Murder on a Starry Night: A Queen Bees Quilt Mystery (10 page)

The ringing of the telephone scattered Po’s thoughts. “I’ll get it,” she said to Max, rising from the couch. For a moment her heart beat too fast, and she stood still beside the deck swing listening to the night sounds. And for that instance, Po didn’t want to answer the phone at all. The news, she knew instinctively, would not be good.

Po walked into the kitchen and picked up the phone. It was Kate, her voice high and her words coming out too quickly.

Po’s heart skipped a beat. Since Kate’s mother’s death, Po had assumed the same role with Kate that she had with her own three children—fearing, when the phone rings late at night, that her child might be hurt.

“Kate, what is it?”

“Oh, Po, when is this craziness going to end? P.J. and I were out on our bikes tonight, riding along the river, getting something to eat. Then—”

“Kate,”
Po stopped her, her knuckles white against the receiver. “Are you all right? P.J.?”

“Yes, Po,” Kate said, impatient to get on with her story. “Everyone you love is fine. But there are others in Crestwood not so fine.”

Po slowly released the air that was creating fire in her lungs. “Go on, sweetie.”

“Well, we rode past the Harrington estate on the way back to my house, and as we were going around the corner, we heard sirens, then a police car, and then the emergency medical van spun around the corner and pulled into 210 Kingfish.”

“So you and P.J. followed.”

“P.J. thought he could help.”

“Of course.”

Kate went on. “Adele Harrington was standing out in the driveway in her nightgown, though it was only nine or so. And Halley Peterson—that nice librarian from the college was there. And Joe Bates, the gardener.”

“That’s an odd threesome.”

“Yes, I thought so, too.”

Po could almost feel the adrenalin surging through Kate’s body and wished, for a moment, that her goddaughter didn’t love danger quite so much.

“Halley was in tears,” Kate continued, “and Joe had blood gushing from his forehead.”

“That poor man. Is he all right?”

“It was mostly superficial, P.J. said. Apparently Adele hit him with one of the workmen’s tools because she thought he was breaking into her house, or so she said.”

“And Adele called the police?”

“No, Halley did. She was walking up the drive and heard Joe scream, then saw the blood as he was trying to get back to the carriage house. So she called 911 from her cell phone.”

“What was she coming to see Adele for at that hour? That’s odd, especially since Adele isn’t very fond of her.” She felt Max standing close behind her and turned, assuring him with a smile that everything was okay. “Kate,” she whispered, her hand cupping the receiver, then nodded toward the coffee brewing on the counter and the apple pie right beside it.

Max’s brows lifted with pleasure. He walked over and helped himself to a generous slice, then settled down at Po’s table with Hoover at his side.

“I don’t know why Halley was there,” Kate answered. “Things were a little crazy, as you can imagine. Adele was upset that the police came. She said she could handle things herself.”

“Did she bring charges against Joe?”

“No. She wanted everyone to go home and forget the whole thing happened. Which they did, but of course the police had to file a report of the call.”

“What happened then?”

“It was kind of anticlimactic. Adele went inside. Joe shuffled off to his carriage house with a bandaged head, and Halley kind of disappeared. I really don’t know where she went.

“P.J. talked to the fellows from the department for a few minutes—they thought the whole thing was strange. Adele’s actions and the whole uncooperative way she’s treated Ollie’s death and murder have the police on alert. She isn’t above suspicion, P.J. says. She only has the house because Ollie died, so there’s motive. And things like this don’t help the way they think about her.”

“Was Joe actually breaking in?”

“Well, turns out he has a key, so no, he wasn’t exactly breaking in. Adele heard a sound coming from the back door, picked up a hammer a workman had left and really hit him hard with it. She could have hurt him badly. Fortunately the paramedics came to check him out, and they said he’d be fine.”

“Adele isn’t crazy about Joe, she’s made that clear. But this isn’t exactly the way to handle it. Why was he going into her kitchen?”

“He adopted Neptune, Ollie’s cat, and he thought the cat had been locked inside the house. He didn’t want the cat to have to spend the night with Adele, he said.”

Po smiled. That sounded like Joe. He was always a bit crusty.

“He mumbled something to the police about Ollie’s murder. Said they were looking in all the wrong places.”

“That’s strange.”

“He wasn’t talking very sensibly. And everyone thought he should go take some aspirin and go to bed. I think he’d had a few beers. He growled at Adele, then finally walked off, and I—” Kate paused.

“What?” Po asked, feeling Kate’s unfinished thought.

“Po, I don’t know why exactly, but for a moment, I felt sorry for Adele. She seemed vulnerable somehow, standing out on that driveway. She tried to put on her usual brave, brassy façade, but she couldn’t quite pull it off. There was a crack in the stone.”

Po listened, nodding. A few minutes later, with Kate’s assurance that she was through with any detective work for the night, she hung up and sat beside Max at the table while he finished his second piece of pie. She filled him in on the pieces of the story he hadn’t grasped from hearing one side of the conversation. The facts were unpleasant— and the thought of Adele swinging a hammer at old Joe Bates was an unforgiving one.

But beneath all the facts, Po suspected Kate was right. Adele’s façade was crumbling. And she wasn’t the ogre she wanted everyone to think she was. There was, indeed, a crack in the stone.

Po had been trying to get to the Canterbury library for several days. Her excuse was to pick up another book Leah was holding for her and to do a little research. But the real reason was to talk to Halley Peterson again, to find out what in the world she was doing at the Harrington mansion late on a Saturday night.

A quick call to the library confirmed that Halley was working that day, and when Halley herself came to the phone, she agreed to meet Po for a cup of coffee around three. Po wasn’t sure if she was reading into it or not, but she thought she heard relief in Halley’s voice, or at the least, a desire to talk with Po.

Po threw a bright blue cotton sweater over her white blouse and jeans and walked the few blocks to the college. It was another amazing fall day with temperatures in the upper sixties, and everywhere Po looked, trees were turning into bouquets of color. The ugliness of Oliver’s death hanging over the town was an aberration and didn’t fit at all with the beauty around them.
Soon
, Po thought.
Please let it end soon
.

In ten minutes, Po reached the edge of campus and slowed down as she passed Eleanor’s big house. Eleanor was like Joe Bates, she thought, admiring the large urns, filled to overflowing with crimson mums. The two of them just looked at a plant and it eagerly responded with beautiful blossoms. She’d have to remember to tell Eleanor how wonderful her home looked.

A bevy of coeds in shorts and t-shirts ran by, and Po stepped aside, admiring their speed and energy as they ran toward town. Her own jogs were not nearly so speedy, but they energized her just the same. And, she thought with a slight trace of pride, kept her in the same-sized jeans she’d worn thirty years ago.

Po walked beneath the large stone entrance arch and across the green area that centered the college. She loved the small campus and welcomed the flood of memories that warmed her from the inside out every time she walked the tree-lined lanes crisscrossing the campus. When Sam Paltrow had been president, Po stopped by nearly every day for one thing or another—to bring one of the kids by to see their dad, to have a little quiet time with her husband in his high-ceiling office in the administration building, to attend benefits and meetings. It was a second home, and Sam’s early death hadn’t changed that feeling—the faculty and staff considered her family and she always felt welcome here. She wondered briefly how Sam would feel about the difference in status, the college growing into a university. It was a matter of funding, she knew, simply semantics. But she resented the pressure it put on friends like Leah and Jed to have to publish articles and books to remain in good standing. It all seemed like a rather childish game to her.

Po greeted several faculty members as she walked past the theatre building and crossed over to the library on the other side of the quad. Inside the cool stone building, she was greeted by an enormous painting of her Sam, looking down at her from the paneled wall in the entryway. She nodded at him, smiling into his clear blue eyes. She let the catch in her breathing pass before moving on. Dear Sam. Always with her, but always, always, giving her permission to move on.

The library was busy with students cramming for exams. Po didn’t see Halley behind the curved desk, but she was a bit early for their coffee date, so she headed for a computer to find her own titles.

A short while later, her yellow notepad filled with scribbles and two books checked out and slipped into her backpack, Po looked around for Halley. “Check the Hawthorne reading room,” a young girl at the desk told her. “I think she was helping one of the professors with his reserved reading list.”

Po thanked her and wound her way around a bank of carrels to a smaller room off a hallway. That room, too, was filled with students at library tables, heads bent together, books open between them, and a buzz in the air that spoke of pending exams.

Po spotted Halley over on the other side of the room, standing beside a carrel. She was talking softly to a man whose back was to Po. While she talked, she removed her glasses, then smiled shyly and leaned forward slightly to hear what the man was saying.

Po smiled as she watched the interaction.
She’s flirting with him
, she thought with some surprise, then started to turn away, embarrassed to be eavesdropping on the librarian.

At that moment, Halley looked up and caught Po’s eye. She gave her a small wave, said something to the man in the carrel, and hurried across the room, glancing up at the big clock on the wall.

“I’m so sorry, Po. I didn’t realize the time.”

“You were busy doing your job,” Po said. “It’s a little crazy around here.”

“Yes,” Halley said in a low voice. “Very crazy. Professors are trying to get reading lists lined up for the rest of the fall semester and the kids are cramming.” With a sweep of her hand, she took in the crowded room. “Look at this, not an empty table in sight. But I love the activity.”

Po noticed the sparkle in Halley’s eyes, missing when she was talking with Adele Harrington just days ago. Her cheeks were pink and glowing. “I can see you love what you do,” she said, and followed Halley’s gaze around the room.

“Yes,” Halley said softly. “I love what I do. I get to take classes for free, I meet fascinating people, and I work in this amazing library. This is where I met Ollie.”

“You miss him,” Po said, reading the wistful sound in Halley’s voice.

“I do. And lots of others do, too. He had friends here, people who loved him.”

Po nodded. “I know that, Halley. And speaking of Ollie, shall we get that cup of coffee? I could certainly use one. And we can talk more about your friend Ollie, too.”

Halley agreed, and began walking toward the door.

Po lifted her backpack over her shoulder and followed, glancing back briefly at the carrel in the back of the room and the man who seemed to have added a glow to Halley’s cheeks.

At that moment, the man stood, picked up his briefcase, and turned to speak to a student asking his help.

Po smiled in surprise as she looked at the handsome profile of Jedson Fellers. Goodness, she thought, one never knew.

“A cup of coffee is exactly what I need to keep me going another couple of hours,” Halley said as she and Po settled in a booth in the small coffee shop that the college had recently constructed. It was a light and airy place with comfortable couches and chairs and a line of booths along one window.