“Especially Ray,” I teased.
She blushed again and wished me a firm good night.
Chapter 31
I was still smiling when I climbed the front stairs. I got a kick out of Aunt Ibby’s casual mention of an expected phone call from Ray Temple, and I’d certainly be interested in what the twins might have to say about their nephew and Lucy attending a play on the night of the murder. Also, as attractive as my aunt apparently is to gentlemen, I’d like to know what the twins have to say about the reason for Eddie Symonds’s happy hour back-door visit, and I still intended to check further into Eddie’s reading habits. I’d surely try to drop in on the next morning’s meeting. I might learn the answers to several questions.
With O’Ryan still close beside me, I unlocked the door to my kitchen. He didn’t even attempt to use his cat door, but waited for me to go inside. Then he sat on one of the tall stools beside the counter, watching me while I double-checked the contents of the refrigerator. Satisfied that dinner prep could be achieved fairly easily, I reached over and patted his fuzzy head. “Are you worried about me, big boy?” I whispered. “That’s okay. I’m a little bit worried about me too, and I don’t even know exactly why.”
He licked my chin, then escorted me down the hall to the bathroom. Gentleman that he is, he didn’t attempt to follow me inside, but sat, upright and alert, in front of the door. I emerged later, shampooed, showered, wearing white satin pj’s with embroidered red roses on the collar and breast pocket. Pete is accustomed to the fact that I can’t wait to get out of work clothes and into pajamas practically as soon as I get home. I save the prettiest ones for the nights when I expect his company. O’Ryan was still at his self-appointed post, ready to accompany me back to the kitchen. I’d left my phone on the table and missed a text from Pete.
“Be there in an hour. Bringing vanilla in case I don’t like the new B & J.”
I put the sweet potatoes into the oven, hit the timer for one hour, put the George Foreman Grill on the counter, and sat in the Lucite chair closest to O’Ryan’s favorite window. He took his usual spot on the windowsill where he watches for birds in the daytime and peers at whatever might be going on out there at night. This time he alternated between looking outside and watching me. It was disconcerting.
“Come on, O’Ryan,” I said. “Let’s play a quick game of Clue. It’s been years since I’ve even looked at it, and I’m pretty sure you’ve never played it.” I opened the box. “Here’s the deck of cards. See?” I spread them out, showing pictures of the six suspects, nine rooms of the house, and six weapons. I picked up the miniature weapons. “Look at these. They are instruments of death.” I lay the tiny rope, lead pipe, knife, wrench, candlestick, and gun above the cards. “These little playing pieces represent the suspects—the people whose pictures are on the cards. See?” One at a time, I named the pieces according to their color. “Colonel Mustard,” I said, putting the yellow piece next to the appropriate card. I followed with the red piece for Miss Scarlet, the white one for Mrs. White, blue for Mrs. Peacock, purple for Professor Plum, and green for Mr. Green. The cat nodded and tapped the purple piece with a dainty paw.
“So, you like Professor Plum,” I said. “Now, here are the rooms. It’s a big house, like ours. Lots of rooms.” I pulled the appropriate cards from the deck and lay them in front of him one at a time. “Kitchen. Study. Hall, Dining room. Lounge. Library. Conservatory, Billiard room, Ballroom.” He examined each one with seeming interest, but no paw tap, still turning nervously toward the window from time to time. I’d finished my Clue game explanation and decided to make it easier on his neck swiveling by turning my chair around. That way we could watch the backyard together, the cat would know exactly what I was doing, and we’d see Pete when he arrived.
There wasn’t much happening out there. The occasional car and one bicycle passed on Oliver Street. Solar lamps illuminated the path between the garage and the back steps, giving a pretty glow to Aunt Ibby’s garden, where sunflowers reached above the wrought-iron fence. A white-faced owl paused on a low branch of a maple tree, arousing O’Ryan’s interest for a moment. I wondered again why Eddie had chosen the Oliver Street route, and wondered even more about Cody and Lucy and the Boston theater alibi.
O’Ryan abruptly left his chosen post and started for the hall leading to my living room. He stopped short at the edge of the kitchen, looking back at me. I knew what was going on. He knew that Pete was approaching, wanted to meet him downstairs, but didn’t want to let me out of his sight.
“Don’t worry, boy,” I told him. “I’ll come with you. I’m anxious to see him too.” We hurried down the hall, across the living room, and through the locked door to the upstairs landing. The cat stood at the top of the twisty staircase, apparently expecting me to follow him down two flights. This is one reason I don’t need a step class. Between this house and the station, I think I travel up and down a mile or two of stairs every day. I followed the cat, and a surprised Pete was greeted by both of us as soon as he stepped out of the Crown Vic.
He greeted me with a quick kiss and put one arm around my waist. “Here’s a quart of vanilla,” he said, offering me a very cold paper bag. He reached down and patted O’Ryan. “To what do I owe this special escort committee welcome?”
“We’re both happy to see you,” I said, “but the curbside reception was his idea.” I pointed to the cat, who by then had moved slightly ahead of us on the path. “He’s in one of his protective modes. Won’t let me out of his sight.”
Pete tightened his grip on my waist and frowned. “What do you think he’s worried about this time?”
“Who knows? He’s a cat.” I tried to keep my tone light, but I knew why Pete was frowning. We’d both seen this behavior from O’Ryan before. I’d tried to ignore it, to make light of it before too. But every time that cat gets overprotective about me, it’s at a time when I definitely need protection—whether I know it or want it or not.
“Hey, O’Ryan,” Pete said. O’Ryan stopped in the middle of the path and turned to face us. “How about I take over watching Lee tonight? You can relax. Okay?”
“Mrrou,” said the cat, resuming his position ahead of us.
“I don’t think he’s ready to relax yet,” I said.
“Well, like you said, he’s only a cat. How’s that dinner coming along? I’m hungry.”
“Potatoes are in the oven. Everything else is ready to go.” We entered the back hall, locked the door behind us, and started up the twisty staircase, O’Ryan still in the lead. It was all right with me if he wasn’t ready to relinquish his protective mode. With both wise cat and strong man watching over me, I felt doubly safe.
Pete’s look was approving when I pulled keys from my pocket and unlocked the door to my apartment. This time O’Ryan used his own door and waited for us inside. “He is acting nervous, isn’t he?” Pete said. “He usually gets right up on that zebra chair and pretends to be asleep.”
“I know,” I said. “He’s been that way all afternoon.”
“We’d better put that ice cream in the freezer.” Pete took the bag from my hand and headed for the kitchen. “Did anything special happen this afternoon to upset him?”
“Nothing,” I said. “He did remind me to lock my kitchen door though.”
“Good cat.” He opened the freezer, read the label on the B & J, shook his head, and tucked the vanilla carton in beside it. “Good thing I brought this. Can you think of anything else that would set him off like this?”
“Like sitting on my feet to keep me from standing up when Eddie Symonds came in?”
He closed the freezer door a little harder than necessary. “Symonds? What the hell was he doing here?”
“That’s what Aunt Ibby and I have been trying to figure out.” I told him how my aunt had admitted to giving Eddie a casual invitation to “drop by” for happy hour sometime, and how he’d arrived via Oliver Street and the back entrance. “Also, he’s going to play one of the characters in the
Clue party game I’ve been planning.” I pulled the bagged salad mix from the refrigerator. “What kind of dressing do you want on the salad?”
“Ranch, please. So do you think he’s hitting on your aunt? Or is he checking on you for some reason?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he’s one of the men who was looking for my address.”
“Maybe he is.” Pete used his cop voice.
“Maybe. Sunglasses. Ball cap. Maybe he could be.”
“How are the twins and the Angels doing? Anything new there?” he asked.
I sprinkled some mesquite seasoning on the chops, along with a little meat tenderizer. “They’re due for another brainstorming session here first thing tomorrow morning. I’m going to try to sit in on it. I’m sure you can too if you want to. Listen, what do you know about the idea that Cody and Lucy were watching a play in Boston when Sam Bond was being killed? Eddie seems quite positive about that.”
“That was the first alibi they offered,” he said. “Not true. Oh, they had tickets for the play. They even had bought train tickets for the trip into Boston. But they never went. Those tickets were never used.”
“So they were here in Salem when the murder happened after all?”
“Looks that way.”
“So they’d made up the alibi ahead of time? Doesn’t that look like they’d preplanned everything?” I had a sinking feeling about Cody and Lucy’s innocence.
“Looks that way.” He said again, but not with a lot of conviction.
I decided to try prying. “If they weren’t in Boston and they weren’t murdering the professor, where were they then? Somebody must have seen them somewhere.”
“Not necessarily.” He plugged in the Foreman Grill. “How soon will the potatoes be done?”
“About ten minutes. Have they told you where they were?”
“Only that they were together.”
“That’s not helpful, is it? Do you think they’ve confided in Cody’s uncles, and the twins maybe haven’t told you and the chief everything?”
He arranged four chops neatly on the grill. “No. Roger and Ray are still cops, first and foremost. They’re working with us on this. All the way. Even if the kids turn out to be guilty.”
I tossed the salad and put plates on the table. “I don’t know, Pete. Even with all the evidence from the ladder to the fingerprints on the knife to the unused tickets, I still can’t see those two as killers.”
“I understand,” Pete said. “I’ve been boning up on the Joseph White case. Everybody in Salem knew Dick Crowninshield and the Knapp brothers were lowlifes. This is different.”
“Very different,” I said, “and every bit as mixed up and confusing as a game of Clue.”
Dinner turned out well, if I do say so myself. The chops were tender and flavorful and had those cute grill marks on top, the salad crisp and pretty, and who knew that Hawaiian sweet potatoes are purple on the inside? Anyway, Pete liked everything except the new flavor of ice cream. (Actually, he didn’t even try it. Didn’t like the name.)
We talked some more about the Bond murder—more than we usually do about police business. “I wonder why Eddie was so certain that they’d gone to Boston that night,” I said. “He seemed to be convinced of it.”
“Apparently they told everybody at the school they were going, then came back the next day with rave reviews of the play.” He waved one hand. “Said what a great time they had.”
“Not a good way to establish an alibi, is it? I mean, it was pretty easy to check, wasn’t it?”
“Pretty easy,” he agreed, not offering further comment on how the police had checked it.
I tried a little more gentle prying. “They don’t have a lot of money between them, I guess. Were the tickets expensive?”
“They were good seats at a good theater,” he said. “Not cheap.”
“Aunt Ibby said everybody has seen Shear Madness. It wouldn’t be hard to read enough reviews so they’d sound as if they’d been there.”
“True,” he said.
“So that’s what they did.”
“Seems so.”
Clearly I’m not as good at prying as my aunt is. I turned on Mr. Coffee. “You sure you don’t want to try the B & J? It’s good.”
“No thanks. Got any of those Girl Scout Cookies left?”
I pulled a sleeve of Samoas from the Little Red Riding Hood cookie jar. We enjoyed our coffee, Pete with cookies, me with delicious ice cream. I tried prying one more time.
“Does anyone know when Lucy might have had access to that kitchen knife? Besides on the night of the murder, I mean?”
“She says she was in Bond’s kitchen almost every time the group met there. She was often the only woman and usually got stuck with putting the snacks in bowls, slicing cheese, and all that kind of duty.”
“Yep. Some things never change,” I said. “So that means anybody who visited or worked in the Bond household had access to the knife—which may already have had Lucy’s prints on it. Am I right?”
“Yes, Nancy.” He sighed. “You’re right. Now can we stop talking shop and enjoy each other’s company?”
“Okay,” I agreed. We put the dishes in the dishwasher, wiped down the table and the counters, turned out the lights, went to bed, and enjoyed one another’s company very much.
Chapter 32
The weekend passed uneventfully, considering that there might still be a murderer loose in Salem, and on Monday morning, Pete was the first one up as usual. But I wasn’t far behind him. I wanted to get a call in to Rhonda early. I was pretty sure Mr. Doan would okay my clocking into work late in favor of sitting in on a meeting with the Temple twins. I made it clear that this time I wouldn’t mention their popular show on a rival station.
Rhonda called back before I’d finished my first cup of coffee. “Okay, Lee,” she said. “Doan says you can go to that meeting but as soon as it’s over, he wants you in his office with your complete plan for that Clue party you’re throwing at the Tabby. Seems your friend Captain Billy has already signed on the dotted line—big-time! Looks like it could be an hour-long prime time special. Doan’s already got the sales team out selling spots around it. Christopher’s Castle wants to do the costumes. Scott’s on his way to the Toy Trawler to shoot some promos. Better get a move on, girl!”
My complete plan? I’d barely put together the cast, and I’d never even met Cody’s students. Had Mr. Pennington prepared a script? Did the Angels all know how the game is played? What about Professor Dreamy and Eddie and Harrison? I hadn’t talked specifics with any of them. Why hadn’t I simply gone along with Cody’s perfectly good lesson plan?
Pete knew something was wrong when I put the phone down. “You all right, babe? What’s going on?”
“Holy crap,” I whined. “How am I going to get out of this one?” I told him what she’d said. “So Mr. Doan wants my complete plans. I don’t have any complete plans.” I was close to tears. “I’m supposed to show up in his office, plans in hand, directly after this morning’s meeting.”
He looked at Kit-Cat. Seven-fifteen. “You’ve still got some time to pull it together.” He sounded so calm, it made me feel better.
“You think so?” I sniffled.
“Sure. The meeting downstairs is at nine o’clock. The Angels will all be there. I’m sure they all have photos you can use. You can get pictures of Eddie and the other guy from the school files. The cast pictures will take up some room in the presentation.”
I was beginning to believe. “I’ll call Mr. Pennington now and see if he’s got a script ready. I’m betting he has. He was so excited about doing it.”
“Why not take a game of Clue with you?” Pete suggested. “The party rules are almost the same as the board game rules, aren’t they?”
“They sure are. They use the same clue cards and everything. And Pete, I already have the toy weapons and I can call Captain Billy now and have him ask Scott to bring the costume stuff I ordered back to the station with him.”
“See?” Pete refilled our coffee mugs, popped a couple of english muffins into the toaster, and opened the jar of New Hampshire clover honey. “You’ve got this.”
“Maybe. At least enough to impress Mr. Doan.” I laughed. “It feels a little like a third-grade show-and-tell presentation, but I think it’ll work for now. Thanks, Pete. What would I do without you?”
“I’m thinking maybe you’ll never have to.” He leaned forward with the kind of kiss that could have delayed the hastily made plans for quite a while. “As soon as I leave here, I’m going to check in at the station, and I’ll be back by nine for the meeting downstairs,” he said. “See you there.”
I finished my coffee and honey-drenched muffin and got to work on my show-and-tell project immediately. I called Mr. Pennington first. “Sorry to call so early,” I said, “but if you have a script of your narration for the Clue party ready, could you send me a copy?” I held my breath and mentally crossed my fingers. Please have a script!
“Yes, certainly. I was going to send it along to see if you approve,” he said. “I’ve taken the liberty of preparing a little backstory for each character, along with a bit of explanation of the supposed connection between the game and the Joseph White murder. I’ve described the rooms too. Would you like me to send photos of the scenery we’ve selected?”
Wow! Can things get much better? “Thanks, Mr. Pennington. That would be great. I’m putting together a presentation package for Mr. Doan, and your material makes a perfect addition.”
“It is I who should thank you, Ms. Barrett,” he said. “The idea has absolutely caught fire here at the Tabby. We should have a full house for our little production. The Theater Arts Department is already planning an adaptation of Scrabble for next year. Something with dancing alphabet letters.”
“That sounds amazing, sir,” I said truthfully. “One more thing. Could you please send me your staff photos of Professor Armstrong and Mr. Symonds? And one of yourself, too, of course.”
Murder, Take Two Page 18