Jolly old Saint Nicholas
THE BLUSTERING WIND THREATENED TO PUSH my truck into a barren field as I drove the very quiet Maggie home on Saturday morning. Her face was a ghastly shade of green, and she kept the window on her side open all the way despite the near freezing temperature.
Hangover-free, I felt really pure, having chosen for once not to overindulge.
“Oh, shut up,” Maggie said to me.
“I didn't say a word,” I protested.
“You were thinking I'm an idiot. Well, I am.”
I couldn't argue with that.
“I'll never do this again.”
“We've all said that, Maggie. Many times.”
“This time I mean it.”
Bill Cromwell, Maggie's fiance, was waiting for us outside their small split-level home. As he walked over to the truck, I noticed he still walked with a limp, a painful reminder of our adventure last fall when he was injured while trying to help me trap a killer. He was wearing his Union Army general officer's uniform, plumed hat and all.
“Kinky,” I said to him. “Do you hang around your house all weekend in that getup?”
He grinned and opened the door on Maggie's side.
Maggie looked up from her struggle to unbuckle her seat belt and laughed. “His regiment is going to be in the Christmas parade today. Doesn't he look glorious?”
Kind of young and skinny, I thought, but refrained from saying so. I still wondered why Maggie came to the funeral service alone last night, but if there was a problem between them, she kept it to herself.
I drove on to the Sigafoos Home for the Aged, where the Chronicle's Christmas party was to be held.
“Why a nursing home?” I'd asked Cassie when she told me about the brunch plans she'd made there.
“Because the Holiday Inn's been booked for months. Besides, the Sigafoos serves good food and is really inexpensive.”
Inexpensive was the magic word at the fiscally challenged Chronicle.
The parking lot behind the home was only half full. I pulled in between two black vans. From one came a swarm of little Amish boys, all dressed in identical black overalls, blue shirts, and little flat black hats.
“ 'Morning, miss,” the non-Amish driver said. “Brought some of your paperboys down from Burnt Stump Hollow. I'll be back to get them after the parade.”
“What do you mean ‘after the parade'? The brunch only lasts till noon. I can't baby-sit them all afternoon.”
“You'uns wouldn't want the kiddies to miss the parade, would you? They don't get to town much-just for special occasions like this one.” He tipped his ball cap and pulled out in a rush before I could argue with him.
“Okay, men,” I said to the children, as we headed toward the canopy-covered back entrance of the nursing home. “Let's party!”
The Chronicle's “staff” consisted mainly of the delivery team: about fifty boys and girls under the age of twelve and ten retired men who drove the papers to places where the children could pick them up. The rest of the people present were the dozen men and women who sold advertising, six freelance writers, and the printer. Most were already seated, waiting eagerly for breakfast to be served.
Cassie greeted me with today's paper in hand. “Wait till you see the front page,” she said, laughing.
I unrolled the paper and was smacked in the face with a headline that said PUBIC SAFETY THREATENED. “Pubic Safety! For God's sake, I know I typed public.”
“Stuff happens,” she said with a shrug. “Half our readers won't notice. The rest will say something like ‘What do you expect from the Chronicle?' and then forget about it.
“It looks like everybody's here, Tori. Why don't you make your welcoming speech now?”
“Welcoming speech? Oh, dear. I never thought about-”
But Cassie was already tapping a water glass with a knife to attract everyone's attention.
“Sit down, please. Our editor has a few words to say to you.”
“Very few,” I promised, and was greeted with enthusiastic cheers from the group.
I thanked them all for their hard work. More cheers. Urged them to drop by the office any time for a visit. Cheers from the children, a frown from Cassie. Wished them a happy new year. Polite applause. Announced brunch was ready. Standing ovation, followed by a wild charge to the buffet table.
After everyone, including a few stray nursing home residents who dropped in to see what was going on, had filled their plates, Cassie and I helped ourselves to what was left: dry scrambled eggs, cold English muffins, and warm fruit cups. The coffee was good, though, and plentiful, since very few of the children drank anything but orange juice.
Everybody seemed to enjoy the party, especially when the waitresses came out with big trays of sticky buns. Everybody but me, that is, for I kept thinking about that dreadful stuffed cat with its stomach slit open that some sadistic person had left on my porch last night. Please, I thought, please let Fred be all right. Who hates me enough to want to hurt my cats? What does anyone have to fear from me?
As the waitresses cleared the tables, Cassie began distributing gifts. Apparently, I was the only person present who found it odd to have a practitioner of a pagan religion passing out Christmas gifts, but I decided it was quite likely that I was the only one who knew about her unorthodox beliefs.
Once the food was gone and the gifts were opened, it was time to leave for the parade. The logistics of getting everybody downtown could have been overwhelming, but Cassie had done it before and knew just what to do. After the children put on their coats and mittens, she had them line up side by side, flanked the two rows with the adults, stationed me at the tail end to round up stragglers, and led us out of the nursing home and out onto the sidewalk.
Four residents of the home, one man and three women in bathrobes and slippers, tried to follow us. One woman was tall and thin, and had silvery-blonde hair pinned in neat curls on top of her head. She looked something like my mother, making me wonder how Christmas was celebrated at the Willows, where she was warehoused. Or if she even knew it was Christmas.
When I led them back inside the home, they looked so disappointed that I asked the nurse if I could take them with me.
“They're going to be in the parade,” she said. “But thanks anyway.”
I tried to say good-bye to my mother-look-alike, but her attention was already on something else.
We had only a few blocks to walk, and we soon found a place to stand in the square right in front of the ruins of the burned-out courthouse.
“This is the best place to be because Santa stops here at the end to pass out candy,” Cassie said. “Yo u 'll be able to get some good pictures here for the paper.”
Our staff bounced up and down, screaming, “Candy. Yay!”
Downtown was beautiful, from the white lights in the bare branches of the trees to the red and white plastic candy canes hanging from the streetlights.
“It's like fairyland,” one of our papergirls said.
Someone behind me grumbled, “Nothing says Christmas like colored lights.”
Cassie no longer seemed upset with me, and I was glad for that. For one moment, I considered asking her if I could come to her coven meeting tonight, but in the back of my mind I kept hearing Weezie's voice repeating “baby blood” over and over, and I just couldn't bring myself to do it. We chatted amiably about nothing of importance and thanked several people who came up to us to tell us today's edition of the paper was the “best one yet.”
“I wonder why a paper full of tragedy is so popular?” I asked.
Cassie shrugged. “After years of looking at our ‘grip and grin’ photographs and reading hot tips from the extension office about the latest developments in cattle food, they probably find it exciting to have something interesting to read about.”
The sound of a band approaching on a side street caught the crowd's attention, and everyone pushed forward. I worried about my kids losing their places, but they all held their own quite nicely. The high school band came around the corner and was greeted with a rousing cheer. Their instruments were decorated with red ribbons and sprigs of mistletoe.
“They just won the district band competition,” Cassie shouted over the din. “This week everybody loves the director.”
I snapped several pictures.
“Don't use up too much film at the beginning,” Cassie warned. “The best floats come at the end.”
Behind the band came a yellow school bus with a Nativity scene on top. Screaming children hung out of the windows and tossed Hershey Kisses to the spectators. I was proud to see my staff got most of them. This was followed by a troop of Brownies dressed as Christmas trees, carrying flashlights that they flicked on and off to represent stars.
A group of middle-aged women, preceded by a banner that said they were the Silver-Haired Twirlers Association, marched in front of the junior high school band in little white tasseled boots and skirts that were much too short for them.
I heard a strange noise come from Cassie. She sounded like a strangling horse, and I couldn't look at her for I knew if I did I'd have the giggles for the rest of the day.
When the bus from the Sigafoos Home for the Aged went by, I saw the woman who reminded me of my mother sitting in the front seat wearing a Santa Claus hat. I waved at her and she returned my greeting with a Queen Elizabeth-style finger wiggle and a vague smile that really did look like my mother's. I suddenly realized I needed to visit the Willows.
The man who'd played the bagpipes at Eddie Douglas's funeral passed in front of me playing an explosive version of “Scotland the Brave.” I noticed Buchanan Mc-Cleary, the borough solicitor, standing on the other side of the street beside Luscious, who looked quite official and almost handsome in his blue uniform.
I waved at Buchanan, who smiled back.
“I want to talk to you,” I mouthed.
He tilted his head and moved his lips. I interpreted it as “What did you say?”
I cut through a troop of marching Boy Scouts to get across the street.
Buchanan greeted me with an enthusiastic hug. He and I had developed a kinship based on our both being outsiders in the small town and both being romantically involved with members of the Gochenauer family.
A Maryland high school band stopped in front of us to play a medley of Dixieland jazz. “What's up?” Buchanan asked loudly.
I didn't want my questions to be overheard by everyone nearby, so I stood on tiptoe and yelled in his ear, “I want to ask you about Stanley Roadcap.”
“Like what?”
“Like what did Stanley have to gain by Bernice's death?” As I finished shouting out my question, I realized the band had stopped playing and everyone around us either heard me or was stone-deaf. I winced with embarrassment.
Buchanan laughed at my expression. Luscious turned bright red, moved away a few inches, and pretended he didn't know me.
Taking my arm, Buchanan led me through the crowd to the semiprivacy of the covered entrance to the Sweete Toothe Candy Shoppe.
“I'm so embarrassed,” I said miserably.
He shrugged. “If that's the worst thing you ever do, consider yourself lucky.”
“I like your philosophy.” I lowered my voice and made sure nobody was listening before I asked, “Is there anything you can tell me about the Roadcaps? I met Stanley yesterday, under rather strange circumstances, and he tried to convince me that he and Bernice were getting back together. I just wondered if this was true. Or if Stanley was trying to convince me that he didn't have any reason to want her dead. Do you know if he stood to gain a lot from her will?”
“I was Bernice's lawyer,” Buchanan said. “So I do know quite a bit about their affairs. And since the settling of her estate is a matter of public record, I won't be breaking any confidentiality by telling you this. Bernice inherited her personal fortune from her father in a trust. The beneficiary of the trust is Stanley and Bernice's son. Stanley won't get anything-a fact that he was well aware of. And he doesn't need it. Stanley is fairly well-to-do.”
“A son? Where is he?” I asked, thinking I had just acquired a new suspect.
“In the army, stationed in the Middle East. He's flying home right now for the funeral.”
There went my suspect. I was vaguely disappointed. The idea of the killer being someone I didn't know was far more preferable to the alternative. I was also aware that the terms of the trust meant Bernice was more valuable to Stanley alive than dead. And for the same reason, it would have been to Stanley's advantage to keep his marriage going. How much of Stanley's patience with Bernice's history of rehab romances was due to his love for her, and how much was due to her wealth?
“At least no man's going to marry me for my money,” I thought out loud. “I don't have any.”
Buchanan looked seriously at me. “I'm not so sure about that,” he said cryptically. “Sometimes I think you act like a rich kid slumming it.”
“Where did you get that idea?” I asked, startled by his comment. “I'm no different from anybody else.”
He smiled. “What about that preppy accent, the five or six languages you speak, the casual way you drop exotic places into your conversations, the way you assume everything will go your way?”
“It's my background,” I protested. “In the foreign service, we tend to live ‘rich’ even when we're not. My father is a career diplomat who worked his way up, not one of those millionaires who bought his ambassadorship. And that accent you referred to comes as a result of my having lived in a dozen foreign countries when I was growing up.”
Buchanan said, “Okay, Tori, you've convinced me. I didn't mean to stir up a tempest in your teapot.”
The high school steel band drummed out my retort. He planted a kiss on the top of my head and moved on with a cheery good-bye.
“If you ask me,” said a woman's voice behind me, “he and that galfriend of his done it.”
I spun around to face Weezie Clopper, who was standing in the open doorway of the candy shop. How long she'd been there, I didn't know, but apparently she'd heard most of our conversation.
“Hello, Mrs. Clopper. How nice to see you again,” I said, forcing a smile.
“I thought about calling you after you left,” she said. “About that Gochenauer woman. She thinks she's so much better than everybody else because her family's been here forever.”
As the poison dripped from her lips, I thought how untrue were her remarks about Greta. Garnet's sister was a true original, an aging flower child, who lived to help everybody and everything in the world.
“What is it you are trying to tell me, Mrs. Clopper?” I asked. My smile was gone now, and I was striving for cool and intimidating.
“You know how she and that-that black man”-she spoke with a sneer in her voice-“have been yacking about saving them brown trout in the Lickin Creek. And you know how they are. If you really want to find out who killed Bernice, you ought to look closer to home, rather than bothering us good Christians.”
“Why don't you write an anonymous letter about it to the Chronicle? I won't publish it, of course, but you might feel better getting some of that venom off your chest.” I turned my back on her.
“You better watch your tongue, young lady. It's liable to get you into big trouble someday.”
I ignored her and pushed through the crowd.
Inside, I was seething at her snide remarks. Just because Greta sometimes used militant methods to further her causes, it was ridiculous to suggest she'd resort to murder to protect some fish. Smiling to myself, I recalled the time she bombarded the town meeting at the Accident Theatre with overripe tomatoes and another time when she chained herself to the fountain to protest the nuclear-waste dump. Yes, Greta could be extreme, even a little scary at times, but she was definitely not a murderess.
I found myself, once again, standing beside Luscious.
“Hi,” I said cheerfully, but Luscious was too busy being chewed out by Marvin Bumbaugh to acknowledge me. Of course, being the mind-your-own-business type of person that I am, I tried not to listen and took several pictures of the Fogal Farms float going by stacked with mounds of beef sticks, or summer sausages as my mother called them. But, standing as close as I was to the men, I couldn't help but overhear their conversation.
Actually, it wasn't a conversation but a one-sided diatribe in which Marvin bombarded poor Luscious with accusations that he was incapable of doing his job and dire threats of having him fired.
“Yesterday, you said I had till Christmas,” Luscious protested. “I haven't even got the toxicology report back yet.”
“And what about Oretta Clopper? What have you done about finding her killer?”
“I'm waiting for the results of the forensic tests on the bullet that killed her.”
“Christmas, Miller. If I don't have a report on my desk on December twenty-sixth, you can kiss your job good-bye.”
Marvin leaned forward slightly to glare at me across Luscious's brass-buttoned chest. “This wouldn't have happened if Garnet was here.”
“Why yell at me?” I snapped back. “I didn't make him go to Costa Rica.”
“Maybe he wanted to get away from something-or somebody,” Marvin said nastily, touching the very painful thought I'd been trying to push deep into my subconscious-the possibility that Garnet had left because of me.
When he left, I turned to Luscious and muttered, “I hate that man.”
“That makes two of us,” he said.
“We'll show him,” I said. “We'll find his murderer for him.”
“Sure we will.” He didn't sound convinced.
I wondered if Marvin would have treated either of us so rudely if Garnet were still here. But, of course, if Garnet were here, he wouldn't have any reason to.
The Chronicle employees waved at me from the other side of the street, and I decided to rejoin them. Reverend Flack's cousin, the bagpiper, was accompanying a group of little girls in full skirts and clogs who stopped to perform a charming Irish folk dance in front of me. As I wove my way through them, a tall clown, carrying a bunch of helium-filled balloons, stopped in front of me and mimed an elaborate double take as if he were surprised to see me. He was taller than anyone around and wore a baggy yellow suit covered with black polka dots. A bright orange wig topped his creepy, white-painted face. When he bent down and patted me on the head, I heard laughter from the crowd.
I've never liked clowns. There's something eerie and disturbing about them, like a bin of broken dolls. I want to know what's under the makeup, yet I'm afraid of finding out.
For the sake of the children watching, I forced a smile. The clown slapped his pockets, as if looking for something, then with a theatrical gesture of relief, pulled something from his vest pocket and handed it to me with a low bow.
I took it, a folded piece of paper.
“Open it. Open it,” the children cheered.
I smoothed it out and read the neatly printed message: MEET ME AT RAYMOND'S. SUNDAY AT TWO.
“Tori's got a boyfriend. Tori's got a boyfriend.” That annoying little choral rendition came from the direction of my office staff.
“Who are you?” But the clown was gone when I looked up.
“Where'd he go?” I asked, but nobody seemed to know.
Besides, who cared, when Santa was coming down the street in an army Jeep with a deer head mounted on the hood? Red laserlike light beams blinked on and off in the dead animal's nostrils. Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer, I realized with a shudder. Or Bambi. This kind of thing could warp a little kid's psyche forever.