Scandal in Fair Haven Read online

  She blew out a spurt of smo­ke. "Okay. The che­ese­ca­ke. So you fi­gu­re eit­her one of the po­ker pla­yers shot Patty Kay or told so­me­body abo­ut the li­me­ricks and that per­son did it. Who are the po­ker pla­yers?"

  "Desmond Ma­ri­no, Stu­art Pi­er­ce, Wil­lis Gut­h­rie, Da­vid For­rest, and Cra­ig Mat­thews."

  "Well, Des­mond has a mo­uth li­ke Ni­aga­ra Falls." A tiny smi­le. "Gu­ess I'm a gre­at one to talk. God, yes, that's true, both ways. But Des­mond tells ever­y­body ever­y­t­hing. Patty Kay al­ways sa­id the only way Des­mond kept from spil­ling cli­ent sec­rets was by ke­eping his big mo­uth busy with ever­y­t­hing el­se." She shrug­ged. "Of co­ur­se, kno­wing how pe­op­le are, all the ot­hers ca­me ho­me and told the­ir wi­ves. It's too go­od a story not to. We we­re all sick of that wret­c­hed che­ese­ca­ke. But you co­uldn't say so be­ca­use Patty Kay was so dam­ned pro­ud of it."

  Gina's eyes clo­sed for just an in­s­tant. Then she lo­oked at me. I knew she'd ste­eled her­self not to cry. "Okay. The po­ker party. I gu­ess we're trying to fi­gu­re out who might ha­ve had a mo­ti­ve. Not Des­mond. The­re's no pos­sib­le re­ason. He wasn't Patty Kay's law­yer. Bra­den Fa­ir­lee to­ok ca­re of her le­gal af­fa­irs and al­ways has. And Des­mond and Patty Kay ha­ve be­en fri­ends sin­ce they we­re lit­tle kids. So, let's see. Stu­art…"

  She gla­red at me thro­ugh the swirl of smo­ke. "Dam­mit, I don't li­ke this."

  "I know."

  "Patty Kay's go­ing to be bu­ri­ed to­mor­row." She smo­ked

  and rub­bed her tem­p­le, her fa­ce puc­ke­red in tho­ught and mi­sery. She stub­bed out the ci­ga­ret­te.

  A mi­nu­te tic­ked by.

  Finally, grimly, Gi­na lo­oked stra­ight at me. "Okay. Last we­ek I was in At­lan­ta. A ho­me de­co­ra­tor show. I sta­yed at the dow­n­town Mar­ri­ott. Con­ve­ni­ent to the con­ven­ti­on cen­ter. Had a dam­ned ti­ring day. So abo­ut fo­ur I went to the bar. It sits up a le­vel in the mid­dle of the lobby. You know, kind of li­ke an is­land. So you can lo­ok down and see the lobby and the ele­va­tors. I saw Stu­art first. He was stan­ding by an ele­va­tor. Then, dam­ned if Patty Kay didn't walk up. They we­re stan­ding si­de by si­de, ig­no­ring each ot­her. Li­ke they'd ne­ver met. They got on the ele­va­tor. Just hap­pe­ned it was only the two of them. The car went up to the six­te­enth flo­or, stop­ped, ca­me down aga­in. I'd had to be bra­in-de­ad not to fi­gu­re that one out qu­ick. They we­re shac­king up. I know it. I know it as well as I can tell you whe­re the scar is -was-on Patty Kay's right el­bow. And what the hell that me­ans with all of this, I don't know. If an­y­t­hing."

  It wo­uld be one mo­re bar in Cra­ig's pri­son cell if it chec­ked out. At le­ast as far as the po­li­ce we­re con­cer­ned.

  "I me­an, I know how I re­ad it. They co­uldn't li­ve to­get­her, but they still-" She pa­used and lo­oked at me do­ub­t­ful­ly.

  Why do yo­un­ger pe­op­le get so un­com­for­tab­le tal­king abo­ut sex to an­yo­ne over sixty? It's part of the Ame­ri­can yo­uth cult. If they sho­uld li­ve so long, they'll dis­co­ver that, as with most as­pects of li­fe, the mo­re you've do­ne it, the bet­ter you get-and gi­ve. Trust me.

  "Oh, hell, the truth of it is, Patty Kay and Stu­art we­re me­ant for each ot­her, but they we­re both ta­ke-char­ge types so they co­uld ne­ver li­ve to­get­her wit­ho­ut kil­ling each ot­her…" She clap­ped a hand to her mo­uth, then vi­olently sho­ok her he­ad. "I didn't me­an that. I didn't."

  Perhaps not. But she'd sa­id it.

  "What I'm get­ting at," she con­ti­nu­ed hur­ri­edly, "is they co­uldn't ke­ep away from each ot­her. That's why I cal­led Patty Kay even tho­ugh we we­ren't spe­aking. She was mad as hell be­ca­use I didn't min­ce words. I told her it was wrong, told her she was pla­ying with dyna­mi­te."

  "What did she say?"

  "She told me to ta­ke my pla­ti­tu­des abo­ut lo­ve and mar­ri­age and go stra­ight to hell. And if I knew so damn much abo­ut mar­ri­age, what hap­pe­ned to mi­ne? We yel­led at each ot­her." Gi­na bu­ri­ed her fa­ce in her hands.

  I won­de­red. It was an ef­fec­ti­ve story. It sad­dled Cra­ig with the ad­di­ti­onal mo­ti­ve of his wi­fe's in­fi­de­lity. It al­so set up Stu­art Pi­er­ce, her ex-hus­band, in the bac­k­g­ro­und as a so­lid sus­pect. And, if true, Patty Kay's ex­t­ra­ma­ri­tal fling cer­ta­inly was a lot mo­re flam­bo­yant than an ar­gu­ment over re­zo­ning.

  Gina lif­ted her fa­ce. Her eyes we­re swol­len. "I re­mem­ber when we we­re girls, the first ti­me Patty Kay saw Stu­art. It was li­ke wat­c­hing Fo­urth of July fi­re­works."

  "A grand pas­si­on."

  "A grand pas­si­on." She rub­bed the bal­led-up tis­su­es on her fa­ce, sme­aring what re­ma­ined of her ma­ke­up. "Yes. That's what it was."

  "For Stu­art too?"

  She sag­ged back in her cha­ir, dra­ined. "Hell, I don't know. Who's to say, with a man. She had a gor­ge­o­us body. May­be that's what he wan­ted. May­be he didn't re­al­ly ca­re ot­her­wi­se. I know that whe­ne­ver she wal­ked in­to a ro­om, Stu­art had a dam­ned hard ti­me ke­eping his eyes off of her. Even af­ter they we­re di­vor­ced. Even af­ter he re­mar­ri­ed. It must ha­ve dri­ven Lo­u­ise crazy."

  Louise Pi­er­ce. Stu­art's se­cond wi­fe. Bri­git's step­mot­her. The one who sno­oped. How far did she sno­op? How much

  did she know? Was this why she'd gla­red at Patty Kay at the su­per­mar­ket?

  But the­se we­ren't the only qu­es­ti­ons that ne­eded an­s­wers.

  Was the ren­dez­vo­us bet­we­en Patty Kay and Stu­art a re­gu­lar oc­cur­ren­ce? If so, we­re both sa­tis­fi­ed with the sta­tus quo?

  Or was Patty Kay ho­ping and plan­ning and co­un­ting on ha­ving Stu­art back aga­in as her hus­band?

  That wo­uld me­an a di­vor­ce for her from Cra­ig. Cra­ig wo­uld lo­se his ex­t­re­mely com­for­tab­le li­fe as the hus­band of a very rich wo­man. The pub­lic hu­mi­li­ati­on wo­uld be pro­fo­und. Even a mild-man­ne­red man co­uld be mo­ved to fury by adul­tery. And a lazy, com­fort-se­eking man might be des­pe­ra­tely de­ter­mi­ned to pre­ser­ve his cushy exis­ten­ce.

  What abo­ut Stu­art?.

  What if he wan­ted Patty Kay, de­si­red her, lus­ted for her, but had no in­te­rest at all in des­t­ro­ying the fab­ric of his pre­sent li­fe?

  What if Patty Kay we­re pres­su­ring him? What if Patty Kay had thre­ate­ned to tell Lo­u­ise?

  Or turn it aro­und, what if Patty Kay wan­ted dal­li­an­ce and Stu­art wan­ted per­ma­nen­ce?

  What if Stu­art thre­ate­ned to tell Cra­ig?

  "I sup­po­se I sho­uldn't say it… but Lo­u­ise re­al­ly ha­ted Patty Kay. She al­ways did." Gi­na frow­ned. "This is li­ke lif­ting up a gar­ba­ge can and fin­ding all tho­se squ­ir­ming whi­te slugs. And the hor­rib­le part of this is, I know you're thin­king Patty Kay was che­ap and trashy. But that's ab­so­lu­tely not true. Okay, she slept with Stu­art and she sho­uldn't ha­ve, but an­y­body can ha­ve a blind spot." Gi­na's red­de­ned eyes en­t­re­ated me. "She was go­od and de­cent and -and ho­no­rab­le. I know that so­unds funny, but it's li­ke with that pre­ac­her and the AIDS thing, Patty Kay just

  wouldn't let it go. She knew it was wrong not to try to sa­ve pe­op­le just be­ca­use so­ci­ety is so stu­pid abo­ut sex. And she des­pi­sed cru­elty. One ti­me when we we­re te­ena­gers the­re was a wor­k­man kic­king a dog, and she to­ok a bro­om and lit in­to him. She was ne­ver af­ra­id to do what she tho­ught was right."

  "She ma­de fun of Bri­git's crush on Cra­ig. That was cru­el."

  "She didn't me­an it that way. She just li­ked to ma­ke a joke of things. So­me­ti­mes she didn't re­ali­ze that she sho­uldn't. She re­al­ly be­li­e
ved pe­op­le sho­uld be open abo­ut things. Go­od and bad. But she wasn't cru­el. She ha­ted for pe­op­le to ta­ke ad­van­ta­ge of tho­se who co­uldn't pro­tect them­sel­ves. In a funny way, I think she tho­ught Bri­git was trying to ta­ke ad­van­ta­ge of Cra­ig, that she was go­ing af­ter him just to pro­vo­ke her mot­her."

  A ser­pen­ti­ne ap­pro­ach su­rely. But pos­sib­le. You can't un­de­res­ti­ma­te the yo­ung. Re­mem­ber Jo­an of Arc and Billy the Kid.

  And I had to be­li­eve Bri­git was self-ab­sor­bed. She'd shed te­ars for her mot­her, but her first tho­ught was for Cra­ig be­ca­use of her own pas­si­on for him. And she hadn't even men­ti­oned the scho­ol­ma­te who'd re­cently ta­ken her own li­fe. All tho­se cars at the gray Ca­pe Cod. I knew abo­ut the kind of pa­in be­hind tho­se clo­sed do­ors.

  I clen­c­hed my hands, but kept my vo­ice even. "How abo­ut Wil­lis Gut­h­rie?"

  Gina tho­ught abo­ut it. And rub­bed her tem­p­le aga­in. "I ha­te lo­oking at pe­op­le I know and trying them out in my mind as kil­lers. The odd thing is, I've known Wil­lis and Pa­me­la all my li­fe and I don't ha­ve any idea at all what go­es on in his mind. I do­ubt if Pa­me­la do­es. May­be it's all num­bers. He's an ac­co­un­tant. He's the kind of per­son who do­esn't even se­em to be the­re when you're aro­und him.

  Boring. Hardly ever says an­y­t­hing. Ne­ver gets ex­ci­ted. Ne­ver saw him lo­se his tem­per." She wrig­gled une­asily. "But he li­kes things. Col­lects old sil­ver. And ra­re bo­oks. And Chi­ne­se pot­tery. And Pa­me­la's nuts abo­ut por­ce­la­in dolls and se­ven­te­en­th-cen­tury snuf­fbo­xes and an­ti­que toys. The­ir ho­use lo­oks li­ke a mu­se­um. They're damn lucky they ne­ver had any kids. Of co­ur­se, if they'd had kids, may­be they'd ha­ve tho­ught abo­ut so­met­hing be­si­des things all the ti­me."

  I was, I re­ali­zed ab­ruptly, li­king Gi­na much too much. Her he­ar­t­b­re­ak over Fran­ci, the em­pathy she had for pe­op­le who had not­hing in the­ir li­ves but things, mo­ved me. I ne­eded to ke­ep my dis­tan­ce. Be­ca­use she'd sha­red a gre­at de­al with me-much of it da­ma­ging to ot­hers-and that co­uld be very de­li­be­ra­te in­de­ed.

  I ga­ve her mo­re ro­om to ma­ne­uver. "So Pa­me­la and Wil­lis are gre­edy?"

  "Greedy. Ava­ri­ci­o­us. Gras­ping. But may­be I'm wrong. I me­an, may­be it's just that they don't ha­ve an­y­t­hing el­se to ca­re abo­ut. Things ma­ke so­me pe­op­le fe­el go­od. So­me­ti­mes it isn't just that my cli­ents want the­ir ho­mes to be be­a­uti­ful, they want to be sur­ro­un­ded by ex­pen­si­ve obj­ects. It's be­yond aes­t­he­tics. The mo­re it costs, the bet­ter it ma­kes them fe­el." She shrug­ged.

  "Will Pa­me­la ga­in fi­nan­ci­al­ly from Patty Kay's de­ath?"

  "Look, ever­y­body in town knows-Pa­me­la and Patty Kay'd be­en fe­uding for months over so­me of the es­ta­te pro­perty the­ir pa­rents had left them. Pa­me­la's all for sel­ling out to so­me con­do de­ve­lo­pers. Patty Kay re­fu­sed to ag­ree. Kind of li­ke my de­al but on a much gran­der sca­le. Patty Kay wan­ted to ke­ep the land un­de­ve­lo­ped. She wan­ted to ce­de it to Wal­den Scho­ol for a wil­der­ness area. The land adj­o­ins the scho­ol pro­perty. They we­re fu­ri­o­us with each ot­her."

  Money.

  Such a go­od, old-fas­hi­oned, so­lid mo­ti­ve for mur­der.

  "Did they-eit­her Wil­lis or Pa­me­la-dis­li­ke Cra­ig?"

  "I gu­ess not. Why wo­uld Wil­lis play po­ker with him? 'Co­ur­se, you can end up do­ing things with pe­op­le you don't li­ke in a small town and the­re's no way to avo­id it un­less you're wil­ling to be ru­de. But I don't ha­ve any re­ason to think so. Ex­cept Cra­ig's not the­ir kind of guy." She lo­oked sud­denly em­bar­ras­sed.

  My sup­po­sed re­la­ti­on­s­hip to Cra­ig was ga­ining me en­t­ree; it co­uld al­so sha­de res­pon­ses. I spo­ke up qu­ickly. "Don't he­si­ta­te to say what you think. I don't ca­re abo­ut an­y­t­hing but fin­ding out who shot Patty Kay."

  "Well." Gi­na cle­ared her thro­at. "Cra­ig's the ni­cest guy in the world, but he isn't a hard char­ger. I me­an, he's not very am­bi­ti­o­us. In the eyes of so­me­body li­ke Wil­lis. You know what kind of ho­urs ac­co­un­tants work."

  I smi­led. "You me­an Cra­ig's a char­ming yo­ung man who mar­ri­ed a rich wi­fe and was per­fectly con­tent to work -not very hard-at a bo­ok­s­to­re she ow­ned for ple­asu­re."

  She didn't me­et my eyes. "Uh, yes."

  "That's Cra­ig. That do­esn't of­fend me. But it co­uld of­fend ot­hers." An en­vi­o­us per­son might ta­ke gre­at ple­asu­re in strip­ping my "nep­hew" of his li­fe of ease.

  She hur­ri­ed to chan­ge the su­bj­ect. "Da­vid For­rest wo­uld be too up­tight to sta­ge the mess in the kit­c­hen. I me­an, this guy's Ma­j­or Dad wit­ho­ut a glim­mer of a smi­le. He's still in the ma­ri­ne re­ser­ves. Ma­ri­ne bo­ot camp was pro­bably the hig­h­light of Da­vid's li­fe."

  "You don't li­ke him."

  "No." It was crisp and une­qu­ivo­cal. "If I had to po­int to so­me­body who co­uld sho­ot in cold blo­od, he'd be the guy. He gi­ves me the cre­eps. Ever­y­t­hing has to be just right for Mr. Da­vid For­rest. I don't see how Bro­oke stands it."

  "Stands it?"

  "Living with him. It wo­uld be li­ke ha­ving sex with a ro­bot."

  Her fa­ce fla­med. For a mo­ment, she'd for­got­ten her audi­en­ce.

  "How did Da­vid For­rest and Patty Kay get along?"

  "Polite to each ot­her. Of co­ur­se, Da­vid's al­ways po­li­te. Patty Kay tho­ught he was bo­ring, but so far as I know, he'd ha­ve ab­so­lu­tely no re­ason to kill her. Ex­cept may­be to rid the world of an up­pity fe­ma­le."

  "Antifeminist?"

  "Oh, ho­ney, you'd bet­ter be­li­eve it."

  "How do­es he tre­at his wi­fe?"

  "David tre­ats Bro­oke li­ke he tre­ats ever­y­body el­se, as an un­der­ling. Of co­ur­se, he was bred to it. The­re ha­ve al­ways be­en two top fa­mi­li­es in this town, the Pre­mis­ses and the For­rests. And may­be the For­rests are even a lit­tle ric­her and a lit­tle mo­re pro­ud of them­sel­ves. Fuck them all," she sa­id che­er­ful­ly. "My dad ran a gro­cery sto­re. Bro­oke and I grew up ac­ross the stre­et from each ot­her. Bro­oke knew what she wan­ted from the ti­me she was tiny. She wan­ted to be 'impor­tant' and she set out to catch Da­vid For­rest when she was in juni­or high." Her grin flas­hed. "Bro­oke was al­ways the pret­ti­est girl in town. And she pre­pa­red to be a rich man's wi­fe the way so­me girls set the­ir he­art on med or law scho­ol. And she ma­de it."

  "I'm sur­p­ri­sed For­rest didn't-rto use an odi­o­us phra­se -marry a girl from his own class."

  Now the grin was a lit­tle wic­ked. "I gu­ess I was wrong. I gu­ess he's not re­al­ly a ro­bot."

  "But the bot­tom li­ne is you don't know of any re­ason why Da­vid For­rest wo­uld ha­ve mur­de­red Patty Kay?"

  The ma­li­ci­o­us light in her eyes di­ed. "No. No­ne." She slum­ped back in her cha­ir.

  I knew she was we­ary, too we­ary for much mo­re.

  "Just one mo­re thing. Bri­git tho­ught her mot­her might be angry with the he­ad­mas­ter at Wal­den Scho­ol. Wo­uld you ha­ve any idea why?"

  "With Chuck?" Gi­na rol­led her eyes. "Who co­uld get ti­red of Mr. Eter­nal Yo­uth? That man ma­kes all grown-ups fe­el li­ke they're eighty. Christ, if he be­li­eves half the stuff he spo­uts! Ac­cor­ding to Chuck, Wal­den Scho­ol is right up the­re with Eden, the gar­den spot of the world." The go­od hu­mor fled her fa­ce, le­aving it sharp and angry. "Well, the­re's a god­damn sna­ke in Eden, all right, and Chuck's go­ing to ha­ve to ro­ot it out. He's got to find out who wro­te tho­se no­tes to Fran­ci. He's got to!" She grab­bed the ci­ga­ret­te box and stuck it in her pu
r­se. "In fact, I'm go­ing to go talk to him now."

  I wis­hed her well. I wis­hed I co­uld help in the qu­est for Fran­ci's tor­men­tor. But this was a task that had to be do­ne by an in­si­der. Cra­ig's aunt had no en­t­ree he­re.

  But I co­uld be su­re of one thing.

  The he­ad­mas­ter of Wal­den Scho­ol was go­ing to be un­der si­ege.

  Which co­uld be qu­ite hel­p­ful to me.

  I al­ways lo­ved the ro­ugh-and-tum­b­le of news con­fe­ren­ces. The pres­su­re of an­s­we­ring sharp, so­me­ti­mes lo­aded qu­es­ti­ons with no prep ti­me can re­ve­al a man's or wo­man's cha­rac­ter fast. I didn't want to miss the ses­si­on bet­we­en Gi­na Ab­bott and the he­ad­mas­ter. And Chuck Selwyn was de­fi­ni­tely on my list. Thanks to Bri­git.

  "I'm on my way to see Mr. Selwyn too."

  She shrug­ged im­pa­ti­ently. "Mrs. Col­lins, I know you're go­ing the ex­t­ra mi­le for Cra­ig, but I ha­ve to tell you Chuck's not a can­di­da­te for first mur­de­rer. I me­an, this guy's a cer­ti­fi­ed eag­le sco­ut. Mom and ap­ple pie are ab­so­lu­tely sac­red to Chuck. Patty Kay ab­so­lu­tely ter­ri­fi­ed him."