Authors: Carlene Thompson
Twenty minutes later, Simon sat in a chair across from Clarice as he sipped his second glass of cognac. “Yes, indeed, Diana was only eighteen when she accompanied me on an Egyptian expedition. Her parents died in a car wreck when she was fourteen. Afterward, she lived with her grandmother—my dear sister whom I could cajole into just about anything—and I persuaded her to let Diana go along. My niece was particularly mature and self-sufficient for her age—her grandmother knew it, too—but even I was shocked by what a trooper Diana was, Clarice! She didn’t complain once, no matter how rough the conditions. And the photos she took were excellent! I used three of them in a book—”
“Mrs. Hanson, did you notice Penny acting strange this week?” Diana interrupted, unable to remain silent one moment longer while Simon surged on with the diverting story. Simon looked at Diana in exhausted surprise while Mrs. Hanson blinked with bewilderment. “I mean, did Penny seem upset?” Diana floundered, angry with herself for dragging Clarice back to the hell she’d witnessed earlier but unable to go on trying, like Simon, to act as if nothing was wrong. “Was Penny . . . well . . . afraid?”
Mrs. Hanson’s slender hand started shaking, and Simon quickly took her brandy snifter before throwing Diana a severe look.
“Was Penny afraid?” Clarice repeated in a weak voice. “Well, of course she was concerned about Willow. The night they admitted Willow to the hospital, Penny came to
my house after visiting hours. She was so worried. I told her about my own young granddaughter who’d had an appendectomy and done splendidly. I could tell that didn’t help much, though. She only stayed about fifteen minutes, but I saw her lights on past one in the morning.” Clarice paused, looking slightly embarrassed. “Sometimes I have trouble sleeping. I really
don’t
watch Penny’s house twenty-four hours a day.”
“Well, of course you don’t,” Simon said reassuringly. “I have trouble sleeping, too, and it’s only natural to glance out the windows when you’re up and you feel like the rest of the neighborhood is snoozing comfortably.”
Diana knew Simon slept like the dead, but he did not want Clarice to be embarrassed. Diana appreciated his concern for the woman’s dignity, but she needed answers.
“But was there something besides Willow troubling Penny?” Diana persisted. “Did you get the feeling Penny was frightened of being harmed?”
Simon snapped, “Diana! What a question!”
Clarice Hanson raised her hand to quiet him. “No, Dr. Van . . . Simon. It’s all right. I should have said something before now. Penny
hasn’t
been her usual self, aside from her worry about Willow’s operation,” she said definitely.
“How was she different?” Diana asked.
Simon leaned forward. His expression told Diana that although she hadn’t mentioned Penny’s agitated phone call to her the night before, he’d already guessed something besides Willow’s illness had been bothering Penny.
“To be accurate, I have to say Penny seemed different the past three weeks. Maybe a bit more.” Surprise tingled through Diana, but she said nothing, not wanting to break Clarice’s train of thought. “Maybe the week before last I noticed she was staying inside a great deal. That isn’t like her. She loved the outdoors, no matter how cold or hot. When she wasn’t working for Dr. Van Etton or at the university, she spent time outside, playing with Willow or gardening. Yet the little flowerbed she’d taken such particular care of this summer wilted because she didn’t water it.
“This week she stayed in the house almost constantly, and she kept her lights on all night I only saw her coming from and going. She usually looks so neat, so carefully groomed,” Clarice went on. “But every time I caught sight of her going out, she had on the same pair of ragged jeans and a loose wrinkled blouse.”
Clarice frowned. “She came to my house on Thursday evening when she got home from the hospital. Willow’s surgery had been performed Tuesday and she’d come through just fine. Penny was bringing her home the next morning. I would have expected her to be ecstatic, but she wasn’t. She asked me if I thought Willow could travel safely by Sunday. I must have looked surprised because she quickly said Willow was bored, and she’d been thinking of taking the child for a car ride.
“Penny was terribly pale,” Clarice went on. “Her jeans just hung on her. Clearly she hadn’t been eating. Or drinking. Her skin and lips looked dry. I offered her iced tea or a soft drink, but she refused. She said she felt a bit nauseated—too much bad hospital coffee, she claimed. Then she said the oddest thing.” Clarice frowned. “She said, ‘You’ve been such a wonderful neighbor, Clarice. I hope you’ll always remember us fondly.’ ”
“ ‘Remember us!’ ” Simon repeated loudly. “What did that mean?”
Clarice looked startled at his tone, then raised her hands in bafflement. “I said, ‘My goodness, dear, are you and Willow moving?’ Penny flushed and burst into high-pitched laughter, saying she was just being sentimental. Then she started crying. Before I could say a word, she jumped up from her chair and ran out the door. I thought about calling her to make certain she was all right, but I decided she needed to calm down and get some sleep, so she’d be ready for Willow to come home the next day.”
“You did the right thing,” Diana said, thinking that Penny must have called her hotel room shortly after she ran out of Mrs. Hanson’s house—called and begged her to stop by the next evening.
Diana snapped back to attention just as Clarice was saying, “No one who looked like they could be Willow’s grandparents even stopped by to see Penny, much less stayed with her this week. There was only . . .” Clarice looked at Diana and stopped abruptly.
“There was only who?” Diana asked.
“Oh . . . no one.”
“That’s not what you were going to say.”
“Yes, it was.” Clarice’s gaze shifted to a crystal ashtray on the table beside Diana. “I wasn’t going to say anything else . . . important.”
“Oh, Clarice, don’t think you’re protecting
me
,” Simon said. “
I
went to Penny’s, Diana. I thought she would be too tired and worried to shop, so I raided our kitchen. I also picked out two bottles of good wine, and I stopped at the bakery to get baklava. Penny loves baklava.”
“I know,” Diana answered in faint surprise. Simon was a kind man, but it wasn’t like him to haul around groceries for someone. “Was Penny home?”
“No, so I just let myself in.”
“You let
yourself
in! You have a key to Penny’s house?”
“
We
have a key, Diana. Have you forgotten that Penny gave us a key in case she ever locked herself out or lost her key?”
“Now I remember. I don’t suppose you noticed anything odd when you were in the house.”
Simon looked reluctant for a moment, clearly not wanting to discuss something troubling. Then he gave up. “First of all, I must say that I, too, noticed a difference in Penny the last two weeks she was here. Each day she was quiet and distracted. On Monday, her hands trembled so much she could barely work at the computer. I was going to ask her on Tuesday if there was a problem, but that very day Willow got sick.”
Simon took a deep breath. “The day I went to Penny’s house with the food, I put the cold items I’d brought in the refrigerator, set everything else on the kitchen table, and wrote her a note. As I left the kitchen, I noticed four or five
large, packed boxes in the living room. Then I glanced at that awful recliner Penny had gotten at a yard sale. Her birthday is in two months, and I’d planned on buying her a new recliner—something sturdy, very comfortable. . . .” Simon’s voice trailed off and he swallowed hard.
“I remember the recliner,” Diana said quickly, knowing her great-uncle would be deeply embarrassed if he broke down in front of Clarice.
Simon promptly regained his composure. “There was an end table next to that awful chair. I saw an object lying on the table.” Simon took a deep breath again then lowered his voice. “It was a very nice Glock 23 handgun, clean and loaded.”
The phone beside Clarice’s chair rang. All three of them jumped and Simon shouted, “Good God!” Then he flushed at betraying his nervousness.
“I gave Tyler Raines this phone number,” he muttered before snatching up the handset and barking a loud, “Hello!” Diana watched his handsome, hawklike face relax slightly. He closed his eyes before saying, “Thank God. Where is she?” Diana was nearly tugging on his arm by the time he hung up after saying, “Thank you, Tyler. You must be exhausted. Forget about the car—we’ll deal with it tomorrow.”
“Did he find Willow?” “Is Willow hurt?” Clarice and Diana asked at the same time.
Simon took a deep breath. “Clarice, you were right. Willow was in the woods. Unfortunately she saw the explosion. She saw her mother . . . on fire.” Simon paused. “Afterwards she went deeper into the woods, scared to death and refusing to answer the police or paramedics who were calling for her, but Tyler found her. He didn’t say how. He said the paramedics looked her over and she
seems perfectly fine—physically, that is. Still, they want her to spend the night in the hospital for observation.”
“I’ll go to her.” Diana stood up. “I’m sure she needs somebody she knows.”
Simon frowned. “I doubt if they’ll let you see her until morning.”
“I don’t care. I’ll ask someone to tell her I’ll be there all night. That might be some comfort for her.”
Clarice began to fumble, trying to rise from her chair. Diana noticed the woman looked exhausted. She also seemed extremely unsure of herself. “Clarice, I’ll show you to your room and get you some nightwear,” Diana said.
Clarice gave Simon and Diana a weary smile. “I accept your hospitality with gratitude.”
“No gratitude needed.” Simon offered Clarice his arm to help her up from the chair. “Diana will have you fixed up in no time. We have a housekeeper—a young woman named Nan Murphy. Her mother has worked for me for years but she had a mild heart attack, so Nan is taking her place for a while. Her demeanor is less than warm, but she does arrive on time. She’ll be here in the morning.”
“Just get up when you please,” Diana added. “We don’t have a routine. If you’ll show Clarice to the bedroom, Uncle Simon, I’ll run upstairs and get something of mine for her to wear.”
Ten minutes later, Clarice sat on the bed in a large, soft gray and dusky blue bedroom. “This is lovely, Diana! Simon said
you
decorated it?”
“Yes. You should have seen it before—all velvet, tassels, valances, dried flowers under glass. It was my great-grandmother’s room during the last months of her life. I didn’t know her. I’ve heard she was rather stiff and formal, though, not at all like her daughter, my grandmother, who raised me after my parents died.”
“Your grandmother was the sister Dr. Van Etton seems to have loved so much.”
Diana smiled. “Yes. They quarreled constantly and
enjoyed every minute of it. They seemed as different as night and day, but underneath, they were very similar. Simon was heartbroken when she died four years ago. He never married, and I’m afraid I’m the last of his family. That’s partly why I moved in with him. He would never admit to being lonely, but he was and it showed. Simon had always loved to entertain. He threw big parties for every possible occasion, but after Grandmother’s death, he never even had a small dinner party.
“Two years ago, I was divorced, living in a small apartment and making do with a tiny bedroom for a darkroom. Simon did me a great favor by inviting me to live here, but he seemed to think he was the only one benefiting. He kept promising not to act like a parent and assuring me that this was a
big
house and he wouldn’t get in my way.” She smiled. “Not too long after I moved into the house, I asked Simon if I could redecorate this room.”
“You did a fine job. The gray and blue are beautiful with the yellow and russet accents. You have excellent taste, Diana.” Then she looked dubiously at the nightwear Diana had brought for her. Diana always slept in one of her many mid-thigh-length T-shirts. The only other thing she’d been able to find was a bright pink nightgown and robe with chiffon flounces and satin ruffles at every opening, embroidered all over with bunches of cherries.
“When I was married, my mother-in-law desperately wanted grandchildren,” Diana said. “She gave me this negligee for Christmas the last year of the marriage. I believe she thought it would drive my husband wild with passion.” Diana paused. “One of the last good times he and I had together was after his mother left and I tried it on for him. He said all I needed was a crown and a wand and I’d look like Glenda the Good Witch in
The Wizard of Oz
. We both howled with laughter.”
Clarice smiled and held up the mass of chiffon and satin. “Well . . .” Her smile faded. “I was going to say something nice about it, but I can’t think of one thing.”
Diana couldn’t help giggling. “I like your honesty. I’ll
get you some proper nightwear tomorrow. What do you prefer—pajamas or a nightgown without ruffles and embroidered cherries?”
Clarice looked at her in surprise. “I wear short nightgowns so I won’t trip over them, but I’ll be going home tomorrow.”
Diana said gently, “Your house suffered quite a bit of damage. You’ll need a second home for a few days, and Uncle Simon and I would love having you.” The woman looked unconvinced. “Frankly, Clarice, I think your presence would be good for Simon right now. He and I are close, but having someone nearer his own age to talk to at a time like this would be a blessing for him. I would really appreciate you staying.”
“In that case, I’d be delighted.” Clarice smiled, then her expression turned quickly to one of concern. “Diana, you don’t need to play hostess to me. You’re terribly anxious to go to the hospital and see Willow. You’ve been fidgeting with your hair and your watch for the last ten minutes. Please go. I’ll be fine.”
Diana had been sitting in a small boudoir chair and she almost jumped up, saying, “I
do
need to see Willow, and you need to get some rest. Promise me not to look at yourself in the mirror once you’ve donned that lovely gown. If you do, you really
won’t
be able to sleep!”