Twisted Threads (14 page)

I held the board. I’d never thought much about spiritualism. I’d visited Sedona a couple of times, and I once had my fortune told there. It had been fun, but the woman reading my cards said things that could have applied to any young woman. Definitely a waste of twenty-five dollars. Could a Ouija board be different?

And yet people had consulted boards and cards for years. They must have delivered messages that meant something, or no one would be manufacturing them. From the modern look of the ones in this room, most had been made in the twentieth century. “It’s too bad the spirits can’t speak out in courts,” I said as Reverend Tom came back in the room. “We could forget forensics if departed souls could come back and tell us what happened.”

“I’ve often imagined a prosecutor in court cross-examining a spirit through a Ouija board,” Reverend Tom agreed, nodding. “We’d have to come up with a whole new set of laws regarding the testimony of noncorporeal beings.”

“Ghosts, you mean,” put in Gram. “This isn’t a good idea, Angel. Spirits can’t come back and talk to us.” She shook her head. “The whole idea gives me shivers.”

“You mean, with all these boards available, you’ve never tried to contact Mama?”

“Never have. Never will.” She poured herself another half glass of wine from the bottle Reverend Tom had left on the coffee table. “When you’re dead, you’re dead. I don’t know if you’re in Heaven or just in the ground, but I don’t believe you can come back again.”

“It’s a game,” said Reverend Tom. “Charlotte, if it upsets you, we don’t have to do this.”

“I’m not going to do it myself,” she said. “But if Angel wants to try, you two go ahead. You need two people, don’t you?”

“Two people,” he agreed. “People who feel extraordinarily attuned to the spirit world do it alone, but usually it requires two people. We’ll try it once.” He glanced over at Gram. I had the feeling he was sorry he’d suggested we use the board, if only because she was upset. “People have been trying to contact spirits for thousands of years. The Ouija board was invented in the late nineteenth century when spiritualism was popular in the United States. Today scientists say there may be truth in them . . . perhaps a way of contacting the users’ subconscious. Not spirits. Angie, you sit on that side of the card table.” He sat on the other side.

I put the board in the middle of the table. He added the planchette.

“When we start,” Tom explained seriously, “you and I will put the tips of our fingers on the planchette, very lightly, on different sides. We’ll concentrate. If you don’t believe, then the spirits won’t come. Sometimes even then, they don’t. If a spirit wants to communicate with us, he or she will move the planchette to answer our questions.”

“Do you do this often?” I asked.

“I assure you, not as often as I read my Bible,” he replied.

That wasn’t a direct answer.

“I’ll start, and then, if we get an answer, you ask the second question,” he said. “We’ll alternate.”

I nodded. We were silent for a minute or two, and then Reverend Tom put his fingers on the planchette. I followed his lead.

He spoke softly. “Is there a spirit nearby tonight who would like to speak with us?”

I focused on the planchette and on my fingers. It all felt a little scary, and a little stupid. Not a good combination. I forced myself to focus on the planchette. Might as well give the spirits a chance.

Then, without warning, the planchette started moving. It circled for a few seconds, and then went directly to
yes.

Reverend Tom nodded at me. It was my turn. “Will you answer our questions?”

More circles, and then the planchette quickly went to
yes
again. And then to
no.
And then back again.

“Do you mean that maybe you’ll answer our questions?” asked Reverend Tom.

Incredibly, the board answered.
Yes.

I asked what I’d been worrying about all day. “Did someone kill Jacques Lattimore?”

The board answered.
Yes.

I shivered. This was too easy. I looked at Reverend Tom. He was pale. I suspected he didn’t usually ask the spirits questions like that.

He asked, “Why was Lattimore killed?”

The planchette spelled out,
C-H-A-N-C-E.

My turn. “Who killed Jacques Lattimore?”

The planchette circled for what seemed a long time before it speeded up. And went to
good-bye.

Maybe Reverend Tom’s collection illustrated one answer to the larger questions of life. Like prayer, Ouija boards offered ways to express desire, hopes, needs . . . whether for forgiveness or love or, eventually, eternal life in another world. They offered hope that there was a place, an abyss, where souls drifted until they were called back to aid someone still on earth. Called back by a memory. Or by a simple board.

I was certain I hadn’t moved the planchette. Why had the board been so sure Lattimore had been murdered?

The rest of the evening in the rectory was considerably less exciting than the first hour. Reverend Tom’s interest in the occult seemed the most unusual thing about him. I would have liked to have asked him more questions about his boards, but Gram was clearly not comfortable heading off into the unknowns of spiritualism.

She and I went home early.

Gram went to bed. I was restless.

First, I called my old friend Clem. Of all the people I’d seen since I’d returned to Haven Harbor, she was the one I most wanted to see again. Except, of course, for Ethan Trask. But seeing him wasn’t a good thing, for an increasing number of reasons.

Not only was he married and a father, but every time I saw him, he was questioning me about a murder. Not exactly the conversations my fantasies had dreamed up on a regular basis since I was twelve. I didn’t need a Ouija board to tell me I needed a new fantasy.

I left Clem a message suggesting we meet for lunch tomorrow if she could get away from her job. I even volunteered to drive to Portland. I loved being with Gram, but what I really needed—I decided after an inch of cognac—was a little distance from Haven Harbor.

Time to get my bearings . . . and a friend. Someone who remembered me as a decent person. Possibly misguided. Possibly unfocused. But, still, someone who could be trusted to keep your secrets and might share a few of her own. A female friend, so there wouldn’t be romantic complications or misunderstandings.

In the meantime I wandered through the house. It didn’t take long before I decided to deal with Mama’s bedroom. At lunch Gram had mentioned that maybe it was time to dispose of her clothes. I’d volunteered to go through them, and Gram had looked relieved.

I gathered boxes and bags from the cellar and tackled Mama’s closet.

She may have been my age, but she’d been smaller than I was. I sorted her clothes either into garbage bags to throw away or boxes for Goodwill. Decisions were easy: stained blouses, out-of-date or wild patterns, went into the garbage bags. A couple of sweaters I held out. I might be able to wear those, and I could use extra sweaters. I hesitated when I came to the dress Mama had always worn when Gram shamed her into going to church. I held it for a few minutes before letting it go. Someone else could wear it now.

Dresses that would be too short for me, and too young for Gram; shoes, leather now cracked; T-shirts advertising places and events in the past—all gone.

I held up a pair of black wool slacks that looked practically new. Had moths gotten to them? They were too short for my legs in any case. I was about to drop them in the “donate” pile when I heard paper crackling. I looked again. This time I checked the pockets.

A folded scrap of paper was tucked deep inside one. On it was a scribbled telephone number, in Mama’s handwriting.

It probably meant nothing. But right then, after the evening with the Ouija board and my second glass of brandy, it felt like a message from her grave.

Whose telephone number was it? It had the same first three digits as numbers in Haven Harbor. A local number.

I put the note on Mama’s bedside table as I quickly checked through the piles of clothes I’d already sorted. Nothing was in any other pocket.

Mama would have worn wool pants in the winter and as late as April or early May. And she hadn’t had these cleaned for the summer. Chances were she’d worn them in the month before she’d died.

I finished going through the closet, ending up with two cartons for Goodwill and several sweaters I could try on. Everything else I threw away.

I still had the bureau to go through, but suddenly I was exhausted.

I took the scrap of paper I’d found and went to my room. It was close to midnight. Too late to call anyone.

Clem hadn’t called back.

The rest of the night my head swirled with numbers and faces. I didn’t recognize any of them.

The next morning I dialed the number Mama’d written down. The woman who answered had never heard of Mama. “Excuse me, but can you tell me how long you’ve had this number?” I asked.

“About six years now,” she answered.

I thanked her, then tucked the paper in my jeans pocket. I’d borrow Gram’s computer and run a search on it later.

A few minutes later, Clem returned my last night’s call. She’d love to have lunch, but she wasn’t free until Monday. And why didn’t we include Cindy (Titicomb, now Bowers)? They’d been planning to get together, and it would be fun for the three of us to see each other. I agreed. Cindy and I had had our issues back in school, but that was a long time ago. She’d left Haven Harbor to attend a private high school. I hadn’t seen her since elementary school. And Cindy’s mom was a needlepointer. If Clem liked Cindy, maybe I could too.

Clem hesitated a bit before asking, “And what about including Lauren? She’s still in Haven Harbor.”

I thought for a moment. No, there were too many issues between Lauren and me. “Maybe after a little more time has passed. Right now, I’d like the three of us to have a relaxed lunch.”

“Monday, then? And is meeting in Bath okay? I’ve been longing for Beale Street Barbeque.”

I smiled to myself. Barbeque wasn’t exactly typical Maine, but Clem was right. Beale’s had always done a great job with it. It was one of the places we’d loved when we were teenagers and one of us could get a car. And some cash.

“I’ll call Cindy,” Clem promised. “She left me a message last night, too. She’s visiting her folks in Haven Harbor now. When she does that, she can usually escape from her kids for a few hours because her mom loves to babysit. I’m really looking forward to this!”

Gram approved the plan at breakfast. “You need to reconnect with your old friends. It’ll help you feel more comfortable here.”

How did she know I didn’t feel “at home” here yet? But I was excited about seeing Clem again, and even Cindy again. Her mom had said Cindy had three kids! How did she cope?

“In the meantime,” Gram started to say, when there was a knock on the front door. Ethan Trask and a man and a woman I didn’t recognize were standing on our porch. A large once-white van identified as belonging to the State of Maine Crime Unit was parked in front of our house. It was official enough to be marked with the state seal. It was intimidating, and no doubt meant to be.

A van like that had visited here after Mama’d been gone a couple of weeks. I’d come home from school and found people going through her room. Gram and I had sat in the kitchen, watched by a policeman. They hadn’t found any clues that day to help their investigation. After they’d left, Gram and I had stayed up half the night putting Mama’s clothes and papers and pictures back in their places. I was convinced that if we messed with her room, she’d never come back to it.
To us.
Gram’d listened to me. Here it was, close to twenty years later, and I’d just started cleaning out Mama’s closet and drawers.

But this morning’s visit couldn’t be about Mama. It had to be about Jacques Lattimore.

“May we come in?” asked Ethan.

“Do we have a choice?” asked Gram. She knew what it was about, too.

“This will be a lot easier if you cooperate,” he said, almost apologetically.

Gram nodded and moved aside.

“Angie, you need to hear this,” he called down the hall to where I was standing in the kitchen. “Don’t touch anything. Put down your coffee and come here.”

“What’s happened?” I asked. I could have guessed. But I knew from my own investigating that it was best to let the other person volunteer information. Even if that other person was a state trooper.

“Autopsy results for Jacques Lattimore determined his cause of death was poisoning.”

Bingo!
But not a total surprise. I hadn’t thought they’d come here looking for wild turkeys. “And?”

“Nothing, so far. He didn’t test positive for any of the usual drugs, legal or illegal. The ME’s office has sent blood and tissue samples out to a federal lab to test for other substances.”

“Do they have any clues?”

Jacques shook his head. “I shouldn’t even be telling you about the poison. But because Lattimore’s death is now considered a possible homicide, and he collapsed here, your home has to be considered a crime scene. I’ll need to talk to you while the crime scene technicians work.”

Gram sighed. “Angie and I were planning to finish going through Mainely Needlepoint’s books this morning to divide the money she got from Jacques. I don’t want anyone to think we’re holding on to it. That money belongs to the needlepointers, who earned it.”

“We’ll be as fast as we can. Do we have your permission to search the house for anything that might be relevant?”

“Do you have a search warrant?” I asked.

“Not yet. But we could get one. I hoped you’d let us search without one.”

Gram threw up her hands. “We have nothing to hide. Go ahead. But, please, don’t mess the place up.”

She, too, was thinking of that earlier visit by the police.

“We’ll try,” Ethan answered. He didn’t sound terribly reassuring. “Can we sit on the porch while the team is working?” he asked.

Our wide front porch overlooked Haven Harbor’s Green. In the nineteenth century, sheep had grazed on the green. Now it was crisscrossed by sidewalks and used for occasional church fairs and bridal portraits. Once I’d tried to fly a kite there, but my string had gotten caught in the branches of a large maple tree. My kite was up there for weeks, a spot of red and yellow among the green leaves, until finally a nor’easter tore it down.

We sat on the wicker chairs Gram had gotten out of the barn in anticipation of summer breezes.

“Lattimore was only in the living room, which we also use as an office, and in the hall and bathroom,” Gram said. “The needlepointers and I were meeting in the living room when Angel and Jacques came in. He sat down. We chatted. He apologized. He had a cup of tea or two, as I remember. And a couple of cookies. Then he looked as though he was having bad cramps, or stomach pains. I showed him where the bathroom was.” She paused. “Just as I told you yesterday.”

“He vomited in the bathroom?”

“That’s what it sounded like,” I said. “And smelled like. We asked him if he needed any help. He said, ‘no,’ so we left him alone.”

“When did you call 911?”

“I opened the bathroom door when he stopped answering me,” said Gram “He was having spasms. Fits. Seizures. His head was hitting the floor. I tried to hold him to keep him from hurting himself. I called to Angel and she called 911 for help.”

“Let’s go back a little. Angie, earlier that afternoon you went to find Lattimore and bring him back here.”

I nodded.

“Where was he?”

I explained again about going to the address Gram had for him in Brunswick, and then following his trail up to the Cambridge Casino. We’d gone over this before. I suspected he was testing us to see if we’d give the same answers we had the last time he’d asked.

“Was he eating at the casino?”

“He might have eaten earlier. It was the middle of the afternoon when I got there. He did have a drink with him at the blackjack table.”

“Do you think it was his first?”

“I didn’t give him a Breathalyzer test. But I’m pretty sure he’d had more than one.”

“And where did you go next?”

“To the room he’d rented, where he was living.”

“In his car?”

“In the one I was driving. Gram’s.” I hadn’t wanted Lattimore to head off in another direction. By driving, I was in control. I didn’t say that to Ethan.

“And when you were at his room, did he eat or drink anything?”

“No.”

“And then you drove him here.”

I nodded.

“Did he eat or drink in the car? Did you?”

“Neither of us did.”

“And then you got here and joined the needlepointers in the living room.”

“He did,” I corrected slightly. “After I gave Gram the money I’d gotten from Lattimore, I went into the kitchen and had a cup of tea there. I wasn’t one of the needlepointers.” I hesitated. “Then.”

“The last time I was here, you gave me the names of those who were at the meeting. Have you thought of any other details since then?” He directed that question to Gram.

“There’s no way anyone could have poisoned him here, in our house,” I insisted. “He didn’t leave the room. No one else left the room. Everyone was drinking from the same teapot and the same plates. If he was poisoned, it must have been slow acting. Something he’d eaten or drunk before I saw him at the casino.”

“That’s what we’re trying to figure out,” said Ethan. “But since we don’t know what caused his convulsions and, ultimately, his death, we have to go backward from his time of death. I’m sure you understand that.”

I sighed and nodded.

“I’ll be talking with everyone who was here, of course, to confirm your stories,” Ethan added. “Is there anything else you’d like to mention?”

Both Gram and I shook our heads.

“I assume you’ll both be staying in the area?” He looked straight at me. “Angie?”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Angie’s now the director of Mainely Needlepoint,” Gram added. “She’s going to get our books in order and contact our customers. Try to put the company back together.”

“Angie’s taking over Lattimore’s job?”

“Partially,” Gram agreed. “But he wasn’t our director. He was our agent. Angie will have broader responsibilities.”

“And when was that decided? That Angie would take on that job?”

“At the end of the meeting that afternoon. Right before Lattimore got sick.”

“So you got the information you needed from him, and some of your money back. And Angie replaced him in your business. You both benefited.”

“From his coming here. Not from his death. And Angel didn’t ask for the job. We all thought she’d be good at it, and she agreed.”

Ethan paused. “I’ve known both of you ladies many years. You’ve had your troubles. Big troubles. But you understand that the circumstances under which Jacques Lattimore died makes both of you persons of interest in his death.”

“We’re suspects?” Gram asked.

“Not yet,” said Ethan. “Not until we know exactly how he died.”