Cat of the Century (23 page)

“Why does it seem longer?” Liz sighed.

“Because it’s so awful. You lose focus and track of time,” Aunt Tally said, then spoke to Inez. “You don’t need to tidy up my papers. I’ll do it later.”

“Okay.”

Aunt Tally met up with Liz in the center hall and said, “I’m glad we had this time together.”

“Me, too.” Inez chimed in as she joined them.

“Are you sure I can’t feed you something?” Aunt Tally offered.

“Oh, no, thank you. I’ve got to get down to Ivy.” Liz named a small community just west of Charlottesville on Route 250. “I promised Terri I’d go over her portfolio, too. Naturally she doesn’t have the resources you two have, but given her age, she’s been a steadfast saver and investor. She should wind up quite well off in her later years. Actually, I need to babysit her, sort of. She’s rattled over Mariah and over the fact that she broke up with her boyfriend.”

“Better you than me.” Aunt Tally laughed.

L
ow-pressure systems made Harry sleepy. The baffling weather continued, with light drizzle and a temperature in the high forties. As Harry walked back from the barn, the rain picked up tempo and the water poured from the front of her oilskin outback hat. No one could “do” rain quite like the English or the Australians. With her hat, her old re-waxed Barbour coat, and her worn Wellies, she kept dry. The chill crept into her bones, though.

Inez was with Fair. Mondays were always busy, regardless of profession, so he’d asked her to help out after her meeting with Tally and Liz. She loved going on calls with him. Like many people who were successful in their careers, she hated being away from the action. She kept her knowledge up and she sometimes strayed to Blanca’s clinic, but it wasn’t the same as being a full-time vet.

Harry hoped that the day with Fair would take Inez’s mind off things. Like all medical people, Inez was a problem-solver. Methodical, calm, with a touch of imagination, Inez, like Harry, was a good person to have on your team. Both were drawn into the two murders more than they cared to admit. Inez had a connection to both of the deceased, whereas Harry’s drive came from curiosity and the desire for an answer.

Harry hung her coat up on one of the pegs on the porch. Better for it to drip there than in the kitchen, but the dampness and cold made
her teeth chatter. She hung the hat up, too, pulled off her boots with the help of a bootjack, then opened the door into the kitchen and jumped in, skidding a little in her socks on the polished random-width pine.

The warmth felt glorious.

Near the door was a carved blanket chest in which household boots, sneakers, and slippers were kept. She pulled on an old pair of slippers. “Ah.” Above this was a long bar of wood with pegs. More coats, an old shirt, and hats hung on these.

Harry put up tea, but she couldn’t shake the cold, so she took an old L.L.Bean Buffalo plaid wool shirt off a peg and put it on.

Looking at the animals curled up in their fleece beds, she said, “You all are smarter than I am.”

“You noticed,”
Pewter observed drily.

Once the tea had warmed her from the inside out a bit, Harry called Susan. She missed her friend. Once she caught up on the progress of Susan’s aunt and the odds and ends of daily life, she told her best friend about the strange events and meeting Ralston Peavey’s granddaughter.

“Small world,” Susan said.

“Isn’t it funny how something that happened back when Christ lost His sandals still bugs you?” Harry used the old expression meaning a long, long time ago.

“Well, the reason you love your cats is that you’re like them. Curious. Curious. Curious.” Susan laughed. “And you know what curiosity did to the cat.”

“Yeah, I know.” Harry laughed, too.

Susan then said, “You have a gift for getting in the middle of things.”

“I know, and I don’t have you to get me out of trouble.” She hastened to add, “When are you coming home? I hate it when you’re gone.”

“Next week.” Susan sucked in some air. “I have been gone too long. I’m beginning to forget what my husband looks like.”

“Are you smoking a cigarette?”

A telling pause followed. “Well—”

“Susan, you said you would stop.”

“I mean to, but you know how I get when I’m stressed. She’s recovering, but the chemo is dreadful. I swear to you, if I get cancer, I’m not doing it, and I’m not doing radiation, either. Makes you sick as a dog. And I suppose most times it works, but then again, sometimes it doesn’t, so instead of having three or five good months, the end of your life is hell.”

“I can’t disagree, but I can still chew you out for smoking.”

“All right. All right.” Susan stubbed out the cigarette, but she knew she’d light up another later.

“You know Didee has the same problem as your aunt. It’s like there’s a cancer epidemic.” Harry wondered out loud.

“No wonder. Pollution. Hormones in our meats, milk. Plus stress. There
is
a cancer epidemic!” Susan then switched subjects. “Is Fair enjoying Inez’s visit?”

One of the first things Harry had told Susan about was Inez’s visit and her trying to hold her alumnae board together. “Loves it. He loves her.” Harry paused. “You know, Inez is a second mother to him, and like most men, he loved his mother, and he loves Inez.”

“We all love our mothers, but I swear the mother-son bond is extraordinary, just like the father-daughter one. I see it in my own children. I love them both, but it’s different with Danny than with Brooks.”

“I’ll be at your door to greet you next week.” Harry noticed Tucker, fast asleep on her back, legs straight in the air.

Before signing off, Susan jumped back to the murders. “Is it possible these are some sort of revenge killings?”

“No one knows. Cooper has tried to glean some information from the St. Louis police and from the Fulton authorities. Not much help.”

“There’s probably not a compelling reason for them to include the Albemarle County deputy in their investigations.”

“Cooper explained she has some concern for Inez and even Aunt Tally, but they paid little attention. Then again, they must be under a lot of pressure, especially the police in Fulton. It’s a small town. There aren’t a lot of murders. St. Louis must be full of them. Little shock value.”

After returning the phone to its cradle, Harry looked outside at the rain, now steady and strong.

“Oh, what the hell.” She took off her slippers, went out onto the porch, and put herself back together. As she did so, Tucker ambled out, along with the two cats.

She looked down at them, then out at the rain. The Volvo, though parked close, wasn’t under cover. She didn’t have a garage.

“All right, but all three of you are riding in the back, because your paws will be wet.” She realized the minute she said it that the cats would be over the back seat and up to the front passenger seat in an instant. She went back into the house and grabbed an old towel.

Out they ran. The hatch lifted right up, and she put Tucker in, who weighed enough to make her grunt. She wiped the dog’s feet. The cats, miraculously, stayed in the back so she could wipe theirs, too.

By the time she slipped behind the wheel though, both Mrs. Murphy and Pewter sat on the passenger seat.

“I’m ready for adventure,”
Pewter purred.

Two miles down the road, the rain became so heavy it looked like a silver-gray curtain. Harry pressed the flasher button on the Volvo. She was born here; she knew these roads. She knew Virginia weather. You could become disoriented in a hard rain or snow, especially with blowing winds and poor visibility. Many country roads had deep ditches alongside to funnel the runoff away so the road itself didn’t flood. How easy it was to wind up in one of those ditches.

“I wish I hadn’t done this,” Harry said aloud. “I could have picked up the phone and called.”

“You said it. I didn’t.”
Pewter, like Mrs. Murphy, stood with hind feet on the leather seat, front feet on the dash.

“Tucker, come up into the backseat,” Harry called to the corgi, who did as she was told.

“You’d be hamburger if we got rear-ended.”
Pewter appeared to relish the detail.

“Yeah, well, let’s also hope no one crosses the center line,”
the dog called back.

Fortunately, no one else was on the road. When it got this bad, people pulled under the overpasses or to the side of the road. Harry usually didn’t go to the roadside and park, because sometimes a car with a foolish driver would be tearing along and perceive the red flashing lights too late. Better to keep moving.

She rolled into Crozet at twenty miles per hour and hooked a right onto Route 240. A few miles later she turned left onto Route 250. The rain had slowed enough so she could see a little better, but in places where the road was banked, the water poured over it onto the other side and into the narrow ditches.

Twenty-five minutes later, she parked in front of Terri’s store. While Harry usually kept some distance from Terri, this was a small community. You couldn’t really avoid people. Remembering what Aunt Tally and Inez said that Liz had told them concerning Terri’s distress, she thought she’d buy one of those damned birds. Then, too, she just needed to get out of the house.

“You all stay here. Let me make my manners.”

“Good.”
Pewter settled down for a snooze.

“Take me. Take me,”
Tucker begged.

Harry twisted around in the driver’s seat. “No. I’m not forking over another $261.41.”

“Two forty-nine,”
Tucker replied, not figuring in the sales tax on the broken vase.

It really wasn’t Tucker’s fault.

None of the three animals understood why humans submitted to taxation. They thought it utterly insane.

Harry cut the motor, pocketed the keys, and slipped out. She’d slapped her oilskin cowboy hat on her head, for which she was grateful as the rain continued.

At the door, she took off her hat, shook it, shook herself to get some of the water off the Barbour coat, then stamped her Wellies, which weren’t muddy. She opened the door. “Terri.”

Terri looked up from the counter, where she was reading the newspaper.

“Hello.” It was not a warm greeting.

“How are you feeling?”

“How do you think I’m feeling?” Terri folded the newspaper.

Harry ignored her attitude. “I’m sorry it’s all so upsetting.”

“What’s it to you? You didn’t really know them.” Terri glared, then added spitefully, “You’re just nosy.”

Harry’s restraint was thinning. “I’m out of here.”

“You were at William Woods, and you didn’t seem the least bit upset by Mariah’s disappearance. That’s what Liz said.” Terri raised her voice.

“I met the woman once for all of two minutes.”

Terri, sweating and restless, couldn’t seem to focus. If anything, she seemed to be looking for a target for whatever was troubling her. “Wherever you are, there’s a problem.”

“I know how to remove the problem.” Harry, realizing that Terri was irrational, strode for the door.

“You can get out of my store!”

Harry stopped at the door and turned, her hand on the long push handle. “Whatever you’re on, get off it. Drink or drugs are a one-way ticket to hell.”

Terri screamed, picked up a small porcelain guinea hen, and heaved it at the door Harry had closed behind her. It hit and shattered.

“See what you made me do!”

“That woman is certifiable.” Harry shook her head, then got back in her car. She drove west on Barracks Road, which turned into Garth Road, all the way to White Hall, where she turned left toward Crozet. The rain came down steady, but not as heavy. She could see, although she stayed about ten miles under the speed limit. She passed the old apple packing shed that Chuck Pinnell had revamped into his house and workshop for making beautiful handbags, belts, and chaps. She was still riding in a pair of chaps he’d made twenty-five years ago. They had been repaired, but it proved her philosophy: Buy the best you can afford, because in the long run, it’s cheaper.

She kept thinking about Terri Kincaid going off the rails. She drove past the old Crozet high school, the new elementary school on her left, and turned right just before the railroad overpass.