“You know where the spare keys are?” asked Sarkisian.
“Well of course he does.” Gerda regarded the sheriff as if he’d just said something particularly dim. “He’s been doing odd jobs for me practically since he moved here.”
The key. The murderer had to have had access to a key to Gerda’s. I’d forgotten that. Again.
I glanced at the sheriff and recognized the calculating look in his eyes as they rested on Simon. Lowell had just given away the fact he knew where to find the spare key. Just how many people around here shared that knowledge?
I had the horrible sensation it was going to become very important to discover the answer to that.
Chapter Seventeen
My head ached. I wanted to go to bed. I didn’t want to think about the murder-or rather, the murders-any more. I still had tomorrow to survive. And that meant dealing with the Dinner-in-the-Park. Owen Sarkisian was never going to have the time to call the school officials for permission for us to hold it in the cafeteria, which meant I was stuck doing it. Leaving the sheriff talking to Gerda and Simon, I dragged myself up the stairs, let myself into the house and went into the kitchen. Next Thanksgiving, I swore, I would be hundreds of miles away from Upper River Gulch.
For several minutes I just stood there, glaring at the phone. I had no way of reaching anybody. Anyone high enough in the school hierarchy to have the authority to give permission also would have the sense to have an unlisted phone number. Frustrated, I tried calling a couple of party rental firms before admitting it was too late on a Saturday night and I hadn’t a chance of getting through. I sank onto the kitchen chair, and at once the manx Hefty scrambled up my leg, using all his claws, and into my lap. I was so tired I made no more than a token protest, then just sat there, cradling the purring beastie. Infinitely better than cradling That Damned Bird. Tedi Bird, for God’s sake. I felt like crying, but at the moment it would take too much effort.
If I was going to put that much energy into anything, it ought to be solving the problem of the dinner. If I couldn’t rent a pavilion, maybe we could make one. Tarps, lashed together, to create one giant canopy covering for the entire park. We could anchor it to trees on one side, the electrical pole on another, and with sufficient ropes we could probably reach across the street to another tree on the fourth corner. Or maybe with sufficient rope I could just hang myself.
With an effort, I dragged my thoughts from the wistful back to the practical. Everyone around here had a tarp or three. They were part of the requirements for country living. Never mind that with all this rain, everyone would already be using them to protect things of their own.
“Why are you just sitting there?” my aunt demanded. I looked up to see her swirling off her new cape to drape over the back of a chair in front of the pellet stove in the dining room. “Don’t you have phone calls to make?”
I nodded. “How many tarps have we got?”
She had stooped to pick up Dagmar, and straightened at this with her arms full of purring gray and white fur. “Whatever for?”
I told her my plan.
She settled the cat across her shoulder. “Whatever for?” she repeated. “Do you really like roughing it? What’s wrong with the school cafeteria?”
I closed my eyes. “Fine. You call and make the arrangements.”
“The sheriff already took care of that. Didn’t he tell you?”
There was going to be a third body, any minute now. I was going to kill Sarkisian. “You mean I’ve been sitting here, frantic, and all this time…”
She shook her head. “Really, Annike, you worry too much. We told you at the beginning, just assign jobs, and everyone will pitch in and do their part.”
Even the sheriff, with two murders to solve. “Let’s give him the turkey as a thank you present,” I suggested. I felt amazingly better, even though Gerda refused to consider my generous impulse. Most likely, Sarkisian had delegated as well and had someone in his department take care of it. I’d have to call-scratch that, I’d drop by-with heartfelt gratitude for Jennifer if I survived all the way to Monday.
The change of venues meant I had to activate the phone tree again, first to arrange for a decorating committee in the morning and secondly to let everyone know they wouldn’t have to come to the dinner armed with beach umbrellas. While Gerda put on a kettle for much needed tea, I telephoned Ida.
“More decorating?” the woman demanded in tones of foreboding when I’d explained the situation to her.
“Hey, it’ll be dry. And the school already has some stuff up for the kids.”
Ida snorted. “Paper turkeys and pilgrims, colored with crayons.”
“You can have a real turkey,” I tried.
Ida, sensibly, ignored me. “Well, I’ll see who I can round up. What a pity today’s refreshments got ruined in the rain.”
“Throw the cookies back in an oven to dry them out?”
She laughed and hung up.
Maybe-just maybe-I could go to bed soon. We made a pot of chamomile infused with oat straw, then Gerda took her turn at the phone. She called Hugh Cartwright. He answered on the fifth ring, and judging from the sound of his “What do you want?” that belted over the wire instead of a more conventional “Hello,” his mood could not be described as good.
“To give you a piece of my mind,” Gerda responded promptly.
“Gerda?” he bellowed, then his tone dropped to a querulous grumble, still audible from a distance of ten feet away from the receiver.
She made appropriate soothing noises while he unburdened himself about his views of people who were so self-absorbed that they could commit murder on his business premises without any thought or consideration for what this was going to do to his work schedules. When he finally ran down, Gerda proceeded to give him the lecture of his life about reneging on promises. To my amazement, he did not resort to shouting again.
Gerda listened to his mutterings in his own defense for a minute, then cut him short. “You’re not fooling anyone. You’re just an old skinflint and ought to be ashamed of yourself. Now, you’re going to call Sheriff Sarkisian right now and tell him you wouldn’t dream of pressing charges against Peggy. Then you’re going to call Peggy and apologize to her for breaking your word. Is that understood?” She listened for a moment, smiling. “Thought so. All right, you too. See you at the dinner tomorrow.” She hung up and turned back to me, beaming. “All taken care of.”
I stared at her. “What hold do you have over him?” I demanded.
She actually blushed. “Oh, he wanted to marry me a couple of years back.”
If I hadn’t already been sitting I would have fallen. I settled for clutching Hefty. “You… He…”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Annike.” She sounded as stern as when she’d talked to Cartwright. “Certainly being rich would be nice, but not if it meant having to put up with that man.” She sniffed. “He doesn’t like cats.” And she walked out of the room before I could think of anything else to say.
I finished my tea, then got ready for bed. It just went to show, there were all sorts of things you didn’t know, even about your nearest and dearest.
The roar of an engine missing on one of its cylinders woke me up all too early Sunday morning. I shoved my feet into slippers, dragged on my comfortable old bathrobe, and hurried out to the deck in the drizzling rain. Through the trees, I could just make out something large and oddly colored down near the gate. Simon Lowell’s old hippie van. I went back inside, donned jeans, a sweatshirt and tall rubber boots, and hiked down to meet him.