The Body In The Bog (6 page)

“I still can't figure out what Margaret and Nelson were up to,” she said. The encounter with the Batcheldors had been the prime topic of lunch conversation, introduced by Ben as soon as he saw his father emerge from the study. Faith had endeavored to downplay the whole event, while punctuating the salient details with various dramatic facial expressions whenever the kids became distracted by the tricolored fusili with Gorgonzola sauce she'd made, Ben's totally unaccountable favorite.

“Are you sure they were ski masks, not woolen hats pulled down low?” Tom asked.

“Of course I'm sure. I thought we had stumbled into the middle of some crazed neo-Nazi maneuvers. When they got close, I could see they weren't wearing fatigues, but they were all in green. Now knowing how nuts Margaret is, I wouldn't put it past her to dress up like a particular bird she was hoping to add to her list, the olive-colored, black-capped bog sucker or some such thing. But given the mood of the meeting last night, I don't think they were birding today.”

“But what?” Tom looked extremely troubled. Nelson Batcheldor was a member of the Vestry.

“Maybe they're planning some way to blow up the bog if Joey goes ahead with his plans.”

“How would that help them?”

“I don't know, Tom. This is all supposition, and as far as I could tell, the only thing resembling a weapon was Margaret's heavy set of binoculars. Unless Nelson's camera is one of those James Bond types.”

“You were in the woods, so they were coming from the bog itself. Maybe they're stockpiling things. Oh, this is too crazy. We know they're a little eccentric.” Tom looked at Faith and amended his words, “Well, very eccentric, and they probably dress like that for bird-watching all the time. We've just never seen them before. And it was cold early this morning. I would have worn a ski mask, too, if I'd been out.”

“You don't have a mask like that. Only robbers do. In fact, I wonder where you'd even get one.” Faith was getting sidetracked into a realm of speculation she'd explored before. You're about to engage in criminal activity. Where do you shop? Walk into house-wares at Jordan Marsh and ask for a good, long, sharp kitchen knife? And these masks.
Soldier of Fortune
mail order? For those necessities not covered by the Victoria's Secret catalog? She was about to expound on all this when the phone rang.

Faith answered it, and whatever she had planned to say about the Batcheldors' proclivities went clear out of her mind.

It was Pix and she was definitely agitated.

“Faith, is Tom home? I've got to talk to you both right away! You know Sam's in California; otherwise I wouldn't bother you.”

This didn't sound either college-or middle school–related.

“What is it? What's happened?” Faith asked anxiously.

“I've just gotten a poison-pen letter,” Pix answered, and burst into tears.

Pix Miller was not a woman who cried without provocation—funerals, illnesses, seeing
The Yearling
once again. As soon as Pix had arrived, Faith put her arm around her friend and led her to the couch with only a fleeting thought to the number of females who seemed to be drenching the parsonage with their tears lately.

“It's the shock, I suppose.” Pix reached around in her pocket, produced a crumpled handkerchief, and dabbed her eyes. “I was opening the mail and there was this thin envelope, and at first I thought, Oh dear, Samantha's been rejected. Then I noticed there wasn't a return address, and I opened it and…well, here it is.”

She handed the envelope, which she had clutched in her other hand, to Faith. Tom leaned over the back of the couch, reading over his wife's shoulder. It was a plain white business envelope addressed in ballpoint pen, block letters, to “Mrs. Samuel Miller,” with the address.

Faith paused and put the envelope down. “It's hard to get prints from paper, but I think we should be careful anyway.” She went into the kitchen and returned with a clean dust cloth, which she used to hold the paper by one corner as she eased it out of the envelope.

There was no doubt. It was venomous—a classic of its sort, the letters neatly cut from magazines and newspapers. Occasionally, the writer had been fortunate enough to find an entire word. A few of the pieces were colored type, producing a collage effect. But it was not a work of art.

“I know one thing”—Pix had given her eyes one final swipe and was giving an award–winning performance of her old self—“whoever wrote this horrible letter is certainly
not
a friend. The idea!”

Faith was staring at the letter.

“It really is strangely worded—‘A friend'…‘betraying.' As if the person has some sort of quirky Victorian manual on how to write nasty letters—or watches a lot of daytime TV. And of course you don't believe it,” Faith quickly reassured Pix.

Sam Miller had, in fact, had one brief, disastrous affair during his particularly bumpy ride into middle age, but that had been several years ago. The young woman, Cindy, with whom Sam had chosen to dally had later ended up as a corpse in Aleford's own his
toric belfry, discovered, in fact, by Faith. The suggestion of current adultery was horrible by itself. Bringing up the murder was particularly loathsome.

“Not for a minute,” Pix said staunchly. “Still, I wish he was home.” Pix was incapable of lying. Coupled with her tendency to speak her mind, it often resulted in revealing self-confession. Faith did not have this problem.

Tom sat down on Pix's other side and took her hand. “There's no question that Sam is totally devoted—and faithful—to you. But letters like this are intended to plant seeds of doubt. It's only natural to want him right here. When will he be back?”

“Tomorrow night. But don't worry. Of course I want to look him straight in the eye, but even more, I just want him home. Who would do this to us?”

“That's what we should be talking about.” Faith thought it was time to get down to business. If they began to dwell too much on Sam, Pix would get weepy again and water those malicious seeds Tom had mentioned. “Do you have any idea at all?”

Pix shook her head slowly. “I never thought I had any enemies. You know, Tom, when you preached that sermon, ‘Who Is My Enemy?' I thought it was going to be about what we fight against in ourselves. Oh, I agreed with what you said, that we can become our enemy—the thief, the slanderer, now the poison-pen wielder—if we don't forgive him, yet I truly can't think of anyone who would want to harm me.”

Faith had to agree. Pix was one of the best-liked people in Aleford and one of the few about whom
Faith had never heard a negative word. It was astonishing. Still volunteering in all sorts of organizations her children had outgrown—Pix had only recently stepped down as head of the cookie drive for the Girl Scouts, even though Samantha's uniform probably wouldn't even fit over her head—Pix was the person Aleford called for help, ideas, and comfort. Which reminded Faith, who said, “I heard you were running St. Theresa's blood drive this year? Are you switching pews?”

“My friend Martha Stanley was doing it, but you know she's scheduled for a hip replacement and she couldn't—”

“Find anybody else.” Faith finished it up for her and they laughed. It was a welcome diversion.

Tom moved them back on track. Although he'd been pleased that someone not only remembered the title of one of his sermons, but had listened. Still they were ranging a bit far afield. “The point is that although we'd be hard put to come up with anyone who had a grudge against you, or Sam, you
did
get the letter, and the first thing we have to do is tell Charley. Do you want to call him or would you like me to?”

The offending object was on the walnut coffee table in front of them, next to a clear glass vase of anemones just past their peak—elongated stems with petals splayed out in bright silk colors. A bowl of pears completed the still life. The letter looked as out of place as a porno magazine.

“You, please,” Pix said promptly, eyeing the missive with extreme distaste. “I don't mind Charley
knowing. I suppose it is a police matter, but I'd just as soon not talk about it.”

Faith thought it impolitic to mention that the moment Charley was on the scene she'd have to do a lot of talking. “How about a cup of coffee or tea while Tom is calling. Or are you hungry? Did you have lunch?”

Pix, a tall woman with a healthy appetite, looked surprised. Certainly she'd had lunch, as had the rest of Aleford—at noon when you were supposed to, but coffee sounded good. “I'd love a cup of coffee, if it's made.”

Faith went out to start a fresh pot and put some molasses spice cookies on a plate while she was waiting for the water to get hot. Chief MacIsaac might come here rather than meet them down at the station. She added more cookies.

“Charley's on his way,” Tom told her when she brought the tray into the living room.

Pix bit into a cookie, “Where are the kids?” she asked. She'd been so involved in her own problem that she'd forgotten about the younger Fairchilds, as much a part of the parsonage landscape as her children—and she counted the dogs—were of hers next door.

“Amy's still taking a good long nap in the afternoon and Ben's upstairs resting. He's been awfully quiet, which either means he's dropped off, too, or he's taking apart the VCR.” At the moment with no audible sounds, Faith was letting well enough, or the opposite, alone.

The doorbell rang. Charley must have left as soon as he hung up the phone.

“So you've gotten one, too, Pix,” he said as he walked toward the plate of cookies.

Faith was oddly relieved. Pix wasn't the only one. Find the common thread linking the recipients and they'd have their noxious correspondent.

“Who else?” she asked.

“Now, Faith, you know I can't tell you that,” Charley said, looking around for a sturdy chair. Unfortunately, the parsonage ran to spindly Hitchcocks. He lowered himself into one of the wing chairs flanking the fireplace. He was a large man, brought up on the stick-to-your-ribs traditional fare of his native Nova Scotia. Food had been sticking to his ribs ever since, although he carried it well. As usual, he was in plain clothes, very plain clothes. His Harris tweed jacket was due for a good pressing and it was doubtful his shirt ever had.

“Let's see it,” he said.

Tom motioned to the coffee table. “We didn't want to add our prints; that's why the cloth is there.”

“Hard to get good ones from paper, but we'll try.”

Faith shot a forgivably smug look at her husband.

Charley read the words slowly, looked at the envelope, and, using the cloth, put them in a plastic bag he'd pulled from his pocket.

“They were mailed from Boston—Post Office Square, to be precise—and at the same time—Thursday afternoon. The miracle is that they all arrived yesterday or today and didn't take several weeks as usual.
Maybe we should be looking for a postal worker.” Charley was not above a little government-employee chauvinism.

“Post Office Square is in the business district. Who do you know who works there, Pix?” Faith asked.

“Could also be that our writer has a sense of humor,” Charley interjected, on a roll. “Post Office Square, poison-pen letters—get it?”

They did.

“Every lawyer, CPA—all those kinds of people—not working here in town works there, as far as I know. Including Sam.” Pix was depressed.

Faith forgot that Sam's law offices were on Congress Street. Yet surely he'd have no reason to mail a letter like this to his wife. Plus, he'd been out of town. Somebody in his office? But was there anyone who was familiar enough with Aleford to send the others, hoping maybe to divert attention from the intended target, if indeed Pix, or Sam himself, was it? It seemed unlikely.

“Does anyone else from town work with Sam?” she asked Pix.

“Only Ellen Phyfe—you know, Morris's wife. She's been the office manager for years. They moved to Aleford because she'd heard such good things about it from Sam.”

Faith's mind began to work furiously. Could Ellen have something against her boss? Faith had to know who else had received letters, and if Charley wasn't going to tell her, she'd have to find out some other way. It looked like Tom was going to be avoiding cow
patties on his own this afternoon at Drumlin Farm. She planned to make some parish calls.

“If you got permission from the others to reveal their names, it might help to meet and establish some common ground,” Tom sensibly pointed out to Charley.

“Exactly what I've been doing. Okay with you, Pix?” Faith had finally put a mug of coffee into his waiting hand. He took another cookie. “I plan to get all of you together…by yourselves—sorry, Faith—later this afternoon.”

Faith didn't think he looked very sorry.

Pix's face assumed a determined look. She'd been running her hands through her short, thick brown hair and one piece in front stood straight up like a visor. “Of course you can include me. Anything that will help to figure this out.”

Charley stayed a little longer, finished his coffee, and managed to tantalize Faith further with references to the other letters. It was Pix who broke things up.

“I have to pick Samantha up at softball practice and take Danny to that skateboard place in Cambridge for a birthday party. And,” she added, “I don't want the kids to hear anything about this. It was bad enough the last time, the Cindy time.”

“Bad enough” was putting it mildly, but Pix did not tend to histrionics. In any case, “bad enough” in Aleford was generally understood to suggest major tragedy.

She left and Charley followed. Faith and Tom sat facing each other on the couch. Amy was beginning to
call from her crib and they could hear Ben go into his sister's room. It was extremely unlikely that he had thoughts of brotherly love in mind. His idea of play with Amy consisted of making her animals “fly.”

“So,” Tom said, poised for intervention.

“So,” said his wife. “We've got to get this settled. I know Pix seemed calm when she left, but that's for Samantha and Danny's benefit. Thank goodness she's got them to worry about.”

Tom had never been enamored of his wife's investigative involvements, but for once he thought she ought to see what she could discover. These were the Millers—parishioners and their dearest friends.

“The first thing we have to do is call Sam. See if he can come back earlier. Pix said he was staying at the Fairmont in San Francisco.”

“Good idea. You do that while I get the kids ready for the farm.” She looked at Tom's shoes. “You'd better put your wellies on, too.”

Tom assumed a forlorn look, “And where are you going to be while I'm having all this fun?”

“At Millicent's, of course—at least to start.”

Faith was surprised he'd had to ask.

 

Millicent Revere McKinley answered her door immediately, confirming that Millicent had been at her usual post, an armchair perfectly angled in the bay window so as to afford the occupant a view of Main Street and the green. Millicent's muslin curtains provided just enough cover so that passersby could not be absolutely certain they were being observed. Milli
cent spent whatever leisure time she had ensconced in the chair, knitting enough sweaters, socks, and mittens to keep not only her own Congregational Church bazaars supplied but one or two others, as well. And she never looked down.

Leading the way into the parlor, she did not ask Faith the nature of her call. All in good time.

“Lovely day, isn't it?” she asked, not pausing for an answer. “Let's hope this good weather keeps up through Patriots' Day, although, as you may know, we have never had to cancel due to an inclemency.”

“Yes, it has been a lovely spring.” Now that Faith was there, her clever opening gambits slipped completely from her mind, as usual, and she felt herself rapidly falling under Millicent's control. She pulled herself together and sat down opposite Millicent's chair, presuming the woman would want to get back to her work—a baby sweater with little teddy bears around the yoke—and her surveillance. She presumed wrong.

“Oh, don't let's sit there. Come here on the couch.”

Recalling other visits when she literally had had to grab the arms to keep from sliding off the singularly slippery and uncomfortable horsehair, Faith defiantly chose a chair next to it. Visits to Millicent abounded in thin-ice metaphors.

“Never mind. The couch is not for everyone,” Millicent assured her. Another test failed. “Would you like some tea?”