A Denial of Death (7 page)

"Angie couldn't have ever been entirely happy with him," Helen said. "Not if she was nagging him all the time."

Charlene waved her hand dismissively. "Oh, that. Angie nags everyone. It's how she shows she cares. If it weren't for her nagging, Ralph would never have started his own agency, and he'd never have made the business as successful as it's been over the years. Although, Angie says it's been a real struggle the last couple years. The economy and all. And she doesn't think he's been doing everything that's necessary to keep the agency afloat."

"But she can still afford three weeks at a casino?"

"She needed the vacation, and she deserved it." Charlene sounded defensive as she escorted Helen to the front door. "Don't worry. You'll see. She'll be home in another day or two."

Helen hated to admit the local detectives might have been right to discount Betty's and Josie's concerns, but if Charlene, who clearly loved her sister, wasn't worried, it was hard to see why anyone else should be. Betty and Josie probably hadn't known about Angie's previous disappearances or what Helen suspected was at least a fascination with gambling, if not an actual addiction. Once they had the additional facts, they'd agree there was nothing to worry about. Ralph would understand too, once Helen tipped him off to the fact that Charlene had taken Angie to the casino.

"I'm glad Angie is safe," Helen said. "You will let me know when you hear from her, though, won't you?"

"I'll do better than that," Charlene said. "I'll have Angie call you herself as soon as I hear from her, if it will make you feel better."

The only thing that would make Helen feel better right now would be to have something interesting to do, something as interesting as Jack found his clay avatars, Tate found his woodworking, and Betty and Josie found their needlework.

Investigating Angie's disappearance had been the most interesting thing Helen had done in months, but she couldn't count on people disappearing on a regular basis just to spice up her life.

The nursing home was between Charlene's house and the used car dealership, so Helen decided she could get in and out of the sports car one extra time to visit Betty and Josie and let them know there was no reason to worry about Angie any longer.

The two women were in their usual corner of the activity room today, in their usual wingback chairs near the fireplace, surreptitiously watching a couple in their nineties necking in the corner.

Helen pulled a rocking chair over next to Betty.

Josie jabbed her crochet hook in the direction of the sweethearts in the corner. "Aren't they cute? He's got Alzheimer's, and he thinks she's his first crush from junior high school. She claims she's just going along with his delusion because she doesn't want to break his heart, but we're pretty sure she planted the seed of his delusion. She's had her eye on him for months."

"They do look happy," Helen said.

Betty dug in her knitting bag for a new color of yarn to add to the wildly striped chemo cap she was making. "Did you know Ralph and Angie were real-life junior-high sweethearts? I bet they'd have been all lovey-dovey together like the couple in the corner in another forty years if, well, you know."

"She means, if Ralph hadn't offed Angie," Josie said without looking away from the couple reliving puppy love.

"Ralph didn't kill her," Helen said.

Betty was startled enough to look up from the apparently complicated color work she was doing. "You solved her murder already?"

"It looks like she's alive and well and not even missing," Helen said. "Her sister says they went to a casino together. Charlene had to come back for her job, but Angie wanted to stay for a while longer."

"A casino?" Josie said, finally distracted from the necking couple in the corner. "Cool. I always wanted to go to one but never got around to it when I had the chance. Now my stupid doctor won't let me go. Says it would be too risky. I might fall or something. Maybe we can set up a poker game here when Angie gets back, and she can teach us all the tricks."

"Poker doesn't sound like something Angie would do," Betty said thoughtfully. "She'd be really bad at it, for one thing. She's got a good head for numbers, so she'd understand the gist of the game, but she's no good at reading other people, and she doesn't like to do anything where she can't be the center of attention. Not exactly ideal traits for a good poker player. They need to be able to tell who's bluffing, and they need to be innocuous themselves, so as not to give away any clues about their hand to the other players."

Josie stared at her friend. "When did you become an expert on poker?"

"It's not all that different from playing bridge," Betty said, "and I used to play all the time with my husband. He qualified as a life master shortly before he died. I only needed a few more points myself, but I didn't feel like breaking in a new partner, so I haven't played since. Before that, though, I played a couple nights every week, plus weekend tournaments a couple times a month. I've seen a lot of both good and bad card players, enough to know Angie would have been a bad one."

"Lots of people are bad at gambling, but they still enjoy it, and they go back, time after time," Helen said. "That's what makes the gaming industry so lucrative for the owners of the casinos."

Betty shook her head. "Angie wouldn't have gone back after the first time she lost money. She's generous with her time and donations to charities, and I can't begin to calculate what she spends on covering her shirts and shoes with rhinestones, but she can be cheap too. She doesn't like to spend money on frivolous things. She considers staying within a budget to be part of her job as a homemaker, and she takes it very seriously. I can't see her throwing money away on a game where the odds are against her."

"Now that you mention it," Josie said, "I remember what happened when we invited her to a bingo game here once. She went a little crazy. You'd have thought we were asking her to participate in some sort of satanic blood ritual."

"Exactly," Betty said, "she lectured everyone about how she was a devout United Methodist, and gambling was sinful. Angie went on and on about money being the root of all evil and how anyone who gambled was more in love with money than with God, and they were surely going to hell. I tried to tell her our bingo prizes weren't money or anything that was worth much, just silly little things. We all donate stuff we have lying around unused or skills we're willing to share. Josie likes to give manicures with bright nail polish, and I usually share the cookies my family sends me, so I'm not tempted to eat the whole batch."

"There's no harm in manicures or cookies," Josie said. "But Angie went ballistic."

"I'm telling you, Angie would never go to a casino to gamble," Betty said. "It's more likely she'd take a hatchet to a roulette wheel, like an anti-gambling version of Carrie Nation."

"Angie's religion probably frowns on drinking too," Josie said. "We just didn't hear about it because there's never anything good to drink here. Forget about a daily glass of wine—we can't even get soda with caffeine in it."

"Angie might not be a gambler, but she's been to a casino at least once before," Helen said. "I saw a picture. She went with her husband and sister."

"Ralph and Charlene went on a trip together?" Betty said. "That must have been…intense."

Helen nodded. "It looked that way from the picture. But they were definitely together at a casino, and Charlene said Angie liked it there. Why would Charlene lie about it? Everyone says she and her sister were close."

"You know how sisters can be," Josie said. "One minute we're best of friends, and the next we're tearing each other's hair out over some stupid borrowed sweater that was never returned."

"A missing sweater isn't the same as a missing sister," Helen said. "Don't you think Charlene would be worried if Angie had really disappeared?"

"I suppose," Betty said, but she still didn't look convinced. She and Josie both plied their needles in vaguely disappointed silence for several minutes, which deepened when the sweethearts in the corner were interrupted by attendants and escorted—separately—out of the activity room.

As they were leaving, Geoff Loring was arriving. The
Wharton Gazette
reporter was of average height, but the grand, double-wide doorway made him look as short as Helen. Much like the previous times she'd seen him, today he was wearing a faded blue sport shirt with rumpled khakis and loafers. He seemed to have fully recovered from his broken arm. The cast was gone, and his face was free of the chronic pain lines Helen saw too often in her own reflection. Of course, Geoff was only in his late twenties, so it wasn't surprising that he'd bounced back from the injury or that he still had the boyish good looks he took for granted.

Geoff usually had a particularly nice smile, but at the moment he was frowning in concentration as he peered around the room, apparently looking for someone. When he caught sight of Helen the missing smile appeared, and he abandoned his search. He strode across the room, snagging a straight-back chair on the way and dragging it over to the spot next to Helen. "Ms. Binney. Imagine seeing you here. I hope this is just temporary."

Helen knew only too well how quickly rumors could spread, especially when talking to a reporter, whether on or off the record. She had to nip this one in the bud. Too many people already thought she needed to be locked up and cosseted. "I'm not a resident, just visiting."

"Oh. Of course. Me too," Geoff said. "I get all my best stories here these days. The people here have lived such fascinating lives."

"Present tense, not past," Betty said, claiming his attention. "Our lives aren't over. We still do interesting things."

"I know," Geoff told Betty in genuine agreement before turning back to Helen. "Quite a few of the residents here have written their memoirs and published them. You wouldn't believe how many published authors we have right here in Wharton. They're fascinating people, so I'm trying to interview every single one of them. Most of them like the free publicity, but some like to play hard to get. Especially the ones who write under a pen name, but I'll find them eventually."

"Some people do like their privacy," Helen said.

"Not you, though," Geoff said. "After all those years in politics, you must have gotten used to being in the public eye."

"I got used to it, yes. Liked it, no."

"Listen, I meant to call you before now to set up an interview," Geoff said. "I hope you didn't think I was ignoring you."

Much as it usually annoyed her to be ignored when she had something to say, she found it even more annoying when Geoff paid attention to her. She thought she'd made that clear when they first met, and she'd pointedly refused to talk to him in his capacity as a reporter. "I don't do interviews anymore."

"Don't worry," he said. "I've changed. I'm not looking to do some big expose. Just a nice, little personal interest story. I'm sure there's something you're passionate about, something besides your political career that you'd like to share with my readers."

She knew he hadn't meant it as a reproach, but it stung to think she didn't, in fact, have anything she felt passionate about these days. There was nothing she cared about as much as Betty and Josie cared about their needlework, Tate cared about his woodworking, and Charlene cared about her art glass sculptures.

"Never mind my story," Helen said. "There's got to be something more interesting you could write about."

"Like what?"

"How does a missing persons case sound?"

He jumped to his feet, rubbing his right forearm—the one that had been broken—with his left hand. "No, thanks. That's a losing proposition for me, no matter what happened to the missing person. If he's dead and I start poking around, the killer could do something desperate to stop me. If the missing person is alive and doesn't want to be found, he could do something equally desperate to keep from being found. I'm not taking the risk. I'll call you later to schedule an interview."

He practically ran out of the activity room, disappearing before Helen could remind him he didn't have her phone number and she was prepared to sic her lawyer on Geoff if he trespassed at her cottage. That might not be as terrifying as the prospect of pursuing a real story, but most people found Tate seriously intimidating when he put on his lawyer face.

*  *  *

"I told you he wasn't a real reporter," Josie said. "If we have to wait for Geoff to figure out where Angie is, she'll never be found."

"It wouldn't be hard for him to drive to the casino and see if Angie's there." Helen borrowed a crochet hook and a skein of yarn from Josie and began making the chain that would form the bottom edge of a chemo cap. Jack never cared how long he had to wait for her, as long as his battery lasted for playing games on his smartphone. She wasn't in any rush to get back into the sports car, so she might as well try, once again, to make a chemo cap that Josie wouldn't have to unravel and remake.

Helen joined the chain together and looked at it. The loops were all different sizes, starting out tight and tiny when she'd started, getting looser as she got into the rhythm, with the occasional reversion to a tiny stitch or two when she stopped to count her stitches. She held it up to the experts. "What do you think? Is this okay, or should I pull it out and try again?"

Josie held out her hand, and Helen passed it over.

While the chain was unraveled and redone more evenly, Betty distracted Helen. "I just can't believe Angie went to a casino. Not for three whole weeks. She might have gone for a few days to see a show or something, but the only reason to stay that long is to gamble. Which she doesn't do."

"Unless her rant over the bingo was a case of protesting too much, because she has a secret addiction to gambling," Helen said. "Charlene said something about Angie staying until she ran out of money."

Betty pursed her lips and shook her head. "I think Charlene's lying."

"But why?" Helen said. "She really didn't seem worried at all, so she must know where Angie is."