Mimi was not available, and Eric was too distraught to handle more than one thing at a time. Nickie didn’t know and Bella wasn’t talking. My most likely stoolies were Suzetta and Bruce, but neither of them was in sight.
Suzetta had not been visible since the agonizing session in the dining room just after the murder was announced. It could be suspicious, I decided. It struck me that Peter had completely forgotten about her midnight prowl the night before, when he and I had bumped nose-to-pajama in the dark. She hadn’t been dressed in rowing clothes, but one cannot be sure what constitutes appropriate attire for transporting one’s murder victim.
I gave Nickie a vague wave and went to the register to find out Suzetta’s room number. Then, a study in nonchalance, I glided upstairs for a girlish chat with the secretary/ private eye/student who had a propensity for prowls.
All very good, but no one answered my discreet tap. I gave up and went along the corridor to my room, where I found my daughter still glued to the telephone. Her last call, I told myself coldly, as I remembered her treachery. She took in my expression, whispered a panicky farewell, and replaced the receiver.
“Did you find the cove on the far side of the lake?” she asked, shrinking into the bedspread. As well she should.
“Yes, and I found a cop waiting for me when I arrived. It seems he heard a bit of gossip on the road.”
“Then you didn’t have to walk back. Good, I was worried that you might get caught in the dark.”
“You were worried about me? I thought your only concerns were the proximity of fish and your income.” I stopped in front of the mirror. A twig clung to the top of my head like a tiny flagpole sans flag. My skin was crisscrossed by red scratches, my chin smudged with dust. Not an image that appealed. But Peter hadn’t been deterred by my untidy appearance … . I put that disturbing memory aside and turned to glare at Caron.
“I was worried,” she repeated. Her lip inched forward, her eyebrows toward each other. “You always think the worst about me, Mother. I happen to be a very sensitive person—you can ask any of the kids at school.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it. While we’re on that subject, am I correct in assuming that Inez is well informed of the latest developments in the case?”
The lip ebbed, and gradually curled at the corners. “Inez agrees that I might be in danger. I swore that I would stay by the telephone in case someone tried to do something to me.”
“A veritable umbilical cord of safety,” I said, returning to the mirror to see if I might be worthy of salvage. “What is Inez going to do if the receiver is banged down in mid-scream? Call the operator to report a homicide, or call information to ask the identity of the strangler?”
“At least Inez is worried about me,” Caron sniffled.
“A mere child, who has no knowledge of what has happened? You need to realign your pose, dear. In the meantime, you are not—repeat—not to speak to Peter Rosen unless he asks you a direct question. Your answer may range anywhere from ‘yes’ to ‘no,’ or perhaps a giddy ‘I don’t know.’ If you do otherwise, you may plan to spend the next five years in your room, where you will subsist on bread, water, and broiled fish.”
Caron plopped a pillow over her face. After a despairing
glance in the mirror, I decided to see if Suzetta might have returned to her room. She had not. I tried the knob and found that it turned easily. No one was in the corridor, and half a second later neither was I.
Suzetta’s bedroom was furnished the same as my own, with an antique bed and the obligatory ceramic pitcher in a bowl. The top of the dresser, however, was lost under an array of bottles, tubes, brushes, and other paraphernalia beyond my limited experience. I felt some satisfaction in the knowledge that her beauty was not a simple task; my semiannual Avon lady would have a coronary at the potential income.
Humming under my breath, I studied the room for a clue, although I wasn’t at all confident that I would recognize one if it crawled up my neck to kiss me on the ear. Beyond the clutter on the dresser, the room was surprisingly neat. Suzetta looked the type to drape clothes on the chair and dangle nylon stockings from the shower rod, but the only signs of occupancy in the bathroom were a blue toothbrush beside a tube of toothpaste rolled neatly at the bottom, and the wisp of a bikini hanging from a towel rack.
I opened the closet door, expecting chaos. Instead, I found a raincoat, a tightly furled umbrella, a row of dresses arranged in order of ascending skirt length, several pairs of shoes, and two empty suitcases. No canoe paddle with bits of blood and hair. A sneeze of disappointment exploded from my decidely sore nose; I was liable to be asked to guide a sleigh if the case wasn’t solved soon. I closed the door and leaned against it while I waited for inspiration.
If Suzetta had not gone outside in the middle of the night to dispose of her corpse, then she had gone for another purpose. Wonderful, Claire. I forced myself to recall the scene in detail. There had been a rumble in the parking lot shortly before Suzetta slipped out the back door. More wonderful, but not helpful; Suzetta hadn’t been the rumbler. But it did mean that someone else was on the prowl at the same time.
“Nickie!” I said aloud, charmed by the success of my mental gymnastics. Obviously, Suzetta was the student whose extracurricular activities were of interest to Peter. One of them had been obliged to silence Harmon. Suzetta had subsequently slipped outside to do the sculling, and Nickie had taken his car to meet her when she came out of the woods. It wasn’t particularly gallant of him, but he could not be accused of chauvinism. Maybe he had no experience with small craft. Something like that. In any case, she had indeed gone outside to dispose of her corpse.
It was as good as any explanation for all the midnight activity. Bella was quite simply wrong. The illicit drug activity was the motive for Harmon’s murder, and Mimi could be cleared before Eric slithered into total depression. Now all I needed was evidence to confirm the brilliant deduction. A tiny capsule would be adequate.
I dropped to my knees and began to crawl around the perimeter of the room, asking myself where I would be if I were an amphetamine. After five fruitless minutes, I determined that I would not be on the floor. I then confirmed that I would not be in the bathroom or in a plastic vial amidst the perfume bottles, nor in the suitcases in the closet. The dresser drawers remained.
I was digging through a pile of brightly colored scarves when the bedroom door opened behind me. I sat back on my heels and gazed into Suzetta’s surprised—and displeased—eyes.
“I came by to ask you something,” I said brightly, “but you weren’t here.”
Suzetta continued to stare down at me, her arms crossed and her lips squeezed into a white line. The brainless giggles were more than absent; they were a contradiction that now seemed incredible. I would have welcomed a hint of a simper or a flutter of the patently false eyelashes. The woman was far too pissed to oblige.
I tried again. “I did so admire the scarves that you wore
to the costume party, Suzetta. You must tell me where you bought them.” When she failed to lapse into the familiar routine, I leaned forward and ran my fingers through the silk rainbow.
We both saw the glint of metal, a cold, bluish-gray glint totally unsuitable for jewelry. It was, however, perfect for a gun. I jammed a red scarf over it and scrambled to my feet.
“Thanks for letting me look at your scarves. I’ll see you at breakfast,” I said, moving around her toward the door.
Unfortunately, Suzetta arrived at the door first. Holding the knob with white knuckles, she said, “I don’t want you to rush off like this, Claire. I haven’t told you where to find the scarves, and I can see how much you admire them. Why don’t you sit over there?”
It was not an invitation. Reminding myself that we were equidistant from the lethal contents of the drawer, I did as told. “Where did you get the scarves, Suzetta?”
“From a discount house, although I doubt that you’ll race out to buy them anytime soon.” She sat down on the bed to study me with a detached coldness. “What were you searching for?”
Oh, dear. It did not seem wise to tell her that I was searching for her stash of illegal substances, but the scarf story did sound weak. Then again, I wasn’t going to learn anything if I scampered out of the room like a puppy that had piddled on the rug. As long as the gun—why did she of all people have a gun?—remained in the drawer, I was safe. Surely.
I leaned back and crossed my legs. If I’d had my knitting bag, I might have whipped out a half-finished bootie à la Miss Marple and clicked away. “I saw you sneak out of the inn last night after everyone was supposedly tucked in bed.”
“And … ?” she drawled, not noticeably distressed.
“I thought it was suspicious.”
“That hardly explains why you decided to search my room.”
A valid point. I uncrossed my legs and put away the mental bootie. “I was looking for evidence.”
“Evidence of what?”
It was not going well. Suzetta was not in tears, eager to confess her evil business with a drug dealer. She wasn’t admitting to a tryst, or looking particularly guilty, for that matter. To my annoyance, she seemed to be increasingly relaxed. I was going to be forced to go for the jugular—if I wanted a confession.
“Evidence of what?” she repeated in the maddening drawl.
“Evidence of your illegal drug trafficking!”
Her mouth fell open, and her eyelashes did a second’s worth of the old flutter. “My illegal drug trafficking? You must be kidding!”
“I am not kidding. Look, Suzetta, Lieutenant Rosen already knows that you’re the link between Nickie Merrick and the students at Farber College. There’s no point in trying to avoid any reprisal, but I think the Lieutenant might be willing to negotiate. I’m sure the whole scheme was Nickie’s idea, and …”
Suzetta had managed to close her mouth and restrain the flutters. In the midst of what I felt to be the most inspirational moment of my sermon, she had also managed to reach the dresser. I ran out of kindly advice when the gun was pointed at my face. The round hole at the end of the barrel was larger than one might have suspected, and very black.
“Get up,” she said. “We’re going for a little walk.”
“You wouldn’t dare shoot me,” I countered calmly. This is not to say that I was feeling especially calm, and I hoped she couldn’t hear my heart rotating as if it were impaled on a spit.
Suzetta flicked the gun at the door before centering it
once again on my nose. “Get up, Claire. You might discover that you have no idea what I will do.”
Indeed. I walked to the door. After draping a sweater over the gun, she jabbed it into my side and said, “Don’t do anything heroic. We’re going to walk downstairs and through the back door to the stable to continue this absurd conversation. If you make any signs or try to escape, you’ll find your internal organs have become external.”
“What a tacky thing to say.”
“But true …”
I marched out the door, refusing to acknowledge the painful little jabs to my spine. As I passed my bedroom door, I willed Caron to open it so that I could at least try to communicate the situation. I could have wished for a pig in a tutu to pirouette past me—and had better odds.
A door did open as we reached the top of the staircase, but it was not my ideal choice of a rescuer. Mrs. Robison-Dewitt came out of her room, snorted as she saw me, and nodded regally to Suzetta. Had she known the danger I was in, no doubt she would have applauded. In oblivious splendor she continued down the corridor, knocked on a door, and was admitted without further ado.
I glanced back at Suzetta. “Mrs. Robison-Dewitt will remember seeing us together. You’ll never get away with this, so you might as well put down the gun and—” I broke off to grasp at the sudden jolt to my ribcage. “I was trying to help.”
“You’ve already helped too much,” Suzetta said coldly.
We went downstairs and turned toward the back door. The door to the office opened, and Peter stepped into my path. “Where are you two going?”
“Out for a walk,” I croaked. I received a jab as a reward.
Ignoring my rather strained expression, Peter smiled benignly. “What a nice idea. Well, I’ll see you later, girls. Enjoy your little walk.”
I doubted that I would enjoy the little walk for long.
Since it was hopeless in any case, I closed my eyes, took a breath, and screeched, “Arrest her, Peter! She has a gun on me!”
Contrary to all expectations, a bullet did not rip through my back to modify my organs and carry me into the great unknown. The pressure was released, and suddenly I heard a most startling sound: laughter, coming from behind me. Gleeful, lilting laughter, as if the clowns had just catapulted their cream pies.
I whirled around. Suzetta was making helpless noises as tears rolled down her cheeks. The gun swung about in an aimless pattern, its owner too convulsed to concern herself with the display of incriminating evidence.
“What is going on?” I demanded.
“She was searching my room,” Suzetta sputtered. “I’m sorry, but I just couldn’t help myself.” She lapsed into laughter again, although she did lower the gun before Aunt Beatrice’s chandelier was decimated.