Irregardless of Murder (Miss Prentice Cozy Mysteries) (25 page)

Sally laughed. “No kidding! Pig Latin? How idiotic. That’s great!” She seemed inordinately amused.

“Still—Derek knew, didn’t he?” I observed sagely, and sat back to listen to Tommy James and the Shondelles declare musically that they thought we were alone now.

“We’re almost there,” Sally said a few minutes later as we turned down a narrow unpaved road.

“Not many neighbors,” I commented.

“Wonderful, isn’t it? All this privacy.” She turned onto a gravel driveway and pulled into an open-ended barn structure that served as a carport. I hopped out of the van and walked around to the front of the house.

In the dim moonlight, the Fields cottage took on a dark blue tint. The white picket fence Vern had mentioned wasn’t white at all. It was unpainted wood, but straight and charming and lined with low, plump bushes. We navigated the flagstone walk carefully.

Sally, I noticed, was elegantly casual in designer jeans and sneakers. I hadn’t had time to change from my standard classroom uniform of white blouse, mid-length skirt, and matching sweater, but fortunately I was back to wearing flats again. The night was cold and we were both wearing our heavy winter coats.

“You can see the exterior is all cedar shake,” said Sally, turning the key. “They put it on four years ago. Up until then, it was plain log. One story, four fireplaces.” She opened the door. “It was tough luck for the Fields, getting the place all fixed up, then being transferred.”

“Have they moved out already?”

Sally nodded. “They left for Japan a week ago. They took all the furniture they wanted, so the rest of it comes with the house.”

As we stepped inside, Sally snapped on the light. We were standing in a narrow hallway with hardwood floors and paneled walls. A rack of deer horns hung to my right and a pair of snowshoes were fastened to the wall with a nail on the left. We proceeded down the hall and into a cozy room with a worn, slip-covered sofa facing a stone fireplace. Right away I wanted to light a fire and curl up with a book.

“Jacob Field—that’s Mike’s great-grandfather—built the house,” Sally said. “This room was built first. It was just a one-room lakeside camp then.” She pointed to a wooden carving above the fireplace: 1890.

“Then they kept adding rooms, one by one. The kitchen is here.” She indicated a slate-topped counter on the left. Behind it was a stainless steel sink, a large refrigerator, and a large gas stove. “Completely remodeled two years ago,” she said proudly. “Well, what do you think so far?”

I looked around me. The style of the Fields home was rustic, even primitive, evoking the woods and nature, vastly different from Chez Prentice.

“I love it!” I said, and meant it.

This house spoke to me of peace and welcome and joy. This house was mine. I wanted to live here. With Gil.

“I love it,” I said again, becoming more sure with each passing moment.

Sally smiled. “Really? I’m so glad. It’s not the Prentice mansion, of course, but it’s snug.” She waved her hand at the passageway to the right. “The rooms back there are charming, but what you really must see,” she said insistently, pushing me along, “is this.”

We turned a corner.

“A screened porch. And a deck. How perfect!” I said, stepping outside. The cold wind off the lake hit my face like a slap. “Whew!”

Sally proceeded to the edge of the deck and pointed. “And a rowboat! Comes with the house, of course,” she said, galloping down the wooden steps to the rocky shoreline.

I followed, crunching unsteadily across the uneven surface.

“Look!” Sally swept her arm toward the water.

The inky surface of Lake Champlain was calm tonight, and the long reflection of the round moon cast a silvery, net-like shimmer on the surface.

“Isn’t this beautiful?”

“Yes,” I gasped.

It was really cold. My breath came in foggy puffs.

The sky was dark, but not as dark as the Green Mountains silhouetted in the distance. A tiny light, blinking regularly, moved slowly across the sky.

“The Burlington airport’s over there. Come on,” she said, untying the rowboat and stepping into it. She held out her hand. “There’s something else I want to show you.”

I moved back. “No,  thanks, it’s too cold. Besides, I’m not much of a rowboat person.”

“You’re kidding. You mean you’re still scared of the water?”

“We can’t all be athletes, Sally,” I said huffily, clasping my arms against the cold.

“I know, but flunking the swimming test,” she said, laughing, “in front of the entire senior class? That’s got to be some kind of record.” Her voice had taken on a derisive tone I hadn’t heard in years. “I didn’t know a human body could sink to the bottom like that—like a rock. But you did, right to the bottom of the Y pool!”

I drew myself up haughtily. “Thank you very much for reminding me. Anyway, I think I’ll skip the boat ride.” I turned back toward the house and mounted the first step.

“No, you won’t.”

I turned. Sally was still standing half out, half in the boat. By the half light from the house, I could see that she held a small gun, pointed in my direction.

“Well, you look ridiculous,” I said curtly.

It was true. I had seen a woman in a James Bond movie strike that very same pose—not as warmly dressed, of course, but with the same cool, disdainful look on her face. The acrobat inside my chest started auditioning for Barnum and Bailey. I tried to ignore him.

“What kind of a toy have you got there?”

“If you don’t want to see a demonstration of this toy,” Sally said, “you’ll join me in this boat.”

This time I was the rocket scientist who figured out the situation: Sally was not what she had seemed, and it behooved me to cooperate with her for the time being. None too steadily, I scrambled aboard and took a seat in the stern.

She pushed us loose of the rocks and hopped lightly aboard, still holding that ridiculously tiny gun.

“What do you call that thing? I mean, a Beretta or something?” I asked, curiosity getting the better of shock.

Sally tilted her head and examined the gun. “You know, I never thought to ask. It was a gift from a friend. It fits nicely in my coat pocket and it’s quite easy to use.”

She held it up and pulled the trigger. There was a loud noise that caused me to jump, rocking the boat. A stone on the shore leaped.

“And I have good aim,” she added unnecessarily.

With one oar, Sally maneuvered the boat around until the bow faced the lake. She then turned to me.

“Row,” she instructed, gesturing towards the oars with the gun, “that way.” She pointed east, toward Vermont.

I set my purse in the bottom of the boat and rowed. A little crookedly at first, but I gradually got the hang of it.

It seemed to me I was entitled to a few answers. “Sally,” I asked in my sternest teacher’s voice, “what’s going on here?”

Sally pulled something from her jacket pocket and held it up. Her gold bracelet with its disc bangle gleamed in the moonlight.

“Recognize this?”

“What about your bracelet?” I asked, leaning forward to examine it.

“Don’t give me that. I’ve seen you staring at it every time I wear it. Trying to read the initials, of course. Marguerite figured it all out before you did, you know. She noticed it once when we were doing business together, so to speak. Asked me what the initials stood for. And like a fool, I told her. Row!” she ordered, and replaced the bracelet in her pocket.

My steel-trap mind clicked into place at last. “The monogram. Ursula Dodd Jennings,” I said, remembering her maiden name. “UDJ.”

“Right,” she said. “Keep rowing.”

I rowed. My shoulders hurt, but I kept on.

“But I thought . . . I mean, they arrested Judith.”

“Yes, thanks to a little something I stashed in her garage. You were on the wrong track, but you’d have figured it out, eventually. I know that.” She leaned forward. “I heard your telephone conference with the police today. Your nephew tried to divert my attention, but I have excellent hearing.”

“He’s not—” I began, but stopped. If my heart was any judge, Vern already was my nephew.

“Yes, he’s not very bright, is he?” she finished for me, switching gun hands to zip her jacket higher. “He never saw me take that little pink slip.”

“Oh,” I said, nodding with her, “and you’re the drug dealer Marguerite was after.”

“You wanna know something funny?” she asked conversationally. “I’d quit. I’d actually finished with that whole business.”

My eyes had long since adjusted to the dim light. I watched the gun sag slightly in her grip. Did I have time to grab it?

Her hand tightened.

No, I didn’t.
Dear Lord in Heaven, help me!

“I told you about the real-estate market. Ever since they jerked the air base out of here. Whoever thought they’d take away a military base that’s been here since 1812?”

“Who indeed?”

I shrugged and kept rowing. At least it was helping me keep warm. I looked out across the water. There was a thin, metallic buzz in the distance. A boat. Too far away to do me any good.

“Things have been tough for Barry and I, thanks to you.”

I forgot to be frightened.

“What do you mean?” I squawked and stopped rowing in outrage. She had made a number of errors in grammar so far, but I decided to let them pass.

“I’ll tell you.” All at once, she looked past me towards the New York shore and said, “Jennings Village.”

“Beg pardon?” I said with ludicrous, parentally programmed courtesy.

“Jennings Village—a commercial pedestrian mall of upscale shops and restaurants in charming Victorian homes,” she quoted. “That’s what the brochure says, anyway. I’ve got a thousand of ’em printed up. And every one of those shops and restaurants paying rent to the UDJ Corporation.”

As she talked, she held the gun with both hands, pointed at the bottom of the boat. Better not disturb her now. If she shot out a hole, this thing would surely sink, and that didn’t bear thinking about.

“It’s been my dream for years. I’ve been buying houses on Jury Street since we started the company, you know.”

“You couldn’t have! There are people living in them.”

She laughed. “Rentals, Amelia. All rentals. Of course, part of the lease is to keep it confidential. But they’re all up next year, and if everything goes according to plan, my contacts in the city council will see that Jury Street is closed off—at taxpayer expense, thank you very much!”

“But—but—” I spluttered, “why didn’t you tell us what you wanted to do?”

Sally snorted. “Yeah, right. And let the prices go through the roof. I paid top dollar as it was. Bought all eleven houses with my own money. But I ran out.” With a wave of the gun, she gestured for me to start rowing again.

I complied, though my shoulder muscles screamed in protest. “Ran out?”

“Of money, of course. I went everywhere I could. Begged everybody I knew. No luck.”

“So you decided to deal drugs?”

“Don’t say it like that! They ought to legalize them anyway!”

So that was how she rationalized it.

“And once I got enough money, I quit.”

“But then Marguerite—”

Her laughter was mirthless. “That’s right, then along comes self-righteous little Marguerite LeBow. Of course, I was on to her right away. Marguerite the narc! What a joke!” She snorted. “Using all those TV clichés and pretending to need the stuff. It was pathetic. I have some friends, Amelia. Business acquaintances. Of course, it’s nobody you would know, but when I told them a problem had come up, they gave me this little pill.” She spoke in a baby talk voice and held up thumb and forefinger to indicate how tiny the pill had been. “You’re supposed to put it in food, but I had a better idea. She took allergy medicine, you know that?”

I shook my head. I’d been learning a lot about Marguerite in the past few days.

I continued to row. My back ached. I could see the lights of our town over Sally’s shoulder. There were people there. My friends. And police. But we were rowing away from them. The lake was wide and they were too far away to hear us.

Lord? Are You listening?

“That’s right,” Sally continued, “prescription capsules. In her purse. I just opened a capsule, dumped out the powder, and stuck in the pill.”

“What kind of pill?”

“I forget. Some kind of spy stuff. Who cares? When she took it, I was nowhere near the place.”

But I was.

“Sally, even if she had turned you in, it wasn’t that serious. They aren’t that hard on drug charges these days,” I continued, making up criminal statutes as I went along. “You probably would have gotten, um, probation or something. You didn’t need to kill her!”

Sally’s face registered mild surprise. “Are you kidding? Do you realize what would happen to Jennings Realty—and Jennings Village—if even a hint of that came out?” She shook her head. “No. I worked too hard to have somebody like Marguerite LeBow spoil it.” She spoke the name with disgust.

I shivered, but not entirely from the cold.

Sally gazed philosophically across the lake. The breeze rippled her hair. Her profile looked almost noble. “You can see how it was, can’t you, Amelia?” she asked mildly.

“Yes, Sally,” I said with breathless sarcasm, not believing the direction this conversation was taking, “sure I can.” I continued to row.

Suddenly, she turned back toward me. Obviously, she’d missed the irony in my tone.

“Listen, we’ve been friends, haven’t we? Ever since grade school? You’re an honest person. A religious person. Swear to me, before God, that this’ll go no further, and we’ll row back to the Fields’ place and forget all about it. How about it?”

I could see her eyes, open wide and staring sincerely into mine.

I shipped the oars once again. “I swear not to tell, and we’ll go home?” I wanted to get the finer points of this little contract straight.

Dear God,
I prayed desperately,
is this how You’re going to rescue me?

She nodded vigorously. “Yes. Just swear. I know you’ll keep your word.”

I believed she was serious. “Well, okay, I, er—” I began.

“You swear?” she asked eagerly. There was a broad smile on her face.