An Old-Fashioned Murder (9 page)

“Not appropriate,” Lillian repeated, clucking her tongue. “Not appropriate at all.”

Beulah rolled her eyes to Daisy, then she turned toward the sour lemon. “What isn't appropriate, Lillian?”

“A first date—or any date, for that matter—dressed the way you are.”

“I'm wearing a skirt and a sweater, with tights and boots.”

“A sweater that's far too snug,” Lillian informed her. “And a skirt that's considerably too short.”

Ordinarily Beulah had a short redheaded fuse, one that usually resulted in her taking a shark-size bite of retribution out of her victims, but in this instance, her prospective date had her in too good of a mood. So instead of spitting insults or hurling daggers, she answered only with a derisive snort.

That apparently egged Lillian on, because she added with her own bite, “Those boots could belong to—dare I say it—a lady of the night.”

“Now, my dear,” Parker protested.

Henry Brent gave a contemptuous clack. “Careful, Lillian. Your claws are showing. Fangs, too.”

She shot him a dark look.

Undaunted, he continued, “There's no need to be jealous of a beautiful young thing. You had your day. Once. Long ago. Such as it was.”

The look turned black.

Drew rattled the ice cubes in his glass. “She's just mad because she doesn't have the legs for those boots.”

Although it was true, Daisy frowned at him. It was good of him to support Beulah, and everyone was more than a little tired of Lillian, but there were still some constraints of civility. Lillian was Daisy's in-law, after all, and it was Aunt Emily's party. Drew offered a halfhearted shrug of apology, to which she replied with a grateful smile.

“Oh, heavens,” May fretted. Her eyes darted anxiously from Drew to Lillian to Henry Brent, and she pulled out her handkerchief.

Edna uncrossed, then recrossed her legs.

“If you're heading outside, Beulah, you better take a warm coat,” Aunt Emily said, coming through the dining room from the kitchen. “I just popped onto the back porch, and it's starting to snow.”

“Snow!” Henry Brent exclaimed, and promptly headed over to the nearest window. He pushed aside its drapery.

Daisy and Beulah exchanged a pair of amused winks. Daisy hadn't been exaggerating to her mama. The burgundy seersucker and the burgundy velvet did match perfectly.

“No doubt about it,” he reported, pressing his nose against the pane. “I see flurries.”

“Dear me.” May rubbed the lace border on her handkerchief.

Edna's legs uncrossed and crossed again.

“Are you sure that you should go?” Aunt Emily asked Beulah.

Beulah winked at Daisy once more. It was just as they had predicted. Aunt Emily was not happy to have her leave.

“I'll be here all day tomorrow to help entertain,” Beulah promised. “I might even be back sooner than expected this evening, depending on how things turn out.”

“We can entertain ourselves just fine,” Aunt Emily retorted somewhat tetchily. “I was more concerned about you driving in this weather.”

“No worries. I'm an excellent driver.”

Aunt Emily limited her response to a raised eyebrow.

“I am,” Beulah insisted.

“What's all the fuss?” Kenneth Lunt interjected. “It's only a few flurries.”

“Only a few flurries?” Lillian echoed, aghast.

Kenneth looked at his wife, who was sitting in the damask armchair next to his. Daisy watched her with interest. Beulah had sparked her curiosity about Sarah, whether the woman's mousiness was at all exaggerated. But she was disappointed a moment later when Sarah simply shrugged. A shrug proved nothing either way.

Henry Brent turned from the window. “Where exactly did you say you were from?” he asked the Lunts.

“I can tell you that they ain't from around here,” Parker remarked.

“Certainly not,” Lillian concurred haughtily.

Sarah's chin quivered. “We—”

Her husband's voice rose over hers. His face was flushed. “I didn't say. And I don't see how it's any of your business!”

The entire group grew still, uniformly taken aback by Kenneth's sudden vehemence.

“None of your damn business at all—”

“I would remind you to watch your language,” Henry Brent cut him off in a stern tone. “There are ladies present.”

Daisy and Beulah glanced at each other, and both restrained a grin. There was something awfully endearing about a ninety-four-year-old who wore a polka dot clip-on bow tie and worried about the delicate ears of the ladies in the room.

Kenneth's face flushed further. “My language? Are you kidding me! I didn't even use a—”

This time Daisy cut him off. “It's the snow,” she said lightly.

He turned to her with a hard gaze.

“It's the snow,” she repeated, hoping that she was correct in her assumption that Kenneth's enmity was a defense mechanism from everybody ganging up on him rather than actual anger.

Aunt Emily nodded at her and mouthed a word of thanks. Encouraged, Daisy continued.

“In this area,” she explained, “even a little snow is enough to shut down the world. We usually get some only once or twice during a winter, and it typically melts within a day, if it sticks at all. The mountains can get more, of course. But there aren't enough plows to cover all the country roads, and there aren't big piles of salt and gravel waiting at the ready like up north and in larger cities. So if there's snow and ice around here, lots of people tend to get nervous and bunker down 'til it's over. That's why when you talked about it being only a few flurries, the natural conclusion was that you weren't from these parts.”

“Precisely.” Aunt Emily nodded at Daisy again.

“Well said, Ducky!” Commending her with a clack, Henry Brent let the drapery fall back over the window. “I can remember the storm of sixty-two like it was yesterday.”

Beulah's nose twitched. “Was that 1862 or 1962?”

He chortled. “If it were 1862, I'd be one heck of a dinosaur, and they'd have me locked up for study and testing.”

“They should have you locked up anyway,” Lillian muttered under her breath.

Fortunately she said it quietly enough so that only Daisy and Parker heard her. They both gave her a reproving look. She pursed her lips, but didn't mutter anything more.

“That storm of sixty-two was a doozy,” Henry Brent reminisced. “A solid inch of ice, followed by more snow than I'd ever seen in my whole life, even in pictures. It was like somebody had busted a snowmaking machine up in the sky. It just kept on coming. Day and night. Heaps of the stuff.”

“Every road was blocked,” Aunt Emily said. “We couldn't leave the inn for a week. And the electrical was out even longer.”

The Fowler sisters chimed in.

“We were only young girls at the time—”

“—but we remember it, too.”

“No school—”

“—for days and days.”

“We thought it was wonderful—”

“—but our mama complained and complained.”

Drew cleared his throat in Daisy's direction. She answered him with a smile. She didn't know if Edna and May had spoken in tandem as children, but if they had, she could well imagine that even the most doting and affectionate parent would eagerly welcome the peaceful respite of schooltime.

Lillian noticed the exchange and evidently found it too intimate for her taste, because she glared at Drew.

Unfazed, he turned to Beulah. “I know that you're not panicked about the snow, but if you want, you can take my truck tonight, just to be extra-cautious.”

“What a good idea!” Aunt Emily appeared relieved.

“It's got four-wheel drive,” Drew went on, “and it hasn't let me down yet, not even in some really nasty mud and serious inclines.”

“My car is kind of a wimp,” Beulah said.

Reaching into his pocket, Drew pulled out his keys. As Beulah walked over to collect them, she passed close to Daisy.

“Don't look now,” she whispered, “but Georgia's watching.”

As surprised as Daisy was, she followed Beulah's advice and didn't immediately snap her head up to look around. Instead she leaned back and pretended to casually stretch in her chair. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of pixie-cut strawberry blond hair. Beulah was right. Georgia was watching. She was hiding in the kitchen, peering into the parlor from the edge of the dining room doorway. How long had she been standing there? And why?

“Thank you, Drew,” Beulah purred, as she took the truck keys from him. “I'll try really hard not to break it.”

Drew laughed. “I'd appreciate that.”

“I told you,” Beulah whispered, passing by Daisy again. “You shouldn't be so quick to trust her.”

Daisy wondered if Georgia was watching all of them, or just one of them. Was it the same person that she had been staring at earlier?

“Is it the secretary, Ducky?”

Although she heard Henry Brent's words, her mind was focused elsewhere, and she didn't respond.

“That's what you're looking at?” He moved slowly from the window to the nook between the parlor and the dining room.

When she still didn't answer, Drew nudged her with his elbow. “Daisy?”

She blinked at him. “Sorry?”

“The secretary,” Henry Brent repeated. “You were looking at the secretary?”

Daisy had been looking at Georgia and not the secretary, but she understood from the way her head had been turned toward the dining room how he could have drawn the wrong conclusion.

“You think it's tippy too, Ducky?” he asked.

“Well…” She hesitated a moment, shifting her attention to the piece of furniture. “It does seem to be tilting a bit.”

Drew nodded in agreement.

“But maybe it's not a problem,” Daisy added after another moment, studying the two parts of the secretary. “Maybe it's just what you were talking about before. It can't sit flush against the wall because the back of the bookcase extends beyond the back of the desk.”

In an attempt to better examine the issue, Henry Brent approached the secretary. He twisted his neck and shoulders and pressed himself as close to the back of it as he could.

“Don't hurt yourself!” May cried.

Edna jumped up in alarm. “You mustn't do that!”

He responded by squeezing his body further behind the secretary.

“They're right, Henry.” Aunt Emily hurried over to the nook. “You're not a stretchy rubber band. You could snap.”

“I'm okay,” he assured them. “I'm just seeing if I can … There's some thingamabob here…”

Although he might have felt okay, he didn't look okay. He looked half squished and, before long, fully stuck. The secretary wobbled slightly.

“Henry!” Edna and May exclaimed in unison.

The secretary wobbled some more.

“That's not good,” Drew mumbled, and a minute later, he was pulling the man out like an obdurate beagle that had gotten itself wedged in a drainpipe chasing after a rabbit.

“Thank you for the assistance,” Henry Brent said, when he had been wrenched free. “Much obliged to you.”

A chorus of reprimands from Aunt Emily and the Fowler sisters followed. Henry Brent replied by brushing his suit, straightening his bow tie, and clacking his dentures at the chattering hens.

“Well, this has been exciting,” Beulah said, heading toward the entrance hall. “But if I don't hurry, I'll be late for my date.”

The adventure with the secretary was quickly forgotten as everyone wished Beulah a safe drive and a good time. As usual, Lillian was less generous.

“Better do the best you can with it,” she advised Beulah. “You aren't getting any younger, you know. You won't have many opportunities left.”

Beulah stopped and turned on the heel of her boot. Blowing a parting kiss to the rest of the group, she threw Lillian such a taunting look that Daisy knew Lillian would one day pay for that remark, no doubt when she least expected it.

 

CHAPTER

9

Although Daisy would have enjoyed Beulah's company at dinner, it turned out that she didn't need her hawk eyes to help watch Georgia and see whom she reacted to. That was because Georgia reacted to no one. She assisted in serving the meal and cleaning up afterward, but she didn't sit at the table and eat with the rest of the group. Her head and gaze were kept studiously down each time she appeared from the kitchen with a new bowl of string beans or an extra dish of scalloped potatoes. And she never opened her mouth. Even when she had to get close to someone to replenish their water glass or was thanked for a clean napkin, Georgia didn't utter a syllable or lift her eyes from the floor.

Her limbs did twitch occasionally, and Daisy also noticed that Georgia's hands weren't the steadiest. But as far as she could tell, the twitching didn't get worse next to any specific person, and the shaky fingers were in keeping with Georgia's general clumsiness. The only time Daisy spotted any response from her was when Sarah Lunt lingered over the breadbasket. It was just as Beulah had described from the night before. The basket was moving merrily around the table, until it came to Sarah. Then she stopped and just held it in her hands, staring at it as though its contents required the utmost contemplation. The surrounding conversation slowly died, and everyone in turn began staring at Sarah.

As the seconds ticked by and the group's focus remained on Sarah, Georgia started shifting her weight back and forth from one leg to the other. But Daisy was inclined to think that instead of taking a particular interest in Sarah, Georgia was merely being impatient. The basket was nearly empty, and she wanted Sarah to make up her mind so she could grab it and run back to the security of the kitchen. Based on the long minutes that it took for Georgia to complete each refill and every other mini-errand, she was clearly eager to leave the dining room whenever she could.