The Pea Soup Poisonings (7 page)

“But you loved each other?” asked Zoe, who yearned for a sister, but had only the one annoying older brother.

“Yes, we argued, but we got along. After all, we had the same mother. We would have liked to live together after Agnes became a widow. Agnes wasn’t comfortable in that house after her son, Alice’s father, died, but she stayed put because of young Alice.”

“Then eventually she was planning to move in next door with you?” asked Zoe, who loved to hear about other people’s lives. She reached for a doughnut. She did love the sisters’ homemade doughnuts. She felt sad, thinking how Spence would probably like one right this minute.

“Not next door, no. There’s only the one bedroom and Agnes liked her own space. No, we were planning to go to the farm.”

“The farm?”

“Up in Alburg. It was my great-grandfather’s farm. He bought the land just after the American Revolution. Vermont had declared itself a Republic at that time, you know. Independent of all the American colonies!” Thelma seemed proud of that Republic: her chin thrust up, her eyes sparkled.

“You still own that farm?”

“Yes indeed. All three hundred-sixty acres. It will all go to Alice when I die. If she doesn’t want it, the land is to go to the state of Vermont. So no one can develop it.”

“No one lives there now?”

“No, but I rent out the land to a farmer. He keeps a few cows and sheep. We used to have forty cows in the barn, though. Oh yes, it was a well-kept farm.”

“Do you have the deed?” Zoe reached for a second doughnut. She was sure the sisters wouldn’t mind.

Thelma fumbled through the papers and peered closely at them through her gold-rimmed glasses. Finally, she held up a paper and waved it. “Round Hill Farm, Ridge Road, Alburg, Vermont,” she read. “Three hundred-sixty acres and one eighth. We’ve had offers,” she said. “Oh yes, we’ve had offers to buy it. A million dollars one offer was! They were planning to put sixty houses on it. They’d make a good ten million dollar profit.”

“Whoa,” said Zoe, her eyes widening. “But you wouldn’t sell?”

“No, child, we wouldn’t. Not ever,” said Thelma. “Agnes and I wouldn’t sell so much as one half-acre.”

“Ten million,” said Zoe, the doughnut ballooning out her cheek. “I suppose a person would kill for that farm.”

Thelma looked up slowly; a glimmer of understanding came over her face.

“A person would
kill
to have that farm,” Thelma repeated. “Yes, indeed, a person would.”

Chapter Sixteen

A Suspicious Policeman

When Zoe got back to her house she found a policeman waiting. He was a tall, robust fellow with a mole by his nose and a shiny badge. He wanted to question her again.

“There’s nothing more you can tell us?” he asked. Without waiting for an answer, he said, “What were you two doing that would make that pair want to kidnap you? If it
was
that pair,” he said. “We haven’t ruled out a runaway boy.”

“Spence wouldn’t run away!” cried Zoe. “Never! And I’m sure it was that pair. We happened to see them kidnapping Alice Fairweather’s Aunt Thelma, I told you, and they want us out of the way. Oh yes,” she said when the policeman looked skeptical. “I tried to stop them, and then Spence got the license number. I mean, part of it.”

The policeman looked interested. He reached out a hand as though Zoe had the license number on a piece of paper, when she actually had it in her head. That is,
half of
it in her head. “It began with MBV.”

“It was a blue car, you said.”

“Half and half. I mean half dark blue and half light blue, like it had just been painted.”

While the officer was phoning the information into the police station, Zoe recalled the beeper they’d heard on the tape recorder. She’d wanted to keep that beeper to herself, but they had to find Spence. Finding Spence was more important than her solving the case, wasn’t it? Tears sprang to her eyes thinking of her friend, wondering where and how he was.

“She’s just a little kid,” said Kelby, coming into the room. He was wearing his Northern Spy Club badge, trying to look important. “She doesn’t know anything about anything,” he told the policeman.

“I do so!” she cried. “I know a lot about a lot!” Her voice softened when she saw the man lean forward. “I mean – other things. I’ve told you all I know, officer. Except...”

“Except?” the officer said.

“Except that Cedric had a beeper. It went off when they put Miss Thelma into the car. But he turned it off again so I couldn’t hear what it said. But it could mean he’s an ambulance volunteer or something.”

Kelby scoffed. “It could mean a lot of things. Anyone can wear a beeper. I could wear one.”

“Sonny, I’m talking to your sister,” said the officer. Kelby frowned and polished his badge with his bony knuckles.

“The officer is talking to me,” said Zoe, making a face at her brother.
She
wasn’t going to be intimidated by any badge. Although she wanted one terribly, she had to admit. “But there’s nothing more I can tell you, sir.”

“Well, now, if you think of anything more, let me know,” he said, smiling down at her, and she said, “Find him please. Find Spence!”

Kelby ran after the man as he was leaving and Zoe heard him say: “Bagley sisters. They’re the ones you should be investigating, officer –not my father or this man with a beeper. I mean, it was their pea soup. They were arguing, too. With Agnes Fairweather. Just before she died. And the sisters came over to our house to get cider. They could’ve stolen that insecticide from Dad’s barn.”

The officer said he might pay another visit to the Bagley sisters after he inspected the apple barn, and then he went out.

“Traitor!” Zoe hollered after Kelby, and she banged out of the house.

She ran back over to the Bagley sisters’ to warn them about the officer. “He shouldn’t see Miss Thelma here,” she told them, out of breath from running. “The police think she’s still at Rockbury. And Kelby thinks you were having an argument with Alice’s granny before she died. He made it sound suspicious.”

For a moment the sisters didn’t say a word. Zoe worried that there might have been a bad argument. But then the two burst out laughing.

“We argued over the pea soup!” Miss Maud said, and Miss Gertie said, “We always put in onions, and Agnes thought that onions spoiled the soup. We said the soup was dull, dull without it, didn’t we, Maud?”

“Absolutely,” said Maud. “The onions add personality. I mean, it isn’t as though Agnes is –was allergic to onions, oh no. She was stubborn, that’s all. She wouldn’t even taste the soup with onions, would she, Gertie? We put a bowl in front of her and she just sat there, staring at it. It was rather annoying.”

“No, she wasn’t an adventuresome person at all. And that’s why we sent over a pot of plain pea soup, no onions. But,” Gertie added quickly, “she was a lovely, sweet lady. We all had good times together, didn’t we, Maud?”

“Yes, yes, we did. Oh indeed, we did.” Miss Maud wiped away a tear with an embroidered hankie.

Miss Thelma came into the house then, with an armful of rosy colored flowers. “Alice picked them. She happened to see me in the garden. I know, dear,” she said to Zoe, “I shouldn’t have let anyone see me. But I saw Alice coming out of her house and I just needed a hug, oh, so badly! So I beckoned her over, and we both hugged and wept buckets.”

“It’s oleander,” said Miss Maud. “It’s a poisonous plant. But it has such gorgeous red blooms. Just don’t eat them, that’s all.”

“Or put them in the soup,” said Miss Gertie –“though once we almost did,” and both sisters giggled.

Alice popped through the door and everyone started talking and hugging at once until a police car pulled into the driveway and Miss Gertie hustled Thelma upstairs. Miss Maud brought out a pitcher of milk and fresh doughnuts and arranged the oleander in a vase. And they all sat down around the table as though they hadn’t a care in the world.

When the officer came in with his shiny badge and his ironed blue shirt, they looked up innocently. “The argument was over pea soup, officer,” said Zoe. Miss Maud explained again about the onions, and they all smiled. Except the officer. He was jotting down notes on a yellow pad. He looked serious. “The Community Players are putting on a show in town,” he said. “My wife is in it. It’s called
Arsenic and Old Lace.”

Zoe
had heard of that play; her parents had rented the movie version on video. It was about two old ladies who poisoned their gentlemen visitors with arsenic. “To put them out of their misery,” as they explained it.

Miss Gertie jumped up out of her chair to face the officer. Her face was as red as the oleander blooms. “I don’t care for the insinuation, officer. Not one bit, no. We don’t take in gentlemen callers, and Agnes Fairweather was a good friend and we certainly didn’t poison her!”

“Indeed not,” cried Miss Maud, standing up beside her sister. “You can’t judge a book by its cover, Mr. Policeman. We may look like the ancient ladies in that play but we’re not poisoners, oh, no! And I’ve a mind to sue you for implying that we are. Why, we were devastated by Agnes Fairweather’s death! All our old friends dying away. One by one.”

“One by one,” murmured Miss Gertie, sitting back down, looking tearful.

“First Agnes,” Miss Maud went on, “and now Thelma. Poor Thelma, her half sister. Who was responsible for taking
her
away? Think about
that,
officer. Find out what
that
person put in the pea soup!”

The officer colored; he stuck a tongue in his cheek. He scribbled something on his notepad. He was looking more sympathetic now. He admired the red oleander flowers in the vase. The sisters offered him a sugar doughnut and he looked longingly at it, but then refused. He had to get on, he said. There was work to do. A missing boy.

“It’s possible that it’s all connected: the kidnapping and Agnes Fairweather’s death. And Thelma Fairweather’s, um, departure,” he said, as though he was the first one to think so.

“Why, there’s a brilliant thought,” said Miss Maud, winking at Zoe, and the officer smiled and took the doughnut anyway. Miss Gertie wrapped it up for him in a yellow napkin. “And give these flowers to your wife,” said Miss Maud, pulling the rosy oleander blooms out of the vase. “But don’t let her put them in your soup,” she warned, “they’ll poison the lot of you.”

The officer looked startled. He waved away the flowers. He squinted his eyes at the sisters. But before he could say anything, his beeper went off. Zoe heard a crackly voice saying, “A blue car with the New York license MBV285 was spotted at the East Branbury Mobil station. Get out there at once.” The officer dashed out to his car.

Zoe looked at Miss Gertie and said, “I think you need gas in your car, don’t you?”

Miss Gertie looked confused at first, and then her eyes brightened and she said, “Yes. Yes, we do need gas. You’re so perceptive, Zoe. We’re off again then, are we?”

“And hurry,” said Zoe. “To the East Branbury Mobil!”

Chapter Seventeen

Tigers and Old Black Bears

Spence heard a door slam downstairs and then everything was quiet. Even the woman, Chloe, was gone – otherwise he would have heard the soap operas, the coffee grinder, now and then a curse when she tripped over a cat or a can opener didn’t work.

He tried the attic door for the hundredth time, but of course it was locked. There were bars on the two windows. Outdoors he could see no other signs of habitation, only a chimney poking up through the maple leaves. If there were people living next door, they couldn’t see him. Just in case, though, as he had done every hour since they brought him here, he waved his arms. He wrote
HELP
with a piece of chalk he’d had in his pocket. Once the woman had come up when he was at the window and he’d had to erase it quickly with his sleeve.

But no one came to rescue him. No one knew he was here. Not even his parents. Not even his friend, Zoe.

At first he was mad at her for getting him into this.

If she hadn’t wanted to join that foolish Northern Spy Club...if he hadn’t said he would help...if they hadn’t gone to Rockbury and kidnapped old Aunt Thelma...if he hadn’t gone home to get the key for the blacksmith shop...if he hadn’t come back with it and stumbled on that pair...

But he had. He sank down on one of the dusty boxes that was piled up by the window. He had done all those things. And to tell the truth, it had been kind of fun. More fun than sitting home, practicing the cello. More fun than cleaning the bathroom and having his mother tell him it wasn’t done right, to do it over again – he’d forgotten to wash the soap dish.

Besides, he liked those old ladies, the Bagley sisters. He didn’t want them to go to jail. He didn’t want anyone hurting Alice’s aunt Thelma. She was a good sport, and a lot more fun than his own Aunt Beatrice, who wrinkled her nose when he played a piece on the cello and said, “So
that was
Mozart?”

And now he was useless. He’d been caught, and he couldn’t help Aunt Thelma
or
the Bagley sisters
or
Zoe.

He got up from the box, feeling restless. Then he realized he had sunk down into it; the top flaps had caved in. Curious, he opened it up. Inside were piles of letters. They looked quite recent, all with this year’s date. Oddly, they were from zoos. The New City Zoo, the Plum Bush Zoo, the Land’s End Zoo. What, he wondered, would the couple want with zoos? He hadn’t heard any animals in this house bark or snarl or growl. A cat maybe, but cats weren’t in zoos.

He opened up one of the letters.

Dear Mr. Wolfadder:

In response to your query, yes, we will be able to provide your wildlife park with an aging male lion and a female tiger. However, we have had other requests, so please let us know as soon as possible when and where to transport them.

Yours,

Walter S. Bayre

Spence opened up another letter. This time it was a wild boar and two twenty-year-old black bears. All being offered to the Wildlife Park. A third zoo would send along a seventy-year-old elephant and two elderly zebras.