The Paperwhite Narcissus

by Cynthia Riggs

  She hung her sweater on a coat hanger and stowed it in the closet, turned on her computer, and opened the window that faced onto Pease’s Point Way. The office seemed stuffier than usual.

  The morning breeze wafted the smell of the sea and the scent of roses into her office and Martha Jo set to work happily. She could always get a lot done before Mr. Fox arrived and the telephone started to ring.

  After she’d finished typing both letters, addressed the envelopes, stuck on stamps, and tucked the letters under the envelope flaps for Mr. Fox’s signature, she looked at her watch. After ten o’ock. She pursed her lips in mild disapproval. A client was scheduled for ten. Fortunately, he—Martha Jo looked at her calendar and corrected herself—she hadn’t shown up yet. Martha Jo carried the letters to Mr. Fox’s office, knocked on his door by habit, opened the door, paused for an instant to absorb what she was seeing, and then screamed.

  The client, Mrs. Jameson—Calpurnia Jameson—came into the reception area at that moment.

  “What is it?” she said. “What’s the matter? What happened?”

  Martha Jo stumbled out of Mr. Fox’s office and leaned on the doorframe. Her face was paler than usual.

  “Are you all right?” Calpurnia seized Martha Jo’s arm and shook her. “What is it?”

  Martha Jo’s eyes rolled up so only the whites showed. She slid down the white-painted doorframe, and collapsed on the floor.

  “Oh for God’s sake,” Calpurnia muttered. She went to the water cooler, removed a paper cup from the dispenser, held it under the spigot, and pressed the button. Bubbles gurgled to the top of the water jug. Calpurnia carried the full cup of water back to Martha Jo and splashed a few drops in her ghastly face.

  Martha Jo opened her eyes. “Police,” she murmured. “Call the police.”

  Calpurnia helped Martha Jo to her feet and handed her the cup of water. She then went to the open door of Al Fox’s office.

  “Good Lord! I might have known,” she said, loud enough for Martha Jo to hear, and backed away from the room.

  Martha Jo had recovered enough to dial 911. She and Calpurnia waited for the police, Martha Jo behind her desk, Calpurnia in one of the two visitor’s chairs. Both had their arms crossed tightly. Neither spoke.

  The Edgartown police arrived within a few minutes and the ambulance and EMTs came shortly after.

  The officer in charge, a sturdy black woman whose name tag read BARBARA DEMPSEY, came out of Al Fox’s office and turned to Ed Prada, who was on duty that morning. “We need the hearse. Call Toby. And call the state police. Better use your cell phone.”

  “Yes, ma’m,” said Ed.

  Al Fox’s body was lying on its back on his mocha-cream leather couch. The cross-stitched Shakespearean quote in its heavy silver frame was lying on the floor, the glass smashed, the frame bent. Only part of the saying was visible, the part that read, “ … kill all the lawyers.”

  Al Fox’s head was bare, shiny except where it was cut. The resulting flow of blood had bypassed most of his scalp and run down onto the soft leather of the couch. What had not soaked in had congealed in a sticky-looking puddle.

  His face was partially covered by his hairpiece and it became apparent, even before anyone touched the body, that the hairpiece had been stuffed into Al Fox’s mouth.

  The state police declared the law office a crime scene and ushered Martha Jo and Calpurnia out of the building and into the fresh June morning, where they seated themselves on a park bench in the grassy triangle out front.

  “We’ll need to ask you a few questions, Martha Jo,” the state trooper said. “I guess, Mrs. Jameson, we’ll need to talk to you, too.”

  Calpurnia nodded. “Of course.”

  Martha Jo said, “Do you suppose I could go back upstairs and get my sweater? I feel a little chilly.”

  “I’ll get it for you, ma’m,” the trooper said. “Wait right here, if you don’t mind.”

  While they waited for him to return with Martha Jo’s sweater, Calpurnia muttered, “Wonder what the obituary will say this time.”

  “I beg your pardon?” said Martha Jo, her arms wrapped tightly around her sturdy body.

  “Nothing,” said Calpurnia.

  Before Victoria got the call from Casey reporting Al Fox’s apparent murder, she heard from Colley, who sounded almost self-satisfied.

  “You said you know who’s writing those goddamned obits, Victoria. He’s done it again. I’ve got another goddamned one. Obituary number five. Get here right away, will you?”

  Victoria hung up and was about to call Casey to ask for a ride into Edgartown when the phone rang and it was Casey, telling her about Al Fox.

  Victoria explained about the latest obituary.

  “I’ll be right there,” Casey said.

  Five minutes later, they were on their way to Edgartown, siren wailing. Victoria pulled down the visor so she could see in the mirror how her blue baseball cap looked; when she was satisfied, she moved the visor back up and settled into her seat.

  “Five obituaries,” said Casey. “There were only two deaths. Three, now. Not five.”

  “The first was Colley’s tie getting caught in the press,” said Victoria, counting on her knobby fingers. “Hardly a death, but that was the start of the obituaries. The first had him hanged. The second was Ambler Fieldstone’s boating death, and the obituary had Colley attacked by a shark. Candy’s death accounted for two obituaries.” Victoria stopped talking while Casey passed a slow-moving tractor. Then she continued. “The obituary for her nonfatal shooting said Colley had shot himself. Candy’s divinity fudge death was the fourth and the obituary said he’d been poisoned by hospital food.”

  “Wonder what the killer has come up with this time.”

  “The killer can’t possible be the obituary writer,” Victoria insisted.

  “He has to be pretty close to the murder for Colley to get the obit this soon. I heard about Al Fox’s murder less than,” Casey looked at her watch, “less than fifteen minutes ago.”

  Traffic was light, but the few cars they overtook had pulled off to the side at the sound of the siren. They were in Edgartown by the time Casey pulled her jacket cuff back over her wristwatch. She slowed at the school zone and turned right at the jail, which had the most beautiful roses on Main Street, tended by inmates.

  “I’ll drop you off at the paper, then I’m going over to Al Fox’s. Don’t do anything rash, you hear?” When Casey saw Victoria’s expression she added, “They won’t let you anywhere near the crime scene. You’d have to wait in the Bronco. You might just as well talk to Colley.”

  Once inside the building, Victoria nodded to Faith, went through the back door, and climbed the stairs that led to the editorial offices. Only a couple of reporters were at their computers.

  Victoria stopped at the door to the morgue. “Where is everyone? It’s awfully quiet.”

  Charity looked up from the files she was sorting. “They’re covering Mr. Fox’s murder. But Mr. Jameson is waiting for you in his office.”

  Victoria continued down the aisle between the reporters’ desks and stepped into Colley’s office.

  “What took you so long?” he grumbled. “This guy,” he slapped a paper in front of him, “This guy got the obit to me before Fox’s body was discovered. He’s the killer. And you say you know who he is.”

  Victoria shifted the chair at right angles to the window and sat down. “I know who wrote the obituaries. He has a serious something against you, and I need to hear from you what that is.”

  Colley toyed with his beach stone paperweight. “I suppose it’s time I went to the police. Save myself some money.” He glanced up at Victoria without lifting his head. “You and your so-called assistant are costing me as much as my ex-wives.”

  “That’s your problem, not mine.” Victoria settled into her chair. “As you know, I urged you, right from the beginning, to go to the police. However, I’ve changed my mind. It’s not a police matter after all. It’s the writer’s i
dea of a joke. What you thought from the beginning.” She held out her gnarled hand. “Let’s see what he’s said this time.”

  Colley slid an eight-and-a-half-by-eleven-inch sheet folded in thirds across his desk. Victoria picked it up and unfolded it. The message this time was in calligraphy, elegant thick and thin lines and swirls of India ink artistically centered on the page with a border of hand-colored daffodils.

  Victoria examined the border and looked up at Colley. “Narcissus,” she said. Before she read the message, she turned the letter over, examined the back, then held it up to the light. “You know what kind of paper this is, don’t you?”

  “Twenty-four-pound white bond,” said Colley. “High rag content. I suppose you think you’ve found a clue.”

  “The writer is out-and-out telling you who he is.”

  Colley folded his arms over his chest and gazed out of his window.

  “This is different from the others,” Victoria said. “When did it arrive?”

  Colley continued to stare out of the window. “In this morning’s mail.”

  “Was there a postmark?”

  “Buzzards Bay.”

  “That’s where all our letters go if we forget to put them in the ‘Island only’ mailboxes.”

  “For God’s sake, Victoria. Everyone knows that.”

  Victoria continued. “From Edgartown, letters go to the steamship dock in Vineyard Haven. From Vineyard Haven they go by ferry to the mainland, where a truck carries them to Buzzards Bay to get postmarked.”

  Colley sighed.

  Victoria continued. “Once they get stamped with ‘Buzzards Bay’ another truck carries them back to the ferry, the mail returns to the Island, and a mail carrier takes them right back to the same post office in Edgartown—the only post office in Edgartown—where they were mailed in the first place and where the recipient has a post office box.”

  “Thanks for telling me, Victoria. I’ve only lived on this Island for five years.”

  “In other words,” Victoria tapped the letter with a knobby finger, “this was mailed at least two days ago.”

  “Okay, then. Before Al Fox was killed. Which proves conclusively that the killer and obit writer are one and the same.”

  Victoria read from the letter, which was centered like a formal wedding announcement. “Viewing hours for the late Colley Jameson, editor and publisher of the Island Enquirer, who drowned in Uncle Seth’s Pond, are from ten o’lock AM until two o’clock PM …”

  “You don’t need to read it out loud,” said Colley.

  “ … and from seven o‘clock PM until nine o’clock PM at the Rose Haven Funeral Parlor on Friday and Saturday.”

  Colley sighed again.

  Victoria continued. “In lieu of gifts to charity, viewers may bring a daffodil bulb to plant at the edge of the pond as a memorial.” Victoria laughed and handed the letter back to Colley.

  Colley thumped the beach stone on his papers. “It’s not the least bit funny. It’s not clever. It’s stupid.”

  “You do know the myth about Echo and Narcissus?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “No matter,” said Victoria. “Tell me about your wives.”

  Colley sat up straight. “Where did that come from? What do my wives have to do with anything?”

  “From what I understand, your first wife was your college sweetheart. Where is she now?”

  “You’re wasting my time, Victoria.”

  “Bear with me.”

  Colley fiddled with the stone. “She married a petroleum geologist six or seven years ago. She and her husband live in Bartlesville, Oklahoma.”

  “Do they ever come to the Island?”

  Colley shook his head. “Not that I’m aware of.”

  “You’re not paying her alimony, are you? Or child support?”

  “Where’s this leading? Of course, I’m not paying her alimony or child support. We didn’t have children.”

  “Candy Keene was your second wife, right?”

  Colley nodded. “Silly woman.”

  “I assume you’re no longer making payments. To an heir? Child support?”

  Colley turned his back to the desk.

  “Are you?”

  “Certainly not.”

  “What about your third and fourth wives? I know Calpurnia is your fifth. I don’t know anything about the other two.”

  “My fourth ex lives in Majorca on a handsome monthly stipend Al Fox extorted from me, and that he delivers to her. In person.”

  “Delivered,” said Victoria. She glanced up from the notes she had been writing. “I should think you might have learned after two or three wives that you’re not cut out for marriage.”

  Colley looked offended. “They left me. I didn’t leave them. Except for the first one. I should never have divorced her.” He swiveled his chair. “That second marriage was a mistake. Stripper. Artiste. What a phony. Sat around all day in her negligee popping candy into her fat face.”

  “You won’t need to worry about her any longer. Any children with the third and fourth wives?”

  Colley stood up and looked out of the window. “This is getting nowhere, Victoria. If you know the obit writer, come out with it.”

  “I have to be sure, Colley. I don’t want to give you the wrong name and have you riding off in all directions.”

  “Just give me the name and I’ll handle it.”

  “That’s what I’m afraid of. We can go to the police, if you want, but if we do, you’ll be sorry.”

  Colley sat down again.

  Victoria looked at her notes. “You skipped your third wife. Where does she live? And you’ll need to answer me. Any children?”

  Colley sighed. “The third ex is from the Vineyard. She married a guy she went to high school with. They live here in Edgartown with her daughter.”

  “Her daughter, Colley? Or hers and yours?”

  Colley said nothing.

  “We may be able to deal with this quietly, but not if you’re going to keep things from me.”

  “Not my daughter,” Colley said finally. “She was pregnant when she left me. The baby wasn’t mine. I never wanted a kid. The kid was some other guy’s.” He picked up a letter opener and shifted it from one hand to the other. “She swore she’d never slept with another man while we were married.”

  “So you had an argument. She claimed she’d been faithful, you claimed she hadn’t been. And she packed up and left?”

  Colley said nothing.

  Victoria sat for a long while. She looked down at her knobby fingers. She smoothed her worn corduroy trousers. She finally looked up at Colley.

  “She’s now Tom Dwyer’s wife, isn’t she?”

  Colley said nothing.

  “The girl is your daughter. You must know that every time you pass her in the street and see her eyes and her build and the way she walks.”

  Colley turned his chair away from Victoria.

  “How do you deal with your daughter, Colley, pretend she doesn’t exist? Ignore her when you see her? Cross to the other side of the street?” Victoria’s voice was getting lower and firmer. “How can you look at yourself in the mirror?”

  Colley still said nothing.

  “I suppose you never paid child support, did you? Even when you must have become convinced you were wrong. Or are you never wrong?”

  “Now they’re trying to extort college tuition out of me,” Colley muttered, turning back to face Victoria. “When she left me, I offered her child support, even though the kid wasn’t mine.”

  “She was yours. Is yours.”

  “Al Fox wrote up an agreement,” said Colley, “but the ex refused to sign it.”

  “I can imagine what sort of humiliating caveats you and Al Fox cooked up between you.” Victoria got to her feet. “I’ll send you my final bill.”

  Colley tossed the letter opener onto his desk and stood too. “Who wrote the obits?”

  “That’s the last letter or obituary you’
ll get from him.” Victoria pointed to the letter. “That paper is not only twenty-four-pound white bond with a high rag content, but if you’ll look at the watermark it says ‘Plover Bond.”

  Colley sat again. “Cute. Real cute. I should have guessed. That hack writer Dwyer and his vendetta against me. Goddamned fishermen, all of them. Wrecking the Island for the rest of us.”

  “I went fishing with Mr. Dwyer,” Victoria said stiffly. “I caught five blues, and his books are excellent.”

  CHAPTER 17

  Casey had parked in front of the Enquirer and was doing paperwork when Victoria came out of the newspaper office.

  “That was the final obituary,” Victoria said with assurance as she got into the Bronco.

  “I hope you’re right.” Casey turned onto Cooke Street. Every white-painted, black-trimmed house had a neatly maintained picket fence in front, and every picket fence was still swathed in roses.

  Victoria took a deep breath and let it out slowly. When she was a girl, the houses in Edgartown were shabby, except for the captains’ houses on North Water Street. The streets had been paved with crushed scallop shells. She could remember the sound of the crushed shells beneath horses’ hooves as they trotted down to the wharf with a wagon rumbling along behind. Chicory and bouncing bet had lined the streets, not roses. Except for the wild beach roses and the pink ramblers, which tumbled in profusion over her grandfather’s barn, only wealthy people grew roses. Not many wealthy people lived in Edgartown then.

  “Who wrote the obits, Victoria? Have you told Colley yet?”

  Victoria inhaled the sweet-scented air and let her breath out again. “It was an unfunny practical joke, and the joker knows it now.”

  “Most practical jokes are not funny. Who was it?”

  “Tom Dwyer.”

  “The mystery writer? Your fishing buddy? You’re not serious, are you?”

  Victoria nodded.

  “His piping plover recipe sure got tongues wagging. Why the obits?”