Tea and Sympathy

by Carol Cox

  Kate waited for an answer, but nothing came to mind. She threw back the covers and swung her legs over the side of the bed. Her normal method of solving life’s puzzles was to indulge in a round of baking. She couldn’t do that right now, but she had to move around again and get her blood stirring somehow.

  She got to her feet and stood cautiously. To her delight, she felt stronger than she had in days, and her sense of balance seemed to have returned. She slipped on a robe and padded out to the kitchen, where she poured herself a glass of water and took a few sips.

  Carrying the glass with her, she made a circuit through the living room and her studio, grateful to be able to stretch her legs and feel strength returning. Returning to the living room, she paused by the sliding-glass door and looked out into the backyard, gazing at the maple tree silhouetted against a clear blue Tennessee sky.

  A heartfelt sigh escaped her lips. How she longed to be outdoors on such a perfect spring day! A day like this was made for tending her flower bed. The thought of spending hours outdoors planting new annuals and digging her gloved fingers through that loamy earth made Kate feel positively nostalgic. Even pulling weeds would be a welcome activity right now.

  Soon, she promised herself. Turning away from the sliding-glass door, she made her way back across the living room, pausing when she heard a heavy knock at the front door.

  Who could that be? Grateful that she’d put on her robe, Kate fluffed her hair with her fingertips and went to open the door, setting her glass on the kitchen counter as she passed by. Her mouth dropped open when she saw Lawton Briddle standing on their front stoop.

  “I heard through the grapevine you’ve been sick,” he said without preamble. “I wanted to stop by and let you know Lucy Mae and I hope you’re feeling better.”

  “That’s very kind of you, Lawton.” Kate looked at the mayor of Copper Mill, trying not to stare. He was the one who looked as if he’d been sick, his taut features telling of the strain he had been under.

  Kate propped herself against the doorjamb and tried to think of what to say. She wanted to speak to Lawton about the media coverage of the scandal, but she wasn’t sure how to broach the subject.

  To her relief, he brought it up himself without any prompting. “I guess you’ve seen the Chronicle?”

  Kate nodded, glad they had the prickly topic out in the open. “I was just reading some of the articles online.”

  Lawton stared at a point above Kate’s head. “As a politician, you have to get used to being in the public eye. In my tenure as mayor, I’ve been the target of some pretty rough public opinion at times, but this...” He shook his head and drew a deep breath. “They aren’t just criticizing my ideas, Kate. They’re attacking my integrity!” His voice cracked, and he broke off abruptly.

  Lawton pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket and blew his nose. “Must be getting a cold,” he said as he tucked the handkerchief away. He cleared his throat. “I’m grateful for all you’ve been doing on my behalf. Knowing you’ve been looking into things has helped me hang on in spite of all the bad press I’ve been getting.”

  Kate stiffened, dreading what she was about to tell him.

  Lawton rubbed his hands together, looking like his old self. “So what’s the good word? I hope you’re about ready to name the person responsible so I can put this whole mess behind me.”

  Kate’s throat tightened. She hated to deal a blow to a man who had already been knocked down. “There’s a bit of a problem, you see.”

  “You don’t have to go after him yourself, Kate. I know you’re not in any shape to do that.”

  “No, it isn’t that—”

  “A name, that’s all I need. Just give me the name, and I’ll do the rest.”

  “That’s just the trouble,” Kate said. “I can’t do it.”

  “Can’t what?”

  “Give you a name.”

  “What is this? Some kind of confidentiality thing? Come on, Kate, this is my honor we’re talking about! Don’t let some misguided notion of—”

  “It isn’t that at all. The simple truth is this: I can’t give you a name because I don’t know who’s responsible.”

  Lawton’s eyes bulged. “But you said...”

  “I said I’d been looking into the scandal,” Kate explained. “And I’m sure I must have found out quite a lot. But that was before I got sick. And for the life of me, I can’t remember what I learned.”

  “But...but...,” Lawton sputtered like a kettle on the boil. “You must have records of some kind. Didn’t you write things down?”

  “I’m sure I did, but the notebook I use to keep track of things is missing.”

  “Missing,” Lawton repeated in a dull voice. “So you have no idea of who’s behind this thing? No way at all to help me?”

  Kate tried to speak but couldn’t force words past the lump that formed in her throat.

  Lawton stared at her a moment longer, then stepped off the front porch and walked away, looking even more miserable than before.

  Kate closed the door and turned back toward the bedroom, wishing she could somehow recapture everything she had discovered about the fraud case. After seeing Lawton and hearing him speak, she felt more certain than ever that he was innocent. She had to find a way to clear him of this charge!

  Halfway to the bedroom door, she stopped and stared at the couch. Paul wanted her to take it easy, but there wasn’t any reason she couldn’t do her relaxing out here on the couch instead of staying cooped up in their bedroom.

  Kate’s spirits rose at the thought of having a different view to look at. She could plug an extension cord into the outlet, run it over to the couch and still be able to...Wait a minute. In order to be connected to the Internet, she’d also need to be able to plug the modem into a phone jack, and the nearest one to the couch was in the kitchen, too far away to reach her laptop.

  With a wry smile on her lips, Kate shuffled back to the bedroom. As thoughtful as Paul’s gift had been, it did have a couple of strings—or maybe she should say cords—attached. He knew how much she would want to take advantage of the high-speed Internet connection. He also knew she would have to stay in bed to use it.

  Now this was a conniving man! And a loving one. Kate smiled and climbed back into bed, torn between being frustrated over the confinement to her room and feeling loved and cherished by Paul’s gesture. In the end, loved and cherished won out.

  Pulling a small notebook and a pen from the nightstand drawer, Kate opened her laptop again and set about tracking down all the information she could about the men who formed the core group of Copper Mill’s chamber of commerce.

  An hour later, she looked over the notes she’d jotted down and shook her head. Fred Cowan had written a couple of articles on new cold treatments for the Chronicle. John Sharpe had won an award last fall as the best insurance agent in the tri-county area. Other than that, the two men seemed to have kept a very low profile.

  She hadn’t been able to find anything on Clifton Beasley, other than an occasional mention in some of the Chronicle’s archived articles. Even those had only quoted him a couple of times in “man on the street” interviews, where he was briefly identified as a local resident.

  Kate wadded up the notepaper and tossed it on the bed. This was hardly the kind of thing that would help her get to the bottom of the case. She hadn’t turned up one single incriminating detail that would point to any of them being involved. On the surface, it looked as if she could cross all three of them off her list of suspects.

  But someone had committed the crime, she reminded herself. And the chamber of commerce was at the very center of the activity. If none of those three had anything to do with the fraud and the person involved was one of the regular chamber members, there was only one person left...Lawton.

  Kate’s lips tightened. Try as she might to focus the search in other directions, the trail always kept circling back to the mayor. And no matter how certain she might feel about his innocence, she ha
d to have substantial proof to back that up, not just her intuition.

  Feeling a bit grim, she spent another thirty minutes checking into the mayor’s background, then settled back to peruse her notes. She found little mention of Lawton’s early years. After he was elected mayor of Copper Mill, his name turned up more frequently. True to form, Lawton seldom missed a chance to make his opinion known on any matter, great or small. Kate found him quoted in a number of newspaper articles, both locally and around the state.

  The Chronicle, of course, accounted for the majority of the coverage. Kate skimmed through articles that went back to the early days of his tenure as mayor. Although Lawton’s tendency to pontificate shone through, she couldn’t find anything that pointed to him as a lawbreaker. A bit of a blowhard, yes. A criminal, no. At least, not until the current scandal swept across the pages of the Chronicle and through the community.

  So where did that leave her? As far as finding a motive for the crime or a way to exonerate Lawton, she was back at square one. Kate tossed the notebook aside in disgust.

  Chapter Eight

  Hey, beautiful, I’m home!”

  Kate’s heart leaped when she heard Paul’s voice. Even the serious nature of her investigation couldn’t weigh her down completely when the most wonderful man in the world called her his own.

  She straightened her nightgown and ran her fingers through her hair before he walked into the bedroom.

  “How did your morning go? Discover any new Web sites while I was gone?”

  “Your ploy to keep me confined to quarters has worked quite well, thank you. I’ve spent a lot of time online. But I’ll have you know I did get up and move around the house a couple of times today. If I keep improving at this rate, I’ll be back to my normal routine before you know it.”

  Paul chuckled and came over to give her a hug. “That’s music to my ears. I take it you’ve been making good use of the high-speed hookup?”

  “It’s going to be hard to revert to dial-up,” Kate admitted with a laugh. “I’m afraid I’m going to be thoroughly spoiled when the time comes to go back to it.”

  “I know you will, but I also know how much you’ll enjoy going back to the library to confab with Livvy while you do your online sleuthing.”

  “True.” Kate smiled. “Life is more than high speed.”

  Paul dropped a wink. “Right you are. Let me go fix us both some lunch, and then you can tell me all about what you found out.”

  While he went off to the kitchen, Kate slipped out of bed and went into the bathroom to apply a bit of blush and mascara. She looked at herself approvingly in the mirror. Nothing like a dab of makeup to make her look less like a washed-out ghost.

  Paul seemed to agree when he came back with their lunch. “What did you do while I was gone? You look downright perky.”

  “Just happy to have my man around.” Kate batted her eyelashes at him.

  “I didn’t fix anything fancy.” Paul waited until she made herself comfortable, then set the tray on her lap. “It’s just soup, and out of a can at that. But it was quick, and I thought it might be easy for you to handle.”

  Kate inhaled the fragrant aroma of chicken and rice. “It smells heavenly. Amazing how a bowl of soup can seem like a feast when you haven’t had a full meal in a while.”

  Paul waited until she had eaten nearly half of the savory concoction, then he said, “So tell me what you’ve learned during your stay-at-home sleuthing.”

  “Not as much as I’d hoped.” Kate filled him in on the mayor’s visit, her conversation with Livvy, and the results of her research on the chamber members.

  “On the positive side of the ledger, I was able to read up on the situation and get up to speed on what happened. At least I don’t feel like I’m walking in the dark anymore. Not quite so much, anyway.”

  Paul’s forehead crinkled. “Your memory’s still giving you trouble?”

  “Not on long-term things, or even what happened today or yesterday. But there are details from the past couple of weeks that are still fuzzy. It’s as if my brain went on a two-week vacation, and it’s been bothering me to no end.

  “I know I must have dredged up more about this case than I can remember, and I couldn’t stand the idea that the things I’m learning now might slip away as well. So...” Kate fished out a leather-covered binder from under the blanket and held it up.

  Paul studied the notebook with a look of bemusement. “It’s very nice, but I’m not quite sure why the fanfare.”

  “Let me show you.” Kate flipped open the cover. “Since we couldn’t find my notebook, I asked Renee to pick up a three-ring binder so I’d have a place to keep my notes on the case. But instead of getting a simple one at the SuperMart, she went to a stationery store in Pine Ridge and got this for me.”

  She stroked her fingers across the creamy tan cover. “It’s goatskin; can you believe it? I was a little shocked, since I was expecting something bound in plastic, not leather. And I have no idea what it cost. When I asked Renee to get my purse so I could pay her back, she waved it off and insisted I take it as a gift.”

  Paul pursed his lips and gave a low whistle. “That was very thoughtful of her.”

  “I’ve already started using it. Look at this. The notes I made about the chamber members are in a section all their own.” She flipped through the tabbed dividers. “Here’s a list of questions I made while I was reading back issues of the Chronicle. And look at this!” Kate turned to the back of the notebook. “There are clear plastic sleeves to hold clippings and photos, and roomy pockets for bulkier items. There’s even a pen holder so I don’t have to waste time looking for something to write with.”

  She closed the cover and gave Paul a look of triumph. “Everything I’ve learned about this case is filed in here where I can keep track of it.”

  “That’s great, hon. And it was really nice of Renee to go to the trouble of tracking down something that meets your needs so perfectly.”

  “It was indeed.” Kate’s excitement dimmed a bit. “Do you think I should have insisted on reimbursing her?”

  Paul looked thoughtful, then shook his head slowly. “I think Renee intended to bless you with this gift. And we wouldn’t want to take the blessing away from her by not accepting it.” He picked up her soup bowl and prepared to carry it to the kitchen. “I ought to be getting back to work. Is there anything I can do for you before I leave?”

  Kate ran through her mental to-do list before answering. “I can’t think of a thing. I have my laptop, the Internet at my fingertips, and my trusty notebook to protect all my notes and ideas. I’m all set for a productive afternoon.”

  “Then I’ll see you this evening.” Paul leaned over and gave her a kiss, then left the room.

  Kate winced at the clatter when he set their lunch dishes in the sink but reminded herself to be grateful for all his tender care. Her convalescence wouldn’t last forever. In fact, she was feeling so much better, she just might get up and wash those dishes later in the afternoon. Wouldn’t that be a nice surprise for Paul when he came home!

  Pleased by her plan, she listened to him open the front door and called out, “Have a great afternoon!”

  His voice rumbled back to their bedroom, but instead of the farewell she expected, it sounded as though he was talking to someone else. Kate strained to hear but couldn’t make out any distinct words.

  A moment later, Paul poked his head back into the room. “Are you up to company?”

  “Who?” Kate automatically reached for the brush she had left on the nightstand and ran it through her hair. “I’m feeling all right, but I’m not exactly dressed for visitors.”

  Paul chuckled. “I don’t think anyone will be bothered by that but you. It’s LuAnne, and there’s another woman with her. They’re here to visit you because you’ve been sick. No one is expecting you to get all dolled up.”

  “I suppose you’re right. But still...” Kate put down the brush and poked at her hair with her fingertips
to give it a little more shape. “It’s just that I’m not used to being on the receiving end of these visits. Maybe the Lord is trying to teach me something about vanity.”

  Paul’s clear blue eyes twinkled. “I don’t think you need to worry about that. No one would ever classify you as a vain woman. Should I tell them they can come on in?”

  “You might as well.” Kate sighed. “I think this is as good as it’s going to get.”

  Paul gave her a wink that warmed her to her toes. “It’s more than good enough for me, sweetheart. Have a nice time visiting, and I’ll see you tonight.”

  “No, wait a minute.” Kate levered herself off the bed and held on to it until she knew the dizziness wouldn’t overtake her. “Show them into the living room and tell them I’ll be right out.”

  She reached into the closet for her robe and slipped her arms into the sleeves. Then she made a quick detour to take a look in the bathroom mirror. Ick. Despite the dash of makeup she had applied earlier, her skin still appeared pale and sallow, and dark circles shadowed her eyes. Paul had really been stretching it when he told her she looked okay.

  On the other hand, Kate knew he’d been looking at her through the eyes of love. A smile spread across her face, and the eyes staring back at her from the mirror lit up with a bit of a spark. With a lighter heart, she went out into the living room to greet her visitors.

  “How are you doing, darlin’?” LuAnne enveloped Kate in a warm hug. “I apologize for not comin’ over sooner. It’s just that things have been so hectic at the diner lately. It’s slowed down enough that J.B. can cover things pretty well right now, so I thought I’d slip over to see you while I had the chance.”

  “Thanks for taking the time,” Kate said. “I know you’ve been busy.”

  “Busy doesn’t begin to describe it!” LuAnne ran her fingers through her red curls. “To think I’ve worked for Loretta all these years and never realized just how much responsibility she carries on her shoulders. It makes me appreciate her all the more, and I’m sure gonna be glad when she gets home to take over again.”