Vultures at Twilight (25 page)

‘Like
Who's Killing the Great Chefs of Europe
?'

‘What's that?' I asked.

‘An old film, where someone went around killing famous chefs.'

‘What was the motive?'

‘You know, I can't remember. It was a black comedy. The sort of thing I'll flip through late at night when I can't sleep.'

‘It has that feel around here. Not the comedy part, but this sense of wondering why and who's next?'
If she knew . . . but my caller can't have anything to do with this. Lil, you have to tell someone, just not Barbara.

‘It's scary,' she commented, pulling into the gates of Pilgrim's Progress. ‘I knew Mildred Potts. I remember her from growing up. I used to look at the jewelry in her window and drool. Of course, I never could afford anything.'

As she spoke, I realized that she was around the same age as Philip and Wendy. ‘I wonder if you didn't know one of the other victims.'

‘Who?'

‘Philip Conroy?'

‘Oh my God! Philip?'

‘You knew him?'

‘Knew him? He was a few years ahead of me. I had a major crush on him in junior high; he was gorgeous. Why would someone kill him? Oh, God.'

‘Welcome to Grenville,' I replied as we pulled up to my condo.

With relief I noted that everything was unchanged. The rain-drenched hydrangeas bent under the weight of their purple-blue blossoms and the leaves of the maple – vivid orange and red – were falling fast. My pulse quickened as I caught sight of Ada in my doorway, cloaked by the curtains of water.

‘Ready to get soaked?' Barbara asked.

‘Ready.'

We ambled up the steep walk toward the front door. With each step I was painfully aware of how weak I had become.

Once over the threshold, I breathed the smells of home. Like coming back to a piece of myself that had been forgotten.

Ada followed. ‘Here let me do that,' she said, helping me off with my coat and pushing me toward the living room and my wing chair. ‘Just relax, Lil.' Her fingers brushed my cheek. Our eyes met. ‘Don't do that again,' she scolded, holding my gaze. And lowering her voice below what Barbara could hear: ‘It's selfish . . . but I don't think I could bear it if something happened to you. Now sit, I'll make tea.'

My cheek tingled from her touch as I scanned my home and saw that the boxes of journals were gone.
Thank God.

Ada returned with tea and a kitten-soft lavender mohair throw, which she draped across my lap. She stepped back, and there were tears in her eyes.

‘I know, I look terrible,' I said. ‘But really, I'm going to be fine.'

She shook her head, and glanced back toward Barbara, who was talking on her cell in the kitchen. ‘Lil, you're not fine and we both know it, and it has nothing to do with your medical condition, although I think that's what brought it on.'

I was about to argue when the phone rang. Without thinking I reached over and picked up. Silence. My stomach clenched with each passing millisecond and I felt a dangerous twitch in the center of my chest. Then the gravelly male voice.

‘You're next.'

THIRTY

‘
L
il, what is it?' Ada asked.

Still holding the phone, and staring out at the pouring rain through the back sliders, I didn't know what to say; my hand felt disconnected from my body. I tried to make it obey, but it clenched tight to the receiver. My head felt fuzzy. It was no prank call; he'd followed me home.

Still frozen, Ada pried away the phone as Barbara came to my side.

‘I'm fine,' I said.

‘Mom, you're shaking,' Barbara said, sounding scared and young. ‘Are you having any pain?'

‘No.'

‘Who was that?' Ada asked.

Before I could answer, the doorbell rang.

No one moved.

Ada gripped my hands in her own. I looked down at her slender fingers, so delicate and yet so strong from years of working in her stores.

‘Someone should get the phone,' I said.

‘The door,' she corrected. ‘Who was that on the phone?' Worry on her face.

‘You're right,' I said, not wanting to tell her in front of my daughter. I needed to get Barbara out of there. Whatever evil had landed in Grenville was heading toward me; I wanted my children away from here.

‘Who was it, Mother?' Barbara asked, smoothing back my still-wet hair and feeling my forehead, such a motherly gesture, one that I had done with her as a child. I imagined her doing it with her kids.

Ada squinted, and nodded slightly.
She knows. Please God, let her keep quiet about it in front of Barbara.

The doorbell rang a second time and then a third.

‘I'll get it.' Barbara rose from the sofa. The touch of her fingers lingered. I wanted to stop her.

‘Ask who's there.' I blurted out.

She looked back at me, a queer expression on her face.

Ada whispered, ‘No name, no number?'

‘I think so,' I said, matching her tone, not wanting my daughter to get involved.

‘He called me at the hospital. But he said something, and then hung up. He's followed me here.'

‘Who?'

‘I don't know.'

‘What does he say?'

I couldn't bring myself to say it.

‘Tell me,' she persisted.

‘Chris!' Barbara's voice came clear from the foyer; my younger daughter had arrived, drenched, but smiling.

‘Lil.' Ada squeezed my hands, trying to get my attention.

I looked at her, at the concerned intensity of her dark-blue eyes. ‘You're next,' I whispered. ‘That's all he says.'

Before she could reply, Barbara returned with Chris. I sat and watched as my children approached. I felt like an actress, trying to portray ‘normal', not wanting them to know how frightened I felt.
Just focus on them.

‘Mother,' Chris said, giving me a soggy hug and kiss before settling on the sofa by my wing chair, ‘what have you done?'

‘Well, I thought,' I said, struggling to keep my fear in check, ‘I'd try something new.'

She chuckled and whispered, ‘Don't do that again.' She took my hand in hers.

‘I won't. I promise.'

‘You're awfully warm,' she commented.

I shot a glance at Ada, who was clearly frightened by what I'd told her.

‘Would you like me to open a window?' Chris suggested.

‘No, I'm fine.' I felt like a parrot, which could only repeat the same phrase. I'm fine I'm fine I'm fine; the words had lost their meaning. I wasn't fine. I wanted them out of there and at the same time it felt so good to see them, to breathe their healthy scents, to witness their strength, their vitality.

‘OK,' Barbara said, from behind the couch. ‘You have to tell us what's going on. Because clearly you are not fine.'

‘I beg your pardon?' I shot back.

‘Don't start,' Chris pleaded. ‘I'm not in the door thirty seconds and you two are going to start one of your pissing contests.'

‘Our what?' I asked.

‘You heard me. You two have been doing it since I can remember.
Yes I will. No I won't. Yes I will. No you won't. You can't make me. Yes I can. No you can't
.'

‘So this is how professors talk?' I asked.

‘On a good day,' she quipped. ‘Can we start again? I feel like I just stepped into the middle of something.'

‘You know,' Ada said, coming to my rescue, ‘the kettle's still hot, anyone want tea?'

‘I'll get it,' Barbara said. ‘You know, Mother, I don't know why you feel like you have to keep things from Chris and me. We're not children anymore.'

‘I realize,' I said. ‘I just wish you wouldn't try to boss me around. It's the last thing I need.'

‘Barbara,' Chris chided, ‘I can't believe that you would try to boss Mom around.'

‘I'm not,' she protested.

‘Yeah, right,' my youngest commented. She turned to Ada. ‘When we were young and would play make-believe, Barbara would get all the neighborhood kids together and tell us what we had to say. It was the most heavily scripted make-believe there ever was. She was a total fascist on the playground.'

‘I was not.'

I smiled at the memories, of looking out my kitchen window and seeing a gaggle of children hard at play. Chris was right. Barbara used to direct the others in a variety of convoluted games of make-believe, everything from pirates to Batman to elaborate marriage ceremonies. I could still hear her eight-year-old voice, ordering her playmates, ‘
OK, you say, “with this ring I thee wed”, and then we walk down the aisle. But you stop us and say, “You can't marry her, because I'm the one who loves her”, and then you push him out of the way . . .
'
It didn't seem to bother the other kids, her total domination. They'd play for hours only to be stopped by the dinner bells, which often sounded in unison at six o'clock. If I concentrated, I could still hear the voices of the neighborhood mothers calling their children to dinner.

‘Enough said,' Christina commented. She turned back toward me. ‘So what
is
going on?'

I shot Ada a warning glance. ‘It's nothing,' I said. But knowing I had to give them something, added, ‘I've been getting some hang-up calls. It's just an annoyance, some kid playing a prank.' Although I no longer believed that, but if I wanted to get my daughters safely out of town, I would not be sharing the truth.

‘Don't you have caller ID?' Barbara asked.

‘I do, but all it says is “no name, no number”.'

‘You can have that blocked,' Barbara said. ‘I have all my phones fixed so only calls that can be identified come through. You wouldn't believe how many people try to fake it past my secretary, wanting to know if something has been cast. “Is there maybe a part for them?” “Have I considered so-and-so?” I screen everything. And if they're trying to block their information, I'm just not interested in hearing from them.'

‘Geez, Barbara,' Christina chimed in. ‘You've moved from call ID to caller totally paranoid. Although it's not a bad idea.'

‘Did she tell you about the murders?' Barbara asked.

‘No, haven't heard a word about it. What murders?'

I was about to pipe in with a suitably timed ‘it's nothing', but I realized under the circumstances, my credibility would plummet.

‘Sleepy little Grenville has woken up,' my eldest commented. ‘There've been three murders.'

Christina looked at me. ‘You've got to be kidding!'

‘It didn't seem pertinent,' I commented.

‘It's actually four,' Ada added, unable to keep quiet.

‘What! Who?' Chris asked.

‘Let's see.' Ada sipped her tea. ‘First there was Philip Conroy, or at least we think he was first; they didn't find his body for quite some time. Then came Mildred Potts, Carl McElroy, and finally Rudy Caputo.'

‘Jesus, Mother, why didn't you tell me?' Christina said accusingly. ‘Wait a minute . . . Did you say Philip Conroy? Not . . . Oh, no.'

‘I know,' said Barbara, ‘it just doesn't seem real.'

‘Why would anyone kill Philip?'

Ada couldn't help herself. ‘That's what everyone's wondering. Lots of motives being tossed around . . . All the victims were antique dealers. Everyone in town pretty much knew them, or knew of them.'

‘Is someone bumping off the competition?' Barbara wondered.

‘Probably,' I said, wanting the conversation to die.

‘Maybe,' said Ada, ‘but it doesn't add up. Why would someone actually kill? It seems excessive.'

‘You're right,' Christina commented. ‘If you look through history, money is a great motive, but usually there's more to it; some sort of emotional context. Unless of course we're talking contract murders, in which case the person who pulls the trigger is strictly in it for the money and the motive lies with their employer.'

‘What sort of emotional context?' Ada asked, warming to the topic.

‘Powerful things, often sexual in nature, even though that may not be what appears on the surface.'

‘These weren't sex killings,' I said. ‘These were, with the exception of Philip, not attractive people.'

‘Doesn't matter,' Chris explained. ‘Although the disparity in types clearly eliminates the sexual sadist.'

‘How do you know so much about this?' I asked, wondering what my assistant-professor daughter was doing expounding on murder motives.

‘Just an interest,' she said. ‘I've even been toying with the idea of doing a Shakespearean-review course that would focus on homicide.'

‘Like Lady Macbeth?' Ada asked.

‘Exactly. Shakespeare's plays contain an encyclopedia of murder and motive.'

‘So what do you think the motive is here?' Ada asked.

‘Off the top of my head, I'd say it had something to do with small-town secrets.'

A swallow of tea went down the wrong pipe; I choked and coughed.

‘Are you OK?' Chris asked, patting me gently on the back.

‘What leads you to that conclusion?' Ada persisted, a concerned expression on her face as my coughing continued.

I carefully took a sip of tea, and tried to calm the flutters in my chest.
Why do they have to talk about this?

Chris explained her reasoning. ‘They all knew each other, moved in the same circles, right?'

‘Yes?' Ada prompted.

‘And if they're antique dealers they probably all buy up estates and go through people's belongings.'

‘Also correct,' Ada said. ‘In fact I'd gotten quotes from two of them; actually three if you consider that Tolliver is Philip's . . . was Philip's partner.'

Chris looked at Ada. ‘That's a strange coincidence.'

‘Don't look at her that way,' I said, having got my breathing under control. ‘This isn't
Arsenic and Old Lace
; we've not been poisoning the locals with elderberry wine.'