovely,” Beatrice whispered, pointing at the scarf.
“And I hear you are taking up knitting, too, Beatrice? It’s wonderful therapy.”
Beatrice smiled brightly. “Once I work some more hours into my days, I will consider it,” Beatrice said.
“But you took Izzy’s frogging class.”
“Yes, I did,” Beatrice said. Her tone of voice indicated that the topic was complete.
Nell tried a different one. “Beatrice,” she began, her fingers working the yarn and her tone friendly and conversational, “did you and Sal know Angie Archer well?”
“Of course not,” Beatrice said sharply.
Nancy tapped her water glass with a fork then, and Nell sat back in her chair. She looked sideways at Beatrice. She had slipped on her glasses and her serious-meeting look and was examining the agenda with exaggerated attention. Her voice had been sharp, indicating the discussion of both her knitting interests and Angie Archer were over. Finished.
Beatrice was a conundrum, she decided. For someone so organized, so involved, it seemed quite odd she’d devote time to a class on ripping out stitches before she’d learned to knit and purl. Perhaps it was the calisthenics Izzy had added to the class that intrigued Beatrice. As for Angie, maybe Beatrice didn’t know her, but Sal was another story, and Nell wouldn’t let that one go so easily.
Nancy began speaking and Nell pulled her thoughts back to the meeting.
“I’d like to suggest something today that we haven’t done before, but it seems appropriate,” Nancy said. “We would like to do something to recognize the dedicated work of the late Angie Archer.” She looked up and down both sides of the table and rested her palms on the smooth surface, leaning slightly forward. “I think you all met Angie at one time or another—many of you knew her growing up. This is a terrible tragedy for her family and friends—and for us here at the museum. The staff and I thought a small gesture would be appropriate, if you all agree.”
Nell paused in her knitting. “What a nice idea, Nancy,” she said.
“It’s well deserved, Nell. Angie worked hard.”
The others at the table nodded.
Beside her, Beatrice Scaglia held her smile, but Nell thought her body stiffened slightly.
“Oh, yes. Angie worked hard and was so sweet,” Lillian Ames, a museum volunteer and board member, said. “I would watch her at her computer, listening to her music through those earphones, and researching like a little beaver. I teased her that the earphones would make her go deaf—like me.” Lillian laughed and pushed her thick brown-rimmed glasses up to the bridge of her nose. “But then she would show me all the things she was gathering up, the list of deeds and pictures and things for the exhibit.”
Nell remembered the music that filled Angie’s apartment the night she died. Music was a part of the Seaside Knitting Studio, and even though Angie’s was sometimes too loud, it was at home there. Some people worked better to music, Izzy said, and her iPod and CD player were well used. And it sounded like Angie’s were, too.
Nancy smiled. “Angie was unique, that’s for sure. But a hard worker, and her efforts have left us with a better and more organized library than before she came, not to mention the work she did for the fall exhibit.”
“What exactly was she working on?” Lucy Stevens, a neighbor of Nell’s on Sandswept Lane, asked.
Nell listened for the answer carefully. She knew Angie was hired because of her research degree in library science, and that she was helping Nancy with a special exhibit.
“She was cataloging everything she could find on the stone quarries—stories, deeds, photographs,” Nancy said. “Then pulling it all together for an exhibit we have planned for the fall.”
“Was Angie going to help with the exhibit?” Nell asked.
“You know how we are around here, Nell. Everyone helps with everything.”
“I heard that Angie might not be working here much longer,” Nell began.
“Oh, no,” Nancy said. “We were hoping Angie would stay a good long time.”
“So she wasn’t going to be losing her job?”
“Angie?” Nancy laughed. “Nell, you’ve seen us go through a lot of staff over the years. Part of that’s the nonprofit handicap— we can’t always pay people what they’re worth—and other times it’s because we may hire unwisely. But Angie didn’t seem concerned about the pay, and she was most definitely not an unwise hire. She was good at what she did. Hard working and conscientious. In fact, she went above and beyond the call of duty.”
“And she seemed to like it here, what with the other young folks coming back to town,” Lillian offered, wanting again to be helpful. She looked over at Margarethe and added, “I saw your handsome son come in here the other week to see Angie. They sat out back and talked so seriously, like they were sorting out the world’s problems.”
Nell saw a look of surprise pass over Margarethe’s face. This was news to her as well.
But Nell remembered what Birdie had said. For some reason, Tony thought Angie was up to no good, tha
t her time in Sea Harbor had more sinister motives than helping with a museum exhibit. Tony had even threatened Angie the night she was murdered, so whatever he thought she was doing was serious—at least to him.
“Tony and Angie grew up together,” Margarethe said to Lillian. “They were probably catching up on news of old friends. You know how they do.” She smiled and turned back to the group. “The idea of something to recognize Angie is a wonderful one. Let’s do it.”
The conversation shifted in an instant. Margarethe was a master at it, and Nell admired the gracious way she had of switching topics without Lillian being embarrassed for bringing up a personal subject at a board meeting. But the thought of Tony bothering Angie at work—if that’s what he had done—stayed with Nell.
Margarethe went on. “I think we should buy that walnut display case that we’ve been wanting to exhibit our ship models. We will put a tasteful brass plaque on it that says it’s in memory of Angelina Archer. And her mother will see it every time she comes into the museum.”
“And it will bring her such joy,” Lillian said, clapping her hands.
The Historical Society didn’t have the money for the expensive case that Margarethe Framingham was talking about. Nell knew that from numerous budget discussions. But she didn’t doubt for one single minute that the next time she came into the library for a board meeting, the case would be in the center hall, polished and oiled—and completely paid for by Margarethe Framingham. Fastened to the top would be a shiny brass plaque with Angie’s name on it—a gesture that would, indeed, inject a moment of pleasure into Josie Archer’s grief.
The board meeting ended by two. As the others filed out into the front hall, Nell followed Nancy into her office. She explained Josie’s request.
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