No Place Like Home (11 page)

“I hope not.” Then I hesitated. Suppose Alex
walked in now and brought up the photo I had found in the barn. “Actually . . . ” I hesitated. I didn't know what to say.

The prosecutor's expression changed. “Has there been another incident, Mrs. Nolan?”

I reached in the pocket of my slacks and pulled out the newspaper photo. “This was taped to a post in the barn. My little boy found it when he went out to see his pony this morning.” Choking at the deception, I asked, “Do you know who these people are?”

MacKingsley took the picture from me. I noticed that he was careful to hold it by its edge. He examined it, then looked at me. “Yes, I do,” he said. I felt that he was attempting to sound matter-of-fact. “This is a picture of the family who restored this house.”

“The Barton family!” I hated myself for managing to sound genuinely surprised.

“Yes,” he said. He was watching for my reaction.

“I guess I suspected that,” I said. I know my voice was nervous and strained.

“Mrs. Nolan, we might be able to lift some fingerprints from this picture,” MacKingsley said. “Who else has handled it?”

“No one else. My husband had already left this morning when I found it. It was taped to the post too high up for Jack to reach it.”

“I see. I want to take it and have it examined for fingerprints. Do you by any chance have a plastic bag that I could drop it in?”

“Of course.” I was grateful to be able to move. I did not want this man to be studying me face-to-face any longer.

He followed me into the kitchen and I took a sandwich bag out of the drawer and handed it to him.

He dropped the picture into it. “I won't take any more of your time, Mrs. Nolan,” he said. “But I have to ask you this: Were you or your husband planning to let the police know that you'd had another trespasser on your property?”

“This seemed so trivial,” I hedged.

“I agree that it doesn't compare with what happened yesterday. However, the fact remains that someone was trespassing on your property again. There may be fingerprints we can get off this picture, and that may prove helpful in finding who is responsible for all this. We'll need your fingerprints for comparison purposes. I know that you have had a lot of stress, and I don't want you to have to come down to the office. I'll arrange for a Mendham police officer to come over in a few minutes with a fingerprint kit. He can take them right here.”

A frightening possibility occurred to me. Would they just use my fingerprints to distinguish them from any others on the picture, or would they also run them through the system? Some kid in town had admitted the vandalism last Halloween. Suppose the police decided to check the juvenile files. Mine might be on record there.

“Mrs. Nolan, if you find any evidence of someone being on this property,
please
give us a call. I'm also going to ask the police to ride past the house regularly.”

“I think that's a very good idea.”

I had not heard Alex come in, and I guess MacKingsley hadn't either, because we both turned abruptly to find Alex standing in the doorway of the kitchen. I introduced the two men, and MacKingsley repeated to him that he would check the picture I'd found in the barn for fingerprints.

To my relief, Alex did not ask to see it. Surely MacKingsley would have found it odd if he had known that I hadn't shown it to my husband. He left immediately after that, then Alex and I looked at each other. He put his arms around me. “Peace, Ceil,” he said. “I'm sorry I blew up. It's just that you've got to let me in on things. I am your husband, remember? Don't treat me as a stranger who has no business knowing what's going on.”

He took up my offer to get out the salmon that he had left on the lunch table. We ate together on the patio and I told him about the offer Georgette Grove had made. “Certainly, start looking,” he agreed. “And if we end up with two houses for a while, so be it.” Then he added, “Who knows, we may end up needing both of them.”

I knew he meant it as a joke, but neither one of us smiled, and the old truism rushed through my
mind. “Many a true word is spoken in jest.” The doorbell rang. I opened the door, and the Mendham police officer with the fingerprint kit stepped inside. As I rolled the tips of my fingers in the ink, I thought of having done this before—the night I killed my mother.

W
hen she arrived at the office, Georgette Grove sensed the tension in the air between Henry and Robin. Henry's habitual timid Casper Milquetoast expression was now one of petulance, and his thin lips were set in a stubborn line.

Robin's eyes were sending angry darts at him, and her body language suggested that she was ready to spring out of her chair and throw him a punch.

“What's up?” Georgette asked brusquely, hoping that she would signal to the two of them that she was not in a mood for petty co-worker hissy fits.

“It's very simple,” Robin snapped. “Henry is in one of his doom-and-gloom moods, and I told him you had enough on your plate without him hanging out the crepe and wringing his hands.”

“If you call the potential of a law suit that would finish this agency ‘doom and gloom,' you ought not to come into the real estate business,” Henry snapped back. “Georgette, I assume you've read the newspapers? I ask you to remember that I have a stake in this agency, too.”

“A twenty percent stake,” Georgette said levelly, “which, if my arithmetic hasn't failed me, means that I own eighty percent.”

“I also own twenty percent of the property on Route 24 and I want my money from it,” Henry continued. “We have an offer. Either sell it or buy me out.”

“Henry, you know perfectly well that the people who want to buy that property are fronting for Ted Cartwright. If he gets his hands on it, he'll have enough land to press for commercial zoning. Long ago, we agreed that we'd eventually deed that property to the state.”

“Or that you would buy me out,” Henry insisted stubbornly. “Georgette, let me tell you something. That house on Old Mill Lane is cursed. You're the only real estate agent in town who would accept the exclusive listing on it. You've wasted this firm's money advertising it. When Alex Nolan asked to see it, you should have told him the truth about it right then and there. The morning I showed that place to Celia Nolan, there was something positively chilling in the atmosphere of the room where the murder took place. She felt it and it upset her. As I also told you, the damn place smelled like a funeral parlor.”

“Her husband ordered the flowers. I didn't,” Georgette replied hotly.

“I saw the picture in the newspaper of that poor girl collapsing, and
you
are responsible for it. I hope you realize that.”

“All right, Henry, you've had your say,” Robin
said, suddenly speaking up, her tone even and firm. “Why don't you calm down?” She looked at Georgette. “I was hoping to spare you from getting hit with this the minute you walked in.”

Georgette looked gratefully at Robin. I was her age when I opened this agency, she thought. She's got what it takes to make people want the houses she shows them. Henry doesn't give a damn anymore whether or not he makes a sale. He wants to retire so much that he can taste it. “Look, Henry,” she said, “there is a potential solution. Alex Nolan did publicly admit that he cut me off when I tried to tell him about the background of the house. The Nolans want to live in the area. I'm going to go through every listing I can find and line up some houses to show Celia Nolan. If I find something she likes, I'll waive the commission. Alex Nolan didn't even want to press a complaint against whoever vandalized the house. I have a feeling they'll both be amenable to settling this matter quietly.”

Henry Paley shrugged and, without answering, turned and walked down the hall to his office.

“I swear he'll be disappointed if you manage to pull that rabbit out of the hat,” Robin commented.

“I'm afraid you're right,” Georgette agreed, “but I
am
going to pull it out.”

It was an unexpectedly busy morning with a young drop-in couple who seemed seriously interested in buying a home in the Mendham area. Georgette spent several hours driving them to view places in their price range, then calling the owners
and getting permission to go through the ones they liked. They left after promising to come back with their parents to look at a house they seemed to have fallen in love with.

Georgette had a quick sandwich and coffee at her desk, and for the next two hours went through the multiple-broker listing of residences for sale and studied it carefully in the hope that one of them would jump out as an attractive prospect for Celia Nolan.

She finally culled the list down to four possibilities. She would push the two she had an exclusive on, but show Celia the others if necessary. She was friends with the agent who had those two listings, and could count on making some kind of arrangement about her share of the commission.

Her fingers crossed, she called the Nolans' number and was relieved and delighted that Celia seemed totally amenable to looking at other houses in the area. Next, she made phone calls to the owners of the houses she had selected and asked to see them immediately.

At four o'clock she was on her way. “I'll be back,” she told Robin. “Wish me luck.”

Three of the houses she eliminated from consideration. All were charming in their own way, but not, she was sure, what Celia Nolan would be interested in. The one she had saved for last seemed, from the description, to be a real possibility. It was a farmhouse that had been restored, and was vacant now because the owner had been transferred
by his employer on short notice. She remembered that she had heard that the house showed well because it had just been redecorated. It was near the town line of Peapack, in the same area in which Jackie Kennedy once had a home. I never did get to see this one because it received an immediate offer last month, but then the sale fell through, Georgette reflected.

A beautiful piece of property, she thought as she drove up to the entrance. It has twelve acres, so there's plenty of room for the pony. She stopped to open the gate of the split-rail fence. This kind of fence is so in harmony with the surroundings, she decided as she pushed the gate back. Some of those gaudy gates and fences they're putting on the Mc-Mansions are an insult to the eye.

She got back in the car, then drove up the long driveway and parked at the house's front door. She opened the lockbox and was glad to see that the key was there, meaning that no one else was showing the house. Of course, nobody is around, she thought, otherwise there'd be a car here. She let herself in and walked through the rooms. The house was immaculate. Every room had been repainted recently. The kitchen was state-of-the-art, while retaining the look of an old-fashioned country kitchen.

It's in move-in condition, she thought. Even though it's more expensive than Old Mill Lane, my guess is that if Celia Nolan likes it, the price wouldn't be a problem.

With growing hope, she inspected the house
from attic to basement. In the finished basement, a storage closet near the stairs was locked and the key for it was missing. I know Henry showed this house the other day, Georgette thought with growing irritation. I wonder if he absentmindedly pocketed the key. Last week he couldn't find his key to the office, and then later was searching everywhere for his car key. It doesn't have to be his fault, of course; right now I'm ready to blame him for everything, she admitted to herself.

There was a splotch of red on the floor outside the closet. Georgette knelt down to examine it. It was paint—she was sure of that. The dining room was a rich, deep shade of red. This was probably the storage closet for leftover cans of paint, she decided.

She went back upstairs, closed and locked the door, and returned the house key to the lockbox. As soon as she reached the office, she called Celia Nolan and raved about the farmhouse.

“It does sound worth taking a look at.”

Celia sounds low-key, Georgette thought, but at least she's willing to see it. “It won't last on the market, Mrs. Nolan,” she assured her. “If ten o'clock tomorrow morning is all right with you, I'll be happy to pick you up.”

“No, that's all right. I'd rather drive myself. I always like to have my own car. That way I can be sure I'll be on time to pick up Jack at school.”

“I understand. Let me give you the address,” Georgette said. She listened as Celia repeated it, then was about to give directions, but Celia interrupted.

“There's another call coming in. I'll meet you there tomorrow at ten o'clock sharp.”

Georgette snapped shut her cell phone and shrugged. When Celia Nolan has time to think, she'll probably call back for directions. That house isn't the easiest place to find. She waited expectantly for her phone to ring, but it did not. She probably has a navigation system in her car, she decided.