We Wish You a Merry Murder

by Valerie Wolzien

  “No one. So tell me how they met.”

  “Oh, well; it sounds like a rather tacky shipboard pickup if you ask me, which, fortunately, Claire didn’t. According to her, she was standing at the rail of the boat late one night, watching the reflection of the full moon on the water, when he came up to her from behind and introduced himself, confessing to admiring her for the entire journey but only now getting up the courage to speak. I ask you!” Susan rolled her eyes. “That man is making her act like a teenager!”

  “So it wasn’t until late in the trip that he introduced himself?” Kathleen asked.

  “Yes. The tour went from Athens, around the Aegean Sea, and out to Egypt. They spent three nights in Istanbul, and then headed back out in the Mediterranean. It was before they got to Egypt that he spoke to her.”

  “And then they came home early.”

  “Yes, the ship was scheduled to spend five days going down the Nile, but she and Dr. Barr decided to skip that and rush home to tell her loved ones about their engagement.”

  “That’s not right, Susan.”

  “Huh?”

  “You’re jumping the gun. They weren’t engaged when they arrived.”

  Susan thought about that for a moment. “No, I guess you’re right; they weren’t. Although Claire was obviously ready to say yes to anything he suggested. I suppose Jed should be happy Dr. Barr suggested marriage instead of running off to a commune in New Mexico.”

  Kathleen allowed herself a chuckle before getting serious again. “So why did they come home early?”

  Susan opened her mouth to answer before realizing that she didn’t have an answer. “I don’t know. I really don’t know.”

  “But she must have offered some explanation. She didn’t just call and say she was coming early, did she?”

  “You know,” Susan began slowly, “that’s exactly what she did do. I was so busy cleaning and getting ready that I didn’t think about why.”

  “And you haven’t asked since then?”

  “No.” Susan shrugged. “She was here, the house was cleaned, her damn diet food was filling up the kitchen. I really didn’t worry about anything else.” If she sounded a little defensive, it was because she felt slightly guilty. She had been letting a lot just pass over her; she had to admit it.

  “Why should you have?” Kathleen soothed her. She had stood up and was staring out the window. The phone on the coffee table rang, and she reached over to answer it.

  Susan got up, planning on going to the kitchen to talk with Kathleen’s mother and, at the same time, give Kathleen some privacy. But the call ended before she was out the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  Susan turned around and discovered that a look of complete happiness had supplanted the musing look on her friend’s face.

  “I was going …” She gave up the thought as unimportant. “What are you looking so thrilled about?”

  “Oh …” Kathleen paused—as if to remember what had given her so much joy. “That call,” she explained. “It was about Jerry’s Christmas present.”

  “What are you getting him?” Susan asked, thinking that the sheepskin coat she had ordered for Jed, while appropriate, wasn’t going to give anyone the happiness that the thought of this particular gift was evidently giving Kathleen.

  “It’s a surprise,” Kathleen answered. “Now what were we talking about?”

  “The murder. How could you forget? Kathleen, was that call really about Jerry’s present?” She couldn’t believe that Kathleen’s mind had wandered so far and so fast. And where to?

  “Oh, yes. Well, I’ve given it all a lot of thought and I certainly haven’t come to any conclusions.” Kathleen fiddled with the cord of the phone while speaking.

  Susan stared at her friend. She’d just been given the brush-off. She blinked twice and opened her mouth once before anything came out. “I’ll say good-bye to your mother before I leave. By the way, what time do you want us for dinner?”

  “I—I’m not sure. Ask my mother.”

  “I’ll do that.” She hesitated again. “Bye?” It was almost a question.

  “Bye.” It was automatic. Susan headed for the kitchen. Maybe Dolores had some ideas about this present that was so remarkable even its giver was struck dumb.

  But Dolores professed to know nothing and, after a perfunctory conversation about plans for the evening, Susan found herself back in her car with absolutely no idea where to go or what to do. It was Christmas Eve. After running around all week, her shopping was done, most of the meal for tomorrow prepared, everything was wrapped and decorated. Since the family’s traditional oyster stew feast had been replaced by Dolores’s dinner tonight, Susan found herself uniquely unoccupied. She wanted to do something Christmassy, but wondered if she was bound to go on investigating the murder. After all, as soon as the body was found, Kelly probably would be arrested and—

  The answer was staring her in the face. She would go home, collect one of the half dozen fruitcakes that had been aging in the back of her linen closet, and take it to Kelly. Two birds with one stone. She smiled to herself.

  She was still smiling when she walked up the path to Kelly’s house, beribboned fruitcake in her hands. The door chime played the first four notes of “Silent Night,” an innovation she hadn’t noticed at the cookie party, and she waited for Kelly happily. Then the door opened.

  It was probably a good thing Rebecca had abstained from alcohol last night, because Kelly appeared to have drunk her share and another person’s besides. She was obviously hung over—or possibly in the later stages of a fatal illness.

  “That damn bell,” she stated, feebly pulling open the door and leaning against it. “Oh, Susan. Good to see you. Come on in.”

  Susan had to push Kelly aside gently to carry out her wishes, and, once inside, she had to turn around and pull the door closed after her. Kelly appeared unable to move.

  “I think I have the flu—or something.” Kelly leaned against the wall and closed her eyes.

  “ ‘Or something,’ I believe. How much did you have to drink last night?” Susan asked, taking her hostess gently by the arm and leading her into the living room.

  “Drink? I don’t drink,” Kelly protested, sitting down in one of the plaid chairs in front of the fireplace.

  “Maybe you had some eggnog last night?” Susan suggested quietly, remembering the quarts of bourbon that had gone into that white, fluffy beverage.

  “Yes, and it was delicious, Susan. You must give me your recipe. But I didn’t have more than a few cups of eggnog. I have to admit, though”—she giggled as girlishly as a woman over forty can—“that I fell for Jed’s punch. I must have had five glasses. I asked him what was in it, and he told me the secret ingredient. I don’t think I’ve ever had maple syrup in a drink before.”

  Or so much alcohol, Susan thought, giving up trying to figure out just how many pints of eighty proof Kelly had consumed. No wonder she was feeling terrible. “What did you think about the food?”

  “Food! I didn’t have any food. I was much too upset to eat anything.” Kelly closed her eyes after this protest.

  Susan, left on her own, looked around the room. A large white pine stood before the bay window, perfectly decorated and surrounded by wrapped presents. A large one at the front of the pile was topped with an unusual and gigantic gold star. Susan glanced at Kelly and then, deciding she was asleep, got up to take a closer look. It appeared to be some sort of complicated origami. She was just wondering if Kelly had made it herself when she noticed the gift tag on the present: to evan. with love from kelly.

  Susan sat back on her heels and stared at the words. Wasn’t it a little unusual to have a gift for your ex-husband under your Christmas tree? Especially if he was dead? She opened her mouth to say something when the long box next to it caught her eye. The gift was obviously a tie; the tag was identical to that on the first gift she had looked at.

  Susan carefully shuffled through the gifts under the tr
ee. One and all, absolutely, positively, each one, was from Kelly and for Evan. What could it mean? Was Barbara right in suggesting that Kelly was crazy?

  “Susan?”

  She spun around, knocking a tiny tin angel off the tree. “I was just admiring your tree.” Susan picked up the ornament and rehung it while speaking. “I love these bows; they’re made out of paper or something, aren’t they? Or origami?” she added, when Kelly didn’t answer.

  “No,” Kelly said finally. “They’re not origami. They’re German. I learned how to make them in Europe a few years ago. Why were you going through my gifts?”

  “They’re all from you to Evan,” Susan said, wondering if she would get a response.

  “Yes. I’ve been buying them ever since last fall. Well, not quite that early. Since a little before Thanksgiving, though.”

  “Why?”

  “Why?” Kelly seemed surprised by the question. “Because I love him. I always buy him a lot of presents. Don’t you buy things for Jed?”

  “Yes, but …” Well, what would she do if, God forbid, Jed died right before Christmas? Pull his gifts out from under the tree? But she was married to Jed, she reminded herself, before she accepted Kelly’s actions as normal. And, if Jed had left her for another woman, she certainly wouldn’t give him a colored paper clip for Christmas, to say nothing of this extraordinary haul!

  Kelly seemed able to read her mind. “I told you that he was going to come back to me, didn’t I? I thought it would be before Christmas.”

  “But—but you saw his body in this room. You were with me. You know that he’s dead.” Susan insisted on some sort of sanity.

  Kelly’s eyes filled with tears. “That wasn’t supposed to happen, Susan. I didn’t know what to do. So I just continued on with the way everything was planned. I even bought gifts for all Evan’s business acquaintances. He insisted on nice gifts for everyone who did business with him and he always trusted me to buy them for him. Look!” She leapt up with more energy than Susan would have thought she had and opened a large built-in cupboard next to the fireplace. “Look!”

  And Susan looked. There must have been thirty brightly wrapped gifts, stacked carefully in the space, each one labeled, each one tied with that distinct star-bow. But there was something unusual here. “Kelly, I didn’t know—” she started to say when the front door opened and Elizabeth and Barbara walked into the house, arguing as they entered.

  THIRTY-TWO

  They stopped arguing long enough to attempt to draw Susan into the fray.

  “Susan, thank heavens you’re here. This woman and Rebecca have gone completely crazy. They are talking about filing some sort of police report charging Kelly with kidnapping Evan! You have to stop them!” Elizabeth insisted, pushing her silvery hair out of her face as she spoke.

  “I … ? How could I …” Susan began, then her glance caught Kelly’s face and she stopped. “Watch out! I think she’s going to faint!”

  “No. No.” Kelly put out a hand and leaned against the mantle. “I’m okay. It’s just this damn flu.”

  “Flu!” Barbara hooted loudly. “You’re hung over. I saw you slurping up Jed’s punch last night. The way you were drinking, you’re lucky you’re not dead.”

  Elizabeth did not rush to her friend’s aid as quickly as Susan would have expected. In fact, that last comment seemed to have stopped her in her tracks.

  “Dead?” Kelly repeated, pushing her headband back slightly. “Who said anything about dead?”

  “No one. No one said anything about anyone being dead,” Elizabeth insisted, loudly and unconvincingly. She looked around the room. Susan was still sitting on the floor near the tree, Kelly was clutching the mantel with one hand and her head with the other, Barbara was standing in the doorway with her mouth open, staring at Elizabeth.

  “You know, don’t you?” Barbara asked. “How did you find out?”

  “Find out?” Elizabeth repeated the phrase.

  “Find out that Evan’s dead,” Barbara elaborated.

  “That Evan’s—” Susan started. “Hey! How do you know?”

  “Why don’t you ask her how she knows?” Barbara countered the question.

  “How do you know that I know?” Elizabeth asked, smiling.

  “Oh, Evan!” Kelly wailed, threw herself down in a chair, and began to sob. “Oh! It hurts my head to cry!” She did so anyway.

  Susan sighed and got up from the floor. “So how does everybody know?” she asked, picking a piece of tinsel from her slacks.

  “Well, I don’t know about everyone else, but Rebecca told me,” Barbara said, coming into the room and sitting down.

  “And who told Rebecca?” Elizabeth asked. “The night of the party she and Evan gave, she was swearing loudly that Evan was called out of town on business.”

  “Well, I only know what Rebecca told me,” Barbara began. “But she didn’t have any reason to lie. She was very upset. Remember, she loved Evan. She was married to him.”

  “Not as long as I was. And they weren’t going to stay married very long. I know Evan and I would have gotten together again if someone—if someone hadn’t killed him,” Kelly perked up long enough to add before again melting into tears.

  “Let’s go back to the beginning,” Susan urged, sitting down in a chair and waving Barbara and Elizabeth to do the same. “I gather you both know that Evan is dead. Right? Right. So how did you find out—and how did the people who told you find out?” She had expected Barbara to answer first, but Kelly surprised her by speaking up.

  “I told her about it. Elizabeth, I mean. I needed someone to talk to yesterday, and it just burst out. I know I wasn’t supposed to say anything to anyone, but I couldn’t bear it alone anymore.” Her crying continued.

  “Is she going to cry all day? She’ll dehydrate,” Barbara said unsympathetically.

  “She’ll be fine. After all, she’s had more than a week to get used to the idea of losing her ex-husband. Not that he was even hers to lose,” came a voice from the doorway. Rebecca followed it.

  “To continue this little expose, I told Barbara about Evan’s death.” Rebecca sat down.

  “Who told you?” Susan asked quickly.

  Rebecca looked at her appraisingly. “Very good. You’ve been keeping track of what’s going on, haven’t you?”

  Susan was more than a little offended by the surprise in the other woman’s voice, but she worked not to show it. “So who did tell you?”

  Rebecca sighed. “The twins. According to them, they saw the body before you and Kelly found it. I’m afraid they broke into Kelly’s house looking for something to drink after the bartender shooed them away from his supply. They said Evan was sitting in the chair, shot, and, when they saw him, they panicked and took off. Thomas suggested that they run around in circles in the backyard to obliterate the tracks from the shed to the house.”

  “Why?” Susan asked.

  “I asked that, too. They claim that they were trying to protect me, that they thought tracks from one house to the other might implicate me in the crime, but my guess is that the excuse came to them later. They were probably afraid someone would accuse them of murdering Evan.” She shrugged. “Neither of them is very honest, I’m afraid. And they really didn’t get along with Evan very well.”

  “Why not? Evan always seemed to be trying to help them—looking for summer jobs for them and all that …” Susan ended her question lamely.

  “They felt that he was just trying to get them out of the way,” Rebecca answered.

  “He probably was,” Kelly said. “After all, Evan never wanted to have any children of his own. He always said they were a distraction and ruined any chance for a decent life-style.”

  “I’m sure they didn’t kill him,” Rebecca insisted. “And he did love my boys,” she added, with less conviction.

  “When did they tell you about—about finding him?” Susan asked.

  “Late that night—long after the guests had left. Oh, I really didn’t belie
ve my own tale about him dashing off to a business emergency,” she said, seeing the look on Susan’s face. “But I really had no idea of how to account for Evan’s disappearance. The last I saw of him, he told me that he was going to the bedroom to make a quick business call, that some sort of emergency had come up, and that he would tell me about it later. He told me everything about his business,” she went on, almost sneering at Kelly. “We were business partners, you know.”

  “We were partners in life,” Kelly answered smugly.

  Susan would have leapt between them to avoid some sort of hair-pulling, face-scratching contest, but there was something more important on her mind. “Is that exactly what happened? Evan didn’t get a call from the office or anything? He said he had to make a call?”

  “Yes, exactly.” Rebecca shrugged, seeming to think the distinction was unimportant.

  “And you didn’t see him after that?” Susan asked.

  “Are you accusing Rebecca of luring him over to Kelly’s house, shooting him, then dashing back through the snow to continue to play hostess at her party?” Barbara asked.

  “Well, she could have done it, couldn’t she?” Elizabeth argued. “After all, her own sons thought it was a possibility.”

  “You didn’t see him again after that?” Susan repeated her question, glaring at the two women. “You never saw him dead?”

  “I—”

  “You don’t have to answer that.” Barbara rushed to her friend’s defense. “What right does she have to ask you questions about this?”

  “What reason does she have not to answer?” Susan slashed back.

  “There’s no reason to hide this anymore. The truth might as well come out now,” Rebecca said quietly.