'Tis the Season to Be Murdered

by Valerie Wolzien

  She followed Jerry’s mother to the kitchen where it immediately became apparent that Susan’s thinking on this subject was not unique.

  “They’re spending an awful lot of time together these days.”

  Susan glanced over at Mrs. Gordon, busily emptying the brown bags onto the tile counter. Only her silver bun was visible.

  “Kathleen and Brett?” Susan asked quietly, dropping arugula and bib lettuce into a bright red, enameled colander.

  “Yes.”

  “They’re working together,” Susan leapt in with excuses. “Kathleen is helping Brett investigate Z’s murder.”

  “I thought you usually did that.”

  “Well, yes, but …” Susan didn’t know how to continue.

  “Is there something different about this particular murder? Some reason why you’re not involved this time?”

  “Every murder investigation is different. Each one involves different people, different relationships.” Susan began when Jerry came into the room, snow melting on his shoulders and a worried expression on his face. “Are you two going to be able to figure out the menu? Or maybe this is just too much work, and we should find a restaurant nearby. There’s a diner in town. It’s not fancy or anything, but …”

  “There’s no reason to spend a lot of money in a restaurant; we’ll be fine here,” his mother insisted. “Kathleen is always very well organized, and I’ve been hearing about Susan’s ability in the kitchen for years.”

  “Yes,” Susan agreed. “You’re going to ruin my reputation if you keep doubting me, Jerry Gordon. You men just go on doing your own thing, and we’ll produce a fabulous meal.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Definitely.” Susan started to sort ingredients into piles, hoping to see some sort of order emerge. “You go on back to the living room and ask how many hot buttered rums I should concoct.” She had spied a bottle of Myers sitting by the refrigerator. “And your mom and I will cook a meal that will make you feel guilty for ever considering a restaurant.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “We’re sure. We’re sure,” his mother insisted, a smile suddenly appearing on her face. “Aren’t you ever going to learn not to question your own mother?”

  Susan pulled a saucepan from the drawer under the stove and filled it with apple juice, sprinkling in dark brown sugar and a cinnamon stick or two. She didn’t know about everyone else, but she could use a drink.

  She was surprised when Mrs. Gordon walked over and put an arm around her shoulder and gave her a gentle hug saying, “Don’t worry. I’ll keep your little secret.”

  “I …”

  “You’re right not to tell Jed. Now that the man is dead, it would only hurt him.”

  Susan, correctly translating the pronouns into people, decided to shut up and be thankful for small misunderstandings. Her reputation wasn’t all that important … at least not as important as Kathleen’s marriage.

  The drink mixture was beginning to boil, and Susan found bright red mugs and plopped a ball of butter and a generous slug of rum into the bottom of each.

  “Any ideas what this dinner is supposed to be?” Mrs. Gordon asked brightly. “I bought a lot of odd-looking mushrooms, and I managed to find the fresh fettuccine that Kathleen seemed to think she needed.”

  “Did you also buy sun-dried tomatoes and pecorino cheese?”

  “Yes, but I certainly cannot imagine—”

  “I can,” Susan interrupted. “It’s a wonderful pasta dish.”

  “Pasta!” Mrs. Gordon condemned the entire food group with one word. “Old-fashioned spaghetti is good enough for Dad and me.”

  “Well, then I’ll make the past—spaghetti,” Susan offered. “The salad is easy, with greens and a champagne vinaigrette dressing.”

  “We prefer Kraft Lo Cal.”

  “Maybe garlic bread …” Susan pulled a long thin baguette from its package.

  “Garlic really doesn’t agree with Dad and me.”

  “There is a wonderful panettone for dessert.”

  “I picked up a pie at a bakery on the way here. It’s cranberry cream.”

  “Wonderful!” Susan enthused loudly. “We’ll just have that.” She carefully pushed the panettone to the back of the counter. She recognized it as one of Kathleen’s mom’s creations—always something to look forward to. “Why don’t you serve the hot buttered rum and rest? After all, you did all the shopping. I can fix the dinner.”

  “Well, okay.” Mrs. Gordon picked up the tray Susan had prepared. “But I hope there’s not too much rum in these things. Dad and I aren’t really accustomed to drinking a lot of alcohol.”

  The door swung shut behind her, and Susan leaned against the counter with a sigh of relief. She was inexplicably excluded from the current murder investigation; her reputation was in shreds; she was going to prepare a meal that a third of the guests would hate; but (count your blessings, kid) she didn’t have to spend the holidays with Kathleen’s in-laws.

  Dinner didn’t quite live up to Susan’s worst expectations. True, the food that Jerry’s mother didn’t absolutely reject, she sniffed and ate with obvious reluctance (making no effort to hide those feelings either, Susan thought). But Jerry’s father (who had consumed two mugs of hot buttered rum) ate everything with obvious relish. Jed and Jerry, busy talking about cutbacks at the ad agency where they both worked, didn’t pay much attention to what they were eating. And Bananas, left to his own devices, ate almost half a loaf of garlic bread, ignored his salad, sorted the different varieties of wild mushrooms into five distinct piles, gulped down his orange juice, and inquired politely about the availability of the dessert course—specifically, where were the Christmas cookies?

  “We’re having cranberry cream pie, sweetie,” his grandmother stopped frowning at her husband long enough to tell the little boy. “You’ll like that, won’t you?”

  “Yes, Grannie.”

  Susan was profoundly impressed; it was easy to see that Bananas was disappointed. There wasn’t a chance in the world that her own children would ever have shown such manners and self-discipline at his young age.

  “Grannie has a bag of Christmas candy in her purse for you, too, sweetie.” Jerry’s mother redeemed herself in Susan’s eyes as Bananas ran off to collect his prize.

  A few minutes later, she was wishing she could be sucking on a candy cane, too. The bakery that made the pie had apparently mixed huge amounts of sugar, Dream Whip, and cranberries, and then filled prepackaged pie dough with the resulting mess. Susan gagged her way through a large slice, trying not to remember the wonderful Italian sweet-bread rejected and waiting in the kitchen.

  Kathleen failed to appear, and Susan was wondering if she was going to have to do the dishes as well as cook the dinner when what Mrs. Gordon was saying came into focus.

  “… her dress was still at the cleaners, so I guess she’s not going to be attending. I understand the attire is formal.”

  “What?” Susan was aware of the fact that her impolite squawk had startled everyone.

  “Kathleen was planning on attending the Hancock hospital holiday ball. Didn’t you know?”

  Susan stared at Jerry’s mother and didn’t answer.

  “It had something to do with the murder of this caterer,” Jerry added. “Kathleen called while you were in the kitchen. She said she won’t be out tonight after all.” He looked down at his son. “So we’re going to go back to Hancock and wait for her, aren’t we, Ban?”

  “You live a very irregular life,” his mother said.

  “We do,” Jerry replied, putting his arm around his son and hugging him. “But we like it that way, don’t we, sport?”

  Bananas, his mouth full of marshmallow snowman, didn’t speak, and Susan was once again impressed with the child’s manners. “What’s going on at this benefit?”

  “The Holly and Ms. Ivy are catering it,” Jerry answered. “Kathleen and Brett felt it was important to attend for some reason, but it looks like they changed t
heir minds.”

  “Really?” Susan absentmindedly put a forkful of fatty crust in her mouth. “Any reason why?” she asked, working to keep from gagging.

  “Those two sure spend a lot of time together,” Jerry’s father commented casually.

  “The Hancock police department was certainly lucky when Kathleen moved to town,” Jed leapt into the conversation.

  “But you’re the lucky one this time. Your wife isn’t involved in this … this investigation. You have your family together for the holidays,” Jerry’s mother insisted.

  Susan, realizing that Jed was trying to protect Jerry from the possibility that Kathleen was involved with Brett and that Mrs. Gordon was trying to protect Jed from thinking that she had had an affair with Z, would have smiled if she hadn’t been working so hard to figure out how to get to that party and do a little investigating herself. She was so busy thinking that she almost didn’t hear what Jerry’s father was talking about.

  “… then we’d just mingle like we belonged there. Got some pretty good meals that way, as I recall,” he said, chuckling.

  “You did what?” Susan asked.

  “Don’t listen to him. He’s always talking about the nefarious deeds of him and his college buddies.”

  “But you said that you used to sneak into big charity balls?” Susan asked.

  “All the time. I’d come home for the holidays, and the New York Times would have lists of upcoming balls. I’d pick one or two, borrow my father’s tux, and go.”

  “How did you get in? Don’t you need an invitation or a ticket of some sort?” Susan was so intent on her question that she didn’t realize the sleeve of her favorite white cotton sweater was soaking up cranberry juice from her plate.

  “It’s a piece of cake. Security wasn’t such a big deal back then, of course, but I’d just attach myself to the edge of a friendly group and walk right in. A friend of mine used to pretend to be one of the waiters—at formal affairs it’s difficult to tell the difference between the staff and the male guests in their tuxes.”

  “Men!” his mother sniffed.

  “Women are actually better at gate-crashing than men,” Jerry insisted. “No one bothers to check out the credentials of a good-looking woman if she walks in next to a man—someone whose wife is in the ladies room, perhaps. Kathleen could do it in a pinch.”

  “I’m sure Kathleen wouldn’t have been forced to deceive anyone to get into a party. After all, she’s working with the police department.”

  “I didn’t mean this thing tonight, Mother. I meant in general.”

  “Yes … Well, I guess it’s time to clear the table.”

  Susan jumped to her feet. “Yes, definitely.” She grabbed all the dessert plates and hurried to the kitchen. She wasn’t the type of person who could go to a formal ball without hours of preparation—not if she was going to sneak in with neither an invitation nor a police escort.

  TWELVE

  There was a tiny run in one leg of her shimmering pantyhose, a small wine stain on the left side of her satin skirt (she had forgotten to send it to the cleaners after the last black-tie affair she’d attended), her makeup was rather hastily applied, and she didn’t want to think what her impromptu French twist looked like from behind, but her new emerald earrings were a hit.

  In fact, the earrings had much to do with the fact that no one questioned her entrance into the ballroom. It certainly wasn’t on account of her good looks, Susan admitted to herself, avoiding her own reflection in the gilt-framed mirrors that lined the room.

  But, while checking her coat, the earrings caught the eye of a beautifully dressed elderly woman. She asked about them, Susan responded, and if the other woman was startled by the way Susan stuck by her side until they had entered the ballroom, her manners didn’t allow her to comment.

  Having reached her objective, Susan smiled at her companion, waved at an imagined friend on the other side of the room, and took off. She accepted a flute of champagne from a handsome young waiter and headed for a tiny table set up in a dark corner. Years of waiting for a chronically late husband had provided her with lots of practice fading into the background. She put what she hoped was a perky look on her face, sipped her champagne, and wondered why she was here.

  It was the question she’d been asking herself since leaving the cabin. She’d cleaned the kitchen, taken Jed aside and explained what she was planning to do, and ignoring her husband’s disapproval, had driven home, leaving Jed to ride with Jerry.

  And then she started wondering exactly why Kathleen and Brett had been planning to attend this party, what they had hoped or expected to find—and where they were now. Refusing numerous offers of elegant appetizers from trays passed by The Holly and Ms. Ivy’s staff, she realized that she didn’t have a single answer. She didn’t even have any questions.

  The perimeters of the room were banked with what looked like hundreds of white poinsettias, and tall balsams, hung with miles of silver tinsel, surrounded columns supporting the ceiling. Susan noticed couples she had known for years, and a few doctors who knew more intimate things about her than she liked to consider, talking and laughing together. They would move into the main room to dine and dance. A massive blue spruce stood near the doorway between the two rooms, and Susan got up for a closer look at it, taking her glass along with her.

  The tree was decorated with dozens of boxes wrapped in pink-and-silver paper and tied to the branches with gold ribbons. Gillian Davies and Alexis Cutler were chatting nearby.

  “I’m just like a kid about Christmas presents,” Alexis was saying.

  “This isn’t a Christmas present. It’s a party favor,” Gillian contradicted her rather sternly. “I don’t see why tiny bottles of perfume or Swiss Army knives are things to get all that excited about myself.”

  “I wonder if anyone would mind if I took a man’s gift. I’m allergic to so many brands of perfume,” Alexis said, fingering one of the silver boxes.

  “Maybe you can trade with your date.” Susan was surprised by how catty Gillian sounded.

  “He’s not effeminate! Just because I don’t feel a need to sleep with every man I date—”

  “Whatever you say,” Gillian answered in a manner that let her companion know exactly what she thought about that subject.

  “Just because he didn’t make a pass at you, doesn’t mean he’s not interested in women. He may be simply more discerning than your usual companions!” Alexis hissed.

  Susan was edging forward, wondering if she was in time to prevent bloodshed, when Alexis stomped off, leaving Gillian alone under the tree with a smile on her face. Susan was hoping to leave without being noticed when Gillian turned and spied her. “Susan! I didn’t know you were there.”

  “I was just looking for … for the ladies’ room,” Susan improvised.

  “It’s easy to find, just look for a line of women. In fact, I’ll go with you.

  “I suppose you heard us,” she said, as Susan followed her across the room.

  Susan nodded.

  “I shouldn’t have said all that to her,” Gillian said.

  Susan agreed.

  “She’s so upset about Z’s death.”

  “Well, of course it’s upsetting when someone you know dies suddenly.”

  “It’s even more upsetting when someone you love dies,” Gillian insisted. With her English accent, it sounded like a line from Masterpiece Theatre. Only this was real, Susan reminded herself, hurrying to keep up with Gillian.

  The ladies’ room was, as Gillian had suggested, crowded, and they joined the line, making the standard humorous comments to each other and the women who had suddenly become their companions in waiting. They couldn’t talk without being overheard, so Susan was forced to wait.

  A booth was finally available, and Susan hurried in, wondering if it would be possible to accomplish her task without completely shredding her damaged stockings. She was pulling them up as carefully as possible when she overheard a conversation that caused he
r to forget sartorial considerations.

  “I heard that Z used to make fresh tekka maki for the two of them afterward …” a voice announced from the booth to her left.

  “Sex and sushi—sounds good to me.” The appreciation came from the booth to her right.

  “I don’t know. I’d have a difficult time sleeping with a man that young … I find it impossible to keep my stomach sucked in for more than a few minutes at a time.”

  “That’s why dark rooms were invented, my dear.”

  Susan bent down and peeked under the bottom of her booth. Black silk heels, black stockings, and the bottoms of long black dresses surrounded her. Since every other woman in the room was wearing black, Susan didn’t see how this information was going to help her identify the speakers. And she was beginning to wonder if every other woman in the room had been involved with Z when she heard something that argued against this particular conclusion.

  Left side spoke up again. “I don’t believe it.”

  “You don’t believe that they had an affair? Why would she lie about it?”

  “Oh, you know Lauren. If it’s the chic thing to do, she does it. Remember her roller-blade period. And when she believed that aromatherapy was going to bring world peace.”

  “And when she heard that Princess Di was bulimic, she started …”

  “No way. You’re kidding!”

  “She bragged about it,” the left side insisted.

  “I love it. Did you hear …” But the toilet flushed, and the hinged doors slammed, and Susan didn’t.

  The run got just a little wider as she hurried to catch up with the speakers, but they blended into the crowd of black silk, velvet, and rhinestones gathered before well-lit mirrors. Susan looked around and discovered that she had been abandoned by Gillian. She suspected it was intentional and rejoined the party.

  This time, one of the people guarding the doorway actually smiled at her, and Susan was beginning to think that this gate-crashing was as easy as Jerry had said, when she felt a hand press down on her shoulder.