April opened her door a few seconds after I rang the bell. I introduced myself and Mark, who had come up the walk with me from the car to see for himself that she wasn't an ogre. Satisfied in that regard, he excused himself and left to take Sandra and Winston to the zoo.
April invited me in with a quick smile. She must be in her mid-twenties, with the kind of petite body that most women would kill for. She wore jeans and a T-shirt with an inscription proclaiming, “Southpaws do it left-handed.”
“Have a seat, Mrs. Morgan,” April said, pointing to a faded blue sofa. “I'm making some herb tea; would you like a cup?”
“Yes, thank you,” I said. I usually drink coffee but I figured herb tea wouldn't kill me. April disappeared into what I assumed was the kitchen while I looked around at older furniture, suitable for someone at least twice April's age. On a coffee table sat an issue of a surfing magazine; this led me to believe that she didn't live alone and that the other resident might be male.
I was surprised that a young woman like April could afford to live in a house so close to the ocean, however small. As one got closer to the water, real estate values rose on an ever-steepening curve, which became vertical at the beach. Which led me to wonder just who her roommate was.
If she supported the place herself she must have a good job. What did she do? A personal computer sat on what was probably the dinner table, with some fish swimming across the screen, but since everybody owned computers that didn't help.
April returned, carrying a tray with two cups filled with hot water and an assortment of tea bags. I glanced at her hands as she put down the tray; she wasn't wearing any rings. I picked a container labeled peppermint, extracted the tea bag and dunked it in my cup.
“The last time I saw Uncle Gerry was two years ago,” April said, offering me milk and sugar, which I declined. She continually brushed her red hair back from her freckled face. Was her complexion suited to suntan country? “After I finished college,” she continued, “I flew to the east coast for some job interviews and visited him at Silver Acres. He seemed to be quite happy there.”
“I believe he was,” I said. “I know this is a personal question, but were you surprised that you were included in his will?”
“I was zapped. I had never given it a thought. It was…very nice of him.”
“You are the only person in his will.”
“I believe my older brother and I are Uncle Gerry's only living relatives. He is ten years older than I am and lives in Boston.”
“Your parents…?”
“They're both dead. My mother died when I was young. My father died four years ago when I was in college. I inherited this house from them. Uncle Gerry's money will help me do some much-needed maintenance. And maybe bring the furniture up to date.” She waved her arm to encompass the room.
“What kind of work do you do?”
“I'm a computer programmer; actually, I'm called a software engineer, but it's the same thing.”
“I've read that those jobs pay very well.”
April smiled an infectious smile. “They do. Listen.” She bounced up from where she had been sitting on the edge of a chair. “I need to run some errands. Would you like to come with me? We can talk about Uncle Gerry on the way.”
Why not? I didn't bother to point out that I hadn't finished my tea yet. The one-car garage held that enigma, a sport utility vehicle. Why everybody liked them I didn't know since most of them were driven primarily to work and they got poor gas mileage. I was good, however, and didn't ask her whether she had actually used the four-wheel-drive or driven it off a paved road.
April drove briskly and I was glad I had my seatbelt fastened. When another car cut in front of her, forcing her to slam on her brakes, she swore at the driver and then apologized to me.
“You should thank him,” I said. “He's paying you a compliment.”
“Huh?”
“Look at it this way. When he made you take action to avoid him he put his life in your hands. So in effect he's saying that he trusts that you are a good driver.”
April laughed. “I'll remember that next time I feel like plowing into somebody.”
Between stops at the dry cleaners, the bank, the supermarket and assorted other places, we carried on a running conversation about Gerald. I told her all I knew about Gerald's life at Silver Acres.
April said, “I was 20 when Uncle Gerry moved to North Carolina. Before that, I had lived close to him all my life. My mother was his niece. Although I don't have much memory of her I suspect that he looked at her as the daughter he never had. When she died he transferred his affection to me. He was always doing things for me, buying me things. He even helped pay for my college education. I guess I shouldn't have been so surprised about his will.
“I wanted to go back for his memorial service, but the company I work for didn't consider him a close enough relative to give me time off and the airlines weren't too keen on giving me a bereavement fare, either.”
April parked and dashed into a store. She did everything at top speed, including talking. When she returned I asked, “Do you play bridge?”
“Yes. In fact Uncle Gerry taught me how to play.” She giggled. “I played a lot in college-when I should have been studying.”
I told her about the hand Gerald held when he died.
“Thirteen diamonds! Wow, that's fantastic. I never had a hand like that.”
“Neither have I.”
I was about to tell her that the hand had been a fraud and lead in to the possibility that Gerald had been murdered-she seemed to have a level head on her shoulders and I thought she could take it-when she said, “You know, Uncle Gerry was dealt a hand like that once before.”
I was immediately all ears. “Thirteen diamonds?”
“Yes. It was a long time ago, before I was born. But he used to talk about it all the time. And the strange thing was, he considered it to be bad luck, not good luck.”
“Why was that?”
“Because the man who was his partner when he got the hand was killed in an auto accident two days later.”
“Did he ever tell you the name of the man who was killed?”
“If he ever mentioned it, I have forgotten it.”
“How about any of the other people he was playing with that night.”
April shook her head as she drove through a light that had turned pink.
I told her about my theory concerning Gerald's death, hoping that it wouldn't make her driving any more exciting than it already was. The news naturally upset her and she asked questions. This led to a discussion of the shellfish and I asked if she knew about his allergy.
“It doesn't ring a bell. I guess it wasn't something he talked about every day.”
“Have you heard of a professor named Maxwell Harrington?”
“No.”
I decided not to tell April about the possibility that Gerald had appropriated Dr. Harrington's work as his own. Instead, I asked, “Do you know of anybody-associates, friends, acquaintances-who had a reason to dislike him?”
She thought about this for a while but couldn't come up with any names.
Before we returned to her house she drove me to the beach where we took a stroll near the pier. A hotel there featured bungalows on the pier, sitting directly above the water. Various types of people walked, ran or biked on the path by the beach, including a man with a dark tan wearing a long, flowing Indian headdress and little else, especially in back.
April laughed when I did a double-take at his retreating backside and said, “So you still look at buns.”
“I’m not dead yet.”
We returned to her house; I helped her carry in groceries and told her that I was expecting a call from Sandra at noon to confirm when the touring trio should pick me up. April asked where they were and I told her.