Touch-Me-Not (16 page)

C
HAPTER
29

“I don’t blame Mr. Weiss for being so upset,” Amelia said when they were in the car after talking to Jim Weiss. “Some lecher spying on his daughter? I can’t imagine how I’d feel if some man were spying on Elizabeth. And his daughter’s only sixteen.”

“A sophomore in high school.”

“Elizabeth is old enough to take care of herself, but I might have been tempted to do violence to whoever did that to her.” She looked away from the road briefly. “Mr. Watts was stabbed in the throat with a knitting needle, wasn’t he? And Jim Weiss is one of the knitters?”

“The weapon that killed LeRoy wasn’t necessarily a knitting needle. He was stabbed right about here.” Victoria ran her fingers down the side of her neck.

“But that would have done the job, right?”

“It was my thought that a knitting needle could be the weapon. Doc Jeffers, the medical examiner, said the weapon was a sharp, pointed implement, like an awl or screwdriver, or fid, or even a pencil or ballpoint pen.”

The afternoon had turned a misty gray. In the glacial swales, mist had thickened into dense fog that rose fender-high, an opaque cloud that flowed like batter toward the sea to their right. Wisps of fog drifted through the branches of the oaks and spangled the new grass.

“The knitters’ group Mr. Weiss belongs to isn’t exactly an old ladies’—” Amelia stopped abruptly.

Victoria ignored the implied slur. “The group hopes to finish the quilt by mid-June. All of them carry around at least one set of knitting needles. . . .” She stopped, thinking again of LeRoy’s widow with her mismatched needles.

“What is it? What were you about to say?”

“Nothing,” Victoria replied.

Amelia tightened her grip on the wheel. “Whether one’s daughter is sixteen or thirty, it’s equally upsetting.”

“Of course.”

Slightly ahead of them to the left was a large patch of showy pink flowers. Victoria was absorbed in her thoughts and didn’t notice them.

Amelia slowed the car and stopped. “Lady slippers, Mother. Just look! I remember how every May around this time you pointed them out to us.”

Victoria sat up. She welcomed the first sight of the Vineyard’s rare, showy orchids. The Island had as many species of orchids as Hawaii, but they tended to be tiny and inconspicuous. These were neither. About a dozen plants clustered together, standing almost a foot high. The flowers had light pink pouchlike lower petals with dark pink veining, overhung by dark magenta upper petals.

Victoria turned to her daughter and smiled. “Every May my mother pointed them out to me, too. Old County Road was nothing but rutted sand then.”

“Would you like to get out?”

“Perhaps tomorrow. I want to interview as many women as we can today, then get home to write up my notes. Before I forget them,” she added, then felt ashamed of herself, hoping Amelia hadn’t noticed the wicked little dig.

Amelia checked behind her and pulled away from the side of the road, and they drove in companionable silence.

Victoria said, “I recall distinctly how I felt as a teenager. I trusted adults, and no adult ever betrayed that trust. At sixteen, I felt awkward and unsure of myself. I was painfully modest. In part, that was the times, but I don’t believe teenagers have changed much.”

“I don’t believe they have, either.” Amelia slowed to a crawl to pass a horse and rider. The rider, a helmeted young girl, lifted her hand in thanks. Victoria waved back.

“What’s our next stop?”

Victoria consulted the list Casey had drawn up for her and sighed. “This is not going to be pleasant.” She gave Amelia directions to the home of one of the victims.

That afternoon, they spoke to three women and heard their identical reactions when they’d found out about the videos. Shock. Embarrassment. Violation. Anger. Disgust.

On the way home, Victoria was silent.

Amelia said, “Thank you for letting me come with you. You’re quite a remarkable woman.”

Victoria continued to gaze out the window.

“You were sensitive,” said Amelia, eyes back on the road. “You always were sensitive to our feelings when we were growing up.”

Victoria smiled faintly.

“You must feel drained. Let’s light the fire and have a good strong drink.”

“That sounds good.” Victoria looked at her watch. “Elizabeth should be home by now.”

Elizabeth had lighted the fire and it danced welcome warmth and light into the parlor.

Victoria held her glass up. Firelight flickered through the ruby red drink. “I invited Bill O’Malley for dinner tomorrow night, Elizabeth. He’d asked about you.”

“He brought his boat into the harbor to show me,” said Elizabeth. “Only I was off duty and didn’t see him.”

“The dump truck person,” said Amelia. “So he has a boat, too?”

“A boat and an airplane,” said Victoria.

“I’ll cook,” Elizabeth offered. “The striped bass are running, and I bet I can get Janet to give us one.”

“Boston baked beans tomorrow.” Victoria eased herself out of her chair. “I’ll put the beans to soak.”

“Beans go nicely with fish,” said Elizabeth.

“What do I wear to dinner with this man?” asked Amelia.

“Clean jeans, Mom,” replied Elizabeth.

The following morning, a day of drizzling rain, Victoria boiled the beans she’d soaked all night, then spooned them into her bean pot with an onion, molasses, and salt pork and put them in a slow oven to cook all day.

Then she and Amelia set out again.

“Who’s next on our list?” Amelia asked before she started the car.

Victoria looked down at the paper. Too many names. What a swath LeRoy Watts had cut. How many lives he’d hurt. “We should probably talk next to Jackie, LeRoy’s sister-in-law. She and Sarah don’t get along. After LeRoy was killed, I made the mistake of asking Jackie to stay with her sister. A poor choice on my part.” She looked up. “You’ll want to head toward Up-Island Cronig’s.”

Jackie lived in a small house in Island Farms. She came to the door with a towel wrapped like a turban around her head. She was almost as tall as Victoria and had a perfect peaches and cream complexion.

“I just stepped out of the shower. I looked for hidden cameras first.” Jackie made a wry face. “What can I do for you, Mrs. Trumbull?”

“May we come in? This is my daughter Amelia. I wanted to talk to you about LeRoy Watts’s murder.”

Jackie offered her hand to Amelia. “Come in. I don’t know what I can tell you. LeRoy was an asshole—excuse me, Mrs. Trumbull.” She led the way to a small, neat living room with an L-shaped couch facing a gigantic TV screen with a game show playing. Jackie turned off the sound. Victoria was transfixed by the characters, who were emoting soundlessly with great enthusiasm. “Keeps me company,” Jackie said. “Have a seat. Don’t mind me if I comb out my hair.”

Amelia glanced at her mother, who nodded. Victoria had been strict about the impropriety of fussing with one’s hair outside the privacy of the bedroom or bath.

“I hadn’t realized he’d changed his name to Watts,” Victoria said.

“Oh, sure. He thought that was terribly smart. He’d changed it before I knew him, so I never heard his real name,” said Jackie, unwrapping the damp towel from her head.

“I was hoping to get your reactions to the murder. Do you have any thoughts?”

“Damn right I do. I know for sure who killed him.” Jackie shot up. “Excuse me. I have to get my comb from the bathroom.”

She returned, running a large pink comb through her tangled damp hair. She picked out loose hairs from the comb and tossed them into the wastepaper basket.

Amelia smiled.

Victoria frowned.

“You asked if I had any thoughts about who killed him. Don’t hold me to it. The obvious killer is my dear sweet sister, his wife. Widow. What I said in the first place.”

“But you denied what you said.”

“Look at it logically,” Jackie went on. “She’s married to God’s gift to the Island, and all of a sudden—wham!—the guy’s done worse than sleeping around. Drooling over chickies in their showers, Island chickies he knows, calling women and breathing at them. Slavering. You know? Totally disgusting. The entire Island is snickering behind her back. ‘Wasn’t she giving out at home?’ You know, that kind of stuff. Blaming her for the way he acted.”

“Really?” said Victoria.

“I know my sister.” Jackie combed her hair over her face, then swept it to one side. “You know the way this Island is, Mrs. Trumbull. We love weird stuff like this.”

“But why would she kill her husband?” Amelia put in. “Sorry, Mother. I should keep quiet.”

“Quite all right,” said Victoria.

“I know my sister,” Jackie repeated. “She’s wound so tight, butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.”

Amelia coughed politely.

“You think she snapped?” asked Victoria.

“Of course she snapped. She sees that video that Emily Cameron got from her boyfriend. She could hardly believe her dear gentle Roy would do such a thing. Then her twins get caught playing with Roy’s Taser at school. Coulda killed someone. The same day, Roy is handed a court date for owning the Taser and thinks he might go to jail. The last straw is he hits her. Did you see the bruise?”

Victoria nodded.

Jackie combed, shook out her hair, and combed again. “He had the hots for me. For years.” Jackie smiled. “I told Sarah he was hitting on me, and my dumb sister thought I was making it all up. That it was the other way around. She accused
me
of hitting on
him.
”

Victoria waited to see if Jackie had anything else to say, but she continued to fix her hair. “Can you think of anything to add? That you’d like to tell me?”

“It’s so obvious, Mrs. Trumbull. I mean, who else could it be?” Jackie stood up. “Excuse me a sec. I’m going to the bathroom to get my nail polish. Paint my toenails.”

Victoria got up. “This has been . . .” she paused, searching for the right word. “I appreciate your taking the time. May I come back if I have more questions?”

“Sure, Mrs. Trumbull. Anytime. It’ll be hard to pin it on her, but believe you me, she’s guilty as sin.”

Victoria got up, and so did Amelia.

“Thank you.” Victoria glanced at Jackie’s hands, one holding the comb with a few more loose hairs, the other holding the damp towel, and didn’t offer to shake.

C
HAPTER
30

“Is she serious?” Amelia asked when they were on the road again. “Accusing her own sister of murdering her husband? The father of her boys?”

The rain had let up briefly while they’d talked to Jackie, but was now coming down in a steady drizzle. The windshield wipers slatted back and forth, flicking water from one side to the other.

“There’s a bit of animosity between the two sisters,” Victoria replied. “I’m not sure we can take what she said seriously.”

“Where would you like to go next?”

Victoria referred to her list. “I need to talk to Emily Cameron again. The boatyard is open on Saturdays now, getting ready for the season.”

“Is she one of the women who was stalked?”

“No,” replied Victoria. “Her boyfriend was Jerry Sparks, the one who was killed.” She looked at her watch. “I’ll invite her to lunch.”

“To the boatyard, then,” said Amelia, turning onto State Road from Island Farms.

On the hillside to their right, young lambs rollicked together, oblivious of the rain, and not too far away from their grazing mothers. On their left, they passed a grove of beeches, Victoria’s favorite tree. One of her favorites, that is. New brilliant green leaves seemed even brighter against the gray sky, a touch of sunshine when the sun wasn’t around. New leaves had shoved aside the dry golden leaves of winter that now lay on the ground in a golden tumble. Rugged oaks had put out their delicate pink mouse-ear leaves, the sign Island farmers went by to plant their corn and squash.

They passed through Five Corners without having to wait for traffic coming off the ferry and turned in at the boatyard.

Emily was at her desk behind the partition. Her eyes and nose were red and swollen. Her bangs hung limply over the tops of her glasses. When she noticed Victoria and Amelia, she stopped turning over the pages that lay on her desk, looked up, and sighed.

“Hi, Mrs. Trumbull.”

Victoria introduced her daughter.

“Can you take a break, Emily?” Victoria asked. “We’d like to treat you to lunch at the ArtCliff, if you’re free. And talk to you about Jerry.”

Emily sighed again and looked at her watch. “I guess so. I didn’t even take a break this morning. I’m not getting much done just sitting here.”

“A lunch break will do you good,” said Victoria.

Emily shut down her computer, pushed her bangs out of her eyes, and stood up. “I always bring my lunch with me.”

“Save it for tomorrow,” said Victoria. She led the way back to the car, holding down the brim of her fuzzy gray hat against the rain,.

“Actually, the ArtCliff is within walking distance,” said Victoria once Emily had seated herself in the back, “but we might as well ride in comfort.”

Dottie, the waitress, seated them in a booth. “Hi, Mrs. Trumbull. Haven’t seen you for ages. And Amelia! I would’ve recognized you anywhere. How long’s it been?”

“A couple of years, I’m afraid,” said Amelia.

“And Emily. Sorry to hear about Jerry. You guys were pretty close.”

“Yeah. Thanks.” Emily stared down at her lap.

“What do you recommend?” Victoria asked.

“Quahaug chowder.” Dottie pronounced it
chow’-duh,
the way most Islanders did. And she pronounced
quahaug
as it should be pronounced,
quo-hog.

Victoria pushed aside her menu. “A bowl, please.”

“Same for me,” said Amelia.

“How about you, Emily?” Dottie held her pencil at the ready.

“I’m not hungry.”

“A cup, then,” said Dottie, writing. “Salads, anyone?”

“No, thank you,” said Victoria.

“Not I,” said Amelia.

All three ordered coffee. Dottie stuck her pencil into her hairdo and headed to the kitchen. She was back with three heavy white mugs of coffee and a pitcher of cream before they’d shucked off their damp coats.

After Dottie left, Victoria reached her gnarled hands across the table. “Would you like to talk about Jerry?”

Emily lifted her hands from her lap as though they belonged to someone else and took Victoria’s in her own. She glanced up. “You’re the only person who’s asked me about him.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“I thought he’d left me. I was getting rid of all his things. And now . . .”

“I understand,” said Victoria. “What was he like, your Jerry?”

“He was kind. He was gentle. He told me he liked my looks. No one had, like, ever told me that.”

“You do have nice looks, Emily.”

She glanced away, still holding Victoria’s hands. “He made me feel special. I knew he had a problem with drugs, but he was trying to get clean.”

“I know that’s hard to do.”

Dottie reappeared with two bowls and a cup lined up on her arm. Victoria withdrew her hands, and Dottie set everything down. “Can I get you anything else?”

“No, thank you,” said Victoria. “That looks just right.”

Dottie left, and Victoria asked, “Did he talk to you about his work with Mr. Watts?”

“Not much. He liked Mr. Watts okay, you know?”

“Jerry did some work for me. I was pleased with what he did.”

Emily smiled thinly.

“Had he told you he’d been fired?”

Emily shook her head.

“What about the day you were supposed to go to the movies at the library?”

Emily set down her spoon. She hadn’t touched the chowder. “That morning, he was, you know, totally sober. He said he was going to talk to Mr. Watts that afternoon about his job and then we’d meet at the library to see the movie.” She wadded up her napkin and tossed it onto the table. “Later that day, I saw him again near Cumberland Farms, and I could tell he was on something, acting, you know, really weird.”

“Did he see you?”

Emily shook her head.

“That’s the last time you saw him?”

Emily nodded. She picked up the wadded-up napkin and dabbed at her eyes. “Mr. Watts killed him. I know he did. I’m glad he’s dead. He killed my Jerry.”

Victoria waited until Emily calmed down. Amelia had finished her chowder, while Victoria had eaten only a couple of spoonfuls.

“Do you have any idea who might have killed Mr. Watts?” she asked, looking closely at the distraught young woman.

Emily hiccuped. “I know who killed him, and I don’t blame her one bit.”

“Her?”

“Mrs. Watts’s sister, Jackie. She hated Mr. Watts. He was always hitting on her, and you could tell she hated him.”

“Had you seen her near his shop?”

“I never went near his shop. I used to baby-sit for the Wattses, and she’d come by sometimes and tell me to stay away from Mr. Watts.” Emily looked at her watch again. “I gotta get back to work. I can’t eat anything. I’m sorry. Thanks for inviting me to lunch.” Her words were hurried. “I gotta run.”

Amelia got up. “I’ll drive you back to work, Emily. You can wait here, Mother, where it’s nice and dry. Finish your soup. I’ll take care of the bill.”

“Not soup,” said Victoria. “Chowder.”