by Donna Doyle
“I doubt it. People just like the latest gossip, and unfortunately, Lyola Knesbit’s murder is gossip. Did you know that Mrs. Stark is LifeLight’s treasurer now?”
Carmela nodded, picking up a tissue from the crocheted box on the end table to wipe her eyes. It was obvious that she’d been crying; her eyes were red-rimmed, her face blotchy. “Ellen Sedloe—she’s our organist at Son Light—called and told me. Ellen doesn’t like Mrs. Stark; Mrs. Stark goes to Ellen’s daughter to get her hair done, but she’s a cheap tipper and she’s never satisfied with how it looks.” Carmela took another tissue and blew her nose. “Mrs. Stark brings in those photos from New York magazines and wants Ellen’s daughter to make her look like they do. She’s almost my age! She’s always trying to look younger.”
No one could accuse Carmela of trying to look younger; her hair was a mixture of steel gray and white, worn in a bun around her head. Strands were coming loose, and Carmela, who in normal times was as attentive to her coiffure as she was to every other aspect of her stern appearance, seemed oblivious. That, if nothing else, convinced Kelly that Carmela was deeply upset.
“She tans in the winter. She goes to the tanning salon. Do you believe that? Why would a woman her age go to a tanning salon? Tanning salons are for young girls with bikini figures.”
“I guess a lot of people do it,” Kelly said. It was a practice that she’d never adopted, even though, as a redhead, natural sunlight in long duration was the enemy. “But, Carmela . . .”
“I’ll be all right,” Carmela said, guessing at Kelly’s question. “I have my savings. I didn’t want to break into it, not after last winter when I had to replace my stove. These new appliances, smart appliances, I just wanted a stove to cook on and I ended up getting one of those modern ones. It’s impossible to find anything else anymore.”
“I know,” Kelly said quickly, heading off a tangent about the inconvenience of modern technology. “You’re sure you’ll be all right until this is all solved?”
“As long as it doesn’t go on too long,” Carmela said. “Does Officer Kennedy have any ideas?”
Troy, it seemed, had gone from being the enemy to being Carmela’s only hope. “Not that I know of,” Kelly said. “But I know you didn’t do it. He’ll probably want to talk to you again, in case there’s something you forgot.”
“I’ve talked to the police twice since they came to town,” Carmela said wearily. “They want to know why I didn’t tell them about the purse and the thief when they were asking us all questions. They don’t understand that I just wanted the day to be over and I wanted to be home. Does that make me a suspect?”
Kelly relayed the question to Troy when they were seated in the booth at Sloppy Joe’s. Winter was probably not the best time to open a new restaurant, Kelly thought; there weren’t many people eating. But the food was good, the French fries were home-made, and the service was excellent.
“It doesn’t necessarily make her a suspect,” Troy replied, “but it makes police wonder. Does she know something else that she’s not telling? Does she know someone who’s connected with the case? What about this Mia Shaw?”
“What about her? I don’t think she killed Lyola,” Kelly said instantly.
“What do you know about her?”
“Nothing, except that she reads library books to her kids.”
“How long have you lived in Settler Springs?”
The question puzzled her. “Not long enough to avoid being an outsider. My parents weren’t from here and that’s a requisite if you want to be on the inside. My dad took the school superintendent’s job when I was going into the third grade. I was eight years old.”
“Did you know Mia Shaw? She’d have been Mia Page then.”
Kelly’s eyes widened. “Mia Page . . . Leo Page’s daughter? No, I don’t remember her, but she’s probably a little older than me. I suppose everyone else in town knows her, though. The Pages are long-time residents. But I don’t understand; if they know who she is, I’d expect a lot more fuss about her being the murder suspect.”
“Leo says she looks different now than she did then. I suppose she got married and moved away and lost touch with people. Before she was married, she was doing drugs, so . . .” he didn’t finish the sentence. Small-town memories lasted a long time. Leo would have had that burden to carry; his daughter a drug addict, ending up in rehab, marrying a dealer who ended up in prison. Who was now out of prison and a threat to Leo’s grandkids.
“I can ask around,” Kelly said. Then she made a face. “No, I can’t. Mrs. Stark is right in the library; she’ll hear every conversation I have.”
“I still don’t understand why an insurance agent would want to leave her business during the day to stand sentry at the library.”
“She has an assistant who comes in twice a day to report to her. I suppose that if people want to get hold of her, they know how to find her. She’s a fixture in the town. I can find out at church, though. People might know about Mia Page. Mia Shaw. The ex-husband, is he back in town too?”
“I don’t know where he is. Leo just said he’s out of prison, but he didn’t say where he’s staying. He’s in contact with his ex-wife, but that might or might not be in person.”
“What’s his name? The ex?”
“Travis Shaw. Maybe I’ll ask Leo if he knows. He’s nervous about all of this and even though he doesn’t want to admit it, he’s nervous about his daughter having any links at all to the murder.”
“I don’t blame him. If she’s just out of rehab, she’s probably having a hard enough time trying to live a normal life. There just seem to be so many loose ends. Why would someone kill Lyola Knesbit? What if it is just a random robbery and she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time?”
It was possible, Troy knew. In a town crammed with twenty thousand tourists, a thief might figure that robbery was an easy way to make easy money. But if the victim resisted, or screamed, a thief might panic. How could a woman be strong enough to force a woman into the creek and drown her? Kelly said that Mia was a thin woman. Carmela wasn’t thin, but she wasn’t a powerlifter either. The killer had to be a man.
He remembered that Cavendish hadn’t ruled that out, but he also hadn’t ruled out the possibility that the killer had had an accomplice. That was where both Carmela and Mia were still on the hook. For what reason, Troy didn’t know. But he needed to find out.
“Other than the fainting spell when she heard that someone had been murdered, did Mia Shaw do anything to draw attention to herself?”
Kelly ate the last French fry on her plate. In all the time he’d known her, Troy didn’t remember her leaving food on her plate. And yet she was as slender as if she were a lifetime dieter. Her zesty appetite was a reflection of her zeal for life itself, he thought. Kelly wasn’t a person on rations. “I didn’t really notice her,” Kelly said, thinking. “I spoke to her on the bus—she looked like she expected someone to make her get off the bus, she was so timid—and then I saw her when she fainted, of course. We all did. But that could have been for any reason. She might have been tired, or hungry, or cold, and news like that would startle anyone. It doesn’t make her an accomplice to a murder.”
“I’m not saying it does,” Troy replied patiently. Kelly was so quick to defend people she thought were innocent that she didn’t realize how many nuances there were to guilt. “But she might know something.”
“I’ll try to talk to her, but I don’t know when she’ll be in again and with Mrs. Stark there, I really can’t say much. Mrs. Stark goes to lunch every day promptly at noon and she’s gone for an hour.”
“I’ll remember that if I need to see you during the day when you’re working.”
12
Secrets
There were a couple different cars in the parking lot of the senior citizen high-rise that night, Troy noticed when he drove by. He kept driving; he didn’t want them to think he had any reason to observe them. Not yet, anyway. The parking lot wasn’t hidde
n, but because the high-rise wasn’t in a busy part of town, it wouldn’t get a lot of attention from the outside. Still, it seemed unlikely that a drug dealing operation that had been based in an alley would move to a parking lot.
He kept driving and didn’t return to the high-rise. He’d have to find another way to keep an eye on the area, one that didn’t include driving by in a police car. Working the four-to-midnight shift didn’t give him the most flexibility and the fact that he and Kelly worked at opposite hours meant that, except for dinners, they didn’t have time to see each other. Not, he reminded himself, that they had done a lot of seeing each other when he worked daylight.
Kelly, too, felt constrained by Troy’s hours, more so now that she was spending every day with Mrs. Stark’s presence. The board president seemed to enjoy holding court at the library as she greeted friends and acquaintances who came in to check out books. When she wasn’t chatting with her circle, she was poring over the library’s financial records. Kelly wasn’t sure what Mrs. Stark expected to find in the records; the library ran on a shoestring budget and there was nowhere to hide anything if anyone had been concealing money. Because Carmela wasn’t there, Kelly spent much of her time out at the circulation desk, waiting on patrons and falling behind on the administrative work that was the director’s responsibility. She wasn’t going to complain, however; no doubt Mrs. Stark would be more than willing to take over other aspects of Kelly’s job.
They didn’t speak to each other except for the routine greetings as they arrived and left. Kelly could feel the build-up of tension but there wasn’t anything she could do about it.
She brightened, however, when Mia Shaw came into the library shortly after Mrs. Stark had left for her lunch hour.
“Mia,” Kelly greeted. “How are you?”
Mia looked dreadful. She was bundled as usual in the too-big winter coat, and her small face was framed by her hood and scarf. She looked as if she wasn’t eating or sleeping.
“Are you here for more books?” Kelly asked. “I’m sorry that Chloe isn’t here, she doesn’t work Wednesdays because she’s at class, but I can help you. Do you want books for your kids?”
“Yes, I—I have the money for a library card,” Mia said, taking off her glove and producing the check.
It was drawn on the account of Leo and Millie Page, Kelly noticed as she began to process the application. Of course; no one with any connection to a drug addict would give them cash. “As I tell everyone,” Kelly said warmly, “this is a great investment and one of the best you’ll ever make. Please fill out the application card with your name and address, telephone number and email address if you have one. I’ll need two forms of identification. After we’ve finished processing your card, I’ll give you a list of our programs. Your kids might enjoy some of the things we have coming up. We do a Dr. Seuss breakfast in March that they might enjoy.”
Mia nodded, produced the forms of identification—a utility bill and her tenant lease for her apartment in Warren—and filled out the card. “They love Dr. Seuss,” she said. “Green Eggs and Ham is Lucia’s favorite. Mason likes The Grinch Who Stole Christmas.”
“We do a Grinch costume party every year for Christmas,” Kelly said. “We serve Who-hash, green eggs and ham, popcorn, plums, and our version of truffula fruitcake.”
A smile appeared on Mia’s pale face. “The favorite fruits of the Barbaloots and Swamee swans,” she said. “That sounds like fun.”
“Maybe you’d like to help with the cooking,” Kelly said impulsively.
Mia looked alarmed. “Oh, I couldn’t . . .”
“It’s not hard. We have some great volunteers.”
“Yes, I’m sure you do, but I can’t. Thank you for the card,” Mia said, putting it in her hand and pulling her glove back on. “I’ll be back again.”
“You can get books out now,” Kelly said.
“Another day.”
Kelly wondered what she had said that had suddenly made Mia back off. When she told Troy about the incident later that evening at The Café, where they met for dinner, he wasn’t surprised.
“If she’s just out of rehab,” he said, “she probably couldn’t get her clearances. You require volunteers who work with children to have clearances, don’t you? Most organizations do.”
“Yes, but—I never thought of it,” Kelly was stricken. “How could I have been so obtuse! I must have made her feel terrible, reminding her about a past she’s trying to change.”
“You didn’t do it intentionally,” Troy replied, smearing honey on the freshly baked bread that came with the chicken dinner he’d ordered.
“No, of course not, but she doesn’t know that. I have to tell her.”
“Don’t go overboard. If she’s shy about her past—and what person out of rehab isn’t—she’s not going to want you shining a spotlight on it.”
“No, I know that. But I can . . . I can take some books to her house for her kids,” Kelly said. “And then I can find a way to make up for what I said.”
“You’d put your time to better use if you could find out what she did on Groundhog Day and if she has any contacts in Punxsutawney.”
That night, he drove by the senior citizen high-rise. The parking lot was empty of anything but cars. Nothing going on tonight, Troy deduced as he continued to drive past. Within the month, he’d have a better idea of what, if anything, was going on in the parking lot. It would take time, but he’d be able to tell with regular patrols, conducted an unobtrusively as possible.
He was driving by The Café when he saw Tia Krymanski closing the restaurant and walking in the direction of home. It was too cold to be walking home on a winter night.
“Tia,” he called, rolling down his window, “do you need a ride?”
“I won’t say no,” she answered.
“How come you’re on your own power?”
“Oh, now that Carrie has her license, she always seems to have somewhere to go. She was supposed to pick me up, but as you can see, I’m done and no car or Carrie,” Tia answered. “She’s going to be in trouble when I get home. Nothing like losing the driving privileges for a week to jog her memory.”
Troy laughed. Tia Krymanski had five kids and was a single mom, but she was the dominant figure in the household. He had a bit of sympathy for Carrie, remembering the day he’d driven her home after she’d gotten in trouble at school for fighting a girl who had made rude comments about Lucas while he was in the juvenile detention center on a murder charge. She was a nice kid; all of Tia Krymanski’s kids were. Tia did a good job raising them.
Tia entered her house prepared to emit her anger like dragon fire against her oldest daughter for forgetting to pick her up at work. When Lucas told her that Carrie wasn’t home yet, Tia’s emotions turned to that maternal blend of worry and rage.
Where are you? Tia texted her daughter
No answer.
Answer me now or lose your driving privileges.
No answer.
Lucas watched in fascination as his mother did battle over the phone.
“She’s never home anymore,” he said, “now that she’s got her license.”
“She’d better have enough on her paycheck to pay for her car insurance,” Tia fumed.
Lucas decided not to mention that the Waitress Wanted sign was back up at Sloppy Joe’s, where Carrie worked. He’d seen it in the window over the weekend when Tyler’s mom had driven the boys back from the movies. She’d gotten the job to pay for her car insurance; Mom had said the only way she could get her license was if she had a job to pay for it. Carrie had been eager, and she said she liked the job. But that was just after Christmas. She didn’t talk about the job much now. Actually, she didn’t talk much about anything. She’d broken up with her boyfriend and that was another subject that wasn’t discussed.
Sisters were too complicated. He wished he had brothers instead.
13
Encounter with a Stranger
Lucas walked into the libra
ry, saw Kelly at the circulation desk and smiled.
“Hi, Miz Armello,” he said. “You need anything done?”
“Wipe your feet,” Mrs. Stark ordered from her work station at the end of the table by the copier. “You’re tracking snow on the floor.”
Lucas looked at his feet, looked at Mrs. Stark, turned around and walked out of the library before Kelly had a chance to answer his question.
“Krymanskis,” Mrs. Stark muttered as if the name conveyed both curse and explanation.
“Lucas helps us,” Kelly said. “When we have a program, he moves tables and chairs for us and helps us set up.”
“Well, there’s no program, so he’s not needed.”
“He shovels the snow for us,” Kelly went on.
Mrs. Stark paused, momentarily without an answer. “I’ll call my brother and he’ll send someone from the borough to do it.”
“That could cause problems. We’re not owned by the borough and they’re not required to maintain our property,” Kelly said. Her voice was devoid of emotion, the only way she could prevent her temper from erupting.
Mrs. Stark took out her cell phone. “I’ll have someone from the borough do it.”
Chloe came in to work the evening. Kelly donned her winter coat and scarf. Mrs. Stark waited until Kelly was leaving before she did the same. As if she wants to make sure I don’t stay after her, Kelly thought. But that was ridiculous. What did she think that Kelly would do in the library if Mrs. Stark were elsewhere?
There was too much to think about, and too many questions without answers. Dispiritedly, Kelly drove home, her wipers pushing the gently falling snow to the sides as she made her way. Then she saw headlights flash in front of her and she saw Troy’s police car.
He pulled alongside her and put his window down. Kelly put hers down as well.
“Day is done?”
“Well, it should be but now that Mrs. Stark is in the library every day, I take the job home with me.”