Murder by Arrangement (Edna Davies mysteries Book 5) (14 page)

Chapter 19

Edna found two
new messages on her office machine when she arrived home shortly before nine
that evening. Family and friends who knew her well had learned to rely on her
land line. She reserved her cell mainly for emergencies or for connecting with
someone at an airport or train station. Otherwise, the instrument was apt to be
left in the car or in her purse or, worse yet, needing to be recharged.
Besides, she informed the uninitiated, she preferred to listen to calls in the
uninterrupted quiet of her office.

Having grown up
in a generation before computers were as necessary to daily life as
televisions, Edna prohibited electronic devices at the dinner table or when the
family was gathered to enjoy each other’s company. Absolutely no mobile calls
were accepted when she was driving, shopping or visiting. She relied on voice
mail to help her manage her day without endless or inconvenient disruptions.

Albert had
phoned at five that evening to tell her they would be out on the boat with
cellular reception unpredictable. She took that to mean he may or may not turn
on his mobile. He went on to say that the weather was near-perfect, as were
ocean conditions, so they were going to enjoy another peaceful night at sea. He
assured her he was doing fine, and hoped she was finding time to relax and
catch up on her reading while he was away. She felt only a small pang of guilt
over this last thought.

Preferring not
to dwell on this feeling, she concentrated instead on regrets over missing a
chance to speak with her husband. She was happy to know the trip was going
well, and hoped it would help Albert’s rehabilitation, although she wasn’t
certain if he would get sufficient exercise for his knee on board a cabin
cruiser. Sighing with resignation over what was out of her control, she
listened to the next call.

“Edna, it’s
Tuck. Call me when you get this, please, no matter the time. We need to talk.”

Tuck must have
been waiting near the phone because she picked up on the first ring. “We have
to do something about Peppa,” she said after she and Edna exchanged brief
preliminary greetings.

“What do you
mean?”

“She just sits
by the phone, waiting for word. I have no idea when Clem’s autopsy results will
be in, but she isn’t doing herself any good by moping around the house. Knowing
her, I bet she’s imagining the worst.”

Edna thought for
a minute before a plan came to mind. “Why don’t you bring her here for
breakfast tomorrow morning? Tell her to bring Rufus. I’ll ask my neighbor to
join us. She’ll bring Hank, her Labrador. If introducing the two dogs doesn’t
distract Peppa, I don’t know what will.”

“Who’s your
neighbor?” Tuck asked.

“Mary Osbourne.
I don’t know if you two have met, but she grew up here so she must have been
one of Peppa’s Saturday morning kids. She’s a bit of a distraction herself.”
Edna was certain that Mary’s ghost theories would provide another diversion for
Peppa.

Tuck sounded
skeptical but agreed. “I suppose that will do for an hour or so, if I can
persuade Peppa to leave the house. Afterwards, though, I’m afraid she’ll go
right back home to brood.”

“Maybe we can
take care of that, too. Between now and then, I’ll ring Charlie and find out if
he’s heard anything,” Edna said, ending the call. Before she phoned the
detective, however, she dialed Mary’s number.

“Sure, I know
Peppa.” Edna could hear the delight in Mary’s voice as she accepted the
invitation to breakfast. The pleasure vanished with her next words, though. “I
was sorry to hear about the professor. I didn’t even know he’d moved back to
town when I heard he’d been run over by his ex-wife. Is it true?” Always on the
alert for the latest news around town, Mary was probably hoping to pump Edna
for more details.

“Yes and no,”
said Edna, purposely vague. “When you see her tomorrow, please don’t mention
it. She’s upset enough over what happened, and we want to take her mind off it
for a while. Besides bringing Hank with you, I was thinking you could tell them
about your ghost.”

The silence that
followed this request lasted so long that Edna thought perhaps Mary had hung
up. She was about to speak when Mary said in a near whisper, “It’s not a
runaway slave.”

Edna gave an
inward sigh and wondered what was coming next. “You’ve been reading more
history?” She made the statement sound like a question, knowing Mary would explain
without even that much encouragement.

“Not exactly. I
found something. Tell you about it at breakfast. The ghost is the spirit of
someone who knew my grandfather. Makes sense, too. I bet Father knew this guy
was haunting the house and didn’t want to scare Mother. Nanny would have moved
out, if she’d had any idea there was an unseen presence in the nursery.” Mary
chuckled. “That risk alone would have been enough for Father to keep anything
supernatural under wraps.”

Edna nearly
laughed aloud as she thought of what Mary would have been like as a child, and
Mr. Osbourne’s terror that he and his wife might be left in complete charge of
their precocious offspring. A whirling dervish around her elderly parents, Edna
was certain. “Do I get a hint?”

“Rather tell you
in person,” was Mary’s curt reply.

Edna still
thought the entire idea of a ghost was pretty far-fetched, but Mary sounded too
serious for Edna to make light of her neighbor’s notion. She would wait to hear
the latest flight of fancy, but she believed that the real culprit must be a
bird or an animal or the wind.

After finishing
her call to Mary, Edna rang Charlie’s mobile. To her amazement, he picked up
almost at once.

“Not busy?” she
asked.

“Tonight’s been
quiet. I’m wrapping up some paperwork before heading home. I can use an early
night.”

Surprised that
he was still in the office, Edna quickly reconsidered merely speaking to him on
the phone. “Have you eaten today?”

Charlie laughed.
“Is that why you called?”

She didn’t
directly answer his question. “Since you aren’t already comfortably ensconced
at home, why don’t you swing by here first? I’ll fix something for you to eat,
and I’m thinking you wouldn’t turn down a nightcap.”

“You’re right
about that.” He paused, then said almost accusingly. “That’s not all, is it?”

“No,” she said.
“I want to hear whatever you can tell me about Clem Peppafitch, and I’d rather
hear it in the coziness of my living room with a glass of wine in my hand. ”

Forty-five
minutes later, Charlie was sitting on the couch across the coffee table from
Edna. She’d grilled ham-and-cheese sandwiches and added homemade oatmeal-raisin
cookies to his plate. Knowing he’d prefer something stronger than a glass of
wine, she raided Albert’s whiskey and vermouth supply to fix the detective a
manhattan.

She made small
talk while Charlie quenched his thirst and took the edge off his hunger. When
he finally put the plate on the coffee table and settled back with the rest of
his drink, she asked the question foremost on her mind. “Have you heard anything
from the medical examiner about Clem?”

“I hadn’t before
you phoned tonight,” Charlie said, “but after you mentioned it, I thought I’d
contact someone I know who works in the lab.”

“And ...” she
prompted when he stopped talking to sip his drink. She suspected he was teasing
her by dragging out the suspense.

“Digitalis
overdose.”

It was so sudden
and unexpected an answer that she didn’t think she’d heard correctly. “What?”

“So far, it
looks like he died of a drug overdose,” Charlie repeated. He frowned. “They’re
still waiting for the complete toxicology screens, but it’s fairly certain that
the poor old guy was dead before he was run over. Peppa didn’t kill him with
her car. It was unfortunate and simple coincidence that he collapsed across her
driveway.”

“Do you really
believe in that much of a coincidence?”

Charlie
shrugged. “Hard to say until the investigation is over. Peggy King is the lead
detective on this one. Patrol’s been going house-to-house, asking if anyone saw
what happened Saturday night. One rookie found a neighbor just this morning who
corroborated another neighbor’s story about a man stumbling in the direction of
Peppa’s house shortly before ten Saturday night. This new witness had turned
off the downstairs lights before going upstairs to bed when she noticed it was
snowing, so she put on a coat and went out to call in her cat. That’s when she
saw what she described as ‘an old drunk weaving his way up the street.’ He was
‘three sheets to the wind’ with his head down and shoulders hunched, so the
witness said she hadn’t recognized him. That sighting was about a half hour
before Peppa said she got home.” Charlie rattled the ice in his glass, watching
the liquid swirl. “Could have been too much medication combined with booze that
did him in, I suppose.”

Edna thought for
a minute or two while she sipped her wine and stared into the fire. Charlie was
quiet, too, seemingly waiting for her to tell him what was on her mind.

“According to
Tuck,” Edna began, speaking her thoughts aloud and turning to look at the
detective, “Clem Peppafitch had been sober for several years. We think he came
back to town to make up with Peppa, so it doesn’t make sense that he’d fall off
the wagon.”

“What are you
thinking?” Charlie frowned at her.

“That there
could be reasons other than alcohol that Clem was staggering or reeling or
whatever it was he was doing to look as if he were drunk.”

Charlie shrugged
but nodded. “What would you guess?”

“I don’t know.”
Edna looked down into her own glass for a few seconds before pushing the
question to the back of her mind. Gazing back at Charlie, she asked, “Why
didn’t that person come forward Sunday morning? Surely everyone on the block
must have seen or talked about all the police activity at Peppa’s house.”

Charlie looked
at her with a raised eyebrow as if surprised she would ask. “People seldom want
to get involved. Some wait and hope the police won’t come knocking on their
door. When we do track them down, they still don’t always admit to something
they saw or overheard.”

Edna switched
the conversation back again to Clem himself and shook her head in sadness. “I’m
sorry if he was drinking again. I’d have thought he’d stay sober if he wanted
to win Peppa back, if that really was his purpose in moving back to town, as
Tuck suspects.”

“Now that you’ve
brought it up,” Charlie said, leaning forward to set his glass on the coffee
table. “I don’t remember hearing anyone at the scene mention anything about
booze. I’ll check that out tomorrow with the M.E.’s office. See if they found
alcohol in his blood and, if so, how much. I’ll talk to Peggy King and John
Forrester, too. They were both at the scene Sunday morning, close to the body.
Either of them would have noticed if Clem had been drinking. Someone drunk
enough to be unsteady on his feet would have reeked of the stuff.”

Edna didn’t want
to think about John Forrester, so she changed the subject. “I’m relieved for
Peppa. It must be bad enough to have run over her ex-husband, so I don’t know
what it would have done to her if she were responsible for his death. When will
you tell her?”

“Since it’s
Detective King’s case, I called her after talking to my lab friend. She was
tucked up at home but said she’d go over and see Peppa. Peggy’s another of the
Saturday morning story kids, you know. She was glad for the chance to ease
Peppa’s mind a little.” He grinned at Edna before adding more soberly, “Until
all the test results are in, about the only thing we can do is inform Peppa
that it wasn’t her car that killed Clem.” He turned his wrist to look at his
watch. “I imagine Peggy’s giving Peppa the news right about now.”

Chapter 20

Wednesday
morning, Tuck and Peppa drove up shortly after nine o’clock in Tuck’s big blue
Lincoln town car. Edna quickly put on her coat and boots and went out to greet
them. It was true that she had asked Mary to bring Hank over, thinking that
introducing the two dogs would be a nice distraction for the librarian, but
that didn’t mean she wanted the two dogs greeting each other for the first time
inside her house.

The retired
librarian looked better, but not nearly back to her former self. Tuck, however,
was absolutely bubbling. She had gotten out and was shutting the driver’s side
door as Edna came out of the house.

“Good news,
isn’t it, Edna?” she burbled as Peppa pushed herself out of the passenger seat.

Edna, nearing
the vehicle as Peppa stood, heard the librarian mumble, “He’s still dead,” as
she pulled a blue knit cap snugly onto her tight gray curls. “Wasn’t
digitalis,” she said in a firmer voice, looking Edna straight in the eye. “Told
that to Peggy last night.”

“But you’ve been
cleared. You are not to blame,” argued Tuck, coming around the hood to stand
beside her friends. “Don’t you feel better about that?”

Instead of
answering, Peppa reached to open the back door. Rufus’s head emerged, and she
attached a lead to his collar before allowing him to jump down onto the
driveway.

Edna was
confused. Ignoring Tuck, she spoke to Peppa. “Last night, Charlie told me Clem
died of an overdose of digitalis. Do you know something different?”

At that moment,
Rufus, tail wagging, looked beyond Edna toward the back yard and gave a single
sharp bark, as if to say “Good morning.”

The women all
turned to see Mary slogging across the yard in calf-deep snow, following Hank who
was bounding toward the group, his own tail wagging furiously. Distracted from
her conversation with Peppa, Edna gasped, wondering if Hank were about to lunge
at Rufus. She thought the bigger Rottweiler would clearly come out the victor.
He was at least twenty or thirty pounds heavier than the smaller lab, clearly
more muscle than fat. She was beginning to panic, wondering what to do if a
fight broke out, when she heard Peppa call delightedly, “Hank? Hank, is that
you?”

Turning to ask
“You know Hank?” Edna saw Peppa bend down and remove the leash from Rufus’s
collar.

“Of course” said
Peppa. “Tom Greene used to bring Hank along whenever he did handy work for me.
Hank and Rufus were great friends. After Tom died, I heard someone had adopted
the Lab, but I had no idea Hank’s new owner was your next-door neighbor. If I
had, I would have brought Rufus over to visit sooner.”

As they talked,
Edna watched the two dogs. At first they had run up to each other, sniffing and
wiggling happily. Suddenly Hank raced several yards away and spun to face
Rufus. Dropping his head and shoulders, Hank waited for the big dog to accept
the challenge. It took Rufus only seconds before he ran forward to leap onto
the younger, friskier dog. Before Rufus landed on him, however, the black Lab
jumped sideways, causing the Rottweiler to skid past.

“Let the games
begin,” Peppa shouted and laughed, clapping her hands. And indeed the games did
begin with Hank prancing around the bigger dog and then taking off as fast as
the snow would allow, around the south side of the house to the backyard. After
a slight hesitation, Rufus took off after him. Several seconds later, the women
watched as the two dogs came back into view and raced toward the stone wall
that bordered the south side of the Davies property.

After watching
the canine antics for several minutes, Mary strolled closer to the small group
of older women. “I guess they know each other, huh?” she said, thrusting her
hands deep into the pockets of her thick green-and-brown camo jacket. “I
remember you from story hour at the library.”

“Of course,
you’re Mary Osborne. I remember you as quite an outspoken young lady.” Peppa
grinned up at Mary with a twinkle in her blue-gray eyes.

Edna, always
amazed that Mary seemed to show up at exactly the right moment, noticed that
Peppa was beginning to look more her old self. That thought brought Edna back
to Peppa’s earlier comment about the circumstances of Clem’s death. She need to
ask about that, but not standing out in the cold morning air. “Shall we go in?
I’ve a fresh pot of coffee brewing.”

“I’m ready,”
Tuck spoke up, rubbing her hands up and down her upper arms. “I haven’t had a
drop yet this morning.”

Mary whistled
for Hank. Obediently, he stopped wrestling with Rufus and came running. Since
the Rottweiler was right on the Lab’s heels, Peppa didn’t need to call her own
dog. Edna led the way down the brick path, recently shoveled by the Benton
brothers, and the back door to the mudroom.

When everyone
had shed coats, hats, boots and gloves, and the canines had been toweled off,
Edna turned and saw Benjamin sitting nonchalantly in the doorway to the
kitchen. Smiling to herself, she knew her cat was up to something. Sure enough,
the black Lab walked jauntily into the kitchen past the ginger cat. The massive
Rottweiler, hurrying after his friend until he spied the feline, decided his
best course of action was to back up and stand still until his mistress came to
rescue him. 

Having taken off
her coat, Tuck reached for Peppa’s and draped them both on the seat of the
nearby parson’s bench. She then placed a hand between Peppa’s shoulder blades
and propelled her gently toward the kitchen with Rufus following meekly behind.
Benjamin, his point made, preceded them with slow, dignified steps as if he
were leading a parade.

“Something
smells wonderful, Edna,” Tuck said. “What have you made for us?”

“I thought a
spinach quiche would taste good. Cantaloupe and apple-cinnamon muffins to
begin.”

“Yum.” Tuck sat
at the kitchen table next to Peppa and reached for the bread basket as Edna
poured coffee. Mary took the chair opposite her old story-hour host.

Rufus settled on
the floor between Tuck and Peppa after Benjamin jumped silently onto a chair
against the wall, where he commanded a view of the room. As was his habit, Hank
dropped down in front of the cat’s perch and laid his head on paws, ready for a
nap.

“Are you working
this morning?” Edna said to Mary, cutting the quiche and serving her guests.
She noticed once her neighbor had removed the jacket, Mary wasn’t in her usual
casual attire, but wearing plain white slacks and a mint green tunic. 

“Doin’ a favor
for one of the other hospital volunteers,” was all Mary offered before reaching
for a warm muffin.

The next twenty
minutes or so seemed to Edna to drag as she tried to hold up a cheerful
conversation with some help from Tuck. Despite the pleasant distraction of the
dogs’ reunion, Peppa seemed to withdraw back into her own thoughts, and Mary
seemed tense with suppressed excitement. When, at last, the meal was over,
plates cleared away and coffee mugs refilled, Mary spoke to Edna.

“Can I tell ‘em
about my ghost now?”

Before Edna
could answer, Tuck piped up. “Ghosts?”

That was all the
encouragement Mary needed. “Yup. A smuggler. Ran whiskey down the coast during Prohibition.”

Edna nearly
choked on the sip of coffee she’d just taken. She should know better than to
take a drink as Mary was about to drop a bombshell. “So you’ve definitely
decided it isn’t a runaway slave?”

Mary shook her
head, her green eyes glittering with enthusiasm. “Not since I found the letter
written to my grandfather.”

“You found an
old letter?” Peppa’s interest had been sparked, and Edna remembered Tuck
mentioning that the librarian was an avid student of local history and
folklore.

“Yup,” Mary
nodded. “In a book of my grandpa’s.”

“I love reading
old letters,” Peppa said, leaning forward to rest clasped hands on the table.
“What does yours say? Did you bring it with you?”

Mary shook her
head. “It’s too brittle and a piece is missing. It’s tearing at the fold, so I
put it back in the book.”

Hiding a smile
behind her napkin as she dabbed at her mouth, Edna thought Mary might also be
dangling it to entice them all to her house so she could persuade them to help
her hunt down this phantom of hers.

“What’s it
about, this letter you found?” The new topic had obviously brought Peppa out of
the doldrums.

“Like I said, it
was written to my grandfather. There’s a piece missing, and the ink is smudged
in one spot. Looks like something spilled on it, but the gist is still there.
What I make out is that it introduced a man named Sam Hopkins and asked Grandpa
to hide him if he ever showed up on the doorstep. Seems Sam was the son of the
reverend who wrote to Grandpa. Because of his smuggling activities--which,
apparently, were okay with his reverent papa--Sam was hiding from organized
crime bosses as well as revenuers. He had to stay away from the family home in
Newport.”

Peppa nodded.
“Many church elders felt the law to ban alcohol was both un-American and
un-Christian. Makes sense. Rhode Island and Connecticut were the only two
states not to ratify the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution. Rhode Island
was about the most anti-prohibition state in the country.” Her expression
became sad and thoughtful, making Edna wonder if Peppa were thinking of Clem
and his problem with alcohol.

“I heard that,
too,” Tuck spoke into the silence when Peppa didn’t go on. “Rhode Island’s four
hundred miles of coastline with hundreds of inlets, coves and small islands has
always been a smuggler’s paradise. During the Roaring Twenties, local
rumrunners went all the way to Canada to get hard liquor--what they called ‘the
real stuff,” while revenuers in other states contended only with mere beer and
bathtub-gin bootleggers.”

Mary nodded,
clearly enjoying the response her story was generating. “Grandpa had a walking
stick with a glass tube in the center. Father once told me that Grandpa called
it his lemonade cane and carried it whenever he went anywhere with his
gentlemen friends.”

Peppa seemed to
revive slightly as she smiled at Mary’s memory. “Do you still have the cane?”

“Sure do. It’s
in the umbrella stand by the front door. I’ll show it to you. The letter, too,”
Mary said, pushing her chair back from the table.

“Wait,” Edna said,
laying a restraining hand on Mary’s forearm before she could rise. “What makes
you think this Sam what’s-his-name is your ghost?”

Mary’s eyes
sparkled. “I think the smudge on the letter is blood. I bet he was hurt and
came to Grandpa for help.”

“Would your
grandfather have put the rest of his family in jeopardy by harboring a
fugitive?” Tuck asked with a shiver. “I wouldn’t have wanted to mess with the
mob, back then. I remember reading about Frank Morelli and Raymond Patriarca
and some of the other local gangsters from the Roaring Twenties. From what I’ve
read, they were mean and dangerous.”

Seeming happy to
explain her theory further while excusing her grandfather of any
thoughtlessness on his part, Mary said, “The house was built with hidey-holes
when it was a depot on the Underground Railroad.” She glanced up at the kitchen
clock and her face fell. “I’m gonna be late for my shift.” Edna could almost
see the plan forming in her neighbor’s mind when Mary paused briefly. “Will you
come to my house tonight, Peppa?” she said, sliding a quick glance at Edna. “I
can show you Grandpa’s cane and the false chimney and maybe we might even see
my ghost.”

Edna was certain
Mary was inviting Peppa so that Edna would join them in a late-night mystical
adventure.