Murder in the Past Tense (Miss Prentice Cozy Mystery Series Book 3) (20 page)

Gil, Janet, and I walked him to the front door. He thanked me. “We’ll keep on it, don’t worry,” he assured us.

Before he climbed into his car, Dennis waved to Bert and Etienne pulling up in Bert’s truck. Spotting us, Etienne jumped from the passenger seat and ran to the porch.

“I have solved the problem!” he said so loudly that Janet started in my arms and began to cry. “
Oh, ma petite!
” Etienne crooned and stroked her hair. “Tsk, tsk, tsk,” he clicked at her softly.

Fascinated, Janet opened her still-damp eyes widely and stared.

“
Bien
.”

“What problem?” Gil asked.

My enthusiastic business partner assumed a haughty demeanor. “Madame Lily wants to . . . er . . .
enterrant
. . . er . . . bury the cat ’ere, at Chez Prentice.” He rolled his dark eyes and shook his head. “I say
non
, and she says—well you know, Amelia, ’ow she is.”

I nodded, jiggling Janet, who was entranced by Etienne’s dramatic recitation.

“But today,
un éclat
!” He stuck his forehead with the heel of his hand. “It’s brilliant!
Un jardin!
—garden—with the flowers, the herbs!
Et aussi,
a little statue for the cat.
”
He tossed off the last statement quickly as an afterthought.

His enthusiasm was contagious. I said, “Of course! That would be perfect! Mother always wanted to have a garden back there—with a gazebo.”

Apparently Etienne hadn’t thought of this. “A gazebo? Of course! It’s a fine idea! Yes, we could have the garden weddings in summer!” Then, more to himself, he looked around and said, “So we will need the wood, the lumber. And plans . . . excuse me.” Lost in thought, he shouldered his way past us into the house.

We followed him inside.

“This one’s about out of it. Better tuck her in.” Gil touched the top of Janet’s head lightly. “This garden thing? Run that by me again.”

I mounted the stairs and paused to explain. “Etienne has decided that it would be all right to bury Sam out in the backyard and mark the grave with some kind of statuary. But rather than make it morbid, we can have a nice garden with flowers and herbs. You heard about the gazebo. It really would be perfect for weddings.” I looked down fondly at the baby whose eyes were half-closed. “Maybe our little girl will be married there someday.”

“Right.” Gil jingled change in his pocket and said dryly, “If the guy can get past me on the front porch—with a shotgun across my knees.”

“I’ll remember that, Duck Commander.”

It was a relief to realize that the plans for the Chez Prentice garden had temporarily diverted Lily from her desire to avenge Sam’s death. Or at least I hoped so. So contagious was Etienne’s enthusiasm that she was willing to accompany him on a shopping trip to select an appropriate memorial piece for Sam.

“It’s a cat,” she announced as she showed me a photo on her cell phone. “It’s sleeping, see? Curled up? They said they could put a little brass plaque on the base.”

She stared at the picture in the telephone and ran a finger along the edge. I noted with horror that her nail polish was chipped. This had never happened, in all the years I’d known her. She really was in mourning.

All at once, her expression changed. She turned to me and spoke in my ear.

“I haven’t forgotten, you know,” she said in a low voice filled with venom, “and I’m going to get even. See if I don’t.”

“Lily—”

She was out the door before I could engage her in yet another fruitless disagreement over justice versus revenge.

Alec was worried about her, too, despite having his own troubles. “I’ve never seen her like this, Amelia. When she’s not drowning in despair, she’s blazing with rage. Please forgive the mixed metaphor, m’dear,” he added, ever mindful of my sensibilities.

“Think nothing of it, Alec.” We were side-by-side, pushing grocery buggies.

He leaned over and peered at Janet, who was sleeping peacefully in the baby carrier I had strapped in the child seat of the cart. “So sweet. Amelia. By the way,” He straightened up and reached for a can of tomato soup, “I was just over at the animal shelter. They’ve a litter of the most cunning kittens. I found one that quite resembled—”

“Alec, no!” I interrupted, “You never, ever try to replace someone’s pet with another one, at least not this soon. All the psychologists say so.”

“But I thought if I surprised her with—”

I turned away from the packets of instant gravy mix and glared at him. “Aren’t you listening to me? Alec, you’d only make matters worse! And I can’t imagine what Lily would be like if that happened!”

He stroked his beard thoughtfully. “I suppose you’re right. I just so wanted to help her, poor bairn. T’is breaking my heart.”

Lily was considerably past her bairn days, but the tenderness in his voice touched me. I laid my hand on his arm.

“I know you care, Alec. And you mean well. But trust me, I’ve known Lily longer than you have, and my advice is to just give her time.”

“Thank you, m’dear. You’re kindness itself. Only a true friend would’ve brought me up short so.”

“Please know I only want you to be happy. And Lily, too, of course.”

“What bothers me,” he said, glancing over his shoulder, “is how she’s taking this.” He shook his head sadly. “The vindictiveness, it isn’t healthy, I’m afraid.”

“You’re right. It would be terrible if she did find out who it was. Serry—I mean—the perpetrator has been through a lot this year. Oh, dear—you heard, didn’t you?—Alec, promise me you won’t breathe a word of this to Lily or anyone, for that matter.”

“No need to worry, m’dear, though I feel quite sorry for that girl. I wish I could think of a way to solve this.” A sad smile lifted the edges of his mouth. “Ah, well, I’m off to the frozen section for waffles. Join me?”

“I’ve already been there, thanks. I need disposable diapers.” I nodded in the direction of the baby supply aisle.

“Well, farewell, then, and many thanks again for the advice.”

~~~

Things had become so uncomfortable with Lily that I experienced a sinking feeling when I saw her enter Chez Prentice the next morning. She was dressed in a becoming black pantsuit and wearing her late mother’s pearls.

“Bert has Sam’s coffin and the grave marker in the back of his truck,” she informed me coolly, leaning over the portable baby bed we had installed in the dining room to smile at Janet. “He’s bringing them around to the garden. We’ll be interring him in a minute, as soon as Alec gets here. If you’re interested, you can come.”

“Coffin?” I tried to stifle a shudder.

“Of course, coffin. I had Burt make it. He’s quite a good woodworker, you know. He gave it a hinged top and put a coat of shiny shellac on the outside. It looks just like the real thing. I mean, it is the real thing,” she corrected herself.

“It sounds sweet, Lily, but if you don’t mind, I’m afraid it would just make me too sad. Besides, it’s time to feed Janet.”

“Suit yourself. Here’s Alec.” They went out the back door together.

I couldn’t resist peeping at the ceremony from an upstairs window. As Lily stood, head bowed, Alec and Bert gently lowered the little box into the hole. The three then stood together as Alec said something. When he finished, he put an arm around Lily’s waist and watched Bert as he began shoveling dirt over the little box.

Janet wasn’t very hungry so our nursing session was short, and when I looked out the window again, Alec was helping Bert position the granite cat statue under Lily’s direction.

When they returned to the house, Janet was sitting comfortably in her baby seat/stroller as I put finishing touches on the lesson plans for my tutoring students at the big round kitchen table.

Lily was unusually quiet, perhaps being contemplative. She sat at the table with us, stared straight ahead and fingered the pearl necklace she wore.

I heard the front door open. Serry Shea must have arrived for her scheduled lesson.

Alec walked over to the kitchen counter and picked up a large box, labeled Local Produce. “I know you thought this contained the vegetables you asked me to pick up at the farmer’s market, Lily, but they’ll have to wait.” He pushed aside my stack of schoolbooks and gently set the box, which had large holes in the top, on the table before her.

I looked at him warningly. “Alec, you didn’t!”

He had the grace to look embarrassed. “No, Amelia, it was not I. Excuse me.” He stuck head out the kitchen door and called into the foyer. “You can come in now.”

Serendipity Shea walked into the room.

“It was this young lady.”

“What’s this all about?” Lily was clearly puzzled.

Serry stood before us ramrod straight, her whole body clenched, as if to prepare for a blow. “It was me, Mrs. Burns. It’s my fault. It was a terrible accident. I had no idea your poor cat was there, and I just—” She shrugged, sniffed, reached in her shorts pocket and extracted a handkerchief, which she held to her face, though I didn’t see any actual tears.

Lily said nothing. The expression on her face was unreadable.

“I want to make it up to you, honest.” Putting away her handkerchief, Serry moved to the box on the table. “Please let me try to make it up to you.” She pulled off the top of the box and reached inside, extracting a handful of long-haired, blue-gray kitten, which she gently held out to Lily.

While Alec smiled at me, Lily Burns, whom I have known for years and years, proved me totally wrong in all my predictions.

“Ohh, what is this? I mean, who is this?” she cooed. “Ohh, what a little darling!” She brought the kitten up to her cheek. “So soft! So sweet! She—” she held the kitten at arm’s length and glanced at its hindquarters, “rather,
he
is the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen! And he looks so much like my Sam!”

“That was rather what we were going for,” Alec remarked with a wink at Serry. He had a smug expression as he turned and looked meaningfully at me. “All the psychologists say so.”

“Please forgive me, Mrs. Burns. Say you forgive me. I’m so sorry.”

Gently, Lily put the kitten back in the box, came around the table and took both Serry’s hands in her own.

“I’ve had some time to think about it, and Amelia, though she wouldn’t tell me who did it, has assured me that it was an accident,” Lily said. “I’ve never been one to hold grudges,” she added, shooting a warning
shut up
glance my way. “I do forgive you.” She reached one hand into the box and stroked the kitten’s head. “I’m going to call him Sam Junior.”

Serry nodded. “That’s real good. Listen, Mr., um, Dr. Alexander, I need to go. Jason’s outside waiting in the car.” She glanced at me. “He’s driving.”

Alec nodded.

“Aren’t you going to stay for your lesson?” I asked, interjecting reality into the celebratory atmosphere.

She was all innocence. “Oh, was that today? Sorry, I can’t. Can we reschedule? How about tomorrow?”

I sighed. “All right, the same time tomorrow.”

A remarkably restored Serendipity walked out with a confident swing in her step.

How much of her remorse had been genuine? I’d been thinking about actors and acting a great deal lately. Perhaps that’s what gave me the wry notion that Serry might just have a future on the stage.

“The Professor called the house and set it all up with my dad,” Serry admitted the next afternoon as we were finishing up her tutoring session. “Then the three of us went down to the animal shelter and picked out a kitten that looked as much as possible like the dead cat. He said that Mrs. Burns was bound to find out who killed the cat eventually, so it was better to forestall disaster.”

She crooked her fingers in quotation marks at that last phrase. In my opinion, Serry was beginning to sound like her old, smart-alecky self, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

“Well, Sam was important to Lily. When you lose an important person—or thing, for instance, even a beloved cat—when they’re taken away, it’s hard,” I added, remembering the death of my mother just the year before. “It becomes a sad milestone in your life.”

The phrase reverberated in the back of my mind.
Why did it jump out at me?

I had been trying to soften the image of a vengeful Lily, but I had the feeling that it applied elsewhere, too.

“Yeah, I get it. We had to do something before she went ballistic. He sure must like her, huh—the Professor? I mean, to do all that. I mean, I guess old people can fall in love like regular people and stuff.” She gathered up her books.

“Most certainly, just like regular people.”

She seemed to sense my sarcasm. “Oh, I don’t mean you and Mr. Dickensen. You’re not really old-old.” She waved blue-polished fingernails at me.

“Thank you, I appreciate that.” I neglected to inform her that Lily was only a year my senior. Time to change the subject. “How is your driving coming?”

Heavy sigh. “I’m like totally grounded for a month and Jason’s in trouble with Daddy for letting me kill the cat. He’s not allowed to take me out in the car any more. Now Daddy’s the only one who can ride with me while I’ve got my learner’s permit. And he doesn’t have a lot of spare time. And even worse, he’s already scalped my FilthyDirtyBlokes concert tickets,” she added.

“Unfortunate,” I remarked.

“True dat.”  Another heavy sigh. “It’s hard, all right.”

True dat? I’m going to have to get Lily to look this one up on the Internet.
I’d always made it a point to keep up with teenage slang.

Serry glanced at her watch and suddenly began to act strangely. “Oh, gosh, I, um, Mrs. Dickensen, could we go over the lesson on sentence diagramming one more time?” She took another look at her wrist. “For about, um, about sixteen minutes, until five-thirty?” She sat back down and began leafing through the textbook. “It was here somewhere, I mean, something about the whatchamacallit, compound preposition or conjunction or something?”

“Of course.” I wasn’t about to admit that I found sentence diagramming every bit as dreary as any of my students. If she wanted to learn for sixteen more minutes, who was I to deny her? I was being paid by the hour, so it only seemed right to fill out the time. Usually, Serry couldn’t wait to leave.

Then again, it had been a little more difficult than usual to concentrate at Chez Prentice. Hester had informed me that she would be deep cleaning the house all afternoon and I was to expect a racket. She’d closed the doors to the dining room to block out the noise. Still, the thumps and bumps and furniture moving had definitely been annoying.

“All right, here it is.” I pulled a piece of paper from my notebook and drew a straight line.

As I explained the various aspects of the sentence diagram, it became ever clearer that the girl was stalling for some reason. She kept stealing surreptitious glances at her watch and asking me to repeat the most elementary of statements.

“Look, Serry,” I said at last, “let’s dispense with this charade. What’s going on? Are you afraid to leave for some reason?”

A teacher must always be alert to the pressures her students are under. Serry had, for all intents and purposes, lost her mother a few months ago and I witnessed the effect it had had on her.

“You can tell me, you know. I’m on your side, dear.”

“It’s nice of you and stuff, but I’m okay. I’m just . . . just . . . ”

“Amelia!” Lily Burns burst into the room. “You’ve got to come quickly! Hurry! Into the parlor!”

She turned and ran out of the dining room and across the foyer. By the time I followed, she had disappeared behind the heavy sliding pocket doors that separated what my grandmother had called the front room from the reception area of the house.

Serry was right behind me. “Wait here,” I instructed her, “it might be something dangerous.”

What could have happened? A fire? I couldn’t smell smoke. An injury? Lily looked able-bodied enough. I hadn’t seen her actually run since high school.

Wait, where was Janet? Lily was supposed to be watching her upstairs! I exchanged speculation for action and pulled one of the pocket doors violently aside.

“Surprise!” The shouts chorused loudly throughout the house. I believe the foundation actually shook.

I stepped back, almost falling into Serry’s arms. “It’s a baby shower!” the girl informed me, loudly, in my ear.

I looked around at the group, which included almost every woman I knew. “How did you do all this?” I asked. “And do it so quietly! I had no idea!”

Marie said, “It wasn’t easy, let me tell you! And it wasn’t really quiet, was it?”

I shook my head and laughed.

“I’ve been hiding most of the goodies in the refrigerator at my house,” Lily said from behind a long folding table, which was resplendent with a lacy tablecloth, a punchbowl containing an inviting pink liquid, a large cake representing a baby carriage, two flower arrangements and various plates, cups, and utensils.

Hester entered, carrying Janet. “We snuck everybody in through the back door,” she said. She turned to Serry. “This little gal did a good job keepin’ you busy.” The two slapped hands.

I laughed as I reached for my daughter. “So that’s why you kept asking me to go over sentence diagramming.”

“You didn’t really think I liked that stuff, did you? Gag me with a spoon! Hey, I want some of that punch.” Serry hurried over to the refreshment table.

I turned to Hester. “And you weren’t really deep cleaning the kitchen and parlor?”

She tilted her head. “What do you think? Don’t I deep clean this place every day? I’m surprised you fell for it!”

The decibel level in the room was heading upward.

I glanced over my shoulder and spotted an unexpected face. “Dierdre, I’m glad you could come!” And I was. My heart went out to her. She’d been very fond of her brother and grief was written all over her face.

The woman in question advanced toward me, struggling to carry a large wrapped package and keep the strap of her huge purse slung over her shoulder at the same time. “For your baby,” she said in an expressionless voice, “I hope you like it.”

Hester took it from her and put in one of our foldable temporary tables that had been decked out in varying shades of pink.

“What beautiful wrapping!”

I looked at Dierdre and could read the melancholy in her face.
She’s had a sad milestone in her life, too,
I thought.

There it was again. All at once, the idea that had been dancing tantalizingly in the back of my mind pirouetted to center stage. I now knew what my subconscious meant by those words! Perhaps I could now ease Dierdre’s pain a little bit.

I leaned closer and said quietly, “Dierdre, I’d like to talk to you later about Terence. I think he may be innocent. I think I know why he couldn’t have killed Danny.”

“What? Really?” Her eyes widened and she managed a small smile. “Okay.”

“I’ll call you after all this is finished. We can talk then.”

“Come over here!” Lily called to me, indicating a wing chair in the corner, bedecked with crepe paper streamers.

Before I could sit, Lily stepped forward and pinned a pink corsage to my shoulder.

Melody, still in her nurse’s scrubs, held up her cell phone and snapped a picture of me. “Were you surprised?”

“I certainly was! Who all is here?” I inquired, swiveling my neck around the room.

“Who isn’t?” Melody countered with a giggle. The noise and excitement was simply too much for Janet, who started to wail.

Courtney Gervais, one of my students, reached out. “Give her to me, Miss Prentice,” she said, making the mistake with my name that I had long ago learned to ignore. “Mrs. Burns hired me to babysit. We’ll be upstairs.”

She took Janet in her arms, began to make cooing noises and was out the door before I could respond. I mentally filed away the valuable knowledge that she babysat for future reference.

Marie pulled her sister Valerie over to my chair. “Hester’n her were planning to do this before you had the baby, but you kind of jumped the gun, y’know?”

“That’s why you two were acting so weird in the kitchen that time!” I said.

Marie laughed, Valerie nodded.

Lily clapped her hands. “Quiet, everybody, it’s time to open presents.”

“Aren’t we having games? I thought there was always games,” said Fleur LaBombard, dispatcher and
Grande Dame
of LaBombard Taxi Service.

“Sorry, no games.” Lily’s cool but cheery tone brooked no resistance. “There will be
no games,”
she said firmly, repeating, “Right now, it’s time to open presents.”

I wasn’t surprised. At my wedding shower, which was organized by Marie LeBow, there were many silly, somewhat embarrassing games, though the guests seemed to enjoy them.

After that party, Lily had said in a disgusted voice, “So help me, Amelia, if I ever put on a shower that has games, please shoot me where I stand!”

In the flurry of gift-gathering, Fleur leaned over to Hester and whispered loudly, “I always thought you had games at these things!”

Hester responded with a roll of her eyes and a tilt of her head toward Lily. “What’re you gonna do? Her Highness is running this shindig. If she says no games, then no games.”

There really wasn’t time to have games. I spent the next hour opening baby gifts as everyone oo’ed and ah’ed, talked and availed themselves of refreshments. When I finished, there were two large trash bags filled with wrapping paper and masses of useful and whimsical items covering the wide table erected for the purpose.

The party thinned out a little as some of the women hugged me and made their exits. Only one tiny cloud on the horizon: By my figuring, I would have thirty-one thank you notes to write. I sent up a little prayer of thanks that Crystal, babysitter Courtney Gervais’ lovely twin, had taken down the names and gift descriptions for me.

When the last guest departed, I started gathering punch cups and plates.

“Cut it out,” Hester ordered. “You’re the guest of honor. We’ll finish cleaning up here.”

Marie joined her. “She’s right, Amelia. You’re going to need to call the mister to help you haul this stuff home.” She gestured to the pile of colorful toys, tiny dresses and various infant appurtenances. “But I know you want to go upstairs and check on your baby first. Mrs. Burns is watching her.”

I took their advice and nursed Janet in the quiet of one of the upstairs guest rooms while Lily regaled me with tales of her new kitten’s escapades. “He’s so much like Sam, I can’t believe it, Amelia. Remember how my Sam always just scrambled around the corner in my dining room when he heard the can opener? Well, this one does it, too,” she said with a decisive nod.

“Amazing,” I said and leaned back. “Look at that. She’s asleep again. I don’t think this baby was very hungry.” I frowned and reached into my diaper bag.

“What’s that?” Lily asked.

“A weird, but handy little thing called a breast pump,” I explained.

Minutes later, I had filled two small bottles.

Lily elected to stay upstairs while Janet slept. She lay down on a nearby bed and closed her eyes. “Us two girls’ll get our beauty sleep. You go put those in the fridge and call Gil. Tell him to bring a moving truck,” she added with a sleepy wave.

“We
two girls,” I whispered over my shoulder.

Downstairs, I retrieved my recently-acquired cell phone from my skirt pocket and punched in Gil’s number. Until recently, I had considered myself too old-fashioned for such modern technology when Alec originally insisted, but had to admit it was a very convenient item to have.

“So how’d it go?” Gil answered.

“So you knew all about this?”

“Sure! Are you kidding? I’m planning to do a story on the party for tomorrow’s edition, photos and all.”

There were definite drawbacks to having a newsman in the family. “Please don’t!”

“Okay, I’ll just give it an oblique mention in an editorial, okay?”

I smiled. “Okay. Can you come pick us up? I’m going to need some help. There are quite a number of gifts.”

“A big haul, huh?”

“Am I interrupting your work?”

“No, I was just going over the Nimrod Rabideau journal. It’s fascinating, even if it is a bit illegible. It’ll be a while before I get there, anyway. I’m not at the office. I’m at the house.” Gil’s newspaper office was only a few blocks away, while the distance to our house was seven bumpy, curvy miles. “Have another glass of punch or something while you wait.”