Gone with the Wool (12 page)

I woke up groggy Tuesday morning. I probably would have overslept, but Julius was standing on my chest, licking my forehead with his sandpaper tongue. I'd fallen into bed with my clothes on, and I suspected that some muffin batter had gotten stuck to my hair.

“Not as good as stink fish, huh?” I said when the cat tired of it and stepped off me onto the bed. I lay on my side for a moment, thinking about the night before and the day ahead. Dane had stayed with me until the two chocolate cakes were frosted and set on their pedestal dishes and the smaller orders of muffins had been taken around town. He even walked with me onto the grounds of Vista Del Mar when I dropped off their supply.

“May they all speed out of those baskets,” he said, waving his hand as if it was a magic wand.

“I think that's Sammy's domain,” I said. And, out of
nowhere, as we were going back down the driveway, he put his arm around me and kissed me.

“I don't know why you're still so skittish about our relationship. Why not just throw caution to the wind and admit what everybody else knows? We have a thing for each other.”

I knew what he was saying was right. We did have a thing for each other, but I was still too worried about what would happen when it didn't work out. I hadn't said anything to him, but if my baking career died, there was a good chance I'd have to leave Cadbury. All of this was getting uncomfortable, and I struggled to change the subject. I brought up Tag and how he'd been acting.

“He snuck out on the porch to meet up with some guy in a Windbreaker and weird rubber boots,” I said.

“Not so weird around here,” Dane said. “He sounds like a fisherman. Probably for squid. They go out late.”

“But why would Tag be meeting a squid fisherman?”

Dane glanced around the restaurant. “You're the detective. Why do you think?” Of course, the answer was obvious.

“He wants to add it to the menu and was arranging to get it directly from the fisherman,” I said and Dane nodded in approval.

“Though I imagine Tag will call it calamari. Sounds more appetizing than a plate of squid.”

I took another minute to lay there thinking about the night before. I winced remembering how Sammy had opened the guest house door when Dane and I were walking up my driveway. It was so awkward. Sammy had told us both that his parents had taken off the gloves after I'd left and laid into him that he was wasting his time in Cadbury.

Julius interrupted my thoughts by stepping onto my hip and looking down at my face as his tail swished. He wasn't
going to leave me alone until he got his morning snack. I went barefoot into the kitchen.

The phone rang while I was trying to wake myself up with a cup of coffee. I'd finally moved from instant to using a filter in a ceramic holder and brewing it a cup at a time. I considered not answering the phone for a moment. I didn't have to look at the screen to see who was calling. There was only one person who called this early.

“Hello, Mother,” I said, trying to sound more awake.

“I just thought I'd check in and see how things are going,” she said. I saw right through it. She wanted to find out how it was going with Sammy's parents.

“You knew they were coming, didn't you?” I said. “And you knew they thought Sammy and I were back together.”

“Estelle might have mentioned they were considering stopping by to see Sammy after the medical conference. And that they were hoping to convince Sammy to leave Cadbury. She tried to enlist my help in convincing you two to get married. I told her that I wasn't the kind of parent who interfered in her children's lives.”

I was having trouble holding back a laugh. Not interfere, ha! My mother finished talking, and there was a silence I was supposed to fill with how things were going. When I started to talk about something else, she got impatient.

“Casey, just tell me what happened.”

I had too much on my mind to play around anymore, so I just spilled it all, about Sammy pretending to be living at my place and that he was just giving lip service to his parents and had no intention of leaving Cadbury.

“He's staying at your place?” my mother said, with an uplift in her voice.

“In the guest house,” I said. I wanted to get off the phone
quickly. My mother could read my voice too well, and I was afraid I'd let on that something was wrong. Then she'd work at me until I spilled it all. My worry about losing my baking business would only fuel her efforts to get me to take her up on cooking school in Paris, or even better, throw in the towel on the whole thing and move back to Chicago.

“Got to go,” I said. “A big day ahead of me.” Then before she could question me any more, I hung up.

Julius and I both heard a key in the lock and turned as Sammy came in. He was freshly dressed, and his eyes went right to my coffee. It was then that I remembered I was still wearing the black jeans and turtleneck from the day before, and I could only imagine what a mess my hair was. I expected some kind of revulsion to show in his expression, but I might as well have been Cinderella after the fairy godmother did her work, by the way his face looked.

Sammy was so unshakable—he was one of those people who didn't seem to get down. He reminded me of those toys that just bounced back up again when you knocked them over. He seemed unaffected by the grilling his parents had given him. I wished he could give me a lesson in that. Even though I'd been in control of the call with my mother, she still always got to me. I offered to make him a cup of coffee and gave him his choice of the yogurt in the refrigerator.

“I cleared my calendar,” he said. “I'm spending the whole day with my parents. I'm hoping I can talk them into going home. Then life can go back to normal.”

“Good luck with your mission,” I said, setting the mug in front of him and pouring the boiling water into the filter. I left him with the fresh coffee dripping into his mug.

It took a couple of soapings to get the hardened cake and muffin batter out of my hair. I added a peacock blue cowl
over the fresh black turtleneck and grabbed an olive green fleece. When I came through the kitchen, Sammy was gone. He'd washed both our mugs and put them in the drainer.

It felt good to be outside in the cool damp air. The sky was a pale apricot as the sun tried to make a showing. I rushed down the driveway and passed the Lodge without stopping, heading directly to the Sea Foam dining hall.

There was a buzz of conversation and the clatter of dishes and silverware. I took in the breakfast scents of pancakes and maple syrup, mixed with the pungent aroma of bacon, and my hunger surged. I went directly to the food line and loaded a plate with a little bit of everything. Then I went in search of a seat.

“Sit by me,” Lucinda said, waving me over as I passed her table. I set down my plate in the adjacent spot and pulled off my jacket. As I sat down I looked over at the other tables with my retreaters. I saw that everyone had brought along their loom and was working on it—including Scott.

“So, they really did give up,” I said, discreetly indicating the needle enthusiasts who were sitting together.

“I don't think they wanted to be left out.” Lucinda held up hers, and I was impressed at how much knitted material was hanging through the center.

“Where's your loom?” she asked.

“I've had a few things on my mind,” I said—an understatement. “I left everything in the meeting room.”

Lucinda put down the loom and picked up her coffee cup.

“How did it go last night?” Lucinda asked. “Was Tag okay?”

I knew she was asking because she'd mentioned that he'd been acting strange lately, like he was worried about something, and when she had asked about it, he'd insisted everything was fine.

I considered how to answer. With all that Dane and I had figured out about Tag's meeting with the fisherman, it seemed likely that the worry Lucinda had noticed might be tied to him arranging for the squid, though why he wouldn't have told her was beyond me. But then I didn't understand a lot of what Tag did.

“He should be fine now. I think he worked it out so that you'll be getting the freshest squ—I mean, calamari,” I said. explaining what I had witnessed.

“What?” Lucinda said, snapping to attention. “There's no calamari on the menu. He's adding something without discussing it with me.”

“Maybe he was planning to surprise you when he got it all together,” I offered.
Which I had now ruined.
It was useless to suggest she forget what I'd said.

Her eyes were flashing and she wanted to rush off to the Lodge and call him.
What had I done?
I convinced her to wait to talk to him in person when we went downtown later, figuring she would be more rational by then. I needed to do something to get her to calm down.

I borrowed from what I'd learned during my teaching days. When dealing with an unruly student, I'd found that getting them to help me with something calmed them right down. I pushed the loom toward her.

“I am still having trouble wrapping the yarn around the pegs. Could you show me how you do it?” It worked like a charm. Lucinda's expression relaxed as she picked up the loom and began to work with the yarn.

She was completely back to herself as she joined the others when breakfast ended. Meanwhile I went to the Lodge to make sure the transportation was set to get everybody into town that afternoon for a Butterfly Week event. I passed the
chapel on my way. Kevin St. John had put up a temporary fence with a covering to block the view of the building, so that the guests had no idea the small structure was still surrounded in yellow tape. As I looked at the fence, Lieutenant Borgnine came from behind the screen and surveyed the area before noticing me.

I expected him to immediately get the pained expression that my presence tended to inspire and head in the other direction, but instead he walked directly toward me and called my name.

“As long as you're here,” he said, when he'd reached me, “it's come to my attention that you had an altercation with the victim.”

“Altercation?” I said. A silent standoff followed my question. He didn't want to give more details, and I didn't know what he was talking about, except that he was trying to say that I might have a motive to kill Rosalie. I knew I was kind of a thorn in his side, but was he so desperate to get rid of me that he was pointing the light of suspicion on me? Kevin St. John came by in his golf cart and stopped it next to us.

“I was just asking Ms. Feldstein about her altercation with Rosalie Hardcastle, but she seems to have amnesia,” the lieutenant said.

“Maybe I can help refresh her memory,” the Vista Del Mar manager said. “Rosalie said it was your muffins that made the two players get sick, which caused the football team to lose the biggest game of the year. And you seemed very upset, as you insisted it couldn't have been your muffins.”

Now I knew what they were talking about. “I'd hardly call that an altercation. She was trying to get the blame off her chili and said it could have been something else, like my
corn muffins.” I looked the rumpled cop in the eye. “Actually, it was Maggie who defended the muffins. Not me.”

The two men traded satisfied nods. “Whatever, Ms. Feldstein,” Lieutenant Borgnine said. “But we know a good part of your livelihood is dependent on your baking. If someone put the quality of something you baked in question, you might have gotten angry, very angry.”

“You have to be kidding.” I started to pull away.

“We'll be in touch,” the lieutenant said.

*   *   *

The morning workshop was uneventful, and the group went right to lunch from the meeting room. I stayed with them, enjoying the grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup. After lunch, the retreaters gathered in front of the Lodge and loaded into the small bus to go to the main part of Cadbury. I had pushed the whole episode with Lieutenant Borgnine and Kevin St. John out of my mind. It was too ridiculous to even consider, and we had a full afternoon ahead of us.

When I first got the idea of including the Butterfly Week activities in the retreat schedule, I was told I had to include a trip to the Monarch Sanctuary. It made perfect sense, since the actual butterflies were what all the hoopla was about.

The stop to see the butterflies proved to be very popular. When the bus turned onto the side street, I was surprised to see it clogged with traffic. The driver had trouble finding a place to park, but eventually, the group filed out, and I led the way.

The word
sanctuary
made it sound a lot grander than it was. There was just a small sign at the end of a driveway that
looked like it had originally been an alley. The road went past a local motel to a stand of tall trees. It had been pointed out to me that the butterflies had chosen the trees first, and after the fact, the area around them had become considered a sanctuary.

A number of docents were standing near a kiosk that had butterfly information. They were easy to pick out, because they were dressed in monarch orange, with bobbing black antennas on their heads. Throngs of people were walking around the small area, looking up at the trees. The sun had burned through the clouds and was filtering through the greenery—or what at first appeared to be greenery. As I looked up, I began to see movement, and the trees became alive with fluttering wings. The trees were literally covered with butterflies hanging from the foliage. Every so often, bunches of them would leave their roost and flutter around, which brought out aahs from the crowd.