A Catered Tea Party (15 page)

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either Casper nor Bernie said anything when they came back upstairs a few minutes later.

“So?” Libby said, but Bernie just shook her head, and Casper said he'd said everything he was going to say, and that was that.

After ten minutes of waiting for Casper or Bernie to speak, Marvin decided it was time to go home. It was getting late, tree branches were bowing in the wind, and flashes of lightning were zigzagging across the sky. It looked as if it wouldn't be long before the storm arrived, and anyway Petunia was waiting for him. Clyde got up at the same time as Marvin. They were joined by Casper, and the three men trooped down the stairs together.

“What if Petunia doesn't like me?” Libby could hear Casper asking Marvin as they walked down the stairs.

“She likes everyone,” Marvin had reassured him. “Especially if you feed her.” Then she'd heard the door close behind them.

Libby watched another flash of lightning streak through the sky. She turned and was about to ask her sister what Casper had told her when she heard the downstairs door open again and the sounds of a familiar tread coming up the stairs. A moment later, Sean walked through the door.

“Dad, how's your finger?” Libby asked. Given what Bernie had said, she'd expected him to have a big gauze-and-tape concoction of some sort wrapped around his hand, but she couldn't even see a little Band-Aid.

Sean chuckled. “Oh, it's fine. You know how women get.”

“No, I don't,” Libby snapped. She resented being put in the same category as someone like Michelle.

“Where is Michelle?” Bernie asked, trying to shift the conversation to a more peaceable tone.

“She went home. She has a lot to do at the shop tomorrow. Opening day isn't that far away.” He looked at his daughters. “You're coming, aren't you?”

“Absolutely,” Bernie answered for both her and her sister.

It took Libby a lot of effort, but she remained silent. Sean looked around. “Who was here?” he asked.

Bernie told him a condescended version of the story.

“Interesting,” Sean said when she was through. “I thought Cumberbatch was under arrest too. I'm surprised Clyde didn't tell me.”

Libby started to say something, but Bernie beat her to it. “Clyde said he told Michelle. I guess she forgot to tell you,” she said, trying to be tactful.

Sean scratched his head. “Maybe she told me and I forgot,” he suggested, although it was apparent to Bernie that he was saying that to try and convince himself.

Libby was about to say “Doubtful,” when Bernie kicked her in the shin. Hard. Harder than she had intended. Libby gasped.

“Are you alright?” Sean asked his daughter.

“She's fine,” Bernie answered for her sister. “She twisted her ankle on the way up the stairs.”

“You did?” Sean asked.

Instead of answering, Libby picked up the tray and stomped downstairs to the kitchen.

“She looks okay to me,” Sean noted.

“The pain comes and goes,” Bernie told him.

Sean looked Libby in the eye. “Really?”

“Really,” Bernie replied, although her father always knew when she was lying.

“So are you going to tell me what's the matter with Libby?” Sean asked after he'd stooped down to say hello to the cat, who'd just emerged from his bedroom. “What's going on here?”

“Take a guess,” Bernie replied.

Sean shook his head. “I don't know. I don't have a clue.”

Bernie put her hands on her hips. “Yeah, I think you do,” she told him.

Sean looked at his younger daughter and sighed. When he'd walked in the door, he'd been looking forward to a bit of chitchat with his daughters, a light snack, petting Cindy, maybe talking a little about what was going on with the Casper Cumberbatch case, and going to bed. That was clearly not happening. Instead he'd walked into a domestic quagmire.

“Tell me what's going on,” he pleaded, although a part of him, the part he was blocking, knew exactly what was going on. He just wasn't ready to confront it yet. He was hoping that if he ignored the situation, things would sort themselves out without any help from him. After all, willful blindness was a strategy that had worked for him before.

“Think about it,” Bernie said.

“Can I get something to eat while I'm thinking?” Sean asked as Bernie turned and went out the door. He sighed as he heard his daughter going down the stairs. He hoped she'd heard him, but he wasn't sure she had.

B
y the time Bernie walked into the kitchen, Libby was done with the dishes and was starting in on the dough for the morning's cinnamon rolls. Bernie watched her sister measure out a little warm water, add the sugar and yeast to it, and set it aside to proof.

“I don't want to talk about Dad,” Libby told her sister, briefly looking up.

“That makes two of us,” Bernie replied. What was the point?

Libby measured out the flour and sugar and added those to the mixing bowl. “So what did Casper have to say to you?” Libby asked

Bernie told her.

Libby's eyes grew wide. “He did what?” she repeated, all thoughts of her dad flying out of her head. She couldn't believe what Bernie was telling her.

“You heard what I said,” Bernie told her.

“Oh wow,” Libby exclaimed.

Bernie handed Libby the melted butter, the warm milk, and the eggs. Her sister put them in the bowl.

“Exactly,” Bernie said.

Libby looked at the water, sugar, and yeast mixture. It had begun to bubble. She added the mixture to the bowl as well and turned on the mixer. The clank of the bread hook as it mixed everything together filled the room. She listened to it as she thought about what her sister had just told her. Now everything made a little more sense.

Libby watched the bread hook go around and around. When the flour, yeast, milk, eggs, and butter had formed a ball, she turned the machine off, lifted up the dough hook, disentangled the dough from it, turned the twenty pounds of dough onto the prep table, and began kneading. The motion and the silky feel of the dough in her hands usually soothed her. But not today.

“So let me get this straight,” she said to Bernie. “What you're telling me is that Zalinsky dies, and Casper steals the teapot and hides it in his house, then someone comes into his house and steals the teapot from him, and then Stan . . .”

“We don't know it was Stan,” Bernie interrupted. “He was being sarcastic.”

“No, he wasn't.”

“Yeah. He was.”

“Fine. Then an unnamed third person comes into Casper's house looking for the teapot, can't find it, so he or she leaves a note on Casper's dining room table implying that they know what Casper did, and now Casper's afraid they're going to come back for the teapot, and when they find out Casper doesn't have the teapot”—Libby made a slitting motion with her finger across her neck—“good-bye Casper.”

“That's pretty much it,” Bernie said. She got out three baking sheets and buttered them. Then she went to the fridge, got out a pound of butter, and put it in a heavy pot that she put on the stove on very low heat to melt. While that was happening, she mixed together the cinnamon and sugar.

“That sounds way too complicated to me,” Libby said. “Kind of like something out of a thirties movie.”

Bernie sighed. “It does, doesn't it?”

“Okay, back to Stan. You say he was being sarcastic when he said he left the note, but I think he did that to throw us off,” Libby said.

“And I think you're imputing a level of sophistication to him that he doesn't have.”

“Maybe I did overreach,” Libby allowed after a moment had gone by and she'd reviewed what had taken place in her head. “When I think about it, Stan . . .”

“Or George aren't the kind of people to resell that teapot,” said Bernie, finishing her sister's sentence for her. “Steal a couple of tires maybe, but something like this. I can't see them for it. At least, I can't see them planning The Blue House caper.”

“Neither can I,” Libby admitted. “Which means we're back to where we started. The Blue House caper. I like that.”

“Thanks.”

Libby took a piece of dark chocolate from the bowl on the prep table, popped it in her mouth, and went back to kneading the dough. Chocolate helped her think. It was a scientific fact.

Bernie took a piece too and stood there enjoying the sensation of the chocolate melting on her tongue. For a moment it was quiet in the kitchen, the only sounds those of their dad running water in the upstairs bathroom sink and the rain pattering on the windows.

Libby stopped kneading, moved the scale closer to her, and began cutting off and weighing pieces of dough. Meanwhile, Bernie took the butter off the stove and brought it and the sugar-cinnamon mixture over to the prep table. She dipped her pinky in the butter. It was lukewarm. Just the right temperature.

Bernie picked up a rolling pin and began rolling out the pieces of dough Libby had cut into strips. When she had done a third of the dough, she painted the strips with butter and coated them with the sugar-cinnamon mix, wound them into circles, and slid them onto the baking sheet. When she was done with the first sheet, she put it in the cooler and started on the second sheet.

“So maybe Zalinsky's murder was about the teapot, after all,” Libby mused as she scraped the last of the dough out of the mixing bowl with a spatula.

“Maybe,” Bernie agreed. “Maybe Zalinsky was just collateral damage. Although,” she added, “it doesn't feel that way.”

“No, it doesn't, does it?” Libby agreed as she put the bowl and the spatula in the sink. “I know I'd be pretty pissed if I'd killed someone to get the teapot only to have it go missing,” she observed.

Bernie closed her eyes and visualized the note lying on Casper's table. “‘Don't think I don't know what you did. Be careful or you're next,'” she repeated. “If I were Casper and I'd done what he did, I'd be scared too.”

“What does he have to be careful about?” Libby asked. “It seems to me he's already done what he did.”

“True,” Bernie agreed.

Libby flicked a piece of dough off her shirt. “One thing is for sure,” she said. “Casper's definitely out of his depth.” she observed.

“For sure,” Bernie said. “Way, way out. Just the idea of him surveilling the house.” She shook her head at the thought. Then she frowned. Casper wasn't turning out to be the best in the communication department either. She was wondering what else she didn't know about him as she went back to making the cinnamon rolls. She filled the second baking sheet, while Libby finished the third.

“Did Casper say what he was planning to do with the teapot?” Libby asked as she put the last tray in the cooler. The lower temperature slowed down the rising of the dough so that the rolls would be ready to bake first thing in the morning.

Bernie placed the bowls and the pans in the sink and cleaned off the prep table. “He said he was planning on selling it.”

“To whom?” Libby asked.

Bernie shrugged. “Casper didn't know. He told me he hadn't gotten that far yet. He said taking it was a spur-of-the-moment decision. He said he thought of all the money Zalinsky owed him and the way he'd treated him, and he just grabbed it and stowed it behind the curtain and came back for it later.”

“So someone knew Casper had taken it. But who?” Libby asked.

“I'm thinking the same person who killed Zalinsky.”

“Not necessarily,” Libby observed. Then she said, “I wonder if Erin and George were looking for the teapot in Zalinsky's house?”

Bernie shook her head. “Judging by the conversation we overheard, they seemed pretty intent on finding the backpack.”

Libby started tapping her fingers on the sink.

“What are you thinking?” Bernie asked Libby.

“That the teapot is worth a lot more money than the backpack,” Libby answered.

“True. But the contents of the backpack are easier to dispose of,” Bernie reminded her.

“Also true,” Libby conceded. She fell silent for a moment, then said, “As I see it, the question is: when did Casper take the teapot? Did he take it while Zalinsky was in the back, or did he take the teapot after Zalinsky was killed?”

“It had to be after,” Bernie said, “when everyone was running around like lunatics.”

“Unless he had an accomplice,” Libby suggested. “Then he could have gotten it right when the lights went out.”

Bernie shook her head. “That implies Casper knew what was going to happen when Zalinsky grabbed the teakettle, which implies Casper caused it to happen.”

Libby wiped her hands on a kitchen towel. “That's my point, Bernie.”

“You're wrong,” Bernie told her. “Casper couldn't plan something like this. Take advantage of, yes; set in motion, no.”

“So you keep saying.”

“Hey. There's a world of difference between fantasy and reality.” Bernie waved her hands in the air for emphasis. “That's like saying the guy who writes a book about a serial killer can be one. Anyway, Casper's too nervous to plan and commit a murder,” Bernie told her sister. “Every little thing freaks him out, and he literally faints at the sight of blood.”

Libby thought over Bernie's answer for a moment. “He
is
a nervous Nellie,” she conceded.

L
ibby walked back to the prep table and sprinkled some flour on it.

“What are you doing?” Bernie asked, looking over her shoulder.

“Drawing a map of the theater. Obviously.”

“Silly me. I thought you were starting on the chocolate chip cookies.”

“That comes next.”

While Bernie watched, Libby blocked out the stage, the backstage area, and the kitchen with lines of flour. Then she took a handful of the large seventy-percent dark-chocolate chips she was going to use to make the cookies and laid them out according to where everyone was at the time of Zalinsky's death.

“See,” she said. “This is you and me,” she pointed to two of the chocolate chips, “and these are George and Stan.” And she went on naming everyone else who had been there.

“I hate to say this,” Bernie said as she studied the diagram Libby had created, “this is a lovely work of art and all, but it was pitch-black in the theater at that time. We know where everyone was supposed to be; we just don't know where they actually were. Anyone could have been anywhere.”

Libby sighed. “You're right. This is pointless.” And she picked up Zalinsky's avatar and ate him. “Here, have one,” she told Bernie, sweeping the rest of the chocolate chips into her hand.

“Thanks,” Bernie said, taking several. “Let's hope that in real life everyone meets a better end.”

“Let's hope so indeed,” Libby said as she ate another chocolate chip. They were really quite good, and she liked the fact that they were made in Brooklyn. Then as she was putting another one in her mouth, something occurred to her. “Remember the person who bumped into me when I was carrying out the tray of pierogies?”

“I thought you bumped into him.”

“That's not the point.”

“Okay. What about him?” Bernie asked.

“Well, I thought it was a techie, but now that I think about it, I'm wondering if it couldn't have been Jason Pancetta.”

“Why are you saying that?” Bernie asked.

Libby shook her head. “I'm not sure. I think it was the voice, plus he was the same size as Jason . . .”

Bernie interrupted. “That's not much to go on.”

“You didn't let me finish. I also have this vague recollection of seeing the flash of something metal. Something round.”

“The March Hare's pocket watch?”

“That's what I'm thinking. After all, it was pinned to his vest. I think you should look Jason Pancetta up on the Internet, and we'll see what we can find.”

“Why don't you?”

“Because you're better at it.”

“Only because you don't do it.”

“I will,” Libby promised.

“When?” Bernie demanded.

“Soon.”

“We are living in the twenty-first century, you know.”

“You do it faster.”

“You would too if you did it more often.”

“How about if I separate the eggs for the macaroons while you do that?” Libby suggested.

“Fine,” Bernie said, bowing to the inevitable and going into the office. She came out ten minutes later. Jason Pancetta didn't have a large presence on the Internet, but what she'd found was suggestive. “Remember what Adam Benson said about Jason and Erin?” she asked Libby.

“Yes.”

“Well, what he didn't say was that Jason worked for the same firm Adam did before he quit, after which he went to work for Zalinsky. I wonder why he'd abandon a perfectly good job to work as an errand boy for the Russian?” Bernie mused.

“Something tells me it wasn't for career advancement,” Libby surmised as she covered the bowl full of eggs whites with plastic wrap. The egg whites had to be refrigerated for three days before they could be used for macaroons. “Interesting that Adam Benson, Erin, Jason, and Zalinsky all knew each other back in the day.”

Bernie nodded. “Isn't it, though?” she said. Then she took out her phone and texted Adam Benson. Not that she expected an answer, which was good because she didn't get one. “We should run everything we have by Dad,” Bernie said, putting her cell down. Their father had a knack for clarifying things. “It would be interesting to hear what he has to say.”

Libby squared her shoulders. “You can if you want to. I'm not going to.”

“Don't be like that,” Bernie urged.

“Be like what?” Libby asked.

“Like this.”

“This meaning?”

“Pissy, Libby.”

“Maybe I am,” Libby answered, “but that's the way I feel right now.”

“You're acting like you're two.”

Libby stuck her jaw out. “So what if I am?”

Bernie sighed. There was no arguing with her sister when she got like this. “You know you're just like Dad,” she told her.

“No, I'm not,” Libby protested.

“Yeah. You are. You're just as stubborn as he is.”

“He needs to apologize.”

“You're going to wait a long time for that.”

Libby shrugged. “Maybe. We'll see. But I'm not going up to ask him for help.”

“Fine,” Bernie said. “Don't. I will.”

Libby folded her arms across her chest. “And while we're on the subject, I'm not going to the opening of Michelle's store either. There's no reason why we have to be there.”

“Good luck with that!” Bernie told her.

“I'm not,” Libby repeated.

“I think you are,” Bernie told her. “Otherwise life around here is going to be total hell. In any case, that's a ways away.”

“Two and a half weeks, to be exact,” Libby told her.

“More like four or five the way these things go.” Bernie reached in the bag of chocolate chips, grabbed a handful, and ate them. Normally she wasn't an emotional eater, but she was making an exception in this case. “Fine. How about we forget about Dad and Michelle for now and concentrate on finding Jason and talking to him?”

“Works for me.” Libby dipped into the bag again. At this rate, she noted, there wouldn't be enough left for the cookies. “Okay then. Moving along. On the business front, how do you feel about using something like quinoa flour to make the chocolate chip cookies?” Libby asked as she swept the remains of the white flour into the wastepaper basket with the edge of her hand.

“We could try,” Bernie said, although she had her doubts about how the end product would taste, but people were entranced with quinoa right now, so it was worth an attempt.

“We'll try them out on Dad,” Libby suggested, having thought over what Bernie had said and decided that peace might be the better alternative. “If we can get them by Dad, we can get them by anyone.” Their dad was a conservative eater. He didn't like change.

“Good idea,” Bernie replied, refraining from further comment. In the meantime, she'd decided she was going to ask their dad to find out if Stan and George had any priors, something her sister didn't need to know. As Bernie was about to turn off the light, she noticed that Libby had put some lemon squares on a plate, one of their dad's favorites.

“In case we get hungry,” Libby explained, even though Bernie hadn't asked her to bring food upstairs.

Bernie smiled. Maybe domestic harmony was about to be restored after all. At least until the next bit of Michelle drama. In any case, it was nice to end the day on a positive note. Especially this day. Now, Bernie thought, if the storm would just blow itself out, they'd be all set.