Veiled in Death

by Stephanie Blackmoore

  That is, if Bev agrees.

  I wasn’t sure how my friend and co-owner of the veil would feel about handing it over to Helene, no questions asked. But I’d deal with that conundrum after lunch.

  Tabitha wrinkled her nose. “Helene does celebrate colonial-era history, and I guess she does deserve to have her family’s veil back.” Tabitha must have read my mind. “But I’m afraid she celebrates it for all of the wrong reasons.” She let out a withering sigh. “Not to go all soapbox, but Helene likes to collect artifacts to bolster her claim of being more American than others, whatever the heck that means. When the spirit of Betsy is about inclusion. She understood being shunned when she had to leave her church and not visit her family, for marrying outside of the Quaker faith. She was a working woman, and supported her family. All things that Helene wouldn’t celebrate. It stinks that it really is her veil.”

  “Helene has dangerous and antiquated views, to be sure.” I thought back to the delicate lace. “But be that as it may, I’ll do my best to convince Bev to return the veil. Though it is interesting.”

  “What?” Tabitha went back to playing with the remains of her now half-eaten chili.

  “I knew Keith’s dad died in a car crash when he was thirteen. He told me all about it.” I jumped as Tabitha’s spoon clattered to the hardwood floor with a crash.

  “Excuse me.” She dove under the table and retrieved her cutlery, a warm-looking blush staining her cheeks. “Go on.”

  But she looked like she wanted to be anywhere but here.

  “But what he didn’t tell me was that it was most likely a hit-and-run. And that the veil was taken from the back seat of his father’s car.”

  Tabitha looked at me as if she were staring down the barrel of a gun. “Who told you that?” Her voice was a mere whisper, hoarse and frightened and disbelieving all at once.

  Whoa.

  “Um, Truman?” I clapped a hand over my mouth. Maybe this wasn’t my tidbit to reveal. “Oh. My. Gosh.” I realized with a start that perhaps Keith had never told me the sordid details of his father’s demise because he honestly didn’t know all the lurid details. He was thirteen, and there was a possibility that Helene told him it was a car crash, not a probable murder for hire.

  But the unnatural fear riveting Tabitha’s face bothered me more. “Tabitha, are you okay?”

  “That’s not a widely known detail.” Tabitha seemed to come to her senses and glugged down half a glass of iced tea. She looked around for a moment, then made the paranoid move to kneel on her leather booth seat and peer over the edge into the next little carved-out vestibule. “I’m not sure even Keith knows.”

  Bingo.

  “I’ll admit I was hurt when Truman told me. I thought Keith had kept an extremely important detail about his life from me. But now I suppose it is possible he just thought his dad was in an accident.” I glanced at the pretty antique ring that had come from Tabitha’s family’s store. It really didn’t matter what Keith had told me. I was with Garrett now, the love of my life, and couldn’t worry about that part of my past.

  “Okay, you got me to tell you how I knew. But what about you?” I tried to keep my voice accusation-free as I posed my question to my friend.

  “Mallory.” Tabitha’s voice was low and rough and halting. My heart rate accelerated. She looked like she was about to pass out. “No one other than Truman and some men on the force who have since retired or passed away knew that tidbit about Richard getting struck on purpose. I only know because I saw it.” Tabitha slunk back in the booth, a course of solemn tears running down her face.

  “You what?!” My voice boomed across Pellegrino’s dining room. “Sorry.” I modulated my voice to a whisper.

  Too late.

  Our server appeared with a concerned look on her face. “You two ladies alright? Can I get you anything?”

  I dashed off two orders of razzleberry pie and coffee just to get her to go.

  “How did it happen that you saw Richard get killed?” I tried to keep my voice gentle, and not trip over the last word.

  Tabitha finished dabbing her eyes with her cloth napkin and set it down on the smooth lacquered table with a sigh. “I know even more.” She fiddled with the purple beaded necklace hanging from her neck and twisted the strand until it was nearly a tourniquet. “I knew Richard Pierce was having an affair. And Helene seemingly never knew. I was a nebby thirteen-year-old, and I was poking around in people’s business when I shouldn’t have.”

  “How can you be sure?” This was all over two decades ago.

  Tabitha was a bit shrill. “I knew! Okay?” More of the lunch crowd turned to stare. “I volunteered at the library. I saw them kissing in the stacks. But never could figure it out. It was Keith’s dad, alright. And he was with a dark-haired woman.”

  I nodded. I knew from old pictures that Helene had been a bottle frosty blonde during that era.

  “The day it happened?” Tabitha seemed to muster the courage to go on. “I saw him kiss what looked like the same woman, but I couldn’t really be sure. She was wearing the veil-like shawl. She got in the car with him, and they had a fight. The woman left. Ten minutes later, Richard Pierce got out of the car to smoke a cigar.” She took a steadying breath. “He looked up, met my eyes, and I froze. I didn’t see the other car barreling down the street toward him. It was some kind of nondescript sedan. Someone in a hat crunched right into him. He crumpled to the ground, the car screeched away, and I was beside myself.”

  Tabitha seemed far away, as if she were reliving the horrid event. I reached across the smooth, glass-like expanse of the table and gave her hands a squeeze. They were ice-cold.

  “I never told the police I found Richard outside of the car.” She shuddered. “But I had his blood on my hands. Literally. I went to help him up, and touched his front. I jumped back when I realized my hands were covered in the stuff. And I think it was too late anyway. I don’t know, thirteen-year-old me didn’t think he was breathing. Then I realized I’d wiped all his blood on my jean skirt. I wrapped my hoodie around my skirt, hurried home, and burned it like some vigilante criminal.” Tabitha let out a strange incongruous laugh.

  I watched her with a peculiar and unsettling mix of horror and awe. A thirteen-year-old had the wherewithal to try to help, then realized she should burn the evidence.

  “The police never questioned you?”

  “Obviously some psychopath just did this—should I have waited around to be found?” Tabitha’s voice grew shrill in the face of my subtle accusations. “I know you were once engaged to Keith. Whose side are you on, Mallory?”

  “I wasn’t aware there were any sides to take,” I said evenly, willing my breathing to slow down.

  Tabitha gave a nervous chuckle. “Do you know strange stuff is happening now? Ever since the spring, items keep disappearing at the historical society. Expensive stuff. Valuable, irreplaceable items. I reported it, and Truman ended up giving me the third degree. I know that’s his job,” she conceded. “But every time he came back to my office to try to puzzle out where our artifacts are going, I thought he would spring Richard Pierce’s twenty-five-year-old murder on me.”

  The true weight of her experience hit me like a full bag of laundry. “You’ve carried it all this time?”

  “Yes. I’m the only witness.” Tabitha was utterly miserable. This was a far different kind of emotion than the sadness over her grandmother Claudia’s death.

  Tabitha picked at her newly arrived razzleberry pie. The server had placed the pies on the table with a warmed dollop of French vanilla ice cream running in rivulets through the red-and-blue baked fruit. It looked like blood on snow. Tabitha pushed her plate away.

  “Mallory.” Her voice grew even more serious. “I love history. I love material culture. But I saw a man die over it. That veil is trouble. I want you to get it out of your possession.”

  “I couldn’t agree more.” The veil was seeming more like a curse at this point than a boon. I thought of the psycho
logical damage keeping such a secret had wrought on my friend. I recalled how the Pierces’ machinations and power had ruined good people’s lives. I didn’t want to get messed up in that. I gave my friend’s hand another squeeze.

  Tabitha took in a restorative, if shaky breath, and tried to drink some coffee, but only succeeded in spilling several sloshes on the table. “What I can’t figure out now was how the veil, missing these twenty-five years, got in our shop.”

  “Your mom’s store is the perfect hiding spot,” I mused. “Or someone could be trying to frame you guys. But it looked like that hatbox had been in the basement of the Antique Emporium for a long time.” I stared into space, feeling good enough to eat most of my pie. “What I can’t get is whether what happened at Cordials and Cannonballs had something to do with this.”

  “Dear God, I hope not.” Tabitha was even more subdued. “I don’t envy Truman and Faith.” The wry beginnings of a smile ticked up the corners of Tabitha’s lips for a millimeter. “Just promise you won’t go all Nancy Drew and try to solve this, Mallory.” She held out her pinky and made me swear not to intervene. I joined in her laughter. No way would I touch this. Tabitha’s mirth lasted a few seconds before the present circumstances dragged her expression back into an understandable frown.

  I paid the check and we walked out into the sunshine. I gave my friend a bone-crushing hug. “Let me know if you need anything, Tabitha.”

  My friend blinked in the sunlight. “Just take care of yourself.” Her blinking turned into a genuine wince. “And my little sister, too, now that she’s working with you. And that reminds me. Are you thinking of moving up your wedding? We need something fun and positive to turn this summer around.”

  I gave my friend a genuine smile. “I think maybe we will. And when we do, will you be a bridesmaid?” In all the doom and gloom, my ideas were beginning to take shape. Or course I wanted Tabitha, my first friend in Port Quincy, to be part of the wedding.

  Tabitha smiled and nodded her assent. “I’d love to.”

  We parted on the sidewalk in the clear light of day. I wished the sunshine could cleanse the icky feeling still clinging to me from Tabitha’s revelations. The sunny day was incongruous with the gruesome and weighty tale Tabitha had just burdened me with. I wondered why she kept that secret for all those years. Who was she protecting? Or was she just an adolescent crushed under the weight of that burden, running scared? I thought of sweet Summer. I wouldn’t wish the weight of what Tabitha had witnessed, and buried in her memories for decades, on anyone, especially not someone so young.

  And Tabitha’s admissions complicated the matter. I had a new suspect in the murder of Richard Pierce. Helene could have found out about his affair, called in the hit, and absconded with the veil herself.

  Don’t go there.

  Tabitha’s warning not to sleuth rang in my head. Okay, I wouldn’t dig around. I’d let Truman figure it out. But Tabitha had to tell him what she knew, and the sooner the better.

  * * *

  Tabitha’s revelations weighed heavily on me. I marveled at the gruesome turn the week had taken. What had started out as a time meant for celebration and reflection had turned into a deadly disaster. And I almost felt guilty, realizing that handling such issues in my early thirties was probably easier than trying to make sense of these happenings as a mere thirteen-year-old.

  I drove home on autopilot. I didn’t want to think of cars as weapons and the strange murder my friend had witnessed. I almost cried tears of joy when I spotted my mother’s Prius in the drive. If she felt like she could leave Doug to pay me a visit, then my stepfather must be truly on the mend. Better yet, perhaps he was here with her.

  But only the sounds of my mother’s humming emanated from Thistle Park’s kitchen.

  “Hello, dear.” Carole leaned over from her ministrations on the counter to give me a quick kiss on the cheek. “I made my famous savory biscotti and maple bacon biscuits and thought I’d pair it with a nice jasmine tea.” Her eyes twinkled. “Doug sent me out for a little bit of fun tonight. The dear man thought I’d been spending too much time tending to him with his broken wing.”

  I giggled at Doug’s characterization of his wounded arm and took a bite of the slightly spicy jalapeño and bacon biscotti. “Yum.” I smiled as my mom’s pug, Ramona, danced on her hind legs. The sweet little doggie wore a jaunty navy gingham scarf. The better to match my mother’s own pretty gingham shirt and navy skirt. The outfit looked cute, and somehow Carole avoided looking like a tablecloth. I knew she liked to bring both Doug and Ramona into her clothing coordination mania. Neither the pup nor my stepfather ever seemed to mind. I bet Doug was recuperating at home in navy pants, a navy polo, and slides. I didn’t even try to suppress my smile at the thought. I retrieved the special stash of doggie biscuits I kept in the pantry and rewarded Ramona with her own treat.

  “Now, down to business.” My mother set down the carafe of jasmine tea. “If you truly are going to get married this summer, you need to get busy, honey.”

  I poured a steaming cup and cocked my head. “This summer has been so dreadful so far. I saw Tabitha today, and she thinks getting married soon would be a good way to focus on something positive.”

  My mother nodded vigorously. “And if you can even pull this off, we’ll need to get you your dress.”

  Like a muse that wouldn’t quit, my mind strayed again to the pretty sundress in the Antique Emporium. I could briefly close my eyes and picture the floating and whimsical number. But there was no way I would bother any of the Battles women this week and try to see if I could purchase the dress. I’d let them bury dear Claudia in peace.

  “Just promise me one thing.” My mother’s grumbling broke my dress reverie and brought me back to the present. “We will not be going to that woman’s dress store!” She huffed and didn’t let me interject. “I thought Bev was a pill when she was merely trying to usurp my role as your wedding planner.” She stopped for a sigh and a sip of the fragrant jasmine tea. “Since you’ve ceded that task to Rachel and Pia, I will be in charge of the dress. But there’s no way we’re going to Silver Bells now that that loon is basically accusing Doug of trying to murder Jesse!”

  I frowned. A few years ago, my mom and Doug had hit a bit of a rough patch. I firmly believed my parents’ marriage was currently strong and healthy, and would continue to be so. But Mom had considered, for the most fleeting of moments in her confusion, her old relationship with Jesse. Bev didn’t even really know that my mother had given it any thought. She just knew that Mom and Jesse had legitimately dated decades ago.

  Before I could open my mouth to carefully wade into the fray, there was a sharp tap on the back door.

  “It’s Truman.” I would normally have been happy to see him, but now all I could think of was Tabitha’s confession of sorts. I wondered if Truman would be able to see the strange look that I felt must be written large on my face. But I always did have a decent poker face, and it seemed as if he had made this call for other business at hand.

  “Would you like a cup of tea?” My mom beamed up at the chief.

  “Don’t mind if I do.” Truman drained the delicate serving in nearly one gulp. He must have had an esophagus of steel to not get burned. My throat felt pain in sympathy.

  Truman sighed and plunked his cup back on the kitchen table. “I’m afraid this isn’t quite a social call.”

  Uh-oh.

  “Processing that scene on the reenactment field was a real doozy,” he began.

  “Nearly every reenactor had a gun of some kind. Thankfully, most of them truly were inoperable replicas.”

  I felt a swig of now-tepid tea go down the wrong way. “Most?” I choked out. I didn’t like where this was going. I happened to know a certain person who had explained to Rachel, Pia, and me that his gun was technically usable, though a replica.

  “We found a musket.” Truman let the statement hang in the air. Ramona gave a little doggie whine, walked around the window seat three times, a
nd nestled down for a nap.

  I saw my mother gulp. “You’re basically family now, Truman. But I don’t like where this is going, mister.” My mother stood to add more hot water to the teakettle. She could outsass anyone, but right now her hands were shaking.

  “I’m afraid you’re going in the right direction, Carole.” Truman did appear apologetic. “Doug’s musket had real shot inside, ladies. And the ammo matched the musket balls found in Claudia and Jesse.”

  “That’s preposterous!” Carole stood again, pacing anew. “I double-checked that horrid thing before he even put it in the car. I’m not a fan of guns.”

  “And didn’t you check the darn thing on the field?!” My mind trailed back to the event, and Truman and Faith’s work not only examining each replica weapon, but running metal detection wands over each person.

  Truman nodded, as glum and stricken as I’d ever seen him. “But don’t worry, Carole.” I knew he was obliquely referring to the terrible week right before Christmas when my mother had languished in jail for a crime she hadn’t committed. “I believe Doug. He said he dropped the weapon in the foggy melee. And you’re correct, I checked the darn thing myself. There wasn’t a speck of shot nor gunpowder in it.”

  “So, someone else puts ammo in,” I mused. “Someone who wanted to frame him for shooting Claudia and Jesse. But why?”

  Truman shook his head. “You’re not going to like it, but there are a few reasons why it could be believable.” He looked up as my mother delivered an angry guffaw. “I didn’t say I believe it,” he clarified. “Both Claudia and Doug were shot at close range,” he continued. I believe other witnesses who said Doug was knocked down for most of the reenactment.”

  I set down my cup with shaking hands. “Close range? Doug told me a musket doesn’t have good accuracy. It was like the killer was trying to execute them?” I took in Truman’s wince.