Shadow of a Spout (11 page)

When she was done making up her cot she sat on it cross-legged and told the two older women what Josh had reported and what Thelma had said. She watched her grandmother’s face, the wrinkles that outlined her mouth emphasized by the pool of light from the bedside lamp. “What are you thinking, Nana?”

“I’m just wondering who Orlando Pettigrew would be talking to that he would tell so much, and how it could be precisely the information we would want to know?”

“What are you saying?” Laverne asked.

She shook her head. “I don’t know. Don’t mind me; I’m just tired, I guess.”

But as Sophie showered and changed into pj’s, she pondered what her grandmother had said. She wished she had been there to see exactly how it happened that Thelma overheard such a pivotal conversation. The woman was not stealthy and she was most definitely not quiet, though she seemed to think she was, so the man
must
have known she was there. Therefore he must have known she would hear him declare his wife a cheat.

Was it posthumous damage control? Was he trying to make it seem like he had no reason to kill her because there was no rift between them? Maybe. One thing was for sure, she needed to find out much more about what was going on in the ITCS, because there sure seemed to be a lot of skulduggery and extreme emotions.

Chapter 12

I
t was early, so Rose left Laverne and Sophie sleeping and went down to the café that fronted the Stone and Scone Inn for a cup of tea. Laverne rarely got to sleep in, especially on a Sunday, when church beckoned. Sophie had never been an early riser. Years of working in restaurants meant that she was accustomed to being up until three in the morning, and asleep until ten a.m. or so. But for Rose the early morning was the best time of the day, when it was shiny and new, fresh and green.

During the dark period after her husband and son died every morning just brought a fresh wave of misery, if she had even managed to sleep at all, but now she was content. Her grandchildren had been the saving grace in her life. Rosalind had her faults, and she didn’t spend much time with her mother in Gracious Grove, but Rose would always be grateful to her daughter for bringing three children into the world and making sure they spent lots of time with their nana.

The coffee shop was comforting like a hundred others, with bright lights, the clink of china, and the faint sound of the radio tuned to an oldies station. There was a diner counter for folks to sip coffee at, red upholstered booths lined the walls and the windowed front, and a bank of booths with high dividers filled the center. There was a local paper on the counter near the cash register, the
Butterhill Bugle
; Rose picked up a copy and found a booth that had just been vacated near the front window. A waitress cleared the table while Rose ordered tea. She leafed through the paper while she waited.

The murder of Zunia Pettigrew had made the front page, but the article didn’t have any information that was new to Rose. She soon laid the paper down and looked around with interest. Cheery waitresses dressed in gold polyester uniforms bustled from booth to booth, teasing regulars, refilling cups and clearing tables. Rose appreciated the scent of fresh coffee, and the smells were making her hungry, as were the sounds, especially the sizzle of bacon on the flattop, where a short-order cook whipped up breakfast for hungry Butterhill folk. She thought she’d stick to toast, though, her usual morning meal.

They overlooked the main street, which was just beginning to get busy with early churchgoers. The booths in the coffee shop were now packed. Folks still had to work and many stopped for a coffee or breakfast at the Stone and Scone coffee shop; there was a police officer, a couple of young women in scrubs—maybe employees at a local nursing home or hospice, since there was no hospital in the town—and as usual, the local gathering of farmers in dirty overalls, sitting together and laughing at old jokes while trading new gossip.

Rose had been coming to Butterhill every other year for several years. With only a couple of days spent each time she couldn’t say she knew every corner of the town. But she did know some of the inn staff, and waved and smiled when she saw a familiar face. Bertie Handler, the inn owner, had slumped into a booth on the wall near the servery and was glumly stirring spoons of sugar into black coffee. He looked dreadful, like he hadn’t slept for ages. She was about to go over to ask him if he was all right when Nora Sommer, sat down opposite him with a stack of paperwork under her arm.

The waitress brought Rose’s tea and buttered toast, so she decided to eat before intruding. She wanted to speak with them both, curious if the convention was going on in the face of the awful events of early Saturday morning. Conversation rose to a lively chatter, with many folks arguing over the
Bugle
article, it seemed, from the number of times she heard Zunia’s unusual name spoken.

Sophie had told them what she had gleaned the night before about the Pettigrews, and Rose put it together with what she knew. Zunia and Orlando had met as members of the Niagara Teapot Collectors Group, centered in Wheatfield, New York, near Niagara. Orlando, a real estate agent and antiques aficionado, had first joined with his wife, Dahlia, who was really the teapot collector of the two, if Rose remembered right from the first time they met. In fact, it seemed to her that Dahlia was a long-time member, maybe even one of those who had started the ITCS, though her husband was a more recent member. Dahlia was a nice woman but mousy and kind of sad-looking. She had little spunk and tended to melt into the background.

Her husband was not an overly attractive man, but he was vigorous and cheerful with his first wife in tow. Both the vigor and good humor appeared to have been sapped, truncated by the whirlwind that was Zunia, the new Mrs. Pettigrew. Orlando’s divorce from Dahlia had happened offstage, so to speak, and Rose had not learned about the new Mrs. Pettigrew until Laverne reported back after last year’s conference. It was a done deal, and Zunia had quashed her husband’s stated intention from the previous year to run for the division head, taking center stage and declaring herself the front-runner.

Rhiannon Galway had tried to put her name forth as a candidate, Laverne told Rose, but Zunia had made sure that Rhiannon backed away. No one was
quite
sure what Zunia held over Rhiannon’s head, other than vague rumors made worse by her quitting the race, but whatever it was did the trick. Zunia ran unopposed with her fawning husband’s obvious approval. According to Thelma’s report from her encounter with him, Pettigrew claimed to be crushed by his wife’s murder. Something about the relationships among that group at the conference bothered Rose. She thought back to Friday, closing her eyes and picturing the conference room and the various interactions she had witnessed.

They had been seated in rows, but from her angle she could see Orlando as he watched his wife. Ah, yes, there it was, just a moment, but a pivotal one.
That
was the reason she didn’t feel convinced of Pettigrew’s grief! There was one brief flash, a look of intense distaste and dislike as Zunia critiqued the first two presenting their teapots. The scales had dropped from Orlando Pettigrew’s eyes, and what he saw when he looked at his wife was anyone’s guess, but it didn’t look like love to Rose. She opened her eyes, wondering what to do with her thoughts. How could you tell the police that you just didn’t think the victim’s husband was really sad to see her gone? Maybe Laverne’s nephew would be able to help.

Bertie Handler was just getting up from his meeting with Nora Sommer, so it didn’t look like she’d be able to corner him alone, as she had intended. He retreated back into the inn through the glass door that opened onto the lobby. Rose, finished with her tea and toast, left money for the bill plus a handsome tip and approached Nora.

“How are you, dear?” she asked, sitting down opposite her in the seat Bertie had vacated.

“Pardon?” she said, looking up. “Oh, hello, Rose. I’m not bad. How are you this morning?”

“I’m fine. Just a little tired after yesterday.”

Nora sighed. “I know. How dreadful! It’s not good publicity for the ITCS. Walter is most concerned.”

Funny that Zunia’s death struck Nora first as a blow to the ITCS, but that was her main focus, Rose supposed. She noticed the schedule of events that Nora had marked up with a black pen. “Are we going ahead with the convention, then? We’ve only got today.”

“We’re going ahead and we’ll cram as much as we can into one day,” Nora said, not looking up from her work. “It’s the highlight of the year for so many! We can’t let all these folks down. Since many of us are staying until tomorrow anyway, I plan to canvass the other members and see if we can finish it up with an evening seminar, if folks don’t mind cramming three presentations into one day. I’ve already talked to the speakers, and they’re all on board.”

“And we’ll have to figure out what to do about the divisional presidency.” Rose watched the other woman, wondering how to get onto the subject she really wanted to talk about.

“
Walter
will have to figure out what to do about that,” Nora corrected, looking up.

“I suppose,” Rose said.

“There’s no ‘suppose’ about it. There would not normally be an election this year, as the president is elected for two years. Since this is midterm, though, Walter has the right to appoint someone to serve out the term.”

For the first time Rose wondered if the real smarts in running the ITCS was the woman sitting opposite her. Was Walter nothing more than a figurehead? But why wouldn’t Nora take over the society herself? Even a woman as traditional as she would certainly not think running a teapot collectors society was unbecoming of her womanhood. “I heard something about the convention not being held here in Butterhill after this year. Bertie seemed quite concerned.”

“I just told him not to worry about it. We’ll be back here next year as always. That was some wild speculation on Zunia’s part.”

“But I thought she and Bertie were special friends?” Laverne had said that the previous year Zunia and the inn owner were “thick as thieves.”

Nora’s carefully darkened eyebrows lifted. “A woman like Zunia . . . You have to know her affections were fickle in the extreme.”

“She did seem mercurial, at the very least.” Rose paused, but then plunged ahead with what she wanted to say. “You
do
know I didn’t do it, Nora . . . murder poor Zunia, I mean. I could never . . .” She shook her head. Maybe it was ridiculous to think anyone would suspect an eighty-something-year-old woman, but the fact that it was her teapot had rattled her.

“My dear, of
course
I know you didn’t do it!” Nora said, reaching across and patting Rose’s hand, her diamond rings, adorning most fingers, glittering in the pendant light over the booth. “Set your mind to rest on that point.” Her tone was warm and her smile genuine.

“Thank you, Nora. I appreciate that. Maybe it seems silly, but I couldn’t bear it if anyone thought I did it.”

“No one who knows you would think you would do something so awful, even to someone as
poisonous
as Zunia.” Her expression was placid, but a snapping anger flared in her dark eyes.

Rose nodded, but her mind was on that look, even as Nora went back to her schedule. That was another thing she had seen at the convention: When Walter reached out to calm Zunia down, Nora had a look of outrage on her face. It was just momentary but unmistakable. And she remembered something one of the women had said, when chafed about running for division president, that she wouldn’t want to work with “that letch,” Walter.

There was one circumstance that would fit with Nora’s fury and Orlando’s disillusionment. Walter Sommer could have been having an affair with Zunia Pettigrew, but even if that was so, it didn’t mean Nora had murdered Zunia. Why would she? Zunia was married and Walter appeared to be known for his flings. Or
rumored
flings, Rose corrected herself, not willing to make that assumption. That indicated a wandering interest that would never light on one woman for long. “I’m so sorry, Nora,” she said simply, watching her.

“Sorry?” The woman stared across the table, arrested in the middle of making notes in the margin of the schedule.

Rose paused, trying to find the right words. “I’m so sorry for what you’ve had to put up with. I know it hasn’t always been easy.”

“What do you mean?”

“There have been rumors. Aren’t there always?”

“Those women! What gossips,” she said. “It was that Faye Alice Benson, wasn’t it? She’s got a big mouth.”

Rose’s breath caught in her throat; she didn’t want to get anyone in trouble. “Actually, no, it wasn’t her,” she said.
Or not
just
her
, she thought, trying to justify the fib. “You must have known Zunia would talk.”

Nora smiled, her demeanor calm after the momentary blaze of anger. “Whatever the rumor mill would have you believe, he was
not
going to leave me for her. He saw what was happening to Orlando and how poor Dahlia was suffering. Zunia was toxic, and Walter is not an idiot. He knows what side his bread is buttered on.”

“Wiser men than he have been taken in by a certain kind of woman.” Rose was just sending out feelers, probing in a quest to get at the truth. “I’ll confess I didn’t see what attracted them—not being a fan of Zunia’s—but she certainly had some men wrapped around her little finger.”

Nora shook her head, adamant in her conviction. “You may think my husband is a fool, but he’s not
that
much of a fool.” She hesitated, but then continued, leaning slightly across the table, “I’ll tell you something in confidence, Rose: All of our money is mine. We married many years ago, but my father made sure my money was tied up right and tight. I cried, begged and pleaded, because Walter was a little miffed when my father insisted on a kind of a prenuptial agreement, but Daddy said that if he loved me it wouldn’t matter, and if he didn’t, then I’d be protected. Walter knows where we stand, and he’s happy with it.”

“So you knew about everything?” Rose asked. She didn’t need to be explicit.

“Of course. I’ve known about every one of Walter’s little
adventures
. He
tells
me.” She appeared amused. “I told him a long time ago, do whatever you want, just don’t expect a divorce unless you plan on being broke. I promised ’til death do us part.” She gathered up the paperwork and stood. “And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go. I have calls to make and the rest of the day to plan. You
will
be coming to the talk on hallmarks, won’t you? We’re having it first thing this morning. I’m going off to tell everyone now.” She whirled and swept out of the coffee shop.