Death of a PTA Goddess (19 page)

“
Half
of the members of the PTA dance?” Amber frowned slightly. “Patty probably recruited everyone. She was quite the enthusiast. She’d go out dancing once a week, in addition to her lessons.”

That surprised me. To my knowledge, Carlton didn’t have a wealth of places with dance floors. “Where did she go to dance?”

“Some new place in town,” Amber replied with a shrug.

Naming the only “new place” I’d heard of, I asked, “Lucinda’s?”

“That sounds right. Let’s go get your skis.” She ushered me toward the back of the store. She suddenly grabbed my arm and gushed, “Oh, good news . . . Randy talked Kelly into entering a painting in the fair after all. And even better news, as far as I’m concerned that is, she actually signed up for something the two of us can do together. Yesterday I happened to be talking about how much I used to enjoy fencing in college, and she said she’d like to try that. I signed us both up for lessons at a club in Saratoga Springs.”

We’d reached the counter where the ski technicians were who’d switched my bindings from my old skis to the new ones. She went behind the counter and soon emerged carrying both pairs of skis. I tried to take one set from her, but she refused to let me. She was probably afraid that my muscles would snap if I did any manual labor.

Partway to the car, I said, “You know, Nathan’s been bugging me to get him fencing lessons, too. Maybe we’ll be able to carpool at some point in the future.”

“Maybe so.” I popped the back of my CRV open. Amber slid the skis into place. “I hope you enjoy these in good health.”

“Me, too.”

She smiled and took one step toward the store, then stopped and cried, “Oh, I keep forgetting. I have something for you in my car that I’ve been carrying around for the last couple of days. Hang on a sec.”

“Sure thing.” As long as that something didn’t turn out to be a murder weapon with my name on it. I waited. She went to a Saab a few cars down from mine and returned with a padded manila envelope.

“I’ve been checking Patty’s mailbox periodically, since Kelly lives with us now but still gets mail there. Anyway, this was marked ‘Carlton PTA President,’ so I figured it should go to you.”

She handed me the envelope, which had been sent from PTA national headquarters. My heart started racing. By the size and weight of the envelope, it felt as though a videotape was inside. Could someone have sent a copy of Al’s students’ tape to the PTA national headquarters?

“Thanks, Amber. And thanks for the skis.”

“Maybe I’ll see you at the fair later today.”

“Okay. Take care.”

She went back inside the store. I got into my car. My heart pounded as I opened the envelope. Inside was a folded sheet of paper and a videotape labeled carlton pta in block letters. The handwriting seemed to be identical to that of the death threat I’d received. The label looked as though it had been hastily stuck on top of a preexisting label.

I unfolded the sheet of paper. It was a letter, which congratulated us for the fine work we’d done this year but stated that a PTA chapter in Iowa had won. The letter went on to explain that the enclosed tape had been sent anonymously but “played no part in the decision.”

The tape had to be a copy of the girls’ video. There was no telling whether or not it had “played no part” in our missing out on the award, but with Patty dead, the contest was irrelevant now, anyway. Maybe it wasn’t irrelevant to whoever killed Patty, however. Could the killer have sent this tape to national headquarters to make sure that Patty wasn’t honored posthumously? That might have been part of the motive behind the break-in at Skye Smith’s house, combined, perhaps, with the fear that the outtakes could have given away his or her identity as the killer.

Too bad Amber had given this to me on a Saturday. With my family home, I didn’t want to watch the tape there. I wanted to view it and see if this was an exact duplicate of the one we’d seen at Patty’s house.

I drove to Lauren’s, raced up her porch steps tape in hand, and rang the doorbell. Tommy opened the door. He wore slippers, pajamas, and a blue terry-cloth bathrobe. He had a bad case of bed-head—his red hair every which way—and his nose was a deep shade of pink, his eyes puffy. He said, “Mornin’, Molly,” in a froglike voice.

“You’re sick. I’m sorry. I didn’t realize. Flu or cold?”

He sneezed into a tissue and said, “Cold,” though it came out sounding like “Code.” Eyeing the VCR tape, he said, “Lauren’s at the drugstore. What’s that you’ve got there?”

“It’s a tape of the Carlton PTA. Somebody had sent it anonymously to PTA headquarters. It has to have been stolen from Skye Smith’s house during the burglary. But I figure some half dozen people have probably handled it since then, so I’m sure any telling fingerprints were long since overlaid. I just now got it from Amber Birch, who said she got it out of Patty’s mailbox a few days ago.”

He held out his hand, and I relinquished it to him, saying again, “It’s probably just a copy of the one you got from Patty’s house.”

“How was it sent?”

“One of those padded mailers. It was sealed when she gave it to me and didn’t appear to have been opened.”

He had a brief coughing fit into the sleeve of his bathrobe, then said, “Give that to me, too.”

“Okay. It’s in my car.” I retrieved the envelope and handed it over. “Are you going to watch this right now and make sure the two videos are exact copies?”

“Uh-huh.” He sneezed again into his tissue.

Well, obviously, he wasn’t going to give me the opportunity to watch the tape with him. I felt a stab of disappointment, but reminded myself that investigating crimes was his job, not mine. “Did Stephanie call you yesterday, about Denise Goodman, the woman she met at the beauty parlor?”

“Uh-huh. We’re lookin’ into it.”

I felt like demanding: Yes, but are you actually
seeing
anything when you do? Is “it” a tunnel? A crystal ball? Pea soup? But I knew he would blow his stack—in addition to his nose—so I merely asked, “Did you also get my note last night? With Emily Crown’s writing sample?”

“Yeah. Real scintillating stuff. Hope the therapy helps you and Jim. I’ll tell Lauren you came by.” He shut the door.

I went home, but was not especially fun to be around. I wished I had more faith that Tommy was following up on the lead that Stephanie had given him. After giving the matter some thought, I realized I’d made an omission. I pressed the speed dial for Lauren and Tommy’s home phone number. He would probably read me the riot act for interfering in his investigation, but there was no sense in my taking foolish chances just to avoid a tongue-lashing.

After four rings, their answering machine picked up. Knowing that Rachel could be the one to hear the phone message, I said, “Hi. It’s Molly. This message is for Tommy. There’s something I forgot to tell you, so I’ll leave the message on your phone-mail at the station.” Then I called his work number and, when his recorder picked up, said, “In the spirit of full disclosure, I just wanted you to know that I asked Emily, Susan, and Jane whether or not they would recommend Lucinda’s. They all denied ever having been there. That means either that Stephanie’s source isn’t reliable, or that one of them lied about Lucinda’s because she knew that incident had edged her into murdering Patty . . . which, in turn, would mean that I might have made myself a target.” I paused, realizing that Tommy was going to be cursing at me when he heard this message. “Hope your cold is better. Bye.”

Nathan had a friend over for lunch, then Jim took the boy home, taking Nathan with them and saying that they were going to the hardware store afterward. To perk myself up, I decided to ask Karen to go to the fair with me. I called upstairs for her and wound up having to make the suggestion while shouting through her closed door.

She came skipping down the stairs, dressed attractively in a flame red sweater and blue jeans. She announced, “Sorry, Mom. I’m going to the fair with Adam. And he’s probably already on his way over here to pick me up.”

“You were supposed to keep me informed of your plans. Remember?”

“I told Dad about this two nights ago!”

That was plausible. “Okay. Good for you.”

She peered at me and chewed on her lower lip a little. In a meek voice, she asked, “So, like, could you stay home, Mom?”

“It’s a fairly large venue, Karen. Even if we were there at exactly the same time, we might never run into one another.”

“Yeah, right,” she mumbled. “Please, Mom? You’re gonna see it tonight, anyway, when you’re judging it. Okay?”

“Why would it bother you so much if we—”

“I just don’t want Adam to get the impression that we’re constantly getting spied on.”

“Well, if I had it my way, you
would
be.”

“Fine.” She stuck her lower lip out and stomped her foot. “I’ll cancel my date, and I’ll stay home alone, locked in my room.”

“Hey, there’s an idea. Then you can grow your hair like Rapunzel for Adam to come rescue you. Since you’re only on the second floor, it won’t take you that long.”

The doorbell rang.

Karen clasped her hands together in feigned prayer and said, “Mo-o-om!”

“Okay. Fine. I won’t go.”

She breathed a sigh of relief and gushed, “Thanks, Mom.”

She dashed to the door. As she started to open it, I said, “Though that’s not saying your father won’t.” If I told him he
had
to go, for instance.

Adam’s face lit up as he looked at Karen. “Hi. Ready to go?”

“Just one second. I need to grab my coat.” She gave me a pleading look as she went to the coat closet, apparently afraid that I’d say something to Adam that would embarrass her.
Moi?

Adam peeled his eyes away from her long enough to give me a quick glance. “Yo, Mrs. Masters. You going to the crafts fair?”

“Not till tonight, when I judge some of the entries.” There! Now was
that
embarrassing? No mention whatsoever of my surveillance operation being on the fritz or my spy team being on vacation.

Apparently unaware of the restraint I’d just shown,

Karen and Adam left, holding hands. A half hour later, Jim and Nathan returned, and the two of them went to the basement to put to use their hardware purchases. Later, Nathan showed me how they’d retooled his tongue-depressor catapult. It was now so powerful that it would be unsafe to use indoors.

Nathan went outside to catapult pine cones over state lines. Meanwhile, Jim switched on the television set and plopped down on the couch to watch a game. He made sympathetic noises during my tale of ostracism from our daughter’s social life, but was apparently more interested in whether or not a batch of tall young men neither of us had ever met were capable of throwing a ball through a hoop some fifty-plus times.

I went downstairs to my office to work on cartoons, but spent most of the time sulking. I’d called Tommy hours ago; he had to have gotten my message by now. He absolutely would have called me back—and yelled at me—if he were closing in on the killer, thanks to this Lucinda’s business. Damn it all! Was Patty’s murderer
ever
going to be brought to justice?

My thoughts were in a constant whirl. Eventually I at least made some progress on a cartoon. An ancient-looking man on roller skates, clad in an ill-fitting sparkling suit with a cape, is trying to negotiate his way through a group of grazing buffalo. The caption reads: Bored with retirement, Evel Knievel sets out to disprove the lyrics of a song entitled “You Can’t Roller-Skate in a Buffalo Herd.”

Karen got home and sought me out, probably due to guilt over her shabby treatment of her loving mother, and told me that the fair was “mostly boring,” but that I’d have a tough decision when it came to assigning ribbons. She then said that she and Nathan were going to watch television in Jim’s and my room, because “Dad’s watching some dumb basketball game in the family room.”

I glanced at my watch. He must be into a second game by now, or quadruple overtime. It was not quite six p.m.—too early to judge the contest at the fair, but getting near to dinnertime at restaurants. I called Stephanie, who instead of “hello” said, “If this is a telephone solicitor, the answer is ‘no.’ ”

“It’s me . . . Molly. I want to resolve this thing about Lucinda’s, for my own peace of mind if nothing else. We need to stake out the place tonight. I could do it myself, but it’d be easier with the two of us.”

“What would we be looking for? Patty’s ghost?”

“For Denise Goodman. Can you help me out or not?”

“I suppose so. But it’ll be at least half an hour till I can possibly get there.”

She probably had to put on her custom-designed stakeout makeup and clothing. “Fine. Let’s drive separately, and I’ll meet you in the parking lot. Okay?”

“I’m all atwitter with excitement,” she replied, and hung up.

Chapter 18

Pardon My Impertinence, Sir Fluffy Foo-foo . ..

Not surprisingly, there was no sign of Stephanie’s car when I arrived at Lucinda’s parking lot. As I’d already told her, it wasn’t strictly necessary for her to be here. If any woman came wandering onto the scene to copy down license plate numbers, odds were very good that she would be Denise Goodman. Stephanie’s presence, however, could help me convince the woman how serious her eyewitness report might prove to be.

It was a long, boring, and cold wait. I was kicking myself for coming here when I could be home with my family. I’d told them that I was “going to a restaurant with Stephanie” and would judge the contest at the fair afterward. Maybe my punishment for my lie of omission would be to wait here for hours to no avail, and to never know whether or not Denise Goodman was simply a raving lunatic.

After half an hour, an athletic-looking man emerged from the restaurant and surveyed the parking lot. In his black suit and ruffled shirt, he appeared to be an employee. There were only a half dozen cars in the lot, including mine, and his vision stopped when he caught sight of me in my car. He gave a little wave, which I returned. I could tell from reading his lips that he was asking, “Are you all right?”

I opened my door and stood up. “I’m fine. I’m supposed to meet a friend here.”

“Wouldn’t you be more comfortable waiting inside?”

“Probably, but I told her we’d meet in the parking lot. I don’t want to confuse her.”

“Okay.” He rocked on his heels a little and looked past my shoulder at the copse of trees to one side of the parking area. “The thing is . . . there’s this lady who comes around a lot. She’s got a wild hair up her . . . she’s harmless, but she’s on a one-person crusade to discourage our clientele from coming here.”

“How bizarre.”

“Yeah, she’s something of a neighborhood kook.” He smiled pleasantly. “If she tries to hassle you, just come and get me. I’m the bartender, and all you’ll have to do is lean in the front door to find me.”

“Thanks. I’ll be fine. I don’t discourage easily.” Understatement of the year, I thought, as I settled back into my cold car.

I kept checking the time. At seven p.m. there was still no sign of Denise or of Stephanie. I vowed to leave for the fair no later than eight p.m. Then I tried to keep myself amused by singing all the songs I could think of with “Fair” in the title. That proved to be a poor diversion, because after Johnnie not coming home from the fair and “Scarborough Fair,” I was stuck. What was the folk song with “Come ’round ye fair maidens . . .”?

A beam of white-yellow light caught my rearview mirror, which made me nearly jump out of my skin. Someone in dark clothing approached on foot, cutting through the woods, illuminating the way with a flashlight.

The person continued to come closer, stopped beside the overhead streetlamp, and turned off her flashlight. This woman did not fit the picture I’d built of her in my head. She was younger than I’d imagined—in her late twenties—and was wearing glasses, jeans, sneakers, and a bulky sweatshirt. Shaggy, strawberry-blond tresses poked out from under the hood of her sweatshirt. Somehow I’d imagined her with more of a Church Lady persona. I decided I needed to play this as coolly as possible; pushing her too hard might make her refuse to say anything to me at all.

I watched as she counted the cars in the parking lot and made notations in her notepad. If I could just get hold of those notes and give them to Tommy, perhaps they’d help him solve this thing after all.

When she neared my bumper, I got out of my car and said, “Hi. What are you doing?”

She was startled, and her hand flew to her neck, but she quickly recovered. “I’m just trying to keep a record of how many cars come here tonight.” Her nasally voice was, indeed, instantly recognizable as the voice on the video. She continued, “I live next door, and I have reason to suspect that Lucinda’s is breaking some business zoning ordinances.”

“They are? I don’t want to support an establishment that’s breaking the law. Maybe I shouldn’t come here, then. I was going to meet my friend here for dinner, but maybe we should reconsider.”

“Absolutely. The food here’s lousy and overpriced, and you can’t enjoy a meal here, even if it were
worth
enjoying, because the music in the bar is so loud.”

“What kind of music do they play?” I asked, just to keep her talking.

“Oh, it’s . . . dreadful. Instrumental music. There’s a cheesy dance floor in the bar, so it’s icky, old-fashioned dance music.”

“Eww. That doesn’t sound like my type of place at all. That does it . . . once my friend gets here, I’ll turn her right around, and we’ll go someplace else. I guess I owe you a big thank you for saving our evening. My name’s Molly.”

I held out my hand to shake hers, but she merely stared at it. She shifted her gaze to my face. “Molly Masters. You’re active in the Carlton PTA. What’s going on? First Stephanie Saunders starts interrogating me at the hair salon yesterday. Now you show up here.”

“Well, you’re right that something’s going on. Stephanie’s a fr—an associate of mine, and we’re trying to help the police investigate our friend Patty Birch’s murder. You’re Denise Goodman, right?”

She pursed her lips and glared at me, saying nothing. “You must have children in school at Carlton, right? Well, so did Patty, and so do Stephanie and I. We just want to make Carlton a safer place, you know?”

She took a step backward and said nothing, her features still set in a frown.

“The thing is, I need to know who exactly you saw accompanying Patty Birch here.”

“Why is that any of your business?”

“It
isn’t
, really, but it’s possible that the man’s wife could have gotten so enraged at Patty after learning of the affair that she killed Patty.”

She switched on her flashlight and shined the beam right in my eyes. I had to look away as she said in a haughty voice, “I’m supposed to tell
you
something like that? I don’t know you from beans!”

I held up my hands, forced to squint at her, although she’d averted the beam slightly. “Fine. Don’t tell me. Just tell the police.”

She shook her head. “I can’t! I’ll get thrown in jail. Lucinda has a restraining order against me. In fact, I’ve got to get out of here right now.”

“Fine. I’ll walk you home.”

She pivoted but said firmly, “Don’t bother. I have nothing to say to you.”

I balled my fists and followed her. “In that case, I’ll just have the investigating officer speak to you.”

She lifted her head in defiance and kept up her steady gait. We were now halfway through the woods. “He already did, but I’ve got a lousy memory. I can’t even remember what we were talking about.”

“You told Sergeant Newton you didn’t remember anything at all?”

“It wasn’t a sergeant. Just some guy my age who’d made junior policeman.”

“So your memory isn’t so bad after all.”

“No, just selective.”

“Please, Denise.” I caught up to her and grabbed her arm. She jerked it from my grasp as I pleaded, “What if you could put Patty’s killer behind bars?”

“Then I’d have to testify about how I met her. And I’ll get jailed for violating the restraining order. And this restaurant will get all that publicity, and its business will increase tenfold. No thank you.”

“Those matters are trivial compared to getting a killer behind bars!”

She spun around to face me. “Come off it! All I saw was some man stepping out on his wife. I’m not getting involved. Leave me alone.”

She picked up her pace, and a pine tree bough slapped me in the face. “Damn it,” I muttered, stopping to tend to my eye. Officer Bob had been correct. An eye gouge, even from a pine tree, could stop a pursuer dead in his or her tracks.

My vision already limited with darkness and now half blinded, I picked my way back through the woods to my car. By then, at least my eye had more or less cleared up. Just as I started to unlock my door, Stephanie’s BMW pulled into the lot.

I stood with my arms akimbo as she shut off her engine and came toward me. “You’re too late, but thanks, anyway. I already found your Denise Goodman and spoke to her, and she wouldn’t tell me anything.”

“She’s hardly
my
Denise Goodman.”

“Well, she sure isn’t
mine
. The good news is, a police officer spoke to her already. The bad news is, she told me she denied everything to him.”

“Why?”

“She doesn’t want to get involved. Even so, the officer will surely have talked to the employees here and gotten a description of the man who came here with Patty.”

“Let’s hope so.” She sighed. “Come on, Molly. Since we’re here, let’s go in and have some dinner. I’m famished.”

“So am I, but I’m supposed to go to—”

“We’ll make it something quick. I’m buying.”

We went inside. The decor had a strong New England flavor, as though we’d walked into someone’s house on the Cape. Few seaside houses came equipped with a dance floor and full bar, however. A hostess asked us if we were “Two for dinner,” and I interrupted Stephanie’s request for a table by the window to explain that I only had half an hour, and we would prefer to grab something quick at the bar. Stephanie held her tongue, but was clearly less than pleased.

We took seats at the bar itself, and the bartender put down the glass he was drying and came up to us. “Your friend finally showed up, I see.”

“Yes, she did. But now we’re pushed for time and need to eat and run, unfortunately.” Though I felt silly for continuing to act like a professional investigator, I couldn’t give up this easily. “Lucinda’s came highly recommended by a friend of ours who used to be a regular here . . . before she died, that is. Patty Birch.”

He narrowed his eyes, but handed us two small, laminated menus. “The police were asking me about her just last night. Far as I know, she never actually ate here. She would just order a ginger ale or two and use our dance floor.”

Stephanie immediately said, “Her dance partner was a tall Latino man, right?”

“No, she was always with some average-looking Joe, about my height . . . five-eight, middle-aged.”

“He was average looking?” I prompted.

“Yeah. I gave his description to the police officer. So. What can I get you ladies?”

“Can you give us a couple of minutes to decide?” Stephanie asked pleasantly.

“Actually, I really do have to eat and run.” I glanced at the menu and chose the first thing I saw. “I’ll just have an order of potstickers and a glass of water.”

“Fine,” Stephanie said. “I’ll have the same thing. But make my ‘water’ a glass of your finest chardonnay.”

The bartender gave us our drinks, then left to put in our order in the kitchen. I said to Stephanie, “Jane’s husband is around five-eight or so. Have you ever met Emily Crown’s husband?”

She nodded. “He is medium-height, too. And he and Emily are good dancers. They occasionally took classes from Chad.”

“Mr. Alberti’s off the hook, since I would think the bartender would have mentioned it if Patty’s partner was bald.”

“Plus his wife wasn’t a PTA officer. Susan’s husband, on the other hand, is even taller than Chad.”

I frowned and shook my head. “Something’s bugging me about this whole . . . dancing business.”

“What?”

“I don’t know yet. I feel like I’m overlooking something obvious.”

She swirled the pale liquid in her wineglass, then took a sip. “I’m sure you’ll come up with whatever it is soon.”

Our food came, and we focused our attention on that. We each had six potstickers, which Nathan had once described to me as “wontons without the soup.” They were tasty, and I ate quickly, wracking my brain for whatever it was that somebody had said to me about Patty and dancing.

“That’s it!” I cried, suddenly remembering. I set down my fork and pushed my plate away. “Chad wouldn’t let Jane and Aaron Daly dance at that contest, remember? He felt that his dancers were supposed to represent his studio, and Aaron had gotten lessons from somebody else.”

Stephanie arched an eyebrow. “So?”

“So, what if Patty was giving lessons to Aaron Daly here all that time? Remember how he came into the studio and told Jane he’d taken lessons as a surprise to her?”

She nodded and said thoughtfully, “Which could explain why Patty kept coming here with another man even though, according to your research, she was trying to win her ex-husband back.”

She smiled and crooked her finger at the bartender, who came over. “Pardon me, I know you’re busy, but one last question about our friend, Patty Birch.”

He leaned both elbows on the bar. “Go ahead.”

“This man that Patty was dancing with . . . was he as good a dancer as she was?”

“No, it looked to me like she was teaching him.”

She gave me a triumphant smile. “Thank you. You’ve been most helpful.” She handed him a twenty and said, “Keep the change.”

The moment we’d pushed out the door, Stephanie said, “Well, that solves it. Jane Daly did it.”

“We have no proof of that, Stephanie. All we have is a theory. And even if Denise Goodman sees fit to identify Jane and her husband to the police, that’s still all we’ll have—a theory.”

She stopped walking, put her hands on her hips, and eyed me. “Rain on my parade, why don’t you!”

“A plausible theory with corroborating evidence is better than nothing. I’m just saying that it’s not the same as positive proof. Please do me a favor . . . go to Tommy’s house right now and tell him what we’ve learned about Jane Daly. He’ll probably at least be willing to bring her in for questioning, and if she’s guilty, maybe she’ll break down and confess.”

“Aren’t you coming, too?”

“No, he’ll listen better if this comes from you than from me, and I promised I’d judge the contest tonight. Provided, of course, that plenty of other judges are there and Jane Daly’s nowhere near.”

There were only three cars in the parking lot at the fair by the time I arrived. I got out of my car slowly and reluctantly, wishing there were more people around. Just in case Jane Daly truly was the killer, I didn’t want to take any chance of winding up with her in an otherwise empty building late at night.