An Anniversary to Die For (7 page)

Susan poured the ground beans into a paper cone, dropped the filter in its holder, pressed a few buttons, and turned around slowly. “I suppose so. If he believed she was trying to kill him, he might have decided the only answer was to do her in first. Of course, that wouldn’t explain why he was such a staunch supporter of her during her trial.”

Kathleen laughed. “Maybe he knew she would be found not guilty and he was afraid of what she would do to him when she was released if he wasn’t publicly supportive.”

“That might not be as far-fetched as it sounds,” Brett said. “There were a lot of people who thought the DA didn’t have much of a case, and it’s entirely possible that Doug was well aware of that fact. Heaven knows, he was interviewed more times than anyone else during the investigation. If he thought she was going to be found innocent, he might have decided supporting her was safer than not supporting her.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Susan protested. “Why wouldn’t he just leave her? Get a divorce? Just get in the car and drive away, for heaven’s sake?”

“Maybe it wasn’t that easy for him to do,” Brett suggested quietly, picking up his coffee mug.

Susan had heard that tone of voice before. “You know something!”

“I don’t know anything about the case. But I do know that a marriage can be complex and demanding in ways that outsiders cannot begin to imagine.”

“Milk?” Susan looked over his head at Kathleen.

“No thanks. This is excellent. Almost as good as the coffee back at the inn.”

“Sounds like you haven’t been to bed yet, either,” Susan commented.

“Nope. And there’s no reason to think today is going to be different.”

“Susan says the chief of police over there used to work for you in Hancock,” Kathleen said, pouring sugar into her coffee.

“Yeah. Peter Konowitz. Did you meet him when he was here?”

“I don’t think so.”

“We were in Maine while he was here,” Susan explained. “Remember? Over the Fourth.”

Kathleen raised her eyebrows. “We were in Maine a few weeks. How short a time was he here?”

“Only a few months. Peter Konowitz was a very ambitious young man. He saw that there wasn’t going to be a lot of movement in the hierarchy here, and he moved on. I think he may have gone to New York City. I don’t remember exactly. I do remember suggesting a larger department where he would get more experience doing different kinds of things, where there’d be more room for advancement.”

Kathleen’s eyebrows continued their upward climb, but she didn’t say anything more.

Susan yawned. “Wow, I wasn’t tired until I sat down, but now . . .”

Brett was on his feet immediately. “I should be on my way.”

“You never told us why you were here,” Kathleen pointed out.

“I dropped Doug off at home, and frankly, I stopped over to suggest that you might look in on him.”

“You want me to tell you what sort of mood he’s in? If I think Doug killed Ashley? I’d be happy to help,” Susan offered quickly.

“Susan, I wasn’t thinking investigator. I was thinking neighbor. Doug’s in a bad way. When I left him, he was going to call their daughter and tell her about Ashley’s death. I just thought it might help if he had someone around for a bit—until Signe arrives.”

Susan stood up, any idea of going to bed evaporating. “Of course. I wasn’t even thinking about Signe. I’ll leave a note for Jed—in case he wakes up—and go right over.”

“Thanks. I know Doug’s had enough of police in the past few months, so I didn’t want to barge in, but I hate the thought of him being alone.”

“I’ve got to get back to my family. The kids will be late for Sunday school if I don’t hurry, but I’ll be free in a few hours. Shall I come back over?” Kathleen asked.

“Sounds good to me,” Susan answered.

“Fine. And I’ll look around in my closet and see if I can find that knitting.” Kathleen winked at her friend as the three of them left the kitchen.

“You knit?” Brett asked, obviously surprised.

Susan was a loyal friend. “Kathleen is a wonderful knitter,” she lied.

“Well, what do you know. You women have hidden talents.”

The three friends split up in the driveway, Brett offering Kathleen a ride home in his police car, and Susan heading straight across the lawn to the Markses’ house.

The first thing Ashley Marks had done after she and Doug moved into the house had been to hire an expensive designer from New York City. The decorator had examined every inch of the large 1930s colonial and decided on what he called the European touch. Apparently when he thought of Europe he thought of crumbling castles rather than Scandinavian modern. After refinishing the golden oak floors and staining them black, he’d had the walls painted ochre and had hung heavy layers of ugly purple velvet at the windows. All the furniture—and there was a lot of it—was ornate and artificially aged. Susan thought the place looked awful. But when Ashley was arrested, the decorating scheme had proven its worth. Once the curtains were closed, no one, from nosy neighbors to the dozens of press people, had been able to peer into the house.

She wasn’t surprised to find the curtains drawn again this morning. She picked up the heavy brass door knocker, which was shaped like an urn, and let it drop. The hollow clunk that action produced seemed unlikely to attract the attention of anyone inside.

But Doug Marks wasn’t inside. He was walking around the corner of his home. Apparently he had been gardening. His hands and the knees of his chinos were covered with soil, and he carried a basket overflowing with weeds. He smiled when he saw her. “Hi, Susan. I was wondering if I should call you today. Your party was wonderful. I just hope Ashley and I didn’t disrupt it too much.”

Susan, who had spent the last few minutes trying to think of something consoling and original to say to this man, was completely nonplussed. Fortunately, Doug appeared to be in a talkative, cheerful mood, and didn’t notice.

“I’m thinking of replacing the swimming pool with a Japanese garden and small koi pond. What do you think?”

“I . . . Sounds lovely.”

“It’s something I’ve wanted to do since we moved in here. But Ashley wasn’t fond of the idea. She always said fish made her nervous,” he explained cheerfully.

“I . . . How unusual. I mean, they’re supposed to be relaxing, aren’t they?”

“Ashley was a very unusual woman.”

“Yes, of course she was,” Susan said. This was something she could hang a sympathetic statement onto. “I’m so sorry about . . . about what happened last night. We’ll miss her. She was a wonderful neighbor. . . .” She stopped speaking, realizing how unlikely it was that Doug would believe that lie.

But Doug didn’t even seem to be listening. He was sorting through the wilting plants in his basket, apparently searching for something. “Look at this,” he said, finally finding what he wanted. “This is the most invasive weed I’ve ever seen. The backyard is overrun. I’m tempted to have the entire place dug up and reseeded. Do you and Jed have a landscaping contractor you’re happy with?”

“We’ve used the same person for years and years. I can give you his name, but this late in the season . . .” She allowed the sentence to go unfinished.

“I’d appreciate that. He may have an opening you don’t know about. And I would love to get going on this project.” Suddenly his voice dropped, and the expression on his face changed. Susan thought he looked like a bereaved husband for the first time. “It will take my mind off things, you know.”

“It’s an excellent idea,” she enthused. “Your yard takes too much work to maintain the way it is. Martha Hallard loved her rose gardens, but I’ve never thought they were worth the effort it takes to keep them looking good—all that pruning and fertilizing in the spring and fall—and all the poisonous sprays it takes to keep them looking good in the summer. It’s amazing no one was ever made ill by them all.” She suddenly realized what she was saying, shut up, and glanced over at Doug. But he hadn’t seemed to notice; he was still sorting through the dying plants in his basket.

EIGHT

^“
AND THEN—THANK HEAVENS—SIGNE SHOWED UP, AND I left the two of them together.”

“Odd.” Jed was making his way through a huge sandwich stuffed with the cold cuts Susan had bought to make sure Chrissy and Stephen didn’t starve while they were visiting, and he didn’t, apparently, want to take the time to reply.

Susan, resisting the obvious comments about cholesterol, continued. “It is, isn’t it? I mean, if I’d been murdered yesterday, I doubt if you’d be out gardening today.”

“Probably not. Is there any more iced tea?”

As Susan told Kathleen later, the surprising thing wasn’t that she and Jed had been married for thirty years. The surprising thing was that, at that very moment, she hadn’t picked up a heavy pot and beaned him with it right there at their kitchen table despite those thirty years together. As it was, she went over to the refrigerator, pulled out the pitcher of tea, and refilled his glass. Then she left him to enjoy his lunch and went down into the basement to see if they had another bag of dog food. The last had vanished apparently overnight.

While she was there, she decided to look in the freezer. Doug and Signe wouldn’t feel like cooking, and Susan was too tired to spend a lot of time at the stove. But she thought she had a large Tupperware of coq au vin. It would thaw as she napped, and she’d take it next door around dinnertime. After a few minutes of moving around a dozen pints of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream—there had been an excellent sale at the grocery—she found everything she was looking for. When she climbed back up the stairs, she had a bag of Science Diet hanging from one hand and a large plastic container of chicken in the other. Jed was no longer at the table, although he had left behind his dirty plate for her to remember him by. Susan looked around. The counters needed wiping. The dishwasher needed running. The tile floor was covered with dog and people prints.

Susan was exhausted. Cleaning could wait. She dumped the dog food and the Tupperware on the kitchen table, called to Clue, and headed upstairs for a much-needed nap.

Her last thought, as she drifted off to sleep, was that she should set an alarm: She didn’t want to sleep away the afternoon.

Her first thought, when the phone woke her less than an hour later, was that she should have turned on the answering machine. She really needed more sleep. Since no one else seemed inclined to answer, she reached out and picked up the receiver. “Hello?”

“Mrs. Henshaw? It’s Signe. Signe Marks. Could I come over and talk to you?”

“I . . . When?” Susan asked, struggling to wake up.

“Now. Please, it’s important.”

“I . . . Of course.”

Signe hung up before Susan could say more. She stretched and put her head back down on the pillow. Where was Signe calling from? How long would it take her to get here? She was just beginning to drift back to sleep when the doorbell rang.

Clue jumped off the bed and flew into action. By the time Susan made it downstairs, the dog had worked herself into a tizzy. Susan grabbed Clue’s collar and opened the door.

A beautiful blond young woman stood on the welcome mat. She wore a white linen tunic over a short, straight, black linen skirt. Italian sandals displayed red-painted toenails—evidence of a recent pedicure. Her long hair was swept off her high forehead with a black-and-white polka-dot silk scarf. Twin gold-cuff bracelets were pushed up on her tanned arms, and black Gucci sunglasses covered her eyes. Her nose matched her toenails—probably because she was sobbing loudly.

“Signe! Oh, my goodness, come in. What’s wrong?” The words escaped Susan’s mouth before she realized how stupid they were.

“Oh, Mrs. Henshaw. You wouldn’t believe what’s happened.” Signe allowed Susan to lead her into the house. Over her shoulder, Susan saw a large truck with Fox News Television painted on its side pull up to the curb before the house next door.

“Come on into the living room. I’ll get you some . . . some tea or something.” Susan led Signe to the couch and retrieved a box of Kleenex from a drawer in a nearby coffee table. “Here.”

“Thanks. I’m sorry to be so . . . so soggy. It’s just that I’m so upset.”

“Of course you are.”

“I don’t know what to do,” Signe said.

Susan thought for a moment. “Perhaps your minister . . . or priest . . . should be called to help out now.”

“What could our minister do?” Signe sniffed.

“Make arrangements for the funeral. Or do you think it’s too early to think about that?”

“I . . .” Signe removed her sunglasses and stared at Susan. “Funeral? Oh, you’re talking about Mother. It’s not my mother I’m worried about now. It’s my father.”

“Of course. He must be devastated,” Susan murmured, thinking that perhaps Doug had waited until his daughter’s arrival to break down.

“He’s not devastated! He’s crazy! He’s on the way to the police station right now. I’m afraid that he’s going to do something terrible!”

“What?” The doorbell prevented Susan from asking any more questions. “I’ll get that. You stay here. It could be those awful reporters.”

But it wasn’t a reporter, awful or otherwise. It was Erika Fortesque—Brett’s bride, Susan’s friend, and, Susan suddenly remembered, Signe Marks’s employer. So when Erika asked, “Is she here?” Susan knew exactly who Erika was asking about.

“In the living room. But, Erika . . .” Susan reached out and grabbed her friend’s arm as she rushed by. “Signe says her father went down to the police station. She seems to be worried about what he’s going to do there.”

“That’s why I’m here.” Erika looked down the hall. “Can she hear us?”

“I don’t think so.” Susan lowered her voice. “What’s going on?”

“Brett called me. And you have to promise you’ll never tell anyone that he did—don’t even mention it to Brett. He’d kill me if he knew I was talking to you.”

“I won’t tell anyone anything. But what’s going on?”

“About ten minutes ago Doug Marks walked into the police station and demanded to speak to Brett. When Brett appeared in the foyer, Doug announced that he had killed his wife.”