Crazy as a Quilt (A Harriet Turman/Loose Threads Mystery Book 8) (27 page)

Lauren also glanced at the kids and then spoke in a whisper.

“I find it hard to believe Michelle arranged anything for someone other than herself. I mean, I know we’re all supposed to buy the new Michelle, and I could believe her doing legal aid work for Marine, because that helps her get reinstated with the bar, but doing something purely for the benefit of someone else? Never happen.”

Everyone drank their tea in silence while they thought about the new information.

Lainie came over to Harriet, interrupting their quiet.

“Can I use my phone to call the Renfros for Etienne? He wants to know what time he’s supposed to go there.”

“Do you have the number?” Harriet asked.

She nodded, using her whole body in the motion. Harriet smiled.

“Okay, I guess you can call them. Let me know what they say, okay?”

Lainie skipped back over to the cutting table and said something to Etienne they couldn’t hear, but he dug in his pocket and brought out a wrinkled card he handed to his sister. She looked at it and started pressing buttons on her cell phone.

“Isn’t she a little young for a phone?” Jessica asked.

“I thought so,” Harriet said. “She said her mother is letting her use a spare one just while they’re staying with Uncle Marcel. She says she has to give it back when she returns to Aiden’s.”

Lainie set her phone on the cutting table when she’d finished talking. She turned toward the tea drinkers.

“They said they talked to Tom, and he’ll come pick Etienne up in an hour. I’m supposed to go over there with them.”

Harriet looked at the stack of blocks beside her machine.

“Finish a few more blocks, and we can sew some strips.”

A soft tap sounded on the studio door, followed by Connie entering.

“Did you get my message on your machine?”

“I did,” Harriet told her. “I’m very curious to hear your news.”

“Would you like tea?” Jessica asked her.

Connie smiled at her.

“Yes, please.” She slipped her jacket off and hung it on the back of the chair Sharon wheeled over to her then sat down. She took the cup of tea from Jessica, dunking the teabag up and down a few times before wrapping the bag string around the cup handle. Like the others, she glanced at the kids before speaking.

“I got the phone number for the tutor from Marcel’s wife. It took a few tries, but I finally got a call back from the woman. I fibbed a little. I told her we were helping Detective Morse gather evidence to try to find out who killed Marine.”

“You go, girl,” Lauren said.

Harriet glared at her.

“Sorry,” she whispered.

Connie continued. “She was reluctant at first, but once she started, I couldn’t get her to stop talking.”

Jessica leaned forward in her chair.

“What did she say?”

“I asked her if she and Marine had talked much. She said Marine confided in her almost as soon as she got here. Marine said she thought she was making a big mistake. She said she was involved in a program in Seattle and was getting her life together, but she’d wanted to be an actress since she was a little girl. Michelle told her she could get her a lead role in the next play at the Foggy Point Theater.”

“So Francine was telling the truth,” Sharon said.

“Do we think Michelle could really do that?” Harriet asked.

Connie shrugged. “That’s what she asked the tutor when she got to Aiden’s. The tutor said she wasn’t around Michelle enough to know for sure. Like us, her observation says no, but she said she was usually in a room on the third floor, so she didn’t hear phone calls or anything like that. She said the nanny would know. She doesn’t know if Marine ever talked to the nanny. She gave me Madame du Cloutier’s phone number, and I left her a message. I haven’t heard back yet.”

Lauren pulled her tablet from her bag and started tapping on it. Connie sipped her tea and wiped her mouth with a napkin.

“The tutor told me it was clear Marine had started using drugs again, although she said it seemed like she was trying not to use. Marine would be real shaky and sweaty, she’d go for walks and take showers, and eventually, it would be clear she’d taken some sort of medication.”

“Are you finding anything?” Harriet asked Lauren.

“If I’m reading this right, the three leads in the upcoming play are already cast. They’re from Seattle.”

“Is it
Blythe Spirit
?” Connie asked.

“That’s what it says here. They have a casting call for some of the other roles.”

Harriet looked at the kids again, but they were engrossed in their respective projects.

“Maybe Michelle could get her into one of those and overstated its importance.”

Sharon set her teacup back on the drink table.

“Could you ask her?”

Connie, Lauren and Harriet started speaking at once, each explaining why that would never happen. They laughed.

“That was a no,” Harriet said finally.

Lainie stood up and came over to the reception area.

“I’m ready to sew blocks together now.”

“Okay,” Harriet told her and went over to the sewing machine. Sharon got up.

“I guess I might as well sew some more of mine together, too.” she said.

Lauren put her tablet back in her bag.

“I’ll take the dogs out again.”

Lainie had completed three strips made up of seven six-inch blocks each when Harriet’s phone signaled she had a text. She glanced at the message and then read it out loud.

“It says Tom is leaving his meeting and will be here in about fifteen minutes. Time to clean up.”

Connie came over and held up two of the finished strips.

“Oh,
mi’ja
, these are wonderful.”

Lainie’s cheeks turned pink, and she smiled. Harriet put her arm around the girl’s shoulders and gave her a quick squeeze.

“See, we’ll make an expert quilter out of you yet.”

“I’m going to show my strips to Mrs. Renfro when we get there,” Lainie said as she carefully folded her quilt pieces and packed them in her quilting bag.

Etienne and Lainie were sitting in the wingback chairs, coats in their laps and bags sitting on the floor beside them, when Tom knocked on the studio door.

“Has anyone seen two lost children?” he said in a loud voice as he came in. He strode past the children in the chairs and made an exaggerated show of looking under tables and around corners. Lainie and Etienne followed him, giggling.

Jessica grinned and stood with her hands on her hips.

“I haven’t seen any children, have you, Connie?”

Etienne tugged on Tom’s jacket pocket.

“Here we are,” he said.

Tom whirled around. “Where have you been hiding?” He tickled the boy, which sent him into gales of laughter. When they finished tussling, he stood up straight again. “Harriet, can I talk to you and Lauren in the kitchen for a moment?”

Connie and Jessica looked from Harriet to Tom and back again.

“Can you entertain the kids for a bit?” Harriet asked.

“Of course,” Connie said.

Harriet closed the door behind her and turned to Tom.

“What’s wrong?”

He reached out and squeezed her arm.

“Nothing. I mean, nothing bad. I heard a piece of information from Joyce. I just didn’t want to talk about anything else in front of the kids. Etienne has been talking to Mr. Renfro. He and Lainie don’t understand why they’re still living at Marcel’s and why they’ve barely seen their mother.”

“So, what did Joyce have to say?” she asked.

“I took some canned goods out to the camp, and while we were loading it into the storage boxes, I was asking her about Marine’s father. She said he’d been living in the woods for a while. He was an alcoholic, but Joyce thinks his real problem was dementia. Chances are he was homeless and drinking because of that.”

“So, whoever got him to call Aiden probably tricked him into it.”

Lauren sat down at the kitchen table.

“Maybe they offered him money or shelter. Depending on how far his dementia had progressed, he might not have remembered he’d sold out his daughter after he’d done it.”

Harriet paced across the kitchen.

“That still leaves us with the big question of who. Who would want to set up Aiden? Who knew Marine’s father had dementia? And who had access to Aiden’s saliva?”

“The real question is: Who even knew that guy was Marine’s father?” Lauren pointed out.

Tom sat down opposite her at the table.

“Maybe that part was coincidence. Whoever was setting Aiden up needed someone to make a false call. It wasn’t important who. I suspect the perpetrator was as surprised as anyone in this town to discover the relationship between Marine and the drunk in the forest.”

Harriet joined them.

“That’s interesting, but I’m not sure it gets us anywhere.” Tom’s shoulders sagged, and she reached over and put her hand on his. “Thank you for telling us. I’m sure it will make sense when we know more.”

“It has to be someone close to one or both of the families,” Lauren said thoughtfully. “I wonder if someone from the French community is involved. I can look and see who else in Foggy Point is French. Don’t they have some sort of local association?”

“There’s a French-American School of Puget Sound,” Tom said. “Aiden’s mother was involved in founding it and was a regular donor. It was started twenty years ago.”

Harriet and Lauren stared at him.

“Don’t look at me like I just grew a second head. I did the plans for an addition they made to the school some years ago.”

“Hard to imagine what could have happened at the school that would cause someone to kill Marine and blame Aiden,” Harriet said with a sigh.

“I know,” Tom said. He stood up. “I’m grasping at straws like everyone else. I better take the kids to the Renfros. Let me know if you need anything, or if you hear anything.”

Lauren and Harriet followed him back to the studio. He took the kids and left.

“Did he have earth-shattering news?” Connie asked when the door was shut once again.

Harriet recounted Tom’s news.

Connie shifted in her chair. “Interesting, but it doesn’t really help, does it?”

Harriet ran her hands through her hair.

“We’re missing something.”

“Well, we aren’t going to solve it sitting around here,” Lauren looked at Jessica. “You ready to head to the homestead?”

Jessica picked up her purse.

“Can we get in our jammies and watch old movies?”

Lauren rolled her eyes.

“Whatever.” She went to the kitchen door, called Carter, and followed Jessica to the door.

Connie followed suit and gathered her things.

“Can I give you the nanny’s phone number to follow up with? I have Carla and Wendy coming over tonight. I think we should try calling again, but I told Wendy I’d watch the princess movie with her, and it’ll be too late for me to call if she doesn’t fall asleep right away.”

“Sure, no problem.” Harriet crossed to her desk and got a piece of paper and a pencil.

“I’m going to go upstairs and take a bubble bath,” Sharon announced.

“Okay, I’m going to work a little on my customer quilt,” Harriet told her as she handed Connie the paper.

Connie wrote the information and gave the paper back.