Chapter Two
“I suppose the police have contacted Pierre by now,” Bettina said. Instead of crossing the street to their own house when Wilfred steered the Mercedes into the Frasers’ driveway, Pamela and Penny had accepted Bettina’s invitation to join her and Wilfred for dinner. The sun had begun to set as Detective Clayborn and Officer Anders completed their interviews, and they’d been glad to escape the shadowy woods when Detective Clayborn told them they were free to go.
Now it was nearly six p.m. and they were enjoying the familiar comfort of Bettina’s kitchen. Pamela, Penny, and Bettina were sitting around the pine table, which had been cleared of cookies and cookie-decorating supplies. Instead it held a half-empty bottle and three glasses of red wine in various stages of consumption. Wilfred was across the room at the stove, the apron he’d neglected to remove for the trip to the nature preserve now serving the purpose for which it was intended.
He was flourishing a long-handled wooden spoon over a gleaming stainless-steel skillet, and the soothing aroma of onions sautéing in olive oil filled the room. “Plenty of food for all of us,” he assured them. “Braised chicken thighs with tomatoes, olives, and capers are just the thing on a dark and chilly night like this.”
Bettina had been uncharacteristically silent. Her face looked drawn and she stared gloomily at her wineglass, but she cheered slightly at Wilfred’s announcement.
“Chicken is usually Tuesday night,” she said. “Rotisserie chicken from the Co-Op. But with Wilfred retired now, we’re eating like gourmets.” A willing but uninspired cook, Bettina had served her family the same seven meals in regular rotation for most of her married life.
“How do you think Pierre will take the news?” Pamela asked.
Bettina shrugged. “She was more in love than he was. Not that looks are everything . . .” Her gaze wandered toward the stove. Pamela agreed with the unspoken thought. Genial Wilfred, with his bear-like physique and ruddy cheeks was truly a prize.
“Pierre will inherit, I suppose.” Pamela took a sip of her wine and glanced toward Penny’s wineglass. Her daughter had taken scarcely a sip.
“No children. Millicent married late in life. I hope there’s a will—she’s leaving behind a considerable estate, including the Wentworth mansion. Millicent’s mother grew up in that house, then moved back in when her parents died. Her mother wasn’t well, and Millicent lived with her and took care of her. Then when Millicent married Pierre, he moved in too. Lots of goodies for people to tussle over, and if that happens the lawyers will get a good cut too.” Bettina sighed. “It’s just so sad . . . nursing her mother all those years and looking after that huge house and she was finally free and ready to downsize—not that she wanted her mother to die . . . but I think the house is already on the market.”
“Do you think Pierre will go ahead with the plans to sell?” Pamela had only met Millicent a few times, so the disposition of her estate wasn’t of compelling interest. But talking about Millicent’s house was at least a slight distraction from talking about her death.
“Probably,” Bettina said. “A big house like that requires a lot of upkeep—and even if there’s plenty of money to pay for it, organizing the upkeep takes time. Not that Pierre has that many demands on his time.”
Pamela raised her brows. “I think you said once that he’s a professor. They work pretty hard, don’t they?”
“Some do,” Penny commented with a slight laugh. “Some don’t.”
“Not exactly a professor,” Bettina said. “Part-time lecturer in French at Wendelstaff College. And not exactly French either. He’s from Montreal.”
* * *
The cheerful voice seemed out of place. Pamela had been struggling to complete a knitting project, a huge swath of fuzzy wool that was somehow to figure in a funeral service. But the voice was assuring her that traffic was moving smoothly at the Hudson River crossings, including the upper deck of the George Washington Bridge. She opened her eyes to darkness. In the summer, the light coming through the white eyelet curtains at her bedroom windows served as an alarm clock of sorts. In the winter, however, she had to rely on the clock radio.
She rolled onto her back, stretched out an arm, and switched on the lamp on the bedside table. A soft form stirred at her feet, migrated up the side of her leg, and inched its way delicately across her torso. It eased its head out from under the down comforter that Pamela used on chilly winter nights. Two amber eyes stared at her from a heart-shaped face covered with silky jet-black fur.
“Catrina,” Pamela murmured. “Good morning! Where are your children?”
This pleasant daily ritual was interrupted by a forlorn voice coming from the hall. “Mo-om!” Penny moaned. “Someone’s coming up on the porch and I think it’s reporters.” Catrina scrambled off the bed and hurried to the bedroom door. If someone was stirring, there would be breakfast soon.
But Pamela’s thoughts were less cheerful. It was barely seven a.m. What nerve reporters had! She flung comforter and sheet aside, sat up, swung her feet to the floor, and thrust them into her waiting slippers. A moment later, she had grabbed her robe and was hurrying down the stairs. She had just reached the landing when the doorbell chimed. She grabbed the railing to steady herself and continued her descent.
The porch light revealed a perky young woman bundled in a neon-green down coat with a fur-trimmed hood. “Marcy Brewer, from the County Register,” she announced, tilting her head to meet Pamela’s eyes. Despite her high-heeled boots, she was scarcely five feet tall, but her lipsticky smile and confident voice signaled that she was accustomed to getting her story. “Is Penny Paterson in?”
“Of course she’s in,” Pamela said, not bothering to soften the frown that she knew had furrowed her forehead and drawn her brows together. “It’s seven a.m. And she doesn’t wish to speak to the press. She doesn’t have to, you know.”
Marcy Brewer’s smile didn’t waver. “I take it you’re her mother. Perhaps she’d like to answer for herself.”
Pamela willed herself to look fierce. “You’re right. I am her mother, and I know what’s best for her.”
“Will she be having a follow-up interview with the police today?” The smile was still in place.
“I expect so.” Pamela stepped away from the door and pushed it closed.
In the kitchen, Penny had already set out a bowl containing several scoops of cat food. A black kitten was finishing his meal and Catrina joined her son. Penny was sitting at the table, still in her nightclothes, a fleecy pink robe tugged on over flannel pajamas. Her dark curls were still tousled from bed. She held a cat on her lap, the ginger kitten Pamela had adopted from the litter of six Catrina had presented her with at the end of the previous summer.
“She’s getting used to me,” Penny said, running her fingers over the kitten’s fur. “She slept with me last night.” The kitten’s father was an impressive ginger tom and his three daughters had inherited his looks. Pamela had accordingly named the kitten Ginger. But being an avid cook and with all three ginger kittens underfoot till recently, Pamela had decided the coats of supposedly ginger cats could be better described as pumpkin pie—or butterscotch.
“You wouldn’t have wanted to talk to Marcy Brewer from the County Register, would you?” Pamela asked. After she closed the door, she had realized maybe Penny was old enough to make such decisions for herself. What if something like this happened while she was at college? (Pamela shuddered at the thought.) Her mother wouldn’t be there to protect her.
“No,” Penny said. “I’m glad you chased her away.”
“Did you sleep all right?” Pamela lowered herself into the chair across the table from Penny and studied her daughter’s face. Penny’s blue eyes were bright, but purplish shadows beneath them suggested her slumber had been less than restorative.
“I kept waking up, and then I’d see—” She grimaced. “And I kept wondering how she died. It wasn’t obvious. She was just lying there. And the policeman led me away while the pol
icewoman sort of studied . . . the body. I guess they’re not supposed to touch anything or move anything in case there are clues. That is, if they decide it’s murder. But they must have, because then they called for more police—” The fingers stroking the kitten’s back began to move more rapidly.
“And that van came from the sheriff’s department,” Pamela supplied. “Bettina will talk to Detective Clayborn,” she added. “Then we’ll find out more from her.” She stood up. “But for now, how about some coffee and toast?”
“Did you see the Register out there when you opened the door?” Penny asked.
“I’ll get it now,” Pamela said. “At least if Marcy Brewer is gone.”
* * *
There was no reason, really, for Pamela to care if Richard Larkin saw her in her robe and slippers. The long fleece robe that reached nearly to the ground concealed more than a coat would. True, a fleece robe and furry slippers didn’t constitute the most flattering of looks. But despite Bettina’s urging to the contrary, Pamela refused to dwell on Richard Larkin’s romantic potential. He was unattached, and a suitable age, and certainly attractive. But she preferred to consider him a neighbor with whom she had a cordial but detached relationship.
Now he stepped away from the back of his olive-green Jeep Cherokee—he’d apparently just been loading something into the vehicle—and caught sight of Pamela. He raised an arm in greeting and took several loping strides in her direction. He was wearing slim dark pants and a bulky jacket, also dark. Despite the chilly morning, his shaggy blond head was uncovered. Pamela had just stooped to retrieve the newspaper and it was dangling from her hand in its flimsy plastic bag.
“Are you and Penny okay?” Richard gestured toward the newspaper. “It’s been on the radio, and TV too, of course.” His face could look so stern, with its strong features and deep eyes. But probably he didn’t mean to look stern now. He was just concerned.
“We’re fine,” Pamela said, tilting her head back. Richard Larkin was very tall, and being tall herself Pamela wasn’t used to looking up at people.
“If there’s anything I can do . . .” He hovered there uncertainly, his eyes fixed on her face. Then he spoke in a sudden rush of words. “I wish Laine and Sybil were here,” he said, and his face relaxed as if he was relieved to have found a conversational topic. “It might help Penny, to have her friends next door. But they’re spending the Christmas break in San Francisco with their mother.”
“I wish they were here too,” Pamela said. “This is going to be hard.”
“Well, if there’s anything . . .” He started to turn away.
“Thank you,” Pamela said. She watched him lope back to his car. But she was not to return to her warm house quite yet. Bettina was waving from the end of her driveway. She waited while Richard Larkin backed out and headed up the street and then she started across.
“I’m seeing Clayborn in an hour,” she called before she reached the other side. “The first item on his agenda.” She joined Pamela at the end of Pamela’s front walk. “He’s as anxious as I am to get the story into this week’s Advocate. Even though Millicent lived in Timberley, it’s Arborville’s case because Arborville is where the body was found.”
Pamela tucked the Register under her arm and hugged herself, rubbing her hands up and down the sleeves of her fleece robe. She was shivering. Her morning routine of fetching the Register in robe and slippers usually just involved a quick dash out and back. Bettina was already dressed for the day, her pumpkin-colored down coat topping off burgundy slacks complemented by sleek burgundy booties. She’d pulled a burgundy wool beret over her bright coiffure.
She intercepted one of Pamela’s hands to give it a squeeze. “Are you and Penny okay this morning?” she asked, tipping her head to examine Pamela’s face.
“Really weird dreams.” Pamela smiled a sad half smile as she recalled the hand-knit funeral shroud she’d been tasked with by her dreaming mind. “And Penny looks tired. But we’ll be fine once we’ve had some coffee. Do you want to come in? I’m just going to make some.”
“I can’t linger.” Bettina released Pamela’s hand. “I’ve got to stop by the Advocate’s office before I go to the police station.” She turned toward the street but then swung back. “That was nice of Richard to take the time for a little chat. Even from my yard I could see he was concerned.”
“Any neighbor would be,” Pamela said in a tone designed to discourage further development of that theme.
Bettina got the message. “Well then,” she said, “I’ll be on my way. But I’ll be back with a report just as soon as I finish with Clayborn.” She paused. “And don’t forget Wilfred Jr. is dropping by this morning to pick up the black kitten for his sons.” She turned back toward the street, but she didn’t move, and neither did Pamela, at least for a minute.
Heading toward them from the corner was a truck bearing the logo of the local TV station. “Oh, no,” Pamela moaned. “I already chased away that Marcy Brewer from the Register this morning. Now . . . them.”
“I’ll take care of it!” Bettina tightened her lips into a stern line. A slight wrinkle appeared between her carefully shaped brows. “You get yourself into the house.”
* * *
Back inside and still bearing the plastic-wrapped Register, Pamela watched through the lace that curtained the oval window in her front door as a young man and a young woman descended from the truck, to be met at the curb by Bettina. The expressions on their faces suggested that they were very reluctant to abandon their assignment. But Bettina stood firm and eventually they climbed back into their truck and went on their way.
Penny had joined Pamela as she watched, now cuddling the black kitten against the pink fleece of her robe.
“Wilfred Jr. is coming for that kitten this morning,” Pamela said as they turned away from the window. She reached an arm around Penny’s slim shoulders and gave her a squeeze.
Back in the kitchen, Pamela deposited the Register on the kitchen table. Its account of the body found in the Arborville nature preserve could wait until they had been fortified with coffee and whole-grain toast.
Accordingly, Pamela’s next action was to measure water into the kettle and set it to boiling on the stove. Then she slipped a paper filter into the plastic cone balanced over the mouth of the carafe and scooped coffee beans into the chamber of her coffee grinder. The coffee-making ritual was detailed and time-consuming, but it was a ritual. And predictable rituals were soothing when events like that of the previous day reminded one how unpredictable life could be.
With a clatter and a whir the beans were ground, and the aroma of coffee began to infuse the kitchen. Pamela spooned the fragrant ground beans into the paper filter just as the kettle began to hoot, and soon the coffee aroma grew more intense as the boiling water dripped through the ground beans into the carafe beneath.
Penny meanwhile had set down the black kitten, who had begun tussling in a half-hearted way with his bold sister, as if acknowledging that he was overmatched right from the start. Penny had taken cups and saucers from the cupboard, a pretty pattern featuring rose garlands. The cups and saucers were from Pamela’s wedding china. She had resolved long ago to use her china every day because what was the point of having nice things if they just sat in a cupboard except for a few days out of the year?
As the coffee dripped, Pamela slid two slices of whole-grain bread into the toaster.
By the time the toast had popped up and was buttered, cut into neat quarters, and set on the kitchen table, Penny had extracted the Register from its plastic sleeve and unfolded it. Right there on the front page was the succinct headline: “Timberley Woman Found Dead in Arborville Nature Preserve.” The thought of toast was suddenly not appealing, but Pamela fetched the carafe from the counter and filled each of the wedding-china cups.
“The article talks about me,” Penny said, looking up with a woeful expression on her pretty face. “‘Police told reporters that the body was found by Penny Paterson of Arbor
ville, who stated she was home from college for Christmas and had gone to the nature preserve on a sketching expedition.’”
Pamela slipped around to Penny’s side of the table and leaned over her shoulder to skim the article, waiting while Penny turned to an inner page for the continuation. A few sentences into the first paragraph on that page, Pamela heard herself gasp, and the sharp intake of breath was quickly echoed by Penny.
“Someone shot her,” Penny whispered.
Pamela nodded. She quoted from the article. “‘Police stated that the victim died from a gunshot wound to the chest. The medical examiner’s report is expected to provide further information about the specific type of weapon used.’”
“I couldn’t tell she’d been shot,” Penny murmured, near tears. “She was lying on her side and her coat was kind of bunched up in front. Besides, I didn’t really want to look.” She sniffed a huge sniff and Pamela rested a hand on her back. “I have to talk to the police again. Eleven o’clock, they said. But I don’t know what else I can tell them.”
“They’ll want to know if you saw anyone, I suppose. Or any clue, like a car down by where that path leads in.” Pamela had returned to the other side of the table. She reached over the newspaper to take Penny’s hands. “I’ll come with you,” she said. “Of course.”
Penny sniffed again, but sat up straighter, suddenly resolute. “It’s okay, Mom,” she said. “I can go by myself. I know where the police station is.”
“But . . .” Pamela felt her face pucker. “I’m your mother, and you’re only—”
“I’m nineteen,” Penny said, sitting up even straighter, “and I’m in college . . . on my own . . . all the way up in Massachusetts.”
Pamela nodded. It was true. She’d been willing to let Penny go away for college—because her own parents had let her go away for college—even though that meant she’d be all alone in her big house. But Penny hadn’t inherited Pamela’s height, taking after her father’s side of the family instead. Pamela was a full head taller than her daughter. That made it especially hard for Pamela to rein in her protective impulses, especially because Pamela and Penny had been their own small family since Michael Paterson’s death six years earlier.
Silent Knit, Deadly Knit Page 2