“I hope Mr. Easton will be welcomed by the light,” she said, bending down to look for something in her backpack. “But if what I’ve heard about him was true, I think he has a few more lessons to learn.” She pulled out a bottle of wine and stood up.
“Ruby’s latest vintage,” she said with a grin. “I volunteered us as taste testers.”
She followed me into the kitchen. I got a plate from the cupboard for the brownies, while Maggie got the corkscrew from the drawer by the sink and set to work opening the wine.
“What is this wine made from?” I asked.
“I’m not sure,” Maggie said. “Maybe rhubarb. Maybe dandelions.”
“Do brownies go with rhubarb wine?” I said as she popped the cork.
Maggie’s grin got wider. “Brownies go with everything.” She swiped one from the plate as she passed behind me to get the wineglasses. “How long will the library be closed?” she asked as she poured.
“I don’t know.” I said. I picked up the brownies and headed for the living room. “I just assumed we’d be able to open tomorrow.” For the first time it dawned on me that the police could keep the library closed for days, putting the renovations even further behind schedule.
Maggie followed with the glasses. The TV was already on and Owen and Hercules were waiting by the footstool. “Hi, guys,” she said to the cats. She knew better than to try to pet them.
I set the brownies on the footstool and sat down, tucking my legs underneath me.
Maggie handed me my glass and curled up in one corner of the sofa. “What were the police doing at the library, anyway?” she asked.
I took a sip of my wine. It was light and fruity. “They—or at least the detective in charge—seem to think Easton and I were involved.”
She set her glass on the floor by the arm of the sofa and reached for a brownie. “Involved? You mean?” She waggled her eyebrows at me.
“Uh-huh. Apparently, onstage at the theater at six thirty in the morning.”
“They have to ask questions like that,” Maggie said, picking chocolate crumbs off the front of her T-shirt. “It doesn’t mean they think you actually did anything . . . or anyone.”
“They found blood at the library,” I blurted.
She sat up straighter. “Blood? Where?”
“In the part of the library that’s not finished, where the meeting room is going to be.” I took another sip of my wine.
Maggie relaxed against the cushions again. “So? With all the work that’s been going on and all the things that have gone wrong, I’m surprised they didn’t find part of an ear and a couple of fingers. Anyway, you said Easton was in the computer room.”
She was right. Gregor Easton hadn’t been anywhere near the space still being renovated, as far as I knew. I felt my stomach unknot.
Owen had been quietly moving across the floor toward Maggie’s glass. Now he stuck his nose in the top, sniffed and jumped back at the aroma. “Back off, furry face,” she said, picking up the glass.
Owen made low, grumpy sounds in his throat and moved back in front of the TV.
Maggie shifted position on the couch. “Kath,” she said, “Gregor Easton wasn’t a young man. He probably had a heart attack. There’s no way anyone would seriously believe you had anything to do with his death. And as for the blood at the library—assuming it is blood and not paint—it’s more likely one of the workmen cut himself.” She gestured at Owen, sprawled on his side now in front of the television, intently watching a talking dog sell baked beans. “And no one is going to believe you set your attack cat on Easton or that you two were . . .” She paused, looking for the right word. “. . . Getting funky with each other. C’mon!”
I thought about the gash on the side of Easton’s head. Of course, just because he’d hit his head didn’t mean that was what had killed him. He still could have had a heart attack. I leaned into the sofa cushions and stretched out my legs onto the footstool. “Why are you always so sensible and logical?” I asked.
“You forgot my winning personality and stunning good looks,” Maggie said with a grin. The grin faded to a smile. “Seriously, Kath, this will be over in another day or two. Don’t worry about it.”
The opening music for
Gotta Dance
began and Maggie turned to the TV. In the recap of the previous episodes there was a shot of rocker Pat Benatar with a gash on one side of her forehead from a fall when a lift went wrong. I pictured the wound I’d seen on the side of Gregor Easton’s head. There had been no blood around the injury or in his hair. Had someone cleaned it? And what had Detective Gordon picked up off the library floor as he’d moved me out of the way? And why had a police car driven by my house at least three times in the last few hours? It was hard to concentrate on the TV.
I wanted to believe Maggie was right. I wanted to believe that this would all be over in a day or two. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that things were just getting started.
5
White Crane Spreads Wings
H
ercules woke me up. Unlike Owen, who just lurked and breathed on me, Herc preferred a more direct approach. He’d stand on his back legs by the side of the bed and swat my face with a paw, no claws. If that didn’t work he’d lean over and meow loudly in my ear. He’d never needed to do anything beyond that.
I got up, made coffee and fed Hercules. There was no sign of Owen. I took my coffee cup and stood by the front door, looking down the hill.
The sun, climbing in the sky, sparkled on the river. It was so quiet, so peaceful. It was another one of the things—to my surprise—that I’d discovered I liked about being in Mayville Heights. Hercules came to sit at my feet and started washing his face. A glass and a half of Ruby’s wine—which was a lot more potent than its light, sweet taste suggested—had had me yawning by the time
Gotta Dance
ended. Matt Lauer and his partner were still, inexplicably, in first place, but the talented Kevin Sorbo and his partner were safe in second.
“Would it be wrong to get a couple hundred different e-mail addresses so I could vote more than once?” I asked Hercules. He meowed loudly once, and went back to washing behind an ear without even looking up.
A glass and a half of wine had also made Maggie’s belief that Detective Gordon’s suggestion that I’d been involved with Gregor Easton was just a routine question seem perfectly logical. It didn’t seem so logical now.
Owen yowled from the kitchen. “Your brother’s up,” I said to Hercules, who continued to wash his face.
In the kitchen I found the tabby sitting by his dish. The fur on the top of his head was standing on end, and there were a couple of dust bunnies stuck to his tail. I filled his dish and gave him fresh water. After yesterday it was pretty clear Owen had parts of more than one Fred the Funky Chicken hidden somewhere. Which made sense. The cat knew every inch of the little farmhouse. How many times had he appeared out of nowhere and scared me half to death?
I leaned against the counter and watched Owen eat. No matter what Maggie had said, I couldn’t stop thinking about Gregor Easton. Detective Gordon hadn’t said I was a suspect or told me not to leave town, but the police car that kept driving by my house since yesterday afternoon didn’t do it because Easton had died of a heart attack.
There was nothing I could do about that, no matter how unsettled it left me. But I did need to do something about the library renovation. I’d committed to seeing it finished on schedule. Probably not a good idea, in retrospect. I couldn’t let things get any more behind.
Owen finished eating and nudged his bowl aside. He twisted sideways, trying to get at the dust bunnies stuck to his tail. “Step one: See if I can get into the library today,” I told him.
I went back to the living room, sat on the footstool and pulled out the phone book. I was transferred to three different people at the police station before I got an answer: Yes, the library could reopen today. An officer would meet me there to return my keys. The meeting-room area would remain closed off for at least another day.
I let the cats out, let them back in again, got dressed, sighed at my hair in the bathroom mirror, packed lunch and set out down the hill in plenty of time to meet the officer to get my keys. I glanced back at Rebecca’s house and made a mental note to check on her later.
Oren’s truck was in the library parking lot. He got out and walked across the grass to meet me. I felt the tension ease out of me.
“Oren, I’m so glad to see you,” I said.
“Good morning, Kathleen,” he said. “How are you?”
“I’m fine.” We walked the rest of the way across the grass and turned up the stone walkway to the main entrance.
A branch had blown onto the path. Oren bent and moved it onto the grass. Then he straightened and looked at me. “I heard what happened. I’m sorry you had to find Mr. Easton,” he said. “I should have been there.”
“I was worried something might have happened to you.”
“I had some personal business in Minneapolis.” We stopped at the bottom of the steps. “You were looking for me yesterday.”
I nodded. “I was hoping you’d have time to put the chairs and the computer carrels together. I’d like to get at least one computer working.”
“I can do that for you.” He looked up at the library. “Are we allowed in the building?”
“Yes. But the meeting-room area is off-limits for now.”
Oren swiped his hand over the back of his neck. “Then I can’t finish the painting. That’s where all the paint is stored.” He thought for a moment. “Do you mind if I work at the Stratton today? That building’s open. I could come about four thirty to put those things together for you.”
Below us a patrol car pulled into the library parking lot.
“Go ahead,” I said. “Four thirty is fine.” My shoulders relaxed. “Thank you.”
The young police officer who’d driven me to and from the police station the day before got out of the car and started toward us.
Oren pulled his keys out of his pocket. “Kathleen, Will Redfern is a good builder,” he said, quietly. “He’s also really good with excuses.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said.
He headed back to his truck, exchanging a “Good morning” with the young policeman as they passed. Even though the officer had taken me to be fingerprinted the day before, I still had to show him ID and sign a receipt before he handed me a small brown envelope containing my keys.
The library was stuffy and smelled faintly of sweaty bodies. I opened a couple of windows, dropped my things in my office and went into the staff room.
Detective Gordon—or someone—had washed the coffee machine. The mugs and plate had been left to dry in the wire dish rack, and the counter and table had been wiped clean of crumbs and coffee rings.
I started the coffee machine, rationalizing that Susan would want a cup when she arrived for work. Every so often she would decide she was going to give up coffee. She’d given it up for peppermint tea with honey. That lasted about ten days. She’d given it up for water from an underground spring in a cave in Michigan—for a week. Currently she was drinking “green” juice she made with a Richard Simmons Superjuicer she’d bought at a yard sale. It smelled like lawn clippings that had been sitting in the sun for a week. She’d been on the juice kick for five days. It was only a matter of time before her twins tried to flush a ficus or each other, and Susan would stalk into the library, pour coffee into the largest mug she could find, add half the sugar packets and drink the entire thing before she said a word.
I was checking in the last few books from the book drop when Susan tapped on the main door.
“Well, remind me not to piss you off,” she said when I let her in.
“Excuse me?”
“The maestro. One minute he’s in here being a jerk and the next he’s dead.” She looked at me over her tiny glasses with mock seriousness. “You didn’t sic your cat on him again, did you?”
I relocked the door and closed the security gate. “No, I didn’t sic my cat on him. And Owen jumping on Mr. Easton’s head the other day was an accident.”
“Whatever you say,” Susan said with a smile.
I followed her upstairs. “Would you like a cup of coffee?” I asked as she put her things in her locker and pulled out the vibrant pink sweater she wore when she was working.
“Oh, screw it. Why not? I had two devil’s-food cupcakes for breakfast.”
I poured a cup for her and one for myself and set Susan’s on the table. “Why?” I asked.
She poured three packets of sugar into the cup and stirred. So much for green juice.
“Eric’s on a chocolate kick,” she said. “Brownies, cupcakes, chocolate mousse, chocolate cheesecake. He’s making some changes to the menu at the café and he’s trying everything at home first.”
She drank a mouthful of coffee and pushed her blackframed glasses up onto the bridge of her nose. “So, is the rumor true? Did you really find Easton’s body at the Stratton?”
I nodded. “I was trying to catch up with Oren. He wasn’t there. But I did see him this morning.”
Susan stirred another packet of sugar into her coffee. “So if Easton died at the theater, what were the police doing here? Why did they close the building yesterday?”
I took a sip of my own coffee. “I’m not sure. A detective came to ask me a few more questions. I told him he could look around. He found something over where the meeting room is going to be.”
Susan leaned back in her chair and cupped her mug with both hands. “What were they looking for in here in the first place?” she asked. “The maestro had a heart attack, didn’t he?”
I shrugged. “He had a cut on his head. That’s all I know.”
“So they think what? You whacked him with a big old
Encyclopædia Britannica
, or something? That’s crazy.” She drained her cup and got up for more coffee. “What did they find, anyway?”
I ran a hand back through my hair. “I’m not sure. There were some . . . stains . . . on the floor.”