Embroidered Truths (13 page)

Betsy smiled. “He didn’t swish here, either. Not all gay men do, you know.”

“Unlike his boyfriend.”

Her smile broadened. “Oh, yes, Godwin swishes. He prances, even.”

He burst out, “God, how can you stand someone like that working for you?”

“Mr. Nye, you would not believe what an asset Godwin is to my shop. Or how valuable he has proven himself to me, over and over.”

“Oh. Then I beg your pardon. Obviously, I have stepped wrong here.”

“Yes, you have. But never mind. Have you stayed in touch with your brother between his visits home?”

“Yes, mostly by e-mail, but phone calls once a month or so as well.”

“Has he seemed different lately? Worried about something?”

“No.”

“When did you see him last?”

“At Christmas. He spent an hour at my house, with just the two of us talking. My wife, God bless her, took the kids to Grandma’s to give us time alone. And for the first time I said something about his lifestyle. I’d heard some of them make a kind of match and settle down, so I asked him if he was going to play the field all his life. He said no, that he was amazed that he’d found someone he never grew tired of.”

Betsy marked that comment for easy retrieval. What a comfort it would be to Godwin!

Charlie continued, “But he did, in the end, didn’t he? They quarreled and separated.”

“Yes, but there’s been a pattern of that for about as long as I’ve known them. They’d have a big fight, and John would throw Goddy out, and then a few days or a week later, John would call, and they’d get back together again. I am quite sure this was just another round in that fight. Goddy was too, and that’s why he’s so devastated by this. They didn’t get that chance to make up before this happened.”

“What would they fight about?” Charlie put that delicately, not sure he wanted to know.

“Different things. John was jealous and Goddy loved to flirt, for example. I don’t know what it was about this time—Goddy insists he doesn’t know, either. I suspect something happened while they were down in Mexico. Goddy won a trip to Mexico City and so he got to play host for a change. That may have felt threatening to John.” She looked inquiringly at Charlie.

He frowned and shook his head. “I haven’t a clue. He didn’t talk about that side of his life except in generalities; he knew it made me uncomfortable. I got an e-mail a couple of weeks ago, he said he was going to Mexico City for a week. He sent gifts from down there to each of my kids. He said that museum, what’s it called, the Museum of Anthropology? He said it was a wonderful thing to see. My oldest, Annie, wants to be an archaeologist, and he sent her a book on the exhibits
in Spanish,
telling her to let him know when she could read it, and he’d pay her way down there to take some classes at the museum. She went right out and signed up for a summer immersion course.” He made a sad face. “I never told him that.”

“How old is Annie?”

“She’ll be sixteen in November. I’ve got a boy, fourteen, and another girl who’ll be eleven in two weeks.”

“Nice family.”

“They’re good kids. And Marti is great with them.” He shook his head. “Such a waste.”

“What is?”

“Johnny. He could have had all that, too, if he really tried.”

Twelve

THE next morning, after a water aerobics session during which even Renee’s hearty instruction could not make her move briskly, and a breakfast left half-eaten, Betsy started down to the shop with a heavy heart. Of course she wanted to keep the place open; this was her one point of sanity in a world gone crazy. But she couldn’t ask Messrs. Whistler and Lebowski to drop by so she could interview them. One would probably be better than the other for Goddy, but how was she to choose without talking to them? Would they both want a retainer before they went to see Goddy, so he could choose? Say, wouldn’t it be great if sending them both set off a bidding war?

If she did set off a bidding war, it had better be a short one. Goddy couldn’t stay hysterical forever. Once he calmed down, Mike could begin the interrogation. Goddy surely had the intelligence to invoke his right to an attorney—didn’t he? Of course he would. It would be prudent for him to have a good one, not some underpaid, overworked fellow still blowing on the ink on his law degree to dry it.

For Goddy’s sake, it would be the best Betsy could buy.

Thirty-six hours was the most they could hold him incommunicado, the man at the jail had said. That had been confirmed through
Google.com
, which seemed to open doors to all information, including the Minnesota criminal law code. Godwin had to be arraigned in court within thirty-six hours or let go.

Which was interesting and helpful, except it didn’t answer the most basic question: What had Mike Malloy found out that made him arrest Goddy in the first place? That was what she couldn’t figure out. What clue, what form of evidence had he uncovered?

Or thought he’d uncovered. Goddy was innocent. Wasn’t there some kind of “discovery” attorneys for the defense got to do, where they had access to the evidence? When did that happen, at the arraignment? Maybe the attorney she hired would share that information with her.

That thought turned the urgency to go talk to them into a screaming gargoyle that rode her head down the stairs.

At the bottom, she turned toward the obscure door to the hallway that led to the back door into her shop. Other worrying thoughts whispered into her ear.

How had Mike broken Goddy’s alibi? Goddy had told Betsy he hadn’t talked to anyone or seen anyone he knew on his late-night drive around Lake Minnetonka. So how had Mike found out he wasn’t at her house in bed?

Mike was angry at Betsy for lying about that to Lars, which was totally unfair. She hadn’t lied, or not exactly. Godwin
was
staying with her, just as she’d said. And he
had
slept in the apartment that night. She’d just let those two statements imply that he’d been there around the time John was being murdered.

Even though he hadn’t.

So, okay, maybe she’d taken a few steps down the road to perdition by planting that idea in poor Lars’s head. But who on earth could seriously think Godwin could murder
anyone,
much less the man he loved?

Besides Mike Malloy.

And Charlie Nye.

Hmmmmmmm.

Sophie trotted ahead of Betsy to the back door of Crewel World. Betsy unlocked and opened that, and Sophie bustled in, eyes and ears on the alert for a customer who might have something edible.

You’d think, Betsy thought, Sophie would know that customers couldn’t get in until she unlocked the front door, too. But hope springs eternal in the greedy heart, and Sophie peered around every corner until, satisfied no treats were in the offing, she jumped up onto “her” chair, the wooden one with the powder-blue cushion, to wait.

Betsy went to the checkout desk, picked up the phone and dialed the police department’s number. She asked, when the phone was answered, “May I speak with Mike Malloy, please?”

“He’s not here right now. Do you want his voicemail?”

Betsy hesitated. “No, never mind, I’ll try again later.”

Betsy went through her opening-up routine, putting cash into the register, turning on lights and the little radio tuned to a classical music station, starting the coffee urn perking and plugging in the tea kettle, then walking to the front door at two minutes to ten, head swiveling from side to side to assure herself all was neat and ready.

She was surprised to find four customers waiting at the door. Not just customers, four members of the Monday Bunch. Bershada Reynolds, Alice Skoglund, Martha Winters, and Doris Valentine stood in a little cluster, smiling at her surprise.

“Well, good morning, good morning!” said Betsy on unlocking and opening the door. “What brings you all out so early?”

“We’re here to take over the store till Shelly arrives, so you can go off and do your thing,” announced Bershada.

“What? What thing?”

“Your sleuthing thing, of course. So go on, get out of here!”

“Oh, I can’t let you do that!” said Betsy.

“And why not?” demanded Alice. “I’m sure that the four of us together know where every item in Crewel World is.”

“And could answer any question about stitches, fabrics, flosses, or designers,” said Doris.

“And I know how to operate a cash register,” added Martha, who until recently operated a dry cleaning establishment.

“Plus, we work for free,” concluded Doris, producing an empty goldfish bowl.

“What’s that for?” asked Betsy.

“We’re starting a defense fund for Goddy, of course,” said Doris, surprised that Betsy had to ask. She walked to the checkout desk, put the bowl on it, and pulled a ten dollar bill from her skirt pocket. “There, let me be the first.”

The other three hurried over to put money into the bowl. “You’d better open a special bank account while you’re out today,” said Alice. “We’re going to fill this up at least twice before the day is over.”

“Oh, ladies . . . this is . . . too, too wonderful,” said Betsy, her eyes filling. “But really, I should be here, you don’t have to do this.”

“Oh, p’shaw!” said Doris. “We can’t just sit around wringing our hands; we want to
do
something! We can’t sleuth, but we can run the shop while you do. Have you found a lawyer yet?”

“I’ve talked to two of them, actually, just on the phone, and I can’t decide which one to use.”

“So go see them both in person,” said Alice. “Then you’ll know.”

“We promise to make correct change and not set the place on fire,” said Doris. “You just be back in time to close up at six.”

Betsy blinked away her tears and yielded. “Well, thank you, I do want to go out. But all of you need to work only this morning,” Betsy said. “I’ve got a part-timer coming in at noon, so maybe two of you can leave then.” Betsy didn’t mind working by herself in the shop, but preferred two part-time clerks there when she was gone. Two volunteers should equal one trained clerk.

“Okay,” said Martha. “Who’s coming in?”

“Rennie Jones.”

The women nodded; they knew her.

“Now, if all of you have had enough by noon, I’ve got my list of part-timers in the desk. You can start calling and find someone else to help Rennie.”

“Don’t worry about a thing, we’re fine, we’ll be fine,” said Martha briskly. “Now go along.”

“All right.”

Betsy went back upstairs to call the two attorneys and found Mr. Lebowski was in court this morning, but could see her right after lunch. Mr. Whistler could see her right now, briefly, if she could come at once to his office in Wayzata.

Wayzata is a town on the north side of Lake Minnetonka, almost directly across from Excelsior, half an hour by slow boat. It takes a little longer to drive to it, because Lake Minnetonka is a big lake with a complex shoreline.

Betsy drove through a long string of little towns, big towns, hamlets, and collections of beautiful houses that lined the shore. Forty minutes later, she came into Wayzata.

The city was built on a series of terraces rising from the lake. The lowest level was very beautiful, with upscale shops and restaurants that rather reminded Betsy of the nicer suburbs of San Diego. Wayzata didn’t go in for the shaggy, country-town look Excelsior had, with its main street perpendicular to the lake. Wayzata went for the luxury-vacation look of white buildings facing the water.

Mr. Whistler’s office was on the second tier, top floor, in a nice old three-story office building. He and his two partners were served by a receptionist of striking good looks. Two other secretaries were making their computer keyboards rattle nearby.

The receptionist took Betsy into a good-sized office where a large mahogany desk sat on the far edge of a beautiful Persian rug. Bookcases full of law books lined one wall. On the opposite there was a large Victorian oil painting of a great stag held at bay by a pack of angry dogs—symbolic of a sympathetic understanding of how clients felt, no doubt. A big picture window beside the painting looked over the roofs of the buildings on the first tier into the blue lake. Already a pretty scene, it must be a wonderful, soothing picture in the summer, when the trees filled in and sailboats dotted the lake.

Behind the desk a slender black man was writing something in a notebook. He looked up at Betsy, closed the notebook, and a very charming smile appeared. He stood. He was wearing an expensive pinstripe suit of somewhat extravagant design and a yellow tie with diagonal black stripes the same width as those on the suit.

“Ms. Devonshire?” he said, offering his hand.

“Yes.” She shook it briefly.

“Won’t you sit down?”

There were two grass-green wing chairs in front of the desk. Betsy took one. “Thank you,” she said.

“I have taken the liberty of informing the arresting officer that counsel is pending in the case of Mr. DuLac, and that Mr. DuLac is to be so informed.”

“Thank you,” said Betsy, wondering what the jailers thought about getting two calls with that message. “I’m afraid I don’t know what questions to ask. I assume you are competent, or Mr. Pemberthy would not have recommended you. But what can you do outside of the courtroom? I mean, I want to be sure that Godwin is treated fairly, with respect. He is a . . . vulnerable person.”

“Do you mean that he is retarded?”

“Oh, no! He’s just . . . gay. Not big and strong, or ma-cho. I saw him not long ago trying to act straight, and it wouldn’t have fooled anyone for more than a minute. I’ve heard they are more careful with people like that than they used to be, but I’m still concerned.”

“Hennepin County would never put your friend into a cell or quad where he’d be in any danger.”

“Good, I’m glad to hear you say that. I guess when two lawyers say it, it must be true.” Betsy blushed; she could feel the heat climb up her cheeks. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. I just meant that perhaps the first person to tell me that was just trying to comfort me.”