Murder With Peacocks (4 page)

  "Meg!" Mother said sharply. I started, spilling some of my coffee. Apparently I'd nodded off while sitting upright.

  "Sorry, not quite awake yet," I mumbled, mopping at myself with a napkin. Good thing I wasn't trying to impress anyone.

  "I know how you feel," Michael said. "During the year I won't let them schedule any of my classes before eleven. I'm still not used to the way people down here get up at the crack of dawn."

  "Ten o'clock is hardly the crack of dawn," Mother said, favoring me with a stern look. "Wait till you've been down here for a few weeks, with all the fresh air and proper food, young lady. You'll be getting up with the larks."

  "Don't try to reform me, Mother," I warned. "Of course not, dear," Mother lied, and led Michael into the living room to measure things. He looked as if he would rather stay in the kitchen to ingest more coffee. I could sympathize.

  I had another cup of coffee and contemplated the mess Mother had made in the kitchen while serving Michael, the mess she always made in any kitchen. I had learned to cook and clean early, in self-defense. I finished my coffee and swabbed down the kitchen before taking up the phone and my list of things to do. Fourteen phone calls later I had lost my temper twice and succeeded in crossing exactly one thing off my list. I could hear Mother gently but firmly ordering Michael around in the living room. Well, better him than me. My turn would come. I went outdoors for some fresh air and found Dad busily trimming the hedge.

  He looked relaxed and happy. Of course he nearly always did. After the divorce, Dad had moved in with my sister, Pam, and her husband, Mal. Or more accurately, into the apartment over their garage. It was all of a mile from the family house, and apart from going home to sleep in a different bed, he made remarkably few changes to his life after the divorce. He still divided his time between gardening at Pam's and at Mother's; doing things with the grandchildren; reading great stacks of books; making anachronistic house calls on the friends, neighbors, and relatives who hadn't yet been persuaded that he'd retired from his medical practice; and, most important, pursuing with wild enthusiasm and single-minded devotion whatever odd hobbies happened to seize his attention.

  As soon as Mother decided on a garden wedding, Dad started grooming our yard for the festivities. Once Samantha decided to have an outdoor reception, he began relandscaping the Brewster's grounds. The Brewsters seemed thrilled to have him doing it, though that could change very quickly if all the extra work made their gardener carry out his threat to resign. And Dad was even pitching in occasionally to help Eileen's father prepare for her event.

  All of which seemed very odd. Dad was working overtime to make the weddings a success, and yet, he had never liked Samantha. He was constantly complaining that Eileen took advantage of me. And as for Mother's remarriage to Jake--was he really that cheerful about it?

  Speak of the devil, I thought, there goes Jake. Predictably, creeping along at five miles below the posted speed limit in his nondescript blue sedan. I waved at him.

He screeched to a halt, rolled down the window, and stuck his head out, looking very distraught.

  "Yes, what is it?" he asked, his voice trembling.

  "Nothing, Mr. Wendell. I was just waving. Sorry if I startled you."

  "Off to fetch your sister-in-law?" Dad asked. "She has a fine morning for flying, doesn't she? From Fort Lauderdale, right?"

  "You-yes," Jake said. "How did you know?"

"Mother mentioned it," I said.

  "Besides, it's hard to keep secrets in a small town like this," Dad boomed jovially. Mr. Wendell looked alarmed, and more like a startled gray-brown mouse than usual. He rolled his window up, tried to drive away with the emergency brake still on, stopped to release it, and finally rolled slowly off.

  Well, that was not a success, I thought. In fact, it was about as much of a bust as most of my attempts to get to know Jake better. Ah, well; I'd have all summer to get acquainted with my future stepfather.

    "So, what are you up to this morning?" Dad said, rubbing his back while surveying the parts of the hedge he'd finished clipping.

  "Phone calls and errands. Want me to help with that?"

  "No, I have a good idea how I want it done."

  "Just as well; I have a feeling any minute now I'll get called into a conference about redecorating the living room. Mother has Michael from the dress shop measuring the house."

  "Now there's an intelligent young man."

"Yes, he seems nice," I said, wincing. That was all I needed, for Dad to turn his boundless energy and determination to setting me up with the least eligible man in town. It was going to be the longest summer in recorded history.

  "He's a professor of drama, you know," Dad went on.

  "Yes, well, duty calls," I said, and fled back to the kitchen before he could continue.

  I decided that chocolate chip cookies would cheer me up and placate Mother as well, so I took the time off from my list to whip up a batch. Lured by the smell, Rob ambled in, followed eventually by Michael and Mother, who graciously issued an invitation for us to make some lemonade and join her on the porch.

  "We always like to have lemonade and cookies on the porch on summer afternoons," Mother said, when Rob and I brought out the glasses.

  "Very civilized," Michael said, wolfing down his sixth cookie.

  Just then we heard the kitchen screen door slam, followed by frantic quacking.

  "Here comes Eric," I said.

  My eight-year-old nephew ran in and launched himself at Mother, wailing and holding up a bleeding finger. By the time Mother had calmed him down enough to look at it, the bleeding had mostly stopped, and he had subsided into muted sniffles. Echoed by muted quacking from his pet duck at the back door.

  "Would you like Grandma to kiss it and make it better?" Mother asked, smiling down at Eric.

  "Grandpa says that the human mouth has more bacteria than even dogs' mouths," Eric said, snatching away his hand and backing off in terror.

  "I'm sure your grandpa knows best then, dear," Mother said, with a touch of asperity. "Why don't you go ask Grandpa to suture it?"

  "Okay," Eric said, charmed by the idea. Suture, indeed; the child obviously needed more of Dad's vocabulary lessons. Mother sipped her lemonade as Eric ran happily out, armed with a fist of cookies. Michael was looking oddly at us.

  "Dad's very good with childhood scrapes and sniffles," Rob said. "That was always one of his major charms as a parent. How seriously he treated even the most minor ailments."

  "It's a wonder you didn't all become raging hypochondriacs," Mother said, shaking her head.

  "Other children might run to Mommy and get a Band-Aid," I added. "We'd go to Dad to have sterile dressings for our lacerations and abrasions--after proper irrigation to prevent sepsis, of course. At least Pam and I did."

  "I never could stand the sight of blood," Rob said with a shudder.

  "Won't that be rather a handicap in your profession?" Michael asked.

  "Oh, very funny," Rob said, and buried his face in his bar exam review book.

  "Rob's a little sensitive about lawyer jokes," I explained, patting my brother's arm.

  "Lawyer jokes?" Michael said. "I'm very sorry; I wasn't trying to make a joke. I could have sworn your father told me Rob was going to go on to medical school. To become a forensic pathologist."

  "Oh, God! Dad's at it again!" Rob groaned.

  "Dad wishes Rob would go to med school and become a forensic pathologist," I said. "He came up with the idea about a week after Rob broke the news that he was going to law school."

  "I didn't realize he was going around telling people that again!" Rob said, shaking his head.

  "Still, dear, not again," Mother said. "He never really stopped, you know."

  "God, think of all the people he's probably told," Rob moaned.

  "I think most of the family understand the situation, dear," Mother reassured him.

  "Our family might, but what about Samantha's family?" Rob wailed.

  "They'll learn," I said. "The important thing to keep in mind when dealing with any of our extended family," I said to Michael, "is never, ever to believe anything any of us says without corroboration."

  "Preferably from an outsider," Rob added.

"Preferably from your own two eyes," I said.

  "Are you telling me your entire family are liars?" Michael asked.

  "I have no idea what you're talking about, Meg." Mother sniffed.

  "Not liars," I said. "Well, maybe a few, and mostly they can't help it. It's just that most of our family are prone to ... exaggeration."

  "Tall-tale-telling," Rob added.

"Creative interpretation of reality resulting from wishful thinking," I suggested. "Like Dad's notion about Rob having a career in forensic pathology. All Rob's life Dad has been dreaming about Rob following in his footsteps. He was depressed about Rob not going to med school until he came up with the forensic pathology idea one day, and after that it took on a life of its own."

  "That's the other thing you have to watch out for," Rob said. "With most of the family, once they get an idea into their heads, it's very hard to get them to change their minds."

  "We hate letting silly things like reality interfere with our pet notions," I said.

  "I think I know exactly what you mean," Michael said. "I've already experienced something of the sort myself."

  "Good," I said. "So you'll know to take everything anyone here says with a grain of salt."

  "A pound of salt," Rob corrected.

"Honestly, I have no idea why you children insist on filling this poor boy's head with such stories about your own family," Mother said. "You'd think we were a family of lunatics and pathological liars." When the three of us burst out laughing, she shook her head, gathered up her embroidery and her lemonade, and went inside.

  "Oh, dear," Rob said. "You don't suppose Mother is upset, do you?"

  "I doubt it, Rob."

  "I'd better go and see." He sighed, heading for the door.

  "Mother is imperturbable, Rob, you should know that by now," I called to his retreating back. Michael chuckled.

  "Oh, it's very funny if you don't have to live with her," I said. "Which, thank God, I don't most of the time."

  "I wasn't laughing at your mother," he said, hastily. "I was laughing from sheer delight; how often does one meet someone who can use words like "imperturbable" in casual conversation like that?"

  "Yes, I know we can be rather pretentious sometimes. Expanding one's vocabulary is one of Dad's pet projects. He used to pay us by the syllable for new words. He does it with the grandkids now. That sort of thing has a permanent effect."

  "A very charming one, if you ask me," Michael said. I sipped my lemonade and looked at him over the rim of my glass. The more I saw of him, the more I realized why instead of treating him as a pariah when they discovered his sexual orientation the local ladies seemed to have adopted him as a sort of pet. He was not only drop-dead gorgeous, he was absolutely charming. Except for the rather generic Middle Atlantic accent, he could easily have been custom-made to fit their notions of a Southern gentlemen. He was immaculately groomed and casually but elegantly dressed, with impeccable manners. Even Samantha and her mother admitted he was a charming conversationalist--although around here, that could simply mean that he had the ability to listen to others rattle on for hours without any overt sign of boredom. And he had a knack for the formal gallantry and witty flirtatiousness that so many aging Southern belles consider their due. More to my taste, he seemed to have a brain, and a slightly sardonic sense of humor. If only ... but no. He wasn't very obvious about it, but if both Mother's branch of the grapevine and Samantha's said he was gay, I could see no use wasting time on might-have-beens.

  "I'm not sure you should be quite so hard on your family, though," he said. "It seems to me that most of the town shares your tendency to see things the way they want to see them."

  "Most of the town are related to us, one way or another. At least the ones who have been here a generation or two. And the rest have just been around us too long."

  "That must be it," he said. "You see, shortly after I got here, something happened that seemed to give everyone the bizarre idea that I--" He froze, looking over my shoulder, and I turned around to see Samantha and one of the bridesmaids.

  "Hello, Meg," Samantha said. "You look comfortable." I felt as guilty as a night watchman caught sleeping on the job.

  "No reason not to be comfortable while I work," I said. "We've been discussing the gowns. Michael has some ideas for making the hoops more manageable."

  I felt guilty picking on Michael that way, but he rose to the occasion. After enduring a seemingly endless conversation on how the hoops could be better constructed to allow us to fit through normal doorways, sit in the limos, and go to the bathroom without too much outside assistance, I excused myself and fled outside on the pretext of seeing if Dad needed help. Michael jumped up and followed me out.

  "Nice of you to come all the way out here from town," I said.

  "It's just down the street, really," Michael said. "I'm staying at Mom's house."

  "Which one is that?"

  "Your mother calls it the Kaplan bungalow."

"Oh, yes," I said. "Not that any Kaplans have lived there for fifteen years."

  As we went out the back door, we ran into Eric, sporting an extremely large and already dirty bandage and followed, naturally, by Duck.

  "Hi, Aunt Meg," Eric said. "Who's he?" I suppose he had been too concerned with his finger earlier to notice Michael on the porch.

  "This is Michael Waterston," I said, in my best formal manner. "His mother runs the dress shop. Michael, this is Eric McReady, my nephew." Michael leaned down to shake the rather sticky hand Eric was offering. "And this is Duck." Michael won Eric's heart instantly by solemnly turning to Duck and offering his hand, which Duck pecked.