“It’s almost three thirty,” Linda said, and pointed at her watch. She hadn’t told Tricia how her interview with Grace had gone, but the small smile that covered her lips and the gleam in her eyes left no doubt that a job offer had been-or was about to be-made.
Tricia felt sick at the thought of conducting yet more interviews for the job of assistant manager at Haven’t Got a Clue. The prospect of working with Pixie was just as nauseating.
“You don’t want to be late,” Linda encouraged.
A submissive Tricia collected her coat from the peg at the back of the store and exited the shop, feeling like a child being forced to go to the class bully’s birthday party.
As usual on a cold April afternoon, traffic on Main Street was less than light. In fact, there wasn’t a car in sight, and Tricia jaywalked to get to Booked for Lunch. She noted the lights were still on inside, but the neon OPEN sign had been extinguished. She tried the door handle, found it unlocked, and entered the café as though stepping before a firing squad.
Angelica had changed her clothes since Tricia had seen her at lunch. She now wore a tight black pencil skirt and a tucked-in black-and-white striped shirt with a button-down polka-dot bib. She’d donned a pair of reading glasses on a chain that gave her the look of a high-powered secretary-or worse, the high school principal from Tricia’s past. She stood on three-inch heels in the aisle between the booths along the south wall and the counter opposite.
“Right on time. Take off your coat and take a seat,” she chimed, directing Tricia toward the first booth, where Pixie already sat. Dressed in a tan-and-brown striped vintage dress from what appeared to be from the 1940s, with her hair once again done in a pompadour, Pixie looked like she’d just stepped out of the pages of an old Life magazine.
“Hello, Pixie,” Tricia said, her voice barely audible.
“Mmm,” Pixie grunted.
Not an auspicious beginning. Angelica didn’t seem to have noticed.
“Now, ladies, let’s begin. First off, Pixie has something to say.”
Pixie glowered, but her anger seemed to melt under Angelica’s reproachful glare. “I’m…sorry, Ms. Miles. Er, Tricia. I was rude and I apologize.” The words sounded rehearsed and not at all sincere. Had Angelica coached her on this?
Tricia sighed. It was only polite to acknowledge Pixie’s apology. “I accept,” she said, and even managed a wan smile.
Pixie looked…frightened? She really didn’t want to go back to jail, and who could blame her?
Tricia turned up the wattage on her smile, hoping she didn’t look demented. “Angelica tells me you know a lot about vintage mysteries.”
Pixie’s eyes widened with interest at the change of subject. “My dad was a big fan of Erle Stanley Gardner. He used to read to me at bedtime, but instead of fairy tales he read me all the Perry Mason stories. When I got a little older, we used to watch reruns of the old black-and-white TV show. Oh, that Raymond Burr-what a guy! Did you ever see Ironside?”
Tricia had only seen the show in reruns, not when it had run on network TV, but she nodded just the same. “I have to admit I liked the latter-day TV movies better than the old Perry Mason show. Let’s face it, William Katt as Paul Drake Junior was a lot sexier than William Hopper on the original series.”
Pixie grinned. “Oh, you better believe it. Did you know he was actually Barbara Hale’s son?”
“I did,” Tricia admitted. “I had a crush on him when I was in junior high. You had to love all that curly blond hair.”
“Ahem.” All eyes turned to Angelica. “Let’s stay on topic, ladies,” she admonished, and Tricia and Pixie were both suitably cowed once again. “Tricia, did you have any questions you wanted to ask Pixie?”
Tricia fought the urge to squirm. She had a lot of questions, but would the goodwill they’d just shared disappear if she asked them? She decided to tread lightly.
“Have you ever worked in a retail business before?”
“Oh, sure,” Pixie said. “Before my last stint in stir, I was a checkout girl at Hannaford’s in Nashua. Held the job for almost six months. Then I met this guy in a bar and got arrested again…” Her sentence trailed off. “But I’ve sworn off my old ways,” she said, suddenly sitting up straighter. “I mean, at my age there aren’t that many men who are interested.”
“How are you at getting along with others?” Angelica asked. “Tricia has an elderly part-time employee.”
“Yeah, I know. Mrs. Harris-Everett’s hubby. She’s real fond of the old geezer.”
Tricia’s eyes widened in indignation. “We call him Mr. Everett. He deserves that kind of respect.”
“Oh sure, I could call him that. Unless he tells me to call him something else, that is.”
“Are you reliable? Will you show up for work every day?” Tricia asked.
“I’ve got a car. It’s kind of a relic, but it works. Just ask Mrs. H-E, she can tell you I never missed a day and I was on time every day, too.”
That wasn’t saying much. She’d worked for Grace for only a couple of weeks.
“I know a lot about old mysteries,” Pixie continued. “I read every one in the prison library at least three times. I can talk ’em up good for the customers, too. If you’ll give me a chance,” she added with sincerity.
Tricia glanced at Angelica, whose eyes were encouraging as she nodded like a bobblehead figurine.
Tricia didn’t like feeling cornered into making a decision, but if Linda was going to leave anyway, what was the point in fighting it? “Okay. We’ll give it a try-on a trial basis. Two weeks, and then if the situation seems to be working out, we’ll call it permanent.”
“How much are we talking per hour?” Pixie asked, then held up her left hand and rubbed her thumbs against her fingers.
“Two dollars over minimum wage.”
Pixie nodded. “I’ll take it. You won’t regret this, Ms. Miles.”
“Call me Tricia,” she insisted.
Pixie smiled, and the light glinted off a gold canine tooth. Tricia hadn’t noticed that before. It was all she could do not to shudder.
“Can I start tomorrow?” Pixie asked, sounding eager.
“Yes. Ten o’clock. If you’ve got time now, we can go over to Haven’t Got a Clue where you can fill out the paperwork, and then I’ll show you around.”
“Oh yeah, I’ve got time. I don’t have to see my parole officer until Monday morning. Don’t worry, it’s at eight o’clock. I’ll be done in plenty of time to start work.”
“And I’ve already spoken to Grace. If it’s okay with you, Trish, Linda can start at the foundation first thing Monday morning. Talk about a win-win situation,” Angelica said.
Although she should have seen that coming, Tricia was still startled at how fast things had escalated around her.
“Time is money,” Angelica said, pointing to the clock, “and I’ve got work to do now that I’ve done my good deed for the day.”
Good deed indeed, Tricia thought, and pushed her way out of the booth to stand, grabbing her coat. Pixie did likewise.
“I’m a long-lost relative of Edgar Allan Poe, you know,” she said as she shrugged into the sleeves of her bulky brown faux fur coat. She struggled to fasten the oversized buttons, which made her look like she was hugging a big old bear.
Tricia doubted her claim. Poe had had no heirs. “Not directly,” she said.
“Oh, of course not. The guy died without kids. But my daddy always said we were several cousins once, twice, or maybe even fifteen times removed. I should’ve paid more attention. He was really proud of that.”
Perhaps that was all Pixie had to be proud of after a life spent on the seamy side. Tricia had always thought of herself as broadminded, and to prove it, here she was contemplating hiring an ex- (at least she hoped) prostitute to work for her.
I must be out of my mind, Tricia thought, and trudged behind Pixie to the exit. But when she got there, she found Grant Baker standing outside the door.
“At last,” he said, sounding frustrated. “I’ve been all over the village looking for you. Frannie Armstrong finally told me I could find you here.”
“Why didn’t my assistant, Linda, tell you where I was?”
“I think it was the uniform that scared her. She probably thought you were in trouble. Which you are.”
“What for now?”
“Because you won’t stop asking questions and bugging people about the Comfort murder.”
“Why should I?”
“For one thing, it could get you killed.”
“Oh, please.”
“I mean it. There’s a lunatic running around out there bludgeoning women.”
“Just one so far.”
“And I’d like to keep it that way,” Baker snapped.
“Uh, I don’t think I need to be a part of this conversation,” Pixie said. She seemed to be having an allergic reaction to Baker’s uniform.
“Why don’t you go over to Haven’t Got a Clue and I’ll meet you there in a few minutes,” Tricia said.
“Whatever you say, boss,” Pixie said, and headed out the door.
“Boss?” Baker asked.
“It seems I have yet another new employee,” Tricia said.
“I’ve got some work to do in the kitchen,” Angelica said, and turned on her heel, leaving the two of them standing in the front of the café.
“I’m actually glad you found me, Grant; I was going to call you, anyway. I’ve spoken to everyone who was at the inn on Sunday night, and I can tell you that none of them have been completely honest with you about why they were there.”
Baker suddenly looked a bit more interested. “What are you saying?”
“At the last Chamber of Commerce meeting, Bob Kelly pulled four business cards out of a fishbowl as winners to stay the night at the Sheer Comfort Inn, but announced four different names.”
“What makes you think that?”
“Bob tore his coat sleeve the day of the meeting and hasn’t had it repaired. He hung the jacket in his office and I checked the pockets not five hours ago. When I confronted him, he admitted that Clayton Ellington, Chauncey Porter, and Mary Fairchild had bribed him to announce them as the raffle winners.”
Now Baker was extremely interested.
“Have you spoken to Bob?” Tricia asked.
He shook his head. “What reason did these people have to want to be at the inn on that particular night?”
“Clayton Ellington was Pippa’s former lover. His wife didn’t want him visiting an old flame, but she just happened to be out of town on Sunday night.”
“And Chauncey Porter?”
“He’s a lonely-probably horny-old man who once tipped Pippa heavily back in the day when she was a Playboy bunny at the New York club.”
“And Mary Fairchild?”
“She only wanted a no-cost night at an inn with her husband to rekindle their romantic life.”
“And what about Angelica? Did she bribe Kelly, too?”
“Heck no. Bob had hoped she’d invite him to spend the night with her at the inn, not me.”
A creaking noise sounded from behind them, and they turned to look at the back of the café. The top of Angelica’s head was visible above the swinging half doors that led into Booked for Lunch’s kitchen-just enough for them to see her eyes.
“Can we have some privacy here?” Baker asked sharply.
Angelica’s head disappeared from sight, but Tricia could still see her feet below.
Baker turned back to face Tricia. “Just drop it, will you? Let the police handle the investigation. My God, it’s only been five days since the murder. These things can take years of careful investigation before they’re solved and a suspect arrested.”
“I don’t sense any urgency on your part. And it seems I’ve been able to gather more information on the case than you and your men.”
He glowered at her. “My department is doing everything humanly possible to solve this crime. And the fact that it doesn’t seem apparent to you doesn’t mean we aren’t following all leads that come in. For instance, cell phone records prove that Clayton Ellington talked to someone, presumably his wife, at her cell phone number on Sunday night for at least twenty minutes before your 911 call and then for ten minutes after. He’s in the clear.”
“How about Harry Tyler? He told me he was with Amy Schram the night Pippa was killed, but Amy says no. She also said she hasn’t spoken to you about it, either.”
Baker sighed. “I’ve already spoken with Mr. Tyler-several times. I’m satisfied with his explanation as to where he was on the night of the crime.”
Tricia’s eyes widened.
“And no, I’m not going to share that with you,” Baker declared.
Tricia was about to argue the point when Baker raised an admonishing finger and wagged it in front of her nose. “I’m not going to tell you again. Stay out of this, Tricia.”
And with that, he turned and exited the café, slamming the door behind him, rattling the glass within it.
A squeak issued from the doors to the kitchen and Angelica emerged. “My, my. He was a tad upset.”
Tricia sighed. “He’s just annoyed that I knew more about the inn’s guests than he did.”
Angelica moved closer and placed a hand on Tricia’s arm. “He’s right, though, Trish. Poking around and asking questions could get you killed. Mother and Daddy would never forgive me if I let that happen.”
Tricia doubted that. In the recent past, her parents had rarely ventured north from their South American vacation home to spend quality time with either of their offspring, and they couldn’t even use the excuse of ill health.
She put those thoughts out of her mind. It did no good to dwell on them.
“I’d better go. Pixie is waiting.”
“I have a feeling she’s going to work out just fine,” Angelica said.
“If she doesn’t, I’m holding you to your promise to help me find someone else.”
“I stand by my word. Now, go back to work and stop thinking about Pippa Comfort’s murderer-at least for the rest of the day.”
“With pleasure,” Tricia said, and opened the door to leave. But as she crossed the street to return to her store, she was sure that it was a promise she wouldn’t be able to keep.