Cutwork (11 page)

Ian turned to look with interest at Shelly. “That’s her name. You know her?”

“Everyone knows Irene,” said Shelly. “She’s a fantastic needleworker, and starting to get famous. I heard she’s not going to take a booth at the art fair anymore, because she’s getting above them.” Shelly blushed. “There, see what I mean? Gossip.”

Ian grinned. “But she as much as told me the same thing.” He turned back to Betsy. “It was your Ms. Potter, all right. But is that some kind of fantasy she was spinning, about you looking into Robbie’s murder? I mean, she said you solve murders all the time . . .” He let that trail off, looking Betsy up and down.

There was that lack of intimidation again. It wasn’t that Betsy was a frump, nor did she have a vacuous face. But she was short and plump, with a pleasant, middle-fifties face. No thin, hawk-like profile here—nor a darkly powerful costume. She was wearing a pale green pantsuit with a cross-stitch pattern of flowers on the collar and pocket.

Shelly said, “Irene exaggerates, but in this case, she’s absolutely right. Betsy’s amazing. She’s solved several murder cases, some of them right here in town.”

Betsy hastened to say, “I don’t know yet if I’m going to get involved in the Rob McFey case. I’ve talked with the boy the police have arrested, and his parents, but I’m not certain whether or not there’s anything I want to do, or even can do.”

“I see,” said Ian, but not as if he really did. “This is kind of awkward. Ms. Potter seemed very sure you’d want to interview me.”

“Well, since you’re here, you might give me a new perspective by telling me about Mr. McFey.”

“I’d be glad to. Robbie was a good friend.”

“Did you see him at his booth at the fair?”

Ian nodded. “On Saturday. I came by to see how he was doing. He seemed happy, said he’d been selling pretty well. He liked the setup in Excelsior, said the park was a pleasant venue, so it attracted lots of people.”

“How long had you known him?”

Ian calculated, his eyes cast upward. “Six, going on seven years.”

“Did you meet because of your mutual interest in art?”

Ian grinned. “No, we met because I didn’t know the difference between advertising and publicity. He used to own Information Please, and I’d been told by my agent that I needed a publicist, so I made an appointment for lunch with Robbie. It must’ve been halfway through the duck at Five-Ten Groveland when he explained that a publicist was not someone who worked at an ad agency. But by then he was intrigued by someone actually making enough money from his art to hire a publicist, and we’ve been friends ever since. I mean, until . . .” He shrugged and looked away, his face sad.

“You said you were helping him get into a Santa Fe gallery?”

“Yes. It’s Marvin Gardens, the same one that represents me. They’ve done very well by me, making sure I get seen by the right reviewers, timing my shows for maximum effect, and most important, paying me promptly.” He expanded a little, literally, rising onto his toes, filling his chest, lifting his bearded chin. “Thanks to them, I’ve developed a national reputation.” He let some of the air out. “I was hoping they could do the same for Robbie.”

“Do you know his family? Was he married?”

“He was in the process of getting divorced when this happened. It was his wife who filed. She wasn’t in favor of his new lifestyle
at all.
”

“I don’t understand.”

“Then let me back up and explain. Like I say, Rob used to be in advertising. About ten years ago he and another fellow started their own company, Information Please. They were doing pretty well, making real money, everybody was happy.” Ian went over to the library table in the middle of the room. He used his good hand to turn the three-tiered holder of scissors, a measuring tape, scrap fabrics, a needle holder bristling with needles, and other gadgets associated with stitchery. He made it go around one full turn, then turned around himself and said, “Then Robbie was given a sentence of death.”

7

There was a shocked silence. Robbie asked, “Have you ever heard of hepatitis C?”

“I have,” Shelly said, pleased to have something to contribute. He turned to her, his eyes warm and interested, which caused a confusion of emotions in her breast. She touched her hair in its knot and continued, “Last year a child in my classroom had it, got it from his mother before he was born—at least, I think it was hepatitis C. It could have been A or B. I do recall he was a very sick little boy.”

Betsy said, “I think they’re up to letter what, G? H? Why do you ask? Do you have hepatitis?”

Ian shook his head. “No, no. But Robbie McFey did. He was told he was dying of it.”

“He did? There was no mention of it in any of the news reports.”

“The doctors were wrong. He wasn’t dying.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m sorry, I guess I’m not explaining very well.” Ian leaned back against the table and stroked his goatee while he considered how to tell his story.

Shelly slipped over a few feet so she could look at him in profile. He was attractive in a homely way. His nose was strong and only a little too big. His chin, under the goatee, was square—and double, which might explain the hairy cover he’d grown over it. His hair seemed to be thinning at the crown; when he tilted his head, the tied-back part was lifted and showed how carefully he’d combed it to disguise the thinning area. She smiled at herself when she realized she found this sign of vanity touching.

Shelly didn’t believe in love at first sight—not true love. On the other hand, she’d experienced that powerful, unexpected, inexplicable attraction to a member of the opposite sex twice before—she’d married the first one—and so she recognized it when it happened again now. Ian Masterson, a big, masterful-looking man, was not at all her type. Nevertheless, he radiated some variety of sex appeal, charm, charisma, or whatever-it-was that brightened her eye and rattled her heart.

Ian continued, “A few years ago, Robbie got sick—muscle aches, vomiting, temperature. He thought it was flu, and went to bed; but when it didn’t get better, his wife sent him to his urgent care clinic—and they put him in the hospital. A blood test had come up positive for hepatitis C.”

Shelly said, “So they’re the ones who made the mistake.”

Ian shook his head. “No. They did a liver biopsy, and found some very early signs of cirrhosis. They asked him if he drank, which he did, but he lied about how much, so they concluded the cirrhosis was from the hepatitis.”

“Anyway, drinking doesn’t give you hepatitis,” said Betsy.

Ian smiled at her. “No, it doesn’t. But they asked him about his sex life and drug use, because unprotected sex and dirty needles are the two most common ways of getting the disease. He said he hadn’t messed around on his wife, and the only people who stuck syringes into him were doctors and nurses.”

Shelly asked, cocking her head pertly, “So did he have it or didn’t he?”

Ian said, “The virus was there. The blood tests showed that.”

Betsy asked, “Did they learn where he got it?”

“It turned out he’d had a blood transfusion back in the late eighties after he ran into someone’s elbow during a touch football game and ruptured his spleen. Back then they didn’t test donated blood for it.”

“I never heard of a disease that has an incubation period that long,” said Shelly. “Well, except maybe AIDS.”

“Hepatitis is another one, it seems.”

Betsy said, “And so they told him he was dying. Are you saying this was a motive for murder?”

“No, I’m just telling you how he came to be at the art fair, instead of writing ad copy.”

“I still don’t understand.”

“What happened was, they told him he had a year to live, maybe two if he took care of himself. They got the symptoms under control, gave him some medicine that made him damn sick, and released him.”

“How long ago was this?” asked Betsy.

“Three years.”

“Well, hey, didn’t he ask about a new liver?” asked Shelly.

“Hepatitis C lives in your whole system, so all that would happen was that the new liver would be infected, too—and much faster, because of the immune-suppressing drugs he’d have to take.”

“You seem to know a lot about all this,” remarked Betsy, and Shelly managed to drag her attention away from Ian to Betsy. Normally, Betsy had the quiet, helpful demeanor proper to a small business owner, but now there was an edge to her pleasant alto voice, and a keen look in her light blue eyes. Shelly was thrilled to get this glimpse of the sleuth she knew resided in her friend and employer. And Ian was supplying the clue! She returned her attention to Ian.

Who, oblivious, was nodding. “We had some deep conversations, Robbie and I. But he didn’t die. It turns out that whatever made him sick wasn’t hepatitis C. They think maybe it was what he thought he had in the first place: flu.”

“They had faulty equipment for testing,” guessed Shelly, wanting him to look at her.

“No, he really had the disease, he was just one of those people who carry it around without getting sick from it.”

“But you said there was liver damage,” said Betsy.

“Yes,” nodded Ian. “I told you, he lied about his drinking. I mean, I’m a party animal from way back, but he put whiskey into his morning coffee, and thought a four-martini lunch was for folks on the wagon. He stopped when he got the diagnosis, of course. Spent three weeks at a clinic drying out, but never went to an AA meeting. Said he didn’t need them to motivate him to stay dry, he had a powerful motive already.” His tone became more emphatic. “But he did quit his job. He told his wife that if he was dying, he was going to spend what time he had left doing what he always wanted to.”

“Carve wood,” said Shelly.

“And sell his work.” He asked Betsy, “Did you see any of it?”

“I saw slides. That lion was wonderful.” Her voice was sincere.

Ian’s head came up. “It’s a masterpiece!” he declared, than looked sadly at the floor. “And the hand that wrought it is stilled forever.” He cheered up a bit—he’s like an actor, Shelly noted, or at least someone with a sense of drama. “Of course, now it, and all his other remaining work, should increase in value. There isn’t going to be any more of it.”

Shelly said, “I guess I should have bought that raccoon when I had the chance, huh?”

Ian turned to her. “What raccoon?” he asked, and again she felt the power of his interest.

“The one with the crayfish in its front paws, he was kind of standing on his hind legs—but oh, it doesn’t matter; I couldn’t afford it then, so I certainly couldn’t now.”

“Crayfish?” he asked, apparently drawing a blank.

She came out from behind the desk, gesturing the size of the piece with both hands, holding them about nine inches apart. “I liked it, I liked it even more than the lion. The way it looked as if it were turning toward something that suddenly caught its attention, about to drop the crayfish because it was so distracted. You almost turned around to see what it was looking at.”

He smiled at her. “How very perceptive of you!” he said warmly. “Yes, his talent for capturing emotion in animals was remarkable, but he had the even more remarkable ability to make the work live in a world bigger than itself. Do you draw or paint?”

Shelly looked down so she wouldn’t see the disappointment in his face when she said, “No, I just do cross-stitch.”

Ian looked around the shop, at the models on the walls. “Don’t say ‘just.’ Some of this stuff is wonderful. It’s made from patterns, right?”

“Yes, that’s right,” said Shelly.

“Well, did you draw any of them?”

“No.”

Betsy said, “But sometimes you take parts of several patterns and combine them to make a piece that’s all your own.”

“Well, yes, I do.”

“That’s very artistic, and completely in the spirit of this age, to combine parts of the work of others to make something entirely your own.” Ian was again warmly approving, and Shelly smiled her gratitude at Betsy.

Betsy asked, “Were there two raccoons among his pieces?”

Shelly said, “I only saw the one.”

Ian said, “I didn’t even know about the one.” He asked Betsy, “Is there anything else you want to know?”

“What do you know about Mr. McFey’s family?”

“Not a whole lot. I think I might have met them twice. Except his daughter Skye, I saw her perhaps a dozen times—he’d bring her along once in a while to dinner, and he liked having her in his workshop. She was quiet and serious, and showed early promise as an artist herself. Did some interesting things in pencil. She was a lot like him, actually, even when she was just a little kid. Intense, funny, hardworking. She’s in high school now. There’s a boy about four years older than she is, his name is Coyne. One of those kids with a scientific mind. A real sobersides, but with a temper if he feels pushed. This is all from Robbie, of course, but he said Coyne was angry because Robbie refused to go back into advertising, back to making good money. I offered to pay the boy’s college tuition, but Robbie turned me down.”

“I should think it was his wife who would be angry.”

Ian nodded. “Very likely. But I don’t know for sure, I think I met her exactly once.”

“But you saw Robbie often.”

He held out and wobbled his bandaged hand. “Off and on. We’d meet almost every day for five days or a week, then not see each other for months. One of us would get into artist mode and disappear.”

“You mean, go out of town?” asked Shelly. “Like to art shows?”

“No, more like going to the back of a big, dark cave to have a deep conversation with your muse. When you come out, you stand blinking at the sunlight, or surprised at the snow, and wondering what’s been going on. I think I was probably among the last Americans to hear about the twin towers in New York coming down, because I was working on a piece during that time. The muse had me by the throat, and when that happens, it’s like the only real thing in the world is the piece I’m working on.”