Tickled to Death (9 page)

I found my way back to the house with only a few false turns. In that it was not yet seven o’clock, I tapped softly on the front door. When no one appeared, I determined that it was locked and went around to the deck. The sliding glass doors were also locked. I lay down on the wicker
settee and put my arm across my eyes, wishing I’d brought the ink-stained bedspread with me. Despite the frenetic twittering of birds and the distant sounds of truly dedicated fishermen, I fell asleep.

“Claire? What on earth are you doing out there?”

I opened one eye and squinted at Luanne, who stood in the doorway with a cup of coffee. Her hair and makeup were immaculate. She wore a silky peignoir and matching slippers, as if she anticipated being swept into a musical comedy. I opened the other eye and determined that the sun was significantly higher. “Sleeping,” I said crossly. “Is there cream in that coffee?”

“What happened to your hair?”

I sat up and tried to salvage my comely red curls. The movement sent barbs of pain to my neck, which had been forced into an unnatural angle due to the limitations of the settee. When you, Dick, and Jillian failed to return last night, I went for a swim at the marina.”

“You did what?”

She was in the mood for questions, but I’d already had my quota for the day. I went to the kitchen, poured myself a mug of coffee, and returned to the deck. Before she could resume her interrogation, I related the events of the night, omitting particulars of the final conversation with Gannet. “He’s liable to show up anytime,” I
added, “and he’ll want to know where everyone was from sunset until midnight.”

Luanne tried to laugh, but the result had a strangled edge. “We certainly weren’t at the Blackburn Creek Marina. I walked down to Anders’s trailer. We talked about eagles until it grew dark, then he drove me back. I assumed you’d gone to Farberville. Jillian called to say she’d decided to stay in town.”

“What about Dick? Did he fish all night?”

“He was in a remote cove when the boat’s motor conked out. He paddled to a marina, but it was closed and everyone gone. He had to walk for hours down back roads until he found a house where the occupants were awake and willing to let him make a phone call. He called me about eleven-thirty and I picked him up half an hour later.”

“Gannet’s going to love the lack of alibis,” I said as I finished the coffee and put down the mug.

“Why do we need alibis? Did Gannet say something you didn’t tell me? Did he accuse Dick of this—this thing?”

Honesty is critical to friendship, but not necessarily indispensable. “No, not really,” I murmured, “but he has questions.” I went to the rail and looked across the cove at Dunling Lodge. Its mistress was sharing the picnic table with various birds and squirrels—and her binoculars were
aimed squarely at me. I waved, then dropped my hand as I remembered the rippling white fingers under the dock. “I wonder how the girls are doing. I don’t see them on the patio.”

“I’m sure they’re fine,” Luanne said coldly. “I wish you’d be honest with me, Claire. If Gannet’s determined to link Dick with Bubo’s accident, he must have said something.”

“Bubo’s accident?” Dick said as he came out the doorway with a plate of pastries and a pot of coffee. “What happened?”

Between bites, I again related the story, then stopped to think over what I’d said. “Bubo must have been dead when I arrived. He could have fallen off the dock, or he could have been hit on the head and encouraged to fall. In either case, the splash would have awakened me. But someone was there more than an hour later.”

“Impressive reasoning,” Gannet said from the bottom of the steps. “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I couldn’t help myself when I heard the dulcet tones of Mrs. Malloy here. I’m beginning to think her reputation is deserved.” He came onto the deck, dressed in a fresh shirt and a jacket already dotted with ashes and flakes. I noted with a flicker of pleasure that his eyes were still red and he’d nicked his chin while shaving. “I had a word with the medical examiner at the hospital in Farberville,” he continued. “Normally the body sinks right after death, but Bubo was wearing a nylon jacket that trapped enough air to keep him afloat
right up until Mrs. Malloy disturbed the water. But it couldn’t have kept him up very long.”

“Then why didn’t I hear a splash?” I said.

Gannet shrugged. “Guess there wasn’t one. We found an empty whiskey bottle over by the boat ramp. There wasn’t any blood on it, but there weren’t any fingerprints, either. We’re wondering if someone used the bottle to bash Bubo, eased him into the water, and then washed it and put it down real quietly so as not to bother Mrs. Malloy while she was taking herself a nice little nap.” He bared his teeth at Luanne and Dick, who were as motionless as salt and pepper shakers. “Now, if you two would be so kind as to tell me where you were last night…?”

I went inside to take a scalding shower and change into clean shorts and a T-shirt. I then polished off another square of cold lasagna, and was conscientiously rinsing the plate when Luanne came into the kitchen.

“That dreadful man!” she said as she snatched the plate from me and jammed it into the dishwasher. Glasses and silverware clinked nervously.

“Shall I assume you’re referring to Gannet?”

“Of course I am! He made Dick go with him to the other marina to verify that there’s something wrong with the boat. He said there was plenty of time for Dick to have gone to the Blackburn Creek Marina to murder Bubo and then return to the other marina and hike up the road to call me.”

I stepped out of her way as she began to pace, grumbling and reeling about like a windup toy. The kitchen was large enough to accommodate such activity; if she’d tried it in my kitchen, she would have imperiled her toes. “Gannet does seem bent on proving Dick is guilty of something,” I said as I retreated behind the breakfast bar.

“Or me! He pointed out that I was alone last night. Dick almost punched him in the nose, but he just said that I could have done it. He’s not all that convinced that you didn’t do it.”

“Me? Oh, that makes a lot of sense. I killed Bubo and shoved his body into the water, then threw myself off the dock so that I could discover the body and report it to the authorities.”

Luanne paused in midstep. “That’s a fairly accurate synopsis of what he said.”

“Why stop there? Why not accuse us all of conspiracy? What about Agatha Anne and Georgiana? The Dunlings? Why leave out the Gordons and the lecherous vet?” I threw up my hands and forced Luanne to retreat as I commanded the track. “And the entire membership of the Audubon Society! Maybe Bubo was shooting partridges in pear trees. Livia Dunling called the national headquarters and they sent out a murder of crows! In that case, the coroner will be dealing with ‘caws’ of death!”

“What is wrong with you?” Caron said from the doorway. “Are you doing this menopause thing again?”

Luanne hustled her into the living room before I could leap across the breakfast bar. “Your mother has been accused of murder, Caron, and she’s not handling it well,” I heard her say in a voice that was not entirely sympathetic.

“Who’s she accused of murdering?” Caron asked in a voice that was not entirely incredulous, for that matter. “Anybody I know?”

I followed them into the room. “Probably, since you and Inez took out the barge yesterday. My purported victim is the man who ran the marina.”

“Oh, him. He leered at us just like the chemistry teacher started doing before they took him away in an unmarked van.” Having dismissed my heinous crime, she turned to more important matters. “Is there anything to eat around here? We had fish and canned peas for dinner last night and bran for breakfast. I’m so dizzy I barely made it here.” She emphasized her condition by collapsing on the sofa and sighing plaintively. “My stomach stopped growling ages ago. I think it’s devouring itself out of starvation.”

Luanne offered to make a sandwich and went into the kitchen. Considering the contents of the refrigerator, it was likely to be made with pâté rather than peanut butter. I sat down and steeled myself for another outburst if Caron was confronted with liver.

“Where’s Inez?” I asked.

“Addressing envelopes. If she keeps at it, she should be done in six or eight hours.”

“Why aren’t you doing the same thing?”

She raised her head to give me an injured look. “Agatha Anne said my handwriting was too sloppy for her expensive envelopes. I was supposed to file a bunch of stuff, but I decided to take a break and root for truffles. There weren’t any alongside the road.”

“You have attractive handwriting,” I said sternly.

“Not in this weakened state,” she said as her head fell back and she closed her eyes. “I could barely dot the i’s, much less cross the t’s. Inez may appear wimpy, but she has a much stronger constitution. She was scribbling her heart out when I stumbled out of the office.”

She was more likely to have slithered out a window when Inez wasn’t looking, but for some inexplicable reason, I was reluctant to launch into a lecture about betraying one’s best friend. “Were you and Inez in the office last night?” I asked.

“Yeah, for a couple of hours. Agatha Anne and Georgiana had all these checkbooks and ledgers spread out all over everything. They kept spouting off numbers until I thought I’d go mad. As long as they have enough money to pay me next weekend, they can pretend to be vice-presidents of the Chase Manhattan Bank all they want—and as long as I don’t have to be there. Inez and I sat on the floor in a corner and sorted millions of stupid brochures. All of a sudden Georgiana started crying. Agatha Anne told us to beat it.”

“In those exact words?”

“No, Mother. She told us we were excused for the rest of the evening and we needed to work on our owls. The only thing I’d like to do to an owl is stuff it. Don’t you think a great horned owl would look nifty on the mantel? Better yet, I could hold it up in Rhonda Maguire’s bedroom window and hoot. Supposedly they go
hoo, hoo-hoo, HOO HOO.
Rhonda would wet her pants!”

Luanne looked a little bewildered as she returned. “What was that supposed to be—an ocean liner?” she said as she set a plate on the coffee table.

Caron suspiciously lifted the top slice of bread. “What’s this?”

I grabbed my purse and hurried out the front door, although not in time to avoid hearing a horrified voice say, “Goose liver?”

I drove up to the road and stopped, since I had no destination in mind. Captain Gannet had ordered me to stay at the house until he gave me permission to leave, but he was at the far end of the lake. It was tempting to go to Farberville. I would be brought back in handcuffs and leg irons, however, and not even Peter could save me. Not that he would necessarily try, I thought with a twinge of remorse for my arch refusal to consider the cruise. He’d probably been sitting home in front of the television, watching a dreary baseball game and eating cold pizza at the precise time I’d been fantasizing about Anders Hammerqvist.

I drove to the convenience store and went inside to call Farberville’s Finest and apologize. Obliquely, of course, but with great sincerity. After digging out all my change, I called Peter’s house. He answered on what would have been the last ring had he not picked up the receiver.

“Hello,” I began, intending to ease into the apology when it seemed suitable.

“Oh, Claire,” he said, breathlessly rather than delightedly. “What’s up?”

“Am I interrupting something?”

There was a pause. “Well, I guess you are. I invited some of the guys from the department to play touch football and cook hamburgers. I called you Friday evening, all day yesterday, and a couple of times this morning. Where are you?”

In the background I heard outbursts of laughter and bantering. Not all of “the guys” had gruff, masculine voices; some of them were sopranos. I explained that I’d come to the lake on Friday, intending to return home the following morning. I was about to elaborate on the cause of the delay when one of the sopranos called, “Come on, Rosen! It’s first and ten, and you’re the quarterback!”

Instead of mentioning the murder, I said, “Don’t let me keep you from your guests.”

“No, that’s okay. So why didn’t you come home yesterday morning? Did Caron and Inez get carried away by an eagle?”

“I believe it was a great horned owl. I’ll tell
you about the rest of it when I get back.” I hung up the receiver and ordered myself not to envision Peter’s teammates, one of whom surely looked like a distaff version of Anders—right down to the little bitty shorts. It was possible Peter and I had been fantasizing about the same thing at the same time.

I bought a can of soda and was sitting in my car, staring bleakly at the windshield, when Sid Gallinago pulled up beside me.

“Hey, Claire,” he said, “what’re you doing?”

I doubted he wanted to hear the ugly truth, so rather than announce that I was in the throes of petulance, I said, “I came to get a soda.”

“I heard about your adventures last night. If Agatha Anne had been the one to find the body, she’d still be squealing like a stuck pig. She can play rough when it comes to protecting her damn birds, but she sure as hell couldn’t have handled that.”

It occurred to me that Agatha Anne was at the Dunling Foundation office and I was in the presence of the person who best knew Dick Cissel. I smiled modestly. “We do what we must. I’m surprised you’re not on the golf course today, Sid. Sunday afternoon, not too hot, blue sky.”

“I played eighteen this morning,” he said, mimicking my modest smile. “You want to come over and have a drink?”

“What a wonderful idea,” I said.

His smile vanished and he gave me a somber
look. “Thanks, Claire. There’s something I want to discuss with you. I’m really worried about Dick, but not the same way Agatha Anne and the others are. I’m starting to wonder if he really is implicated in Becca’s death.”

The Gallinagos’ house, like the Gordons’, was familiar, but only because I’d driven down the road on several occasions. The house was built with the same materials as most of the others: native rock, redwood, and glass. I parked and followed Sid inside. The living-room decor was a profusive jumble of corals and fuchsias and other subtle designer colors with exotic names. It was the perfect roost for Agatha Anne, who undoubtedly had a closet filled with clothes chosen to coordinate with the upholstery.

I opted for iced tea. Sid supplied it, as well as a beer for himself, then sat across from me. “I’ve known Dick for thirty years. We were roommates at the Kappa Sig house all through school. Opening a practice together seemed natural, even though Dick had to twist my arm to get me to specialize in pedodontics. We got married the same year, bought houses in the same
neighborhood, and joined the same country club when the practice began to thrive.”

“And later bought lake houses only a few miles apart. Do your boats match?”

“We don’t go around town holding hands,” he said, giving me a narrow look. “Dick plays a lot of tennis and racquetball; I play golf every spare moment. Agatha Anne and Jan were friendly, but Jan was a little too shy to keep up with the country club matrons and their incessant golf and tennis tournaments, charity affairs, luncheons, and so on. She always looked uncomfortable at cocktail parties. We used to tease her about the number of times she called home to speak to the babysitter.” He put down his drink and rose. “Let me see if I can find something,” he said as he left the room. A minute later he returned with a framed photograph and handed it to me. “This is of the four of us on a vacation in St. Croix about ten years ago.”

They were standing in front of a row of bright flowers, with palm trees towering behind them. Jan was attractive in a puppyish way, with cropped dark hair, a large and noticeably sunburned nose, and a strained smile. Her sundress emphasized her thick waist and freckled arms. Sunglasses hid her eyes, but I had an idea they would have been lowered. Sid wore a gaudy shirt, Bermuda shorts, and sandals. He held up a drink festooned with fruit and a pink paper umbrella; his grin was lopsided and his eyes unfocused. Dick and Agatha Anne could have graced the cover of
People
magazine, all tanned and sleek, toasting the camera with glasses of champagne. He wore white shorts and a shirt emblazoned with an animal. Agatha Anne’s starchy white tennis dress brushed the top of her thighs, and a fuzzy yellow sweater hung around her shoulders. Her wristbands and socks were yellow. I wouldn’t have been astounded to see a yellow tennis racquet in the background.

I studied Jan’s expression for a minute, then handed back the photograph. “You look as though you were having fun,” I said.

“Yeah, there’s a great golf course down there, as long as you don’t mind playing around the cows in the middle of the fairways. And watching your step.”

I wasn’t interested in the golf course or its pedestrian perils. “You said you wanted to talk about Dick, Sid. I can’t stay too long. Captain Gannet may show up, and he won’t be pleased to find me here.”

“Because of what happened to Bubo Limpkin last night?”

I nodded. “Gannet’s interested in everyone’s whereabouts last night between sunset and midnight. I’m afraid it may be a formality. He seems to be concentrating on Dick—as usual.” I paused delicately, but Sid failed to volunteer the pertinent information. “Someone mentioned that Agatha Anne and Georgiana were at the foundation office. Did they work all night?”

“I don’t know what time they quit. I made myself dinner, watched a couple of videocassettes, and went to bed at eleven or so. My golf date was at seven this morning. I wanted to be at my best so I could get back some of the money I lost last week. I ended up three over par, and it would have been two if I hadn’t screwed up on seventeen. That damn putt cost me fifty dollars.”

“About Dick?” I persisted.

Sid pulled out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead. Looking unhappy, he said, “I don’t know what Dick’s told you, but there’s a reason why Gannet keeps pestering Dick about Becca’s accident. I keep telling Dick to be straight with Gannet. He won’t do it, and sooner or later Gannet’s going to find some hard evidence and Dick will find himself facing a jury. You’ve dealt with this before, Claire. Lying to the police makes you look guilty as sin.”

“Is that all Dick’s guilty of—lying to the police?”

He went from unhappy to utterly miserable. “I wish I knew. He’s so damn stubborn that he won’t even tell me what went on that night. Gannet claims that Dick’s Rover was parked near the marina, which means Dick could have gone down to the boat and loosened a fitting to create a slow leak. Dick insists he wasn’t there, that he and his Rover were in Farberville.”

“Gannet said he had a witness,” I admitted. “He wouldn’t say who it was, though.”

“He hasn’t told Dick, either. What I haven’t told anyone until now is that I was worried about Dick after he stormed out of the party, announcing to one and all that he was returning to Farberville. He’d had several drinks and he stumbled over the mat as he left. When Agatha Anne and I got back here maybe an hour and a half later, I called to make sure he’d gotten home okay. Nobody answered. I tried again an hour later, and there was still no answer. I was damn glad to hear his voice the next morning.”

“Did you ask him where he’d been the night before?”

“He said he was asleep and didn’t hear the phone. Kind of hard to believe that, isn’t it?”

“There are a lot of things that are hard to believe,” I said under my breath, then added, “You saw Dick every day at the office and out here on weekends. Did you get the idea he and Becca were having marital problems?”

He went into the kitchen and returned with another beer. Resuming his seat, he said, “No, Dick never said anything to me. He’s a great guy and my best friend, but we’ve never confided in each other the way women do. He’s always been reserved, even back when we were chugging beer at the frat house and telling lies about the sorority girls. He was on scholarship. I used to wonder if that made him uncomfortable.”

“What did you think about Becca?”

“She was a great gal,” he said. “I dated a few
lookers in my day, and most of them were pretty damn snooty. Becca was a knockout, but she was more interested in the people around her than she was in checking her lipstick in the mirror. The first year they were married, she’d come by the office a couple of times a week with freshly baked cookies. She made sure all our staff received flowers on their birthdays. When our grandson was born, she sent him an antique silver christening cup and a teddy bear three times bigger than he was. When Agatha Anne’s father passed away unexpectedly, Becca took charge of the telephone and flower deliveries and stuff like that. Afterward she helped Agatha Anne sort through her father’s things and decide how to dispose of them.”

I warned myself to keep a civil tongue, but a wee bit of irritation may have crept into my voice. “I’ve already heard how relentlessly perfect she was, Sid—but no one ever is. She was a mortal, just like the rest of us. The night before she died she was slinging quiche, for pity’s sake. I’d make a lot more progress if one person would give me a realistic assessment of Becca. Do you know why she came to Turnstone Lake with the Gordons?”

“They said she was an old friend,” he said uneasily, as if I’d dropped a labyrinthine essay question into the middle of a true-false test. “I seem to recall Agatha Anne saying that Marilyn was depressed about her mother’s mental deterioration and was having a hard time coping, so Becca volunteered to stay and help out.”

That was one interpretation, and certainly a popular one. Then again, Sid remained uneasy, which suited me fine. I sipped my drink and let him stew for a long moment, then said, “But you didn’t believe she was quite so perfect, did you?”

“I’m a pedodontist, not a psychologist—but no, I didn’t. She never once flirted with any of the men, or even gazed suggestively. As far as I know, Agatha Anne’s faithful, but she can’t control herself when she looks at the golf pro or even our own Anders. Georgiana’s the same way. She can be sobbing about Barry one minute and panting over some virile young man the next. Becca acted like a virgin who’d been raised in a convent—voluntarily.”

“So what did you think that indicated?”

“I never could decide if she was genuinely uninterested or if she was putting on an act. She must have known that all she had to do was wink and she could have had any man in the room.”

“She didn’t waste much time after Jan died,” I pointed out politely. “She and Dick were married within a few months, weren’t they?”

He started to speak, then closed his mouth and mulled over what amounted to an accusation. I suspected he’d been more intrigued with Becca’s physical demeanor than with her behavior in matters that did not directly involve particular areas of his anatomy. Testosterone can have that impact on the male brain.

“Well,” he said at last, clearly struggling for
the right words, “that just kind of happened, you know? Dick and Jillian were both zombies. Becca made an effort to do everything she could for them, but she didn’t intrude like you’re implying. She’d drop by with food and discreetly clean the house while they ate. After a month, she coerced Jillian into driving into town a couple of times a week to shop and have lunch. Every now and then she called me to suggest I invite Dick to play golf. She wasn’t stalking him; she was just being thoughtful.”

And I was a strong contender for the Republican nomination for the presidency. “But four months, Sid? That’s hardly enough time to work through grief, especially if he was as overwhelmed as you’ve said he was. Then again, he bounced right back after Becca’s death, didn’t he? Three months later he was picking up women at the bank. He’s either as resilient as a new tennis ball or is putting on his own little act.”

Sid stood up. “I think you’d better leave.” Rather than angered, he seemed shaken and deeply disturbed. He went to the window to stare at the lake, his hands clenched behind his back, his neck muscles tensed, his jaw quivering.

I let myself out and drove back toward Dick’s house and Dunling Lodge, trying to filter out the facts from Sid’s romanticized version of the story. Very little of what I’d heard from him—or from anyone else—was based on facts. Everyone seemed determined to live in a gilded fairy tale in
which all motives were pure, all actions uncalculated. Becca, I thought with a sigh, must have felt as though she were conning a kindergarten class. First Marilyn at the airport, visibly in need of a firm hand and a sympathetic ear. Scottie, as easily flattered as a beauty contestant. Jan, timidly hovering at the edge of the social circle. Agatha Anne and Georgiana, eager to add recruits to the cause—especially when the recruit met their fashion criterion. Jillian, dumpy and plain, dazzled by that same criterion. Dick, immobilized with grief. Anders, an enthusiastic womanizer who lived in a conveniently remote area.

I stopped in the middle of the road as I replayed Anders’s remarks about the day of the accident. I’d asked ever so casually if Becca had been at his trailer. He’d replied that he couldn’t remember, but had added with preciseness that Agatha Anne and Georgiana had been there and stayed until dark, discussing the release date of a red-tailed hawk. He had a curiously selective memory. Surely Gannet had questioned everyone remotely connected with the deceased woman, tracking her movements prior to the accident, demanding details. He would have done so the next morning, if not that same evening, and he would not have accepted such a casual answer.

Anders had lied to me, and behind his dismissive “of that I am not sure” was deliberation. The only incentive for lying was to hide something, and the obvious something was an affair. Becca
had a superficially virtuous reason for her trips to the trailer. With the windows open, she and Anders could hear a car or truck grinding down the hill several minutes before its arrival. Anyone approaching from the rear would set off an avian alarm system more effective than a siren.

I came to an unpleasant realization. If Dick suspected as much, he had yet another motive for murder. Anders lacked one. I’d caught him in a clench with Agatha Anne, who might have been jealous. Blowing up Becca and the boat seemed a bit extreme, however, and apt to discourage the resumption of an amorous relationship. And she’d dutifully reported the propane leak hours before the accident. As a would-be assassin, she had a lot to learn.

This not-all-that-improbable affair could explain a lot of minor mysteries. Said topic could have caused the fight at the cocktail party, if either Becca or Anders had done something indiscreet that confirmed Dick’s suspicions. I’d seen no symptoms that he was a violently possessive man, but I didn’t know him well and nothing to provoke such an emotion had taken place during my visits. Luanne sure as hell wasn’t going to pass along any insights. If Dick had snapped, he could have done exactly what Gannet had suggested: tamper with the propane line, fake the report, and later silence Bubo, who was a logical contender for the unidentified witness.

The tea in my stomach seemed to curdle as I
considered how neatly it all fit together. The only puzzle that remained was the identity of the vile sneak who’d pushed me into the lake. Luanne had said that Dick called her at eleven-thirty. She may have been blinded by passion, but I doubted she was unable to tell time—or tell the truth. Turnstone Lake was a vast puddle of many thousand acres, and Dick would have needed time to take his boat to its far end and find a telephone.

A car sped around the corner, braked abruptly, lurched toward the ditch, and skidded to a stop inches from my bumper. Gannet’s face was visible for a moment before dust drifted down, coating both our windshields like a lacy brown blanket. A car door slammed, footsteps crunched the rocks, and my door was yanked open.

“I thought I told you to stay at Cissel’s house,” Gannet said with what I felt was inordinate exasperation.

“I was on my way back there, Captain Gannet. I needed to make a long-distance call, so I went to use the phone at the convenience store. You really shouldn’t drive so recklessly on these narrow roads. It’s bad for your blood pressure.”