Once again, she wondered if the deaths were really the work of the Sixes. She couldn’t imagine what the motive would have been, or how it linked back to the last two circles of membership.
A light drizzle had begun, and Phoebe scooted off the picnic table. It would be even trickier to drive in this weather, and she wanted to head home now. Once she was in the car, she e-mailed Glenda, asking her to find out what dorm Jen was in. She would just head over there and nab the girl coming or going. As Phoebe started to drop her phone into her purse, it rang in her hands.
“Ms. Hall?” the person asked when she answered. It was a male voice she didn’t recognize.
“Yes.”
“Dan Hutchinson here. Ed Hutchinson’s nephew.”
“Oh Dan, thanks for calling back,” she said. “I’m so sorry for your loss.”
“I appreciate your call. My uncle even mentioned you to us. He was hurrying back on Sunday to chat with you.”
“I know. I just feel horrible about what happened. Will there be a service of some kind?”
“Yeah, definitely. It’s been delayed because the coroner held on to the body for a while. I’ll e-mail you the details when I have them.”
“Thank you,” she said and gave him the address. “By the way, is Ginger okay? Do you have her?”
“Yup, we’ve got her—though she seems awfully freaked out. Wish we could keep her, but my wife is allergic. We’re asking around to see if any friends can take her while we look for a permanent home.”
“Well, wait,” Phoebe said, almost without thinking. “Why don’t I babysit Ginger until you find a home for her. I can even ask around campus.”
The last thing she needed was a dog, but she wanted to do it for Hutch.
“Gosh, that would be a lifesaver,” Dan said. “I’m going into Lyle to sign some paperwork tomorrow. I could even drop her off for you.”
They agreed on noon, and she gave him her address.
It was after two when she let herself into the house, and just like yesterday, she felt a mid-afternoon fatigue beginning to ambush her. But she couldn’t take a nap, she told herself, she had too much to do. She made a double espresso and carried it with her into the study.
She opened her laptop and checked a few Web sites to see if any break in the case was being reported. She found nothing. Then she made notes about where she should take her class next. She had plenty of time before next Monday, but she’d loved the way things had gone today, and she wanted to be sure to build on that. Maybe she’d keep up the newsroom approach.
Finally she turned her attention to the files she had dumped on her desk after returning from Duncan’s. As she sorted out several folders, her eyes drifted toward the back of the table. They found the piece of cardboard, the one that had been around the six spoons, and she realized that in her muddled state the other day, she’d neglected to mention it to the police. She’d have to give Michelson a call.
Grimacing, she picked up the cardboard, smoothed it out, and stared at it. When she’d studied it previously, she’d assumed it had come from some type of packaging, probably from the spoons themselves. But now she wasn’t so sure. She peered more closely at it. At each of the upper corners there was a bit of faded yellow with short strokes of black over it. From the size and the thickness, she realized that it might be an oversize playing card. And then suddenly she knew. It was a tarot card. She took a deep breath. So maybe there had been a message intended for her after all.
There was probably enough color left, she decided, to figure out which tarot card it was. She opened her laptop again and Googled “tarot cards,” then began running her eyes over the images.
It didn’t take long to find the correct card. There was a man with yellow wings on the upper left-hand side and a giant bird on the right—the black strokes were the ridges of the feathers—and between and just below them was a sphinx. Her eyes dropped to the words at the bottom of the card on the screen: “Wheel of Fortune.”
She lurched back in the chair, making it scrape along the floor. No, no, no, she thought. It’s not possible. It was the same as the tiny silver wheel on the bracelets years ago.
She looked down and stared at the card again on the table. At the very bottom of the card, she now saw the faded lower edge of the W.
Blood had surged to her head, and she could hardly think straight. It must be a coincidence, she thought, trying to fight off panic, just the Sixes sending a message of some kind. She searched quickly for the meaning of the card: “A turning point, a change in fortune and destiny. Sometimes good, but also sometimes bad, a prophesy of luck deserting you.”
But what if it wasn’t a coincidence? What if the Sixes knew about her past? But how could they have? It had all been kept under wraps. She remembered the reference in the fake blog site to the poetry journal. It seemed that someone was funneling secrets about her past to them. Would they use the information against her somehow—even with Blair and Gwen under arrest?
She grabbed her phone and called Glenda’s cell. When Glenda didn’t answer, Phoebe tried her office line and barely gave the receptionist a chance to speak before she asked for Glenda. The woman reported that Dr. Johns was off campus at the moment.
Next, Phoebe tried Duncan. Maybe she would stay there tonight after all. She had to stay calm, she realized, or this could push her to some edge she couldn’t see.
“Hey, it’s me,” she said into Duncan’s voice mail. “I’ve got a problem. Can you call me as soon as you can?”
A buzzer rang, making her jump. It was the doorbell, she realized. She rose from the chair and hurried to the living room. Peering out the window, she spotted a child standing on the porch, dressed in a yellow rain slicker with the hood up. Why would a kid be coming to her house? she wondered as she opened the door.
“May I help you?” she asked.
The child reached up and tugged off the water-streaked hood of the slicker. To her shock, Phoebe saw that it was actually Jen Imbibio. She felt an alarm go off inside her head. Was this some kind of setup? But the girl appeared genuinely distressed.
“I have to talk to you,” Jen said.
Phoebe ushered her inside and locked the door behind her.
“Okay, shoot,” Phoebe said quickly. She was still reeling from the tarot card, and she had to force herself to focus.
“I’m one of the Sixes,” Jen said.
“I see,” Phoebe said, not knowing what else to say. It was just as she’d suspected.
“I need your help. Blair and Gwen—they didn’t kill that old man. I know that for sure.”
27
“ARE YOU ALONE?” Phoebe asked.
The girl’s face wrinkled in confusion. “Of course,” she said. “Who would be with me?”
Phoebe motioned her into the living room and gestured toward an armchair. Jen took the seat, perching on the edge of the cushion. She looked vulnerable, but also a tiny bit impudent, like someone called into the principal’s office who didn’t feel deserving of punishment.
“So why do you think that—that they’re innocent?” Phoebe said.
“First of all, I just know that they would never do anything like that,” Jen said. “They’re just not the type. I saw Gwen in the café on Monday, and she seemed perfectly normal.”
“People who brutally kill people are often sociopaths,” Phoebe said bluntly. “They can look and sound like the rest of us, but they do awful things without feeling a trace of remorse.”
“Sociopaths?” Jen exclaimed. “Is that what you think they are?”