Morning Glory Circle (6 page)

“Yeah, she’s a nut, but no, what I mean is when we got there, Connie and the man were having a huge fight in the kitchen.”

“What about?”

“I think he wants to move out, and she was telling him he couldn’t go.”

“Seems like it would be up to the paying guest whether he stayed or went.”

“Sounded to me like he’d reserved the room for a long time and she’d turned away other customers. This is a really busy time right now with the festival coming up.”

Scott shrugged, saying, “None of our business, really.”

“You’re no fun at all,” Hannah said, and then thanked Mitchell for bringing her order to the table.

“Is that going to be your breakfast?” Scott asked her.

“Are you kidding? I had breakfast hours ago. This will just about tide me over until lunch.”

“How can you eat like that all the time and stay so skinny?” Scott asked her.

“Thin genes, I guess,” she said. “My brothers are all the same way.”

“Are we square about the dog?”

“I know I often forget to pick up animals when I leave them with people, but I really am going to take that dog with me. I’ve got a gal up at the library who loves Chihuahuas, and I’m going to take it up there to her.”

“What did she ever do to you?”

“Now, don’t be hateful. We can’t all be pretty and precious. Speaking of which…”

At that moment, Ava Fitzpatrick came in the bookstore with her children, and Hannah snorted in derision.

“What have you got against Ava?” Scott asked her.

“She may have all you men wrapped around her little finger but she doesn’t fool me. She’s no saint.”

“I never said she was. She doesn’t look like any saint I ever saw. An angel, maybe.”

Hannah rolled her eyes.

“Well, if you’d been hearing what I’ve been hearing…”

“That’s just gossip, Hannah, you know that.”

“It may be, but you’re missing out on some pretty interesting theories about why Theo left her all that money.”

“Speaking of vicious gossip, have you seen Margie today?”

“Speaking of crazy criminals, I can’t say that I have. Why?”

“Even though she knew Enid was scheduled to move to Mountain View this morning, Margie went out early and didn’t come back.”

“That’s weird, even for her.”

“I thought so too.”

“I can ask the scanner grannies, if you like.”

The scanner grannies were a group of senior citizens in town who used their older model police scanners to listen in on cordless and cellular telephone calls. It was terribly illegal and immoral, of course, but it was also very useful in gathering information.

“That would be great, thanks.”

“You know, Scott, for someone who doesn’t listen to gossip you sure don’t mind asking me to, except of course, when it comes to Saint Ava.”

Maggie came over to their table and handed the small dog to Hannah.

“It’s scaring the customers,” Maggie said.

“Well, off with its little head then,” Hannah said. “Let’s not let a poor little homeless dog get in the way of your profit margin.”

Maggie put her hands on her hips and glared at her cousin, who also happened to be her best friend.

“Are you saying I care more about making money than anything else?”

“I am.”

“Well, you’re right,” Maggie said, and then turned on her heel and walked away.

Scott spent the afternoon asking people if they’d seen Margie that day, but no one had. Many people took the opportunity to share stories of their past unpleasant run-ins with the former post-mistress, and Scott felt renewed regret over how long Margie had been allowed to make malicious mischief in Rose Hill, especially on his watch.

He checked back at her house again before he went off duty. Her handbag and heavy winter coat were still hanging by the door, with her gloves and hat sticking out of one pocket. Up in her room, despite feeling squeamish about it, Scott checked her dresser and closet, which were both full of clothes. There was an old cardboard suitcase under her bed, but it was empty. Where could she have gone without coat, purse, or a suitcase full of clothes?

Scott hated to think the worst, but he was beginning to.

M
aggie called Hannah at 2:30 in the morning. Hannah’s husband Sam answered on the first ring, as he was still up working in his home office. Sam owned a network security-consulting firm, and had contracts with several large corporations and government agencies. He worked odd hours from a room that looked more like the command center of a futuristic space ship than a home office in a hundred-year-old farmhouse.

“I know she’s sleeping,” Maggie told him, “but Caroline just called from the Pittsburgh airport and Hannah and I said we’d pick her up.”

“Wasn’t she supposed to come home next Sunday?” Sam asked.

“That was the original plan, but you know Caroline, she said she had a premonition she needed to be home sooner.”

“Are these her ‘guides’ talking to her again?” Sam asked in a sarcastic tone.

“She didn’t say that,” Maggie said, “but it wouldn’t surprise me.”

Caroline Eldridge was a free spirit, and a generous trust fund had allowed her to dabble in many different religious and charitable organizations. As a result of this decade-long spiritual and cultural exploration, Caroline espoused a mélange of ancient mystical and new age beliefs that transcended any single philosophy or religion, with rules and rhetoric that often contradicted one another.

“That woman needs a shrink more than a guru,” Sam said, not for the first time.

“Give her a break,” Maggie said. “She has more money than she knows what to do with and good intentions.”

Maggie could imagine Sam shaking his head, but he just said, “I’ll get Hannah.”

They were on the road by 4:00 a.m., driving Scott’s Explorer. Hannah wasn’t allowed to take the animal control vehicle out of the county, Sam’s wheelchair adapted van employed hand controls that Hannah just could not get the hang of using, and Maggie didn’t think her vintage VW Beetle would survive the trip. Luckily, Scott was always glad to give Maggie anything she wanted, including the use of his SUV. He offered to drive but she quickly declined as graciously as possible. Maggie wanted Caroline to feel free to talk, and Scott’s casual conversation technique often tended to come across, albeit unintentionally, as police interrogation.

Two and a half hours later Maggie and Hannah were in the baggage claim area of the Pittsburgh airport, looking for the friend they hadn’t seen since they dropped her off at the same airport over six years previously. Back then she was volunteering on a humanitarian aid trip to Haiti, and had been her usual exuberant, sunny blonde self, eager to be off on a new adventure. The woman who approached them this morning and flung her arms around them, on the other hand, they at first mistook for a much older homeless person.

Maggie and Hannah tried to hide their shock but it was difficult. Caroline stank to high heaven for one thing, an overpowering mixture of body odor, patchouli, and mildew. She was dressed in a stained t-shirt, torn jeans and sandals, with only a huge, filthy backpack for luggage. The previously attractive young woman now had lank, dirty hair, leathery skin, a deeply lined face, bloodshot eyes, and some seriously chapped lips. Hannah and Maggie exchanged horrified glances behind her head as she hugged them.

Maggie didn’t know what to say other than, “Where is your coat? It’s February.”

Caroline held her friends out at arms’ length and beamed at them.

“I’m so glad to see you guys!” she said. “You haven’t changed a bit!”

Caroline excused herself to go to the restroom, and Maggie and Hannah just stared at one another, speechless for a few seconds.

“I pity the people who just flew several thousand miles with that stench,” Maggie finally said.

“I pity the two of us for the next few hours,” Hannah said, and the realization of what she meant sank in for Maggie.

“Oh no,” she said. “We probably need to stop and get her something to eat.”

“We’ll drive through somewhere,” Hannah said. “We can’t inflict that malodorous pong on any of our favorite places or we’ll be banned for life.”

“How do you tell someone they stink?” Maggie asked.

“I don’t,” Hannah said. “But you let me know how that works out for you.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“Is that a pot smell or a perfume?” Hannah asked.

“I think it’s the patchouli. I associate that smell so strongly with pot that I get them mixed up as well.”

“I never liked that stuff,” Hannah said. “It just made me sleepy.”

“You know, it just occurred to me that you haven’t had a cigarette yet today.” Maggie said. “Have you finally quit?”

“It’s the weirdest thing,” Hannah said. “This past weekend they started to make me feel queasy. I stopped on Sunday, got a huge headache on Monday, bit Sam’s head off all day, and now I don’t want one. It can’t be that easy.”

“Maybe you’re pregnant,” Maggie said.

“I seriously doubt that. If it hasn’t happened in ten years of using no birth control I think the odds are against it happening at all.”

“You could get tested.”

“Yeah, but if nothing’s wrong with my equipment then Sam would have to get tested. I can’t see him bouncing back quickly from bad news on that front. I’d rather just leave it a mystery we don’t talk about.”

“I’d say I’m glad to see you quit smoking but I think you’d start back up just to spite me.”

“I’ve been thinking about quitting ever since your Grandpa Tim had his throat zapped, and of course Sam nags me about it all the time. I think I’m just ready.”

When Caroline came back they ascertained that she did not in fact have a coat, and didn’t seem a bit concerned about the sub-freezing temperatures outside.

“I’ll just think warm thoughts,” she said, and Maggie could hear Hannah groan, although it was a quiet one.

Caroline pulled a ratty looking wool sweater out of her backpack and pulled it on over her ensemble, and this helped Maggie and Hannah identify the main source of the mildew smell. She happily accepted Maggie’s gloves for her hands and Hannah’s mittens for her feet.

“You can keep those, by the way,” Hannah assured her.

Maggie was ashamed of how embarrassed she was to be seen with and smelled with her old friend. The odor was so bad it made her eyes water and her nose run. When she licked her lips, a big mistake it turned out, she felt as though she could even taste it.

Caroline declined a drive-through meal, saying, “I’m vegan, and I don’t eat anything fried.”

“What does that leave?” asked Hannah, who considered French fries with ketchup two healthy servings of vegetables.

They stopped at a giant grocery store where Caroline was equally bowled over by and critical of the abundance of choices. She explained she didn’t have any U.S. currency yet so Maggie bought the hummus, pita bread, and the glass bottle of organic apple juice her friend picked out. She was appalled at how much they cost. Caroline’s smell had killed both their appetites, so Maggie and Hannah each just purchased something to drink.

“You know, Hannah, the carbonation and high fructose corn syrup in that soda will ruin your liver and kidneys,” Caroline told her as they got back in the SUV. “You should also know, Maggie, that if people would quit buying bottled water, the cities would have to clean up the public water supply, and everyone would have access to clean water.”

Back in the SUV, neither Maggie nor Hannah could think of anything to say, so they just listened to Caroline smack her lips as she chewed with her mouth open, while telling them all the ways in which gas-guzzling SUV’s, like the one currently being used to retrieve her from the airport, were ruining the environment. After Maggie stopped at a gas station to fill up the tank for the return trip, Caroline lectured them on the evil deeds of all the oil companies, and how they manufactured the oil crisis to drive up prices and justify drilling on protected lands.

Maggie, who recycled, conserved water, turned off the lights when she left a room, and contributed both time and money to local charities, agreed with most of what Caroline said. Still, she dreaded spending the next two hours listening to how woefully inadequate she and Hannah were in preventing the suffering of third world populations and in how many ways they were constantly contributing to the ultimate destruction of the planet. Maggie wondered why it didn’t bother her to read about it online or listen to it on television, but having someone she knew preach it to her in person was incredibly irritating.

Hannah must have been thinking along the same lines, because she suddenly changed the subject by saying, “We are so sorry about Theo.”

“Gwyneth said someone hit him over the head and he bled to death,” Caroline said, as if they were discussing the weather, and not her older brother’s murder.

“Yes,” Maggie said. “The person who did it died in a car accident soon after.”

“That karma was pretty instant,” Caroline said. “Why’d he do it?”

Maggie was amazed at Caroline’s seeming detachment, but still chose her words carefully, trying to be sensitive.

“As well as Scott can determine, he thought he might inherit some of Theo’s money if he died. He got the idea he was Brad’s son.”

“Not possible,” Caroline said immediately, about her brother Brad, who had drowned when he was 15. “Brad was gay.”

Maggie almost turned around in her seat at that, but remembered she was driving. Hannah, however, spun around instantly.

“Brad was gay?” Hannah asked, incredulous. “How do you know?”

Caroline caught Maggie’s glance in the rearview mirror, smiled, and said, “I saw him with someone once.”

Maggie knew ‘that someone’ was most likely her own brother Sean. Hannah, however, did not know about any of that, and Maggie hadn’t planned to tell her, so she was grateful when Caroline didn’t. Maggie considered her brother’s sexual orientation private family information, and she wasn’t about to gossip about any of her brothers, even with Hannah.

Maggie thought about Margie’s recent remarks about her father and sister-in-law, and was just relieved she didn’t also know about Sean. Margie’s hostile accusations about Maggie’s family had been uncomfortably right on target. Her father was disabled due to a back injury, and he did supplement his pain medication with alcohol. During the investigation into Theo’s murder, Hannah and Maggie found a wall in Theo’s house covered with photos of her sister-in-law Ava, and as a result Maggie wondered if there was anything to the rumors about her beautiful sister-in-law and the deceased. Maggie was used to speculation about her family, and had learned to deflect it by pointing out that it was no one’s business but their own. It was bad enough to have to live in the soap opera, let alone to have to explain the plot to curious onlookers.

Caroline told them all about the mission she had been on, taking much-needed medical supplies to rural communities outside Concepcion in Paraguay, and the trip to California that preceded that.

“I stayed with some really great Buddhist monks in Santa Cruz,” she said. “A few weeks ago their monastery burned down in the wild fires out there and I’ve invited them all here to stay with me until they find a new place.”

“I can’t wait,” Hannah said quietly, and Maggie gave her a warning look.

“How will they get here?” Maggie asked.

“I haven’t really thought that through,” Caroline said. “I’m sure the universe will take care of it.”

Hannah sent Maggie a stern look that she understood immediately. Hannah didn’t want her to do it, but Maggie’s first inclination was to help Caroline, so she ignored her cousin.

“You should call Midge at Sacred Heart,” Maggie said. “She’s the church secretary, and her dad Elbie drives the church van; I think it holds twenty people. If you make a donation to the food bank and pay for the gas they will probably help you out.”

Hannah rolled her eyes in disgust as Carolyn thanked Maggie.

“Why don’t you come home with me instead of going straight out to the lodge,” Maggie suggested, “I hate to think of you being up there alone with no supplies. At my place you can get a shower, wash your clothes, and we can shop for provisions.”

Caroline agreed, and then delighted her two companions by laying down in the backseat to have a nap. Through an ingenious method Hannah improvised of sliding down every window in the Explorer less than an inch and cranking the heater, the cross ventilation took most of Caroline’s body odor out the back window, and everyone still stayed warm. When they got to the other side of Pittsburgh, Maggie offered to take Hannah home first, but Hannah quickly refused, saying it would probably be better not to spring a visitor on Sam without warning, and that Caroline would probably want to “freshen up” before she visited anyone.

“I think she’s asleep,” Maggie whispered.

“Maybe she’s just having an out of body experience,” Hannah said.

“Do you think she can hear us from the astral plain?” Maggie asked.

“Maybe she’s checking the ozone layer to see how big the hole is we’re making,” Hannah said.

“I do care about the environment,” Maggie said. “I buy recycled paper products for the store.”

“I do too, you know,” Hannah said. “I’m the one who made you go see that movie about it.”