“And she should be!” Kathleen, an ever-loyal friend, exclaimed. “You spent hours getting that book. We even went into the Metropolitan Museum to buy it.… She won’t be able to return it there.”
“If she can, I sure wasted my time shopping in the city.”
“No, you didn’t. Remember the nice time we had visiting the angel tree at the museum … the decorations at Rockefeller Center … the lights on the trees on Park Avenue … and those wonderful caviar omelets at the Russian Tea Room. Are you hun—”
“Don’t ask. We have some serious shopping left to do,” Susan said. “You don’t want Jerry’s parents to freeze to death, do you?”
“Or are you thinking of that coat?” Kathleen kidded. “Saks is right here.”
An hour later Susan was hungry also. Poor and hungry. But the coat really had been a bargain, she reminded herself, shifting from one foot to the other and resting her packages against a counter covered with piles of embroidered fabrics.
“Those are handmade in Madeira.”
Susan, startled, looked around to see where the voice had come from. An elderly woman, who looked as if she also believed it was time America adopted Boxing Day, was frowning at her. “It is very difficult to find women who can do handwork like that. Most of our imports are from the Orient, and there just isn’t the tradition there.” Susan must have looked perplexed for she continued to explain. “I’m speaking about the linens upon which you just dropped your parcels.”
The demonstration of exemplary grammar was as intimidating as the tone of voice, and Susan hurried to gather up her belongings, apologizing all the while. “They really are very nice,” she agreed. “And very expensive,” she added, noticing the discreet tag hanging from a dainty square of embroidery. “I guess I should go help my friend.”
Kathleen was standing on the other side of the small store, examining two large, puffy comforters. She turned when Susan appeared. “Which do you prefer? I think the deep green satin twill will look nice with the room, but I’m afraid I’ve fallen in love with the pastel paisley.”
“I’d get what I love—besides, one of these days Bananas will insist on getting a cute little puppy that will grow into a monster that will shed on everything. And that dark green will show every long hair.”
“I think I’ll take the green,” Kathleen said to the saleswoman who was hovering nearby. “You’re right, but Jerry grew up with black Labs, and I suspect that’s what we’ll end up with when we join the doggy set. The green will disguise dark fur better … Susan?”
“I’ll be right back,” Susan said, hurrying to the door. “There’s someone I want to see.”
Kathleen glanced out the door and saw a long, blond ponytail extending from a huge bunch of green-and-red Mylar balloons. Susan was chasing after it, only to return as Kathleen was completing her purchase.
“I thought it was Z,” she explained, panting.
Kathleen nodded. “I assume it wasn’t.” She put her credit card back in her wallet and picked up the voluminous bundle. “I hope this fits in the car.”
“We could have it sent …”
“I need it tomorrow night,” Kathleen said. “But thanks. Want to go to the inn for lunch?”
“Wonderful. I’m starving.” Susan started for the door.
“Madam!” The saleswoman sounded as if she were tired of this particular problem. “You forgot your packages!”
Susan looked around. “I’m so sorry … Where … ?”
“On the Madeira, madam. On the Madeira.”
Susan grimaced. “I was thinking of someone … of something else.”
FIVE
The friends were greeted enthusiastically by Charles, owner of the Hancock Inn. Susan had helped solve a murder there last spring, and he felt he was in her debt. It got her the best seat in the house every time.
Not that there were any bad seats at the inn. One of the original inns in this part of Connecticut, Charles had remodeled and modernized, maintaining charm while adding comfort and convenience. Menus were created on a computer, but guests saw a hand-lettered sheet of heavy parchment. The restaurant was decorated for the holidays with tiny yellow lights echoing the flames in the three fireplaces and many armloads of pine and holly. Susan and Kathleen were smiling as they were led to their favorite booth.
“Your decorations seem to be holding up better than mine,” Susan commented, thinking of her shedding wreath.
“They’ve been replaced more than once,” Charles assured her. “We decorated three weeks before Christmas, and we’ve been renewing the holly and candles ever since. We keep all this until New Year’s.” Charles handed Kathleen a menu. “If you’re still hungry after the feast I know Mrs. Henshaw fed you yesterday, I recommend the wild partridge with red cabbage confit and fresh fig chutney. It’s light and delicious.”
“I always take good advice,” Kathleen said. “And a glass of Beaujolais, please.”
Charles turned to Susan. “How are the sea scallops in pastry?” she asked.
He beamed. “Excellent. Would you like arugula salad? And I’d suggest a Chablis?”
“Wonderful.” Susan prepared to let out her belt another notch.
Charles hurried off with their order, to be replaced by two fur-wrapped women, giggling like girls.
“Susan! Kathleen! Merry Christmas!” Well-coiffed heads and exotically made-up faces leaned on their table for support. “Guess what we’ve been doing?” the ash blonde asked, blinking under the weight of thick gray mascara.
“Returning the presents our husbands gave us!” the aggressively frosted brunette answered her companion’s question.
“And getting complimentary makeups!” the blonde continued. “They wanted to do me in plum colors, but I insisted on cooler tones. Do you think I made a mistake?”
“You look lovely,” Kathleen lied.
“What did your husbands give you?” Susan asked, hoping she could avoid a public declaration on the subject.
“You won’t believe!”
“Negligees!”
“Hideous ones!”
“She got green, and I got plaid satin! Plaid! Who sleeps in plaid?”
Susan had a plaid flannel granny gown that she had worn since college. She was so fond of it that she saved its threadbare comfort for nights when she really needed it. She couldn’t imagine plaid satin.
“They shop together the day before Christmas every year!”
“And we return everything the day after!”
A calm voice appeared behind them. “Your table is ready, ladies.” Charles was back. “And the hot buttered rums that you requested.”
“Rum!”
“Susan, did you hear about that good-looking hunk who runs the catering business? Z?”
“What about him?” Kathleen asked, wondering what had happened to the wine she had ordered.
“He’s involved with JoAnn Kent. Her husband found them together in the bedroom! Unwrapped! Get it? Like Christmas presents! Merry Christmas! Ho, ho, ho, and a bottle of rum!”
Susan and Kathleen watched their departing backs. “This is probably how Fellini spends his Christmas holidays,” Kathleen commented, smiling as she spied their wine arriving.
Susan didn’t answer until after the waitress had left, then she took a sip of her Chablis and frowned. “Have you noticed how many rumors are going around about Z?”
“He seems to be the type of man that people are going to talk about.”
“What does that mean?”
“He seems to be the type of man who gets involved in the lives of other people. I’ve never heard of Z alone, just Z and Gwen, and Z and this woman or that woman.”
“He’s not like that.”
“So, you know him. Tell me about him,” Kathleen suggested, picking up her glass.
Susan hesitated before answering. “It’s hard to describe someone.”
“Susan, you’ve been telling me about people for years and years. You can describe anyone. Start by t
elling me the basic things: his age, what he looks like—stuff like that.”
“I don’t know his age. I’d guess somewhere in his late thirties.”
That didn’t jive with what Gwen had said about him, unless he’d been much older than the average college student, but Kathleen didn’t interrupt.
“He’s very good-looking. Blond with a long ponytail—but not at all feminine.”
Susan noticed Kathleen smiling. Their salads had arrived, and Susan continued with her description as she ate.
“He’s very sweet. And very bright. You can talk to him about anything, not just food and decorations, you know?”
“Like what?”
“Well, you heard what Gwen said: he was an American studies major.”
“You’ve talked about literature with him?”
“No.… Not really. But you feel like you can.”
Kathleen concentrated on her chewing.
“He’s fun, too. I mean, he has a really great sense of humor. And, of course, he has wonderful taste, and he’s very creative.”
“Creative? Intelligent? Good-looking? Masculine? Good sense of humor? And he can cook? Who do we know who is single? He sounds like quite a catch.” Kathleen changed the subject abruptly when she noticed the scowl on Susan’s face. “Tell me about your party Saturday night. We’ve been so busy discussing plans for Christmas that I haven’t heard anything. Did I tell you that I bought a new dress?”
Susan didn’t answer, and Kathleen babbled on about fashion, and then segued to makeup, diet, exercise classes, and the impossibility of finding good-looking, waterproof boots before Susan spoke.
“I can’t imagine Z involved with JoAnn Kent. She’s so tacky.”
“Nothing’s quite as tacky as bringing another man into your own bedroom,” Kathleen agreed.
“That’s exactly what I mean. He’d never be involved in something like that.… I sound like a kid with a serious crush, don’t I?”
“Not really …”
“A good friend would tell me the truth,” Susan insisted, smiling at Kathleen’s tact.
“A good friend would assume that you don’t have to be told how you feel.”
“I am acting like an idiot, aren’t I?”
“No.” Kathleen shrugged. “You like Z. He’s a lot like you. You’re allowed to have male friends—this is the nineties, after all. And here’s our food.”
Susan wasn’t sure if she was as grateful for the interruption as Kathleen seemed to be. Something in her wasn’t sure exactly how she felt about Z. And talking about it might have helped. She slowly picked up her fork.
But, as usual, the meal was a delicious distraction, and Susan was feeling comfortably full before she and Kathleen broached the subject again.
“No matter what you think about him, it’s interesting that Z is a topic on so many people’s minds right now, isn’t it?” Kathleen asked, picking up the dessert menu. “I think it would be nice to have something sweet with our coffee, don’t you?”
“I’ve had something sweet with coffee, tea, and almost every breath of air I’ve breathed ever since Thanksgiving,” Susan said. “So why stop now?
“But you’re right,” she continued. “Z does seem to be the hot topic these days, but maybe it’s just because there’s so much entertaining going on and The Holly and Ms. Ivy are in such demand.”
“Gwen Ivy is an impressive woman,” Kathleen commented, obviously more interested in the menu than anything else. She frowned. “Would it be piggish of me to have the dessert platter? I can’t seem to make up my mind—everything sounds wonderful.”
The dessert platter was a large plate that contained a taste of every dessert on the menu. Susan and Jed had shared one on those rare occasions when she felt thin and had forgotten that cholesterol existed. She knew Kathleen would graze her way through the entire thing with no apparent bad effects. “I’ll have the zabaglione with raspberries,” Susan told the waitress. “And espresso.”
Kathleen placed her own order, sat back, and looked around the room. “Have you used the espresso machine that your kids gave you?”
“Late last night. They had even included a package of decaf beans with the machine. It was wonderful.”
“Your kids are so thoughtful. I can’t wait till Bananas is older. Right now his idea of an appropriate Christmas gift is a Matchbox car. That’s what he wanted to get his father for Christmas.”
Susan wondered how Kathleen could have watched Chrissy and Chad go through their teens and still be looking forward to her own son’s future. She shrugged. It must be one of those things that people have to experience for themselves. “Well, the cappuccino was wonderful. I wonder if we could serve it Saturday night? There must be machines that make it more efficiently.”
“I don’t know. Even in coffee houses, it’s produced a cup at a time, but they do it fairly quickly.”
“Maybe the bartender could move over to an espresso machine late in the evening,” Susan muttered. “I think I’ll give Gwen a call and suggest it.” She stood up. “I’ll be right back.”
“I’ll be fine,” Kathleen assured her. “Go ahead.”
Susan trotted off to the phone booth, wondering if she would be able to speak with Z this time. She dialed quickly, having memorized the company’s phone number the day after Thanksgiving.
The phone was answered on the first ring.
“Hi, this is Susan Henshaw,” Susan began.
“Mrs. Henshaw? Please hang on. Gwen Ivy wants to speak with you immediately. I’ll call her.”
Susan heard the tension in the speaker’s voice. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the wall, imagining all sorts of things: the invitations for her party were just discovered in a desk drawer; no one was going to come. There had been a mix-up: six parties were planned for New Year’s Eve; The Holly and Ms. Ivy couldn’t handle all that; her party had been canceled. The check she wrote to the caterers had bounced. Etcetera. Etcetera.
“Mrs. Henshaw? Did you hear what I said?” Susan’s attention returned to the present. “Z is dead.”
“Dead? Z Holly is dead?” Susan repeated into the mouthpiece.
A woman standing behind her screamed and ran off, wondering aloud what was going to happen to her party tomorrow. Susan wasn’t so distracted. “Who is this?” Gwen?”
“Ms. Ivy is busy with the police. I’m Jamie Potter. I’m one of the pastry chefs. Ms. Ivy told me to tell you that Z is dead, and could you please come here as soon as possible. She needs your help.”
“I’m at the Hancock Inn. I’ll be there immediately.” And Susan hung up without bothering to say good-bye. She leaned against the wall and took a few of the long, deep breaths she had been taught in natural childbirth classes. They didn’t work well in this situation either, and she wiped a tear from her eye and hurried back to the table.
Kathleen was just dipping her spoon into a miniature crème caramel. “Hi, you look terrible. What’s happened?” she began anxiously.
“Z is dead. The police are at The Holly and Ms. Ivy. Gwen says she needs to see me right away.”
Kathleen may have loved her calories, but her priorities were in the right place. “Then let’s get going,” she insisted, standing immediately.
An attentive waitress hurried over to them, and Susan explained that there had been an emergency, and that they needed their bill immediately.
“We’ll worry about that later.” Charles had appeared with their coats over his arm. “I hope everything is okay with your families, and you will let me know if I can do anything.”
Susan wasn’t so upset that she didn’t have time to stop and reassure him. “Our families are fine, thank you, Charles. We appreciate your concern.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” Charles said, rushing over to open the door for them.
Susan and Kathleen pulled on their coats and almost ran back to the Jaguar. They didn’t speak again until they were squashed inside between the packages. “Where’s the body?”
Kathleen asked, putting the car in gear.
“I don’t know.”
“How did he die?”
“I don’t know that either. I guess I don’t know … What are you eating?”
“I just grabbed this little eclair off the tray as we left,” Kathleen said. “Do you want half? Well then, what do you know?” she continued as Susan shook her head no.
“Nothing. I called and introduced myself, and before I could say anything else, the voice on the other end of the line said that Gwen wanted to speak to me and vanished to get her. But I didn’t get to speak to Gwen. A woman named Jamie Potter told me that Z was dead and that the police were there and could I please come help immediately. She’s a pastry chef.”
“The woman on the phone is a pastry chef? How do you know that?”
“She told me so.”
“Of course.” Kathleen munched on the last of her own pastry. “So that’s all we know.”
Susan nodded. “That’s all we know,” she agreed quietly. There was a pause before she spoke again. “Do you think you could drive faster?”
Kathleen accelerated.
“I wonder where they found him,” Susan muttered.
“Hmmm.” Kathleen’s response was noncommittal. She was concentrating on passing a dark green van. The task was complicated by the fact that the van itself was trying to pass two joggers.
“Looks like they’re trying to work off your big meal yesterday,” Kathleen said, when she had accomplished her mission.
“What?”
“Wasn’t that Gillian and Alexis? The joggers we just passed?” Kathleen added when Susan didn’t answer.
“I don’t know. I wasn’t paying attention.” Susan leaned forward in her seat as though she might arrive a little more quickly if she did. “Don’t miss the turn up here.”
Kathleen turned where indicated (and where she was going to anyway), and they arrived in front of the carriage house. The lot was crowded: there were three police cars, an ambulance, a few dozen cars, and three vans identical to the one they had just passed. “I’ll drop you off and park on the street,” Kathleen offered, noticing that the driver of the van behind her was eyeing the last available parking spot.
'Tis the Season to Be Murdered Page 5