Wreck the Halls (35 page)

Because having a youth so wild it was the stuff of legend, then becoming a tattooed strip club dancer whose act included
a live snake, was not exactly evidence of personal stability. But everyone had been fascinated by these stories, even a little envious, maybe, of a woman with nerve enough to do such things. So no one had taken them seriously for what they were:

Symptoms. Getting worse. I said, “So what Kenty heard was—”

“Nothing,” Ellie replied. “Or almost nothing. Which was the strange thing, of course, to her.”

At last I understood it. The sound of a vehicle starting up with no backfire at all: a brand new van, purring like a well-creamed kitten.

Like the one I’d heard out at Melinda's the night Bob was attacked. Kenty would have wondered whose it was, so she could gossip about it, later. That was why she'd looked: in hopes that she mightbe able to see something.

And as she did, Joy Abrams had looked, too.

“Poor Kenty,” Ellie murmured. But my mention of the dead woman had lighted a beacon of purpose in my friend's green eyes. “Jake, I don't suppose you'd like to have a collection of African violets?” she asked, as if this idea were only just now occurring to her.

It wasn't. “They're going,” she added with quiet urgency, “to the dump, otherwise. I asked the garden club people first, but they all had the same verdict about African violets.”

It was mine, too, about this particular species. “Fattish and hairy,” I said. “And persnickety. I don't think I—”

But then I stopped. Ellie held up a small potted plant. “This one is called Nancy's Mustard Gold.”

From the clay pot grew a dark green specimen only six inches across. Its leaves, plump and juicy-looking, were ovals whirled in dark maroon. A blossom was opening on it: sunshine yellow.

“Oh,” I said, feeling my heart captured. “It's—”

“Yes, well,” Ellie said, satisfied. “I’ll bring the rest over to
you tomorrow, and you can decide where to set up the plant trays and fluorescents, where to store the plant food and the soil testers and the watering jug and the potting soil.”

Just what I needed: more hardware. The Fein “Multi-master” box still stood in the back hallway, reproaching me with all the polishing, sanding, and cutting it could do if only I would put it to work. Which I resolved to do, first thing in the morning…

“Oh, and books about African violets, lots of them, you'll want those, and the videos about them, of course,” Ellie added happily.

Of course. I got up and put my arms around her, careful not to crush the sprig of holly she had found somewhere and pinned to her scarlet sweater.

“Merry Christmas,” I told her.

“You, too,” she whispered back. “And Jake… thank you.”

Soon afterwards Tim Rutherford had departed, George and Wade were finishing their plans to go down to the dock together in the morning and work on the tugboat, and Sam had excused himself to begin reconstructing his Internet project.

Victor pulled his coat on while Ellie tugged the purpletasseled hat over her red hair.

“Jacobia,” he said. “Tell Sam's friend Tommy I’ve found someone to pin his ears back for him, will you? He'll do it as a professional courtesy to me. No charge.”

“Why, Victor,” I said, surprised, “that's very…”

Nice of you, I would have finished. But then being Victor of course he had to go on and spoil it. “You know, if that kid could wiggle those things, I’ll bet he could fly.”

I shut the door firmly on him. “So,” Wade said when everyone had gone, the porch lights were out, and we were alone.

“So,” I replied, feeling renewed contrition. “Wade, I do solemnly promise that I will never, ever—”

“—fail to maintain safety equipment properly,” he finished ominously. “Jacobia, if I’d done that you'd carve out my giblets and roast them for supper.”

He was under the impression that I’d forgotten to refresh the battery in the cell phone, and I’d decided not to tell him what had really happened. After all, it had only been a near electrocution…

Or anyway, I wouldn't tell him right now. But the thought of giblets was not a welcome one and he must have seen it.

“Oh, all right,” he said, relenting. Then:

“Listen, I put that salt fish kettle out in the snow.”

I’d wondered why I didn't smell cat food anymore. He looked embarrassed. “I think maybe my aunt helped my uncle with it. The recipe, I mean. I ate a bite.” He grimaced.

“You poor thing.” Food from the old days could be a comfort, I knew. Sometimes even I hankered for a taste of squirrel.

Just a wee taste. “Tell you what, we'll try it again,” I said. “But we'll ask Ellie how. I’ll bet she knows. Okay?”

He brightened. “Okay. And… what the hell, I might as well tell you the other thing. The sawmill's down for a few months, without it there won't be extra ships. Not enough cargo for ’em.”

So the harbor-piloting business was going to be down, as well. Which meant even worse than less extra cash, for Wade…

“I meant to get us rings,” he said. Wedding rings; diamonds like the ones I had wanted.

Naturally he'd known. “We'll do it someday,” I told him. “It doesn't matter…” But just then came a knock on our back door.

It was Ben Devine. “Mickey Jean's still up at the hospital
with Melinda,” he said. “But we both wanted to say we appreciate your help. All of you.”

“She's not furious with me?” I asked.

He shook his head, pulling a small manila envelope from his jacket pocket. “Not a bit. Said to give you these.”

“You don't have to pay us,” I began, but he wouldn't listen.

“It's not payment. It's a gift. Please,” he said, “we'd like for you to have them. Look inside,” he invited.

So I did, shaking the envelope's contents carefully out onto the palm of my hand: four glittering stones.

Diamonds; Ellie must have told him. “Ben, we can't…”

“You people didn't just help us out, see. You showed us we've got friends. Ones we can trust. And that,” Ben finished, “is worth more'n diamonds. To us.”

I glanced a question at Wade. He nodded.

“Thank you,” I told Ben. “They're beautiful.”

They were, too: at least a carat apiece and bright white.

“Mickey Jean figured you could get a pair of matching rings for ’em, maybe, two stones apiece.”

“If it's all right,” I ventured, “I was thinking of earrings, too. For Ellie. One stone each for us, a pair for her?”

She would love them. And the whole thing had been her idea, really: helping Faye Anne.

And it was Christmas. Wade nodded, and after a moment Ben did, also. “All right, then. I gotta go. Oh, and…” He looked embarrassed. “Timmy Rutherford mentioned to me that you guys, and the cops, too, found some cigarette ashes by Melinda's shed. And look, I promised Mickey I’d quit smoking. But I didn't, really.”

I had a sudden mental picture of him in La Sardina, puffing away as if it were a rare opportunity. “Used to sneak a smoke by the shed,” he said. “But no more. So if you could maybe…”

I made a zipping-my-lip gesture. “You got it.”

“Great.” He turned toward the door again. But then he turned back, his face crinkling into a grin he tried mightily to repress.

“That… that suit!” he burst out.

Bright, tight neoprene rubber: Melinda had looked like a neon-orange water animal in it. I tried suppressing a giggle and failed utterly. “… just adore the cold…”

“Maybe she'll wear it in the parade next Fourth of July,” Wade speculated, chuckling.

“Right,” Ben guffawed. “I’ll try to talk her into it.” Then, grinning as if the weight of the world were off his shoulders, he went out, Wade and I watching as he got into his truck.

“Wade. What do you suppose did it?”

“Made Joy get that way?” He draped an arm around me. “Don't know. But if I had to guess I’d say maybe she felt guilty about something from back when. Something she didn't protect Willetta from, maybe?”

“Maybe.” Two motherless girls in the woods, men coming in and out on a regular basis. We would never know, probably. But:

“Trying to make up for it,” I mused aloud, thinking again of how murder divides everything into before and after.

They never found my father's body after the explosion. Later I was told that the blast was so powerful, no portion survived. But now, as Ben's old truck started up with a bia-rump! of backfire, I wondered if there was another reason, a before I had never suspected. Ben drove off and I closed the door on the question.

For now.

“One last thing,” Wade said as I came back into the kitchen. “I know you want to save on fuel. However…”

He strode to the windows and pulled off the milky sheets of plastic. “Sorry. But can we please spring for the double layers of clear plastic out here? This is just too damn ugly.”
⁷

Suddenly I could see through the windows, out and up into the pitilessly clear night sky full of icy stars.

But when I moved, the reflection of the lights here in the house shone back at me. Warm air coming up off the hot radiators smelled of balsam from the tree Wade had brought in so we could decorate it, tomorrow. And… my hands felt clean.

“You're right. It's better,” I told Wade.

Much better: later in the darkness of the big old barnlike kitchen, with the moon shining in through the tall bare windows and glazing the pointed fir trees outside with a rime of winter silver, I gave one of those diamonds to Wade and he gave one to me. It was a magic moment—

Until the kitchen light snapped on, Sam sloped out to raid the refrigerator, the dog engaged the cat in a marathon around the table, and a mouse streaked merrily across the floor, pausing only to shoot me a mousy grin and—I swear— a tiny, upraised mouse-middle-finger.

Whereupon I was ready to command Sam to forget the late-night snack, put a stop to the dog-cat hostilities, and trap the mouse or at least make it very, very sorry for that outrageous gesture. But Wade stepped in front of me, leading me gently into the darkness of the hall.

Abruptly the chaos in the old house receded, leaving only the interested twinkle in Wade's eye, more precious than any gems.

“How about if we let this old world turn without us for a while?” he suggested softly. “We're still practically newly-weds, aren't we? The diamonds just make it official.”

“I think,” I said, moving in waltz-step with him, “that's a fine idea. But… Sam's home, you know.”

Wade's arm snugged around my waist as we climbed the stairs together. “Silence,” he predicted, “is golden.”

All was calm.

All was bright.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

SARAH GRAVES lives with her husband in Eastport, Maine, in the 1823 Federal-style house that helped inspire her books. She is the author of six Home Repair Is Homicide mysteries— The Dead Cat Bounce, Triple Witch, Wicked Fix, Repair to Her Grave, and Unhinged.

Visit Eastport, Maine, on the Web at
www.nemaine.com/eastportcc
— or visit in person!

For more information:

Eastport Chamber of Commerce

P.O. Box 254

Eastport, Maine 04631

Phone 207-853-4644

If you enjoyed Sarah Graves’
WRECK THE HALLS, you won't
want to miss any of the exciting books
in her Home Repair Is Homicide
mystery series. Look for
THE DEAD CAT BOUNCE,
TRIPLE WITCH, WICKED FIX,
and REPAIR TO HER GRAVE
at your favorite bookseller's.

And turn the page for a tantalizing
preview of the newest Home Repair Is
Homicide mystery, UNHINGED,
available in hardcover from
Bantam Books.

UNHINGED

A Home Repair Is Homicide mystery by
SARAH GRAVES

Chapter 1

H
arriet Hollingsworth was the kind of person
who called 911 the minute she spotted a teenager ambling down the street, since as she said there was no sense waiting for them to get up to their nasty tricks. Each week Harriet wrote to the Quoddy Tides, Eastport's local newspaper, a list of the sordid misdeeds she suspected all the rest of us of committing, and when she wasn't doing that she was at her window with binoculars, spying out more.

Snoopy, spiteful, and a suspected poisoner of neighborhood cats, Harriet was confidently believed by her neighbors to be too mean to die, until the morning one of them spotted her boot buckle glinting up out of his compost heap like the wink of an evil eye.

The boot had a sock in it but the sock had no foot in it and despite a diligent search (one wag remarking that if Harriet was buried somewhere, the grass over her grave would die in the shape of a witch on a broomstick) she remained missing.

“Isn't that just like Harriet?” my friend Ellie White demanded about three weeks later, squinting up into the spring sunshine.

We were outside my house in Eastport, on Moose Island, in downeast Maine. “Stir up as much fuss and bother as she could,” Ellie went on, “but not give an ounce of satisfaction in the end.”

Thinking at the time that it was the end, of course. We both did.

At the time. My house is a white clapboard 1823 Federal with three full floors plus an attic, forty-eight big old double-hung windows with forest-green wooden shutters, three chimneys (one for each pair of fireplaces), and a two-story ell.